Policy Analysis

Crown Prince Abdallah bin Abd al-Aziz, who has run the affairs of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for the ailing King Fahd since November 1995, released four of the country's leading Sunni radical fundamentalists on June 25; they had served nearly five years. The most well-known of them, Shaykhs Salman

Kuwait is in a region characterized by contradictions and dichotomies between young and old, state and society, religion and politics, and national identity and globalization. The Kuwaiti experiment is part of a regional experiment, and what takes place there has an impact on the Arab world, particularly on the other

Israel-Palestinian Peace Process: In Israel and the Arab world, the mood is changing with respect to peace. In Israel, the recent elections were evidence of soul-searching. Although Israelis have diverse views on peace, last month they looked at the region and decided they needed a change. Most Israelis are now

Testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Subcommitte on Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs MR. CLAWSON: Thank you. It's an honor to be here with you today. I've submitted a statement for the record. And if you'll permit me, I would like just to summarize that briefly. SEN. BROWNBACK

Adapting U.S. Policy for the New Israeli Government Paul Wolfowitz: U.S. policies should not change every time a new government is elected in Israel. U.S. policymakers have become too invested in the internal politics of foreign countries, in particular Israel and Russia. The United States should support the policies of

Israel. Gen. Ehud Barak was elected with a remarkable mandate. The Israeli electorate decided that Israel was stuck on several fronts -- social issues, the economy, and peace -- and needed a new prime minister to get things moving. Change cannot be expected immediately, though, and Barak deserves time to

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) members are discussing in the corridors two proposals for a new Iraq resolution designed to restart UN inspections of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by offering Saddam Husayn the prospect of some relief from sanctions. The details of the two competing proposals are important

Keynote address by Dennis Ross. With David Makovsky, Mahdi F. Abdul Hadi, Colette Avital, Yuval Steinitz, Thomas Donilon, and Paul Wolfowitz.

I am appearing here tonight at what can only be described as an interesting time. There has been an election in Israel and there is a new prime minister, Ehud Barak, who won with a remarkable mandate. It is fair to say that the Israeli electorate perceived that the country

Yesterday's cabinet reshuffle in Saudi Arabia was another sign that the kingdom is going down a path toward a government that is more professional, more transparent, and more accountable. The cautious Saudis' penchant for slow steps can mask how much change is occurring. In some ways, the most important aspect

American and Libyan diplomats are slated to meet tomorrow at the United Nations in what will be the first face-to-face discussions in more than a decade. The purpose of the meeting is to discuss whether sanctions against Libya, which are currently suspended, should be permanently lifted. However this issue is

Dr. Adnan Pacachi, former Iraqi foreign minister and United Nations (UN) representative: The Iraqi opposition represents the yearnings and aspirations of Iraqis, who after years of oppression and dictatorship want a democratic and pluralistic government that protects the human rights of all its citizens. Saddam Husayn led Iraq into two

For more than a year, Palestinian leaders have advanced the original partition resolution -- United Nations (UN) General Assembly Resolution 181 of 1947 -- as the cornerstone of their diplomatic effort to gain international support for independent statehood. Whereas this was originally a tactic adopted to confront the policies of

Arab Middle Eastern reactions to the Kosovo conflict can be described as a deafening quiet. Arabs are generally distraught by the plight of the ethnic Albanian Kosovars and tend to blame Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic for their suffering. Many Arabs feel that the Kosovars are not pious Muslims, however, so

Turkmenistan president Saparmurad Niyazov today signed an agreement with Turkey's energy and natural resources minister, Ziya Aktash, to supply Turkmen natural gas to Turkey via a trans-Caspian pipeline. Later this month, work will begin on a much-delayed oil pipeline to carry oil from fields operated by a Chevron-led consortium in

Campaign: Israel's elections were primarily a referendum on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyhahu's leadership, and the verdict was clear: "Anybody but Netanyahu." This was also the sentiment during the campaign, especially when the three prime ministerial candidates (Yitzhak Mordechai, Ze'ev "Benny" Begin, and Azmi Bishara) from the three smaller parties dropped

Optimism About the Peace Process, Post-Netanyahu "The powers of rationalism which want to put an end to extremism and violence have triumphed. . . . This is a message from the majority of the Israeli public to Barak that it wants to close the chapter of conflict with the Palestinians

After three years of a foreign policy that found Israel increasingly isolated, Ehud Barak's landslide victory in Israel's elections Monday should inaugurate a new "era of good feelings" between Israelis, Americans and Arabs. But once the honeymoon wears off, Israel's negotiating partners shouldn't expect Mr. Barak to make substantive concessions

Sighs of relief sound the same regardless of their underlying meaning. It is therefore, easy to gloss over the distinctions among those hailing Ehud Barak's landslide victory over Benjamin Netanyahu in Monday's Israeli elections, and to focus on the common aspects of relief heard in the sighs: A long divisive

Iraqi president Saddam Husayn is undoubtedly watching events in the Balkans quite closely. Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic's continued defiance of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) proves that the Western alliance continues to misunderstand dictators. Milosevic, like Saddam, does not care about his people but only about his own power