When we presented the twentieth edition of the IEMed Mediterranean Yearbook last year, we spoke of the profound transformations that the region had experienced in the past twenty years. We referred to progress and setbacks, opportunities and hopes, revolutions and counter-revolutions, new wars, Euro-Mediterranean policies… But also to frozen conflicts that endure, marking the region’s future to a large extent. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been a focus of the yearbook in all its editions to a greater or lesser extent. The lack of progress in the search for a lasting solution and the steady deterioration of the situation in Palestine has been a constant in the analyses we have been publishing over the years. At a time when Israel’s relations with some Arab countries were normalising, on 7 October 2023, Hamas launched the worst attack ever suffered by Israel from Gaza. The unprecedented outbreak of violence and death on Israeli soil brought the conflict back into the international spotlight and sparked a wave of solidarity with Israel and its right to self-defence among its Western allies.
However, the Israeli response, even more deadly and devastating, with thousands of civilians killed, Gaza virtually razed to the ground, and a humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions, led to international reaction, threatened regional expansion of the conflict, sowed doubts among some of Israel’s allies, divided EU countries and polarized international public opinion on the conflict.
The Gaza war has profoundly shaped developments in the Mediterranean region. For this reason, the conflict, its consequences and its future outlook have determined the entire content of this edition of the Yearbook. Obviously, we cannot ignore all the other problems in the region, which have also been addressed, but the conflict has marked the table of contents, from the Dossier to the Annexes, offering a cross-cutting view that goes beyond violence and destruction.
The Hamas attack is a turning point in a long-standing conflict, which is why the Dossier could not stop at horror, but rather needed to seek out the geopolitical and socio-political elements that converge in this conflict and those that can offer the keys to possible solutions to the crisis. Hence, we have tried to produce a Dossier dealing with the issue from a broad perspective and with authors of proven quality. Thus, we begin the Dossier with an article contextualizing the conflict, from the Oslo Accords to the Hamas attack, and another focused on the immediate context of the attack, the first reactions to it and future prospects.
Following these articles, the dossier offers several that focus on the stances and reactions of the different regional and international actors in the conflict. This group of articles analyses: the position of the United States and the future of its relationship with Israel; the role of powers such as Russia and China in the crisis and their attempt to increase their authority in the region at the expense of American influence; the internal divisions within the European Union in the face of a conflict on which there were already contrasting positions among the different countries, but on which the unprecedented magnitude of the crisis has revealed deep fractures; the state of Israel’s normalization process with certain Arab countries, in particular the case of the agreement with Saudi Arabia after the turning point of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza; and finally, the position of Iran in the conflict is analysed, as the visible head of the “Axis of Resistance” but without escalating the conflict to a regional scale, which would lead to an escalation of violence of unimaginable proportions.
The following articles in the Dossier analyse the internal politics of the parties to the conflict, highlighting the lack of consensus among Palestinian factions and the need for a political leadership of unity that would allow for an agreement on a national strategy in the face of the dramatic nature of the current situation. On the other hand, the Israeli government’s need to maintain a bellicose profile in order to mitigate criticism of its management prior to the Hamas attack or the hostage situation, in addition to the internal protests that have marked the evolution of the Israeli government over judicial reform or corruption cases. Criticism and protests that in few cases question the policies that have led to the current tragedy.
Finally, the Dossier includes an article on the humanitarian crisis caused by the Israeli attack on Gaza, an unprecedented one in which the civilian population has suffered devastating attacks with thousands of victims and wounded. The situation has been aggravated by the destruction of basic facilities and health services infrastructure, exacerbating the food and health crisis, and by the blockade of humanitarian aid as well as attacks on NGOs and UN humanitarian agencies. The destruction of buildings and infrastructure has turned Gaza into a wasteland with few areas left untouched, which means that a future for the people of Gaza, even if a minimally stable truce can be reached, is far, very far from possible. The reconstruction of Gaza will only be possible with peace, a peace that is far from being achieved with the deep and dramatic scars that this war will leave behind.
Although the conflict in Gaza has garnered most of the media attention in the region, we cannot ignore other issues of great relevance for the Mediterranean area. As in every edition, the Keys section selects some of these issues to address them in greater depth through various articles.
The first of this edition’s Keys is dedicated to the crisis in the Sahel. The situation in the southern neighbourhood of the Mediterranean countries has become a source of tension that affects the entire Euro-Mediterranean region. The articles analyse different aspects of the situation: on the one hand, the security shifts exemplified by coups d’état, jihadist insurgencies and the pivot towards Russia in parallel to the failure of Western countries in the region. The European Union’s loss of influence is reflected in the growing influence in the region, not only of Russia, but also of other countries such as China, Turkey and the Gulf States. Finally, it also analyses the growth of migratory movements in the region (both internal and external) resulting from conflicts and instability.
The second of this issue’s Keys focuses on the EU’s relations with the Mediterranean neighbourhood. On the one hand, it addresses the position of southern Mediterranean countries vis-à-vis the EU and their apparent disenchantment with Euro-Mediterranean policies and diversification of international alliances. On the other, it analyses how the reorganisation of the Eastern Partnership and the relaunch of EU enlargement affects the Mediterranean countries, both Southern and Eastern Mediterranean Countries and the Western Balkans.
The next of the Keys, of a more economic nature, focuses on the role of infrastructure in the face of the challenges of economic and sustainable development in the Mediterranean. This section analyses the issue from the perspectives of finance, adaptation to climate change and the presence of new international actors in the competition for the construction of new infrastructure in the Mediterranean.
The fourth and last of the Keys focuses on the migration crisis in the Mediterranean. It analyses EU migration policies, especially the European Pact on Migration and Asylum, as well as the role of the Mediterranean partner countries in the externalisation of EU migration control.
In addition to the Dossier, the conflict in Gaza is also addressed in the rest of the yearbook. Thus, the Panorama section includes articles on the economic impact of the war on the countries in the region, the role of social networks and the media in reporting on the conflict, and the conflict from a gender perspective.
This section also maintains its usual collection of short articles designed to offer an overview of recent events in the region from a double perspective: on the one hand, a series of articles from a geographical point of view that analyse the situation in the Mediterranean countries, from the ten years of Croatia’s EU membership or the Chinese presence in the Western Balkans to the multiple crises in Lebanon or the incorporation of Arab countries into the BRICs.
On the other hand, an assortment of texts from a thematic/sectoral perspective where one can find, in addition to those mentioned above, articles on security (cybersecurity, drug trafficking in the Middle East), economy (the reactivation of tourism, energy, the role of ports in regional interconnectivity), the environment (climate emergencies, climate justice) and culture (diplomacy and sport, creative industries and cultural cooperation), among other topics.
All these articles round off a compilation of analysis and information on recent events and future prospects in the Mediterranean region. It is impossible to provide an exhaustive overview of the diversity of issues in the region at a time when the war in Gaza is in the spotlight. However, the collection of articles in the yearbook offers a broad, diverse and rigorous overview of the situation in the region. The yearbook’s articles offer analysis, reflection and information so that those interested in the Mediterranean region can gain a general overview and delve deeper into more specific aspects.
Lastly, less analytical but no less important are the annexes to the yearbook. The annexes are intended to be exhaustive and respond to the need to offer our readers the information they need to go a step further in their analysis of the region and the countries that make it up. The selection of contents makes it possible to provide background information on many of the topics covered in the yearbooks and also on those not covered in the articles, allowing readers to go beyond the published analyses and find the points of interest most relevant to them in relation to the Mediterranean area.
Finally, I would like to end this presentation by thanking all those who participate in preparing the yearbook, from the advisory board that helps define the table of contents to the authors who, through their articles, mark the quality of the analyses, as well as the translators, proofreaders and layout designers, not to mention the editorial team and the IEMed staff who ensure that the yearbook continues to be an important point of reference in the study of the region year after year.
In the face of the events ravaging the region, we know that it is difficult to change the dynamics of conflict, but only through knowledge, rigour and analysis can we lay the foundations for promoting solutions that bring us one step closer to peace and prosperity in the region. We hope that the Yearbook will contribute in its modest way to this objective.