Deals and Divides: The New Frontier of Global Conflict

In the modern geopolitical theatre, the most dangerous conflicts are not only fought with missiles or tanks — they are fought with short-sighted political deals. Across continents, from the Middle East to Latin America, the growing dominance of transactional diplomacy — a style of foreign policy that prioritizes immediate bargains over enduring principles — is reshaping the world in ways that are neither sustainable nor just. While this “deal-first” approach often promises quick wins, its long-term consequences are far more corrosive: deepened conflict, economic fragility, and the slow erosion of democratic norms.

At its core, transactional diplomacy treats foreign relations like a marketplace. It is a politics of exchange, where the currency is not shared values or international law, but short-term advantage. This shift has accelerated over the last decade, and its consequences are now impossible to ignore.

Although the impulse to strike immediate bargains is as old as diplomacy itself, the modern form of transactionalism emerged most starkly during Donald Trump’s first term as U.S. president. Trump reframed diplomacy as a series of high-profile deals, whether on trade, arms sales, or bilateral agreements. International law, multilateral institutions, and moral obligations were pushed aside in favor of spectacle and immediate political payoff.

This style has proven contagious. Even within the European Union — long seen as a bastion of rules-based governance — elements of transactional thinking have taken root. Short-term bargaining over migration policy, climate commitments, and trade has fueled nationalism, xenophobia, and a creeping anthropocentrism that privileges domestic expediency over global responsibility. Instead of strengthening the EU’s cohesion, such trends have fragmented it from within, while sending destabilizing ripples into the wider international order.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) provide a sobering case study of the costs of persistent instability compounded by short-term diplomacy. According to the latest World Bank data, the region’s poverty rate has more than doubled — from 4% in 2010 to 9.4% in 2025. Alarmingly, nearly 11 million people fell below the poverty line in just the past year.

Global crises — the 2008 financial collapse, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Ukraine war — have all played a role, but they cannot fully explain this deterioration. Other regions struck by these same global shocks have fared better. The global average poverty rate today stands at 9.9%, down from 21% in 2010, suggesting that MENA’s deeper problem is structural. Chronic armed conflicts, fragile state institutions, and the absence of long-term economic planning are the true culprits.

What makes this situation even more striking is that fluctuations in oil and gas prices — often seen as the region’s economic heartbeat — cannot fully account for the malaise. The North African subregion contains both energy exporters and importers, yet the overall trajectory remains one of stagnation and vulnerability. This points to governance failure and the compounding effects of war, not just bad luck in commodity markets.

Here, Arab governments face a stark choice: embrace the quick fixes of transactional diplomacy, retreat into isolationism, or commit to a balanced strategy that weds immediate pragmatism to a coherent long-term vision for stability.

The recent Israeli airstrikes on Iran underscore the danger of politically motivated action disguised as preventive security. Israel’s official rationale rests on a statement made three decades ago by Benjamin Netanyahu — then a member of parliament — warning that Iran could produce a nuclear weapon “within weeks or months.” Yet, to date, neither the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) nor U.S. intelligence has found credible evidence of an active Iranian weapons program.

In fact, in March 2025, U.S. intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard testified before the Senate that Iran was not actively pursuing nuclear arms. The IAEA concurred. Despite this, the strikes proceeded, backed by German Chancellor Friedrich Mötze and G7 leaders, and followed by U.S. attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities. A ceasefire arrived just two days later — a quick military climax with long-term regional consequences.

What these events reveal is not an urgent nuclear threat but the logic of transactional alliances. Short-term political gains for Israeli leadership — rallying domestic support, projecting military dominance — outweighed the international community’s commitment to evidence-based diplomacy. And in the wake of the strikes, tourism cancellations and investor withdrawals began rippling through neighboring Egypt and Jordan, economies already strained by their proximity to Gaza’s long-running conflict.

The Israeli–Iran episode is only the latest example of how proxy wars and regional conflicts damage even those states not directly involved. The Iran–Iraq War (1980–88) crippled both combatants for a generation. The 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq—justified by false claims of weapons of mass destruction—destabilized the entire Gulf region. The Gaza war has devastated not only the strip itself but also Egypt and Jordan, despite their formal peace treaties with Israel.

Tourism, energy security, transportation networks — all fall victim to the collateral damage of sustained conflict. For countries like Egypt, the recent escalation has revived the specter of budget deficits, rising public debt, and unemployment. Such economic shocks erode domestic stability and can trigger the very unrest that authoritarian leaders claim to suppress through hardline policies.

The risks are not confined to the Middle East. A protracted conflict involving Iran would likely destabilize global oil markets, spike shipping costs, drive up inflation, and push central banks toward higher interest rates. Currency depreciation and market volatility would follow, eroding investor confidence worldwide.

Yet some Western leaders cling to the belief that war can boost economic growth. In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Keir Starmer recently argued that increased defense spending could spur recovery. While the arms industry might benefit in the short term, the idea that wartime economies translate into broad-based prosperity is a dangerous illusion. The destruction of infrastructure, the displacement of populations, and the long-term cost of rebuilding vastly outweigh any temporary stimulus.

Israel’s normalization of relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan in 2020 was initially a clear example of transactional diplomacy. The agreements were framed as pragmatic economic and security partnerships, not as steps toward resolving the Palestinian question. Yet over time, Israel has used these ties to consolidate its control over occupied territories, signaling a deeper, long-term agenda.

For Arab states, the lesson is clear: transactional agreements can be harnessed for strategic purposes if paired with firm long-term conditions. Saudi Arabia offers a case in point. It has withheld joining the Abraham Accords until there is “irreversible and credible progress” toward a sovereign Palestinian state along the 1967 borders. This stance is not anti-pragmatic; it is an insistence that short-term deals serve, rather than undermine, enduring policy goals.

If transactionalism corrodes foreign policy, it can also erode the independence of domestic institutions — even across borders. A recent episode in Israel illustrates this danger vividly. During Prime Minister Netanyahu’s corruption trial in Tel Aviv, U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee appeared in court alongside the embattled leader. His presence, widely seen as a breach of diplomatic protocol, sent a blunt political message: Washington’s support for Netanyahu outweighs respect for Israel’s judicial process.

Photographs of the ambassador standing beside Netanyahu went viral, prompting comparisons to the start of Netanyahu’s 2020 trial, when he appeared flanked by masked ministers. The symbolism was clear — the trial itself had become a stage for political theatre. Former U.S. President Donald Trump openly called for the proceedings to be halted, and the ambassador’s conduct seemed to embody that demand. The implicit threat was unmistakable: those who pursued the case risked sanctions, trade wars, and political isolation.

The Netanyahu trial episode is not unique. In Brazil, Trump announced a 50% tariff hike in apparent retaliation for the prosecution of former President Jair Bolsonaro. Current President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva responded firmly, declaring that Brazil would tolerate no foreign interference in its judiciary.

The common thread in both cases is the weaponization of economic and diplomatic tools to shield political allies from legal accountability. This is transactionalism at its most corrosive — not merely trading policies for favors, but trading the rule of law itself.

The spread of transactional diplomacy presents a profound challenge to global stability. For Arab nations, the immediate test lies in how they navigate relations with Israel, Iran, and Western powers in a period of heightened volatility. The temptation to strike quick bargains — whether for security guarantees, economic aid, or political recognition—will be strong. But as recent history shows, the costs of short-termism can be catastrophic: entrenched poverty, chronic instability, and the weakening of democratic institutions.

Balanced diplomacy is not about rejecting pragmatism. It is about ensuring that each immediate deal serves a coherent strategy for peace and prosperity. The alternative—a perpetual cycle of reactive bargains and opportunistic interventions—leads only to deeper crises.

The world’s future will be shaped not by the number of deals struck, but by whether those deals are stepping stones toward stability or traps that lock nations into endless conflict. The choice is urgent, and the stakes are global. If the wrong path is chosen, it will not only be the Middle East or Latin America that suffers—the price will be paid by all.