Policy Analysis

On a recent trip to Iraq, I visited the three northern provinces that fall under the auspices of the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG). I happened to be in Erbil, the region's capital, during the recent Turkish incursion into northeastern Iraq to disrupt the terror camps of the Kurdistan Workers Party

On March 14, Turkey's chief prosecutor, Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, filed a case with the country's Constitutional Court asking it to shut down the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and ban seventy-one of its members from seeking elected office for five years. He accused the party of spearheading "anti-secular activities" in

On Friday, Turkey's chief prosecutor filed a case in the Constitutional Court to shut down the Justice and Development Party, which controls the national government, and ban the president, prime minister and senior party officials from politics for five years. The party -- known by its Turkish initials AKP --

Qassam rocket strikes from Hamas-controlled Gaza -- recently amplified by longer-range Iranian-made Grad rockets -- continue to rain down on Israeli civilian targets, triggering military retaliations. What is Hamas's strategy, toward both Israel and the ordinary Palestinians under its own rule in Gaza? What is the nature and outcome of

On March 16, Vice President Cheney departs on a Middle East trip that will take him to Oman, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the West Bank, and Turkey. Coming less than two months after President Bush's trip to the region, the vice president's itinerary is intriguing. His undisclosed agenda with "key partners,"

When President Bush assumed office, Iran was not a nuclear power. When his successor takes the oath of office next year, however, Iran will have achieved (or be on the verge of achieving) that status. Nothing the Bush Administration or the international community is doing now is likely to alter

A month after visiting Washington, Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayad continues to face significant political, economic, and security challenges to his reform plan. Fatah, the ruling political party in the West Bank, has resisted many aspects of his agenda and is critical of his cabinet's composition and performance. And although

Fifteen years from now, when classified documents produced today begin to be declassified, we will surely look back with some discomfort and see just how far off some of our judgments were when written in 2008. Such is the nature of intelligence assessments. What would be worse, however, would be

Qassam rockets -- unsophisticated weapons manufactured in garages and backroom laboratories -- have transformed the strategic equation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. These crude rockets give Palestinian terrorist organizations the capability to strike deep into Israeli territory, throwing the security assumptions behind future peace negotiations into doubt. Background Qassam rockets --

In the Middle East, it is widely believed that Syria is obstructing the election of a new Lebanese president. Amid this crisis, many are beginning to doubt whether the next Arab League summit, scheduled to open in Damascus at month's end, will take place at all. Lebanon Crisis In key

Recently, two important developments have broken months of gridlock on the Iranian nuclear issue: a third round of UN sanctions and a new warning by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). Although both measures are positive, their ultimate impact will depend on how aggressively and effectively key governments implement them

Since the fall of Saddam Hussein, Sunnis in Anbar and other western Iraqi provinces have struggled to develop a coherent and representative political leadership. The recently formed Iraqi Awakening Convention (IAC) -- a collective of so-called "Awakening council" leaders -- could represent the next step in that evolution and, if

It is tempting to view the current violence in Gaza as just another symptom of the greater Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But it is not. The Hamas-sanctioned rockets and the Israeli retaliation are actually at the core of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's inability to move the peace process even one inch

How is the U.S. government applying its financial and economic tools to combat terrorism and rogue regimes?

The following is an excerpt of this article. Read the full text (PDF). When John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt published a paper decrying the influence of the Israel lobby on American foreign policy in March 2006, they received a torrent of criticism from former policymakers, historians, politically-inclined academics, and several

Early indications from Turkey's Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi: AKP), which assumed governance for the second time in July 2007, render it possible to make certain predictions about the future of Turkish foreign policy. The AKP will likely continue its hallmark policy of good ties with the

Senator John McCain often attacks the two Democratic presidential front-runners for their soft stance on Iraq. "Senator Clinton and Senator Obama will withdraw our force from Iraq based on an arbitrary timetable designed for the sake of political expediency," he recently said, "which recklessly ignores the profound human calamity and

In response to the February 12 assassination of chief of operations Imad Mughniyeh, Hizballah has ratcheted up its threats, warnings, and saber rattling. In turn, Israel has locked down its foreign missions, put its military on heightened alert, and deployed Patriot missiles near Haifa. And in Washington, the FBI issued

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This past week's news placed Hamas in the spotlight, with press coverage of key Hamas activity in the West Bank, Egypt and Jordan. While Hamas suffered significant setbacks at the hands of Israeli and Jordanian authorities, the group fared much better in Egypt. First the good news. Coming on the