Middle East loses trust in Russia amid Ukraine war morass

Middle Eastern countries have lost trust in Russia in light of Moscow's aggressive actions and expansionist policies in countries such as Ukraine and Syria, which have triggered a wider feeling of insecurity, political analysts said.

Russia does not appear to be winning in Ukraine a year after launching an unprovoked assault on that country, they said, despite President Vladimir Putin's claims to the contrary.

"When Putin declared war on Ukraine, he claimed that he could end it in a short period, while boasting about the military capabilities of the Russian army," political researcher Abdul Nabi Bakkar told Al-Mashareq.

But one year after the Russian invasion, the Russian army has failed to achieve tangible results and has incurred heavy losses, he said, noting that it appears Putin has mired his country in problems that will not be easy to resolve.

With the international alignment against Putin's war and expansionist policies, Russia has lost the diplomatic progress it had made in the global community since the end of the Cold War, Bakkar said.

Most Middle Eastern countries are not on Russia's side, even if they are not fully with the West, Bakkar said, as the consequences of the Ukrainian war have been catastrophic for them, with supplies of wheat and basic commodities disrupted.

The war in Ukraine has led to record surges in food prices and food insecurity in the Middle East, along with high inflation and a decrease in the exchange rate of local currencies against the US dollar.

Putin's war on Ukraine has changed the political landscape in the region, disrupting the recent diplomatic rapprochement between some world powers and the Gulf states, political analyst Ramez Mamdouh told Al-Mashareq.

The Gulf states and other countries in the Middle East will not risk their strong relations with the United States and other Western countries, he said, predicting that they will slowly move away from Russia.

Loss of trust

Since Russia's intervention in the Syria war in 2015 on the side of the regime of Bashar al-Assad, signs of its renewed activity in the Middle East have been on the rise.

A blend of military intervention and arms sales, an appetite for energy and infrastructure projects and the use of soft power tools like propaganda to disseminate its disinformation are emblematic of Russia's expansionist views.

Relations between countries are largely based on mutual trust, writer Hasnaa Abdullah said, noting that Russia has undermined, if not destroyed, whatever trust was left between it and the Middle East.

Russia's intervention in Syria while seizing that country's natural resources, as well as its attempt to invade Ukraine despite the devastating international repercussions, has undermined Moscow's credibility, she told Al-Mashareq.

Many Middle Eastern countries are now viewing their relationship with Russia "with a great deal of caution, while dealing more earnestly with the United States and other Western countries", she said.

This will have dire political and economic consequences for Russia, she added, as it will restrict Moscow's ability to engage with them economically or exploit their resources.

Russia's inability to move forward with agreements on gas extraction in Lebanon, even though it had attempted to position itself as a key player, is one example, Abdullah said.

The true face of Russian policy has been fully revealed of late, she said, and it was found to be based primarily on expansionist views, which will widen the distance that some Middle Eastern and African countries keep from Russia.