When Tel Aviv Sneezes, Washington Coughs: Somaliland and the New Grammar of Power

[Deeq A.]

When Tel Aviv Sneezes, Washington Coughs: Somaliland and the New Grammar of Power

In international politics, recognition is rarely an act of idealism. It is a declaration of interest. Israel’s recognition of Somaliland is not an isolated diplomatic gesture; it is a strategic tremor whose aftershocks are already being felt in Washington, the Gulf, and the wider Horn of Africa.

For three decades, Somaliland has existed in a diplomatic purgatory—stable, democratic, and self-governing, yet denied recognition in deference to a fictional Somali unity that survives only on paper and foreign subsidies. Israel’s decision punctures this illusion. It reframes Somaliland not as a secessionist anomaly, but as a strategic asset in one of the world’s most contested corridors: the Red Sea–Gulf of Aden–Bab el-Mandeb axis.

When Tel Aviv moves, Washington recalibrates, not because of subservience, but because interests converge. The United States has long struggled with the contradiction at the heart of its Somalia policy: pouring resources into Mogadishu while insecurity metastasises, even as Somaliland quietly builds institutions, conducts elections, and denies space to extremist networks. Israel’s recognition forces an uncomfortable but necessary question in Washington: why is stability being punished while failure is endlessly rewarded?

The path forward will not be theatrical. The CIA will not announce itself, nor will policy arrive wrapped in slogans. Instead, the shift will be bureaucratic, incremental, and deniable. Somaliland will be folded into counter-terrorism architectures, maritime security frameworks, and congressional briefings. USAID and defence planners will expand engagement without using the word “recognition,” until recognition becomes the least controversial option left.

The United Arab Emirates plays a significant role as an accelerator. Through ports, logistics, and capital, Abu Dhabi turns Berbera into a geopolitical fact. In global politics, concrete and cranes often speak louder than communiqués. Once trade routes, naval logistics, and energy corridors run through Somaliland, the map adjusts itself.

This is how power operates in the twenty-first century. Sovereignty no longer emerges solely from colonial borders or African Union dogma, but from functionality, security, and relevance. Institutions follow reality; they rarely create it.

Opponents will cry precedent. However, precedent already exists in the cases of South Sudan, Eritrea, and Kosovo. What they fear is not fragmentation, but the collapse of a long-maintained lie—that borders matter more than people, and that diplomatic comfort should outweigh empirical governance.

Somaliland’s recognition, if it comes, will not be a gift. It will be an admission—long overdue—that the international system can no longer afford to ignore functioning polities in favour of failed abstractions.

When Tel Aviv sneezes, Washington coughs. But when reality asserts itself, even empires must eventually listen.
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from Gatineau, Québec·

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