Neville Teller
On April 2, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Qatar as “a complex country”. The epithet seems a trifle inadequate. Qatar is close to mirroring Winston Churchill’s famous description of Russia – “a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.”
Dubbed “the wild card of the Middle East”, Qatar makes for an intriguing case study. This stand-alone and gas-rich Gulf state – the wealthiest country in the world on a per capita basis –is best known to the general public as having won the hosting rights for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in somewhat dubious circumstances.
Qatar has long pursued a foreign policy that appears self-contradictory to the world in general, and positively infuriating to its Arab neighbors. While offering itself as a key US ally in the Middle East, it has also consistently backed hardline Islamists — from Hamas in the Gaza Strip, to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, to wild-eyed jihadists in Assad’s Syria.
“We don’t do enemies,” a one-time foreign minister of Qatar once said. “We talk to everyone.”
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