Muhammad Dahlan and the Deal of the Century

A controversial former security official and Abu Dhabi-based political operator, Muhammad Dahlan, has lurked for several years in the shadows of Palestinian politics. It is possible that he will emerge in an attempt to pave the way for US president Donald Trump’s much maligned “Deal of the Century” to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Israel’s New Existential Challenge

The creation of an Iranian military/terrorist axis along Israel’s northern and southern borders, comprising Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad, lays the groundwork for the long-term multi-frontal attrition of the Jewish state.

Trump’s Economic Plan Is Necessary Because Peace Is Not Possible

None of the three actors in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – Hamas, the PA, and Israel – envisions peace in the foreseeable future. It is this very absence of the prospect of peace that makes the Trump economic plan so timely. Engendering economic wellbeing does not solve deep-seated political conflict, but it does contain the prospect that differences can be expressed in less violent ways.

Ahead of the Bahrain Conference, Hamas Casts Its Lot with Iran

A week and a half ago, Hamas organized its weekly confrontation on the Gaza fence in honor of World Jerusalem Day, an event inaugurated by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 and celebrated since then primarily by Iran and its Hezbollah proxy. This move reflects the organization’s defiance of the Sunni Arab states, especially those who plan to attend the Trump-sponsored conference in Bahrain.

Finally, from Gaza, a Ray of Light

Notwithstanding Hamas’s recent success at partially overwhelming Iron Dome, it has failed to accomplish one of its signal goals: nothing it has done has succeeded in galvanizing the Arab population in Ramallah and Hebron to rise up against either Israel or the PA.

The Diplomacy of Violence in Gaza

Ever since the unilateral disengagement from Gaza in the summer of 2005, Israel has engaged in “bargaining by the threat of violence” with Hamas. Within that framework, the IDF has conducted three large-scale operations in Gaza in addition to smaller rounds of hostilities. With no possibility in the offing of either serious political negotiations or a decisive war, the only alternative is to continue the “diplomacy of violence.”

Lessons from the Failed “Gaza Initiative” of 1949

Seventy years ago, while the Arab-Israeli Lausanne peace talks were deadlocked, a pioneering and creative diplomatic initiative was aired to deal with the fate of Gaza and its Palestinian Arab refugees. This US initiative was a serious effort to bring about a settlement between Egypt and Israel while contributing to a solution to the Palestinian refugee problem. Though it ended in failure, it provided valuable lessons.

Handing Gaza to Abbas Will Solve Nothing

Overthrowing Hamas and handing rule in Gaza to Mahmoud Abbas will not bring about a solution to the Gaza problem. In fact, it was Yasser Arafat, Abbas’s predecessor as PLO leader, who transformed Gaza into an ineradicable terrorist hotbed by flouting the Oslo Accords that he had signed. The solution to the Gaza problem does not lie in Ramallah but rather in the Strip’s historic hinterland – the Sinai Peninsula.

Israel’s Dilemma in Gaza

At this strategic watershed moment, one can discern the logic of the policy that has guided the Netanyahu government’s approach to Gaza over the past decade – that it is in Israel’s interest for Hamas to remain in control until the group is rejected by its own people.

Hamas Is Willing to Risk War to Avoid Economic Collapse

Yaakov Lappin
March 10, 2019
Paper No. 1108

Tensions between Israel and Hamas are surging again following a string of attacks from Gaza and Israeli retaliatory airstrikes. The reason is simple: Hamas is struggling to manage Gaza economically, it refuses to divert funds from its military wing to civilian needs, and the Strip’s infrastructure is eroding at an alarming rate. Only brinksmanship with Israel can extricate Hamas from the disarray it has created.