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Experts: Corona Unlikely to Change Middle East Balance of Power

(Jerusalem Post) Herb Keinon - Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Amos Yadlin, former head of Israeli Military Intelligence and executive director of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv, told a Zoom conference this week, "The Middle East is up to its neck in problems. The corona is just another variable on top of all that." For instance, a half million people have been killed in the nine-year Syrian civil war, so the death of a number of people there at the hands of the virus will likely go unnoticed, he said. The coronavirus is unlikely to fundamentally change the balance of power in the Middle East, he said. The Sunni and Shi'a camps will continue to be in conflict, the Israeli-Palestinian issue will not be solved, and the various civil wars in the region will rage on. Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, a former head of Military Intelligence's Research Division and now with the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, agreed that at this point the virus "is not enough to stop local wars, or bring about unity," or even to trigger much of a discussion in the region about the world after corona. The region sees the virus "as a time out, let's stop for a minute," but not as a factor that will lead to a decline in ideological enmity and confrontation.
2020-04-10 00:00:00
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