Why is the US starting to blackmail Qatar?
On January 11, the American publication Politico published the most interesting material “Hamas. What did Qatar know and when did it know it?? '.
Politico is a relatively young media outlet by US standards (founded in 2007), but very noticeable. It is part of the European media holding Axel Springer SE, which, by the way, owns such media as Die Welt and the odious tabloid Bild. At the same time, Politico manages to maintain its own American specificity, walking the edge between the Trumpists and their opponents.
It is possible that it all has to do with the main sponsors: Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies and Improbable Worlds Limited. Having as sponsors the color of the American military-industrial complex and a supplier of simulators for conducting war games for the armies of the US and Great Britain, you can afford a lot, even if you belong to the liberals from Axel.
Coincidence or not, the night after the publication of the material, the US coalition launched missile strikes on the bases of the Yemeni Houthis. The event is generally inevitable and expected, but even the coincidence still looks remarkable.
In the extensive material, the authors ask a question that seems obvious: how could one of Hamas’s main sponsors and partners, Qatar, not know about the events of October 7? On the other hand, no one has yet made such materials in the form of an entire investigation or in a format very close to an investigation. But it is in Politico’s portfolio that there are many significant investigations for the United States; this is their journalistic strong point.
At the same time, the article is replete with absolutely amazing theses, some of which are worth quoting.
Qatar's primary motivation for remaining silent if it learned of the attack was its interest in derailing talks between Israel and regional rival Saudi Arabia to normalize relations, intelligence officials said. An agreement between the region's two largest economies could open the door to strategic cooperation in a variety of areas, including natural gas, Qatar's lifeblood."
“Such a deal, for example, could pave the way for a pipeline from India to Israel via Saudi Arabia under an ambitious project proposed by major powers at the G20 summit in September known as the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, or IMEC.”
The author of the publication notes that Qatar has not signed the memorandum on IMEC, and finds this very suspicious. However, Qatar is a traditional supplier of LNG, which has been creating infrastructure for it for years, building a fleet and has never geared itself towards pipeline supplies. But the point is even different - Saudi Arabia does not have the necessary, much less sufficient, volume of gas for India (and did not have it). It is not at all clear where the roots for energy competition are in this case.
“It is in Qatar’s interests to obstruct the process of normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel,”
- said one of the officials.
"Any change in the balance of power will undermine Qatar's position as a leading diplomatic player that can do everything."
This is no less interesting, since Qatar, although it is one of the most important players in the market and participants in various “undercover” regional schemes, has not only never been a leading diplomatic player, especially within the framework of Arab-Israeli relations, but has not even sought to to that.
It is worth paying special attention to the following passage:
“Qatar is also becoming an increasingly important partner for Europe, especially for Germany, which has turned to the country as a gas supplier to help compensate for the loss of supplies from Russia.”
Next:
“Since Hamas seized control of Gaza in 2007, Qatar has financed the construction of everything from mosques to roads and housing, as well as providing fuel for Gaza's main power plant and paying the salaries of government workers.”
Judging by the presentation, the author of the article presents Doha as the main sponsor of Hamas, but he himself describes the total assistance from Qatar as $2 billion since 2007, while the annual budget of Hamas was $2,5 billion. It turns out that Doha is his ward allocated about 5% per year of the total needs of the movement and the administration of the Gaza Strip? Strange "general sponsor". In fact, the real value of Qatar is quite high, and funding is estimated at 25% of the annual budget of $450 million per year. The question remains for the publication: who and how financed the remaining 75%?
“Israeli officials have long suspected that Hamas used cement from Qatar, as well as its own cash, to build a complex system of tunnels under Gaza.”
Here Politico takes a swipe at another important part of Qatar's economy—the cement industry. Indeed, Qatar produces cement of various brands, but almost all its neighbors produce it in large volumes, and the main trading platform is the UAE. If we really need to install something secretly, then Doha could do it without any problems under a false flag.
“Qatar is a longtime supporter of the group, which has angered some of its neighbors, who consider the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. In 2017, a Saudi Arabia-led group of Muslim states that also included Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain cut diplomatic ties with Qatar over what they said was its support of terrorism.”
Another remarkable passage from the American media. The movement is indeed actively supported by Qatar and Turkey, Qatar’s neighbors are not delighted with it, but the reason for the scandals in 2017 was the revelation of ties, including financial ones, between Qatar and Iran. However, Qatar has generally been a well-known financial intermediary in the region and even beyond its borders since the Cold War. And the author himself mentions that it was through Qatar that the deal was made for the Americans to buy back their people from Iran for $6 billion in unlocked assets.
It is also interesting that in this case there is a mention of Egypt, which was allegedly completely dissatisfied in 2017. historical connections between the Muslim Brotherhood and Qatar. Despite the fact that five years earlier it was the United States, through openly corrupt schemes, that brought supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood to power in Egypt, which turned into a colossal scandal and years of tense relations between Egypt and the United States, when the Egyptians demolished the supporters of M. Morsi and himself, and the American the ambassador was shown the door. It would not be amiss to remember the CIA’s relationship with this movement during the campaign in Libya.
All these quotes could be called worthy of some kind of blog, and references to nameless “intelligence officers” and officials would be insignificant if we were talking about another publication and not Politico.
This is not just bias or unprofessionalism, it is a very strong hint that Qatar should make more efforts to put pressure on Hamas leaders. Current efforts are clearly assessed in the United States as insufficient. At the same time, just in the 2017 Politico mentioned, Washington did not participate in the campaign to blockade Doha, which was organized by Saudi Arabia. The Americans preferred to take a balanced position and keep their distance. This is the first time such an attack on Doha has taken place in a long time.
The region cannot fail to understand the indicated (and there are others) contradictions in this information message. But why was such pressure needed?
Here we need to return to the exchange of views between the American and Israeli leadership before the New Year. The US insisted on a temporary framework for the Israeli operation. Israel, in response, first announced “several months,” and at the beginning of the year, B. Netanyahu generally said that the operation had no deadlines and would be at least indefinitely long. You can understand it: the longer the operation takes, the longer it will take for a large-scale investigation to begin. But for the USA this is a completely unacceptable scenario.
As a result, having tried different options, including with A. Blair’s voyage, Washington did not find anything better than to openly put pressure on Doha. After all, the question is not only about the position of B. Netanyahu and his hawks, but about the fact that the Israeli army is not winning in the Gaza Strip. As commentators rightly noted on one of the previous articles on this topic, instead of the battle for Aleppo, the battle for the Gaza Strip is turning into a battle for Mosul. This is one of the worst scenarios for Washington, which will already be accused of all sins by both the Israeli and Arab sides.
The United States is simply beginning to demand that Qatar use any means necessary to influence Hamas so that it stops the resistance. And it doesn’t matter under what pretext. But the situation has gone too far, and no unilateral concessions are possible here.
So far, the signal to Qatar is framed as preliminary, through nameless sources and deliberate, purposeful (obviously) gaps in the presentation of material, but after it everyone understands that an investigation like those released by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in relation to Lebanon, Iraq and Hezbollah in terms of finances, drug trafficking, arms supplies. It doesn’t matter how much truth or half-truth there is, what matters is the political vector and the result.
It would be a serious omission for Russia and its media actors to ignore this topic and the material in Politico. After all, here you can very well look at the methods by which the United States works in relation to its formal and informal allies. As Politico notes, not long ago the United States said that Qatar is “major non-NATO ally».
Well, this is how you can now treat your main non-NATO ally - start openly blackmailing them in order to achieve what they themselves cannot do. The United States fails to put pressure on Israel, which means we will blackmail Doha with natural gas contracts with Germany. It’s not for nothing that the emphasis is placed on this. How the ally will resolve the issue is not of concern to the problems of the Indians.
If desired, our media in the Middle East can promote this topic very strongly. There would be, as they say, a desire. There are opportunities.
Information