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War and Peace

Shlomo Ben-Ami

Is an Islamic civil war underway? Can democracy take root in the Middle East? Is the “war on terror” winnable? Can the UN’s ability to resolve conflicts and keep the peace be strengthened? What, if anything, will deter Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

When communism collapsed, some saw the “end of History” at hand. No longer. The quagmire in Iraq and Afghanistan now jeopardizes America’s influence, as Russia returns to oil-funded global prominence and new superpowers rise in Asia. Peace in the Middle East appears more distant than ever. Failed states proliferate, as do nuclear weapons. History, it seems, has returned with a vengeance.

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Turkey’s Rise and the Decline of Pan-Arabism

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-06-23

Turkey’s growing relevance in the Middle East is the measure of the Arabs’ failure. As Islamist democracies whose governments emerge from popular elections, Iran and Turkey – and their Hamas and Hezbollah allies – can claim an advantage over the incumbent Arab regimes, all of which suffer from a desperately yawning legitimacy deficit.... read

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Haiti’s State-Building Challenge

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-06-03

The $5 billion in short-term aid for Haiti, and the $10 billion pledged for its long-term reconstruction in March, is a vote of confidence in the potential of collective international action. But the question is not only one of money; it is about whether Haiti’s agony is to be addressed as a long-term quest for institutional stability and sustainable development.... read

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The Abuse of History and the Iranian Bomb

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-05-03

Saturated with their often tragic history, Jews tend to pay great reverence to the past. But the past, when not handled with care, can be the enemy of the future and distort perceptions of current challenges, which is certainly the case with Israeli leaders' insistence on comparing the threat posed by a nuclear-armed Iran to the destruction of European Jewry in the Holocaust.... read

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Jerusalem and Beyond

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-04-02

The policy of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s government on Jerusalem is ill conceived. And yet, while Netanyahu might not be a great peacemaker, the Obama administration, by portraying the announcement as a deliberate attempt to frustrate the upcoming indirect talks with the Palestinians, exaggerated the incident for its own purposes. ... read

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The Middle East’s Hair Trigger

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-03-03

Across the Middle East region, a fatalistic conventional wisdom is taking hold: war is unavoidable. With the days of Pax Americana in the region over, avoiding a regional explosion will require mobilizing the major international actors that favor diplomatic solutions for the Arab-Israeli conflict and for Iran’s quest to become a legitimate partner in a new regional system. ... read

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The Unbearable Lightness of Change

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-01-27

Barack Obama’s first year in office has been a sobering exercise in the limits of presidential power. It also carries lessons about how the resilient and impersonal forces of history can constrain any leader’s drive for change. ... read

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Israel and NATO – Between Membership and Partnership

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2010-01-05

Israel's accession to NATO has frequently been proposed as a way to encourage it to make the necessary concessions for an Arab-Israeli peace settlement, and some Israeli leaders, like Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, believe that NATO accession would deter Iran. But, despite important steps toward closer cooperation, full Israeli membership can be ruled out for the foreseeable future.... read

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Shifting the Afghan “Great Game”

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2009-12-01

The obstinate battle cry of the Bush administration in Iraq has now won out in Barack Obama’s plan to "stay the course" in Afghanistan. But none of Afghanistan's regional neighbors, whose vital strategic interests are no less affected than the US by what happens there, is considering a military solution, opting instead for economic engagement and diplomatic alternatives.... read

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Israel after Goldstone

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2009-11-03

The Goldstone Report, accusing Israel of war crimes in Gaza, and the report’s subsequent endorsement by the UN Human Rights Council, exposes serious flaws in the system of international law. Even so, Israel's leaders must now take more resolute steps toward peace if their argument aimed at derailing the report – that it “hinders the peace process” – is to have any credibility.... read

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The Return of 1948	Shlomo Ben-Ami
The restitution of lands occupied in 1967 will obviously continue to be indispensable to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but it is the legacy of the 1948 war that both parties to the conflict have now put at the center of the debate. Only an acceptable deal on the Palestinian refugees can definitely close the 1948 file – and only then can the conflict in Palestine end.... read

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Obama’s Hardest Choices Lie Ahead

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2009-04-28

It was only natural that Barack Obama, whose election was one of the most revolutionary events in American history, should fill his first 100 days in office with a breathtaking, all-embracing agenda. But, as far as his foreign policy is concerned, the real test of his strategy of dialogue and cooperation will come only when it fails, and tough choices will have to be made.... read

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The Bigger Issue in Sudan

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2009-04-03

The most immediate consequence of the International Criminal Court's decision last month to issue an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was the expulsion of most aid agencies from the country's Darfur region. But the more vital issue is to build international support for a strategy to implement fully the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement for Sudan.... read

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Who Wants Cold War II?

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2008-09-01

A new Cold War between the US and Russia is in nobody's interest. after all, America's global influence is dwindling, Europe is dependent on Russian energy supplies, and Russia itself continues to be burdened by the same problems that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.... read

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Are Israel and Syria Ready for Peace?

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2008-06-03

An Israeli-Syrian peace deal is strategically vital for both sides, and both sides know it. But US support will be essential, and that will depend on America’s readiness to move away from military solutions and rigid ideological imperatives and instead embrace the pragmatic culture of conflict resolution. ... read

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Bush’s New Middle East

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2008-04-03

America’s inability to inspire the peoples of the Middle East, all ruled by US-backed autocracies, is not exactly stunning news. What is news is that American power might also be losing its ability to intimidate them.... read

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Bush’s Road Map to Failure in the Middle East

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2007-02-05

Six long years of failed Middle East policies have finally brought President George W. Bush to recognize that the alliance of moderates in the region that he covets can only be forged through an Arab-Israeli peace. Indeed, only by effectively addressing the Israeli-Arab dispute can he possibly salvage America’s standing in the region. But the round of peacemaking that America has recently embarked upon not only comes too late in the political life of a lame-duck president who has been defeated at home and abroad; it is also ill-conceived and unconvincing. ... read

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A Farewell to (Glorious) War

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2007-03-05

In recent days, Italy’s government fell after losing a parliamentary vote on the country’s troop deployment in Afghanistan, while Britain and Denmark announced that they are to begin withdrawing their troops from Iraq. Whereas the Bush administration is deploying an additional 21,000 American soldiers in Iraq, and is pushing for more allied troops in Afghanistan, America’s allies are rejecting its Middle East policy. They are increasingly convinced that “victory” will be elusive in any asymmetric conflict between states, however powerful, and religiously driven armed insurgents. ... read

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Arab Fathers and Sons

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2008-01-04

The decision by Arab secular republics like Syria, Egypt, and Libya in favor of dynastic succession may be lacking in democracy, but it is not entirely devoid of merit. Arguably, it is a choice for economic modernization, for an end to the politics of conflict, and for positive political change further down the road.... read

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Rescuing Annapolis

Shlomo Ben-Ami Series: War and Peace

2008-03-04

Israel must change its strategic objective in Gaza from toppling Hamas to rescuing the Annapolis process, and with it the last chance for a two-state solution. This requires not only a cease-fire with Hamas, but also a return to a Palestinian national unity government that alone can offer the peace process the vital legitimacy that it lacks today.... read

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Obama’s Middle East	Shlomo Ben-Ami
Barack Obama’s plans for the Middle East, the region where his predecessor’s policies shattered America’s standing around the world as a benign superpower, represent a welcome departure from President Bush’s grand design to redress the region’s ills through “constructive chaos.” Unfortunately, Obama’s all-encompassing promises might prove to be just as unrealistic.... read
Disarming the Middle East	Shlomo Ben-Ami
By exposing the inadequacy of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran, a signatory, has signaled that the Middle East regional order can no longer be based on Israel’s nuclear monopoly as a non-NPT member. Hence, forcing NPT members like Iran and Syria to comply with their commitments must be accompanied by region-wide repudiation of all weapons of mass destruction.... read

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AUTHOR INFO

Shlomo Ben-Ami

Shlomo Ben-Ami, a former Israeli foreign minister who now serves as the vice-president of the Toledo International Centre for Peace, is the author of Scars of War, Wounds of Peace: The Israeli-Arab Tragedy.

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