Five Dimensional Chess: Understanding The Players, Their Objectives & The Requirements For Peace in the Middle East / #Israel #Palestine #strategy #criticalthinking

Part 1-Understanding the Chess Players and Current Positions on the Game Board

In chess, moving one singular piece forward without tactical backup, defense or collaboration can many a times spell the capture of that piece and signal futility in moves made to the advantage of an opponent who may be more judicious in how they ‘open up’ and establish their strategy. Their in, one’s ability to create the outcome for victory can be sidelined in the short-term and narrow interest of simply galavanting across the board towards a skillful adversary.

In the interplay of international relations, such as those between Israel and Palestine, it could be said that the chess board and number of pieces, even the number of players, have greatly expanded to become nothing less than a five dimensional game kept in stagnant check. Each side unwilling to forfeit the possibility of position, which can imply a loss of physical territory, loss of the political power of specific managing players, and a new balance of power, which can further develop the political influence of external players, whom use the Israeli/ Palestinian conflict as a proxy, achieving their own interests and aims.

It is clearly understood, for example, that Russia has a developed relationship with the leadership of the country of Iran, a government which routinely has called for the annihilation of Israel. Likewise, the United States of America, a Judeo-Christian nation with strong cultural ties to Jewish heritage, has a strong Israeli lobby, which has successfully maintained (to varying degrees), a U.S.-Israel connection which almost blurs the lines between both nation-states. Adding more hue, America, a nation predominantly populated with descendants of European ancestry, has been a republic of immigrants, making it as our coin states in Latin (E. Pluribus Unum) ‘One From Many.’ That is to say, that the threads of all the players on the chess board, including those mentioned below, have also planted familial roots within the United States. Their children study in the U.S., they create businesses within American borders, they are a part of the countries communities.

Within the Middle East region, countries such as Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria are intertwined in the five dimensional stagnant chess balance with an interesting political, cultural and religious positional stance introducing further complexity into the matter. Jordan, a primarily Muslim Kingdom with secular aspects, happens to have developed one of the best political balances in the midst of the real-life game of chess, with ties to both sides of the game board, yet clearly willing to see a peaceful, political solution which allows it to maintain its close relation to the United States, and also to Palestine, of whom it more closely shares a religious and cultural connection. Lebanon has been an actual physical battle ground in present times and in decades past, and can be likened to being close to center in action on the game board. Like Jordan, it also shares a closer cultural, Muslim-dominated heritage, making it a natural sympathizer to the plight of the Palestinian mission to be recognized as a country, complete with a capital in Jerusalem. Though be that as it may, the Jordanian Kingdom has long been a sort of sobering mediator between Washington D.C. and the contention that neighbors it within its region. Lebanon, like Jordan, has secular cultural qualities to it, enjoying to a large degree, a populace that has extended itself to greatly value education and normalization of affairs with the Western political-cultural sphere of influence. Even so, it has been used as a somewhat neutral staging ground for varied, military-political organizations used as proxies by larger, more powerful players sympathetic to anti-Israel campaigns, and/ or focused on exacting a greater sphere of influence in the region to counter ‘Western-led’ hegemony. The reasons for such powerful players, such as Russia and Iran, to carve out regional influence in the Middle East do not necessarily fall along ideological lines only, as in having greater non-Westernized social control that can create future leverages of political power on the game board, but may have also to do with the desire to control physical territory towards the growth and stabilization of energy fuel projects. All said, the need for such positional maneuvering is largely created by actual individuals who may obtusely subscribe to priorities of social-political and economic power which, in comparison to the people-focused growth of such countries as the United States of America, are outdated, and not in line with the basic requirements of the constituents in their countries. In placing the desires of a centralized state apparatus first, over the well-being of the people, nations rob themselves of the real strength behind the growth and development of countries. Namely, that power must rest in the people, and that these citizens, employed with the educated mindset to seek the good and enrichment of their families, will upright a nation far more effectively and efficiently than autocratic leaderships.

Is it for this reason that centralized-state government find that the acquisition of state fortune comes at the expense of an impoverished people? Could it be that the understanding of what is best for a country is a blessing of humility in leadership, a social-political and economic insight that servant leadership is better than a leadership that serves itself at the expense of its constituency? If there be credence to this notion, if there be weight and validity to this just said, then the five-dimensional chess game is not merely stagnated due to the movement or non-movement of the small and large players on the game board, but it is stagnated according to a hardness of the heart of specific entities.

As for Saudi Arabia, the arrangement of Western and Middle Eastern relationships is both more nuanced and strikingly defined. The kingdom has, until recently, enjoyed a special relationship with the United States of America as a provider of oil, which America’s car culture has used to fuel its operation, and yet, new developments in North American energy independence have softened the need for the decades long reliance on the OPEC oil cartel, traditionally overpowered by the Saudi Arabian oil industry, leading to a prolonged down pressure force on the world’s oil market, of which the kingdom was one of the largest, (if not the biggest) global supplier of. Adding fuel to the political tilt in the Middle East, throughout the course of the special U.S.-Saudi Arabian energy relationship, military sales of fighter airplanes have been a constant, which has indirectly brought in the United States military as a presence into the region, largely without the conscious acquiescence of the American people. Howbeit, through this joined stratagem, the Saudi Arabian royal leadership, along with the United States military capability, effectively created a proxy balance of power over the last seventy years in the region in opposition to an Iranian leadership-led, anti-Israeli drive.

Iran, a country with a people who are mostly Muslim, has a very well-educated population, with a strong community vested in common social values, irrespective of its theo-autocratic governing system. They do however, live under the physical force of an ideological system that allows for one person to reign supreme, and without impunity or fear of losing office. This system of governance from the top-down does not value the rights of its constituents as individuals whom can guide, direct and create a better vision for their communities, than that which they currently have. Quite the opposite of having a government of and for the people, Iran, though it allows the free movement and relative exchange of ideas, it does have its limits on secularism, and does not tolerate the full practice of freedom of speech, the freedom of a free press to question leadership, nor the right for its people to become exceedingly politically empowered as individuals. No, instead, its leadership is picked by its higher echelons, and its governing structure is ultimately subjected according to the will of its supreme leader. In effect, nothing changes or approaches real social change; bottom-up movements are quashed and infiltrated; individuals must censor themselves according to the parameters of the top-down system.

With no avenue of possible social-political upheaval possible, the people strive to create culture and their lives with as much normalcy as can be, yet, it does not come remotely close to the freedoms a country like the United States of America creates for itself over and over again through the practice and valuing of individual liberty, and its foundational safeguards to keep it so. This gives the American nation a tremendous advantage on the chess game board. The players that operate on the U.S. side can continually change, and so new ideas and improvements are always possible. We are able to learn from our mistakes if we want to and look to improve in how we go about the governing of ourselves, even how we interact on the international level. In fact, our varied forms of domestic and international leadership are, in the end, wholly subservient to the individual voter and the free press. In addition, as if that were not enough, Iran’s lack of the right for individuals to bear arms allows its top-down governing system to rule without fear of uprising. America’s second amendment stipulates that its people can bear arms, even keep a standing militia (though we don’t have one) aside from the military afforded by its own government. The U.S.A. is actually the most individually armed nation in the world. Far from the possibility of an insurrection, just the existence of this fact serves as a check and balance on its government, which along with what should be a free press, maintains social order.

The first and most important line of liberty that needs to be fully free and is not in a nation like Iran is the support of the critical thinking individual. Iran, a civilization thousands of years old, need not be Westernized to give itself such freedoms. As it stands, the demand for greater social and economic liberty by its people appears to be a growing force placing increasing pressure from within and calling for greater freedoms and liberties to govern itself from the bottom-up. As it is, Iranians are not actually given a say in the international relations or behavior of its political leadership. For about seventy years, Israel has been a globally-recognized nation state in the Middle East and has found economic prosperity and democratic freedom within that time frame. Its diversity of industry is testament to its prioritization of education and allowance unto itself that individuals are the driving force of a nation’s ability to innovate and lead unto new frontiers. Though imperfect, like America, Israel as a whole understands that individual liberty is key for its social, economic and political life.

‘People are people,’ and the world over sees the robustness of systems of democracy that place individual liberty along with the support of a critical thinking populace foremost. So it is, that on the international chess board, the Middle East arrangement of power is in large part impacted by the health of the individual liberties enjoyed by each representative state. The liberty and freedom’s of the people directly lead to who gets to make the chess moves, for how long, and in what direction, and in the absence of each nation’s individual freedom’s and liberties, opportunities for social, political and economic ‘flourishment’ get truncated, devaluing the richness of the interplay, leading to economic stagnation, misprioritization of time and awkward balances of power which put the narrow-minded ideology of one over the benefit of an entire nation.

Part 2: Help the People

What is to be done when many of the players on the five-dimensional chess game are unwilling to cede their chosen priority objectives, allowing for the passage of time and the social-political and economic status quo to continue as is?

1. How can one set of people living in what would be a democratically-functioning society help those living under autocratic, totalitarian rule?
2. Should it be that the intelligence organizations of one meddle in the undermining of the social-political system of another? How has that worked out in the past?

Rather, just as the next step forward for capitalism could very well be the notion of an empathic, socially responsible economy, one where profit, for profit’s sake is not the end all be all, but a growing construct wherein the social issues that beset people and communities at large are valued ahead of, or in league with the focus of making money, the example of a thriving government for the people, and of the people can be a light onto other people’s around the world living in states of control. This implies that the valuing of an educated, critical thinking culture, which places the individual over the livelihood of political government, be prized as a compliment to the safeguarding and growing of a free, and open society.

More so than the operations of diplomacy alone, the people of a free nation can ‘talk’ to the people of a subjugated nation through the active practice of a critical thinking social order. That is to say, the dominated people must continue to see that in lands like Israel, the United States, England, and every nation that places individual liberty and freedom ahead as its valued treasure, that society works. They must see that individual economic prosperity is possible, that their children can speak their minds and reach the highest levels of political power, if it be their desire.

Is this not why people yearn to, and do immigrate to Europe and America in the hundreds of thousands, in the millions? Their own countries would benefit from more democratic governance that shifts power onto the people, and away from the conceptual design of a few, but until that becomes a reality, the easier move is to seek livelihoods in such free nations.

Is it then possible that the deep hatred the Iranian leadership feels for Israel has more to do with the witnessing of its Supreme Leader of the rapid and continued growth of its economic power, more so than the difference between Judaic and Muslim beliefs? Is this not called jealousy, in its simplest form? If this is correct, then their is a purposeful disconnect and misplaced animosity as to why such vehemence has been allowed to root itself for so long. From this positional standpoint, the dynamic of international relations amongst the chess players who actuate influence in the Middle East region are in one part, attempting to force the economic prosperity and political influence of a few autocratic regimes, while dimly justifying such overt and covert hostility without practical reason. What is happening is that some regimes are looking to become materially and politically powerful at the expense of ignoring what is best for their people, and these are creating irrational subterfuge as to their reasoning, even simply not addressing the rationale of creating such hostility against one another.

In such a dynamic, grievances have occurred across the board which have been illegal. Within the unhealthy political balance, illegal assassinations, territorial occupations, and unlawful acts of war have been exacted on all sides, muddying the clarity of who holds the moral high ground at any given time. Actual, specific players have been beholden to internal pressures to continue in certain manners, such as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s attempt to lead while trying to placate hard-line Israeli settlers who insist on giving no territorial rights to Palestinians. This has hamstringed, Israel’s power to reach a better position on the five-dimensional chess board of Middle Easter international relations. There is only so much the governments of Lebanon, and Jordan can do. It is not their fight to resolve. More so, Russia’s continued involvement in propping up Syria’s barbaric Assad regime has fueled Iran’s Supreme Leader’s underlining stance against finding peace with Israel. Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is interested in growing energy resources in the Middle East and being a political force to counter American-Israeli Western regional influence. Likewise, the politics of situations having nothing to do with the Middle East, such as American economic sanctions on Russia have been answered on different stages by Russia. It is not always a clear cause and effect on one game board, but that a number of chess games are being played on various boards all at the same time. If it is not politically feasible to give direct answers between chess players on one board or stage, then these are answered, right or wrong, on another. It is called politics.

Part 3: Envisioning a Long-Term Pathway Towards Peace in the Middle East

Ultimately, a political achievement would be a copacetic arrangement were Israel and Palestine can co-exist in a dual capital within Jerusalem. This implying Palestine also being acknowledge as a Sovereign Country with distinct national borders. As was shared earlier, for all its freedom and liberties enjoyed by its citizenry, Israel is putting incredible downward pressure on the Palestinian people. Their homes, schools and communities are routinely bulldozed, displaced and left in states of disintegration. This directly affects how the Palestinian people, human beings, see themselves and Israel. This angers the Muslim world, also human beings. They in turn have answered in ways and manners that have not been to their best interest, directly targeting Israeli civilians with inviting outside players to use them as a proxy, with suicide bombings in Israeli towns, assassinations, and street violence across Israel.

In the absence of a free society, in the absence of critical thinking individuals who are empowered to lead social-political change from the ground up, we are left with a default dynamic of relationships. Who can step in to make things better? Can Supermen and Superwoman show up and fix everything? No, not really. That is wishful thinking. You cannot change people. People have to be willing to change themselves. The best we can do is live as righteously as possible to show as an example that there is a better way. The Prime Minister’s office of Israel cannot offer a dual capital solution to Palestine, as the dynamic stands now, without inviting all the proxy powers and players into Jerusalem also. The Palestinian leadership cannot expect global recognition, or Israeli recognition of itself as a nation as long as it continues to misappropriate hundreds of millions of dollars to reward people who violently target the Israeli populace. Iran will not stop its hostile stance against Israel until its people are the one’s in charge of its civilization. Syria’s Assad regime will continue to drop bombs and employ chemical warfare on families and children as long as it sees it has the backing of Russia, which has ties to Iran’s leadership, (it does not have ties to its populace). The Middle East will not know peace as long as none of the players show the political bravery to reverse course, and seek how to be of service to its people in democratic ways which empower them through education, civil liberties and systems of government that place the critical thinking individual above the designs of a few at the top of the political ladder.

The way forward is through the quiet work of sowing peace at the ground level and growing a movement upward. This is a principle of  the notion of servant leadership. In placing the welfare and human rights of people first, in seeking to develop an educated and free people who have the power to elect officials into and out of office, new foundations can be established. The people of each nation must rule. This would mean that Moms and Dads would collectively exercise power that places the well-being of their children first. Of course, inept leaders can be parents and can rule with total impunity. To convey it succinctly; power has to be diluted amongst entire communities and safeguarded through basic human rights, seeking to replicate the supports that have made it possible for such systems of governance to work in countries like the United States.