Middle East

Horror and surprise have characterized recent events in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Thanks to CNN, the horror entered living rooms worldwide— notably the scenes of a 12-year-old Palestinian boy killed in a crossfire, two Israeli soldiers lynched by a mob,...

Before we can see clearly the way ahead from the horrible events of September 11, we need to look backward to sources— for if we do not understand how these events came about, we will be hard pressed to...

The debate over whether Hafez al-Assad of Syria would ever make peace with Israel has now been settled: not in his lifetime. Assad’s death at the age of 69 on June 10, 2000, removes from the scene a stubborn...

On September 5, 1978, then President Jimmy Carter convened a summit conference at the Camp David retreat to save a faltering peace negotiation between Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat and Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin. Twelve days later they produced...

The capture of Abdullah Ocalan by Turkish commandos last February ignited a national celebration in Turkey.  After all, Ocalan, the supremo of the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), was held responsible for the deaths of some 30,000 people, half...

As anyone who has tried knows, teaching teenagers about places far away, and in which they have no particular knowledge or special interest, is a challenge. It is especially a  challenge when typical American teenagers—generally affluent, monolingual, and seemingly...

The Greater Middle East — defined as the Arab world, Israel, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and the Caucasus — is the site of the world’s largest supply of fossil fuels and a place where several ambitious powers actively seek...

1. It is odd that Jews, a religious group, have Israel as a state. Israel is unique, but not exactly for this reason. In ordinary countries one can distinguish readily between ethnicity and religious affiliation among the people who...

On September 13, 1999, Israel and the Palestinian Authority held a ceremonial opening of the final status talks ordained six years earlier by Oslo I. In fact, this was the third ceremonial opening of such talks: once in 1995,...

The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has apparently been set adrift. Ever since last February, when Turkey captured the terrorist organization’s leader, Abdullah Ocalan, the group has struggled— and largely failed— to maintain any sense of its former military or...