Policy Analysis

Hamas--the Islamic Resistance Movement--arose during the intifada as the organization of Palestinian Muslim fundamentalists of the West Bank and Gaza. Because it views the Arab-Israeli conflict as a religious struggle between Islam and Judaism that can only be resolved by the destruction of the State of Israel, it opposes the

For nearly four decades, King Hussein of Jordan has managed to survive and consolidate his rule in the face of difficult internal and external circumstances. Indeed, Hussein’s will to survive has been and will remain the central organizing principle of his statecraft. In this Policy Paper, Uriel Dann, highlights the

The collapse of the Soviet bloc and the end of the Cold War have come almost too swiftly to be registered. As Czechoslovakia's dissident-turned-President Vaclav Havel has said, one no longer has even the time to be astonished. No less striking than the demise of Soviet power has been the

Executive Summary Since the formation of Iraq in 1920, the Sunni minority has held power and played the Shi'a and Kurdish minorities against each other. Aside from their shared enmity towards the Baghdad government, the Shi'a and the Kurds have nothing in common. The Iraqi opposition is structurally weak and

Executive Summary Israel enters a new peace process at a time of considerable short-term safety and long-term uncertainty. The social and demographic consequences of the Gulf War have not fully expressed themselves on the politics of the region, while the military role of Iraq in the future is hard to

Executive Summary Traditionally, Arab states have been unable and/or unwilling to make peace with Israel for a variety of internal and external reasons -- domestic instability and external weakness in the case of Jordan, ideological and strategic militancy in the case of Syria, domestic opinion and regional weakness in the

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What I hope to offer here is a Congressional perspective on the Persian Gulf War, the end of the Cold War, and what these developments may mean for the Middle East peace process. The Gulf War in Retrospect First, to the Persian Gulf War: there were many articles and retrospectives

Keynote addresses by Richard Haass, Les Aspin, and Dan Meridor. With Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Ze'ev Schiff, Zalman Shoval, Hussein Hammami, and others.

The Syrian regime of Hafez al-Assad has in the past year seemed to change direction, first with tentative moves toward liberalization, then by siding with the American-led coalition that fought against Saddam Hussein and, perhaps most dramatically, by acceding to America’s wish to attend a peace conference with Israel. There

While economic issues have not been a driving force in the Arab-Israeli peace process in the past, they are sure to play a critically important role in the historic negotiations looming ahead. Across the wide Sinai expanse, Egypt and Israel have little to show in the way of economic ties

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Executive Summary The defeat of Saddam Hussein and the elimination of Iraq's offensive capabilities have reestablished a favorable balance of power in the Middle East. But the Gulf War has left in its wake serious challenges to American efforts to establish a more stable regional order. This report focuses on

The Difficulties Encountered in the Gulf Crisis The effort that was mounted last August by President Bush to counter Saddam Hussein's aggression now looks, in light of all that has happened since August 2nd, as though it were foreordained. We are all used to dealing with the fact that the

Keynote addresses by Richard Cheney and Ze'ev Binyamin Begin. With Thomas Freidman, Tahseen Basheer, Ehud Ya'ari, Alexander Haig, and others.

Yesterday John Chancellor bitterly concluded that, "George Bush is supporting Saddam Hussein." The New York Times explained that: "President Bush has decided to let President Saddam Hussein put down rebellions in his country . . . rather than run the risk of splintering Iraq." The situation in Iraq today is

Though Iraq wreaked enormous devastation on Kuwait's oil industry toward the end of the war, Kuwaitis can hope for a fairly rapid recovery after an initial period of sorting out. What may not return to normal is Kuwait's relationship with its Palestinian community and with Jordan. Kuwait and other Gulf

Iraqi efforts to acquire unconventional weapons became a major concern even before the invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Chemical weapons produced during the 1980s were used in large quantities against Iranian soldiers and Kurdish civilians. Iraq developed extended range ballistic missiles, and built an infrastructure for development and production of