Middle East Task Force

Archives: Middle East Task Force Articles and Op-Eds

Will There Be Blood?

  • By
  • Leila Hilal,
  • New America Foundation
March 14, 2012 |

Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest exporter of oil. The petroleum sector accounts for around 80 percent of the country’s revenue, 45 percent of its GDP and 90 percent of its export earnings. Agricultural production is less than 3 percent of the economy in this vast desert. Dependence on foreign labor is high. Wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few thousand men, with around 20 percent of the national population estimated to be living below the poverty line, although official statistics are not available.

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Netanyahu Won't Attack Iran

  • By
  • Daniel Levy,
  • New America Foundation
March 2, 2012 |

The intensity of background spin emanating from Washington and Jerusalem threatens to leave very little to the imagination in advance of the March 5 meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Various U.S. officials, current and former, named and anonymous, have shared their skepticism regarding Israel's ability to inflict decisive damage on Iran's nuclear-enrichment program, as well as their trepidation at the costs, consequences, and retaliatory attacks that might follow from an Israeli strike.

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Israeli Leader Wrongly Blames UN and Arab States for Palestinian Refugees

  • By
  • Leila Hilal,
  • New America Foundation
February 21, 2012 |

Ayalon's claim that Arab states deny refugees basic rights as demographic warfare against the Jewish state is also out of context. All Arab refugee-hosting countries endorsed the Arab Peace Initiative (API) in 2002 and again in 2007. The API contains an implicit compromise proposal to implement the right of return in a manner sensitive to Israel's demographic interests following Israeli recognition of international principles. As political landscapes shift in the Middle East, so may Arab foreign policies.

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Israeli Democracy in Peril

  • By
  • Daniel Levy,
  • New America Foundation
January 6, 2012 |

While 2011 will be remembered as a tumultuous year in the Middle East, that most headline-grabbing of regional issues—the Israel-Palestine conflict—barely merits a footnote. The glacial pace of developments on that front could not have been more out of sync with the surrounding frenzy. There has been no Palestinian Spring to date (although there have been weekly demonstrations in Palestinian villages impacted by Israeli land confiscations) and the entire year passed without even a day of Palestinian-Israeli peace talks (those were in part resumed on Jan.

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Israeli-Palestinian Talks in Jordan: Working Hard at Treading Water

  • By
  • Daniel Levy,
  • Leila Hilal,
  • New America Foundation
January 5, 2012 |

On January 6, 2011, then Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Sharm el Sheikh in an effort to resuscitate the flagging peace process. Egypt for many years played the role of regional protector of an Israeli-Palestinian peace process, which was extremely heavy on process while being ever-more transparently light on delivering peace. It is a role that the new Egypt is unlikely to volunteer for.

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The Last Straw for Bedouin in Jerusalem's Periphery?

  • By
  • Jonathan Guyer,
  • New America Foundation
December 23, 2011 |

United Nations officials have issued a warning that the Government of Israel's plans for Palestinian Bedouin communities living in Jerusalem's periphery could constitute "mass forcible transfers" and "grave breaches" of international law. A pending plan in the West Bank threatens to displace Khan al-Ahmar, a Bedouin village of refugees originally from Israel's south, pushed off their indigenous land in the early 1950's. Khan al-Ahmar lies on the side of a major West Bank thoroughfare and is sandwiched between the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumin and Jerusalem.

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Israel's Chilling Relations with the U.S.

  • By
  • Jonathan Guyer,
  • New America Foundation
December 6, 2011 |

The Israeli government has come under criticism from both the Obama administration and American Jewish communities over the past week – the latter focused on a bizarre advertisement campaign aimed at the US diaspora.

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Next Challenges for Tunisia

  • By
  • Leila Hilal,
  • New America Foundation
November 10, 2011 |

Last month Tunisians went to the polls to elect a 217-seat constituent assembly to rewrite the country's political and legal map. The elections were widely venerated for their transparency and efficacy, marking a uniquely positive development in the otherwise stalled Arab Spring. As the official review of the preliminary election concludes, a wide consensus prevails to move on to the next challenges in the nation's transformation.

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Five Comments on Palestine Joining UNESCO

  • By
  • Daniel Levy,
  • New America Foundation
October 31, 2011 |

So the UNESCO's general conference has voted to admit Palestine as a member. The U.S. government has made good on its Congressionally-mandated commitment to withhold its dues payments to UNESCO.

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U.S. Looks Increasingly Irrelevant as Mideast Peace Broker

  • By
  • Jonathan Guyer,
  • New America Foundation
October 21, 2011 |

While a growing number of influential voices here and in the region insist that the nearly 20-year, U.S.-sponsored "peace process" has reached its terminal phase, the administration of President Barack Obama remains committed to reviving direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO).

"…[M]oving forward, we want to see progress on the peace talks," State Department spokesman Mark Toner has emphasised repeatedly over the last two weeks, which have seen Washington's special envoy David Hale shuttling between Jerusalem and Ramallah.

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