Research & Commentary Results

Israeli President Reuven “Ruby” Rivlin was recently asked about the prospects for a two-state solution to Israel’s long conflict with the Palestinians. He described this concept for building a future between Israel and its neighbor as “irrelevant.” Indeed, he claims to have said as much to President Barack Obama when they last met.

What does “irrelevant” mean in this context? The dictionary lists as its synonyms “immaterial” or “beside the point.”

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Robert S. Ford, Paul Scham, and Marvin G. Weinbaum provide analysis on recent events including the battle against ISIS for Fallujah, Israel’s upcoming address to the EU Parliament, and Pakistan’s upcoming accession to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

ISIS to Lose Fallujah
Robert S. Ford, Senior Fellow

Amidst great excitement, Jordan signed a $10 billion agreement with Russia to construct the country’s first nuclear power plant in March 2015. Chairman of Jordan’s Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) Khalid Toukan confidently asserted, “We aim to build a state of the art nuclear power plant that will be a showcase for the region.” Promising cheap energy, Toukan assured that nuclear power is the optimal way forward.

For several years, Israeli-Saudi collaboration over regional geostrategy to check Iranian influence has been the worst kept secret in the Middle East since the advent of Israel’s robust nuclear arsenal. Still, public coordination has been taboo, and while indirect, and even direct, coordination may be taking place behind closed doors, no official relationships can develop. This, of course, is due to the history between the state of Israel and the Arab world.

Read the full article on Al Jazeera.

These days even the hint of a renewal of diplomacy on Palestine is enough to set tongues wagging. In recent months, France has led what remains an inchoate effort to fill the diplomatic vacuum created by the Obama administration’s decision two years ago to close its book on Palestine.

The so-called ‘French initiative’—a boost-plan for the moribund ‘Middle East Peace Process’ designed to bring Israel and the P.L.O. back to the negotiating table under an international umbrella through a series of multilateral summits—was born in classic French diplomatic opulence. Not nearly half-baked, the initiative was presented ceremoniously in a grandiose manner by a foreign minister who was replaced shortly after, prompting knee-jerk reactions from all parties.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Robert S. Ford, Charles Schmitz, Gonul Tol, and Mabrouka M’Barek provide analysis on recent events including Manbij offensive, Yemen talks, Israel-Turkey rapprochement, and Tunisia national unity government.

Ousting ISIS from Manbij
Robert S. Ford, Senior Fellow

The 2016 presidential primaries have upended a wide variety of assumptions about the rules of American politics, and what the traffic will bear. One of these areas is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

At a time when Arab governments across the region unveil grand economic reform ‘visions,’ Jordan has launched its own bold scheme to revive its faltering economy. Jordan is looking for a cure to what many Jordanians consider an economic burden: over 1.2 million Syrian migrants due to the war next door.

With the exception of the extremely slow reconstruction process of what was destroyed during the last Israel-Gaza war in the summer of 2014, the conditions that preceded that war remain in place. The Palestinian reconciliation process remains cosmetic, negotiations for a truce between Israel and Hamas that were supposed to resume under Egyptian auspices have stalled, and humanitarian conditions in Gaza are becoming increasingly dire. Without improvement on any of these issues, the risks for a new round of fighting remain high.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Marvin G. Weinbaum, Charles Lister, Hassan Mneimneh, and Paul Scham provide analysis on recent events including the killing of Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour, deadly blasts targeting regime-held territory in Syria, Iraq’s intra-Shiite feud, and Avigdor Lieberman’s appointment as Israel’s Defense Minister.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Paul Salem, Paul Scham, Charles Lister, and Jean-François Seznec provide analysis on recent events including Lebanon’s elections, unrest in Gaza, the ongoing Syria talks, and Saudi Arabia’s new oil minister.

Lebanon Elections Run Smoothly
Paul Salem, Vice President for Policy and Research

This paper is part of a MEI scholar series titled “The Middle East and the 2016 Presidential Elections.”

Introduction

The pre-emptive security operation against a suspected ISIS-linked cell in the northern Jordanian city of Irbid earlier this month was a rude awakening. That all members of the cell were Jordanians added to public anxiety. While praise of the security forces and Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID) came from all sides, starting with King Abdullah himself, a sense of unease permeates throughout the kingdom. This was the first armed confrontation with ISIS, called Daesh locally, within the kingdom’s borders.

For the first time in almost half a century, the United States has acknowledged that it is “out of ideas” about how to address Israel’s occupation and fulfill a declared American interest in establishing a Palestinian state at peace with Israel.