Since Israel unilaterally dismantled its settlements and withdrew its troops from the Gaza Strip in August 2005, it has repeatedly expressed concern over the security of the Egypt-Gaza border. Israel claims that ongoing smuggling of sophisticated weaponry into the Gaza Strip could dramatically strengthen the military capabilities of Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip in 2007. Israel also charges that Egypt is not adequately sealing its side of the border, citing the recent breakthrough of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who rushed into Egypt on January 23, 2008 and remained for several days.

After the first Gulf war, in 1991, a new peace process consisting of bilateral negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon achieved mixed results. Milestones included the Israeli-Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Declaration of Principles (DOP) of September 13, 1993, providing for Palestinian empowerment and some territorial control, the Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty of October 26, 1994, and the Interim Self-Rule in the West Bank or Oslo II accord of September 28, 1995, which led to the formation of the Palestinian Authority (PA) to govern the West Bank and Gaza Strip. However, Israeli-Syrian negotiations were intermittent and difficult, and postponed indefinitely in 2000. Negotiations with Lebanon also were unsuccessful, leading Israel to withdraw unilaterally from south Lebanon on May 24, 2000. President Clinton held a summit with Israeli and Palestinian leaders at Camp David on final status issues that July, but they did not produce an accord. A Palestinian uprising or intifadah began in September. On February 6, 2001, Ariel Sharon was elected Prime Minister of Israel, and rejected steps taken at Camp David and afterwards.

On May 14, 1948, the State of Israel declared its independence and was immediately engaged in a war with all of its neighbors. Armed conflict has marked every decade of Israel’s existence. Despite its unstable regional environment, Israel has developed a vibrant parliamentary democracy, albeit with relatively fragile governments. The Kadima Party placed first in the March 28, 2006, Knesset (parliament) election; Prime Minister Ehud Olmert formed a coalition government. Israel has an advanced industrial, market economy with a large government role.

The recent breach by Hamas of the Egyptian-Gaza border has short and long term implications. In the short term, the event strengthened Hamas' standing in Gaza and increased the current security challenges to Israel, as terrorists and arms crossed the porous border. As rockets continue to fall on Israeli cities near Gaza, the Israeli public demands action by the government. Egypt is forced to play a role in the new situation, and finds itself caught in a dilemma – showing solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza while simultaneously preventing Hamas' influence in internal Egyptian politics. This event could become the catalyst of a reintroduction of Arab states taking responsibility on the Palestinian issue.

During her visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority in early March, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke about activating the trilateral mechanism headed by US General Charles Frasier to monitor the fulfillment of the Roadmap obligations of both sides. American officials explained that the Administration has not given up hope of reaching agreement on the core issues in the conflict but that it is logical to focus now on a parallel improvement in the situation on the ground. If the reality does not change, they argued, any agreement reached would be purely theoretical.

By the end of 2007 the southwestern region of Israel had been bombarded from Gaza by over 7000 rockets, for seven years. Gaza is supplied with fuel, electricity, food and medical supplies from Israel. Some rockets came close to damaging the Ashkelon power plant that supplies Gaza with electricity. Polite requests to cease the rocketing do not succeed. The Israeli government, in seeking to avoid the bloodshed inherent in using force to stop the bombardment, imposed gradual cuts of a few percent in the electric supply, and limited fuel supply to humanitarian needs.

The IDF posts are gone. The settlements are gone. Hamas even declared Gaza liberated. Yet two-and-a-half years after the disengagement, at least one local human rights group still considers the Strip occupied. And, surprisingly, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International agree.

The Middle East Peace Conference convened by the United States on November 27, 2007, met in a spirit of easily restrained enthusiasm. Unlike the last formal relaunch of Arab-Israeli negotiations — Madrid 1991 — this was an assembly of the weak. Bush the father came in the wake of victory over Saddam in Kuwait; Bush the son came in the midst of a near defeat in post-Saddam Iraq. Israel’s then Prime Minister, Yitzchak Shamir, brought a stable coalition, a reputation for modesty, and a tough immobility occasionally punctuated by pragmatism. In contrast, Ehud Olmert is widely distrusted, lacks a durable party base, and suffers a reputation for dangerous haste (the Lebanon War) and dubious deals. The Palestinians, then as now, were divided. Those attending Madrid, however, had their eyes on Yasser Arafat, an acknowledged master of Palestinian politics. At Annapolis, the eyes were on Hamas. And Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), although Arafat’s one-time confidante, is definitely not the master of Palestinian politics.

The long-awaited Annapolis summit on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process managed to bring together more than 40 countries in support for renewed Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. It remains unclear, however, whether it has made any significant contribution toward a resolution of the conflict.

September 2007 marked seven years since the outbreak of the Palestinian uprising in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. There is no end in sight to this round of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which since its eruption has continued in waves. Consequently, the key developments and trends of the confrontation cannot be summarized definitively, and at best they can be illustrated in terms of an intermediate balance sheet. At the same time the bottom line of this balance sheet, which addresses the major aspects of a multifaceted, implication-laden conflict, is clear, unequivocal, and distressing. It indicates a considerable worsening of conditions for laying the foundations of an Israeli-Palestinian compromise based on political and territorial separation and the establishment of a viable Palestinian political-economic entity alongside the State of Israel.

The main objective of this study is to analyze the terrorist organizations’ use of rocket and mortar shell fire between 2000 and 2007, the years of the terrorist campaign initiated by the Palestinians (called the Al-Aqsa intifada). The study examines the extent of the fire, the policies employed by the various organizations, the factors influencing those policies, trends of escalation or lulls in the attacks, the impact on the residents of the western Negev settlements.

The establishment of a new Palestinian Unity Government would create significant dilemmas for Israel in terms of its policies towards the Palestinian Authority and whether to continue the political process. Israel should begin to evaluate the dilemmas such a government would pose.

Negotiations over Permanent Status that began at Annapolis are expected to deadlock within a few months. Israel will then be faced with a strategic decision and may opt to change its political logic and strive to upgrade the PA's status to that of a State with Provisional Borders.

El 29 de noviembre de 1947, la recién creada Organización de las Naciones Unidas, a través de la Resolución 181 (II) de su Asamblea General, decidía repartir el territorio del Mandato Británico de Palestina entre los dos pueblos que lo habitaban: un 46% para la población original palestina, árabe (musulmana, cristiana o judía), y un 54% para la minoría de colonos judíos que habían comenzado a llegar de Europa y otros lugares unas décadas atrás. Para éstos, la partición era el primer paso hacia la consecución del ideal sionista: la creación de un Estado propio en Sión, la Palestina histórica, vaciada de su población árabe para que pudiera convertirse en la patria de todos los judíos del mundo y acabar así con la marginación secular de que eran objeto en la mayoría de sus países de origen. Para los palestinos el plan era inadmisible porque suponía la usurpación de la mitad de su tierra y la entrega de la misma a unos recién llegados a los que consideraban sucesores de las potencias coloniales que se habían repartido la región tras la desmembración del Imperio Otomano.

The process that will be launched shortly at Annapolis may not quite be do-or-die for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process but at the very least it is do-or-barely-survive. Positively, a U.S. administration that neglected Middle East peacemaking since taking office appears committed to an intensive effort: it has persuaded both sides to agree to negotiate final status issues – no mean feat after years of diplomatic paralysis and violent conflict. But pitfalls are equally impressive. The meeting, like the process it aims to spawn, occurs in a highly politicised context, with sharp divisions in the Palestinian and Israeli camps. These will make it hard to reach agreement and to sell it to both constituencies and, for the foreseeable future, virtually impossible to implement. Moreover, failure of the negotiations could discredit both leaderships, while further undermining faith in diplomacy and the twostate solution.

President Bush’s initiative to convene an international meeting in November on the Israeli-Palestinian track has given a new boost to the Israeli-Palestinian dialogue. This follows the dynamic created by Hamas’ takeover of the Gaza Strip in June this year. The key question now is whether these stimuli can pull the cart of Israeli-Palestinian relations out of the bog in which it has been stuck since the end of 2000.

Within a few months after Abbas came to power, Palestinians started realizing that he was not delivering. Instead of fighting corruption, he surrounded himself with the same Arafat cronies. There was a decrease of perhaps 30-40 percent in the level of corruption but an upsurge in internal violence.

On June 17, at least two rockets were fired at Israel from an area between the villages of Adaisseh and Kfar Kila in southern Lebanon's Marjayoun district. The Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona was targeted by the rockets. While no injuries were reported from the rockets, these are the first missiles fired against Israel from Lebanon since the end of the 2006 summer war between Israel and Hezbollah. The Lebanese Shi'a movement has denied any involvement in the attacks, as reported from al-Manar television.

The Hamas takeover in Gaza is a dramatic event that has ramifications for Israeli-Palestinian relations, as well as regional significance. The forceful takeover by an Islamic movement of an Arab political entity generates repercussions and shockwaves in the Arab world. The question that now confronts various players – Israel, the Arab world and the international community – is how to deal with this new situation. Does the situation contain only risks, or are there also opportunities?

The size and composition of Israel's defense budget provide a regular subject for public debate. The debate revives very year in the fall, when the time approaches to decide on the defense budget, and perforce includes the question of prioritizing among various defense and social welfare needs (or as Shaul Mofaz was wont to say, between “life and the quality of life”).

Most Israelis view the results of the Second Lebanon War as inconclusive, with half believing that neither party won and the other half almost evenly divided between those who think Israel won and those who believe that Hizbollah won. Half of the population report that their confidence in the IDF has decreased and also see a decrease in Israel's deterrent capability. Nevertheless, over 80 percent of the Jewish population feel they can depend on the IDF to defend the country. While faith in the political leadership is quite low, over two thirds support the decision of the government to go to war against Hizbollah, though the vast majority believe that Israel should have continued the war until either the destruction of Hizbollah or the return of the abducted soldiers.

At the Israeli cabinet meeting on May 13, the primary topic of discussion was the need to expand military operations in Gaza in light of the ongoing Qassam rocket fire and the increasing strength of armed groups in the Gaza Strip. The cabinet meeting ended with a decision to step up preventive actions against Qassam fire, including targeted killings and the entry of small forces into territories near the border. No decision was made to undertake wide scale land operations in the Gaza Strip, as recommended by some elements in the IDF (in the Southern Command). In the meantime Qassam fire has continued, and there is growing pressure to expand the operations.

In the wake of his impressive electoral victory, President-elect Nicholas Sarkozy of France will now face the challenge of keeping his campaign promises to carry out reform at home and to elaborate a new foreign policy. In his victory speech, Sarkozy stressed the importance he attaches to the European Union but also reached out, once again, to the United States. Israel was not specifically mentioned in that speech, but the Middle East, in general, and Israel, in particular, are known to be on Sarkozy’s agenda.

Abruptly interrupted in 2000, Israeli-Syrian negotiations seem only a distant possibility but a renewal is urgent and would have a real chance of success. The obstacles appear daunting, including a weak Israeli government and a U.S. administration intent on isolating Syria. However, Syria’s President Bashar repeatedly has stated his desire to resume talks, and in recent conversations with Crisis Group in Damascus, senior officials have clarified these could take place without any precondition – thereby removing what had been a principal hindrance. Peace negotiations between Israel and Syria would profoundly alter the regional atmosphere; a peace deal between them would fundamentally transform it. This opportunity may not last long and should not be wasted.

On September 17th 2006 The Government of Israel decided, under section 8A of The Government Act 2001, to appoint a governmental commission of examination "To look into the preparation and conduct of the political and the security levels concerning all the dimensions of the Northern Campaign which started on July 12th 2006". Today we have submitted to the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defense the classified interim report, and we are now presenting the unclassified report to the public.

During Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's last visit to Israel, she devoted special attention to the revival of the 2002 Saudi-inspired Arab peace initiative. As a result, expectations had been elevated that the Riyadh Arab summit might provide a mechanism for restarting the Arab-Israeli peace process. Certainly, Israeli diplomats had hoped that a modified peace plan might be adopted by the Arab heads of state that would leave out any references to the return of Palestinian refugees to Israel - a non-starter across the Israeli political spectrum. When that seemed unlikely, there was increasing speculation that while the formal initiative would remain unchanged, then at least some other statements would be made separately that would try to reach out to Israeli public opinion and build mutual confidence.

The Arab Summit that convened in Riyadh on March 28 2007 reaffirmed the “Arab peace initiative” originally adopted by the Arab League in 2002. It calls for Arab-Israeli peace based on Israeli withdrawal from the territories captured in 1967, a just and agreed solution to the refugee problem based on UN General Assembly Resolution 194, and the creation of a Palestinian state with its capital in East Jerusalem. Principled differences between Israel and Arab League members over some of the elements in the proposed arrangement will make it difficult to translate the initiative into an actual agreement. Another substantive obstacle is the absence of an authoritative Palestinian interlocutor. The President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, supported the initiative, but Hamas leaders refrained from endorsing even the conditional readiness to recognize Israel

It has been a year since Hamas formed its government – and what a dismal year it has been. The Islamists thought they could govern without paying an ideological price, Fatah that it could swiftly push them aside and regain power. By imposing sanctions and boycotting the government, the Quartet (U.S., European Union (EU), Russia and UN) and Israel hoped to force Hamas to change or persuade the Palestinians to oust it. Washington promised security and economic aid to encourage Fatah to confront Hamas and help defeat it. The illusions have brought only grief. The 8 February 2007 Saudi-brokered Mecca Agreement between the Palestinian rivals offers the chance of a fresh start: for Hamas and Fatah to restore law and order and rein in militias; for Israelis and Palestinians to establish a comprehensive ceasefire and start a credible peace process; and for the Quartet (or at least those of its members inclined to do so) to adopt a more pragmatic attitude that judges a government of national unity by deeds, not rhetoric. The adjustment will not be comfortable for anyone. But the alternative is much worse.

In a world in which "spin" often means more than the substance of the matter, a rather dramatic story was woven by the Israeli media around the recent visit by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (on her way to the Arab Summit in Riyadh). She had reportedly planned a grand announcement, launching direct or indirect Israeli-Palestinian talks on the permanent status issues—Jerusalem, borders, refugees—only to be forced to abandon it, after prolonged and tense talks with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, when the latter made clear his objections to this course of action. The dramatic buzz prior to her visit was replaced by what the leader of the left-wing opposition, MK Yossi Beilin of Meretz, called a "hollow" press conference; and more than one commentator in Israel used the phrase "the mountain gave birth to a mouse."

In the late morning hours of March 17, 2007, the Palestinian Legislative Council held a vote of confidence for the new national unity government and ratified its establishment, with 83 representatives voting in favor and three against (two from the PFLP, which is not part of the government, and one independent). In the evening the government ministers were sworn in by Abu Mazen, the chairman on the Palestinian Authority, in at a festive ceremony held simultaneously in Gaza and Ramallah by conference call.

For years cynical statesmen have played a game of make-believe with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: From podiums in Europe or at the United Nations, they announce that their top priority henceforth will be promoting a "comprehensive settlement," brokered by the "international community." That Israelis and Palestinians may be nowhere near ready for such a deal doesn't concern them. Their interest is not the actual Middle East but political constituencies at home, or perhaps oil-rich Arab governments, for which the mere words "Palestinian state" are something of a talisman.

Reflecting on last summer’s Hezbollah-Israel border conflict reminds us just how long the Jewish state has had to fight for its existence against enemies that have now become our foes. American practitioners of counterinsurgency have too often studied the lessons of U.S. forces in the Vietnam War or the British in Malaya while neglecting the very relevant experiences of the Israel Defense Force over the past several decades in combating terrorism and insurgency. Located in the heart of the Middle East, Israel’s combat theater much more closely resembles America’s challenges in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Horn of Africa in terms of culture, history, and political/religious persuasion than that of communist-inspired guerrillas in Asia several decades ago.

As recently as December, Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas refused to back a proposal for a unity government offered by Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) member and head of the Independent Palestine list Mustafa Barghouti. That deal was based on the concept of a technocratic compromise under which Hamas officials would not have held the prime ministership or led any ministries. Yet under the terms of the February 8 Mecca accord, the current prime minister, Hamas's Ismail Haniyeh, will stay on as head of the next government, and the only portfolios Hamas members specifically will not hold are the finance, foreign affairs, and interior ministries, which will be headed by independents acceptable to both sides.

On February 8, Saudi-sponsored negotiations in Mecca produced agreement on a Palestinian national unity government signed by Mahmoud Abbas on behalf of Fatah and Khaled Mashal on behalf of Hamas. The agreement included measures to end the internecine violence, a key for distributing portfolios and the text of a letter of appointment to be given by Abu Mazen to the new government, and steps to incorporate Hamas and Islamic Jihad into the Palestine Liberation Organization. In addition, there is apparently an understanding to held early presidential and parliamentary elections in early 2008 if the experiment in national unity government proves to be a failure.

The negotiations between Israel and Syria on a political settlement that lasted throughout the last decade of the previous century came to a halt on March 26, 2000 with the failed meeting between Presidents Clinton and Hafez al-Asad. Since then, considerable changes have occurred in the strategic map, impacting on the current and future situations in Israel-Syria relations. They have occurred in Syria, in Israel, in the region, and around the world.

Wars once had clear endings and definitive out comes. They would end with surrenders and peace treaties, cremonies and victory marches. Wars today rarely end so clearly, if they end at all.

On November 8, an errant IDF artillery shell intended to disrupt the launching of Qassam rockets landed in a residential area in Beit Hanoun and killed 23 Palestinians. That tragic result, which dramatized the distress to Gaza Strip residents caused by the constant escalation of violence, also prompted Prime Minister Ismail Haniya and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to renew negotiations on the guidelines for a National Unity Government. But after several weeks of discussions, differences over basic principles and division of authority remained unresolved.

Israel should not try to second-guess U.S. decisions about putting American soldiers in harm's way. However, the specific strategy that the Baker-Hamilton report proposes for facilitating an American pullback in Iraq - the use of an international support group including Iran and Syria - poses serious problems that affect vital Israeli interests.

Following the failure of efforts to reach agreement between Hamas and Fatah on the formation of a government of national unity, there are growing fears among Palestinians that the two movements are now on the brink of an all-out civil war. Indeed, some argue that the war has already begun, albeit still on a small scale.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's set of proposals to break the seemingly interminable impasse in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict seems doomed to failure - but not because there is anything in them that is wholly unreasonable. First, it would appear to be the wrong moment for any real progress to be made, with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government relatively weak. The second flaw, however, is one of Madrid's own making, namely the botched manner in which the peace plan was sprung upon a divided international community.

This article examines as a case study the Arab reaction to Shimon Peres’ economic initiative, the New Middle East. The initiative, which followed the Oslo peace accords, offered a comprehensive program to strengthen cultural, scientific, political, and primarily economic ties between Israel and its Arab neighbors.

Defense Minister Amir Peretz denied last night that Israel Air Force warplanes had fired missiles at a German naval vessel off the Mediterranean coast in the north of the country on Tuesday. Peretz called his German counterpart, Franz Josef Jung, to inform him that such a firing did not take place, nor does Israel have any intention to fire on German forces. He added that cooperation between Israel and UNIFIL in the area should be upgraded.

From Israel’s standpoint, difficulty number one, we have to fight on two fronts: in the south against the Hamas, in the north against the Hizballah. Then we have to fight in a disappointed situation because everybody in the world told us land for peace. We gave back the land; we didn’t get the peace. We left Lebanon completely. There is no claim against Israel. Even we were complimented by the United Nations. We gave Gaza completely back to the Palestinians, and they are continuing to shoot. That is a problem for us.

"Israel believes this threat is existential," explained the clearly dubious former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Richard Murphy. Well, how could they think that? (And by the way, all former ambassadors, especially those who served in Saudi Arabia and now are advisers to Saudi banks, should be taken with a large grain of salt.) Could it be because Iran has announced its intention to wipe Israel off the map and is hurtling toward building nuclear weapons? Could it be because Iran's agent, Hezbollah, welcomes "World War III"; is pledged to destroy Israel; and is raining missiles down on Israeli cities and towns?

In trying to negotiate an end to the latest Middle East conflict, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice appears to see the solution through a broader prism that redefines its stakes. The real issues, U.S. officials say, are not simply the hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah but far wider questions of Lebanon's sovereignty and what the administration sees as an existential battle between forces aligned for and against democracy in the region.

Less than a month into the still nameless war waged across the Israel-Lebanon border, neither side is entitled to claim victory. The killing of more than 50 Lebanese civilians by bombs in the village of Kafr Kana was a severe moral setback for Israel. But Jerusalem, while apologizing, said it would press home its attack on Hezbollah.

We learn that "world opinion" is quite exercised over Israel's unintentional killing of a few hundred Lebanese civilians behind whom hides Hezbollah -- a terror group that intentionally sends missiles at Israeli cities and whose announced goals are the annihilation of Israel and the Islamicization of Lebanon. And, of course, "world opinion" was just livid at American abuses of some Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. In fact, "world opinion" is constantly upset with America and Israel, two of the most decent countries on earth, yet silent about the world's cruelest countries.

After some initial uncertainty, and mixed messages from the State Department, the Bush Administration now seems properly focused on exploiting the clash between Hezbollah and Israel as a strategic opening. The opportunity is to degrade Hezbollah and further isolate its enablers in Syria and Iran.

OVER the past week, with rockets exploding among the cafes of Beirut and in the streets of Haifa, the world has been stunned by the rising ferocity of the war between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia. But equally surprising, to many, has been the way the conflict has illuminated the sweeping changes that are reshaping the entire Middle East.

In war innocents pay a heavy price. There is no way to fight a war without “collateral damage” to civilians unless the opposing armies agree to meet in a desert and let the superior force prevail. It certainly cannot be done when the aggressor is a terrorist army that deliberately places its headquarters, its weapons depots, its missile launchers and its staging bases in the middle of large urban centers like Beirut, or in the small villages abutting the border of its victims.

When Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, secretary general of Hezbollah held his press conference to declare his new victory over his enemy, Israel, he was triggering –probably without knowing- a new era in the history of Lebanon and the region. “We will continue in faithfulness to our line,” he declared, in legitimizing his cross border attack on an Israeli patrol, killing soldiers and kidnapping two. But the real “fidelity” Nasrallah was referring to wasn’t to his captured men in Israeli jails, but to the regimes decision-makers in Tehran and Damascus. The “operation of July” came as a tipping point in a larger conflict, which superseded Hezbollah’s detainee, the Shebaa farms, borders skirmishes and Israeli tactical responses.

As expected, spokespersons from the United Nations, the European Union, the Organization of Islamic Conference and an assortment of human rights organizations have condemned Israel for its ‘disproportionate’ response to Hezbollah’s unprovoked attacks. They have called for an immediate ceasefire, which is exactly what Hezbollah wants in order to stay in place and build up for more devastating future attacks.

This Mideast crisis is different from all other Mideast crises. Over the years, since the Six-Day War of 1967, the United States and other onlookers have become accustomed to a certain kind of Middle East crisis. Palestinians or their sympathizers would threaten and wreak violence against Israel. Israel would respond, sometimes locally, sometimes by major actions like the defensive War of 1973 or the occupation of southern Lebanon in 1982. The cry would go up: Let the cycle of violence end, let Israel give up land it has occupied in return for peace.

President Bush's unwillingness to pressure Israel to halt its military campaign in Lebanon is rooted in a view of the Middle East conflict that is sharply different from that of his predecessors.

As the misery and wreckage mount in Lebanon, I find myself wondering what happened to two news items, one old and the other very recent. The old item concerns the fate of Lt. Col. Ron Arad, an Israeli air force officer whose plane went down over Sidon 20 years ago and who was captured by Hezbollah. He was at one point offered as a bargaining chip for Hezbollah prisoners, and letters from him were produced as proof that he was alive. A strong but unconfirmed report indicated that he had been taken to Iran, or even sold to Iran, which would have been a fairly extreme form of rendition. In any event, Hezbollah's Lebanese chieftain Hassan Nasrallah has since announced that Lt. Col. Arad is dead, and that his remains have been "lost," so that his family has no information and nothing to bury.

Imagine yourself as a heavily bearded 46-year-old Shiite cleric from Lebanon named Hassan Nasrallah. Your job title is secretary general of Hezb Allah, or Party of God, which holds 14 of parliament's 128 seats, including a seat in the cabinet. You've provoked a war with Israel, to the dismay of many Lebanese, though by no means of all. Refugees are streaming northward as an Israeli land invasion threatens. The south Beirut office where you worked until last week has been reduced to rubble by Israeli warplanes.

This week marks the anniversary of a massacre eerily connected to today’s news—the July 18, 1994 terrorist bombing of the seven-story Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, killing 95 people and wounding more than 200. A similar bombing in March 1992 destroyed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires, killing 29 people. The governments of Argentina, the US, and Israel suspect Iran of carrying out the attacks through its Hezbollah hit men.

Opening a security conference in Tehran on July 8, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad exhorted the Islamic world to mobilize against Israel and "remove the Zionist regime." The nations of the region are growing furious, he said. "It will not be long before this intense fury will lead to a huge explosion."

For the millions of Christian Lebanese, driven out of our homeland, "Thank you Israel," is the sentiment echoing from around the world. The Lebanese Foundation for Peace, an international group of Lebanese Christians, made the following statement in a press release to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert concerning the latest Israeli attacks against Hezbollah:"We urge you to hit them hard and destroy their terror infrastructure. It is not [only] Israel who is fed up with this situation, but the majority of the silent Lebanese in Lebanon who are fed up with Hezbollah and are powerless to do anything out of fear of terror retaliation."

As the violence in the Middle East escalates, it is hard not to conclude that every player involved directly or indirectly has badly miscalculated. This conflict will not end by a restoration of the status quo ante. Israel will refuse to allow a replay of the last two weeks. This means that there must be a dramatic change in both Lebanon and the Palestinian territories that satisfies Israel's security concerns and sends the Israelis and Palestinians to the negotiating table in a permanently calm atmosphere.

Today, we the G-8 Leaders express our deepening concern about the situation in the Middle East, in particular the rising civilian casualties on all sides and the damage to infrastructure. We are united in our determination to pursue efforts to restore peace. We offer our full support for the UN Secretary General's mission presently in the region.

Once again Lebanon finds itself a major player in a war it did not choose to fight in. And once again Lebanon is paying the price. So who stands to profit from the latest developments in Lebanon? Certainly not the Lebanese who are once again seeing their country destroyed right in front of their eyes.

Yesterday's events, in which members of Hamas and a group known as the Popular Resistance Committees attacked a military base in Southern Israel, killing two Israeli soldiers and kidnapping a third, represents a dangerous escalation in the conflict between Israel and the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.

A widely-publicized attack on supporters of Israel by two leading academics commits a fair number of inaccuracies not the least of which is their characterization of controversies surrounding the Israel Lobby as they manifest themselves on American campuses

Saddam Hussein had begun showering Israel with scuds. David's upscale community in Ra'nana, where he and his family lived, where his wife was in the hospital, was also being attacked. Earlier in the week, another terrorist bomb had exploded somewhere in Israel -killing the young, the old and the innocent.

The results of the heavy fighting that raged Sunday along the Israeli-Lebanese border was clearly seen from Mount Adir near the border fence.

The ad pulls no punches. Israeli withdrawals from south Lebanon and Gaza, it says, have played into Al Qaeda's hands and increased the terror threat "for Israel and for us." Olmert's proposed "convergence" program in the West Bank - a follow-up to last year's unilateral retreat from the Gaza Strip, when 21 communities were destroyed and 9,000 Israelis were expelled - will only intensify that threat. "Albert Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results," the ad bitingly observes. "We cannot afford any more of this insanity."

In the wake of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's visit to Washington, press attention continues to focus almost entirely on the latest chapter in a story that began with Hamas' creation nearly 19 years ago: the terrorist organization's conflict with Israel. But the mainstream media thus far has largely overlooked another story, one which doesn't fit the ordinary paradigm of Arab vs. Jew: the fact that Hamas' relations with Jordan are worsening, and the same may be about to occur with Egypt.

Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is in Washington, where he will be asking for advice and assistance in financing the withdrawal of 50,000 to 100,000 Israeli settlers from 90% to 95% of the West Bank and major portions of Jerusalem, and for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to be repositioned largely near the security barrier Israel is constructing. Most Americans are inclined to believe that such disengagement may be a reasonable step toward a two-state solution, even if some territorial disputes remain to be negotiated. It is also widely assumed that Palestinian hostility to Israel is fueled by despair that can only be reduced by Israeli concessions. Both assumptions, however, may be fundamentally flawed.

When Ehud Olmert, the new Israeli Prime Minister comes calling at the White House this Tuesday, his main objective will be to receive President George W. Bush’s support for and Israeli retreat from the West Bank and Samaria of the Bible, the historic birthplace of the Jewish people. President Bush should voice his strongest opposition to this dangerous and reckless scheme.

Current issues in U.S.-Israeli relations include Israel’s military sales to China, inadequate Israeli protection of U.S. intellectual property, and espionage-related cases.

An investigation into the attempted attack on April 26th 2006 reveals that it was carried out by the Popular Resistance Committees in the Gaza Strip under the direction of Hamas.

The suicide bombing attack carried out by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) at the old Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv murdered nine people: six Israeli civilians, a Jewish tourist from France and two workers from Romania. As of April 20, approximately 30 of the wounded were still hospitalized, two of them in critical condition. Among the wounded are a French citizen, a Slovakian and two holders of both American and Israeli citizenship.

Following the victory of Hamas in the Palestinian Legislative Council elections, the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), charged Hamas leader Ismail Haniya with the task of forming of a new government.

Is al-Qaida setting up a base in the Palestinian territories? Are Osama bin Laden's mujahedeen positioning themselves within easy striking distance of Israel? Both Israeli and Palestinian officials believe that to be the case. However Hamas, who recently won the elections and will form the next Cabinet, denies the presence of any al-Qaida operatives in the PA.

Ariel Sharon always claimed that his achievement in doubling the Likud's Knesset representation from 19 seats to 38 in the last Knesset was a success for what he saw as his pragmatism - the readiness for "painful compromise," the robust alliance with the Bush administration.

This report provides an overview of the new political realities in the West Bank and Gaza after the election, the challenges Fatah and Hamas face, and possible implications for U.S. policy.

In a Capitol Hill briefing held today on Hamas's strategy after the Palestinian elections, MEMRI's President Yigal Carmon presented an assessment of this strategy and its limitations, as well some policy recommendations.

Israel has always had to be on guard against enemies to have a clear-eyed view of potential threats, and to confront dangers squarely. Throughout its history, the country has faced sudden, random acts of terrorism -- attacks intended to shake Israel's confidence and break the will of its people.

Hamas’ victory in the Palestinian Legislative Council has set off a flurry of speculation about the possible implications for regional politics beyond the Israeli-Palestinian relationship.

When the President of Iran calls for "wiping Israel off the map," while his country provides weapons and training to terror groups, and the International Atomic Energy Agency officially declares that it is in violation of its commitments under the Non-Proliferation Treaty prohibiting the development of nuclear weapons, what can the advocates of human security and multilateral disarmament offer in response?

The massive electoral victory of Hamas in the Palestinian parliamentary elections has created an entirely new strategic reality for Israel which vastly increases the importance of the Jordan Valley (a desert zone almost devoid of population) for Israel's security in the near term.

The best way to provide Israel with that additional security is to upgrade its relationship with the collective defense arm of the West: NATO.

Hamas' landslide victory in last month's Palestinian legislative elections is largely reminiscent of the great electoral triumph of Algeria's Islamist movement, the Islamic Salvation Front, in the early 1990s.

It is impossible to deny the reason for such disproportional empathy with the Palestinians. Through history, each group that has blamed the Jews has been utterly convinced that its own unique reason for doing so is fair and obvious. Surely, they say, the Jews would recognize they are at fault if only they'd stop crying "Anti-semitism!"

The idea is as logical as it is radical: The notion of Israeli membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is bubbling to the surface after recent events that have crystallized the threats to Israel and how common they are to the dangers confronting the U.S. and Europe.

The U.S. and EU should also withhold all funding from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and call for an immediate inquiry into how it has been spending donors’ money as well as allegations that it has hired members of terrorist organizations and stoked anti-Semitism among Palestinian refugees.

Nuestra posición para el diálogo es que Hamas renuncie a la violencia, que reconozca a Israel y que reconozca los acuerdos que se concluyeron entre la OLP e Israel, en especial, los acuerdos de Oslo. Así es que ese es el marco en el que podríamos considerar tener un diálogo con el Hamas. Esta posición es la posición francesa que fue retomada por la Unión Europea y por el Cuarteto.

Hamas’ surprising victory in the recent Palestinian parliamentary elections—the first democratic elections to date—have raised a number of questions, not least due to the steep rate of the movement’s success and its sheer unstoppable rise to power.

Many Palestinian Christians expressed shock and now wait to see what will develop following Hamas's upset victory in January's parliamentary elections, Palestine's first since 1996.

With Hamas dominating the Palestinian Authority, Jordan could find itself sandwiched between the pro-Iranian forces in Iraq and a pro-Iranian Palestinian Authority. In addition, should Israel face a new round of armed Palestinian violence, its ability to isolate the Hamas regime from external reinforcement will be a key security requirement.

Which is all the more reason for the U.S. to promote a more serious diplomatic response suggested to us last week over lunch at the Journal by former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar: Begin NATO accession talks with Israel.

The Bush administration allowed the Palestinian Authority to take sole credit for U.S.-funded projects intended to help its prospects in today's Palestinian elections. This marked a sudden reversal of a recent policy to take direct credit for development projects in the Middle East as part of a new public diplomacy effort to improve America's image.

The Palestinian people have voted for change, but it is the view of the Quartet that their aspirations for peace and statehood, as articulated by President Abbas in his statement following the closing of polls yesterday, remain unchanged. The Quartet reiterates its view that there is a fundamental contradiction between armed group and militia activities and the building of a democratic state. A two-state solution to the conflict requires all participants in the democratic process to renounce violence and terror, accept Israel's right to exist, and disarm, as outlined in the Roadmap.

This is the path Prime Minister Ariel Sharon announced several years ago. We - who were his partners in its formation - worked with him in order to establish a new public movement, which will determine our path in the coming years, and which will propel Israel forward.

Hamas is set to join the Palestinian legislature and possibly the government after next week’s elections. The U.S. and EU currently avoid (in the American case, bar) contacts with the Islamist movement, deny funding to projects with Hamas-run municipalities, and threaten to halt aid to the Palestinian Authority if Hamas joins it.

The terrorist attack in Netanya in the first week of December is but the latest in a string of suicide bombings carried out by Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) after the declaration of tahdia by mainstream Palestinian organizations.

Hamas’ sweeping gains in the fourth round of the Palestinian Authority (PA) municipal elections, held on December 16, completed its evolution as the dominant faction in local politics, with significant ramifications for national Palestinian politics as well.

The political propaganda machine has created many such myths to fuel their war against the Jewish state. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East that elects its leaders in free elections and guarantees rights to its citizens, and honors those rights. Yet Israel is the target of those who claim to be fighting for “human rights.”

Israel this week completed its disengagement from Gaza and from areas of the northern West Bank. Responsibility for these areas has been handed over to the Palestinian Authority.

The death of Yasser Arafat (Nov. 2004) and the election of Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) for Chairman of the Palestinian Authority marked the beginning of a new era, or rather a new phase, in the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian violent confrontation that had started in September 2000. In this new era, terrorist attacks were supposed to stop and there was supposed to be a lull in the fighting, based on an agreement achieved in Cairo between the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian terrorist organizations. The fundamental disagreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority should have been resolved by resuming dialogue and negotiations in the spirit of the agreements achieved in the Sharm el-Sheikh summit (February 8, 2005).

Viewed through the prism of the Turkish media, the visit to Israel of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was not just another visit of a Turkish state dignitary to yet another foreign country. That is because Turkish-Israeli relations are widely seen, not as a “bilateral” matter, but rather as part of a much broader and more intricate framework containing major Middle Eastern, European and, of course, American components.

Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies (C.S.S). April 2005. This article will both analyze Syrian interests in Lebanon and examine the main stages of Syria’s assumption of control of it, from the beginning of the civil war to the régime of Bashar Assad. It will also examine the weakening of that control, culminating in Hariri’s assassination, mass demonstrations of opponents of the “Syrian order” and its Hezbollah-led supporters.

A spokeswoman on behalf of EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana issued a statement (Nov 25, 2004) denying Solana or his office staff had met or held “direct contacts” with Hamas or other terrorist organizations on the EU list of banned terrorist organizations. Yet, in an interview given to the BBC soon afterwards (Nov 25, 2004), Solana mentioned that he had “had direct contact with Hamas, but not in the last few days.”

The United States is working with Palestinians and Israelis to improve security on the ground. Building true security for Israelis and Palestinians demands an immediate, strong and sustained effort to combat terrorism in all its forms.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon met this morning (Tuesday, 15.3.05) with French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, who arrived in Israel for the dedication of the new Yad Vashem museum.

The one-day meeting held in London on March 1 to mobilize global support for the Palestinian Authority was a fallback position for the participants, many of whom would have much preferred a full-blown international conference to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

Parte del trabajo en curso del Proyecto de monitorización MEMRI TV es monitorizar las declaraciones de las principales organizaciones terroristas, como Al-Qa'ida o Hezboláh. Lo siguiente son extractos de dos discursos del líder de Hezboláh, el jeque Hassan Nasralah.

En este artículo, 'Uweis debate las condiciones de las Brigadas de los Mártires de Al Aqsa con respecto al cese de la violencia. Lo siguiente es extracto del artículo.

Following are Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's remarks at the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting today (Sunday), 27 February 2005