Algerian diplomacy, especially in recent years, has positioned itself as a “supportive” symbol of the voice loyal to the Palestinian cause, through a discourse that supports “resistance” and rejects international trusteeship over a cause that the Algerian president once said he “personally follows.” It has even used it as a platform to attack Morocco and accuse it of “betraying” the issues of the nation, before its vote on the recent Security Council resolution on the solution in Gaza revealed another face of the policy of a state that is ready at all times to reverse its positions, which it describes as “historical and principled,” on the scale of international interests and balances.

At the heart of the paradox of this vote, which the “Al-Muradia Palace” rushed to justify and which sparked opinions within Algeria that attacked the positions of their country’s regime, which had stood with it on issues that sometimes contradicted its ideological orientations, observers believe that this shift cannot be separated from the broader strategic context, as it seems that Algeria is seeking, through this “pragmatic deviation,” to send positive signals to the United States of America, at a time when Washington is clinging to its strong support for Rabat in the Western Sahara issue, especially after betting on the waning of this support during the era of Joe Biden, the rival of Donald Trump, the architect of the American decision, thus turning the humanitarian issues that it had adopted into a tool to secure strategic interests far removed from the principles that it has always declared.

Tactical retreats

Al-Buraq Shadi Abdel Salam, an international expert in crisis management, conflict analysis and risk management, said that “Algeria’s vote in favor of UN Resolution 2803 in the Security Council, which stipulates a peace plan for the Gaza Strip and includes the establishment of a temporary international force and disarmament measures, is considered a blatant evasion of previous positions and the declared discourse of Algeria towards the Palestinian issue, which has always been about supporting the resistance and rejecting international trusteeship and peace processes and other slogans and positions that do not have a direct impact on the course of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”

Al-Buraq added that “Algerian diplomacy, through its support for an international resolution that includes measures for disarmament in Gaza, confirms its exploitation of international political positions. Algeria has consistently opposed international circles on fundamental issues, not out of commitment to higher principles, but rather to serve its own narrow agendas.” He emphasized that “this vote, which aligns with an American plan to reshape the landscape in Gaza, represents a sacrifice of principled positions for purely pragmatic purposes, thus confirming suspicions about its true motives, which are linked to an attempt to provide diplomatic services in the Security Council to halt the profound shifts that Morocco is making in the positions of international powers.”

He added that “Algeria’s recent positions in the Security Council, which included reservations or tactical retreats compared to its traditional positions, can be interpreted as a pragmatic attempt to send positive signals to the United States, indicating a systematic shift in the compass of Algerian foreign policy, aimed at getting closer to Washington in an effort to obtain geopolitical support or strategic guarantees on other regional issues of concern to the Algerian state, even if this is at the expense of declared principles.”

The source told Hespress that “the adoption by the Security Council of Resolution 2797, which reinforces the Moroccan approach to the regional conflict by focusing on a realistic political solution based on supporting the autonomy proposal under Moroccan sovereignty, has had profound strategic repercussions on the Algerian position.

Consequently, these diplomatic repercussions that Algeria received in the Security Council led to a state of confusion among the political decision-makers in Algiers, which affected their diplomatic behavior in an unexpected fluctuation in many previous positions in international forums.

Repositioning

For his part, Said Berkanane, a media and political analyst, explained that “Algeria’s recent vote in the UN Security Council on the resolution to disarm Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip and place the administration of the Strip under international supervision, raised a number of questions that we cannot find answers to unless we approach this vote through contexts related to the changing conditions in North Africa and the Sahel south of the Sahara and the accelerating events in the Middle East region, in addition to the internal contexts related to the centrality of the Palestinian cause in the discourse of the ruling regime in Algeria.”

The source explained to Hespress that “the recent vote can be justified by the fact that Algeria has begun to base its positions on regional and international issues on the diplomacy of interests, and not on rigid ideological positions as was the case in many of its previous positions that exposed it to problems and caused it to be suffocated in its regional environment,” considering that “this change in Algeria’s political behavior can also be understood in light of this country’s attempt to re-strengthen its presence in regional and international issues through diplomatic positions that are consistent with international trends.”

Berkan stressed that “the Security Council resolution on the Moroccan Sahara, which established the principles for settling the fabricated conflict based on the autonomy plan, also played a role in Algeria’s reversal of the positions it considered historically firm in support of the Palestinian cause, especially with regard to supporting the Palestinian factions,” stressing that “there is an international project that enjoys the support of the world’s great powers in the Middle East and North Africa region, which is related to emptying the region of armed groups, whatever their references, and restricting weapons to the hands of the member states of the United Nations only.”

He continued, “This project has already begun to be implemented by eliminating the military power of the Lebanese Hezbollah and the armed organizations in Syria and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party abandoning armed struggle. Now it is the turn of Hamas and the Polisario Front, as the recent dialogue between America and Algeria before the issuance of the final decision on the Sahara was within this framework, especially in light of the trend within the US Congress to place the Polisario Front on the list of terrorism that threatens the stability of Washington’s allies, including Morocco.”

Berkan concluded that “the great powers have come to see the future of the Middle East and North Africa from an economic perspective, and to establish this future it is necessary to eliminate armed groups and confine weapons to the hands of regular armies,” highlighting that “Algeria’s recent vote on the resolution on Gaza may have internal consequences, as it puts the regime in this country under criticism regarding its positions and political behavior, but it is likely that this will be overcome as soon as the details of the peace plan sponsored by Washington between Algeria and Morocco become clear and the mechanisms for Algeria’s return to the political forefront in the region are revealed.”