Month: March 2021

Keeping with my developing interest in US-Middle Eastern relations, last night I attended a talk led by Dr. Ali Vaez and OU’s Dr. Joshua Landis entitled “Iran & the US: Will Diplomacy Work?” The discussion was based around the current negotiations between the US and Iran regarding a return to JCPOA and a potential new nuclear deal.

Dr. Ali Vaez is particularly suited to talk on this subject; he is the Crisis Group’s Iran Project Director, as well as Senior Advisor to the President. He led the Crisis Group in consultations that helped lead to the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and the US, and he is well positioned to offer insightful observations about the current status of US-Iran relations.

A brief overview of the situation: In 2015, the US and Iran came to an agreement wherein Iran would cease its pursuit of nuclear knowledge and development of nuclear weapons, and in exchange would become more integrated into the European economy. Under the Trump administration, the US not only left the deal but imposed economic sanctions on Iran despite Iran holding to their obligations set forth by the deal. The Biden administration is trying to persuade Iran to reenter the deal, but currently they are facing a bit of a stalemate, wherein neither side wants to make a substantial first step towards compliance with the deal until the other does.

I already knew most of the above because of a global security course I’m currently taking. However, Dr. Vaez offered some insights and new information that I was not aware of.

Dr. Vaez discussed how the Biden administration would like to achieve full compliance with JCPOA before the end of the summer. This summer, Iran will be holding their presidential election, and the possibility is very high that the current administration will be replaced with a more conservative administration. Dr. Vaez said that from his point of view, it would be best and easiest if the US could convince the current administration to reenter JCPOA (since the current administration was the one to negotiate the deal initially) and then strive to negotiate a new deal with the incoming administration, which would probably be easier to do since there would be less infighting and less mistrust between the deep government and the new administration.

The trick is to get the current administration to agree to reenter JCPOA. 

So far, the US has not taken any meaningful steps towards lifting economic sanctions. Biden has taken some symbolic steps, but lifting economic sanctions against Iran has been unpopular in Congress, and Biden needs Congress’s support. Until the US does take a meaningful first step, Iran seems unwilling to budge first. Compounding to this stalemate is the fact that the whole matter has become a bit of a public feud. The technicalities of trying to reenter the deal would have been better negotiated behind closed doors, out of the public eye, but instead the blame game is being played out in front of the entire world. 

From Iran’s perspective, they are the aggrieved party. The US made this deal, and then they left this deal, and Iran did everything that was asked of them. Dr. Vaez said that they have been expecting some manner of mea culpa apology from the US ever since Biden’s inauguration, and the absence of one and the length of time it took for Biden to address Iranian economic sanctions has not encouraged enthusiasm on Iran’s part to make the first move.

This lecture over current Iran-US relations, as well as the global security course I’m taking, have really opened my eyes to the intricacies of global politics and the puzzle like nature of diplomacy. I’m reminded of playing of Catan with my family, where every party needs something, and you’re trying to negotiate in such a way that you ensure a good outcome for yourself while also maintaining goodwill with your allies/trading partners. Nothing is black and white in global politics, and all of the discussion and negotiation around restarting the Iranian nuclear deal is a prime example. It is up to the Biden administration and Iran’s government to decide on which path to take, and hopefully they decide on one that will benefit both our countries.

Dr. Vaez says, the best way forward? Direct communication, back and forth modest and incremental steps towards reentering compliance, and beginning with both sides each taking at least one step.

In December, I attended a meditation session sponsored by OU’s Buddhist Association. It was led by Venerable Bhante Dhammadipa, who also gave a talk about Dharma after the meditation. I knew very little about Buddhism before the session and talk, and while I’ve googled “mediation” during most finals weeks to combat my stress, I’d never actually gone to a meditation session before.

During the meditation, we were told not to pay any attention to our senses. One of the first conditions of meditating is to isolate ourselves from our body so as to move beyond it. Then, we needed to join our minds to one object (usually a concept) and focus on our breathing. Concentrating on breathing helps the mind to automatically turn towards the inside and better focus on the object of meditation.

It reminded me of mental prayer, a type of prayer that is highly regarded and strived after by many Catholics. In mental prayer, you try to remove yourself from worldly concerns and elevate your mind to God. It takes a lot of time and work to reach the necessary level of self-discipline to successfully meditate or experience mental prayer, and additionally for mental prayer, we believe that successful prayer is a grace given by God. 

Similarly yet also differently, Venerable Dhammadipa told us about dharma, which is “that which holds us and measures us.” We are always dependent on other people, and meditating upon our dependence means meditating on dharma. We’re all equal in dharma. He also spoke about how our background forms our habits, and our habits create our reality. Buddhism is the logic of awakening, and the awakened person is aware that his reality is based on his habits. 

The most striking part of the talk for me was when Venerable Dhammadipa said that the highest reality is not created, and so it does not need something other than itself. Our reality is caused by conditions and causes made by something other than itself. This really reminded me of my own theology. God as the highest being is not created, but he has created everything else.

While I did see strands of my own beliefs sprinkled throughout the talk, I was struck by what a different belief system Buddhism truly is. There is a lot more emphasis on detachment and striving after enlightenment, and the assumption that we can do so of our own power. 

Interfaith dialogue and learning experiences such as this one are extremely important for understanding other people’s mindsets and backgrounds. When we identify pieces of ourselves outside of our own experiences, we better understand that we are not so different from other people, regardless of how vast those differences may first seem. They also provide an opportunity for us to seek out truth outside of what our own traditions. And, especially helpful in my current state of life, this meditation session and talk taught me a better method of relieving stress and working towards a clearer mindset.

At the beginning of November, I was able to watch the live broadcast of “Shi’a-Sunni Dynamics and the Geopolitics of Sectarianism in the Middle East” lecture and discussion led by Dr. Payam Mohseni from Harvard and moderated by Dr. Joshua Landis from OU. Last semester, I was taking an Islamic theology course, and I was interested in seeing how the theology we discussed in class might apply to the modern day world. As it would turn out, the finer points of Islamic theology are often times not the most influential factors of Middle Eastern geopolitics.

First, the lecture began with Dr. Mohseni discussing the specifics of Sectarianism. Before 2003, the terms Shi’a and Sunni were relatively unknown, but now we hear them all the time, especially when discussing violence or militant groups in the Middle East. But this great divide is more complicated than the narrative commonly perpetuated. Both sects encompass many different denominations for one. For another, sectarianist violence is not always driven by religious factors. This dichotomy is not as straightforward as we might think, either in religious terms or in discussing conflict.

Dr. Mohseni paid a lot of attention to the role of foreign influence in Sectarianism, which is a factor often overlooked in this discussion. Many of the politics driving Sectarianism are a direct result of the post WWI legacy of colonialism in the Middle East. US relations with various Middle Eastern countries have also contributed; the US tried to give power to Shi’a Arabs in Iraq in 2003, yet seems to also suppress Shi’a groups in places like Lebanon. These factors can and do cause shifts in geopolitics, such as causing Iran to look for security by building better relations with its neighbors and depending less on the United States, which in turn can affect the political climate of the entire region.

From the theology class I was taking at the time, I had already gotten the sense that trying to cleanly separate Islam into only two branches is not a true representation all of the different denominations that do exist in Islam. Every Sunni or Shiite theologian we looked at in class could be distinguished from one another in at least one particular area, even if they did belong to the same branch. This was reflected in Dr. Mohseni’s lecture when he explained that the Sunni-Shi’a divide is mostly based around the issue of who had authority after Muhammad’s death, and that conflict even arises between groups within the same branch, such as between denominations of Sunnism.

Chalking up violence in the Middle East to be a product of Sectarianism without any greater thought is allowing oneself to willfully misunderstand the forces at work behind these conflicts. Dr. Mohseni really emphasized that the world likes to tell these grand stories of this age old conflict between the two groups, but ultimately, nothing is as clear cut as we might like it to be. It can be easy to let our reasoning rest upon the unfamiliarity of religion, but we must strive to see more clearly the whole picture in order to better understand what drives the geopolitics of the Middle East.