Open War... The Negotiations, Where to?
For the first time, China is throwing its full international political weight behind Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt, in order to set the stage for American-Iranian negotiations capable of producing a workable solution on the basis of a ceasefire — not an end to the war, as Iran had demanded. The effort appears to have succeeded, with Islamabad beginning yesterday to host both delegations in the same hotel.
This shift in the mediation initiative reflects Beijing's capacity to exert direct influence over Iranian decision-making, and at the same time reveals the convergence of its strategic position with that of the four countries around a shared objective: ending the war without toppling the regime in Tehran and without allowing violence to spiral toward extremities that no actor would be able to control.
Without the Chinese counterweight, however, the four countries would be unable to secure Iran's presence at the negotiating table or to provide the guarantees necessary for its success. This observation points in turn to the nature of the balances prevailing in the Middle East among the regional powers — Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey — balances that are neither decisive nor sufficiently structured to generate a Middle Eastern solution independent of Washington first, and then of China, Russia and the European Union. This is precisely what might be described as “geopolitical fluidity”: a configuration that allows the field to produce new facts bearing on the regional and international equation as a whole, and that also permits an adjustment of the priorities that Washington, as the dominant pole, intends to assert, Washington, which has projected its military power from the Far East into the region in order to preserve a status it is not prepared to relinquish, even at the cost of an open-ended war.
The Tail Wagging the Dog
In an interview with CNN on 3 April, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal described the conflict as “Netanyahu’s war,” designed, in his view, to divert attention from the Israeli Prime Minister’s domestic conduct in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, before invoking the image of the tail wagging the dog to suggest that it is Netanyahu who has dragged the American president into this battle, and not the reverse. The metaphor is harsh, and it points to a deep dysfunction within the American political establishment, for such a situation runs counter to the logic one would expect of a state like the United States when it wages war in the Middle East, that heart of the old world now said to be new.
After the remarks of the seasoned Saudi prince, long versed in security and political affairs, Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s statement to the New York Times on 8 April described Netanyahu as “a skilled salesman, adept at evasion,” who had “deceived the administration once again” by dangling the prospect of regime change in Tehran rather than a strategy of containment.
At the same time, the Israeli press revealed that the State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon’s senior commanders had not endorsed Netanyahu’s assessments or the Mossad’s reports, which led to the well-known resignations and dismissals, and further heightened the political confusion increasingly visible in presidential statements.
It was thus that the White House’s definitive policy ended up entrusting the conduct of the negotiations in Karachi to Vice President J.D. Vance, the very man known for his principled opposition to the war.
One can therefore readily understand that Prince Turki al-Faisal should have sounded this political alarm, seeking to draw attention to the gravity of what was unfolding in Washington and to the singular role Netanyahu had arrogated to himself. He was also sending a firm signal regarding the steadfastness of the Kingdom’s official orientations, which had not in the least abandoned its strategy of producing a solution grounded in a balance of interests, in response to Netanyahu’s hegemonic ambitions over the region.
Now that Netanyahu has been sidelined by Trump, it is worth tracing this shift in priorities at the top of the American hierarchy back, first and foremost, to the personality of President Trump, then to the distribution of powers within the American political system, and finally to the balance of forces driving this state through its vast political, military and security institutions — which makes political decision-making the complex product of internal balances at every level. It is in this way that the question of negotiations was settled by a return to the policy of containing the Iranian regime.
The Insolence of an Ambassador
It was from Kuwait City that the Iranian ambassador there, Mohammad Toutounji, made himself known to the wider public through his statement to AFP on 7 April, calling for every possible effort “to avert the catastrophe,” on the grounds that Tehran would respond to external threats with measures affecting “the security and stability of the Gulf states.” This rhetoric echoes the insolence of the same ambassador who, in Beirut, had never been accredited and had nonetheless refused to leave the country, despite the formal decision of the Lebanese authorities.
This is a well-established practice in Iran’s militia diplomacy, consisting in covering the supreme leadership’s retreat from its initial maximum positions while maintaining a dual language — one directed at the American administration, another at the Iranian people and the peoples of the region. The documents submitted to the White House revealed an unofficial face kept carefully out of sight.
Had Tehran truly held firm and refused to meet the essential demands set out in the American document, the United States Vice President would not have traveled to meet the speaker of the Iranian parliament, especially given that the war has exhausted the regime’s overall capacities, leaving it with only a portion of its missile and drone stockpile, along with a few million loyalists capable of fighting the Iranian people whenever they take to the streets in protest.
Black Wednesday
The mediators’ success dealt a stinging blow to Netanyahu, now sidelined by Trump, who decided in accordance with American interests first and foremost, without even consulting his Israeli interlocutor this time, merely informing him after the fact. It is this precise moment that I believe pushed the Israeli leadership to unleash its fury on the city of Beirut, venting its political frustration in a criminal day partaking of the “war of extermination in Gaza.” Without the Lebanese state’s position, the Israeli leadership at its three levels — political, military and security — would have sought to shift the war from its previous mode to the Gaza model of extermination.
This is why the fate of the negotiations in Pakistan, whether they succeed or fail, matters less for Lebanon than the success of its endeavor to separate its existential cause from the “arenas” dossier, as Tehran invariably prefers to frame it.
What is at stake now is the battle of direct negotiations with Israel for Lebanon’s salvation and deliverance, through a comprehensive vision of what the Lebanese state must be and of how to end this war on the basis of a victory for sovereignty and a guarantee of security for the people and a dignified life.
When that day comes, we will be able to say that the inaugural address and the ministerial statement served as the midwife that brought the new Republic into the world, as its people wish it to be and are prepared to accept it.