A-Infos (en) Italy, UCADI #211 - INTERNATIONAL OBSERVATORY - Middle East: Muhammad's Covenant (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

As we hypothesized in the last issue of the newsletter, the "Mohammed 
Alliance" is structured as follows: Turkish President Erdogan, Pakistani 
Prime Minister Sharif, and Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Bin Salman signed 
a mutual defense treaty, called the Mecca Accord, in Riyadh, Saudi 
Arabia. Although the treaty states that an attack against one will be 
considered an attack against all, it is not an automatic common defense 
mechanism similar to NATO's Article 5. The deterrent function of the 
agreement is intended to replace US protection in the area, transferring 
responsibility to individual countries. The alliance does not have an 
anti-Iranian function, but it certainly rebalances the balance of power 
in the strategic Persian Gulf region. China appears to be heavily 
involved in the agreement, which, through its privileged relations with 
Pakistan and the promise of investment, particularly in infrastructure 
in Saudi Arabia, has acted as a guarantor. Egypt has not yet joined the 
alliance, deemed by Saudi Arabia to be unreliable and too closely tied 
to US policies and military supplies, as well as to economic aid, and 
therefore unable to fully adhere to the new alliance's interests. It is 
also primarily engaged in the war in South Sudan and the intervention in 
Libya, where its interests do not coincide with those of Turkey, which 
is largely present in the area alongside General Haftar.
The agreement stems from the realization that the presence of US bases 
in the Gulf has not served to protect the countries that accepted their 
presence and paid handsomely to the US. Rather, it has been the factor 
that has made these countries the target of Iranian retaliation. This is 
demonstrated by Saudi Arabia's last-minute warnings, which went 
unheeded, to Trump, advising him against waging war against its powerful 
neighbor.
The Alliance leaves out the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Kuwait, a 
country in which Turkey has a strong military presence, but enjoys the 
full attention of Qatar, which has a military assistance agreement with 
Turkey. The Alliance's goal appears to be to reach a modus vivendi with 
Iran for the management of the region.
The United Arab Emirates, Israel's secret partner, will be able to 
continue their dirty business by plundering Africa.
The Alliance effectively establishes a cordon sanitaire around Israel 
and its expansionist policy through Turkey's control of Syria and its 
projection of power, once again from Turkey, into Iraq, a territory 
disputed by Iran, which exerts strong influence over the country through 
its Shiite minority. Jordan, a foolish servant of the United States, 
will likely remain the only country in the region hosting US bases, 
unless Israel decides to annex it, albeit gradually, given its largely 
Palestinian population.
Thanks to the new alliance, the United States sees its role as a 
thalassocratic power degraded as it must cede control of the Arabian Sea 
and the Red Sea to third-party powers that control the Straits of Hormuz 
and Bar-el-Mandev. The new alliance relies on Turkey to fulfill its 
role, having to keep at bay both the role of the Houthis, allies of 
Iran, who have demonstrated over the years the inadequacy of the Saudi 
armed forces, and find a way to counter the role of Hezbollah in 
Lebanon, a thorn in Israel's side and a defender of the Palestinians, 
along with Iran and the Houthis.

Zelenski and Kosovo

It should come as no surprise that Zelensky, visiting Serbia to shop for 
munitions and weapons-the Serbs are well-known arms dealers-used the 
opportunity to endorse the existence of Kosovo . He did so entirely 
coherently and respectfully of Ukraine's opposition to Donbass's demands 
for autonomy, earning the indignation of the Kosovars, who declared they 
would cease all aid to Ukraine, as they had done in the past.
In this case, the Ukrainian position is in line with Spain's, which has 
not recognized Kosovo so as not to have its refusal of autonomy toward 
the Basque Country and Catalonia challenged. Criticisms of Kosovo's 
existence highlight the contradiction in that the European Union, when 
it has been convenient, has supported the right to self-determination, 
only to deny it to the Russian-speaking populations of Donbass and blame 
Moscow. Thus, Kosovo, strongly supported by the European Union, clashes 
with the policies of its own sponsors and distances itself from Edi 
Rama's position of servile support for Ukraine. Inconsistency and the 
violation of principles are evidently a common trait in the life of 
states defending their interests.

Putin and the Pacific

Putin took advantage of your visit to the Kurile Islands, intended to 
reaffirm their belonging to Russia following the outcome of the Second 
World War, to announce a new cornerstone of Russia's political strategy 
of deterrence .
We do not intend here to engage in a debate on Russia's possession of 
these islands and the circumstances under which it entered the war 
against Japan and signed and concluded treaties with the Land of the 
Rising Sun. Nor do we intend to reflect on Japan's equally worrying 
rearmament, in violation of the Japanese Constitution itself. Instead, 
we intend to highlight the content of his statement.
Having noted and acknowledged the repeated attacks by Western countries 
on oil tankers belonging to the so-called Russian shadow fleet, which 
distributes Russian oil, and the completely illegitimate controls on 
Russian or Russian-linked vessels, Putin declared that from now on 
Russia will respond with an asymmetric intervention on maritime traffic 
near its Pacific coast. He received a detailed report from the Admiral 
Commander of the Pacific Sector on the types and nationalities of 
vessels encountered in those seas and their affiliations to different 
states, a sign that Russia has long been monitoring maritime traffic in 
the area, and is ready to act in the area most favorable to it. This 
decision widens the dangers of conflict and the theater of war, 
transforming the ongoing conflict into a global confrontation.

Ukraine: Port blockade

In response to Ukraine's disruption of maritime traffic from Russian 
ports on the Black Sea and the bombing of oil terminals, including those 
of third-party countries, that use those coasts, Russia unleashed a 
retaliatory strike that struck deep into Ukrainian port facilities 
located in the remaining coastal area, consisting of Odessa and the 
ports on the Danube, under Ukrainian control .
The bombing was devastating, disabling bridges, crucial hubs for the 
transit of goods in the area, both by road and rail, systematically 
destroying locomotives, which, due to the different gauge, were 
difficult to replace with new ones supplied by the West. The 
impassability of the roads blocked access for goods from neighboring 
Romania and Moldova, and immobilized thousands of tons of wheat, 
sunflower seeds, and barley in silos and storage facilities, which were 
also hit, impeding both the storage of the upcoming harvest and its 
marketing.
The blockade of Ukrainian ports is complete not only because of the 
effectiveness of Russian bombing but also because their bombings act as 
a deterrent, advising shipping companies not to insure ships bound for 
Ukraine, effectively interrupting the transit of goods.
Faced with this situation, Ukraine is forced to seek alternative transit 
routes, not only by reaching the port of Constanta (Romania) with 
enormous difficulty, but also by passing overland through Polish or 
Romanian territory. This has sparked a rebellion among farmers in those 
countries, who see their agricultural markets swamped by Ukrainian 
products of questionable healthiness and marketability due to 
war-related pollution, but sold at rock-bottom prices that undermine the 
incomes of farmers in other countries. What is happening is only 
increasing resentment toward Ukrainians and creating the conditions for 
a global food crisis due to both the blockade of Russian and Ukrainian 
exports.

Japan

This unexpected move was made to prevent Japan from resorting to selling 
US Treasury bonds held by the Japanese bank, but it surprised the 
European Central Bank, which was notified only after the transaction had 
been concluded, effectively transforming the European currency into a 
means of cushioning the Asian country's currency crisis . The Japanese 
currency crisis occurred because the Bank of Japan (BoJ) had long 
maintained an ultra-accommodative monetary policy and near-zero interest 
rates, unlike Western banks. Investors thus borrowed cheaply in yen to 
invest in more profitable foreign assets, denominated in dollars, and 
the Japanese currency experienced a drastic depreciation and sudden 
fluctuations that required a joint bailout. To carry out the bailout, 
Washington avoided selling dollars so as not to alter the internal 
dynamics of its own currency and the Federal Reserve's monetary policy. 
The impact of this maneuver was devastating for the value of the euro: 
by selling euros to buy yen, the United States indirectly shifted part 
of the burden of this macroeconomic rebalancing onto the Eurozone. An 
incompetent, cowardly, and servile political class was unable to react.

Syria

Syrian President Abu Muhammad al-Jawlani, renamed Ahmed al-Sharaa in 
January 2025, signed an agreement with the Russian Federation after two 
years of negotiations to maintain, albeit with a "softened" role and 
functions, the management of the Russian naval base in Tartus. The base 
has been downsized to a logistics support center to allow Russian naval 
warships in the Mediterranean to avoid having to return to the Black Sea 
for maintenance, which has been made unsafe by Ukrainian attacks . In 
exchange, Russia has assured Syria of access to military instructors, 
supplies of wheat and food, and technical assistance. The Russian 
presence also serves an obvious deterrent function against governments 
hostile to the Syrian one.
It should be noted that the agreement could not be reached without the 
consent of the US government, which has al-Jawlani under its wing, and 
even more so of Turkey, his great sponsor and protector. In this way, 
Putin keeps an eye and an ear on the Mediterranean, which adds to the 
Russian presence in Cyrenaica (Libya, a territory from which the 
Russians project their presence towards Central Africa, expanding their 
influence in South Sudan, Niger, the Central African Republic as far as 
Burkina Faso and Mali), areas in which they have taken the place of the 
French in supporting the fight against jihadism supported by the United 
Arab Emirates, which trades in gold and diamonds.

The Editorial Staff

https://www.ucadi.org/2026/09/06/osservatorio-internazionale/
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