All Policy Analysis by David Schenker

When Hafez al-Assad was president-for-life of Syria, Washington overlooked the misdeeds of his Baathist dictatorship because it always seemed the brass ring of a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace deal was just around the corner. Now that Assad is dead and his son Bashar nears the six-year mark of his own rule

On June 7, 2006, Institute senior fellow David Schenker testified before the House of Representatives Committee on International Relations Subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia. The following is the prepared text of his remarks. President Bush signed the implementing order of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration

On May 7, Lebanese Druze leader and member of parliament Walid Jumblat told reporters in Cairo that Hizballah should disarm. These comments came just four days after Jumblat offered his assistance to the Syrian opposition in establishing "a democratic and free Syria." Jumblat has always been an enigmatic and unpredictable

Reports from Syria indicate that President Bashar Assad is engaged in a systematic crackdown on his opposition. The good news is that Syria may be feeling the pressure of U.S. efforts to promote reform in the world's last Baathist regime, including a promised $5 million to pro-democracy groups. The bad

On April 18, the Jordanian government announced it had discovered a cache of weapons -- including rockets, C-4 explosives, and small arms -- in a northern Jordanian town. Jordanian authorities said the weapons belonged to Hamas and had entered Jordan from Syria. Subsequently, Jordan arrested ten Hamas militants and cancelled

On March 22, leaders from across the Lebanese political spectrum completed another round of the ongoing National Dialogue. The talks, which started earlier this month, have touched on some of the more salient topics in Lebanese politics. Conspicuously absent from the agenda, however, has been a discussion of disarming militias

Jordan has long served as a pivot between moderate pro-Western and radical anti-American states in the Middle East. In the wake of "regime change" in Iraq, the economic, social, and political effects on Jordan will be pervasive. David Schenker, an expert in Middle Eastern politics, explores the complex nature of

On October 30, Iranian parliamentarian Elaheh Kula'i appeared before the Majlis and warned that a reluctance to implement UN resolutions regarding terrorism could result in "consequences" for the Islamic republic. Kula'i was specifically referring to UN Security Council Resolution (UNSC) 1373, which outlines the financial and legal measures that UN

On September 12, in the media haze of the September 11 terrorist outrages, the State Department delivered to Congress the semi-annual report assessing PLO and Palestinian Authority (PA) compliance with their "peace process" commitments. On the plus side, this document—the first covering a period on the watch of the Bush

President Bush called Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to express his condolences for the innocent Israelis killed in Hamas' latest suicide bombing spree. But Sharon could have given his own condolences to Bush, since one of the victims was an American. Given the current trend of Palestinian terrorism and rhetoric

In the aftermath of the horrific Hamas suicide bombing of a Jerusalem pizzeria on August 9, President Bush once again called on Palestinian Authority (PA) leader Yasir Arafat to take the necessary steps to end the violence. Inside the PA, however, there is little discussion about a cessation of violence

This week, Jordan's King Abdullah took two major decisions that will have significant implications for the kingdom's complicated and often troubled relations with its Palestinian and Islamist communities. Last Sunday, Abdullah approved a new election law; two days later, he issued a decree indefinitely postponing parliamentary elections. Taken together, these

As Secretary of State Colin Powell arrives in Tel Aviv today to shore up the shaky Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire, across the river in Jordan, King Abdullah is quietly coping with his own separate but related crisis. On June 14, without any prior warning, Ibrahim Ghawsheh, the Hamas spokesman expelled from the

This morning, the text of the long-awaited Mitchell Commission Report, an account of the past seven months of Israeli-Palestinian violence written by a five-member committee headed by former Senate majority leader George Mitchell, was made publicly available. Conceived as a "committee of fact finding" at the October 17, 2000 Sharm