Qatar leading the Islamist train • Commentary

introduction

In the last few months, the "concepts" that led Israel to October 7, 2023 came up for discussion. There was talk of the "deterred Hamas" concept, the concept of buying peace with money, the concept of the intelligence, and more and more of everything.

What for some reason comes up less for discussion, is perhaps one of the most serious strategic failures that Israel has suffered. It is about the inability to understand the role of one of the most significant factors in our region. There is a lot of talk, and rightfully so, about Iran as the head of the snake responsible for controlling chaos in our region and the entire world. Every person on the street knows how to point to Iran's destructive role.

But there is another such snake head in our region, no less dangerous, and even more sophisticated than Iran. The head of this snake is Qatar. Israel falls into every trap that this head of the serpent sets for her. She plays the game according to his rules and interests, and causes enormous damage to herself and the region. In the following lines we will try to understand who this head of the snake is, how it works, and how much more sophisticated it is than us.

Note

I am not an expert orientalist. I gathered the insights after going over materials on the web and media channels. I learned a great deal from the words of Dr. Ronit Marzan, a renowned Orientalist from the University of Haifa, who specializes in knowing Hamas, and I recommend everyone who is interested in the subject to listen carefully to her words.

Several facts

Qatar is a small country and emirate that sits on a small peninsula that juts into the Persian Gulf in the northeast of the Arabian Peninsula. The area of ​​Qatar is 11,586 square kilometers (about half the area of ​​Israel), and in the south it borders Saudi Arabia.

Qatar has about 3 million inhabitants, of which about 350,000 are citizens, and the rest are migrant workers

The Al Thani family has ruled the emirate since its foundation in the 19th century. In the 20th century, Qatar was a protectorate of the British Empire, and in 1971 it gained full independence. The regime in the Emirate of Qatar is an absolute monarchy, and its head is Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.

The gross domestic product per capita in Qatar ranks eighth in the world - $87,000 (for comparison, Israel with $53,000 ranks 24th in the world). Qatar's economy is based mainly on the production of oil and natural gas, and it has the third largest gas reserve in the world. All of this is to say that Qatar is an extraordinarily wealthy country, which gives it enormous influence beyond its tiny size.

Qatar (AI version)

Go to one of the AI ​​websites and ask for the following task there:Write an essay on Qatar's role in the world today". I did so and the results are before you.

At Bard I received a beautiful article whose closing paragraph is:

Claude knew how to tell:

And ChatGPT even enlarged and wrote:

Qatar's role in the world

AI tools know how to reflect the prevailing melody in the world. It is interesting that Israel, armed with the best strategic and intelligence minds, behaves as if it is ChatGPT. But, as we will immediately see, in order to understand Qatar's role in the world, human and not artificial intelligence is required.

Qatar (reality version)

Despite Qatar's quasi-Western appearance, it is an extreme Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. The Qatari media deals with the demonization of the Jews, with blatant anti-Semitic cartoons, conspiracy theories of Jewish world domination, blood plots, the connection of Zionism to Nazism, and the dehumanization of Israel and Jews.

Qatar is not just another Muslim country. It is a country with a particularly extreme agenda, whose goal is to turn the entire Arab space (and later beyond it) into one dominated by extreme Islam along the lines of the "Muslim Brotherhood".

In order to achieve this goal, Qatar has been running a particularly sophisticated policy for many years, which has already brought it tremendous success. Along the way, Qatar wears the mask of a moderate country that maintains ties everywhere, and even serves as a mediator in international conflicts.

Below is a partial list of the Qatari activities and achievements.

Taking over the campuses in the West

For many years, Qatar has been investing large sums of money in academic institutions in the Western world, in order to turn the younger generation against Western values. The result: Moral and academic bankruptcy, as has erupted on US campuses since October 7th.

Taking over the showcases of world sports

Qatar is involved in the purchase of sports clubs and stadiums in Europe. Not long ago she hosted the World Cup (after bribing FIFA officials).

The football team "Paris St. Germain" is also owned by a Qatari.
The result: Great public relations and creating a positive image.

Media

Qatar established the media channel "Al Jazeera" - a mouthpiece of the state that spreads propaganda in the Arab world and the Western world.

The result: A huge echo of Islamist propaganda in the guise of a legitimate news channel.

Challenging regimes in the Arab world

Qatar was deeply involved in the events of the "Arab Spring" from 2010, in an attempt to replace the Arab regimes with radical Islamic regimes, and its Al Jazeera channel worked to increase the flames.

The result: The overthrow of the regime and riots in many Arab countries.

Positioning Qatar as an international intermediary

Qatar supports Iran and terrorist organizations, while at the same time winking at the West and openly hosting Western military bases and prestigious sports tournaments.

The result: Qatar has positioned itself as a mediator between the Western world and all the crazies of the Arab world.

Qatar mediated between the US and the Taliban, and is largely responsible for the return of the Taliban to Afghanistan after the departure of the Americans. Qatar also managed to position itself as a mediator between Israel and Hamas, and as an ATM for Hamas (with massive Israeli encouragement).

Qatar and Hamas

I base the following lines on the analysis of Dr. Marzan, who specializes in Hamas. The analysis is well-founded and logical, but will surprise a large number of readers. The relationship between Qatar and Hamas is much more complex than meets the eye. There is a game here between three parties: Qatar, Hamas-outside and Hamas-Gaza.

Hamas-External (Haniya and Sha'al) and Hamas-Gaza (Sinwar) are bitter rivals. Hamas-External sees Sinwar as an obstacle that must be replaced, because he is too independent and not radical enough (?!). Hamas members tried several times to oust Sinwar. They almost succeeded, and were going to try and do it again.

Hamas's agenda also includes terrorist activity in the world. Qatar, which hosts on its soil the leaders of Hamas, has always stood by their side in this struggle.

According to Dr. Marzan, the funds that Qatar transferred to Hamas-Gaza (courtesy of Israel), ostensibly for supporting civilian infrastructures (and indirectly also terrorist infrastructures), were mainly intended for two hidden and more important purposes:

1. Painting Sinwar as a collaborator of Israel, who buys good behavior from him with money (to pave the way for his replacement by Hamas-External)
2. Sticking a finger in Egypt's eye, and driving a wedge between Israel and Israel.

The Egyptian connection

The Egyptian context requires explanation. Egypt and Qatar are enemies competing for a leading place in the Arab world. Egypt does not forget Qatar's support for the Egyptian uprising in 2011 and its part in the riots that brought Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood to power (until they were overthrown by Sisi).

In June 2017, a major crisis occurred between the United States and moderate Arab countries over Qatar's support for terrorism. The United States declared Qatar a state that supports terrorism, and Arab countries led by Egypt and Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic ties with it and imposed a political and economic embargo on it that lasted several years.

The Egyptians, by virtue of their geographical proximity to the Strip, have a great influence on Hamas-Gaza. The Egyptians don't have the resources or the will to give money to Hamas, but it has powerful levers of pressure on the Strip, and Sinwar has always tended to respect them.

The involvement of Qatar (by Israel) in the enormous economic aid to Hamas, harmed Egyptian interests and Egyptian honor. For reasons reserved to him, Netanyahu has been behaving contemptuously and disparagingly towards Egyptians for years, preferring Qatar over them at every opportunity. The result is that Egypt had a stomach full of Israel and its prime minister from the beginning.

After October 7, the situation worsened, when Israel rushed to bring in Qatar as a mediator in the issue of the abductees. The head of the MLA, Tzachi Hanegbi, complimented the Qataris and thanked them for their blessed activity.

In doing so, Israel exacerbated the damage to Egyptian interests and honor, and magnified the power of Hamas abroad, which resides in Qatar. This is nothing less than a strategic failure.

It is certainly possible that the Egyptians, with their actual levers of pressure on the Strip and Sinwar, could have achieved better results, but Israel completely abandoned this course. It is not surprising that after all this, the willingness of Egyptians to come towards Israel's interests is somewhat reserved.

Why is this happening?

Qatar represents the "Muslim Brotherhood" and "Hamas-External", as opposed to Egypt, which fears the "Muslim Brotherhood" like an epidemic, and whose interest is to control "Hamas-Gaza". 

Those who look carefully will find the fingerprints of Qatar next to those of Iran also in the scandalous genocide lawsuit filed by South Africa against Israel. If this is the case, how is it possible that Israel has been working for years to promote the interests of Qatar (and the radical Hamas), and is harming Egyptian interests?

There are, in my opinion, three possible answers:

1. The entire analysis above is wrong, and our leadership is convinced that Qatar is actually a follower of the nations of the world, or at least a channel that can be exploited.
2. Someone in the leadership of the State of Israel is acting from foreign considerations. This is a completely conspiratorial possibility.
3. This is a serious strategic failure of the State of Israel and its leader, related to the concept of buying peace with money, and it doesn't matter where the money comes from.

The first option does not make sense to me, and in any case, the party being exploited here is, in the end, precisely Israel. I don't even dare to imagine the second possibility. We are left with (another) serious strategic failure by whoever has been leading the State of Israel in recent years.