From day one the new government must focus on making sure that the next government will be better.
Arguably the time is now ripe to begin accumulating such nuances in regard to Turkey. The difficulties of dealing with Turkey and President Recep Erdogan are incontestable and well-known. Nevertheless, Turkey’s geopolitical significance is equally indisputable and far-reaching. Many of the major issues in European security – migration, Libya’s civil war, confronting Syria’s civil war (the equivalent in our time of the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s), stabilizing the Balkans, defending the Black Sea, European energy security, and in particular accessing the energy in the Eastern Mediterranean – would benefit from the restoration of a true and ongoing strategic dialogue with Turkey. Indeed, neither we nor Turkey can make progress on them without such a dialogue.
On May 12, 2020, MEI hosted Dr. Mohammed Shtayyeh, Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority, for a roundtable discussion on the many crises facing Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority.
During his visit to Israel this week, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is slated to give Netanyahu the green light.
The central bank has depleted its reserves dramatically by funding state bank interventions in defense of the lira.
On April 30, roughly a week after the Southern Transitional Council (STC) declared self-administration in Aden, a military confrontation broke out on the remote Yemeni island of Socotra between members of the STC and government forces. After just a few days, the situation was diffused when the island’s governor and the STC asked the Saudis to intervene. Although an agreement was reached quickly, it is likely to be fragile because the causes of the conflict are not entirely local. The island of Socotra is simply too important to multiple international players that are not willing to let it easily slip outside their sphere of influence.
Officials in Damascus say reconstruction plans for what was once Syria’s largest Palestinian refugee community will pave the way for the return of large numbers of displaced residents “as soon as possible.” But with plans beset by delays and vague statements from those same officials, the available evidence suggests otherwise.
For Jordan Israeli annexation of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, as well as the strategically important Jordan Valley, constitutes an existential threat to the kingdom. But now Jordan faces unprecedented economic hardship as a consequence of the coronavirus crisis, and this could limit its scope for action.
The tensions between the two sides are unlikely to ease anytime soon.
With its territory under increasing pressure, its finances dwindling, and manpower more challenged than ever, HTS’s ability to balance its extremism with controlled uses of pragmatism is under strain. Internally, its leadership is bitterly divided over decisions of the past, present, and future and externally, its rivals and enemies all appear to be conspiring against it. In an attempt to protect internal cohesion, HTS has become determinedly self-assertive in recent weeks, pursuing unpopular policies such as trading with the regime and lashing out at those brave enough to express their dissatisfaction. In response to HTS aggressions, a wider array of opposition voices — both moderate and Islamist — are declaring loudly that HTS now represents a threat to their revolution.
Even before the coronavirus upended life around the world, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was already grappling with a host of problems. Then COVID-19 hit the country. Many argue the virus will exacerbate Erdogan’s problems but where others see a problem, Turkey’s president sees an opportunity. He is using the crisis to undercut the opposition, distribute government contracts to his loyalists, and punish his critics. Erdogan is relying on the virus to score foreign policy points as well. Sending medical aid to its neighbors and beyond helps assert Turkey’s leadership and improves its shattered image. The coronavirus likewise provides an excuse to remove a long-time irritant in Ankara’s ties with Washington and perhaps end its isolation in the region.
While there is no shortage of rhetorical opposition to Israeli annexation from all corners, the question now is whether any of them intend to follow up their strong words with concrete actions.
The April 20 Netanyahu-Gantz agreement legitimized the possibility of an Israeli law that will act as a unilateral annexation of parts of the West Bank to start as early as July 1, based on the controversial Trump Middle East plan. Articles 28 and 29 of the deal condition such annexation on the “consent of the Trump administration” and note that such a move would only be possible if the annexation preserves “the security and strategic interests of the state of Israel including the need to keep regional stability, keep existing peace agreements, and pursue future peace agreements.”
There is certainly no shortage of writings on Turkey today regarding that country’s “drift” away from its Western orientation. Some who espouse this argument frame the consequences in terms of Turkey’s increased ties to China. While Turkey itself has launched an “Asia Anew” policy, the outsized focus on this and other alleged signs of Turkey’s “drift from the West” distracts from the very palpable effects of its adventurism in the Middle East, North Africa, and Eastern Mediterranean. Turkey’s increasingly reckless foreign policy is on full display — from weaponizing refugees to extort the European Union to exporting mercenary Jihadist fighters to Libya. These are hardly the actions of a responsible regional power, much less a key member of the NATO alliance.
With the coronavirus sucking almost all of the oxygen out of the world’s news, it’s no wonder that Israel’s ongoing political crisis hasn’t received more coverage. But while the outside world is otherwise occupied, Israel, besides battling corona itself, is serving as a poster child for dysfunctional (yet democratic) government.