The Obama Administration’s Middle East policy appears to have swung from the slightly idealistic to the definitively realistic in recent weeks, with the opposition continuing to denounce the supposed naiveté of the president’s intentions. Barack Obama began his offensive in Cairo, Egypt last year where he called upon the Muslim world to end “the cycle […]
A new bilateral relationship is emerging across the Near East as India and Saudi Arabia strengthen their ties. The desert kingdom has grown to become India’s foremost supplier of crude oil while the government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh realizes that the nation’s security is very much dependent on stability in the Middle East. Relations […]
The economic factor tends to be overlooked in discussions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It shouldn’t be.
Sanctions and negotiations aren’t working anymore. Iran is determined to acquire the Bomb so the West must start thinking ahead. How to deal with a nuclear Iran? “Containing” the country has been suggested before, specifically by cutting Iran’s financial ties abroad and quietly working to destabilize the regime from within. Last December, Danielle Pletka of […]
David Petraeus asks that the Palestinian territories be placed under his Central Command.
Europe may be reluctant to embrace Turkey but the country is well underway to establishing itself as a regional power. As a gateway to the West, it engages with nearby Middle Eastern states, signing free-trade agreements with Egypt, Israel, Morocco and Tunisia. It is currently in negotiations with the Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, to […]
American secretary of state Hillary Clinton suggested in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Monday that Iran is sliding into a military dictatorship. The country’s Revolutionary Guard, she said, is gaining influence “across all areas of Iranian security policy, and certainly nuclear policy is at the core of it.” The United States propose sanctions therefore, specifically aimed […]
The Israeli prime minister met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to discuss Middle East peace and Iran’s nuclear program.
There are two major yet unrelated conflicts taking place in Yemen.
The president admits he may have underestimated the challenges of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Where last month the European Council decreed that there can only be a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with Jerusalem as capital of both nations, American envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell is more nuanced, stating that Israel “annexed” East Jerusalem so that “for the Israelis, what they’re building in, is in part […]
The war in Yemen is suddenly not so quiet anymore after an Islamic terrorist who was trained in the country tried to blow up an American airliner headed for Detroit this Christmas. Some forward-looking analysts recently identified the Yemen problem as probably President Obama’s greatest challenge ahead. Considering the regional dynamics involved, that assessment may […]
Had we had another man for president this year, Iran’s nuclear facilities might well have been carpet bombed already. Certainly the United States would not have discouraged Israel from undertaking such a venture. But would it have been the smart thing to do? When even The New York Times advocates military action it must seem […]
Year’s end is near so journalists like to look back and beyond to what’s coming especially, it seems, for the Obama Administration. The president has had his fair share of “litmus tests” already: the overanalyzed “first hundred days” in office; his first foreign visits as head of state; the new Afghan war strategy; his Nobel […]
The European Union model is an example to many nations across the globe. The South American Mercosur is well underway to become an even more successful game plan for cooperation while in Southeast Asia, ASEAN provides a forum for states that might want to try to compete with their northern neighbors China and Japan. Even […]
