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82. The Sunni Arab Insurgency: A Spent or Rising Force?
- Author:
- Michael Eisenstadt
- Publication Date:
- 08-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Warnings by Sunni politicians of even greater violence if Sunni Arab concerns are not addressed in the draft Iraqi constitution raise the question: could the insurgency get worse? The answer can be found by examining the insurgency's demographic dimension.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Politics, Religion, and United Nations
- Political Geography:
- Iraq and Middle East
83. Changing the Guard at the Saudi Embassy in Washington
- Author:
- Simon Henderson
- Publication Date:
- 07-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On July 20, the Saudi foreign ministry announced that Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the long-serving Saudi ambassador to the United States, was stepping down, and that "the process of nominating" Prince Turki al-Faisal, the current Saudi ambassador in London, to replace him had begun. When the widely anticipated death of the recently hospitalized, eighty-four-year-old King Fahd occurs, both Prince Turki and Prince Bandar, as senior "next generation" princes, could be crucial players.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Politics, and War
- Political Geography:
- Afghanistan, United States, Washington, and Middle East
84. The U.S.-Turkish Relationship beyond Iraq: Common Values, Common Agenda
- Author:
- R. Nicholas Burns
- Publication Date:
- 07-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On July 18, 2005, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs R. Nicholas Burns addressed The Washington Institute's Seventh Turgut Ozal Memorial Lecture. Undersecretary Burns's prepared remarks were delivered by Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Daniel Fried. The following are excerpts from the speech followed by a summary of the subsequent question-and-answer session. "Today, we have all gathered to honor Turgut Ozal, a strong leader with a clear vision of Turkey's future. Ozal — who we as Americans are proud to call a close friend — sought tirelessly to advance Mustafa Kemal Ataturk's legacy, his dream of a modern, democratic Turkey anchored in the West....
- Topic:
- International Relations, NATO, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Iraq, Europe, Middle East, and Eastern Europe
85. Women in Gulf Politics: A Progress Report
- Author:
- Simon Henderson
- Publication Date:
- 06-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On June 20, 2005, Kuwait's first female cabinet minister, Massouma al-Mubarak, was sworn in, taking responsibility for the planning portfolio. Six months earlier, a woman was appointed minister of economy and planning in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Women have assumed ministerial posts in Bahrain and Oman as well. And in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Oman, women now have the right to vote. Indeed, women's political rights, previously nonexistent in the conservative Arab Gulf states, have undergone extraordinary growth in recent years. Yet, how much progress has there really been, given that women's representation in this region is still poor even compared with the rest of the Arab world? In particular, can the United States, which actively encourages enhanced rights for women, do anything about Saudi Arabia's anomalous lack of such progress?
- Topic:
- Gender Issues and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Middle East, Kuwait, Arabia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and Oman
86. Iran's Presidential Election: The Candidates Speak
- Author:
- Naysan Rafati
- Publication Date:
- 06-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Iranians will head back to the polls on June 24 to decide an unprecedented presidential runoff pitting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Ahmadinejad, 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. Rafsanjani, president from 1989 to 1997 and current chairman of the Expediency Council, reportedly received 6,159,452 votes (21 percent). The following is a survey of each candidate's recent statements on a range of domestic and foreign policy issues. It should be noted that their past statements on some of these issues may differ with what they have said in the past few weeks.
- Topic:
- Democratization, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Iran, Middle East, and Tehran
87. Netanyahu's Victory: Major Challenges for the Likud Party
- Author:
- David Makovsky
- Publication Date:
- 12-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Former Israeli prime minister and recently resigned finance minister Benjamin Netanyahu won the Likud leadership primary on December 19, beating the foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, by a margin of 45 percent to 33 percent. Netanyahu returns to the leadership of Likud, which he vacated after his loss in the 1999 election. Netanyahu's victory comes a day after Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon suffered what his doctors called a mild stroke; he was released from the hospital within forty-eight hours. At seventy-seven, Sharon already shares the record for the oldest Israeli prime minister; David Ben-Gurion was seventy-seven when he resigned in 1963. Sharon turns seventy-eight in February.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Israel
88. The Consequences of Fatah's Chaotic Primaries
- Author:
- Ben Fishman and Mohammed Yaghi
- Publication Date:
- 12-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- After a relatively calm first round of Fatah primaries in five of the West Bank's eleven electoral districts, a second round of primaries in five additional districts—four in the West Bank and one in Gaza—held between November 28 and December 3 have caused increased tensions within the movement. Where the victories by the younger generation of Fatah leaders in the primaries could have represented a watershed moment in Fatah's evolution, they have been marred by a haphazard system of voting and numerous accusations of fraud. Moreover, repeated incidents of violence at polling stations demonstrate Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas's difficulty in enforcing his principle of One Authority, One Gun even within his own movement. Rather than unifying Fatah, the primaries have highlighted the party's disorganization and divisions. The old guard represented by Fatah's Central Committee, which dominates a committee of the wise tasked to determine Fatah's final electoral lists, will now have greater leverage in that process to place its own members high on Fatah's national list of candidates in Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) elections scheduled for January 2006.
- Topic:
- Democratization, Development, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
89. Fatah Primary Results: Lessons from the First Round
- Author:
- Ben Fishman and Mohammed Yaghi
- Publication Date:
- 11-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- In preparation for January elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), Fatah, the mainstream Palestinian faction that dominates the current council, held its first ever primaries on November 25.
- Topic:
- Development, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Palestine
90. Campaign Season Begins in Israel (Part II): Labor's New Leader, Amir Peretz
- Author:
- David Makovsky
- Publication Date:
- 11-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Amir Peretz's decision to pull the Labor Party he leads out of its national unity government with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon set Israel's new political calendar and precipitated Sharon's decision to bolt the Likud Party and consent to elections in March 2006. Peretz is a veteran labor union leader who won the leadership of the Labor Party on November 10, defeating Shimon Peres, a dominant force in the party since 1974.
- Topic:
- Development, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
91. Campaign Season Begins in Israel (Part I): Ariel Sharon Bolts from Likud
- Author:
- David Makovsky
- Publication Date:
- 11-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On Monday, November 21, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon announced that he is bolting the Likud Party and forming a new National Responsibility Party. The Knesset took a preliminary vote to dissolve itself. While wrangling may continue, a final date will soon be set for elections in March 2006. Sharon remains prime minister during the interregnum.
- Topic:
- Development, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Israel
92. Political Participation and Palestinian Legislative Elections
- Author:
- Ben Fishman and Mohammed Yaghi
- Publication Date:
- 10-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- In the leadup to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas's October 20 visit to Washington, the Bush administration urged the Palestinian Authority (PA) to tighten rules enacted in 1995 and change the law governing upcoming Palestinian legislative elections to make it clear that candidates, even those backed by Hamas or other militant groups, could not incite violence or keep ties with militias. However, the PA seems unlikely to adopt this approach, in part because the administration reportedly backed away from its position. What alternative strategies exist for limiting Hamas's political influence?
- Topic:
- International Relations and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Middle East, and Palestine
93. On the Verge of Gaza Disengagement
- Author:
- David Makovsky, Dennis Ross, and Michael Herzog
- Publication Date:
- 08-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On August 4, 2005, Dennis Ross, Brig. Gen. Michael Herzog, and David Makovsky addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Ambassador Ross, the Institute's counselor and Ziegler Distinguished Fellow and former U.S. Middle East peace envoy, has just returned from a month in the region. General Herzog of the Israel Defense Force is a visiting military fellow at The Washington Institute. Formerly the senior military aide to the minister of defense, he was also an Israeli peace negotiator. Mr. Makovsky, senior fellow and the director of the Project on the Middle East Peace Process at The Washington Institute, is author of the Institute monograph Engagement through Disengagement: Gaza and the Potential for Israeli-Palestinian Peacemaking. The following is a rapporteur's summary of their remarks.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Peace Studies, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Washington, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Gaza
94. The Future of the Jewish Settler Movement, Post-Disengagement
- Author:
- Aviezer Ravitsky
- Publication Date:
- 06-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- On June 24, 2005, Aviezer Ravitsky, a professor at Hebrew University of Jerusalem and an expert on religious Zionism, addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. The following is a rapporteur's summary of his remarks. The impending Israeli disengagement from the Gaza Strip and four settlements in the northern West Bank threatens the ideological foundations of many settlers. This is particularly true for religious settlers, most of whom view Israeli habitation of the West Bank as the fulfillment of a biblical mandate initiated by the Hebrew patriarchs. The fact that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, a prime architect of the settlement movement during his tenure as housing minister in the late 1970s, unilaterally proposed the disengagement epitomizes what many settlers see as their abandonment by the political establishment. They fear that Israel will eventually withdraw from most, if not all, of the West Bank. That prospect threatens to undermine the cause of the national-religious camp in Israel, which has championed the settlement movement above all else since Israel assumed control over the territories in 1967.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- Washington, Middle East, Israel, and Gaza
95. When Minorities Rule in the Middle East (Part I): Syria
- Author:
- Ammar Abdulhamid
- Publication Date:
- 12-2004
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- When discussing the topic of "minority rule," it is worth remembering that all dictatorships in fact are a form of minority rule, whether it be ethnic, religious, or bureaucratic. Once a minority establishes control over a nation, a crisis of legitimacy for the government will naturally arise. However, after the initial crisis fades, the main objective of those rulers is to establish representative coalitions that function under their control and rules. The norm is that nearly everybody is eventually represented within a system of parochial interests. In order to democratize one cannot champion the cause of the majority, but must instead champion the cause of civic education and citizenship -- otherwise, the country will fall into the trap of sectarian politics.
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- Middle East, Arab Countries, and Syria
96. Blair's Visit to Washington: British Politics and the Peace Process
- Author:
- Simon Henderson
- Publication Date:
- 11-2004
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- British prime minister Tony Blair arrives in Washington on November 11 -- the first foreign leader to visit following President George W. Bush's reelection. The visit confirms Britain's status as America's most supportive ally and Blair's status as the president's closest foreign confidant. But the British leader is likely to use the two days of talks to place distance between himself and Bush. Unless obscured by diplomatic platitudes, the public differences will be most acute over the pace and direction of the Middle East peace process.
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- America, Washington, Middle East, and Arab Countries
97. Succession Politics in the Conservative Arab Gulf States: The Weekend's Events in Ras Al-Khaimah
- Author:
- Simon Henderson
- Publication Date:
- 06-2003
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- The normally sleepy shaykhdom of Ras al-Khaimah, part of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), was wracked by gunfire and street protests over the weekend after the aged and frail ruler, Shaykh Saqr bin Mohammed al-Qassimi, switched the title of crown prince from one of his seven sons to another. Sword-waving supporters of the deposed son, Shaykh Khalid, forced members of the emiri guard to retreat behind the high walls of the ruler's palace. A semblance of order was restored only after Abu Dhabi, the lead emirate of the UAE, sent armored vehicles to Ras al-Khaimah. Shaykh Khalid still contests the change, but troops have prevented supporters from reaching his palace. Although he is an outspoken critic of the United States, his removal flies in the face of certain U.S. policy objectives.
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- United States, Middle East, and Arab Countries
98. Impact of an Iraq Confrontation on Gulf States: Foreign Policy and Domestic Politics
- Author:
- Shafeeq Ghabra
- Publication Date:
- 01-2003
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Regime change in Baghdad could do more than make Iraq a positive force in the Middle East instead of a source of trouble; it could also give a strong boost to liberalizing trends throughout the Middle East. Therefore, a war to topple Saddam Husayn's regime would create both opportunities and dangers for the region.
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- Iraq, Middle East, Baghdad, and Arabia
99. Ein al-Hilweh: Lebanese Tinder Box
- Author:
- Jonathan Schanzer
- Publication Date:
- 11-2002
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Last week's bombing of a coffee shop and car-bombing attack against a Fatah figure in Ein al-Hilweh, a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon, are the latest developments in a wave of recent violence in the camp. Al-Sharq al-Awsat has reported no less than nineteen bombings in Ein al-Hilweh since the end of September 2002. Asbat al-Ansar (League of partisans) – a predominantly Palestinian terrorist group based in the camp, with established links to al-Qaeda – is seen as the culprit behind this violence. In an apparent move to ignite heightened Arab-Israeli tensions, the group has destabilized the camp and surrounding areas. Mounting tensions in this long-neglected and impoverished camp could undermine Lebanese stability, aggravate its refugee crisis, and enfeeble America's efforts in the "war on terror."
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, and Religion
- Political Geography:
- America, Middle East, Palestine, and Arab Countries
100. Special Policy Forum Report: Europe America / Europe v. America: Alliance Politics in the Middle East
- Author:
- Josef Joffe and R. James Woolsey
- Publication Date:
- 06-2002
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
- Abstract:
- Although the current campaign against terrorism is just unfolding, America has actually been in the middle of a new "World War" of sorts for some time. In order to understand this war, one must answer three crucial questions: 1) With whom is the United States at war? 2) Why is America at war with these particular adversaries? 3) How should the United States conduct this war, both at home and abroad?
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, Religion, Terrorism, and War
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, Europe, Middle East, and Arabia