Sunday was Jerusalem Day in Israel, a holiday once again observed by thousands of young Jews who chanted as they marched …
Palestine
A New Season of Palestinian Protest Challenges Both Israel and Abbas
The Arab League is talking about Syria; Israel and the U.S. are talking about Iran. Nobody in the corridors of power, these days, is talking about the Palestinians. In part, that reflects the shifting geopolitical sands and the …
Why Real Madrid Can’t Beat Barca at Football, But Leads Comfortably in Business
The target market for Real Madrid’s new theme-park and resort venture in the Persian Gulf is not the tens of thousands of Spanish fans who fill the club’s Santiago Bernabeu stadium and, together with tens of thousands of Catalan rivals, turn their team’s frequent showdowns with arch-rivals Barcelona into a passionate ritual …
Egypt Brokers a Gaza Ceasefire
After more than 170 rockets fired by Palestinian militants into Israel, and 37 attacks by the Israeli military into the Gaza Strip, the latest round of warfare appeared to end on Tuesday, as both sides honored a cease-fire …
‘Iron Dome’ Protects Israel From Gaza’s Missiles: Will That Embolden it to Strike Iran?
Another round of fighting broke out over the weekend between Israel and militants in the Gaza Strip. It was the usual thing, only more so: Until Sunday morning, only militants were reported killed on the Palestinian side. And …
A Hunger Striker at Death’s Door Turns Up the Heat on Israel — and on the Palestinian Leadership
Update 2.21.2012: Palestinian detainee Khader Adnan has reportedly agreed to end his hunger strike on its 66th day, following a deal under which the Israelis have agreed to release him in April and not seek an extension of his …
What the World Learns from What Obama Didn’t Say
Strategic decision-makers in the Middle East, Europe and Asia who stayed up late to catch President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address on Tuesday may have initially wondered why they had bothered. In sharp contrast to the Bush era when three quarters of a typical SOTU address covered matters of national security and the projection …
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 …
Why Israel’s Netanyahu May Prefer a Waltz With Hamas to a Tango With Abbas
Tuesday’s milestone prisoner exchange does not, repeat does not portend a new peace process between Israel and Hamas. Neither side is even seeking that goal: If the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is unable to agree peace terms with the moderate President Mahmoud Abbas, it’s hardly about to seek a “grand bargain” to end …
An ‘Interim’ Peace Deal? Israel’s Netanyahu Tries to Reheat a Souffle
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could be forgiven for feeling just a wee bit lonely, right now. Events in the Middle East are increasingly passing him by, leaving him on the sidelines as the region’s history is being remade. And on Wednesday, one of Israel’s most senior veteran diplomats, Ilan Baruch, resigned from the …
‘Peace Process’ – What Peace Process?
It ought to have come as no surprise that the Western-backed Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad this week offered to bring the Islamist Hamas movement into a unity government: Sure, Hamas participation in a Palestinian government has long been a red line for both Israel and the United States, but in case nobody noticed, the …