Obama Bids Adieu to Mideast Orthodoxy

Obama Bids Adieu to Mideast Orthodoxy

President Barack Obama has turned over the table of orthodox foreign policy theory and practice in the Middle East. The United States may now have choices before it that are better grounded in fact, but has roiled the region in the process. It is the short-term consequences of the American shift that have attracted the most attention, but it is the long-term that will produce the most important outcomes. Four of America’s traditional allies—Israel, Egypt, Turkey and Saudi Arabia—are now estranged partners. To make it more complicated, each has its separate reasons for distrusting America. Obama has also pulled back from, at times, intense pressure to involve the United States in two additional wars in Syria, and Iran prior to the nuclear deal. Instead, his new team to help shape the future of the Middle East includes Russia and Iran. This might have been the stuff of a novel if it weren’t a non-fiction work.

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