James M Dorsey An Israeli ground offensive in the southern Gazan enclave of Rafah is a question of when, not if. Not because Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is oblivious to US and international pressure but because it could prove to be make or break for Israel’s embattled leader. Netanyahu has promised “total victory” in the Gaza war and to “finish the job” in Rafah. The stakes for Netanyahu could […]
James M Dorsey Multiple overt and covert wars have pushed the Middle East to the edge of a cliff. Increased tension between Iran and Israel complicates efforts to pull the Middle East back from the abyss. With the two archenemies walking a fine line between waging covert or overt war, escalation between Israel and Iran has the greatest potential to push the Middle East off the cliff. […]
James M Dorsey Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is tying himself up in knots as he grudgingly, and only to a limited degree, bows to US President Joe Biden’s demands. In doing so, Netanyahu is puncturing Swiss-cheese size holes into Israel’s Gaza narrative, making it easier for Mr. Biden to take him publicly to task. Biden has demanded that Israel allow the unfettered flow of desperately needed humanitarian […]
James M Dorsey The Greater Middle East is a ticking time bomb. Generations in war-wracked Palestine, Syria, and Yemen have little, if anything, to look forward to. Moreover, discontent is mounting and could explode anytime in countries like Jordan, Egypt, and Iran. Palestine is a pressure cooker. Gazan youth has known little else than two decades of wars and siege. Beyond the trauma of the latest six-month-old war, Gaza’s next […]
James M Dorsey Muhammad Manassara walked in late February into a gas station near the West Bank settlement of Eli. Armed with an automatic weapon, Manassara killed two people before he was shot dead by the owner of a restaurant at the station, the site of the killing last summer of four Israelis. Three weeks later, Mujahid Barakat Mansour, a father of two small children, opened fire near the […]
James M Dorsey Israel’s refusal to lift restrictions on the unfettered entry into Gaza of food, medical supplies, and other desperately needed humanitarian goods, has less to do with a stand-alone starvation policy and more with who controls distribution in the Strip. Both Israel and Hamas see control of aid distribution as a building block of who comes out on top once the guns fall silent. The […]
James M Dorsey Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s walls are caving in. His multiple battles fall into two categories: keeping his increasingly fragile government in place and fighting a war he has already lost in the court of public opinion and possibly on the ground in Gaza if measured by the prime minister’s war goals. On Monday, Israel suffered its most significant international setback since 2016 with […]
James M Dorsey A just-published Palestinian public opinion survey offers pointers for what a successful transition from the devastating Gaza war to a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will have to entail. The survey’s pointers take on added significance as the United States, Europe and Arab states seek to turn the fallout of Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel and the carnage caused by Israel’s assault on the Strip […]
James M Dorsey This year’s US presidential elections are not the only potential hurdle confronting President Joe Biden’s multi-pronged vision for a Middle East peace once the Gaza war ends. So is Israeli intransigence, the prospect of a long-term insurgency in post-war Gaza, and increasing Saudi Chinese technological cooperation. The Biden administration is pushing for a multi-pronged comprehensive Middle East deal that would not only end the […]
James M Dorsey \Failed efforts to achieve a Gaza ceasefire on the eve of Ramadan leave innocent Gazans in the lurch, highlight the gap between Israel and Hamas’ demands in negotiations, and raise the stakes for the United States. At the core of the stalled negotiations is Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s insistence on continuing Israel’s assault after a ceasefire and an exchange of some Hamas-held hostages kidnapped […]
James M Dorsey The Gaza war has turned Palestine into a lightning rod for mounting frustration and discontent in Arab autocracies such as Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. Concerned that the war could mobilise segments of civil society, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates where any form of public protest is banned, have cracked down on expressions of solidarity with Gaza, including the sporting of […]
James M Dorsey A proposed temporary Gaza ceasefire and prisoner exchange appears designed to buy war-battered Gazans relief while enabling Israel and Hamas to claim a success. However, whether Israel or Hamas emerges as the ultimate victor will be determined by whether the truce becomes permanent and the war ends. Negotiated by Qatar, Egypt, the United States, Israel, and Hamas, the deal would be whittled down to […]
James M Dorsey Two recent soccer incidents suggest that beyond optics little has changed in the Saudi-Iranian rivalry since China mediated the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries a year ago. On the contrary, the Gaza war has highlighted the potential threat Iran and its non-state allies pose to the kingdom, even if both countries have toned down their rhetoric, are cautious not to provoke the other, […]
By James M Dorsey The irony of Middle Eastern geopolitics is that Israel makes it increasingly difficult for US President Joe Biden to support it, while Iran strengthens domestic US anti-Iranian and pro-Israeli hardliners. The hardliners are emboldened by the failure of calibrated US strikes in response to numerous attacks on US forces in the […]
The post Iran Facilitates Biden’s Support For Israel, But Tel Aviv Makes It Increasingly Difficult first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey A recent Lebanese public opinion poll suggests there may be limits to Iran-backed Shiite militia Hezbollah’s restraint in confronting Israel. It also suggests why Iran feels emboldened by escalating tensions in the Middle East. The poll results are significant with Hezbollah and Israel engaged in tit-for-tat cross border attacks that both […]
The post Hardliners Ride High In Miidle East As Border Hostilities Escalate Unexpectedly first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey History repeats itself. Palestinian airplane hijackings and attacks on Israeli civilians in Israel as well as on Israeli and Jewish targets abroad pockmarked the 1970s and 1980s. The violence put the Palestinian issue on the world agenda. The violence erupted, and at times, was driven by fierce debate among Palestinian guerilla […]
The post History Repeats Itself With The Killing Of Senior Hamas Official Saleh Al-Arouri first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Think that the heart wrenching images streaming out of the Gaza Strip suggest that Israel has Hamas over a barrel? Think again. Talks in Europe and in Cairo suggest otherwise. The talks stalled after Hamas insisted that it would not engage in prisoner exchange negotiations unless Israel halts fighting and agrees […]
The post Israel, Hamas Prisoner Exchange Talks Further Mired first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Israel wasn’t slamming the door on renewed indirect prisoner swap negotiations with Hamas when it this week barred David Barnea, the head of Mossad, the country’s foreign intelligence agency, from travelling to Qatar to explore possibilities for renewed exchanges. Instead, it was manoeuvring for greater leverage in potential talks and expressing […]
The post Hamas Manoeuvring Complicates Efforts To Secure Prisoner Swaps With Israel first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
James M Dorsey The United Arab Emirates walks a geopolitical tightrope, juggling big power rivalries and mounting regional instability fuelled by the Gaza war. Putin’s movements beyond the confines of Russia are restricted. Signatories of the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court are obliged to arrest Putin against whom the court has issued a Ukraine-related international arrest warrant. Visiting the UAE and Saudi Arabia was a […]
By James M Dorsey Spanish philosopher George Santayana didn’t have Palestine in mind when he coined the phrase, ‘history repeats itself. ‘Yet, Santayana’s maxim may apply to Hamas when comparing the group’s political evolution to the 16-year-torturous road traversed by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from classification by Israel and its Western allies as a […]
The post Counterintuitive Palestine Politics: Hamas May Be Treading A Path Paved By PLO Earlier first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel has not just divided Muslim political leaders. It’s also solicited diverse responses from religious figures and institutions, reflecting deeper divisions about what Islam stands for in the 21st century. At the core of the differences is the ability and willingness to empathise with innocent victims […]
The post Gaza Conflict Ends Up Separating Wheat From Chaff Among Religious Leaders first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Israel’s options are central to discussions about the day after the guns fall silent in Gaza. Absent from the debate is what Palestinians want. Also absent is any discussion of funding for Gaza’s reconstruction, although the assumption is that oil-rich Gulf states will step up to the plate. The significance of […]
The post Israel In Gaza: Only Limited Options Available When The Guns Fall Silent first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey It took 11 days and the death of 256 Palestinians for US President Joe Biden’s preference for a bear hug rather than a sledgehammer approach to get Israel to halt the Gaza bombing in 2021. Even then, Biden needed to be blunt and go public to get what he wanted. After […]
The post President Biden’s Bear Hug Of Israel’s Netanyahu Is A Double-Edged Sword first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Israel will likely win the Gaza war on the battlefield. Even so, it has already been defeated in the court of public opinion. It no longer really matters who attacked Gaza’s Al Ahli Arab Hospital in which hundreds of innocent civilians were killed or the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in […]
The post Israel May Win Gaza War, But It Has Already Lost The Battle For Public Opinion first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Human beings’ most destructive instincts – survival, anger, fear, despair, and vengeance – dictate Israeli and Palestinian war strategy and policy in the wake of Hamas’ October 7 brutal attack on Israel. The dominance of emotions produces an environment in which one atrocity justifies another and reinforces Israeli and Palestinian demonization […]
The post Emotions Fuel Gaza War, Burying All Hopes Of Resolving Israeli-Palestine Conflict first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Islamic Law is at the centre of debates about what constitutes moderate Islam and what it would take to reform Islam. Essentially, two schools of thought dominate the discussion. Islam’s traditional approach simply picks and chooses which elements of Sharia it opts to ignore. That is the approach adopted by autocratic […]
The post A Tunisian Party Evolves From Islamism To Muslim Democracy first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey A Saudi-Israeli agreement to establish diplomatic relations involving enhanced US commitments to Gulf security could be a game-changer for great power rivalry in the Middle East. To be sure, US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu face formidable obstacles in paying the price tag Saudi Arabia puts on […]
The post Saudi-Israeli Deal Would Be A Gamechanger, But Not For Discussed Reasons first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey It’s a no-brainer to suggest that we live in an increasingly polarised world. Geopolitics are polarised, so are societies. Polarisation marks the transition from a unipolar world dominated by the United States to a bipolar world with China, or more likely a tripolar world that includes India, in which middle powers […]
The post The ‘Global Enduring Disorder’ In An Increasingly Polarised World first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey Debates about the US commitment to Gulf security are skewed by confusion, miscommunication, and contradictory policies. The skewing has fuelled uncertainty about US policy as well as Gulf attitudes in an evolving multi-polar world and fuelled misconceptions and misunderstandings. The confusion is all the more disconcerting given that the fundamentals of […]
The post Confusion And Uncertainty Shape Debate About United States’ Gulf Policy first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
By James M Dorsey An unexpected twist in the run-up to next year’s Indonesian presidential election puts Centrist Democratic International (CDI), the world’s largest alliance of conservative political parties, and Nahdlatul Ulama, the world’s largest and most moderate Muslim civil society movement, in a bind. In a surprise move, Muhaimin Iskander, leader of the National […]
The post Indonesian Presidential Election Produces An Unexpected Twist first appeared on Latest India news, analysis and reports on IPA Newspack.
