Middle East

To paraphrase Talleyrand, the invention and recognition of a “state” called Kosovo by the United States and Brussels in February was worse than gross ignorance, it was a mistake. Every Western political delusion since the end of the Cold...

President Bush’s long-awaited and much-demanded personal engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian tangle has finally begun. Visiting Jerusalem and Ramallah in early January 2008, he announced his role: Nudge-in-Chief. Then, refreshed by visits to the wellsprings of Christianity, the President reiterated...

The best way for a big power to fight an insurgency is to avoid fighting it in the first instance by helping solve the political issue that created the conflict, thus drying up support for the insurgents. The second...

The Middle East Peace Conference convened by the United States on November 27, 2007, met in a spirit of easily restrained enthusiasm. Unlike the last formal relaunch of Arab-Israeli negotiations — Madrid 1991 — this was an assembly of...

Negotiating with Syria, as advocated by so many in the United States–including many members of Congress–can produce nothing positive. The problem is not so much “talking” to Syria, in a manner equivalent to a date. The real issue is...

The 100,000 square miles of sand in the Western Sahara that until November 1975 were the Spanish territory of Saguia el-Hamra and Rio de Oro–the latter an ironic name for an area lacking both water and gold–have been the...

invading Iraq, the U.S. unintentionally threw open the door to the expansion of Iranian influence in the region. With the U.S.’s commitment to majority rule, the Shia took political control of Iraq, and neighboring states watched in horror as...

On July 16, 2007, President Bush delivered a speech marking five years since his declaration of American support for a democratic Palestinian state. The original draft, scheduled a month earlier, had to accommodate an untoward event: the violent seizure...

President Bush’s January 10, 2007, speech announced the “endgame” for Iraq. His new strategy is intended to salvage an American policy sharply undermined by rising violence in Baghdad and falling support in the United States. Bush coupled this change...

Mr. Turzanski led off, noting that the Report is more political than military. What may surprise or disappoint some is that it isn’t a strategy for victory, at least not in the conventional military sense. But the ISG came...