Hezbollah, Islamic State of Iraq And Syria And Foreign Interests in The Middle East

Abstract

The focal points of foreign interests within the Middle East are crude oil resources, prevention of nuclear proliferation, the fight against terrorism, and promoting democratization. International actors have specific interests they seek in the region. Among these, the US interests are the protection and free flow of oil, and the control of nuclear weapons to prevent threats against the security of crude oil, Russia’s interests are arms sales, energy and investment while China’s interest is to have a continued access to energy resources. The scramble for these interests among these international actors brought about the crisis that weakened the security of the states in the Middle East. The weak security caused many ethnic and religious nationalities to begin engaging in conflicts which eventually escalated into civil war. This war led to confrontations between regional states thus, providing Hezbollah and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) the opportunity to rise up to fill the security vacuum in the region. The study therefore investigated the roles and consequences of Hezbollah and ISIS on foreign interests in the Middle East.

The study adopted qualitative method. The population of the study was the violent organizations in the Middle East. Hezbollah and ISIS were purposively selected because they constituted the major security threats in an already volatile region between 2010 and 2017. Data were collected through documentary review (of publications and audiovisual recordings by Hezbollah and ISIS as well as journals and materials from Internet). Data from interviews of five Syrians and four American citizens complemented the major sources. Data were analyzed thematically.

The study found that the interference in the Middle East crisis by foreign interests led to the rise of violent groups in the region. In addition, the support of some groups by Russia, China, Japan and USA on the pretext of humanitarian intervention fuelled the Hezbollah and ISIS violent activities. ISIS denied Russia access to their oil pipeline route and that affected Russia’s federal fund and foreign earnings, causing a decimation of profits for the Russian government. Furthermore, the trade route owned and managed by the Chinese construction company was destroyed by Hezbollah. This made China to lose trade route access from the Middle East to the rest of the world. In addition, the US military base in Syria was attacked by the ISIS and it resulted into casualties of some Americans.

The study concluded that the foreign economic and military interests in the Middle East had been decimated by Hezbollah and ISIS. The study recommended that the various governments of the Middle East in dealing with the foreign interests should take cognizance of the internal demands of their citizens.

Keywords: Foreign interests, Hezbollah, ISIS, Middle East

DOI: 10.7176/IAGS/73-04

Publication date:June 30^th 2019