It’s unlikely that President Barack Obama intends to go to the polls in November with the United States engaged in a hot war with Iran, but there is a growing danger that events could conspire to make the decision for him. The …
Obama
Can Diplomacy Save an American Condemned to Death in Iran?
The bad news for Amir Mirzai Hekmati, the 28-year-old American sentenced to death in Tehran on Monday for allegedly spying for the CIA, is that the state of relations between Iran and the U.S. makes Iran’s leaders indifferent, at …
Why New Sanctions Raise Danger of Iran Building Nuclear Weapons
The White House believes the latest round of saber rattling from Iran is a sign that sanctions are beginning to bite. Perhaps. But as the U.S. and its European partners move to throttle Iran’s economy by cutting off its ability
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As U.S. Explores Dialogue with Muslim Brotherhood, Israelis Urge a Tougher Line Against Islamists’ Rise
Unlike its predecessor, the Obama Administration has understood the limits on Washington’s ability to remake the Middle East to its own specifications. The corollary, of course, is that in a rapidly democratizing region, refusal …
In Post-Gaddafi Libya, Freedom is Messy—and Getting Messier
“I fear this looks like a civil war”, one Libyan rebel commander from Misrata told the Associated Press, in the wake of a fierce firefight between rival militia factions using heavy weapons in broad daylight in Tripoli on …
Ten Grim Lessons Learned From the Iraq War
Despite the upbeat talk of the Obama Administration, the eight-year war that ended this week has done plenty of long-term damage to both Iraq and the United States. And it has bequeathed lessons worth considering ahead of future conflicts
Tighter Sanctions On Iran: An Alternative to War — or a Road to War?
Pity President Barack Obama trying to stay off the slippery slope to war with Iran in an election year, while his challengers perform crowd-pleasing, spoken-word versions of Senator John McCain’s “Bomb Iran” adaptation of the …
As Obama Overrules the FDA on Plan B One-Step, Access to Emergency Contraception in Asia Grows
The first time that I asked my general practitioner in Hong Kong for a prescription for birth control pills, she stopped scribbling down her notes in my file and looked up at me. “You don’t need a prescription for that,” …
Cairo in Turmoil: Obama’s Plan B Stumbles, What’s Plan C?
The reason the Obama Administration has been so reluctant to criticize Egypt’s military junta for its violent handling of the latest round of democracy protests is that the generals have, all along, been Washington’s preferred stewards of post-Mubarak political change. The State Department on Tuesday finally condemned the “excessive …
Despite a Tougher IAEA Report, It’s Business as Usual on Iran’s Nuclear Program
The Washington spin on the IAEA resolution agreed Thursday is that it “sharply criticizes” Iran — or, more accurately, expresses “deep and increasing concern about the unresolved issues” about the nuclear program Tehran insists is purely peaceful, but which the UN nuclear watchdog has alleged may have have included research work, …
Obama in Indonesia: Will the President Speak Out on Human Rights?
Obama loves Indonesia. He lived there as a boy and returned, last year, as president of the United States. In his homecoming speech at the University of Indonesia he reminisced about the Jakarta of his youth, conjuring scenes of rice paddies and kites drifting on the breeze. “Indonesia is a part of me,” he mused, lauding the young …
Fayyad Reported Sidelined as a New Palestinian Political Era Emerges – Will Abbas Follow?
Once hailed by Western pundits as the technocrat-magician who would conjure a Palestinian state into being through irrepressible institutional competence, Salam Fayyad has been unceremoniously sidelined from his job as Palestinian Prime Minister according to a deal announced Tuesday — a sign of the collapse of the illusions …
Israel and Iran: Covert Warfare Raises Risks of Retaliation, and Conflagration
If Iran’s leaders actually believe their official insistence that last weekend’s blast at the Bid Ganeh Revolutionary Guard Corps missile base was an accident, the event is unlikely to make any difference to regional stability. But if Iran, instead, believes claims — and widely held suspicions in Tehran — that the blast, which …