Don’t laugh. Riyadh is going ahead with plans to dig a canal along its border with Qatar making it an island. But will the PR stunt distract media attention away from its own internal crisis, not to mention Qatar’s ‘independence’?
In just 12 months, the so-called Qatar Crisis – Saudi Arabia’s nefarious bid to make its tiny neighbour a pariah state – has not only failed spectacularly, but is actually making Qatar a winner, as it lugubriously embraces a destiny of autonomy – entirely manufactured by Riyadh.
Qatar has good working relations with Iran, is sympathetic to a number of groups in the region which the Saudis are sworn enemies to, and, by and large, refuses to accept Riyadh’s own regional and foreign policy. The Saudis are also envious of Qatar’s gas wealth and Al Jazeera’s impact on the news agenda around the world.
And yet, one year on, after initiating a sea and land blockade and attempting to isolate Qatar, the Saudi move has made Qatar shine. The blockade has done exactly the opposite of what was intended and Qatar now has a new lease of life, with the country embracing a new independent zeal, both commercially and geopolitically, with its leader Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani at the helm of a new nation, seen as Qatar’s own Che Guevara iconoclast.
Qatar is a winner because it has sustained the beating from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Egypt. Despite having to reorganise its trading partners, change its national carrier’s airspace corridors and work on trade with Turkey, Iran, and others, it has actually reformed and modernized its economy and boosted its image around the world as a consequence – which in turn has made the rest of the world look at the isolation led by the Saudis with even more skepticism.
It’s not just about Turkey, Iran, and Oman helping Qatar with goods on the shelves. It’s about the Qataris themselves being forced by the Saudis to reinvent themselves – a move which could threaten the already weakened six-state Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which took its ‘foreign policy’ doctrine from Riyadh. Qatar’s move is stating that this model of choosing between Saudi Arabia’s geopolitics and those of Iran and its allies (Russia and China) is outdated. Qatar is joining a tiny group of Middle Eastern countries which are looking to a more autonomous model – like Turkey – which doesn’t see Iran as a regional threat.
Qataris have tasted freedom, and free from the shackles of Saudi foreign policy bullying, are loving every minute of their shiny new state. But Riyadh is buckling under the pressure of the blunder. With both Qatar now effectively no longer a partner of the GCC (and question marks over Oman as a member, which supported Qatar) and foreign investment in Saudi Arabia crashing to an all-time low, Mohammad bin Salman (MbS) needs a new plan for Qatar.
MbS needs to dig himself out of a hole entirely created by the Qatar fiasco. And that is what he plans to do. Literally.
The Saudis believe now that despite losing considerable face around the globe for their Qatar escapade, they need a new PR plan which will distract media away from the real crisis they are facing internally themselves. With almost no foreign investors left in the Kingdom, the Saudis need an ingenious media campaign to distract journalists away from growing internal problems.
And they have one, which despite appearing a tad barmy, might just work.
Plans to dig a massive sea canal skirting along Saudi Arabia’s border with Qatar have been given the go-ahead by MbS. The bold plan, costing almost a billion dollars, is expected to be the final message to Qatar that it will be cut off forever from any land ties with Saudi Arabia – with one pro-Saudi journal even comically going as far as to warn that Saudis in their home country would not be able to travel to the World Cup in Qatar in 2022 with such a canal in place. Riyadh plans to cultivate the canal into a tourist destination with restaurants, beaches and marinas.
But the crackpot idea is fatally flawed as it is largely based on the same theme as the original one: that Qatar would be psychologically shaken too hard by being entirely dislocated at the hip with its Big Brother.
The Saudis have massively misjudged the Qataris again, it would seem. Unless of course they are hoping for an egregious amount of media coverage to the canal, which would cast a convenient shadow over the Kingdom’s deeper problems. But just how long could that be drawn out?
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