Who will shape Egypt’s constitution – the Islamists or the military-backed secularists? While the former seemingly holds the majority public vote, the latter holds the fire power, thus evening out the political battlefield.
Supporting Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman in the current crisis will prevent a Muslim Brotherhood takeover of Egypt and avoid a bloody and protracted Egyptian civil war marked by foreign intervention.
The US should withdraw its forces from Afghanistan because there are other states capable of shouldering the burden of stabilizing the country, and the threat to US security is no longer acute. Iraq, however, can be stabilized only by the US, and its long-term stability is a vital US interest with lasting and broad implications.
Mahmoud Abbas cannot yet afford to lose the Israeli army presence in the West Bank as the threat of a Hamas takeover there still looms. Thus the peace talks are a pretense.
Recent signs of Abbas’ radicalization include indications of support for
violence against Israel. This suggests that Abbas may not have been, after all, the address for negotiation of a stable two-state solution.
Abbas finally appears to have gained some power in his party, Fatah. But due to persisting Palestinian internal divisions, he will still need the help of Israel and the US for controlling the West Bank.
The Israeli election result this week confirms the emergence of a one-block, right-of-center dominant political reality in Israel; a fact that is
likely to dominate for many years to come. Kadima’s electoral achievement is ephemeral.
Throughout the Middle East, deep Muslim political divide could stymie
President Obama’s well-intentioned Mideast efforts. Mainstream Arab
countries, like Israel, seek US resolve in confronting the Iranian-led axis, not an “outstretched American hand” to the radical part of the Muslim world.
A decisive, concretely visible Israeli victory over Hamas – which means
pursuing the enemy into its hideouts in Gaza urban areas and refugee camps and bringing about its surrender – is critical to rolling back the march of Islamic fundamentalist political power in the Middle East.
Hamas miscalculated its strength and support; erred in ending the six-month ceasefire with Israel; unwisely offended and threatened Egypt; and misread Israeli politics.
Russia is historically prone to internal collapse, as is shown by numerous examples from both the imperial and Soviet periods. The collapse usually takes place as Russia rests on the laurels of recent military victories while internal economic and social troubles grow. History teaches that the best way to deal with Russia is to keep intervention to a minimum and wait for its internal troubles to bring about its collapse.
There is much discussion around the world about how to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. But few, if any, international bodies deal with the question of how to prepare for the day Iran achieves such capabilities, if that day has not already arrived.
Why does the EU single out Israeli “occupation” over other “occupations”? Because anti-Israeli, pro-Palestinian positions are one of the few rallying cries that unite Europe.
In an academic ranking of countries according to happiness level, the “Palestinian Territories” are far from the bottom of the list – something of a surprise, as the never-ending lamentations about the “Israeli occupation” would suggest a different outcome. The real tragedy is Tunisia, which achieved democracy but has not registered expected economic dividends. Its citizens are more discontented than the Palestinians.
A corruption scandal involving sexual misconduct, nepotism, retaliation against whistleblowers, and lots of business-class travel has gripped the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). It represents a new low for UNRWA and is an indictment of the idea of an international agency dedicated to a single interest. But it’s also a unique opportunity to see behind the curtain of a billion-dollar UN bureaucracy and phase it out.
The concept of “settler colonialism” has been applied with almost unique vehemence against Israel. But the fact that Jews are the indigenous population of the Southern Levant can be proved with ease. In contrast, historical and genealogical evidence shows Palestinians descend primarily from three primary groups: Muslim invaders, Arab immigrants, and local converts to Islam. The Muslim conquest of Byzantine Palestine in the 7th century CE is a textbook example of settler-colonialism, as is subsequent immigration, particularly during the 19th and 20th centuries under the Ottoman and British Empires. The application of the concept to Jews and Zionism by Palestinians is both ironic and unhelpful.
Many American detractors of Israel begin by citing that Israel receives the lion’s share of US military aid. The very suggestion conjures the demon of an all-powerful Israel lobby that has turned the US Congress into its pawn. But these figures, while reflecting official direct US military aid, are almost meaningless in comparison to the real costs and benefits of US military aid – above all, American boots on the ground. In reality, Israel receives only a small fraction of American military aid, and most of that was spent in the US to the benefit of the American economy.
The Oslo diplomatic process is the starkest strategic blunder in Israel’s history and one of the worst calamities ever to have afflicted Israelis and Palestinians. Twenty three years after its euphoric launch on the White House lawn, the Oslo ‘peace process’ has substantially worsened the position of both parties, and made the prospects for peace and reconciliation ever more remote.
