How tiny Qatar plays a double game for big global gain
In August 2004, a dozen masked gunmen blocked the car of French journalists Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot in war-torn Iraq and kidnapped them.
The French investigative journalist was traveling from Baghdad to Najaf with his Syrian driver.
The driver was released in November, but the French journalists had to remain in captivity of shadowy Islamic forces in Iraq for four months before Qatar negotiated their release.
This was one of the first hostage cases negotiated by Qatar, which is now a fully professional hostage negotiator.
The story of Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot becomes more interesting after their release was secured. Both were grateful to Qatar for the talks, but were determined to examine the overall role of the small country.
What they came up with was explosive.
In their book, ‘The Qatar Papers’, Malbrunot and Chesnot showed with data and ground visits how Qatar was funding the Muslim Brotherhood, considered a terrorist organization by its Arab neighbors, and 140 mosques across Europe, Islamic There was a project of schools and centres.
Malbrunot also questioned Qatar’s hostage-negotiating role.
What they suggest is a double game by a small oil-rich Arab nation that has spread its influence globally. Through its game of elaborate smoke and mirrors, Qatar has taken the front seat in many negotiations.
How did India free its eight former navy personnel?
However, on February 12, 2024, the world saw something rare. People held captive by Qatar, the world’s top hostage negotiator, have been released.
In a major diplomatic victory for India, seven out of eight Former Indian Navy personnel previously on death row in Qatar brought back To India. Something unimaginable.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s equation with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani played an important role. New Delhi’s backdoor diplomacy ultimately made the release of the marines possibleaccording to sources.
The Indian national, who was released on February 12, worked with Dahra Global. He was arrested in August 2022 in an alleged espionage case. Given the sensitivity of the case, the allegations against the Indians were not made public.
PM Modi spoke to the Emir of Qatar on Thursday (February 15)According to reports, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha “expressed his deep appreciation” over the release of the Indian Navy veterans. PM Modi’s visit to Qatar came after his visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Qatar, chief hostage negotiator
Qatar is a small state – about 284 times smaller than India.
However, with an autocratic foreign policy that makes use of proxies and oil wealth, the Arab country has come to wield influence that is unmatched by any other country.
It is the world’s top hostage negotiator, a role that Qatar has played very deftly. Its location has also come as a blessing.
It is located between Sunni Iran and Shia Saudi Arabia, two countries that compete fiercely for control of the Middle East. Qatar shares a major oil and gas field with Iran, while its only land border is with Saudi Arabia.
Qatar has also hosted the offices of Hamas and the Taliban and has leveraged those ties to gain leverage. It is reportedly funding the Muslim Brotherhood, which seeks regime change in Islamic countries with hereditary rule.
Qatar also uses Doha-based Al Jazeera to escalate conflicts or give them the desired flavor, and then jump into them as a peace broker.
Interestingly, the first video of hapless French journalists Malbrunot and Chesnot being held captive by Islamic forces was broadcast by Al Jazeera.
Above everything else, Qatar has occupied the seat at the head of the negotiating table due to the US government’s excessive dependence on it.
Qatar is host to Hamas, Taliban and US forces
Qatar is a host of contradictions.
If it houses America’s largest military base in the Middle East, it also hosts the offices of Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that administers Gaza. Qatar was also a haven for Taliban leaders before they took over the reins of Afghanistan.
“The Taliban has maintained a political office in Doha since 2013 and on February 29, 2020, a peace agreement was negotiated and signed between the US and the Taliban, effectively paving the way for the final withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan.” Doha,” Col Rajeev Aggarwal (retd), assistant director, Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defense Studies and Analyzes (MP-IDSA), tells IndiaToday.in.
“In 2003, the US moved its Combat Air Operations Center from Saudi Arabia’s Prince Sultan Airbase to Qatar’s Al Udeid Airbase near Doha. Al Udeid hosts more than 10,000 US troops, serves as the logistics and command base for US Central Command (CENTCOM) and is critical to US military operations in the region,” says Colonel Aggarwal (Retd).
He points out that Qatar, which is slightly larger than Tripura and has a population a fraction of Delhi, has a surplus of more than $450 billion in sovereign wealth funds, which can be invested around the world.
Not just for the military base, the US government also depends on Qatar for diplomatic interventions with countries like Iran and Afghanistan and non-state actors like Hamas and Hezbollah.
“In recent times, especially after the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban in August 2021, Qatar has emerged from the shadow of big powers in the region, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, as a nation to be reckoned with and Can talk on global issues.” impact,” says Colonel Rajeev Aggarwal (retd).
Following the Taliban’s rapid capture of Kabul on August 15, 2021, the US looked to Qatar for help in evacuating thousands of people from the war-torn country. The Associated Press reports that about 40% of the 113,500 evacuees were evacuated via Qatar.
The withdrawal from Afghanistan made the US dependent on Qatar for Afghanistan-related issues. In 2021, the US signed an agreement with Qatar, making it the representative of US interests in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
“After the US withdrawal from Kabul, the US Embassy in Afghanistan operates from Doha,” says Colonel Aggarwal (retd).
However, if on one side the Qatari administration helps the US, on the other side there is the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas and the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah.
Hamas has had a political office in Doha since 2012. Qatar is providing millions of dollars in aid to residents of Hamas-controlled Gaza Since 2014. Qatar’s money is sent to Hamas through Israel.
That office has now been leveraged by Qatar to become the key negotiator in Israel-Hamas talks for the release of Israeli hostages taken by Hamas following the October 7 terrorist attacks.
“Qatar’s role in the US-Iran prisoner swap deal in September 2023 is well documented. Even in the ongoing Gaza war, Qatar is playing a key role in negotiating a ceasefire and possible peace deal with Egypt,” says Col Aggarwal (retd).
In fact, in December 2023, Qatar had helped in negotiations on the sensitive issue of hostages. With Qatar’s intervention, Israel and Hamas agreed to a ratio of three Palestinian prisoners for every civilian hostage.
Qatar’s role as negotiator questioned
Qatar has extended its sphere of influence beyond the Middle East. In 2021, it helped the return of an American journalist from Myanmar and is also trying to broker an agreement between warring Ukraine and Russia.
This role of negotiator has been questioned by Malbrunot and Chesnaught in the Qatar Papers.
French journalists suggest that Qatar, through its high-profile, secret Qatar Charity, was indirectly helping to finance Islamist groups that are themselves involved in hostage-taking. This comes even as Qatar has caved in while negotiating the release of Western hostages.
In an interview with The New Yorker for an article on Qatar’s rise as ‘the world’s hostage negotiator’, Malbrunot, one of the kidnapped French journalists and co-author of the ‘Qatar Papers’, talked about a “double game”. talked to. ,
Although Qatari officials say their bid in hostage negotiations is for humanitarian reasons, Malbrunot suggests that Qatar uses conflict and resolution to gain influence and status in an otherwise unstable region. “It’s a double game, a gray zone,” Malbrunot told The New Yorker.
To escalate the conflict and highlight its role in resolution, Qatar uses the Al Jazeera TV channel, which has been condemned for its news slant.
When Arab neighbors broke ties with Qatar
Qatar’s Arab neighbors – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt – saw through the double game and broke ties with it in 2017.
The 13 demands he presented to lift the sanctions on Qatar included freezing diplomatic relations with Iran, ending all ties with terrorist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood and Hezbollah, and shutting down Al Jazeera and its affiliate stations.
Qatar is said to have launched the Al Jazeera TV channel in 1996 with the intention of trying to add political clout to its economic assets in the region and beyond. Leaked US cables have revealed that Qatar manipulates Al Jazeera’s coverage to advance its influence and interests.
Al Jazeera was banned by the Indian government for five days in 2015 for repeatedly showing distorted maps of India.
In addition to Al Jazeera, Qatar tried to ride the Muslim Brotherhood wave in Egypt until it was ousted from power and outlawed in 2013.
The four Arab countries accused Qatar of trying to interfere in their internal affairs through proxies such as the Muslim Brotherhood.
After a 43-month embargo, the Arab neighbors restored ties with Qatar in 2021.
Qatar’s ‘political Islam projects’
Qatar has also tried to spread influence through soft power by using its wealth.
Qatar, a country with little history in football, hosting the World Cup in 2022 was one of the high points of that influence.
In 2010, it defeated the United States, South Korea, Japan and Australia to qualify for the 2022 World Cup, a process that was criticized over allegations of bribery and corruption. Despite skepticism from many quarters, Qatar successfully hosted the mega event, the 2022 World Cup.
That’s the neat side. On the other side of the use of money for influence are the Muslim Brotherhood and Qatar Charity.
The Qatar Papers, a book by French journalists Malbrunot and Chesnot, details how Qatar funds the disruptive Muslim Brotherhood despite publicly denying it.
They allege that Qatar is funding political Islam with the help of Qatar Charity, a secret NGO linked to the country’s ruling family.
The Arab Weekly speaks to ‘Qatar Papers’ co-author Christian Chesnot reveals how he and Malbrunot were astonished when they saw the scale of Qatar’s funding of political Islam.
“It was not a question of financing a mosque here and there, but a project on a European scale. We’re talking about 140 projects here from Norway in the far north to Sicily in the south and across Europe, Ukraine, Spain, Poland, Germany, France, etc.,” Chesnot said.
In that 2019 interview, the journalist whose freedom was negotiated by Qatar also revealed why the country does what it does.
Despite wealth, Qataris always felt inferior to their neighbors Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh. Their survival was essential… They could not do so militarily, given their demographic and geographic size. So, they started building a whole base of soft power through military alliances with the US and Britain, as well as sports, education, culture and investment,” Chestnut said. He calls Qataris “opportunistic” people.
Arab neighbors need to live with Qatar and the world’s complex chessboard needs its negotiating skills. Had it not been for Qatar, Hamas’s political leadership would have been pushed to a country like Iran, making negotiations very difficult. Apart from its teeming coffers, tiny Qatar’s strength lies in its duality. These allow Qatar to punch above its weight in the international arena.