2023-10-22 02:17:38
Cynicism and hidden agenda or intelligent search for influence and independence? What is Qatar’s relationship with Hamas? How sincere are the calls for an end to the escalation between the Palestinian organization and Israel? What role can the extremely powerful and tiny Gulf emirate play in the crisis in Gaza? Last week, Qatari Prime Minister Mohamed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani assured that “Qatar’s diplomatic priorities were to achieve an immediate ceasefire, protect civilians and ensure the release of prisoners, and work to limit the expansion of the violence and the cycle of conflict in the region.
The world’s leading exporter of liquefied gas, Qatar’s history in the last two decades is one of a constant and permanent search to expand its political, economic and diplomatic influence – through soft power – throughout the world. The small absolute monarchy of the Arab Gulf maintains excellent relations with both the West and its greatest nemesis, Iran, as well as with China, Russia and Turkey.
«The hallmarks of Qatari foreign action are mediation in regional conflicts such as the establishment of the Al Jazeera television channel, the promotion of culture, education and science by the Qatar Foundation or the holding of major sporting events. like the 2022 World Cup, all with the aim of increasing its specific weight and differentiating itself from its neighbors,” stated in Qatar: the pearl of the Gulf, an essay published last year, the Spanish professors Ignacio Álvarez-Ossorio and Ignacio Gutiérrez of Teran.
Qatar has managed to maintain close ties with Hamas, which it sponsors and hosts on its soil – several of the leaders of the Palestinian organization reside in Doha – and preserve a privileged relationship with the United States, which has most of its bases in the Middle East, that of Al Udeid, and considers the emirate “a major ally outside of NATO.” Not in vain, relevant figures in Qatar’s public life, such as the sister of the current emir and CEO of the Qatar Foundation, Hind bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, stated in a post published on her Instagram profile after the Hamas attacks against Israel that “they will call them terrorists, we will call them freedom fighters.”
«The relationship between Hamas and Qatar, which has a representative office in Doha, is undoubted. Furthermore, the Qatari authorities pay the salaries of Gaza Government officials in addition to financing infrastructure such as power plants or schools in the territory,” Spanish predoctoral researcher at the University of Granada Leticia Rodríguez, who is preparing her thesis on the foreign policy of the emirate. After the Arab Spring, in October 2012, Emir Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani was the first international leader to visit Gaza, where he condemned the blockade and promised aid worth $400 million. Hamas has controlled the territory since 2007.
Recently, Qatari government officials admitted that the country’s aid to Gaza arrived in the Strip in cooperation with Israeli authorities, in charge of transporting the cash to the border with the territory. A delay last summer in the transfer of aid from Qatar to Gaza compromised the payment of Palestinian civil servants’ salaries and exposed the Strip’s dependence on Doha. This same week, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian met in Doha with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.
The accusation that the small emirate deploys, beyond its diversification of alliances and soft power, a hidden or parallel agenda is not new. «The agenda is mesquiteo, a friendly Arabization that has achieved a global association between Arabs and Muslims. “Qatar gets along well with everyone but it has been the refuge of all those who left ISIS and Al Qaeda, and it is evident that Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been financed by Qatar, and not by Iran,” a member told LA RAZÓN. veteran Spanish university professor of Arab and Islamic Studies who prefers not to be identified.
Doha emerges as mediator
Aware of Qatar’s influence on Hamas, the eyes of the leaders of the main powers have been on Doha from the first minute. Doha was one of the stops on the recent regional tour of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (who met with the emir himself). Washington is pressing for the emirate to facilitate the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza. «The country can be a mediator and play a relevant role in the conflict, as it has already demonstrated in Ukraine. “Blinken has already been here and Rishi Sunak is expected in the next few hours, which makes the relevance of this country clear,” Rodríguez explains to this medium from Doha.
While diplomacy acts silently in Gaza, the Qatari authorities claimed responsibility this week for having facilitated the release of a group of Ukrainian children, now back with their families in their country after having been kidnapped by the Russian authorities and, above all , two American hostages held by Hamas in Gaza, mother and daughter, on Friday afternoon. Likewise, Doha had been key in the agreement reached last month between Washington and Iran for the exchange of several prisoners, including five American citizens. Aside from hidden agendas or more or less altruistic desires, the negotiating capacity of the powerful Gulf emirate is not lost on either Washington or Tel Aviv.
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