Cohen: Middle East fearful of Iran

• Article
• Comments ()
• Click-2-Listen
• Videos

By Nicholas Kralev

Former Defense Secretary William S. Cohen said Tuesday that fears about Iran have replaced animosity toward Israel as the top concern of governments in the Persian Gulf and the broader Middle East.

Mr. Cohen, a former senator from Maine who was the only Republican in President Clinton's Cabinet, from 1997 to 2001, also warned the Obama administration that it would be a "mistake" to promise Russia to scale back plans for a missile-defense shield in Europe before Moscow helps stop Iran's nuclear ambitions. He gently chided top administration officials for recent comments criticizing Russia, which he said needlessly antagonized a Kremlin still resentful of U.S. treatment after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Having made six trips to the Gulf in the past 18 months, Mr. Cohen came to a conclusion reached by other U.S. and foreign diplomats and analysts regarding Arab jitters about Iranian influence.

"What has changed in the Gulf region from my perspective is that, in all my years in the past, the first thing I'd get was a lecture about Israel, and it could last for a long time," Mr. Cohen told editors and reporters at The Washington Times.

"I no longer receive that, and when I go and travel, what I hear is, there is greater fear of Iran than there is animus toward Israel," he said. "So that is almost a predominant sentiment that I've noticed throughout most, if not all, of the Gulf states."

Mr. Cohen, who after leaving office in 2001 founded the global consulting firm the Cohen Group, said that many Arab leaders have made gestures toward Israel in a sign of their shifting strategic concerns. He cited a meeting he attended that was hosted by the emir of Qatar last year and also included Tzipi Livni, who was Israel's foreign minister.

"I think [the Arabs] accept the fact that Israel is going to be there, it's going to exist, and now the question is, how do you solve the issue for the Palestinians?" he said.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said that several Gulf foreign ministers have expressed concerns about Iran's nuclear program. Last week, she reprised a position from her unsuccessful presidential campaign, saying the United States could extend a "defense umbrella" over its allies in the Gulf if Iran did not abandon its apparent pursuit of nuclear weapons.