Narrowing the Gulf

For many years the most influential Western cultural institution in the Arab world was the American University of Beirut (AUB). Founded in 1866 as the Syrian Protestant College, during much of the 20th century it was both an important university and a hub of intellectual and political ferment.

What will happen after Bush?

In its latest issue, dated November 8, The New York Review of Books published in a prominent - if not screaming - manner a letter signed by eight famous individuals and addressed to United States President George W. Bush, warning him of the grave dangers inherent in a possible failure of the Annapolis conference.

Markers on the Route to Damaskus

From my recent article in Ha’aretz:

In 1974, the Agranat Commission published its report, which examined the principal failures and the secondary failures that led to the Yom Kippur War. Inter alia, the commission recommended that, in order to prevent future mistaken “conceptions”, the pluralism of intelligence assessments in Israel should be strengthened by reinforcing the research divisions of the Mossad and the Foreign Ministry.

Courting Syria

A change in the United States' Middle East policy seems to be in the offing. The reasons for this expectation are the failure in Iraq and the defeat of President George W. Bush and the Republican party in the midterm elections, a failure that led to the immediate resignation/dismissal of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.