The aftermath of the “Arab Spring” and waning of great power influence has seen Turkey and Iran, both with imperials pasts to assert themselves regionally. Another Shia-Sunni rivalry unfolds. Look for local proxies to join sides.
Coming up, fifty years after the June 1967 War. How many times have I taught the causes and effects, or written about the War? Hundreds of times in forty years.
In the aftermath of UNSC Resolution 2334 condemning Israeli settlement construction, Secretary of State John Kerry publicly blamed Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank for being the major barrier to a two-state solution to resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found are a great way to understand the Palestinian narrative and in particular, advocates of the Palestinian cause like former President Jimmy Carter.
For almost 100 years, the Declaration has represented, for the Palestinians, the political beginning of Palestine falling out of their influence and into the control of the budding Zionist movement.
In 2008 and again in 2012, President Barack Obama made lofty promises and gallant assessments about Iran and the Middle East respectively. His remarks to the annual AIPAC conference four years ago about Israel and Iran have proved to be out and out fictions. Who will hold the 45th President accountable for promises made but not kept?
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified at the Senate Armed Services Committee on February 9, 2016 on the top global threats to the US.
What are the implications of the Paris attacks; what do they mean for the US homeland in particular, and what next?
Obama’s legacy in the Middle East will be defined and deeply scarred by the region’s inconclusive wars.
In the interest of securing any deal rather than the right deal – politics over principle – the president and the diplomats he sent to negotiate seem to have forgotten or perhaps never learned why Iran must not get a nuclear weapon.
“When we analyze foreign policy, the first question should be what interest or objective is served by a particular policy. A good policy should clearly advance U.S. interests and should complement rather than clash with our larger strategy, unless the policy in question heralds an entirely new strategy that can be clearly articulated and implemented.”
On July 14, 2015, Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany (P5+1) concluded a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) concerning the future of Iran’s nuclear program.
In the wake of the Israel-Hamas war in summer 2014, US and Canadian college campuses were the settings for many anti-Israel activities, including the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.
Congressional rejection of the nuclear deal wouldn’t be pretty, but a messy domestic political battle is a far cry from the president’s warnings of potential war with Iran.
The agreement will not prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapons capability. It will not require the dismantling of Iran’s nuclear enrichment infrastructure. It will however reduce that infrastructure for the next 10 to 15 years.
Anti-Semitism on American college campuses is rising—and worsening. Where does it come from, and can it be stopped?
The lifting of sanctions on Iran will allow Teheran to increase its support for terrorist groups across the region, and bolster Iran’s political and military power.
Yossi Kuperwasser, “The Struggle over the Iranian Nuclear Programme, ” Fathom, Winter/2015
Alliances of convenience alongside alliances of conviction: when do the first become the second? Who is telling the story that we read?
Preliminary negotiations and changing political realities have catalyzed the opening of new talks, but even a two-state agreement would not guarantee an imminent end to the conflict.
Many in the Arab world and amongst Palestinian leaders believe that, for the sake of evenhandedness and justice, the U.S. government, a longtime supporter of Israel’s security and existence, should have openly endorsed and urged others to vote for the proposition of Palestinian state recognition at the United Nations. Criticism of the U.S. failing to do so has been harsh, but it is also without perspective or historical context. What is forgotten is the persistent, even aggressive, perhaps unprecedented role that Washington has played in pushing for Palestinian rights, self-determination and, most recently, for Palestinian statehood.
Ambassador Alan Baker (ed.), Israel’s Rights as a Nation-State in International Diplomacy, published in 2011 by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and the World Jewish Congress. The importance of this book arose in light…
June 2011 Asher Susser, “Jordan 2011: Uneasy Lies the Head,” Middle East Brief, Brandeis University, Crown Center for Middle East Studies, June 2011. Jordan in early 2011 is in the throes of a serious domestic crisis….
Should the United States become centrally or peripherally involved in monitoring a cease-fire and the movement of a cease-fire into a new status-quo for Gaza, the contents of this MOU could constitute a workable outline for helping enforce calm in Gaza and on its borders.
