Middle East

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman recently suggested a not-so-novel approach to the problem of Iran's nuclear ambitions. He wants to apply what he calls the Cuban model, in which "the United States alone can do everything in order to stop this program."

Lieberman went on to suggest, "If the United States adopts the legislation and the entire Cuban model toward Iran, without awaiting understandings and consensus within the [UN] Security Council framework, this would be enough to strangle and bring down the Iranian regime."

On March 16, 2010, New America Foundation's American Strategy Program Director Steve Clemons and Former Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs James K. Glassman discussed the role that strategic communications should play in United States policy toward Iran.

It took a year of trying for President Obama to persuade Israelis and Palestinians to enter into "proximity talks" to resolve issues standing in the way of a final peace plan. But as we learned from the stunning announcement this week -- during Vice President Joe Biden's visit to the region -- that Israel had approved 112 new settlement units in the West Bank and 1,600 new settlement units in East Jerusalem, there is a lot that can go wrong.

Israel’s announcement of 1,600 new settlement units in Arab East Jerusalem, coming during Vice President Biden’s visit, and the previous day’s announcement of 112 new settlements elsewhere in the Occupied West Bank, should not be seen as one-off slaps at the United States.

In many ways they are a culmination of this Israeli government’s efforts to “teach” President Obama what he can and can’t do to defend American interests in the Middle East.

Joseph Biden, the US vice president, left on Sunday for a head-scratching trip to the Middle East and many are wondering what he is up to. 

After all, the vice president has a lot on his plate already.

Biden has been the person behind the White House scenes who has helped nudge forward the tenuous deals between Shia, Sunnis and Kurds which secured Sunday's historic elections in Iraq.

In his keynote address at last week's Herzliya Conference, Ehud Barak summoned up the most dramatic case for changing the status quo: "If, and as long as between the Jordan and the sea, there is only one political entity, named Israel, it will end up being either non-Jewish or non-democratic ... If the Palestinians vote in elections, it is a binational state, and if they don't, it is an apartheid state."

A peculiar if familiar ritual is currently playing itself out in Middle East diplomacy. A concerted push is under way to restart Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, though none of the chief protagonists show any signs of believing they will change anything. We have all been here before, many times over.

On January 14^th, Middle East Task Force Director Daniel Levy co-hosted a conference call with Ufuk Ulutaş of the SETA Foundation-DC to address the current diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey, next steps, the background, and the implications for the protagonists, the region, and the U.S.

On January 26, Barak Barfi (author of New America’s Counterterrorism Strategy Initiative policy paper entitled “Yemen on the Brink?”), Christopher Boucek (Middle East Research Associate, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace), and Brian Fishman (Counterterrorism Fellow, New America Foundation) discussed extremism in Yemen and its risk for exploitation by al Qaeda. The speakers were introduced by Peter Bergen, Senior Research Fellow and Co-Director of the Counterterrorism Strategy Initiative at the New America Foundation.

The New America Foundation's Middle East Task Force and Project Engage are pleased to invite you to a timely discussion on the first anniversary of the conflict in Gaza.

Just in the last week, there have been mortars fired into Israel and Israeli attacks in Gaza.  A year after Israel's last military operation, the blockade of Gaza continues and looks to be tightened as Egypt also constructs a wall on its border with Gaza.  The status quo remains rooted in insecurity and uncertainty.