This week’s Time magazine cover story features Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and attempts to divine the Israeli leader’s true ambitions. Time asks: Now that he has formed Israel’s strongest coalition in the country’s history, what does he plan to do with it? Analyzing Netanyahu’s “true intentions” has become a virtual cottage industry, both in Israel and abroad. Over the years, many commentators have scoured the Israeli leader’s personal history, speculating on the respective influences of his father, his wife, his fallen brother, and his childhood in the United States. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. Earlier today, Burhan Ghalioun offered to resign as head of the Syrian National Council, the country’s primary opposition group. In making the announcement, Ghalioun called on the Syrian opposition “to break the cycle of conflicts and preserve unity.” Ghalioun’s resignation, just two days after he was reelected to head the SNC, was nonetheless reportedly due to the mounting criticism of Ghalioun’s leadership within the opposition. Some constituents threatened to leave if their concerns were not properly addressed. Meanwhile, violence within Syria continued with reports that fifteen people were killed by army shelling today in Rastan, and dozens more reportedly killed earlier this week. Some twenty-three Syrian soldiers were killed by rebels in Rastan on Monday. Syria’s fighting also spilled over into Lebanon this week with Tripoli in the north the scene of days of bloody clashes between Bashar al-Assad supporters and backers of Syria’s uprising, leaving at least six dead and some one hundred wounded. Despite the violence, President Assad announced in a rare interview on Tuesday with Russian television that Syria faced no real domestic opposition. He attributed recent violence to foreign-backed terrorists saying, “We have an acute problem with terrorism.” Read more »

Israel’s political landscape was just redrawn last week with the surprise agreement between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Kadima party head Shaul Mofaz to form a new government rather than hold national elections in September. I discussed the implications of this development with former New York Times diplomatic correspondent Bernard Gwertzman in an interview featured on CFR.org and published below. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Israel. In a move that caught virtually all Israelis by surprise, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced early Tuesday morning that he was forming a new unity government with the Kadima party and its new leader Shaul Mofaz (my Tuesday morning analysis available here). Israelis had been bracing for new national elections. As Netanyahu and Mofaz met secretly to hammer out the deal on Monday night, Knesset members were working to dissolve the government in preparation for a likely September 4 vote. Mofaz’s Kadima brings an additional twenty-eight Knesset seats to the Likud-led coalition. The new government will be comprised of ninety-four of the available one hundred and twenty Knesset seats, making it the largest ruling coalition in Israel’s history. Netanyahu will now serve out the remainder of his term and elections will likely be held in October 2013. At a joint press conference with Mofaz on Tuesday, Netanyahu said, “we’re pulling together for four main issues: to pass a fair and equal replacement of the Tal Law; to pass a responsible budget; to change the system of governance; and, lastly, to try and promote a responsible peace process.” Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas’ spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, responded on Tuesday saying “This is the right time for the Israeli government to reach peace with the Palestinian people by immediately accepting the requirements of the peace process.” Read more »

I just returned from Israel and the West Bank where I accompanied the Quartet Representative, former Prime Minister Tony Blair, for meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders. Israelis and Palestinians already were already absorbed by the impending election campaign, having rapidly internalized an apparent decision by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to dissolve his government and hold elections on September 4. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. The United Nations announced today that the three-week old truce in Syria “is not holding.” Major General Robert Mood, chief of the UN Supervision Mission to Syria, told Britain’s Sky News that “This is not easy and we are seeing–by the action, by explosions, by firing–that the cease-fire is really a shaky one.” He went on to say that “what we are also seeing on the ground is that where we have observers present, they have a calming effect and we’re also seeing that those operating on the ground, they take advice from our observers.” His remarks follow UN under secretary for peacekeeping operations Herve Ladsous’s statement on Tuesday that Syrian forces have kept heavy weapons in cities and that both the Syrian military and rebel forces have violated the truce. He also said the UN had recruited only about half the number of the three hundred monitors it had hoped for in Syria but that commitments were still coming in. Meanwhile, a protest on a university campus turned deadly when Syrian security forces stormed a dormitory at Aleppo University last night. Syrian activists report that security forces fired tear gas and live ammunition to disperse students gathered in protest; at least four have been killed and more than fifty students were arrested. Aleppo province saw further violence yesterday when rebel forces ambushed Syrian soldiers in the village of Al-Rai, killing fifteen troops. Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch released a report on Wednesday which accuses the Syrian military of committing war crimes in Syria’s northern Idlib province just before a ceasefire went into effect on April 12. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. The United Nations Security Council established the U.N. Supervision Mission in Syria on Saturday, increasing the number of ceasefire monitors there from thirty to three hundred. UN special envoy Kofi Annan subsequently urged the Security Council on Tuesday to deploy the expanded unarmed military mission rapidly. However, the head of U.N. peacekeeping operations, Herve Ladsous, said it will take a month to deploy the first one hundred monitors. French foreign minister Alain Juppe announced on Wednesday that he would push for the deployment of the entire three hundred person contingent within two weeks. Juppe also suggested that France would push for Security Council action under Chapter Seven of the UN Charter if Assad’s government does not fully implement the Annan peace plan by early May. Meanwhile, an explosion ripped through a residential building in Hama on Thursday killing at least sixteen Syrian civilians. The opposition blamed government shelling for the deaths while Syrian state media accused terrorists of bombing the building. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. The United Nations Security Council unanimously passed a resolution Saturday authorizing the deployment of a thirty-person monitoring mission to oversee the Syrian ceasefire. By the time the first observers arrived in Syria on Monday, violence had flared up in recent flashpoint towns, including Homs and Hama. Clashes also broke out near the Turkish border. In light of the continued violence, France convened a Friends of Syria meeting today in Paris that fourteen foreign ministers, including Secretary of State Clinton, attended. The Friends group issued an urgent call to Syrian president Assad to implement the Annan plan. Meanwhile, the Syrian foreign ministry announced today that it had reached agreement with the UN on the terms of a cease-fire monitoring mission. The Syrians announced that the agreement “aims to facilitate the task of the observers within the framework of Syrian sovereignty.” The UNSC meets today for a briefing by Kofi Annan’s deputy Jean-Marie Guehenno to discuss the possibility of deploying a larger monitoring mission, perhaps numbering three hundred observers. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. An uneasy UN-brokered ceasefire went into effect at dawn in Syria this morning. Activists report relative quiet throughout the country though Syrian forces have not returned to barracks. UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan said in a statement this morning that he was encouraged that “the cessation of hostilities appears to be holding.” Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi welcomed the development and urged Annan to send observers to Syria to monitor the ceasefire. Annan reportedly told the UN Security Council in a closed-door briefing today that the Syrian regime has failed to implement the full troop pullback. UNSC secretary general Ban Ki-Moon echoed Annan’s call for the Syrian regime to keep its promises and implement Annan’s six-point plan, saying: “As of this moment the situation looks calmer. We are following it very closely.” The cease-fire comes after a tumultuous week in Syria with over one thousand deaths reported by the Syrian National Council, and violence spilling over into Turkey and Lebanon on Monday, with a Lebanese journalist killed inside his country by shots across the border from Syria. Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch issued a report on Monday that documented at least one hundred extrajudicial executions by the regime and called for a referral to the International Criminal Court. Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. The Friends of Syria group held its second ministerial conference on Sunday to discuss UN special envoy Kofi Annan’s peace plan for Syria. Meeting in Istanbul, representatives from more than eighty nations issued a declaration that recognized the Syrian National Council as a legitimate representative of the Syrian people and the opposition, much to the disappointment of SNC members who had hoped the opposition organization would be recognized as Syria’s sole legitimate representative and that lethal assistance would be pledged. Instead, the Friends group called on every member to do everything in its power to support the opposition’s political activities and to bring about regime change in Syria. Gulf states said they would contribute several million dollars to pay the salaries of opposition soldiers and to encourage more defections from Assad’s regime. Secretary of State Clinton said the United States would contribute an additional $12.2 million in humanitarian aid and communications equipment, bringing the total to $25 million since Syria’s uprisings began. Annan announced on Monday that Assad agreed to withdraw troops from Syrian cities by April 10. A spokesperson for Annan said today that the envoy expects both the Syrian government and the opposition to implement the ceasefire fully by April 12. Despite these efforts toward a ceasefire, violence in Syria continued unabated, with more than eighty people reportedly killed on Tuesday, and dozens more on Wednesday. Turkish authorities have also announced that more than 1,600 Syrians have fled to Turkey in the last two days. Meanwhile, Russia stepped up its diplomatic involvement, inviting Syria’s foreign minister Muallem and members of the opposition to Moscow for talks later this month. Read more »