Arab & Islamic Politics

The promotion of democracy abroad, long a major tenet of U.S. foreign policy, has taken on newfound importance in the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse. President Clinton has promised to make the promotion of democracy a key element of his foreign policy. The Middle East, a region where autocratic

In the contemporary Middle East, threats of political instability are both real and imagined, and differentiating between the two is no easy task. Myths, such as the region's near-congenital predisposition for instability, abound, but when rapid change (e.g., Iraq's invasion of Kuwait) does occur, Western governments are often caught off-guard

In the Middle East, the Gulf War shattered many stereotypes and preconceived notions, not least among them, about the so-called “Arab street.” Commentators regularly depict a mythologized and often demonized “Arab street”—an ominous urban mass that is sometimes depicted as intimidating regimes, sometimes as being held captive by them; and

Hamas--the Islamic Resistance Movement--arose during the intifada as the organization of Palestinian Muslim fundamentalists of the West Bank and Gaza. Because it views the Arab-Israeli conflict as a religious struggle between Islam and Judaism that can only be resolved by the destruction of the State of Israel, it opposes the

The collapse of the Soviet bloc and the end of the Cold War have come almost too swiftly to be registered. As Czechoslovakia's dissident-turned-President Vaclav Havel has said, one no longer has even the time to be astonished. No less striking than the demise of Soviet power has been the

Executive Summary Traditionally, Arab states have been unable and/or unwilling to make peace with Israel for a variety of internal and external reasons -- domestic instability and external weakness in the case of Jordan, ideological and strategic militancy in the case of Syria, domestic opinion and regional weakness in the

The Syrian regime of Hafez al-Assad has in the past year seemed to change direction, first with tentative moves toward liberalization, then by siding with the American-led coalition that fought against Saddam Hussein and, perhaps most dramatically, by acceding to America’s wish to attend a peace conference with Israel. There

As UN Secretary-General Perez de Cuellar begins diplomatic contacts in Amman with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz, the Gulf crisis moves, at least temporarily, into a phase of negotiations. But negotiations can be as dangerous as battle -- leading to escalation, defeat, or even disaster. U.S. policy must be flexible

Executive Summary Faced with pressure from the uprising leadership in the territories, by gains of rival Islamic and leftist groups and by Jordan's disengagement from the West Bank, Yasser Arafat is seeking approval for a Palestinian declaration of independence at the Algiers PNC meeting. But will the PLO actually achieve