Policy Analysis

The June 21 meeting between Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas highlighted the widening expectations gap between the two parties. Less than two months before Israel commences its pullout from the Gaza Strip and parts of the northern West Bank, the security situation is

Once again the Iranian nation is at a fork in the road: a choice between worse and worst. It is not clear when it will have the possibility of choosing, under a democratic structure, between better and best. A problematic election and the intervention of the armed services in politics

Iranians will head back to the polls on June 24 to decide an unprecedented presidential runoff pitting Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad against Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Ahmadinezhad, mayor of Tehran, defied pre-election forecasts by reportedly finishing with 5,710,354 (19.5 percent) of the 29,317,042 ballots cast in the original election on June 17

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, America's most politically powerful pianist, delivered a virtuoso performance in Cairo on Monday. She struck just the right notes in a speech calling on Arab states to implement a long list of democratic reforms. Two days earlier in Ramallah, however, Rice's tune was uncharacteristically flat

Today Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas, the Israeli and Palestinian leaders, will hold their second summit in five months. Mindful of the recent admonition of Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, to co-ordinate their steps on Israeli disengagement from Gaza, they will focus on ensuring a smooth withdrawal of Israeli

Palestinian security reform was high on the agenda during Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s recent visit to Ramallah. A spike in armed clashes, crime, and demonstrations in the territories has highlighted the issue of law and order among the Palestinian people, who are increasingly concerned about their daily security. On

On June 17, 2005, Jeffrey White participated in a forum titled "Occupied Iraq: One Country, Many Wars," the fortieth installment of the Middle East Policy Council's Capitol Hill Conference Series. The following is an unedited transcript of the entire forum. See video footage of the event. Speakers Ivan Eland Senior

Lebanon’s ongoing parliamentary elections—held in a staggered format through June 19—reflect a new, complex reality for the country. Although free from Syrian tutelage and gerrymandering, the results have been much less encouraging than had been hoped when Syrian troops withdrew. Background: Past Elections The 1990 Taif Accord offered an imperfect

Today, when Iranians go to the polls to elect a new president, the vote will almost certainly be free, competitive, and fair. It will also be a joke. Always inventive, Iran's ruling mullahs years ago developed a new twist on the old autocratic game of holding sham elections. Whereas the

From Newsweek to The New York Times, the Middle East policy buzz du jour is whether the Bush administration will jettison years of precedent and authorize diplomatic contact with Hamas, the radical Islamist movement in the West Bank and Gaza. This is not a hypothetical issue. Running on an anti-corruption

Among the challenges facing the Israeli government in the weeks before the Gaza disengagement commences are relocating evacuated settlers and determining the future of settlement assets. This PeaceWatch will examine the former issue; a future PeaceWatch will address the latter. Settler Compensation On June 9, 2005, the Israeli supreme court

Let there be no doubt: cutting off the flow of funds to Jihadist organisations bent on carrying out acts of violence is critical. Shutting down militant organisations is an important part of that strategy, but undermining the theological foundation of 'economic Jihad' is equally important. Unlike the tactical process of

President Bashar al Assad of Syria has lately seemed to be doing everything possible to make himself an ex-dictator—and this week he took yet another step in that direction. Ironically, his latest mistake was not some egregious act of oppression or deceit—though he has in the past been guilty of

On May 20, 2005, Ahmed Nazif addressed The Washington Institute’s Twentieth Anniversary Soref Symposium. Prior to becoming Egyptian prime minister in July 2004, Dr. Nazif served as the country’s first minister for communications and information technology. In that capacity, he was widely credited with establishing Egypt’s free internet connectivity plan

The British, French, And German foreign ministers met last week with the Iranians and afterward declared that a crisis had been averted. Iran's threat to resume uranium enrichment activities has been put on hold for now. But are we out of the woods? Not likely. In the Paris talks, Hassan

Testimony before the House Committee on International Relations. Read this testimony in Turkish. It is no secret to anyone in this room that these have not been the best of times for U.S.-Turkish relations. Time will tell whether they are the worst. But there is no question that in recent

On May 19, 2005, Paul Wolfowitz addressed the Institute's Twentieth Anniversary Soref Symposium. Dr. Wolfowitz, former deputy secretary of defense, is president of the World Bank. The following is a selection of excerpts from his presentation. Read the full transcript. So many Iraqis, 8.5 million of them, demonstrated courage on

Testimony before the House Committee on International Relations. We have a number of issues to discuss. I would like to focus on three of them, namely: 1. Turkey's importance for the U.S; 2. U.S.-Turkish ties within the context of the ripple effects of the Iraq War; and 3. Turkey's European

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran has gone through three distinct political stages. The first stage, which began with the victory of the revolution and ended with the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, was a period in which the revolutionary regime was established and consolidated. This stage, which also witnessed

Syrian leaders hope that significant reforms introduced at the Baath Party's Tenth Regional Congress on June 6 will allow them to fend off both domestic challenges and foreign threats. Among the important issues on the Congress' agenda is the status of the Baath Party itself. Obsolete Ideology Since he assumed