Former Middle East diplomats discuss perils of a Trump presidency

Hillary Clinton is expected to be received much better in the region's capitals than Donald Trump, whose personality and unclear foreign policy represent a wild card for important US allies.

Donald Trump meets the Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi in New York in September. Mr El Sisi is the only Arab leader who has held talks with the Republican candidate since he started his presidShow more

BEIRUT // Mercurial, loose-tongued and frequently offensive, Republican candidate Donald Trump could spell trouble for the United States’ relationships in the Middle East if he is elected president on Tuesday.

Former American and Middle Eastern diplomats largely agreed that Mrs Clinton – already familiar to many leaders in the region – would be received much better than Mr Trump, whose personality and unclear foreign policy represent a wild card for important US allies.

“She’s a known quantity and I think for the most part they’re very comfortable with her,” said Robert Ford, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute who served as Washington’s ambassador to Syria from 2010 to 2014. “Trump is an unknown quantity for all of them.”

“Those who oppose America I think are leery of Clinton and those who are traditional American friends in the region – Arab as well as Israeli – I think are more comfortable with Clinton and in some cases might welcome her over Barack Obama,” he added.

For Middle Eastern leaders “it’s all about perception. The perception is that Hillary is more rational and clear in her message than Trump, but that doesn’t mean she will be much better for the Arabs or their leaders than Trump,” said Bassam Barabandi, a former Syrian diplomat in Washington who defected to the Syrian opposition in 2013.

So far, most Middle Eastern leaders have not said who they would prefer to win.

In a September interview with CNN, Egyptian president Abdel Fatteh El Sisi, the only Arab leader to have met Mr Trump during his campaign, said he had “no doubt” that the property tycoon would make a strong leader.

Other countries have not been quite as friendly: in Jordan last December, 50 parliamentarians asked the country to ban Donald Trump amid rumours he was planning to visit.

Mr Trump has frequently made statements grating to Middle Eastern countries. Early this year, he engaged in Twitter spat with Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, a member of the Saudi royal family, calling him a “dopey prince” and accusing him of trying to “control our US politicians with daddy’s money”.

Mr Trump caused anger in Iraq after suggesting the US should have “taken” Iraq’s oil after the 2003 US invasion and heaping praise on Saddam Hussein’s effective killing of “terrorists”.

And then of course there is Mr Trump’s call for a ban on Muslim immigration or travel to the US.

“This sort of bull in a china shop approach I think would be offensive anywhere,” said Feisal Istrabadi, Iraq’s deputy permanent representative to the United Nations from 2004 to 2007 and the founding director of Indiana University Bloomington’s Centre for the Study of the Middle East. The world of diplomacy, he added, is “signals, it’s subtlety, it’s dignity … that’s in spades in the Middle East because we come from a culture that is inherently more concerned with courtesy and politeness than western culture generally is.”

Policies of presidents usually outweigh their personalities in the eyes of foreign leaders, Mr Istrabadi said, but Mr Trump may prove to be an exception if he ends up in the White House.

“Personalities play a role, but at the end of the day it’s the policies … If you want me to respond to Trump’s policies, the problem is he hasn’t articulated any,” he said. “You couldn’t predict what policy would be from day to day.”

Winning the presidency would have Mr Trump dealing directly with Middle Eastern leaders who themselves have reputations for being erratic and difficult to work with.

One such leader is Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Hosting US forces that are involved in the war against ISIL in Iraq and Syria, Turkey is a key ally of the US in the region. But Mr Erdogan and his government constantly waver between friendship and outright hostility towards the US, particularly after a coup attempt in July in which many blamed Washington of being complicit.

“The possible negative scenarios are endless with Trump as the US’s president and Erdogan as Turkey’s president,” said Sinan Ulgen, a former Turkish diplomat who is now a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe in Brussels.

However, some believe Mr Trump’s more mercantile approach to foreign policy – where diplomacy would be more about transactions than relationships – could play well with some Arab states that want US help without a dose of unwanted US values or encouragement for reform.

“His model in politics is more about business deals: ‘what can you give me and what can you offer me’. And I think the Arab world can offer a lot in that sense,” said Mr Barabandi, the former Syrian diplomat. “The Democrats are looking more for US values, US strategy, long-term strategy, the classical, traditional way of doing business. This means that their life with the Arab world will not be easy.”

While much of Mr Trump’s foreign policy has not been made clear – and the candidate has frequently gone back and forth on key issues such as the Iran nuclear deal – he has said he could significantly shift US policy in the region.

One of his most consistent calls is that Gulf states like Saudi Arabia should not get US military protection for free. He has also threatened to stop buying oil from Saudi Arabia if the kingdom did not contribute more to the fight against ISIL.

But severely altering the US’s relationships with longtime allies may prove difficult for a president, said Edward “Skip” Gnehm, a former US ambassador to Kuwait and Jordan who is now a professor at Washington, DC’s George Washington University.

“When you come into office, you suddenly realise that you’re existing in a world that’s already there, with friendships and hostilities and commitments and all sorts of things that already define the playing field,” he said.

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US election coverage from The National’s foreign correspondents

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