Abstracts
Abstracts
Special Interview with Doctor Ibrahim al-Jafari
Part 2
Doctor Ibrahim Abd al-Karim al-Eshaiker al-Jafari was born in Karbala in 1947 and joined the Dawa Islamic Party when he was less than twenty years old. He was educated at Mosul University as a medical doctor.
He moved to Syria in 1980 and started working as a member of the leading council of the party in the political office and got elected as the official spokesperson of the party in 1996.
He then moved to Iran and took part in founding the Islamic Revolution Council of Iraq and represented Dawa Party in this council and was chairman of the administration office of the supreme council.
He moved to London in 1990 and participated in forming and leading the committee of common measures of Iraqi opposition in 1991; he had an active role in Iraqi political conferences such as Beirut Conference and in forming and leading the Iraqi National Congress in 1992. In 2002, he called for an alliance of the Iraqi national forces which attracted 17 Iraqi political forces and 33 political figures.
He returned to Iraq after Saddam fell and was elected as the first interim president of the Iraqi Governing Council. He also served as the vice president in 2004, the Prime Minister in 2005 and the Foreign Minister in 2014.
He was elected as the Member of the Parliament in both 2006-2010 and 2010-2014 elections.
In 2005, he founded the political party of National Reform Trend and headed the Iraqi National Alliance.
Dr. Jafari is also a knowledgeable scholar with profound studies, papers and theories about the political and international issues.
He considers the human being the linchpin of politics and says that 'as long as the Islamic countries enjoy a diversity of resources such as water, oil, agricultural resources, strategic advantages and also intellectual and spiritual treasures, they would be vulnerable to the enemies' conspiracies and wouldn't experience total peace. What they have to do is to create a powerful defense force in order to protect their assets and security.'
Jafari maintains that we are living in the age of victory of the 'right' and the new wave of awakening and awareness among the nations wouldn't ebb away; it would go on until justice dominates the world.
He attributes all the civil unrest in Iraq to the American and Zionist's schemes and says that it's unfortunate that Shia Islamic movements in Iraq are ignorant of what happens in this country and are preoccupied with trivial differences and conflicts.
Dr. Jafari believes that Imam Khamenei has a pivotal role in unifying the Muslims and states that, 'we can clearly understand his concerns regarding the unification of the Muslims in both his speeches and in the seminars of the Islamic unification in which all the Islamic scholars participate.'
In his view, this seminars and conferences in which the notable figures of all different Islamic sects take part can adequately indicate the unification approach and the necessity to go beyond religious differences; they have been able to exponentially spread all the elements of Islamic unification in the Islamic countries.
The Tehran Foreign Policy Studies Quarterly has had a special interview with him which due to the covid-19 pandemic was done in the form of written correspondence.
Transatlantic Relations and 2020 United States Presidential Elections
Mehdi Ghanbari
(An expert in Europe's foreign policy)
Abstract
Currently, in order to understand Europe's attitude towards the 2020 United States Presidential Elections, we should, as a matter of course, gain a complete and accurate knowledge of the transatlantic relations, principally the approaches of the Germany and France (in the absence of the United Kingdom) as the driving forces of the European Union for arranging the relationships. Unlike France, Germany lacks the historical experience of non-cooperation with the NATO and therefore, we can see the difference of outlook in German officials' opinions about the quality of the transatlantic relations and also their hesitation and desperation in the decisions they make regarding their relations with the US.
Emmanuel Macron is now dealing with some domestic problems and therefore prefers to maintain the current state of cooperation with the NATO despite the commercial disagreements with the US and not create another conflict in his foreign policies; he would rather advance the two ideas of "the army and the European security council" and the continuity of "Russian-French Security Cooperation Council". Germany has also explicitly expressed the it will present the plan of "the framework of the European security council" in the second half of 2021 with the presence of the United Kingdom. In the years to come, Germany would worry more about the NATO's internal conflicts but would eventually be closer to France that before. It seems that Europe's security interactions with the US in a mid-term time span would be a combination of these two factors: first, the quality of German-French cooperation, and the European Union's new team's approach.
Key words: Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the European Union, transatlantic relations, Trump, Biden.
Arab States of the Persian Gulf and United States Presidential Elections
Hossein Ajorloo
(Visiting assistant professor at Allameh Tabatabaee University and head of the West Asia and North Africa group in the International Studies Research Institute of Abrar Moaser Tehran – hoajorloo@yahoo.com )
The present article seeks to investigate and analyze the place of the 2020 United States Presidential Elections in the foreign policy of the Arab States of the Persian Gulf and also each of these states' approach to the presidential candidates, i.e. the republican Donald Trump and the democratic candidate, Joe Biden. Since what comes out of the elections impacts America's foreign policy, especially regarding the Persian Gulf region and West Asia, the results of this election, like all the previous ones, have always been of special importance to the southern states of the Persian Gulf. Due to the internal US considerations and also these countries good relations with both American parties, the Persian Gulf states can't openly exert their position and support one of the candidates, but they try to unofficially support one more and help him win the elections based on their political, security, military and economic plans and the candidate's plans, background and approaches towards each country's domestic changes and regional equations. Apparently, Donald Trump's approach –which is increasing the pressures to deter the Islamic Republic of Iran and also supporting the current rulers' domestic and foreign approaches– is more to the likings of the majority of the Southern Persian Gulf countries. However, Joe Biden's softer approach has also attracted some supporters among some leaders and powerful elements in these countries.
Key words: US Presidential Elections, the US foreign policy, the southern states of the Persian Gulf region, deterrence of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The Expert Panel: Biden's Foreign Policy; Continuity or Change?
Rezadad Darvish (Ph.D.)
(Editor of International Affairs)
The countries' strategic behaviors in the international arenas is formed based on the components of the national power, limitations, challenges, capacities and the mental conception of the decision-makers of all these components and their willpower to utilize them. The foreign policy patterns and trends of the countries, especially the great powers, are always continued by the changing of the governments on a platform of "stability" and "change". The governments' strategic behavioral pattern are defined and executed in a process of combining the foreign policy components and instruments.
American behavioral pattern during the last decades indicates that the structure formed by the possibilities, limitations, and capacities created by integrating the components of power, instruments and the agents' conceptions has continued to exist amongst both stability and change. George W. Bush was after creating an empire, Obama was after hegemony, Trump was an exceptionalist and Biden dreams of the revival of America's leadership in the world. After Trump came to power, the rather continual trend with changes according to the circumstances and time requirements turned into the dominance of the change paradigm over continuity. Yet, it can't be interpreted as a strategic shift in the US foreign policy.
Now that Biden is about to embark on the tasks of the forty-sixth American president in the White House after a controversial election and the tainted legitimacy of the government, many scholars and analysts of the American foreign policy issues both inside and outside the US are trying to decode Biden's foreign policy for the United States.
The main question is this: "What principles and axes will the American foreign policy be based on?" In order to find out the answers to the main questions, a series of secondary questions will be answered during the expert panel of "Biden's Foreign Policy; Continuity or Change?"
The Tehran Foreign Policy Studies Quarterly is holding this expert panel with a number of senior experts and researchers in the field of American foreign policy to examine and strategically decode Biden's foreign policy model based on the views, stances and statements of both him and his advisors.
The experts taking part in the panel are as follows: Mahmood Yazdanfam (Ph.D.), American strategic policies expert, Behzad Ahmadi (Ph.D.), senior researcher of European affairs, Isa Kameli (Ph.D), senior expert in American issues and Rezadad Darvish (Ph.D.) editor of the international affairs in the Tehran Foreign Policy Studies Quarterly.
The Factors Influential in Jordan's Foreign Policy against Palestine
Seyyed Esmaeel Yasini
(MA degree in Diplomacy and International Organizations from the School of International Relations of Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
Abstract
As a result of its geographical location, Jordan is one of the regional players in the Middles East which has seriously been involved in Palestinian conflicts and the peace process from the beginning. Consequently, the Palestinian crisis is of great significance in Jordan's foreign policy and has consumed a major part of political, economic and security capacities of this country during the last seventy years. Since Jordan has always had more or less the same attitude towards a solution to this crisis as the Western super-powers, there have always been multiple opportunities for this country to play a role in this regard.
The most important factors affecting Jordan's foreign policy regarding Palestine include the geopolitical position, security concerns and the king. Due to its geopolitical position, Jordan has always had to interact with the Palestinian deal, and Palestine has inevitably turned into Jordan's first political, regional and international priority. Security concerns about Palestinian crisis and Israel's occupation of this country have also affected Jordan's foreign policy. Given the construction of Jordan's political system and focus of power in monarchy and the king himself, the third important factor can be the king and his approaches. Interacting with Palestinian issue and its consequences is not so much a choice as a necessity and therefore Jordan has always strived to serve its national interests by decreasing the threats and increasing the opportunities.
America's Proxy War in Yemen
Dr. Rezadad Darvish
(University professor and American affairs researcher)
Supported by the United States of America, on 26 March 2015 Saudi Arabia invaded Yemen. Saudi Arabia led a coalition of nine countries from West Asia and North Africa including the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Sudan, Egypt and Jordan and enjoyed a thorough weaponry, intelligence, and political support of the US and its western allies to continue the war in Yemen to this day. Western societies and the Saudi coalition have referred to this war as the proxy war between the Saudi Arabia and Iran. Given the reasons of the war, its unmentioned goals and the implications during the last five years, we can truly define it inside the frameworks of US proxy wars. The so-called Saudi-Emirates coalition with delusional ambitions is both providing the human and financial resources for this war to cruelly kill civilians and turn Yemen into a burnt land, and having an important role in improving American economy. This article is examining these issues based on the American policies in the region by gathering data.
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