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In-Depth Coverage

Original Commentaries

07/08/08
Planning the Transition  —Ghaith al-Omari, director of advocacy, American Task Force on Palestine; former foreign policy adviser to Palestinian President Abbas. Original Commentary for Middle East Bulletin.
07/07/08
Moving Forward in Lebanon After Doha: Bridging Deep Divides  —Mona Yacoubian, director of the Lebanon Working Group, U.S. Institute of Peace. Original Commentary for Middle East Bulletin.
06/27/08
Dealing with the Challenge of Prisoners  —Brigadier General (Ret.) Ilan Paz, former head of the Israeli Civil Administration in the West Bank (2002-2005). Interview with Middle East Bulletin.

Setting the Record Straight

Israeli-Syrian Peace Could Alter Regional Dynamic

“I think [the Israelis] are making a mistake trying to negotiate with Syria now, because I don’t think Syria has any independent ability to make decisions. Over the past several years, Syria has become functionally a satellite of Iran, so that if the Israelis really wanted to negotiate with somebody, they ought to be in Tehran, not in Damascus. … I think it will be seen as a mistake in their domestic politics, and it certainly wouldn’t fit my cost-benefit analysis of a fruitful place to have discussions.”
—John Bolton, senior fellow, American Enterprise Institute & former U.S. ambassador to the UN, interview with NationalJournal.com, May 23, 2008 versus
  • "An Israeli-Syrian peace would be based on interests … The first thing the Syrians want is the Golan [Heights], but they want other things too. … Syria wants to be defined differently than Iran and come back to the center of the international system. In terms of Israeli interests, I think the first thing would be no all-out warfare. … In addition, an agreement with Syria would include the larger Arab world and not the Assad government alone. Such an agreement would also undermine Hezbollah, Hamas and extreme Islamist movements. … The United States is needed for addressing the Syrian interests, beyond the Golan, including removal of Syria from the ‘axis of evil’ and economic incentives.”
    —Major General (Ret.) Danny Rothschild, former IDF coordinator of activities in the Palestinian territories (1991-95) & president, Israeli Council for Peace and Security, event ,"Peace with Syria," July 14, 2008 (translated by Middle East Bulletin)

    • Middle East Analysis

    Hopes Fade for Turkish Water as a Strategic Asset

    Gareth Jenkins (Eurasia Daily Monitor)
    April 9, 2008

    Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Syrian President Bashar Assad (AP)

    A recent report in the business daily Referans suggests that Turkey’s hopes of using its water resources as a strategic asset to strengthen its ties with the Middle East countries are likely to be frustrated. The latest figures suggest that as the result of a combination of population increase, poor resource management and decreased rainfall, Turkey is far from being a water-rich country but is now in danger of becoming a water-poor one, with barely enough water to meet its own needs.

    During the 1990s, Turkish government officials were fond of predicting that the country’s water would become a strategic resource, not only compensating for its limited reserves of hydrocarbons but–by supplying water to the countries of the Middle East–bolstering Turkey’s ambitions of becoming a regional superpower. The dams built on the Tigris and Euphrates as part of the $32 billion hydroelectric and irrigation Southeast Anatolia Project (GAP) had already given Turkey a stranglehold over the two main rivers flowing through Syria and Iraq. …

    After Turkey and Israel signed military training and defense industry cooperation agreements in 1996, there were also hopes that the rapprochement could be underpinned by Turkey supplying Israel with freshwater. … Particularly after the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in Turkey in November 2002, there was also talk of using the agreement with Israel as the basis for the construction of a “Peace Pipeline”, which would carry Turkish water not only to Israel but to Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and the Palestinians. …

    Even if it had been possible to persuade the various countries to bury their political differences, there had always been doubts about the economic feasibility of the water pipeline, which had been expected to take up to 15 years to build at a projected cost of $8 billion. It now also appears that, regardless of political and economic considerations, Turkey simply does not have the water to spare. Access the full article>>