ISRAEL’S STRATEGY IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN Zsolt Csepregi Questions of a country’s relative geographic position are no alien to a Hungarian audience. Being identified as a Central, Eastern, or East-Central European country is an issue for debate with many consequences in the realm of politics and society, as words and expressions matter greatly in human affairs. Israeli debates regarding their position and geopolitical orientation must be viewed through a similar lens. The Jewish state has been in an uneasy position in the Middle East since its modernday inception in 1948. It is, at the same time, in the heart of the Middle East, has connections to Eurasia and Africa, and serves as the sole bridge between the continents, while it is also discriminated and threatened politically. Through many wars and (much more welcome) peace accords, Israel managed to secure itself to a relatively high degree in the Middle East, with cold peace enduring on its eastern and southern borders. As pressure slowly reduced from the north as well, the previously overlooked Mediterranean aspect of the state came to the foreground. Naturally, Israel has always been an Eastern Mediterranean country and society. Its culture, cuisine, vistas, and outlook on the world resemble much more that of Saloniki, Izmir, or Beirut than of Doha or Aden. That is, if we are talking about the coastal, Tel Avivian or Haifan scene, if we go to the mountains of Israel, visit the vibrant communities belonging to the four Abrahamic religions, the Jewish, Muslims, Christians, and Druze, we can immediately imagine their counterparts in the Meteora in Greece or on Mount Lebanon. Still, there is a debate enduring even in the highest echelons of Israeli strategic thinking on whether the country is a Middle Eastern or an Eastern Mediterranean power, a mixture of the two, or something completely different. 40
COUNTRY STUDIES
BENEFITS AND THREATS FROM THE SEA This renewed Israeli interest during the last decade towards its western maritime neighbourhood had its reasons. The underlying causes were, and still are, both positive and negative in their nature and very much interlinked. No other example portrays this dual nature better than the issue of hydrocarbon reserves in Israel’s exclusive economic zone: these resources bring benefits but also threats to those owing or aspiring to owe them. Israeli leaders and society experienced a pleasant shock after 2009 with the discovery of the Tamar gas field, and especially in 2010, when the first exploration of the Leviathan gas field also proved successful. At the time of its discovery, the latter was the largest natural gas deposit in the Mediterranean, containing reserves that can make Israel energy independent for decades to come. This windfall brought about a significant shift in Israeli strategic thinking, as earlier the prevailing self-image in the country was perfectly encapsulated by the somewhat sarcastic remark by late David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s founding prime minister, who said that, in His eternal wisdom, the Creator had given to Israel the only place in the Middle East which had no oil. Technically, he was, of course, right, as Israel only has some negligible deposits on land, and he did not imagine that the ever-underestimated sea (Jews and their predecessors, the Israelites, were hardly maritime people even in ancient times) would become such a boon. Israel not only became practically self-sufficient in electricity generation (which is only limited by price considerations) but also came to possess a significant amount of natural gas to export. Having new import sources was a welcome development for Europe, as well, which, thereby, had the opportunity to reduce its dependence
