Middle East

Foreign Policy  King Abdullah of Jordan celebrated his 49th birthday this past Sunday, and his reign turns 12 years old on Feb. 7. Neither anniversary could fall at a more unpropitious time. As popular protests roil the Middle East,...

The stunningly rapid unfolding of Tunisia’s so-called “Jasmine Revolution” left analysts, activists and officials scrambling to make sense of an extremely fluid and uncertain situation. To be sure, matters on the ground appear to have stabilized somewhat, with the...

There is no good policy for the United States regarding the uprising in Egypt. The question is whether the U.S. government should adopt a strategy that has lots of negatives but possibly fewer than straddling the fence. Here’s the...

September 2010 marked the beginning of renewed peace negotiations in the Middle East. The American-brokered talks took some time to restart—18-months to be exact—and its two primary participants, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, were...

I. Silent Adoptions As one of his first acts after taking office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay within one year. “This is me,” the President said at the signing...

The Gaza Strip has represented a potentially strategic threat on both the local and regional levels for the past several years. During this time, various steps have been taken by Israel, Egypt, the United States, and the European Union...

Abstract Iran’s June 2009 elections set into motion four processes that are central to the operations of the Islamic Republic regime. They include: the growing gap between large sections of Iranian society from the Islamic Republican state; the steady...

Abstract Al Qaeda leaders have often stated their desire to attack the state of Israel. But, while the intent and imperative of killing Israelis and Jews features prominently in al Qaeda rhetoric, it has rarely translated into operational attacks...

Abstract In December 2009, Egypt began construction of an underground steel wall on its border with Gaza in a move designed to halt the smuggling of illegal weapons and other contraband via the Hamas-run underground tunnel network. Egypt’s initiative,...

The 9/11 attacks generated an unprecedented level of international cooperation and yet the extent to which states collaborate varied across various domains within the war on terrorism. Indeed, while states supported the invasion of Afghanistan, joined international treaties, and...