Essay by the Editor

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/arabstudquar.46.1.0005
• Published date: 19 January 2024
• Pages: 5-8
• Date: 19 January 2024

ESSAY BY THE EDITOR

The Centrality of West Asia to

Global Politics1

Recent political events in West Asia (and North Africa) have proven the thesis

that West Asia is currently at the heart of global political and geo-strategy. A gaze

at the Mediterranean confirms that fact when we view a flotilla of U.S. aircraft

carrier groups (the Gerald Ford and the Eisenhower), two British warships and a

German warship close to shore. NATO’s naval presence was quickly ramped up in

a futile effort to deter the axis of resistance in the region from engaging the Zionist

entity in support of the resistance in Gaza. As events have shown, the Lebanese

resistance engaged the Zionist entity one day after October 7. The Iraqi resistance

and the Yemeni resistance followed suit, all defying the U.S. and NATO threat in

the Eastern Mediterranean.

Contrary to the claims of multiple analysts in both the East and West that the

U.S. was about to leave the “Middle East” as it has bigger fish to fry in Southeast

Asia; that its gaze is now on China, we see that the U.S. has increased its presence

in West Asia and shall be here for a longer time than those analysts have predicted.

Those analysts tried to convince themselves and the crowds around them about

that false claim of withdrawal by pointing out that the U.S. had withdrawn from

Iraq and Afghanistan. The fact of the matter, though, is that the U.S. was defeated

in both Iraq and Afghanistan and was compelled to withdraw. Many analysts

either did not pay much attention to those facts or were perhaps engaged in propa-

ganda that served the interests of the West to dampen the effects of those and other

defeats of Western imperialism in our region.

Regardless of whether one supports this or that state in the West Asia region, it

is critical to look at the facts to determine where we are geopolitically and estimate

where we might be headed. Facts do not lie. In this case, they demonstrate that the

axis of resistance (Iran, Yemen, the Lebanese resistance in both its secular and

religious wings, many of the Palestinian resistance groups and later the Iraqi

Popular Mobilization Forces) had fought and defeated the U.S. and Zionist mili-

tary onslaught to further divide the Arab world and end the Palestinian struggle for

liberation once and for all.

The Russian Federation entered directly into the fight on September 30, 2015,

which was a clear indication of the centrality of West Asia to Russian geopolitical

strategy. It also had been able to tip the balance in favor of the Syrian state. It is

critical to note that the defeat of ISIS in Syria and Iraq had foiled the U.S. strategic

DOI:10.13169/arabstudquar.46.1.0005