Analysis & Commentary
2012: It Could be a Year of Middle East Uncertainty
In addition, Jonathan Schanzer, vice president of research for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, agreed that the "Iranian nuclear crisis will be the number one security concern of 2012."
47% of Germans Think Israel Exterminating Palestinians’
Study shows a strong presence of “anti-Semitism that is linked with Israel and is hidden behind criticism of Israel" in Europe.
9/11 and Arab Democracy
Beyond catastrophe and mourning, September 11th had unforeseen consequences in the Arab world, especially in my home country of Egypt. The attacks of that day, by citizens of America’s key Arab allies, made officials in Washington rethink their relations with Arab dictators, and begin supporting democracy in the Middle East.
A Chance for Peace?
There were no televised debates, an underwhelming turnout and charges of serious ballot stuffing. But the election of Mahmoud Abbas as the new Palestinian leader is one of the first promising signs Palestinians and Israelis have seen in many a Mideast moon. Abbas, aka Abu Mazen, is a well-educated, decidedly uncharismatic millionaire businessman with a pragmatic mind of his own. He was one of the few top-ranking Palestinians to publicly call for an end to violence. And while he may invoke his predecessor's name (as an election gimmick, say his defenders), he openly defied Yasser Arafat - even resigning from the Palestinian premiership rather than toeing the Arafat line.
A New United Church Report Shows How Israel-Haters Have Lost the Argument
According to a new report from the United Church of Canada, “the deepest meaning of the Holocaust was the denial of human dignity to Jews.” Oh, really? Actually, I’d say that the “deepest meaning of the Holocaust” was the slaughter of six-million human beings.
A Palestinian State Means War
With the U.S.-led peace process looking increasingly moribund, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has begun enlisting foreign leaders in a dangerous effort to recognize a Palestinian state without Israel's agreement. Abbas and his prime minister, Salam Fayyad, began this effort earlier this year to strengthen the Palestinian negotiating position, and it is bearing more fruit than even he could have expected. Abbas, however, should be careful what he wishes for. A declaration of statehood without Israeli approval could start a war in which the Palestinians themselves would pay the highest price.
A Tale of Two Elections; Abbas and Allawi
The Palestinian election on January 9 was the first of two important national votes in the Middle East, the second being the Iraqi polls on January 30. Whether the two sets of votes mean that two new democracies will be born is uncertain. Upon these elections hang considerable expectations, not just of Palestinians and Iraqis but of their neighbors and the broader Middle East. Many expect that they could provide an opportunity to resolve the instability that bedevils the Middle East.
A Time for Middle East Peace
Resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict would be a wonderful thing. But the reality is that for more than a half century, every American president has attempted to find a magic formula that would bring peace to the tiny territories between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. And every American president has seen his efforts come a cropper.
A U.N. Vote: A Loss for Israel and a Humiliation for the U.S.
I spoke this morning with Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, who testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday. Before his testimony he went to the Middle East to glean information about the upcoming vote and the reaction of Palestinians to the potential for U.N. recognition of Palestinian statehood in some form.
A Widening War
What must Hamas leaders have been thinking? Last month they sent guerrillas through a secret tunnel from Gaza into Israel where they launched an attack, killing two Israeli soldiers and kidnapping a third, 19-year-old Cpl. Gilad Shalit. Since no civilians were targeted, this was not an act of terrorism. It was an act of war.
Abbas Talks, Won’t Walk the Walk…
With Israel set to withdraw from the Gaza Strip this summer, you'd think everyone would focus on the Jewish state's daring gamble for peace. Instead, the world legion of bend-over-backward analysts keeps harping about what Israel isn't doing and how by incorporating a Jewish suburb into Jerusalem city limits and continuing the security barricade that keeps terrorists out, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is endangering chances for peace.
Abbas’ Victory: Until Jihad comes back?
As of mid Sunday, Western media networks were in awe as of the results of the Palestinian presidential election. Anchors and newswires projected a landslide result in favor of Mahmoud Abbas, the winner of the first post Arafat popular election within the Palestinian territories. Some outlets described the results –with 66 to 70% of the ballots won- as a “clear and overwhelming mandate from the Palestinian voters” to Abu Mazen.
Abbas’s Police State
The Palestinian Authority is taking aggressive new measures to squelch dissent -- and the White House is missing in action.
Abu Khaled Toameh: Palestinians in Disarray Dimming Peace Push by Obama
This looks like the fulfillment of what Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies in Washington, DC has argued expressly would be a likely outcome both in his book, Hamas versus Fatah: the Struggle for Palestine and in his recent commentaries.
AKTINA FM
U.S.-Israel relations, Israel-Turkey relations, and political developments in Egypt.
An Alternative Road to A ‘Two-State Solution’
Last week, not for the first time, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said he was considering declaring a Palestinian state and asking the United Nations to recognize it. In the past, it went without saying that the United States, which holds a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, would veto any such proposal that did not come about as the result of a negotiated agreement between Palestinians and Israelis. But there is now speculation that President Barack Obama might break with that precedent.
Arabs vs. Iranians
Americans like to think big in foreign policy, so they yearn to settle the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation.
Arafat Defined
Who was Yasser Arafat? During his life he had been labeled a defender, a champion of peace, an obstructer of peace, a dictator, a terrorist,and a man of the people. Still today, the mere mention of his name can cause emotions to rage as furiously against him as they will in defense of him. From support rallies in the Gaza strip to overt threats in the Israeli Knesset, Arafat positioned himself as one of most controversial leaders of the 20th and early 21st centuries. However, despite the awe in which so many Palestinians held him, irrespective of his reception of the prestigious Noble Prize for Peace, and his popularity throughout the European and American academia, the fact remains that Arafat's biggest accomplishment of his checkered life was his development of terrorism as a political hammer, and his mastery of the combination of belligerent attacks on an innocent civilian populace with perpetuations of his institutions' role as the “eternal victims.”
Arafat Wins Again
Give Yasser Arafat credit. The man has always had a genius for destruction. And in the long twilight of his career, he hasn't lost a step. In a stroke, he has derailed progress toward an Israeli-Arab peace, transformed the new Palestinian Authority prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas, into a powerless puppy, sowed discord between his old enemies, Israel and the US, and made President Bush contradict his own policies. Not bad for a few days' work.
Arafat’s ‘Means’ Failed in the End
I remember vividly the bearded man with dark glasses and his Keffiah,the Arab headdress that became equated with him in the West, as he harangued the masses on a West Beirut university campus. It was in the early 1970s and my brother and I were students in Beirut, and Yasser Arafat, the emerging leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, was the shining star in the Arab world.
