Iran’s policy and the Algerian gateway to North Africa
The strengthening of Algerian Iranian ties
The recent severing of relations between Algeria and Morocco spotlighted the growing presence and involvement of Iran in North Africa, an issue which western officials and experts have neglected in recent years. While Algeria received American praise for its role in resolving the hostage crisis at the U.S Embassy in Tehran in 1979, its relations with the Islamic Republic today have become stronger and closer based on a convergence of interests between the two countries, aimed at achieving political and ideological goals, among them the facilitation of Iranian involvement in North African affairs, as well as countering the interests of the U.S and its allies.
The participation of Algeria’s Prime Minister, Ayman Ben Abderrahmane, in last month’s inauguration ceremony of Iran’s new president Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran and the meeting of the two leaders, were a strong indication of where Algeria’s priorities lie at present, but whether it represents an Algerian strategic shift or tactical maneuvers remains to be seen.
The Israeli angle
The event which led to the Algerian decision to cut off diplomatic ties with Morocco was Israeli Foreign Minister, Yair Lapid’s visit to Morocco. During his visit to Rabat, Lapid did not hide his country’s concern over the Algerian Iranian rapprochement, attacking Algeria for its role in “launching a campaign against Israel’s admission to the African Union as an observer. In this context, there are Indications that the Algerian Iranian rapprochement provides cover for Iranian efforts to infiltrate and encircle Israeli interests and impede U.S peace efforts.
Algerian gains
If Iran’s goal is to break out of its isolation and crowd out Arab-Israeli relations, then the interests of Algeria, even if they are confined to its regional-geographical dimension, converge with the Iranian interests, and serve Algeria’s agenda. In addition to the military cooperation memorandum signed by Algeria and Iran in 2002, there are other longstanding Iranian projects of arming Algeria with the Shahab-3 medium-range ballistic missiles and possibly providing the Algerian defense establishment with nuclear technology.
Morocco’s concerns
Iranian statements expressing Tehran’s commitment to come to the defense of Algeria if it is threatened, have angered Morocco, but they were mainly a testimony that Iran’s expansionist goals are not limited to the Middle East and the Arab Gulf, but also go beyond it to the African continent, by supporting everyone who welcomes Iran and extends a hand of cooperation to it. Considering the rupture of the Moroccan-Iranian relationship and Moroccan-Algerian relations, there is no room for any doubt that Iran wants to benefit from any changes to besiege the U.S and Israeli interests in North Africa. Iran’s support through Hezbollah of the Polisario Front (which is sponsored by Algeria on its territory) provides strong evidence that the Algeria of 1979 is very different in its military and political ambitions from the Algeria of 2021.
By virtue of the rapprochement that brings Rabat closer to Washington and Tel Aviv, the Iranians are working to turn Algeria into a major gateway to antagonizing U.S interests, whether with Morocco or in Libya, and perhaps benefiting from the presence of terrorist organizations in the region and with Algerian complicity to form a foothold for the Iranians and enable them to form armed organizations that help the Republican Guard in achieving its military and political goals in the region.
Iranian infiltration into the African continent
Undoubtedly, Iranian intentions not only in Algeria but in Africa in general are one of a series of interconnected circles that Iran is working on to tighten its grip on the political decisions of the countries of the African continent, employing methods they have used in the Middle East, via Hezbollah, working to form armed cells that owe allegiance to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) Quds Force. In recent years, Hezbollah reportedly created sleeper cells in Cameroon, Ghana, Niger, Congo, and the Central African Republic, as well as in North Africa through the support of the Polisario Front, which Algeria embraces on its soil and which Hezbollah supports with training and weapons. Last February, Ethiopian intelligence managed to dismantle an IRGC cell that was spying on the embassies of the United States, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates in Addis Ababa. Last April, the Ugandan authorities arrested an Iranian citizen who was planning to carry out terrorist operations on Ugandan soil.
U.S policy
These developments have not been at the center of attention in Washington. There is a set of necessary questions, which U.S officials need to ask themselves as the answers may be more than urgent in preventing the Iranian threat from exacerbating the African continent. If the Iranian-Algerian relations are based on strategic interests on both sides, it is absurd to say that this condition applies to the rest of the African countries. Perhaps Iran will take advantage of the needs of these poor countries to consolidate and strengthen its secret networks, and perhaps build an interconnected system that may be difficult to deal with, as is the case in Lebanon, Iraq, and Yemen and Syria. These questions include what threat the Iranian-Algerian alliance poses to the region, to what degree is the issue on the radars of U.S intelligence agencies, what impact will the U.S withdrawal from Afghanistan have on Iran’s actions in North Africa. At this point, these are all unresolved questions, but the sure answer is that the Iranian tactic in the face of U.S interests did not and will not exclude the African continent, just as it did not exclude, in the recent past, the alliance with the Venezuelan and Cuban regimes. The delay in curbing Iranian activity in Africa may be a grave mistake for the West and may cause a lot of damage to the interests of the United States and its allies. More by the Author
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