By Daled Amos
The reestablishment of the State of Israel represents, in part, the creation of a place for Jews to find refuge. This is all part of a promise that Israel continues to keep, whether accepting immigrants from Ethiopia, Russia -- or the Ukraine.
Meanwhile, for his part, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan presents himself as the champion of Muslims around the world.
And then there is Iran, which has also been positioning itself as a Muslim world leader:
Since its 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran has engaged in a number of scuffles with countries over their mistreatment of Muslim minorities, diplomatic tiffs that have aimed to position Teheran as a guardian of supposed Islamic world unity.
Yet both Turkey and Iran stop short in their support of their fellow Muslims when it comes to China.
There are approximately 12 million Uyghurs, Chinese Muslims, of whom approximately 2 million have been detained in detention camps by the Chinese government.
In July 2019, a group of 22 nations addressed a letter to the president of the UN Human Rights Council and to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, calling on China to end its detention program in Xinjiang. The letter expressed concern about “credible reports of arbitrary detention” in Xinjiang and “widespread surveillance and restrictions” and demanded that the Chinese government “refrain from the arbitrary detention and restrictions on freedom of movement of Uighurs, and other Muslim and minority communities in Xinjiang.”
But there was a second letter --
signed by 37 countries.
In that letter, the signatories
opposed “politicizing human rights” and defended what China claimed were
“vocation education and training centers.” The letter went on to justify
China’s actions, that:
Faced with the grave challenge of terrorism and extremism, China has undertaken a series of counter-terrorism and deradicalization measures in Xinjiang, including setting up vocational education and training centers.
That second letter, defending China's treatment of Muslim Uyghurs included the signatures of Muslim countries such as Algeria, Bahrain, Belarus, Egypt, Kuwait, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates.
For its part, Turkey did not sign that second letter, but neither did it come out in opposition to China's detention camps.
More than that, it was reported in 2020 that
Turkey was actually helping China by facilitating the return of Uyghurs
back to China:
Now lawyers say Beijing is manipulating extradition agreements to drag Uighurs back to the re-education camps. And, activists argue, Ankara’s growing economic dependence on Beijing is compromising its ability to withstand Chinese pressure and to protect Uighurs who have fled Xinjiang.
While Turkey refuses to send Uighurs directly back to China, campaigners say there are those willing to send them to third countries, like Tajikistan. From there, it is easier for China to secure their extradition.
But Turkey is not the only Muslim country aiding China by deporting Uyghurs.
In a video report, the BBC noted that
Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE -- which signed that letter defending
China -- also forcibly sent Uyghurs in their countries back to China:
The Saudi Embassy said:
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia fully complies with international norms and Saudi law when cooperating with other countries on issues such as deportation". "Saudi Arabia considers all deportations on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the nature and seriousness of any violation and paying no heed to a person’s race or religion.The Egyptian and Emirati embassies did not respond to our requests for comment.
The motivation driving these countries to side with China against the persecuted Muslims derives in part from economic considerations, since China is an important trade partner and investor in the region.
In addition, criticizing human rights violations in China could leave Muslim regimes open to similar criticism.
But there could be more to it than that. An analysis in The Washington Post suggests:
China has been able to align its hostility toward its Muslim population with the antipathy of these countries toward particular forms of political Islamism — ranging from mainstream political groups that want their governments to expand democracy, cut corruption and protect human rights, to more radical Islamist groups that denounce governments as apostates and puppets of the West.And where does Iran stand on the issue of the Uyghurs?
Iran’s support for persecuted Shiite Muslim groups reaches far and wide, from repressed Shiites in Sunni-governed Bahrain, to the Houthis waging war in Yemen, to the pro-Iranian Islamic Movement in Nigeria which seeks to establish an Islamic state and whose rebel logo includes a portrait of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founder of Iran’s Islamic republic.
...Now, critics claim Teheran is looking the other way on the Uighurs, a clear, hard indication that its crucial trade and investment links to China outweigh its claimed guardian mission in the Muslim world.
This is not the first and only time that Iran has forgone its self-declared
role as guardian of Muslims worldwide:
For instance, in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the ensuing crackdown on the peninsula’s Muslims, Iran failed to protest.
Nor did Tehran raise its voice against Russia’s violent repression of the Muslim Chechnya insurgency in the mid-1990s and later harsh anti-radicalization initiatives driven by President Vladimir Putin.
In addition to trade and weapons, Russia has provided political support for Iran, preventing it from being isolated at the UN, while China is helping Iran avoid the pinch of US sanctions. Another consideration is the fact that the Uyghurs are Sunni and are not a primary concern of Shiite Iran.
And what about Israel?
In the context of the current Russian invasion of the Ukraine, Israel has had to tread carefully because it needs to coordinate with Russia, which has thus far allowed Israeli jets to take action against Iran in Syria. This consideration has prevented Israel from being too outspoken against Russia.
Israel's relations with China are similarly complicated. Last year, Israel signed on to a letter in the UN Human Rights Council, condemning China's treatment of the Uyghurs -- despite China's request that it not take part, just as it recently voted for a World Health Organization investigation into the source of the COVID-19 pandemic, something which China was trying to avoid.
Israel, like much of the Middle East, has economic ties to China and has to measure its actions, taking into account that China has not let its economic interests in Israel prevent it from taking measures against it:
While cultivating economic ties between the countries, China votes against Israel in international forums and pushed for strong condemnation of Israel’s actions in Gaza during Operation Guardian of the Walls last month. In addition, Chinese state-sponsored media have taken anti-Israel and even antisemitic positions, such as a segment claiming that wealthy Jews control American finance and media and have undue influence on the US government.
Israeli diplomats already told their Chinese counterparts under Lapid’s predecessor, Gabi Ashkenazi, that they cannot have it both ways without any consequences.
If China is separating diplomacy and economics in its treatment of Israel, then the current thinking in Jerusalem is that it can do the same to Beijing.
But there could be another potential issue.
We see how there are attempts to draw parallels between Palestinian Arabs and Ukrainians on the one hand and Israel and Russia on the other.
How long before we see similar parallels of Palestinian Arabs with Uyghurs and Israel with China?
And what about the potential impact that China's persecution of Uyghurs could have on the Abraham Accords? After all, the UAE is not only not publicly coming out in defense of the Uyghurs and in condemnation of China -- they are actually deporting Uyghurs back to China, where they will be put in detention camps.
All for the sake of trade and weapons.
Kind of what the UAE is looking
for from Israel.
The Saudis, who are also deporting Uyghurs, is becoming more open in its relations with Israel.
Similarly, Egypt -- which was the first Arab country to sign a peace deal with Israel -- is similarly sending Uyghurs back to China.
Turkey, which has declared a willingness to rebuild ties with Israel, deports Uyghurs as well.
It would be easy to taint these growing diplomatic ties between these Muslim countries and Israel by drawing a comparison between their relations with China and their relations with Israel.
Reliance on Russia and China makes it difficult for countries in the Middle East to balance their ties with China and Russia with their other interests and needs. If these Muslim countries do not do a better job, they may irreparably tarnish the Abraham Accords and all the good that has come from it in this short time and that will yet in the years to come.
