Near East Report - 07.09.2001

 

 

Near East Report (AIPAC)

Quiet Contacts

A new report shows that Israel has forged ties with the former Soviet Muslim Republics in the decade since the iron curtain fell.

While Israel’s relations with the Muslim countries of the Middle East are strained because of the continuing conflict with the Palestinians, Israel’s effort to strengthen its ties to the Muslim nations of the former Soviet Union has been a fruitful mission and is yielding promising projections for future cooperation.

These positive developments are detailed in Country Reports 2000-2001 recently published by NCSJ: Advocates on behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States and Eurasia. The group’s report, which highlights key trends occurring inside the Soviet Union’s successor states, indicates an overall warming trend in relations between Israel and the former Soviet Republics since the end of the Cold War.

While Russia’s continued assistance to Iran’s missile and nuclear programs has strained Israel-Russia ties, Israel has capitalized on the ten years since the collapse of the Soviet Union by pursuing active diplomatic ties and cooperative initiatives with the Muslim nations of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Of these six states, Israel has exchanged embassies with three, and is actively engaged in further cooperation with five.

Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan enjoy the group’s strongest relations with Israel. Uzbekistan, whose dense Muslim population is 88 percent Sunni Muslim, maintains an embassy in Israel and remains the most pro-Israel of all Central Asian republics. Kazakhstan, another predominantly Muslim country, boasts 16 Israeli government experts on-site in the fields of telecommunications, agriculture and medicine.

The main areas of cooperation between Israel and the CIS countries can be found in economic and agricultural projects. In Kazakhstan, the MASHAV (Israel’s international development cooperation program) project, a 5-year Aral Sea irrigation initiative in conjunction with the U.S. Agency for International Development, has helped boost interaction between the two countries. These relations are likely to flourish since the establishment in April 2000 of a joint committee to promote cooperation, the NCSJ report says. Other reports suggest that these economic ties are already paying off in the diplomatic arena. The Jerusalem Report magazine recently reported that Kazakhstan’s president has instructed his U.N. ambassador to stop voting with the Arab bloc.

As the contacts between Israel and the republics have expanded, Israeli companies have found good business opportunities in the CIS. In the Muslim republic of Kyrgyzstan, the Kadima company struck oil and the Magal security company has installed advanced security fences. Turkmenistan, another Sunni Muslim country with an embassy in Israel, uses the Israeli Merhav energy company to export energy resources. Veteran Israeli commentator Ehud Ya’ari, writing in The Jerusalem Report, predicts that Israeli economic activity in the region will double within one to two years.

Despite Israeli concerns over continuing Russian-Iranian weapons cooperation, Israel maintains “cordial relations” with the Russian Federation, according to the NCSJ report. This past January, Moshe Katsav made the first visit to Russia by an Israeli president. At a state dinner with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the two leaders dined on kosher food specially prepared for the visit. Post-Cold War relations between the two countries began in 1992, when then and current Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres signed a Memorandum of Understanding to promote cooperation on trade, tourism and economic affairs. In 1994, then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin visited Russia on the first official diplomatic visit.

While the growing hostility of neighboring Arab nations and the continuing Russian-Iranian alliance may dominate the headlines, Israel is quietly making Muslim friends in Central Asia by engaging in economic and agricultural diplomacy. — Avi Daniel Rosenblit

Rosenblit is an intern in AIPAC’s Communications Department.