Afghanistan: the end of the surge
It must be very difficult to construct an intelligent American foreign policy in this era of limited financial resources and even more limited popular appetite for international incursions. Yet somehow President (...)
Hanan Ashrawi was in town last week. A member of the PLO executive committee and a long-time Palestinian spokesperson, negotiator, and politician, she is a well-known figure in Washington, DC. After delivering a prosaic and predictable talk at the (...)
“I know that the President will be speaking in greater detail about America's policy in the Middle East and North Africa in the coming weeks.” So said Secretary of State Clinton earlier this month to the U.S.-Islamic World Forum. She went on to (...)
The epic of Gilgamesh dates back 4,000 years, written first in Sumerian, and later in Akkadian, a Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Assyria and Babylonia.
Last month, while reading Stephen Mitchell's brilliant verse translation of (...)
Obama's Monday night presentation on Libya was one of the best speeches ever given by a secretary general of the United Nations.
Given the primacy of his global humanitarian orientation in international relations, one might reasonably conclude (...)
Shahbaz Bhatti, John Galliano, and Matthew Snyder were the subjects of news stories from three different continents this week. What links them together is the question of how the state should relate to speech that offends and the larger question of (...)
When, if ever, is it appropriate for an American president to tell the leader of another country to leave office?
In the last several decades, when the U.S. government has determined that vital U.S. interests would be served by the removal of a (...)
I can think of no week in recent history when the invitation to “Re-Think the Middle East” seems more timely.
How are we to make sense of the vast upheavals currently under way in the Middle East and North Africa? From the people's revolt in (...)
Of course it's premature to bid a final farewell to The Peace Process. Like hope, the Middle East peace process springs eternal. Like Proteus, it constantly shifts its shape.
One year it's all about West Bank settlements. The next year the focus (...)
Last month in Washington DC, at an Aspen Institute forum on U.S. national security interests in the Middle East, an Arab diplomat publicly urged the necessity that “the United States should be perceived throughout as an honest broker that takes no (...)
In a western, the sheriff confronts the stranger who rides into town and asks him to turn in his six-shooters. “This is a peaceful little place, mister. We don't want no trouble here.”
Jerusalem, the city of peace, has seen more than its share of (...)
The “peace process” in the Middle East lurches along from crisis to crisis. Since President Obama took office, George Mitchell has served as his special envoy to the region, with his energies focused primarily on bringing the Israeli-Palestinian (...)
In the previous two articles I suggested that 1) assigning sovereignty over the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif to the Palestinians and sovereignty over the adjacent Western Wall to the Israelis is impractical, and that 2) having two capitals of two (...)
The premise of this article is simple. If Israelis and Palestinians can ever agree on the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, and if they can further agree on the division of Jerusalem between the two states, it would still be (...)
Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman gave a provocative speech to the UN General Assembly last Tuesday, September 28. He was immediately condemned for presenting the illiberal idea that the best way to address the issue of borders for a (...)
The new round of Palestinian-Israeli direct talks stumbles along. Israel's semi-moratorium on construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem is currently scheduled to end later this month. Abbas has threatened to walk out of the talks if the (...)
As the Jewish New Year begins, as the Muslim month of Ramadan draws to a close, and as Israeli, Palestinian, and American negotiators prepare for another round of talks, this is as good a time as any to reflect on what is possible, what is (...)
The Cordoba Initiative, the organization which first promoted the controversial Park51 project, works to “cultivate multi-cultural and multi-faith understanding” and “to strengthen the bridge between Islam and the West.” But how is Islam to be (...)
Most of the editorial comments, pro and con, regarding the proposed new mosque complex for lower Manhattan, are concerned with Who and Where: the people behind the mosque and its proximity to Ground Zero. My purpose in these articles is not to (...)
In the Rose Garden last week, President Obama asserted that “if we've learned anything from the tragedy in the Gulf, it's that our current energy policy is unsustainable.” Perhaps he meant energy practices rather than energy policy, since an energy (...)
Last week, on July 22nd, the International Court of Justice in the Hague issued an advisory opinion regarding Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence from Serbia. According to the opinion issued by the ICJ, “the Court considers that general (...)
Two of America's key strategic allies at the east end of the Mediterranean are at loggerheads. Ever since the deadly flotilla incident in May, harsh words have flowed from Tel Aviv and threats have issued from Ankara.
Although Prime Minister (...)
J Street, the “pro-Israel, pro-peace” lobby, ran its first television commercial this past week. Watching the ad online confirmed my worst suspicions about this new organization which likes to portray itself as the “real voice” of the mainstream (...)
I found the following video clip online this week, along with a story about it in Haaretz. Please view the clip before reading the rest of this piece. . .
The tune is catchy and the kids are cute, so what is wrong with this video?
First of (...)
Last week I returned home following a visit to Jerusalem, Ramallah, Tel Aviv, and Istanbul. After clearing customs at the Philadelphia international airport, I waited in the security line in order to fly back to Washington, DC. Philadelphia's (...)