Russia's recognition of the results of the Crimean referendum and the independence of the Republic of Crimea, and the subsequent acceptance of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol as new constituent entities of the Russian Federation, have elicited an extremely negative reaction in the West and led Washington and Brussels to announce sanctions against Moscow.

We can only hope that this tension will not have a negative effect on the extremely important cooperation between Russia and the West on the entire set of urgent problems of Afghanistan and the Middle East region. (It is sufficient to mention the problem of removing chemical weapons from Syria, Iran's nuclear program, resolving the Syrian crisis, the Middle East conflict, the situation in Yemen, etc.) However, there are already signs that this tension in relations between the leading global players is having an impact on their regional policies and on the behavior of the regional powers themselves.

In Moscow, it is not considered a coincidence that it is now, when Russia has decided to bring Crimea and the city of Sevastopol into the Russian Federation, that President Barack Obama has announced the closing of Syria's diplomatic missions in the United States. This is interpreted as a signal that the American administration is pursuing a tougher policy with respect to Damascus, and that Washington is very likely to move away from cooperation with Moscow in resolving the Syrian crisis. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad declared his full support for Moscow's actions in Crimea, clearly attempting to use this to his advantage now, when he hopes to achieve a military victory over the scattered rebel units or, failing that, at least reduce them to an insurrection movement of an "acceptable level" not representing an existential threat to the regime, and trending toward fragmentation and decline.

Analysts in Moscow also think it is no coincidence that now, at a time when relations between Washington and Moscow are increasingly strained, Obama has launched a new attempt, by himself, to get the Palestinian-Israeli negotiation process moving again. Does this mean that Obama has given up for good on this important aspect of partnership with Russia as well? In other words, does it mean that the short-sighted policy of comprehensively isolating Russia will also apply to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process? Or is the US president, foreseeing that the conflicting sides will probably be unable to agree on anything by the end of April, merely trying to save face through this unilateral initiative?