TRIPOLI/ARBIL: UAE warplanes secretly bombed Islamist militia targets in Libya, apparently catching Washington off guard, as turmoil in the North African country deepened with the Islamists naming a rival premier. US officials said on Monday that the United Arab Emirates jets launched two attacks in seven days on the Islamists in Tripoli using bases in Egypt. An Emirati official told AFP only that his country had “no reaction” to the report, while Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukri yesterday denied any “direct” role by his country.
The air strikes signalled a step towards direct action by regional Arab states that previously have fought proxy wars in Libya, Syria and Iraq in a struggle for power and influence. Arab responsibility for the attacks would also add to a picture of the West’s regional allies acting increasingly independently in the absence of decisive US involvement, seeking security goals with which Washington may not agree. The bombing raids were first reported by The New York Times, and Islamist forces in Libya had also charged that Egypt and the UAE – two of the region’s main anti-Islamist powers – were behind them. “The UAE carried out those strikes,” one US official told AFP on condition of anonymity. Asked about the account, a senior US official said “the report is accurate”.
The United States did not take part or provide any assistance in the bombing raids, said the two officials, who could not confirm that Egypt and the UAE had left Washington totally in the dark about the attacks. One US official said the two countries and Saudi Arabia have been supporting for months a renegade general’s campaign against Libyan militant groups, but that the Saudis don’t appear to have played a role in recent strikes. Another official said Washington knew about Egyptian and UAE plans for a possible operation and warned them against going through with the effort.
The first strikes, on Monday last week, focused on militia targets in Tripoli, including a small weapons depot, according to the Times. A second round south of the city early Saturday targeted rocket launchers, military vehicles and a warehouse, it said. Those strikes may have been a bid to prevent the capture of the airport, but the Islamist militia forces eventually prevailed anyway.
The UAE – which has spent billions on US-made warplanes and advanced weaponry – provided the military aircraft, aerial refuelling planes and crews to bomb Libya, while Cairo offered access to its air bases, the Times said. Egypt’s Shoukri said: “We have no direct tie to any military operation in Libya.” However, he told journalists in Cairo: “We help the Libyan armed forces by supplying their requirements for training.”
In an indication of the sensitivity of the issue, the publication of the assertions was followed within hours by a joint statement by the United States and European allies cautioning against foreign interference. Outside involvement would worsen divisions in Libya and slow progress in its political transition, it said.
Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE view Islamist militants in the region as a serious threat and have cooperated against what they see as a shared danger. “I think this strike is the unsurprising result of a momentum we’ve seen building in Libya… and within the region amongst Egypt and these Gulf states,” said Frederic Wehrey of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “I believe there was no consultation with the West,” said Wehrey, a specialist on the Gulf, Libya and US policy in the Middle East.
Inter-Arab Relations
If the raids were indeed carried out by Egypt and the UAE, it would open a new chapter in inter-Arab relations, said Theodore Karasik, research director at Dubai think tank INEGMA. “The feeling is that America hasn’t stood up for its values and policies in the region,” he said, referring to a common Arab view that the US administration has been hesitant in supporting rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. “So these states will now take it upon themselves to act. Ironically this is, in broad terms, what Washington has been asking them to do – solve their own problems. The important point here is that regional forces are taking their own path to supporting proxies,” said Karasik. “This is the result of the region wanting to police itself without waiting for extra-regional decisions.”
Abdulkhaleq Abdulla, political science professor at Emirates University, said: “The lesson of Syria still resonates… that you cannot depend on America or the West… America is no longer reliable.” Abdulla said that if the UAE had taken part in the raid, it must have had “very compelling reasons to do so”. If Libya became a failed state and an exporter of extremists then the stability of neighbouring Egypt would be at risk, he added. The world was busy with many other crises, and so action may have been needed to prevent extremists taking over, he said.
Whoever carried out the raids, they were in tune with wider efforts by Egypt and conservative Sunni Muslim allies to roll back the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood – a regional Islamist movement – and its sponsor, Qatar. While policy differences between Washington and its Arab allies are nothing new, the propensity of some to go it alone in pursuing their aims is novel. Egypt provides a clear example. Saudi Arabia was furious when veteran ruler Hosni Mubarak was toppled in 2011 and the Muslim Brotherhood, long mistrusted by Riyadh, later won power. Qatar helped to fund the elected Brotherhood government of President Mohamed Morsi, who was ousted by the army last year.
Riyadh and the UAE have since provided money to support Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, who as a general led the takeover and has since been elected president after suppressing the Brotherhood. US officials have looked askance at the heavy-handed political and security tactics of Sisi’s authorities, which they believe have helped to polarise Egyptian society. Sisi’s men now fear that Islamists, if left to flourish in Libya’s disorder, could lay the foundations for the return of the Brotherhood in Egypt one day.
For most Gulf Arabs, the Brotherhood is anathema because its ideology challenges the principle of conservative dynastic rule long followed in the Gulf. Gulf Arab states take Egypt’s stability seriously, regarding the Arab world’s most populous nation as their chief regional ally in their confrontation with Shiite Iran. Riyadh sees the Iranian administration as an expansionist power bent on exporting revolution to the Arab world and interfering in the affairs of neighbouring Gulf states. Tehran denies any such interference.
Kurds Get Weapons from Iran
Separately, Iran was the first country to provide Iraq’s embattled autonomous Kurdish region with weapons to fight off jihadist-led militants, president Massud Barzani said yesterday. “The Islamic Republic of Iran was the first state to help us… and it provided us with weapons and equipment,” Barzani said at a joint news conference with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. Militants led by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group launched a major offensive in June that overran large areas of Iraq, and began a renewed push earlier this month that saw Kurdish forces pushed back towards their regional capital of Arbil.
The Kurdish setbacks sparked a campaign of US air strikes in northern Iraq and an international effort to provide them with arms and ammunition, and they have since managed to claw back some territory from the militants. Iran has a direct interest in bolstering Kurdish forces, as a large section of its border with Iraq is made up of Kurdish-controlled areas.
Zarif, who arrived in Iraq on Sunday, reiterated his assertion that while Iran is supporting its neighbour to the west, it is not doing so with forces on the ground. “The Iraqi people require assistance, including defence assistance, but not soldiers… We do not have any soldiers in Iraq, we don’t intend to send soldiers to Iraq,” Zarif said. There have been reports of Iranian forces fighting in Iraq, and despite Zarif’s denial, evidence points to a more direct military role by Tehran. State media reported that an Iranian pilot was killed fighting in Iraq, and several Iranian Su-25 warplanes are also in the country.
– Agencies
