There have been many new twists in the chain of Middle Eastern upheavals in the last year — from the rise of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) to the escalation of civil war in Yemen — but Russia has been only marginally involved in most high-intensity political manoeuvring in the region, only making a splash with the recent ‘unfreezing’ of the sale of S-300 surface-to-air missiles to Iran.
This is hardly surprising given the current preoccupations of the Russian leadership: the Ukraine conflict and its expanding confrontation with the West. Yet the Middle East is the only region in the world where Russia has continued to play a key role, validating its claim as a global power despite Western efforts to isolate it. Opportunities for re-asserting this role have been few and far between, and the attempt to stage talks between Bashar al-Assad’s government and some Syrian opposition groups in Moscow in February-March 2015 failed to yield a breakthrough. The question remains, however, whether the conflict in Ukraine will encourage Russian policymaking in the Middle East (particularly regarding the civil war in Syria) to shift emphasis from opportunity-seeking to scoring cheap points as a spoiler.
Wandering in the Syrian desert
The civil war in Syria, deadlocked yet still mutating, remains the focal point of Russia’s policy in the Middle East. For Vladimir Putin, the stakes in this debacle are higher than the mere survival of Russia’s last client-regime. In the Kremlin’s analysis, the tide of revolutions (allegedly sponsored and manipulated by the United States) constitutes a major threat to the world order; and Putin fancies himself a champion of the counter-revolutionary cause.
