Voices from the Arab press: Between the Yalta and Alaska summits

Nearly six years after its outbreak, on May 8, 1945, World War II officially ended in Europe with the surrender of Nazi Germany, and then in Asia and across the world on September 2 of that same year, with the surrender of Japan.

Eighty years after that pivotal meeting – attended by the leaders of the United States, the Soviet Union, and Britain – the state of Alaska, just a few kilometers from Russian territory, became the stage for another historic encounter, this time between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

For Europe, this war represents a profound violation of the rules established at Yalta eight decades ago and a harrowing sign that the continent’s geostrategic order is once again being rewritten. On one side stands the West, embodied by the European Union and NATO, with their economic, political, and military strength. On the other stands the Russian Federation, flexing its military power and wielding its political influence.

It is almost cruel irony that the original blueprint of this East-West division was drawn in Yalta, a coastal city on the Black Sea in Crimea – territory that remained part of Ukraine until Russia seized and annexed it in 2014, decades after Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev transferred it to Kyiv in 1954.

The fact that the Alaska summit was convened to address the very conflict over Ukraine – and Russia’s steady annexations, beginning with Crimea, where Yalta itself sits – speaks volumes about history’s circular rhythm.

From the little that has been revealed, it is already clear that the first US-Russian summit under these volatile and perilous conditions will leave behind a legacy: a world order that departs significantly from the post-Yalta consensus.

The Yalta Conference had produced the division of Germany, including Berlin, among the victors of World War II, as well as territorial adjustments in Poland. But its broader significance lay in the West’s tacit acceptance of Moscow’s dominance over Eastern and Central-Eastern Europe, and the incorporation of the Soviet Union – on its own terms – into the international framework represented by the United Nations and its institutions. The Alaska meeting, by many indications, mirrors this precedent.

Alongside this, there appears to be an acceptance of Moscow’s demands to halt NATO’s expansion into neighboring states, especially Ukraine, in exchange for security guarantees designed to reassure Russia without undermining its grip on seized lands.

Just as striking, however, is the likelihood that Russia’s reintegration into the international system – politically, economically, commercially, and financially – will be the most immediate outcome of the Alaska summit. With the Trump administration’s active encouragement, Moscow is being pulled back into global structures of legitimacy, setting the stage for a reemergence of bipolarity in world affairs.

This paradox is striking not only because of its contradictions, but also because its advocates deploy the same rhetoric to brand rival political parties as traitors if they dissent from their position on the question of weapons outside the authority of the state.

Lebanese political life, at least in its modern history, has always been steeped in classifications and counter-classifications, many of which have spilled beyond Lebanon’s borders into the broader regional context.

These labels have arisen for various reasons – some grounded in genuine ideological or political divisions, others the product of transient circumstances, opportunistic alignments, or external influences. They have been wielded as weapons, used by one faction to cast its opponent, whether an individual or a political party, in a particular light.

The Lebanese remember these classifications well, and some persist in the collective consciousness long after the political eras that spawned them. Think of the old dichotomies of Right vs Left, or progressive versus reactionary, terms that once dominated the landscape. Others endure today, deployed intermittently: nationalist vs unpatriotic, patriot vs traitor, loyalist vs agent, independent vs submissive.

These accusations have resurfaced with vigor in recent years, particularly in the arsenal of Hezbollah and its media machine, as part of its assault on the national debate over the exclusivity of weapons in state hands.

Historically, Lebanon’s political classifications rested on a basic logic of mutual exclusivity: a party or individual could be right-wing or left-wing, but never both; reactionary or progressive, not a mixture; nationalist or unpatriotic, with no middle ground.

The Sudan that emerges from this war will not resemble the Sudan that existed before it. From the bitterness of this experience will come painful lessons and inevitable changes, forcing a reckoning with problems that were once ignored, or at best, acknowledged with complaints but never met with real solutions.

Among the most urgent lessons is the need to end the phenomenon of militias, armed movements, and auxiliary armies, ensuring that no weapons exist outside the control of the regular armed forces and the authority of the state.

It was precisely the previous chaos and the unchecked growth of the Rapid Support Forces that led Sudan to its current catastrophe. This is why the recent decision to place all allied and supporting forces fighting alongside the army under the provisions of the Armed Forces Law of 2007 is of vital importance.

More than an organizational measure to enforce discipline on those who bear arms, and to regulate their lawful use, this decision lays the groundwork for the next essential step: the integration of all armed groups and movements into a single, professional, national army subject to the control of the state, rather than the ambitions of groups, individuals, or private interests.

This move did not occur in isolation but was preceded by other measures, including the order to end the presence of all armed groups in central Khartoum and to relocate them to camps outside the capital. It also reaffirmed that individuals may not carry weapons or circulate with them in civilian areas – be they residential neighborhoods, markets, or other public spaces.

These measures are part of a broader effort to restore security, pave the way for displaced families to return to their homes, and bring life back to the capital, where intense efforts are underway to clear war debris, rehabilitate vital service facilities, repair essential infrastructure – especially electricity and water – and reopen the airport within weeks.

In parallel, authorities issued decisions on two issues that the war cast into sharp relief: informal settlements and the unregulated foreign presence. Though long a source of debate and worry, the conflict magnified these challenges and thrust them into urgent public view.

Many of the looting incidents targeting the homes of displaced citizens, as well as the pillaging of markets and factories, were committed by residents of informal settlements – crimes documented in widely circulated videos. A large number of armed robbery gangs apprehended by security forces came from these areas.

More alarming still, some residents of these slums joined the ranks of the Rapid Support Forces, participating in atrocities in Khartoum, Wad Madani, and elsewhere.

Every country has the sovereign right – and the obligation – to address the problem of informal settlements, which have always posed security risks by violating land laws and fostering instability. Sudan can no longer afford to avoid dealing with this reality, just as it can no longer ignore the peril of illegal foreign presence, whose unchecked growth has reached alarming levels and poses a serious security threat.

The authorities have begun to tackle these thorny challenges, and they should be commended for doing so, because postponement only compounds the problems. Resistance from some quarters is inevitable, but corrective action is overdue and indispensable if Sudan is to confront the war’s consequences and draw lessons that can prevent future tragedies.

In this context, the position taken by certain leaders of the Justice and Equality Movement (Gibril Ibrahim’s faction) and the Sudan Liberation Movement (Minni Arko Minnawi’s faction), who oppose subjecting all allied armed factions to the Armed Forces Law, is both puzzling and shortsighted.

Their argument – that their forces remain under the Juba Peace Agreement and cannot be brought under military law until the integration and demobilization provisions of the security arrangements are implemented – suggests deliberate stalling and selective interpretation of the accord.

“The Brotherhood is a group that believes only in itself and recognizes only its own authority.” – the late president Anwar Sadat.

“The Brotherhood raises the banner of Islam to rule people, not to serve Islam.” – Dr. Mustafa Mahmoud.

The voices behind these words were not ordinary commentators; they were figures who studied and engaged with this rogue group over decades and who distilled their experience into a clear and unshakable judgment.

Their view is one almost universally shared by fair-minded intellectuals across generations: The Brotherhood seeks nothing but power and destruction, advancing its cause with relentless vigor. It harbors hostility toward the very concept of the homeland, refuses to acknowledge it, and continually plots against its institutions.

The danger is compounded by its willingness to stretch its treachery beyond borders, reaching out to foreign powers in attempts to undermine Egypt and diminish its international standing.

Its members ceaselessly spread rumors, lies, and disinformation through satellite channels and social media, pumping venom into the public sphere around the clock.

The assessments of Hussein, Nasser, Sadat, and Mahmoud feel less like historical warnings than direct descriptions of what we see today: a terrorist organization incapable of reform, intellectually stagnant, and consumed by arrogance.

Can anyone seriously deny that the Brotherhood laid the ideological foundation for modern takfiri extremism and legitimized the use of terror as a means to seize power?

These were not aberrations, but a continuation of the very methods outlined by Sayyid Qutb, the group’s chief ideologue, who in a handwritten document from 1965 – after his arrest for leading armed terrorist cells – openly described plans to bomb bridges, electricity and water plants, and other vital facilities. He admitted to stockpiling weapons for attacks against the state, including an assassination attempt on Nasser.

Violence was not incidental; it was the backbone of their program, indoctrinating generations in a culture of terror. Nor should we forget the gruesome episode in the 1970s when the Takfir wal-Hijra group, born of Brotherhood ideology, kidnapped and murdered Muhammad Husayn al-Dhahabi, the minister of religious endowments.

Its leader, Shukri Mustafa, had been a disciple of Sayyid Qutb in prison, drinking deeply from the poisonous doctrine of takfir and violence as tools for power, regardless of the blood spilled or the innocent lives destroyed.

Always, they claim sanctity, wrapping their atrocities in the fraudulent rhetoric of “defending Islam.” Anyone who imagines that the Brotherhood’s threat is confined to a few states is gravely mistaken. Their danger extends across continents.

Even the United States, which once provided them with cover and refuge, is now openly debating designating them as a terrorist organization, while other nations have placed them under tight surveillance, monitoring their every move.

These men are merchants of religion, addicted to power, treacherous and deceitful, incapable of change. There is no illusion of reform to be entertained.