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Palestinians
Creativity and realism required for success in Middle East talks
YESTERDAY in Washington, President Barack Obama formally launched the resumption of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians after a 19-month hiatus. International expectations for the talks are low because there appear to be a number of fac...
Published: 03/09/2010 read more
Today's Israeli-Palestinian Summit in Washington
As readers are doubtless aware, Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu is meeting Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas today in Washington in a summit designed to formally re-launch direct Israeli Palestinian peace talks. This Update offers backgrou...
Published: 02/09/2010 read more
Scribblings: The BBC Pre-empts Flotilla Inquiries
Israelis have been much focused in recent weeks on the testimony of various top officials to the Turkel inquiry - looking into the flotilla clash off Gaza on May 31 that left nine Turkish activists dead. On top of this, the Israeli government has ma...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
Israel's Endangered Deterrence
There are few journalists specialising in strategic and security affairs more experienced than Ron Ben Yishai. After fighting as a paratrooper in the Six Day War, Ben Yishai turned to journalism full time. Since then he has covered, from the battlef...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
Hamas' Gaza Killing Spree
News stories about bodies found at sea are occasionally published by Gaza newspapers. The number of such bodies isn't huge, yet not all those drowning victims chose to go swimming voluntarily. The Gazans who found their death at sea include mid-leve...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
Essay: Decade of Disappointment
It's been a decade since Israeli and Palestinian leaders met as peacemakers only to part at loggerheads. Now, with most of the Camp David summit's protagonists long gone from the scene, that ill-fated conclave's military, diplomatic and political re...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
The Last Word: Ideology Above Humanity
What struck me then, and continues to strike me, was their complete lack of concern, sometimes even contempt, for the human beings they claimed to champion and the hatred for the human beings on the other side of the political divide. There was no r...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
Books: The Betrayers
In four decades of reading about international affairs and Middle Eastern geopolitics, I do not think I have come across a work of history that more fully illuminates the true sources of Palestinian terrorism and irresolvable conflict with the reali...
Published: 27/08/2010 read more
The Prospects of the Sept. 2 Israeli-Palestinian Summit
As readers will be aware, following a statement by the Quartet (the US, UN, EU and Russia), which you can read here, the Israelis and Palestinian leaders have agreed to a Sept. 2 Summit in Washington to launch much-delayed direct talks. This Update ...
Published: 26/08/2010 read more
Are Israeli-Palestinian Direct Talks Finally Imminent?
The US government is reportedly expecting that direct Israeli-Palestinian peace talks may finally be announced - after months of efforts - as soon as Monday. This Update deals with why it has taken so long to get to this point and what to expect if ...
Published: 20/08/2010 read more
Hamas' stances/Israel, the Arab world and Iran
This Update features some new material on Hamas, its goals and its efforts to control Gaza. And it also has an important and detailed look at the increasingly complex relationship between Israel and the Arab states in the face of the Iranian hegemon...
Published: 12/08/2010 read more
Lebanon Border Incident/ The Arab League and Direct Israeli-Palestinian talks
As readers are probably aware, there was a significant clash between Israeli forces and the Lebanese Army yesterday, which left a total of five people dead. This Update deals with both this incident, as well as the prospects for renewed direct Israe...
Published: 04/08/2010 read more
Scribblings: Going Green?
There does seem to be one prediction on which most election analysts agree - the Australian Greens are likely to wind up controlling the balance of power in the Senate. This will be worrying to many in the Australian Jewish community because not onl...
Published: 27/07/2010 read more
The Reset Button
All of a sudden we have seen a different type of meeting between Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and Obama. And a major effort on the part of the President, for the first time since his election, to be nice to the Israeli people by giving an interview...
Published: 27/07/2010 read more
Broken dreams in the promised land
EHUD Barak and Yasser Arafat, smiling broadly, jostled before the world's cameras to see who could enter the door last. It was Camp David, the US presidential retreat in Maryland, and the world waited as the Israeli and Palestinian leaders attempted...
Published: 24/07/2010 read more
Flotilla Military Probe Outcome/ Gaza revisited
This Update features a look at the details that have been released from Israel's military investigation into the Gaza flotilla incident on May 30 (obviously, the major state inquiry led by Justice Turkel is still under way, as is an investigation by...
Published: 14/07/2010 read more
Editorial: The Truth About Gaza
There could be few greater blows to peace hopes than an unconditional lifting of the Israeli and Egyptian blockade of Gaza. Empowered by Iranian funds, expertise and armaments, Hamas would become much better able to take on both Israel and the PA, w...
Published: 30/06/2010 read more
Scribblings: Listening to Abbas
It is worth noting one more thing that Abbas said in Washington, not to the Jewish leaders this time to but to President Obama. According to Haaretz (June 13), he reportedly told the President he is opposed to lifting the naval blockade of the Gaza ...
Published: 30/06/2010 read more
Asia Watch: Stormy Seas
As elsewhere, the Israeli military confrontation of activists aboard the Freedom Flotilla's MV Mavi Marmara on May 31 put Israel at the centre of fiery rhetoric in Southeast Asia over recent weeks. In Indonesia, demonstrations were staged in Jakarta...
Published: 30/06/2010 read more
Collateral Damage
There is general agreement here that Israel has made mistakes before and during its navy's May 31 fatal clash with the flotilla's main vessel some 100 kilometres into the Mediterranean, southwest of Tel Aviv. However, there is also general agreement...
Published: 30/06/2010 read more
Creativity and realism required for success in Middle East talks
YESTERDAY in Washington, President Barack Obama formally launched the resumption of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians after a 19-month hiatus. International expectations for the talks are low because there appear to be a number of fac...
03/09/2010 read more
Today's Israeli-Palestinian Summit in Washington
As readers are doubtless aware, Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu is meeting Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas today in Washington in a summit designed to formally re-launch direct Israeli Palestinian peace talks. This Update offers backgrou...
02/09/2010 read more
Editorial: In the Balance
The next prime minister of Australia should be whoever can more convincingly promise a stable coalition able to undertake the responsibilities of government more effectively. Overseas and Australian state government experience demonstrates that s...
27/08/2010 read more
Scribblings: The BBC Pre-empts Flotilla Inquiries
Israelis have been much focused in recent weeks on the testimony of various top officials to the Turkel inquiry - looking into the flotilla clash off Gaza on May 31 that left nine Turkish activists dead. On top of this, the Israeli government has ma...
27/08/2010 read more
AIR New Zealand: A Tzur Thing
When Israel reopened an embassy in Wellington in April this year, it seemed obvious that the new Ambassador, Shemi Tzur, and his staff had a big job in front of them. Almost a decade without on-the-ground representation, as well as some years of tro...
27/08/2010 read more
Fall of the Teflon Terrorist?
On Aug. 9, 2010, members of Indonesia's elite counter-terrorist police force arrested the militant cleric Abu Bakar Bashir as part of their ongoing investigations into a terrorist training camp discovered in February 2010 in Aceh, plots to kill Pres...
27/08/2010 read more
Israel's Endangered Deterrence
There are few journalists specialising in strategic and security affairs more experienced than Ron Ben Yishai. After fighting as a paratrooper in the Six Day War, Ben Yishai turned to journalism full time. Since then he has covered, from the battlef...
27/08/2010 read more
Hamas' Gaza Killing Spree
News stories about bodies found at sea are occasionally published by Gaza newspapers. The number of such bodies isn't huge, yet not all those drowning victims chose to go swimming voluntarily. The Gazans who found their death at sea include mid-leve...
27/08/2010 read more
The State of the Iranian Revolution
Since coming to power in 1979, the Islamic Revolution in Iran has had two main aims. First, it wished to remain in power and if this was the aim of the Islamic Revolution, 31 years later, it has been successful. But revolutions don't come about simp...
27/08/2010 read more
Essay: Decade of Disappointment
It's been a decade since Israeli and Palestinian leaders met as peacemakers only to part at loggerheads. Now, with most of the Camp David summit's protagonists long gone from the scene, that ill-fated conclave's military, diplomatic and political re...
27/08/2010 read more
The Last Word: Ideology Above Humanity
What struck me then, and continues to strike me, was their complete lack of concern, sometimes even contempt, for the human beings they claimed to champion and the hatred for the human beings on the other side of the political divide. There was no r...
27/08/2010 read more
Books: The Betrayers
In four decades of reading about international affairs and Middle Eastern geopolitics, I do not think I have come across a work of history that more fully illuminates the true sources of Palestinian terrorism and irresolvable conflict with the reali...
27/08/2010 read more