The Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff, Lt.-Gen. Gadi Eisenkot, revealed this week that Israel was prepared to share intelligence with Saudi Arabia in an effort to combat Iran’s expansionist agenda and malign regional influence. The unprecedented statement was made during the course of an interview with the London-based, Saudi online publication, Elaph.

Israel and Saudi Arabia have historically been bitter enemies. In 1967, just prior to the Six-Day War, King Faisal added his voice to the endless chorus of Arab leaders calling for Israel’s destruction. When asked by a British interviewer what sequence of events he’d like to see happen in connection with regional developments, he answered bluntly: “The first thing is the extermination of Israel.”

During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Saudi Arabia used oil in an effort to blackmail countries from engaging with Israel, causing long lines at the pumps and sending fuel prices skyrocketing. And over the years since, the Kingdom has pumped an untold fortune of petro dollars into the coffers of Israel’s genocidal enemies.

But the changing times have made for strange bedfellows. Saudi Arabia no longer sees Israel as its enemy. Indeed, the Saudis now grudgingly view the Israelis with favor. The threat to the Kingdom now emerges from the east in the form of the malignancy known as the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Shia Iran has been waging a relentless proxy war with Sunni Saudi Arabia on several fronts and appears to be succeeding. The Islamic Republic has succeeded in creating a land bridge extending from Teheran through Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut and out to the eastern Mediterranean.

They’ve also been fomenting unrest on the Arabian Peninsula by deploying proxy militias and agitators in Bahrein and Yemen, prompting Saudi Arabia to intervene militarily on behalf of those countries. Particularly troublesome is the situation in Yemen where the Iranians are backing the Shia Houthi rebels against the internationally-recognized government of President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi.

Thus far, the Iranian inspired Houthi insurgency has claimed 10,000 lives and over 40,000 injured. An Iranian success there could give the Islamic Republic control over the Mandeb Strait, a major maritime choke point. Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz and the Mandeb Strait would have instant negative global ramifications. Much of the world’s maritime traffic would be held hostage to the whims of the mullahs. Oil prices would skyrocket while stock markets would crash.

The Yemen civil war has been a major headache for the Saudis.  On January 30, a suicide boat packed with explosives, and piloted by Houthis, plowed into a Saudi frigate on patrol near the Mandab Strait, killing 2 sailors and injuring 3. Houthis have also fired missiles – which were either intercepted or fell short of their target – at U.S. warships.

In a marked escalation, on November 4, Houthi rebels fired a missile, possibly a Scud, at Riyadh. The missile was supplied by Iran and the Iranians provided their proxies with the technical knowhow on how to operate it. Saudi air defense units intercepted the missile with a Patriot anti-missile system destroying it near Riyadh’s King Khaled international airport.

On the very day that Iran’s proxies were firing missiles at Riyadh, Saad al-Hariri, Lebanon’s Sunni prime minister, resigned and fled to Saudi Arabia. Hariri, whose father was assassinated by Hezbollah agents in 2005, cited credible intelligence of an assassination plot on his life.

Lebanon’s constitution calls for a Sunni prime minister, a Christian president and a Shia speaker of parliament reflecting the fractious ethnic mosaic of Lebanon. Hariri’s departure dealt another deathblow to Lebanese sovereignty. The Hezbollah terrorist group, which is the dominant military force in Lebanon, has steadily transformed the tiny dysfunctional nation into an Iranian outpost on the Mediterranean.

Hezbollah has completely absorbed Lebanon’s state institutions. Lebanon’s Christian president, Michel Aoun, was hand-picked by Iran and is almost certainly on the mullah’s payroll. The Lebanese military has increasingly acted as an auxiliary force for Hezbollah operations, and according to some reports, has allowed Hezbollah to pilfer its arms depots. Hezbollah and Iranian operatives have free rein at Beirut International Airport, which serves as a conduit for drugs, cash and arms destined for Hezbollah.

But most troubling for the Saudis and Israelis is Iran’s nuclear ambitions, which despite the Iran deal, remains a national priority for the mullahs. According to German intelligence, the Iranians, using front companies, have continued to make concerted efforts to obtain nuclear technology related to their militarized program. In addition, twice since the JCPOA went into effect, Iran exceeded its 130 metric ton limit for heavy water, which is used to cool reactors that produce plutonium. Clearly, the Iranians are testing the Iran deal’s elasticity. Thus far, there have been no negative ramifications for Iran’s transgressions.

Most troubling however, for both Israel and Saudi Arabia is the JCPOA’s sun set clause. After 8 to 10 years, most of the key restrictions on Iranian uranium enrichment taper off, providing the mullahs with a legal pathway for acquiring nuclear weapons.

Saudi Arabia knows that despite Iran’s saber rattling and nefarious regional activities, Israel is by far the most formidable force in the Mideast. U.S. appeasement policies pursued by the Obama administration and its deleterious retreat from the Mideast forced the Kingdom re-think its long-held hostile views vis-à-vis the Jewish State, prompting a fundamental and historic realignment of regional alliances. Perhaps some good emerged from the Obama administration after all.

Iran has long relied on proxy groups to carry out its evil deeds in neighboring countries. And every year, the ruling regime pours billions of dollars of the Iranian people’s wealth into aiding and abetting these terrorist groups. However, as a firm policy starts to take shape against their belligerence in the region, Tehran and its surrogates are finding themselves in dire straits, like reported by washingtonexaminer.com.

The latest manifestation of this change of policy was a series of events triggered last week when Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri declared his resignation from the premiership. Hariri’s statement came after a botched attempt at assassinating him in Beirut, allegedly planned by Hezbollah, a terrorist group with well-known ties to Iran. Hariri cited Iran’s influence and hostage-taking of his country through Hezbollah and threats to his life as the reason for his resignation.

Hezbollah was founded by members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and has acted as an extension of the latter for more than three decades. Hezbollah has had an active role in carrying out Tehran’s terrorist ambitions in the Middle East and across the globe. It has fought on behalf of Iran in Syria to prop up Bashar Assad’s regime against opposition forces.

The government that took shape last year in Lebanon following a long, two-year impasse put too much power in the hands of groups aligned with Hezbollah, effectively handing over the reins to Iran. Tehran had been taking advantage of the situation to further inch its way toward accomplishing its goal of establishing a Shiite empire that spans across the Middle East.

Hariri’s resignation shook off what little legitimacy was left of the Hezbollah-dominated government, dealing a severe blow to the facade that enabled Iran to wield considerable clout over Lebanese politics and military.

What makes the move more significant is that it comes on the heels of a major push to crack down on the destabilizing activities of Hezbollah and its Iranian patrons. The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed two measures, including one that imposed sanctions on Iran and Hezbollah for using civilians as human shields, and a second that sanctions any entity that supports the group by supplying it with weapons, or by other means. The critical measures are meant to target Hezbollah’s financing, and “hold it accountable for its acts of death and destruction,” said Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who sponsored one of the resolutions.

A third resolution calls on the European Union to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, a measure the U.S. took in 1997.

Shortly after Harriri’s statement, French President Emanuel Macron “reiterated the importance France attaches to Lebanon’s stability, security, sovereignty and integrity” during a visit to Riyadh, and concluded this “means having a very demanding stance on those who could threaten any leader,” a thinly veiled challenge directed at Hezbollah and Iran. This is in contrast with European politicians’ penchant for avoiding hard talk against Iran’s provocative actions in the region.

Trump’s new policy toward Iran, declared last month, aims to deal with the multitude of threats that Tehran and the IRGC pose to the nations of the region and across the world, a decision his predecessor was loath to make. The concerted clamp down on Hezbollah, the IRGC’s main foreign surrogate, is a vital step toward implementing this policy in earnest. It should be complemented by regional and global efforts to curb the destructive machinations of Iran’s other proxies, including the Popular Mobilization Forces, which account for crimes against humanity in Iraq and the Houthis in Yemen. Cutting off Tehran’s tentacles in the region in tandem with tightening the noose around the IRGC will ensure that Iran has no loopholes to exploit.

The current crisis in Mali is quite a complicated affair, comprising of a mixture of persistent and fundamental grievances from diverse ethnic groups. Additionally, it now involves the vital interest of global superpowers. France is deploying special military forces in the country under the pretext of protecting civilians from various extremist groups – risking the ‘Afghanistization’ of Mali, like reported by eurasiareview.com.

Over the years, the Sahara has seen several ethnic movements against colonization, and industrialization, which have been mercilessly suppressed and uprooted by the superpowers. The Azawad movement by the indigenous Tuareg communities in Mali is one such example.

The Tuareg people have been living in the harsh conditions of the Sahara for millennia. There are about two million Tuareg living in Mali, Niger, Libya, Algeria, and Chad. But the largest population of Tuareg is found in Mali, with an estimated 950,000 people.

Tuareg men wear indigo veils, which gave rise to the popular characterization “Blue Men of the Sahara.” But it is not their beautiful attire which is attracting attention from the world’s superpowers. The Tuareg homeland has the largest energy deposits in Africa. Their dream of an independent state, separation from Mali, and the right to govern their own land, which they called “Azawad,” threatens five neighboring states and has the potential to trigger the biggest war that Sahara has seen in a century.

And they are not the only group who wants to rule here. “Al Qaeda” is also strengthening its roots in the desert with a vital interest of realizing Bin Laden’s dream of creating a new Afghanistan in the Sahara and promoting Sharia law. Mali is left in the middle, as a powder cake of war between the Tuareg rebels and Al Qaeda.

After Mali’s independence from France in 1960, a series of droughts affected the northern cities of Timbuktu, Kidal, and Gao. This is one of the least developed regions of the country, and it’s the homeland of Tuaregs. The present-day state of Mali failed to ensure a holistic and inclusive development across all regions; the northern part was ignored by the government and now finds itself crushed by the ever increasing weight of climate change.

Tuaregs: A Bitter History

“This is a people with a long history of resistance to centralized rule, from the Roman Empire to Arab conquest and French colonization and then, since 1960, the independent state of Mali,” says Bruce Whitehouse, an anthropologist at the University of Lehigh.

The Tuareg have fought a series of rebellions against colonialism since the 20th century. But they were brutally subdued by colonial France during this period and suffered untold discrimination and exploitation.

There have been four major rebellions since the 1960s. The first Tuareg rebellion took place in 1962-64. During this period, Tuaregs were greatly oppressed by the government of ‘Modibo Keita,’ who came to power after the French departed. At the time, Tuaregs were highly discriminated against and lagged behind others in terms of the distribution of state benefits. To make the situation worse, Keita’s government enacted certain policies on land reform that threatened Tuareg’s access to agricultural products in their own lands.

The second larger rebellion began in 1990. The animosity triggered by harsh repression perpetuated dissatisfaction with government policies. And in the third rebellion, there was no major uprising, but routine kidnapping and killing members of the Malian armed force were reported.

In the 1970s, there were terrible droughts in the Tuareg home region that destroyed their livestock and made it impossible for sustaining their livelihood. So, thousands of Tuaregs left their homeland for Libya, which had oil and employment opportunities. Interestingly, in 1982 Gaddafi declared Libya to be the home country and place of origin of all Tuaregs. Many thousands of Tuaregs were recruited into Gaddafi’s armed forces.

The Rise of the MNLA

In 2011, after the collapse of the Gaddafi regime, Tuaregs who had been part of Gaddafi’s mercenary army returned to northern Mali with sophisticated weaponry. For Tuareg fighters, this was a journey from abundance to misery – they had seen the wealth of Libya, and now suddenly they were back in their home country, plagued with poverty, drought, and disease. They decided to bring peace and prosperity to the region and revive the dying pasture land – their only source of livelihood. They formed the “National Movement for Liberation of Azawad” or MNLA in 2011 as the political-military platform to continue their fight for self-rule.

Just one year after the formation of MNLA, the Tuaregs toppled the Malian government forces in March 2012 and declared the independent state of Azawad in what had been northern Mali. “At the beginning, this was essentially a political movement, but with the return of the Tuareg from Libya it became military as well as political,” remarks Pierre Boilley, a professor of Contemporary African History at the University of Paris.

Colonel Meshkenani Ag Bela of MNLA is the fourth generation of his family to rise up against Mali and its forerunner colonial friends. “We have a deep-rooted and bitter history. We fought French imperial forces until they left. We never accepted French colonialism nor when France gave our land to Mali without our consent. Ever since then we have never stopped struggling. Every decade we start a new rebellion for our rights,” Meshkenani told Al Jazeera.

Declaring independence on 6 April 2012, MNLA spokesperson Mossa Ag Attaher, stated: “Mali is an anarchic state. Therefore, we have gathered a national liberation movement to put in an army capable of securing our land and an executive office capable of forming democratic institutions.”

Nonetheless, the independence declaration proved premature. “Azawad failed because the MNLA wanted a secular independent state. And the Islamists were not interested in that. They just wanted to establish Islamic rule. There is a dynamic at work here where different factions within the Tuareg population have competing agendas. And the micro-politics of the situation is extremely important in determining where their loyalties lie,” said Whitehouse.

Ripple Effects of the Azawad Movement

The Azawad movement came to an end in 2013. The government of Mali and the coordination of Azawad Movements also known as CMA signed the Algerian-brokered peace deal. According to the agreement, the CMA will respect the “unity and territorial integrity of Mali.” The Malian government agreed to implement a more decentralized-system of government, with regional assemblies elected under universal suffrage.

Instead of one single elected assembly, now Azawad will have five – one for each of the area’s regions, which are Timbuktu, Gao, Kidal, Taoudeni and Menaka with the last two to be newly created. The agreement also provides for increased representation of the regions of Azawad in Malian state institutions, along with greater economic investment.

However, all of these promises from Mali for greater political autonomy for the Tuaregs in the north have never materialized. As a result, the Mali government is still facing massive challenges to control the situation in the region and it has thus far failed to develop trust amongst the Tuaregs.

The Birth of New Radical Groups

The MNLA and Al Qaeda are no longer the only radical groups in the region. New armed groups have been emerging in the central regions of Mopti and Segou, and these groups have an entirely different local agenda.

Take for instance the Peul communities, where both pastoralists and sedentary farmers are complaining that their issues are not being addressed properly by the Malian government. “As long as we are not associated with the process, it will be difficult to obtain peace” claims Abdoul Aziz Diallo, president of Tabital Pulaaku, an organization established by the Peul activists.

The National Alliance for the Safeguarding of Peul Identity and the Restoration of Justice, better known as ANSIPRJ, announced its emergence as a military force recently. Similarly, there are also other rebel groups emerging in the central region, including the Macina Liberation Front, which takes its inspiration from the Macina Empire of the 10th century.

Foreign Military Securing the Tuareg Homeland

For France, stability in Mali is crucial because any uprising in the country threatens French economic interest in neighboring countries such as Niger, Senegal, Burkina Faso, and the Ivory Coast.

Most importantly, Mali’s vital importance to France comes into focus when we take into account the presence of uranium mines in Niger which supply French nuclear power stations, mines which are located along the border between Mali and Niger. It should be noted here that uranium mines in the Niger provide around 50 percent of the raw material for France’s nuclear power plants.

Similarly, U.S. armed forces have been providing high-level military training to the Mali military for years. Take for the instance of the ‘Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Partnership’ established in 2005, comprising of eleven African partner countries such as Algeria, Burkina Faso, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, and Senegal.

But the presence of U.S. armed forces in Mali is not a big concern for the radical groups operating there. Mali is said to be the most dangerous active deployment for UN troops – 60 UN peacekeepers have been killed in the country so far.

Meanwhile, the heavily armed military presence of the French and U.S. governments in Mali suggests that the battle will go on. It raises certain important questions about how much these global superpowers know about the conflict going on in a foreign country.

Mali has become a model for bad governance: freedom of speech has been denied, and due to the poorly-equipped and incapable army, the country is unable to provide security for its own citizens. Once a leading democracy in West Africa, Mali is becoming an Afghanistan in the Sahel and Sahara regions.

The spokesperson for Ansar ed-Din, Sanda Ould Boumama, told CNN, “The war has only started. We expect more causalities.” After French troops and their allies fought against Islamists rebels for control of Gao, a 30-year-old local resident, Maouloud Dicko, stated that “I am really afraid. You hear of these kinds of things in Pakistan or Afghanistan. Gao is becoming like Pakistan.”

A Ray of Hope?

The superpowers should promote a multi-pronged approach if they have a genuine interest in protecting civilians and restoring peace and stability in this troubled region. But in reality, they are suppressing the voice of ethnic communities and looting the resources, thus giving rise to certain unpleasant questions: France in Mali, controlling or protecting? As per the need of the hour, France should encourage the Sahel states through diplomatic initiatives and adopt a regional approach to fight terrorism and the spread of Islamist extremism in the region.

In order to restore stability in the region, there is a pressing need to create an enabling condition that allows Tuaregs to look after their own situation. Without creating such favorable conditions, dictatorial anti-terrorismstrategies led by the French and U.S. governments can further intensify radical uprisings in the region.

The Mali government should also initiate dialogue with Tuareg communities and ensure a holistic approach to address the regional socio-economic and development issues of poverty, injustice, drought, and famine.

Last week’s resignation of Lebanon’s popular Prime Minister Saad Hariri has fueled a plethora of politically inspired conspiracy theories. At the forefront are some of Iran’s several Lebanese proxies who immediately in knee-jerk fashion, accused Saudi Arabia of holding Hariri hostage while they demanded the PM’s return to Lebanon. For what purpose is still not clear. Many in Lebanon believe it to give his stalkers time to organized Hariri’s assassination, like reported by counterpunch.org.

Lebanon’s virulently anti-Palestinian President Michel Aoun (who has sworn that if he is President, Palestinians in Lebanon will never be allowed the elementary civil right to work) was handpicked and put into his position by Hezbollah after a 19-month Presidential vacancy, immediately demanded to know why PM Hariri did not inform him in advance. And, Aoun added, why were not Lebanon’s Internal Security Force (ISF), or Lebanon’s army, Parliament and airport officials not told of Hariri’s plans, destination and schedule.

Beirut and Washington DC sources have suggested to this observer that Hariri’s thinking and motivation for a quick departure from Lebanon was influenced by reports delivered to him personally from three Western security agencies who have for the past six months been monitoring the movements of certain security agents from Hezbollah. These elements, it is claimed have been using ‘secured’ mobile phones while stalking Hariri since his appointment as PM one year ago much as was done to shadow his father Rafik, twelve years ago. The intelligence agencies are said to believe, as do most Lebanese, including a majority of Shia, that the Hezbollah members, currently being tried in absentia before the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) in The Hague blew up Saad’s father and 21 others on February 14, 2005. Saad Hariri was reportedly shown demonstrative and probative evidence that those currently watching and recording most of his moves, including his convoy routes and frequented destinations, constitute a mortal danger to him and that he urgently needs to take immediate security measures and even leave Lebanon until the threat could be removed. French, German, British and American officials, with knowledge of the intelligence reports have said even publicly that they do not credit the Aoun-Hezbollah-Iran claims that Hariri is being held hostage by Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, some Western countries and that their security forces have ‘activated’ assets in Lebanon to investigate the threats.

The West, as well as the Arab countries, are backing Hariri. On 11/13/2017, France’s Foreign Ministry insisted that an essential condition for the stability of the region is that Iran stops interfering in Lebanon’s domestic affairs. The Ministry’s spokeswoman read the statement: “Mr. Saad al-Hariri called on Iran yesterday to stop interfering in the affairs of Lebanon and its neighbors. We believe that this is an important condition for the stability of the region.”

The preceding day, 11/12/2017, the UAE Minister of State for Defense Affairs warned a gathering of U.S. government, military and business leaders that Iranian-sponsored terror, while “similar” to al-Qaeda and ISIS, “has greater potential” for impacting negatively on the region and the world. He added: “Iran has exceeded all limits, and this has serious repercussions on world peace.” Moreover, distributed on the sidelines of the meeting were summaries and some copies of newly released CIA documents from the 2011 Navy SEAL raid that killed Osama bin Laden. This observer has not read the physical documents but they allegedly contain demonstrative evidence that Iran provided funds, military advisers, staffers, travel documents and coordination to al Qaeda. Similar accusations are made with respect to claimed Iran assistance to ISIS while claiming that Iran needs ISIS to continue its mayhem in Syria and Iraq to have “Resistance” projects in both countries as it continues to colonize them. As it is doing to Yemen and has already accomplished, many believe, in Lebanon.

The main immediate cause of the current Lebanese crisis and possibly another civil war is grounded in the proxy confrontation between Iran and Saudi Arabia Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Qatar, Afghanistan, Palestine and beyond. Very recent history has witnessed permutations in these confrontations which have brought the tensions to a head. “We are in the eye of the storm,” Hariri announced on 11/12/2017 on Future TV. Lebanon’s Prime Minister communicated between the lines that the unity government he formed a year ago was to construct and honor an agreement for any Lebanese militia not to interfere in regional affairs and it was agreed that Lebanon would ‘disassociate’ from regional war. But that Hezbollah was not serious and never intended to honor the agreement per orders from Iran. And that this has been the case since Hezbollah entered Lebanon’s fractured political arena in 2005.

Hezbollah’s critics have meanwhile called for addressing the political content of Hariri’s resignation. Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea challenged Iran and Hezbollah on 11/11/2017 insisting that “if Hezbollah’s March 8 alliance truly wants PM Saad Hariri’s return they would withdraw from the crises in the region.”

When Hariri became Prime Minister, it was to be a “consensual” government. But it was never so intended by one side and was dominated by parties taking orders from Tehran.

Hariri stated in his interview with a Future TV that “Hezbollah is a regional issue, not just a Lebanese issue.” He explained to the Lebanese public that his resignation was totally his own decision dismissing as ludicrous reports that he was forced by anyone to resign. But he also made clear that he needs to focus seriously on security arrangements before returning to Lebanon. Hariri added: “The Syrian regime does not want me alive and a lot of parties do not want Saad Hariri. I Wrote the resignation letter and I had to resign in an unusual fashion for security reasons.”

It is no secret in Lebanon that Saad Hariri’s life has been in danger. In addition, confidential information from a few Western and Middle Eastern security agencies who track Hezbollah’s security movements in Lebanon reportedly warned MP Hariri that he was in imminent danger. “I remember what happened when my father was martyred. I don’t want the same thing to happen to me,” Hariri said. As noted above, his father, former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, was killed by a car bomb in Beirut in 2005 widely attributed to Hezbollah against which massive relevant, material, probative and likely juridically dispositive evidence has been amassed in the soon to rendered verdict by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) in The Hague.

On 11/12/2017 Aoun reiterated, allegedly on instructions from his handlers, that “anything declared by Prime Minister Saad Hariri from Riyadh will be a subject of suspicion.” Aoun continued, “These circumstances make anything that PM Hariri has issued or will issue, and anything attributed to him, a subject of suspicion and ambiguity.” Aoun added that Hariri’s stances “cannot be recognized as official or emanating from his free will.”

Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah has argued the same thing while instructing Al Manar, Al Mayadeen, Press TV and other Iran paid for media not to air Hariri’s news conference of 11/12/2017. Lebanon’s President also instructed Lebanon’s state television channel to black out Hariri’s interview. Why Aoun deemed it in the interest of the Lebanese people not to listen to their Prime Minister’s interview on an important security issue has not been explained despite media requests. Others insist Aoun was instructed by Hezbollah not to allow Hariri’s interview to be aired.

So what is one to think about Aoun’s complaint that Hariri was somehow insubordinate by not detailing to him in advance his security plans? Or, perhaps more relevant, to Lebanon’s Internal Security Agency (ISF) or the Lebanese army? The frank answer is that Aoun is considered by many in Lebanon and the region as Iran’s agent and not Lebanon’s legitimate President. Aoun cannot be trusted with Lebanese security matters because many if not most of Lebanon’s supposed secrets are channeled from his office to Hezbollah and then to the Iranian Embassy where reports claim Nasrallah’s second favorite hideout is four levels underground.

Aoun was appointed by Hezbollah. Aoun cannot be trusted to safeguard Lebanon’s security issues, many Western countries and even members of Lebanon’s Parliament believe. With respect to the ISF, it is considered largely controlled by Hezbollah via its Shia pro-Hezbollah Director, Abbas Ibrahim. Many Lebanese and foreign observers also believe this to be the case with Lebanon’s army, most of its soldier’s being Shia. Lebanon’s army, according to two Sunni soldiers on active duty, increasingly takes its orders from Hezbollah as was exposed during the recent Lebanon-Syria border fighting. The Lebanese army has also been accused of protecting many of the Iran/Hezbollah arms depots in south Lebanon and along the Syrian border in the Bekaa Valley. This, as UNIFIL tends to nod off when Hezbollah units appear in a particular area.

So it may not be too surprising that PM Hariri did not telegraph to perceived Iran-Hezbollah loyalists the advanced details of his plans and movements. Nor is it particularly suspicious, contrary to some media assertions. Or that Mr. Hariri did not cancel some appointments for a subsequent couple of days and that is somehow proof that he was kidnapped. In fact, the Prime Minister did not suddenly cancel his schedule until he departed Lebanon so as not to arouse suspicions and alert his possible assailants. Most of us would likely have done the same thing.

PM Saad Hariri’s speech accused Iran of “meddling in the region” and blamed Hezbollah for taking Lebanon “hostage” and that he had reason to fear assassination like his late father, Prime Minister Rafik Hariri who was killed on February 14, 2005. With unusual bluntness, Saad Hariri informed the world that the hands which seek to subjugate Lebanon and the region “will be cut off.” Hariri declared that it is no longer sensible for him to share a government with the armed “Resistance” militia Hezbollah.

Lebanon’s gifted people now face yet another escalating and dangerous crisis largely imposed from without but made deadlier by local collaborators and foreign proxies.

Saudi Arabia has rounded up so many top officials that it is running out of space at the Ritz-Carlton in which to jail them, like reported by economist.com. Since November 4th more than 200 princes, ministers and businessmen have been detained. A rather more quotidian Marriott has been commandeered to house the overflow. Billed as an anti-corruption sweep, the jailing also feels unmistakably like a purge of political foes.

Other dramatic changes are also under way as the country pushes forwards with major economic and cultural reforms. Women will be allowed to drive from next summer. Cinemas may soon be opened for the first time in decades, as will new tourist facilities. Saudi Arabia wants to build a high-tech $500bn economic zone on its north-west coast. At the centre of all these changes is Muhammad bin Salman (widely known as MBS), the young crown prince poised to become Saudi Arabia’s strongest ruler in decades. How did he amass so much influence?

King Abdel-Aziz, the founder of the modern Saudi state, had dozens of male heirs. To reduce rivalries in his sprawling family, he established a horizontal line of succession, with power passing from one son to the next. One, King Saud, was deposed in 1964, partly over fears that he wanted his own son to succeed him. Other royals carved out fiefs: one prince oversaw the army, another the foreign ministry. But the sons of King Abdel-Aziz have aged.

The youngest is now in his 70s. The current king, Salman, is fading. The gerontocracy has struggled with the task of running a modern, youthful state, where 59% of the 20m citizens are under 30. King Salman started to address this in 2015 by naming a member of the younger generation—his nephew, Muhammad bin Nayef—as crown prince. He lasted just two years in the role. King Salman cast him aside in June and replaced him with his favoured son, Muhammad bin Salman. This marked the first time a Saudi monarch had officially tried a dynastic transfer of power.

The new crown prince wasted little time consolidating power. After the recent shake-up, which he orchestrated in the name of his frail father, Prince Muhammad and his allies control all three branches of the security services. For only the second time in Saudi history, the foreign minister is a commoner, a career diplomat who owes his position to the ruling duo. In September, police detained dozens of critics, among them two prominent Muslim scholars.

The threatening message of the arrests seems to have been understood. The king’s decision to end the ban on women driving, which followed, attracted little dissent, even from the conservative religious establishment. Nor has there been much grumbling over the purge. The Saudi king has long been primus inter pares, but Prince Muhammad is breaking this delicate balance. Though he casts himself as a youthful reformer, he is transforming Saudi Arabia into a truly absolute monarchy.

The defenders of the crown prince say these abrupt changes are necessary. In an era of low oil prices, Saudi Arabia needs to diversify its economy. Decades of corruption have cost the kingdom untold billions. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Prince Muhammad is seen as hard-working and clean. But his actions so far have also been destabilising.

He has shown a taste for ill-conceived foreign adventures, from a costly war in Yemen to the unsuccessful blockade of neighbouring Qatar, which has achieved little beyond dividing the Gulf Co-operation Council. Closer to home, he is ending a long period of consensual politics that ensured stability. Prince Muhammad is only 32, 49 years younger than his father. He could conceivably rule the kingdom for decades. But the list of his enemies is already long.

Terror group at the center of Lebanon’s current crisis serves as Tehran’s proxy throughout region, but its main focus remains Israel’s destruction, like reported by toi.com

Lebanon’s Hezbollah terror group, blamed by Saad Hariri for his shock resignation as premier, has grown over the three decades since its founding into a mighty army used by Iran to project regional influence.

Hariri criticized the powerful Shiite movement for its meddling across the Middle East during a televised interview from Saudi Arabia on Sunday, his first media appearance since he stepped down on November 4.

Despite being branded a terrorist organization by the United States and Gulf countries and targeted with economic sanctions, Hezbollah has risen to play a decisive role in regional conflicts.

Hezbollah has participated in Hariri’s government for almost a year.

From Lebanon to Syria, Yemen, and Iraq, the terror organization has matured into Iran’s most useful “tool” — drawing the ire of Tehran’s regional rival Riyadh, analysts say.

‘Most important tool’

“The most important Iranian tool in the region is Hezbollah,” said Hilal Khashan, political science professor at the American University of Beirut.

Hezbollah has trained Iraq’s powerful Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary forces, Khashan said, and even has “operatives” in Yemen’s war to back Shiite Huthi rebels targeted by Riyadh.

Combining its military expertise and political savvy, Hezbollah has matured into Iran’s “crown jewel” in the Middle East, said Joseph Bahout at the Carnegie Foundation think tank.

It now serves as a “model” for all Iran-allied groups in the region, from Syria’s pro-regime militias to Iraq’s Hashed al-Shaabi and the Iran-backed Huthi fighters, Bahout said.

Hariri’s criticism

These military ventures formed the crux of Hariri’s criticism of Hezbollah during his landmark interview on Sunday from Riyadh.

Breaking his silence more than a week after his resignation, Hariri called on Hezbollah to commit to Lebanon’s policy to “disassociate” from regional conflicts.

“I tell Hezbollah: It is in your interest, if we want to protect Lebanon… to leave some of the areas that you have entered,” Hariri said.

He zoned in on Yemen, saying Hezbollah’s involvement in the protracted conflict there had drawn Saudi rage: “Did the kingdom have any position towards Hezbollah before the war in Yemen?”

Hariri’s surprise resignation sparked worries that Lebanon would be caught in the crossfire of the bloody, decades-long power struggle between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

“This resignation indicates Saudi’s will to put a stop to Iran’s expansion,” said international relations expert Karim Bitar.

Hezbollah had become Iran’s “trump card” in the Middle East, added Bitar, of the Paris-based Institute of International and Strategic Affairs.

Since its founding in the 1980s during Lebanon’s grinding war, Hezbollah has relied heavily on Iran for financial, political and military support.

It is the only faction to have retained its arsenal of weapons after the end of Lebanon’s 15-year civil conflict in 1990.

Here is a look at the 35-year-old terror group, its sources of power and regional role.

Beginnings and leaders

Hezbollah was formed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard in 1982 to fight against Israel during the Lebanon War, known by Israel as Operation Peace for Galilee.

Under the leadership of Hassan Nasrallah, who took over in 1992 after his predecessor, Abbas Mussawi, was killed in an Israeli airstrike, the group moved from seeking to implement an Iranian-style Islamic republic in Lebanon to focusing on fighting Israel and integrating into Lebanon’s sectarian-based politics. Nasrallah, now 57, has played a key role in ending a feud among Shiites, focusing attention on fighting Israel and later expanding the group’s regional reach.

Wars with Israel

Hezbollah became the main group firing rockets and launching attacks against Israel and the buffer zone it established in southern Lebanon in 1985. In 1996, Israel began Operation Grapes of Wrath to end the terror attacks.

Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 2000 was hailed as a victory for Hezbollah. In the same year, Hezbollah captured three Israeli soldiers and a businessman in cross-border raids, and later negotiated a swap in 2004, releasing hundreds of prisoners and terrorists.

Then in 2006, Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, sparking a 34-day war that killed 159 Israelis and more than 1,000 Lebanese.

A UN-brokered ceasefire brought thousands of international peacekeeping troops to police the Israeli-Lebanese border.

Hezbollah at home

Hezbollah’s popularity at home didn’t only stem from its opposition to Israel. With a weak Lebanese state, the Iranian-sponsored group, like most other sects, provided a vast array of social services for its supporters, through education, health and social networks. But as the terror group sought more executive and legislative powers following Israel’s 2000 withdrawal, it worked to funnel some of its support through state institutions to reach the broader public.

Another turning point came in 2008, when heavily armed Hezbollah fighters seized control of vast parts of Beirut, flexing its power domestically for the first time. The show of force followed attempts by Lebanon’s Western-backed government to curb the terror group’s influence by dismantling its telecommunication network.

Hezbollah has been the most powerful player in Lebanon’s politics ever since. Saudi Arabia and Iran, which backed opposite sides inside Lebanon, ended a two-year deadlock over electing a president by tacitly approving a power-sharing deal that effectively enshrined Hezbollah’s new powerful role. With that, Hariri, a Sunni, headed a unity government and Michel Aoun, a Hezbollah ally, became president.

Regional footprint

Hezbollah sent its gunmen to fight alongside the forces of Syrian President Bashar Assad in 2012, providing a significant boost to the overstretched military, and turning the tide of the war. It was also crucial to safeguarding the Shiite terror group’s access to Syria, the land corridor through which it is believed to get its weapons from Iran.

Citing estimates based on diplomatic reports and open-source data, Thanassis Cambanis, a fellow at the Century Foundation, said some 20,000 to 30,000 armed men, including 4,000 core fighters as well as local militiamen and tribesmen, are under Hezbollah’s command in the fighting in Syria and Lebanon.

This war has allowed Hezbollah’s fighters to improve their interoperability, working closely with the Russian military and other Iranian-backed militias from Iraq or Afghanistan.

Hezbollah is also believed to have increased its military facilities in Syria’s Qalamoun mountains and in the Golan Heights, as well as throughout Lebanon. It is believed to have built munitions factories there and Israeli officials estimate it has an arsenal of 150,000 missiles.

“It has crossed a military threshold,” Cambanis said. “Hezbollah today possesses a credible deterrent against preemptive war by its opponents.”

Hezbollah backing for Yemen’s Houthi rebels has been harder to prove, though the structure and rhetoric of the Shiite Yemeni group mirrors that of Hezbollah. Saudi Arabia accuses Hezbollah and Iran of providing the Houthis with training and financial support in the stalemated war that is causing a humanitarian disaster.

Saudi authorities said a recently intercepted missile near Riyadh airport, the longest-range yet used by the Houthis, had Iranian markings, confirmed by the Americans. In addition, small arms shipments allegedly from Iran were confiscated before reaching Yemen. And Saudi TV networks have aired what they say was evidence of Hezbollah fighters training the Houthis.

Fears of new war with Israel

There were even fears of a new war with Israel, after Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah accused Saudi Arabia last week of asking Tel Aviv to bomb Lebanon.

But any new conflict between Lebanon and its southern neighbor risked spilling over into the broader region, experts have said.

“This time,” said Bahout, “because of the extension in Syria and Iraq, it won’t be a war on Hezbollah only. It will very quickly flare up.”

Nasrallah’s forces could respond to Israeli pressure by striking elsewhere, including the United Arab Emirates or even Saudi Arabia.

For Bitar, a convergence of factors — including “an impulsive Saudi Arabia, backed by an equally, extremely impulsive American president, and rising rhetoric in Israel” — could indicate a war was near.

“But at this stage, we are still in a system where there is mutual deterrence, a balance of terror,” he said.

“The two parties know that an eventual war would be devastating for both sides.”

If you live long enough, nothing will surprise you. So it was that when Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri resigned during an unannounced visit to Saudi Arabia, few within Lebanon’s political society, already scarred by war and bruised by civil strife, were truly shocked, like reported by middle-east-online.com.

However, like seagulls following a trawler, speculation trailed Hariri’s stepping down. For some, his departure points to the renewed vigour and direction of Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy. For others, as they seek the public stage to bemoan the seemingly forced exit of one of Lebanon’s most prominent politicians, they secretly mourn the loss of a political watchdog who had assumed the role of silent partner. For a public beset by corruption, a failing economy and civil unrest, the country’s long-promised elections stand as a desperate, if diminishing, respite from the uncertainty of the present.

On the surface, Hariri’s resignation November 4 led many to believe that it had been forced by his Saudi patrons, who gave him no choice but to announce the dissolution of his alliance with Lebanese President Michel Aoun, a Hezbollah ally, in such dramatic fashion. At the time of their union, the political marriage between Hariri and Aoun had been touted as having been undertaken with the blessing of the international community, including Hariri’s sponsors in Riyadh and Hezbollah’s allies in Tehran.

However, like an errant husband, Hezbollah soon strayed, committing to hostile action in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and increasing its military commitment to Bashar Assad in Syria. While Aoun was keen to explain and justify these actions, Hariri stood silent.

Lebanese political activist Lokman Slim said he sees Hariri’s departure as emblematic of larger changes taking place across the region and, principally, in Saudi policy towards Lebanon.

“Essentially Saad Hariri lost his political purchasing power as an ally to the Saudis,” Slim said, “especially after he proved useless in standing up to Hezbollah and its hostile acts.”

Slim characterised the new Saudi policy as a shift from “its former practice of outsourcing its Lebanese agenda to local Sunni families and actors,” saying they have now “opted to do it themselves and thus Hariri has been downgraded to a tool rather than a political contractor.”

Ironically, those who most publicly mourned Hariri’s departure were the same factions whose ambitions his position had been intended to check, namely Aoun and Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah. Behind their crocodile tears lies the inescapable fact that both Aoun and Iran’s other Lebanese allies had lost the Sunni cover that Hariri and his political career had afforded them.

As Lebanon looks internally for the answers for Hariri’s departure, it omits the wider world in which it exists and the Saudi petrodollars that have been keeping it afloat for years with little or nothing offered in return. If anything, Hariri’s departure has proven that it is not enough to simply stay silent and look to the international community to check Hezbollah and Iran’s expansion when the expectation is that these things must be opposed and opposed publicly.

Looking forward, many of the Lebanese factions say that Hariri’s resignation, despite its magnitude, can be sidestepped and a new government formed. Many of the proponents of this school fail to recognise that a more sensible direction is to allow Hariri’s government to execute its caretaker duties and carry the country towards the election of a much-needed new parliament.

Khalil Gebara, the interior minister’s adviser for election affairs, said: “We at the ministry are capable of running the elections on time, provided all factions concerned have the political will to see it through.”

Gebara, who previously served on Hariri’s team, added that “despite the many logistical and political challenges of parliamentary elections, it might still be easier to conduct than trying to conjure up a new weaker cabinet.”

Hariri’s resignation and all that went into its details unquestionably mark a watershed moment in the history of Lebanon. However, rather than worrying about where Hariri is and what happened with him in Riyadh, the Lebanese are better asking themselves where the Lebanese state is and how can we bring it back from its local and regional captors.

If the Middle East is at least in part a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, then Lebanon may be called its western front. For nearly two generations, Riyadh and Tehran have vied for influence there, as the country has been, with a few interruptions of stability, at once a hostage to and the object of their competition. The competition resumed this week, and it appears that Saudi Arabia is losing, like reported by geopoliticalfutures.com.

On Nov. 4, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his resignation in a recorded message aired on Saudi media. In the message, he criticized Iran for interfering in Arab affairs and criticized Hezbollah for holding his country captive. He resigned, he said, because there was a plot to kill him. The next day, the Saudi minister of state for Arabian Gulf affairs accused Lebanon of declaring war on his country. Then, on Nov. 9, a Reuters report suggested that Hariri was coerced into resigning by the Saudis and is being held in the kingdom. The Saudi government has since called on all its citizens in Lebanon to immediately return home. Tensions have run high before, but the past week has been particularly acrimonious.

A Country Divided

Lebanon is a country divided, home as it is to Shiite, Sunni, Christian and Druze communities. Civil war wrecked the country for 15 years until a power-sharing agreement was reached in 1989. The treaty was in part a reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which told their proxy groups that participated in the war to settle their differences. The accord named Syria the overseer of Lebanon, and for the next two decades, Hezbollah, a Shiite Islamist movement backed by Syria and Iran, gradually became the most powerful force in Lebanon.

It owes much of its rise to the Israeli invasion in 1982. The Israeli military remained in southern Lebanon until 2000, and in doing so gave Hezbollah an excuse to maintain a massive armed wing – even after it joined the political mainstream. It drew criticism after an international tribunal found Hezbollah to be involved with Syrian intelligence operatives in the 2005 assassination of Hariri’s father, former Prime Minister and Saudi functionary Rafik Hariri. Syria was forced to withdraw tens of thousands of troops it had stationed in Lebanon, but it maintained its influence through intelligence assets and through Hezbollah, which was jointly managed by Iran.

For years, Hezbollah’s armed wing was more powerful than the Lebanese military. Nurtured by the Iranians, Hezbollah would later withstand the 2006 invasion by Israel, and its resilience only added to its clout – and, by extension, to Iran’s. It became so influential that it was able to engineer Saad Hariri’s ouster in January 2011. A few weeks later, the Arab Spring started, and by March it had reached Syria.

For Riyadh, the uprising in Syria was a godsend. The kingdom had been losing ground to Tehran for some time, so if the Sunni majority in Syria could topple the government of Bashar Assad – which was aligned with Iran – then it would have broken the otherwise uninterrupted arc of influence Tehran had from Iran to the Mediterranean Sea. It would also weaken Hezbollah.

But it was not to be. The Syrian government, backed by massive amounts of Iranian (and Russian) support, reclaimed territory it had earlier lost to the rebels. Six years later, the government is nominally still in place. Through it all the Saudis and Iranians wanted Lebanon to stay out of the conflict. The Saudis were losing Syria and Iraq to Iran, and they therefore could not afford to lose Lebanon as well. The Iranians, for their part, had the upper hand and had no reason to disturb that reality.

Saudi Arabia had meanwhile been supporting Salafist jihadists in the Syrian conflict, hoping that they could effect regime change where the Saudi military could not. Instead, Riyadh inadvertently empowered groups likes al-Qaida and the Islamic State. And their rise actually undermined Saudi Arabia’s position in Lebanon. The main political Sunni faction there, Hariri’s Future Movement party, was in a state of decay, having been challenged for years by Sunni hardliners. Non-Sunni factions were scared of what empowered radical Sunni groups in Syria would do to them if Assad lost the war. Hezbollah’s participation in the Syrian civil war, then, benefited Saudi Arabia’s enemies in Lebanon.

Few Options

The Lebanese peace agreement from 1989 was acceptable for Saudi Arabia – acceptable but not optimal. According to the agreement, the president would be a Christian, the prime minister would be a Sunni and the speaker of the parliament would be a Shiite. All major parliamentary factions would be represented in the Cabinet. The Lebanese presidency for years had been held by individuals who were neutral but sympathetic to Saudi Arabia. However, a key Hezbollah ally, Michel Aoun, was elected president roughly a year ago. The Saudis begrudgingly accepted Aoun’s presidency because it allowed them to negotiate Saad Hariri’s return from political exile.

But a lot can happen in a year, and Iran is more of a threat than it once was. The degradation of the Islamic State has strengthened Iran’s position in Syria and Iraq. The Assad government, now more than ever dependent on Iran, continues to reclaim territory. The Saudis, meanwhile, have been fighting a losing war in their own backyard. In Yemen, they have been unable to defeat opposition forces led by the pro-Iranian Houthi movement. Only a few days ago, Riyadh intercepted a missile allegedly launched by Houthis and allegedly supplied by Iran.

The only place Saudi Arabia can counter Iran is in Lebanon. If Riyadh can end the uneasy peace the country has had for the past few years, it could force Iran and Hezbollah to spend less time and attention in Syria and Iraq and more in Lebanon. But Saudi Arabia has its own problems and so is unlikely to be successful in this regard. Denouncing Lebanon is an admission of just how weak Riyadh has become.

Four US special operations personnel were killed and two wounded in an attack October 4 in western Niger, an emerging hot spot of Islamist terrorist activity, like reported by middle-east-online.com.

If an Islamist armed group was responsible, as reports suggest, this would be the first known incident in which such a group has killed US military personnel on active duty in the Sahel. Western civilians, including US citizens, have died, however, in recent mass-casualty attacks by Islamist extremists. Several French military forces have lost their lives, too.

Militant groups regularly attack local targets, focusing on government officials, prisons, schools and individuals accused of collaborating with the state or French-led counterterrorism operations and UN peacekeepers in Mali.

Analysts have claimed that the heavy-handed approach of local security forces contributed to instability. Niger is a key transit point for African migrants seeking to reach Europe via Libya and the Mediterranean.

An often overlooked factor is the French economic interest across the region, which boasts gold, uranium, gas, coltan, manganese, lithium and rare earth minerals.

Mehdi Taje of the Institut de recherche stratégique de l’Ecole Militaire in Paris, said: “The geographical reality in this region allows certain states to position themselves militarily to better control the (mineral) wealth of the Maghreb and West Africa.”

General Vincent Desportes, who lectures at Science Po Paris, said French engagement in Mali in 2013, the interests of Areva, a world leader on nuclear power, and its access to Niger’s uranium would have been at risk. A report to the French Senate in 2013 asked the government to ensure the security of French access to the Arlit uranium mine in Niger.

One should not forget that it was the US invasion of Iraq and the Western-led destruction of the Qaddafi regime in 2011 in Libya that destabilised Mali and led to the massive French Serval operation launched in 48 hours in January 2013 to stop well-armed groups of northern Malians who had served in the Libyan Army and fled the country in 2012 from attacking Bamako.

The deterioration of security across the Sahel is the consequence of unsolved local tribal and social conflicts that were, more often than not, brutally repressed rather than politically addressed.

Two outside factors poured oil on the fire: The destruction of the Iraqi and Libyan states by the United States, the United Kingdom and France in 2003 and 2011 resulted in the collapse of the army and security apparatus in both countries.

Many officers turned into effective “jihadi terrorists” as a result. When Libya collapsed, Tuaregs from northern Mali, an area the southern leaders of that country had done little to develop and who had sought employment in Qaddafi’s army, returned home so to speak and by advancing on Bamako in January 2012, prompted the French intervention.

Neither in Iraq, nor in Libya did Western powers show any sign of strategic thinking about the possible consequences of toppling existing regimes by force.

Approximately 4,000 French troops were deployed, with no debate in parliament in Paris. This morphed into the Berkhane operation in August 2014. It was never discussed by French deputies.

Beyond Mali and Niger, terrorist attacks have spread across the region. Troops from Niger participate in the Nigeria-led Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) to counter Boko Haram and five Sahel countries known as the G5, including Niger, have proposed a similar joint force to pursue Mali-based terrorist groups and enhance border security.

Niger boasts one of the largest number — 800 — of US troops in Africa, eight times as many as when former US President Barack Obama started the ball rolling in 2013. The US State Department has sought to build up the capacity of Niger’s security forces for security and counterterrorism for 15 years and large sums of money have been devoted to providing the country with counterterrorism equipment, training and strengthening the agriculture sector.

Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world. Military coups and rebellions and food security crisis are recurrent. The US organisation Freedom House asserted that Niger’s security challenges have “served as an alibi” for the administration of President Mahamadou Issoufou “to restrict freedoms and civil liberties.”

In Mali, the Tuareg north has rebelled many times since independence and Boko Haram has thrived on the misery and corruption so characteristic of government in northern Nigeria.

The United States created the US Africa Command (Africom) in 2007 to fight terrorism in Africa and, as US Defence Secretary James Mattis made clear last April, fully supports French-led military operations. The French commitment, as President Emmanuel Macron pointed out in May when he spoke at the French military base in Gao, Mali, is open-ended.

African troops, who do much of the fighting, are often accused of violations of human rights. The region is rife with tribal, economic and political grievances that are not addressed. Smuggling — of cocaine from South America and increasingly of illegal Africans migrants trying to get to Europe — means that Islamist terrorists morph into smugglers or gangsters without anyone being able to say who is who.

Meanwhile, younger imams across the region, trained in the rigorous Wahhabi doctrine of Islam, have been increasingly trained in Saudi Arabia.

All of which suggests that, if you describe the region as a bed of nails, the only answer is a hammer.

A recent report to the US Congress expressed concern about US military rules of engagement and force protection in what is a shadowy war with an unclear strategy, of which the American public knows little.

France’s much-vaunted move of renovating its policy in West Africa looks increasingly like a facelift of neo-colonial behaviour. Selling sophisticated weapons to very poor countries whose elites are notoriously corrupt may be fine for the armament industry, as Desportes concedes, but it will hardly bring peace and development to the region.

Those who choose to see it as part of a global war on terror should read the report published by the Association Malienne des Droits de l’Homme (AMDH). It may provide second thoughts about the wisdom of the policy France and the United States are pursuing in the Sahel.

Time is running out fast for Daesh, the terrorist group that first appeared in late 2013 and within months was able to claim vast swaths of Iraqi and Syrian territories on which it proclaimed its so-called caliphate, like reported by arabnews.com.

In recent days Iraqi forces were able to liberate the organization’s last stronghold in Iraq, the town of Qaim, while Daesh fighters were forced to retreat into the Syrian enclave of Boukamal. About the same time on the Syrian side, regime forces conquered the group’s last major base of Deir Ezzor, pushing fleeing militants into the Euphrates River basin, where they now find themselves wedged between government forces and fighters belonging to the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.

And so we reach what is being described as the “end game” in a long and costly war against one of the most brutal, and perplexing, terrorist groups in living memory. Its military defeat will constitute an important milestone for a region that has been stunned by the quick emergence of Daesh, its ability to rally supporters from all over the world and its devastating legacy that has left deep scars on the people and culture of this part of the world. Its hijack of Islam is perhaps the issue that will challenge and occupy Muslim scholars and leaders for a long time to come.

But while its downfall will be celebrated as a major victory by all those who were part of the anti-Daesh coalition, the euphoria should not overshadow a number of grim facts. Religious extremism has become a global phenomenon and while Daesh, and before it Al-Qaeda, embraced a strict, fanatical and contentious interpretation of Islam, the field remains open for other fundamentalist groups to adopt and follow similar doctrines. The task of confronting religious extremism in our region is enormous and is directly linked to social, cultural, economic and political complexities and challenges that we face.

A third wave of Islamist radicalism is therefore not far fetched, especially in countries that are going through dangerous transitions in the wake of the so-called Arab Spring and its outcome. Sectarian politics and ethno-confessional systems of government will provide fertile grounds for radical groups driven by religious zeal among people who feel marginalized and disenfranchised.

But a more immediate concern will be the fate of thousands of former Daesh fighters, including foreign militants, who had answered the call and joined the terror group, particularly in Iraq and Syria. Those who escaped will either head home or go underground, posing a clear danger to regional governments. Both scenarios present an awkward challenge. Some countries, such as Tunisia, have decided not to repatriate citizens who had joined Daesh. Others have established special programs to rehabilitate those who give themselves up. The issue is complicated and there are no easy answers.

But there is a danger that in the wake of Daesh’s defeat in Syria and Iraq, returning extremists and local sympathizers will carry out retaliatory attacks in their native lands. While the threat of attacks on major targets will slowly recede, the fear that lone wolves will be active for some time is reasonable. This year alone there have been horrific attacks against innocents in London, Paris, Barcelona and more recently in New York. All these terrorist acts were carried out by individuals who were inspired by Daesh but were not directly connected to it.

The period following the final defeat of Daesh in this part of the world will be the most dangerous. Misfits will attempt to carry out reprisals in the name of the defeated group. And while Daesh succumbs on the ground in Syria and Iraq, its proxies continue to be active in the Sinai, Libya, Somalia, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Furthermore, eliminating the group’s presence in the virtual world will prove difficult, although not impossible. It will require a global effort and some of the measures adopted by governments to regulate the online space will be controversial.

As the dust settles in the wake of Daesh’s anticipated defeat, we should begin a thorough review of the events of the past few years that enabled this fanatical cult to emerge and expand. The debate should not be limited to the geopolitical tremors and conspiracies that shook the region, but to the factors that led to the creation of the foreign extremists’ phenomenon, especially in Europe, and the support that this group with its perverted version of Islam was able to find among Sunni Muslims in Iraq and Syria and elsewhere.

As we search for answers we should not forget the thousands who perished under Daesh’s ruthless rule, the hundreds of thousands who were displaced, members of ethnic minorities who were killed, raped and enslaved and the cultural heritage that was destroyed for ever. We resolve not to let something like this happen again.