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A limited military move will allow the Syrian regime to maneuver, yet will provide fresh impetus to the rebel forces. Read More »
The EU’s blacklisting of Hizbullah’s military wing ignores the fact that Hizbullah is a unitary, hierarchical organization. Read More »
In an interview on Al-Jazeera this past May, the commander of the Free Syrian Army, Brig. Gen. Salim Idris, explained that the diversion of Hezbollah forces from Lebanon to Syria to take part in the civil war was part of a “Safavid” plan for the Middle East region. Read More »
Supply of the S-300 by Moscow will create an air defense umbrella over Syria allowing Damascus to carry out weapons transfers to Hezbollah. Read More »
Iran sees the civil war in Syria as a war of survival against a radical Sunni uprising that views Iran and the Shiites as infidels to be annihilated. Read More »
The death in Syria of Gen. Hassan Shateri of the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps confirms that elements of the Iranian army are involved in Hizbullah’s activity. Read More »
This is not the first time Europe has waffled when it comes to defining terrorism. Since the days of Maximilian Robespierre, the word Terreur has evoked horror and aversion and sparked philosophical and political debates. The organizations and militias that […] Read More »
Hizbullah claims control of 18 Shiite villages in Syria along the border with Lebanon. Read More »
As part of its efforts to break the grip of Western sanctions, Iran is working intensively to develop its economic ties with Lebanon. Read More »
Getting Iran to stop the higher-level enrichment is expected to be a priority for world powers when they meet with Iran in Baghdad next week in an attempt to start resolving the decade-old dispute over Tehran’s atomic ambitions.
“It is still going strong. I hear it is unchanged,” one diplomat accredited to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, which regularly inspects Iran’s declared atomic sites, said about the country’s most sensitive nuclear activity. “But with installation work going on, at some point there will be an increase,” the official said. Read More »
It is no longer clear that Iran sees carrying out an attack in the U.S. as crossing some sort of red line. Read More »
This anthology of 31 recent studies by eleven leading security and diplomatic experts outlines the Iranian threat to Israel, the Middle East region, and the West. Read More »
The wave of protest in Syria has put to the test the strategic alliance between Iran (and Hizbullah) and Bashar Assad’s regime. Syria is the main state component of the “resistance camp” and serves as a logistical hinterland for Hizbullah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Iran sees its unequivocal backing for Syria as a demonstration of its ability to stay loyal to its allies despite the regional turmoil. Read More »
Now radical Islam is gaining strength among the Palestinians with the victory of Hamas in the 2006 parliamentary elections of the Palestinian Authority. Hamas and its allies completely reject a negotiated solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict and align themselves with jihadi organizations across the region. As a result, the Arab-Israeli conflict has become increasingly a part of the much larger struggle between radical Islam and the West. Read More »
The next military conflict with Israel, Hizbullah will hit Tel Aviv with missiles at the outset of the war, while dispatching forces to conquer the Galilee. Read More »
The revelation last week by the Obama administration of a plot by Iran to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington opened the eyes of many Americans that the threat of Iran is on the southern doorstep of the United States. […] Read More »
The changing situation provides yet another reason why Israel must not be pushed into sacrificing vital security assets, like the Jordan Valley, which has been the front line of its defense for decades and will be critical in the future against the uncertainty it faces to its east in the years ahead. Read More »
In the Iranian lexicon, one does not encounter the concept of the “Arab Spring.” Instead, Iran has coined the term “Islamic awakening.” In contrast to the perceived economic enfeeblement of the Western economies headed by the U.S., which constitute the bases of support for the “Zionist regime,” Iran offers a substitute view of a new world order and an alternative, defiant Islamic agenda. Read More »
Five years after the Second Lebanon War, a war whose results Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah considers a “divine victory,” Hizbullah has currently reached one of its lowest points due to the endangered survival of the Assad regime in Syria, as well as the international tribunal that has demanded the extradition of four Hizbullah members suspected of murdering former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. Read More »
The main view voiced is that it is better for Israel to work with the “devil we know, rather than the devil we don’t know.” Read More »
Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati recently succeeded in forming a new government dominated by the Hizbullah-led March 8 alliance, thus ending a deadlock that left the divided country in a power vacuum for almost five months. The thirty-member cabinet was […] Read More »
Iran is exploiting its growing ties with Latin American countries for subversive and propaganda activity, terror and smuggling, and the development of long-range military capabilities. There have been reports that Iran is seeking to establish a missile base in Venezuela, at the doorstep of the great Satan. Read More »
Vol. 11, No. 2 June 2, 2011 Bahrain is the locus of a titanic struggle between regional powers representing polar extremes of Islam (Shiite Iran vs. Sunni Saudi Arabia), and international powers’ economic and geo-strategic interests. Washington has been regarded as […] Read More »
World War III is occurring right now. It is a religious war – first and foremost within the religion of Islam. It is a war of the culture of Islamic radicalism against the rest of the world, which includes the majority of Muslims worldwide. Read More »
Iran no longer hesitates to state publicly that its forward defense line now passes through “Lebanon and Palestine.” In practice, the Lebanese-Israeli border is in fact Israel’s border with Iran. Hizbullah is nourished by the growing strength and power of Iran and draws upon its successes. Both parties recognize that the fall of one also signifies the demise of the other. Read More »
There is a tendency in the West to underestimate the Iranian role in Hizbullah decision-making. _x000D_
Iran is signaling to the Obama administration that the main political developments in Lebanon are being decided today in Tehran and not in Washington. Iran is testing U.S. power and determination, and the states of the Middle East are closely following what will be the outcome. Read More »
Hizbullah has 50,000 rockets and missiles, including 40-50 Fatah 110 missiles and 10 SCUD-C ground-to-ground missiles. Furthermore, some 10,000 Hizbullah fighters have been provided with a broad range of modern weapons, while the Iranian Revolutionary Guards have trained Hizbullah teams to operate these weapons. Read More »
The last few years have witnessed an explosion of anti-Zionist rhetoric on university campuses across the United Kingdom. Encouraged by the University and College Union’s annual calls for discriminatory measures against Israeli institutions and academics, the rhetoric has become even more strident since Operation Cast Lead. A recent boycott-divestment-sanctions campus tour explicitly invoked anti-Semitic tropes. The consequently hostile environment for Jewish students has jeopardized their educ Read More »
How do we resolve the dilemma of a peace agreement that includes handing over the Golan Heights to the Syrians, while facing the fact that Israel cannot be defended without the Golan Heights? The way around this was supposed to be a peace agreement with specific security arrangements. This approach was based on a number of misguided assumptions. Read More »
Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s visit to Lebanon constitutes an additional stage in the process of the Lebanese state’s collapse. From now on, Hizbullah supporters will find it difficult to argue that theirs is a national Lebanese party operating in the Lebanese reality on behalf of Lebanese objectives. Read More »
Shiite religious leader Sayyed Muhammed Hussein Fadlallah played a leading role in the increasing Islamic radicalization of Lebanese Shiites and laid the foundations for Hizbullah’s ideology of violent struggle against the West and Israel. He supplied an organized doctrine for the mujahid who is ready to sacrifice his life. Yet he opposed the aspirations of Iran to establish an Islamic republic in Lebanon. Read More »
Hizbullah is not a national Lebanese movement, as has been frequently claimed in the West. Hizbullah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and his men are not loyal to the president of Lebanon or to the government of Lebanon, but rather to Iranian leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Read More »
The Arab Gulf states are feeling compelled to adopt an appeasement policy toward Tehran while with increasing dread they helplessly follow the nuclear crisis, epitomized by Iranian determination and aggression in the face of American weakness. Read More »
In February, Syrian President Bashad Assad hosted President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Damascus. Afterward, Hizbullah’s online magazine suggested that war with Israel was on the horizon. Damascus’ support for "resistance" was on full display at the Arab Summit in Libya in late March, where Assad urged Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to abandon U.S.-supported negotiations and “take up arms against Israel.” Read More »
Regional cooperation begins with resuming negotiations with the Palestinians. In the interests of achieving a just, lasting, and comprehensive peace, Israel sees the economic domain as one of the cornerstones of good relations. Read More »
Israel must simultaneously pursue three interdependent tracks for advancing Israeli-Palestinian relations: capacity-building measures that foster the rule of law within the Palestinian Authority, regional economic cooperation, and meaningful political dialogue. Read More »
Hizbullah’s alleged move toward pragmatism is based to a large extent on an Iranian decision to create a new atmosphere in Lebanon that will allow it to work unmolested. Iran is looking for strict silence in the Lebanese arena in order to enable Hizbullah to reconstruct its strategic capabilities (including long-range rockets and missiles) in Lebanon in order to make use of these capabilities at a time to be determined by Tehran. Read More »
The Islamic Republic has already proved it only uses talks with the West as a delaying tactic as it relentlessly pursues nuclear arms. Only severe sanctions backed by military threat will have any impact. Read More »
The desire in Washington and Riyadh to repair damaged relations with Damascus is admirable, but should not come at the expense of Lebanon and the larger U.S. strategic goal of weakening Iranian influence in the Levant. While a diplomatic rapprochement with Syria might result in some marginal improvements in its behavior, this would likely have little impact on Syria’s thirty-year strategic relationship with Tehran. Read More »
Relationship Status: Special, but Complicated
Die deutsch-israelischen Sicherheitsbeziehungen: Vergangenheit, Gegenwart, Zukunft [The German-Israeli security relations: Past, present, future], edited by Milena Uhlmann, Berlin: Berliner Wissenschaftsverlag, 2008, 164 pp. [German/English]
Reviewed by Alexander Arndt Read More »
On April 3, 2009, Hizbullah published its political platform in advance of elections to the Lebanese parliament scheduled for June 7, 2009. The document calls for the abolition of sectarian politics and for the enactment of a new election law that would alter the equation of sectarian forces in Lebanon. The abolition of the existing political system will advance Hizbullah toward its fundamental goal: the establishment of an Islamic state and a complete Iranian takeover of Lebanon. Read More »
Germany has been increasingly forced to confront "homegrown" Islamist terrorism, the threat of radicalized converts to Islam, and the threat of non-integrated Muslim immigrants. In 2003, Iranian-backed Hizbullah was found to have identified Israeli, Jewish, and American facilities in Germany as terror targets. Which are the prominent radical Islamic groups operating in Germany? Read More »
It is of prime importance to prevent Iran from acquiring influence in post-war Gaza through any assistance programs._x000D_
Israel and the international community should transform the Palestinian Authority into the principal factor, along with Egypt, entrusted with the rehabilitation work in Gaza. Read More »
Throughout 2008, U.S. mediation on the outlines of a settlement were once again the equivalent of banging a square peg into a round hole: the territorial demands of the Palestinian leadership did not fit into the territorial space Israel could afford to vacate without compromising its minimal security needs as well as its most important historical rights, especially in Jerusalem. Read More »
Hamas could have pretended it wanted a political solution and the whole world would have recognized this. The Quartet posed to Hamas only three conditions: recognize your neighbor, recognize the peace agreements, and avoid terror. But Hamas said, no, Israel has no right to exist. They have a dream – to join the other Islamic forces, to revolutionize the whole Middle East. Read More »
Click here to watch former UN Ambassador Dore Gold discuss Ahmadinejad’s visit to the United Nations. Read More »
Asharq Alawsat reported on August 18, 2008, that Hizbullah operatives were involved in attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces in four Iraqi provinces. In June 2006, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State David Satterfield disclosed that Hizbullah cadres had attacked U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq. Hizbullah units claimed responsibility for operations against coalition forces and Iraqi security personnel as early as the latter part of 2005. Read More »
By exchanging prisoners with the proxy organizations as if they were law-abiding states, Israel can be seen as upgrading the status of the organizations’ unlawful combatants from terrorists and war criminals. Such exchanges afford them the same rights as lawful soldiers, without demanding from their leaders the reciprocal obligations. At the same time, Israel downgrades the rights of its own captured soldiers by overlooking the organizations’ systematic depravation of POW rights. Read More »
By exchanging prisoners with the proxy organizations as if they were law-abiding states, Israel can be seen as upgrading the status of the organizations’ unlawful combatants from terrorists and war criminals. Such exchanges afford them the same rights as lawful soldiers, without demanding from their leaders the reciprocal obligations. At the same time, Israel downgrades the rights of its own captured soldiers by overlooking the organizations’ systematic depravation of POW rights. Read More »
The three primary generators of Middle East radicalism and extremism are Iran’s “Shia Crescent,” the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Global Jihad. Iran is Persian, ideologically and historically different from the Arab world. Yet if Iran gets its hands on nuclear weapons in the future, the threatened pro-Western regimes of the Arab world may decide to join it and not fight it. Read More »
In recent years, an intense effort has been made by American-based academics to portray Ayatollah Mohamad Hussein Fadlallah, the most important religious authority among the Shiites of Lebanon and the Gulf states, as a moderate religious leader. Yet Fadlallah praised the massacre of eight Israeli students at Mercaz Ha-Rav Yeshiva in Jerusalem on March 6. Read More »
Syria served as a primary conduit for the build-up of Iranian-backed Hizbullah prior to the outbreak of the Second Lebanon War in July 2006. Damascus supplied the majority of the heavy-payload rockets Hizbullah fired at Israel Read More »
If there remains doubt over the underlying reasons for the ongoing violence in the Middle East, the Second
Lebanon War with hizbullah is one of the clearest illustrations in many years that “the Middle East conflict” does not stem from
Israel’s “occupation of Arab o Read More »
Once Israel dropped its past reliance on a diplomacy based on its own rights and adopted a new concession-based diplomacy instead, its spokesmen essentially acquiesced to the Palestinian historical narrative. Read More »
In general terms, the Winograd Commission Report dealt mostly with the flaws in the decision-making process in Israel. However, the report contains important insights into the strategic thinking that was predominant in the Israeli political-military leadership from the time of Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon until the outbreak of hostilities in July 2006, with the advent of the Second Lebanon War. Read More »
There is a growing strategic alliance between Iran and the radical Palestinian forces in the territories. Iran is involved in supporting both the Islamic factions and Fatah, as well. Today, at least 40 percent of Fatah’s different fighting groups are also paid by Hizbullah and Iran. Hamas thinks it can build a new southern Lebanon in Gaza, and this is what it is busy doing. Read More »
Senior Israeli military and intelligence officials have with a high degree of certainty linked Iran’s senior leadership with direct involvement over the past fifteen years in Qods Force operations against Israel. The Qods Force carries out these types of military operations across the Middle East, to export the revolution and establishing an “Iranian Shiite crescent” through which Iran could assert regional hegemony. Read More »
The Islamic fundamentalist war against Israeli and Jewish existence in the Middle East – which is being waged by both Hizbullah and Hamas – did not begin in 1967, and it is not going to end even if Israel redeploys along the 1967 lines. Hardly anybody in Israel thinks that if we give territories now, we will get peace in return. Read More »
Iran is more determined than ever to achieve regional hegemony in the Middle East and is fueling regional instability across the entire area. The primary threat to the Sunni Arab states now clearly comes from Iran. There is no short-term diplomatic option for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The stabilization of the Middle East requires the neutralization of any of the components of the current radical Islamic wave. Israel has a continuing need for defensible borders. Read More »
Listen carefully to Ahmadinejad. He is not insane. He embodies very accurately the nature of the Iranian regime and he is gaining popularity among Muslims. Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, sitting in Damascus where he is supported by Iran and Syria, controls the military wing of Hamas and is more powerful than PA Prime Minister Ismael Haniyeh. Mashaal is responsible for the money, for the policy of terror, and he holds many cards relating to Israel’s abducted soldier in Gaza. Read More »
What is the real mood of the Israeli people after the war? It is that we are not suckers and we are not going to make the same mistake again. We are not going to put ourselves in danger if it is not necessary. We unilaterally retreated from Lebanon and didn’t retaliate for six years, and in the end we found Hizbullah in a stronger position to fight against us. When Israel retreated from Gaza what was the result? More Kassam rockets on Sderot and Ashkelon. Read More »
It is necessary to adopt an alternative concept of victory, which should be called “minimal victory,” in which terror is not destroyed, but is contained at a minimal level, and one must invest constant energy in order to prevent its eruption. In a continuous and uninterrupted effort since Operation “Defensive Shield” in April 2002, after it counted 132 dead in one month (the equivalent of 1,400 deaths a year), Israel’s terror casualty rate declined to 11 civilians for all of 2006. Read More »
In responding forcefully to Hizballah’s provocation in the summer of 2006, Israel not only restored much of its deterrent capability, but did so against a weapon of the Iranian and Syrian militaries. Israel acted only after exhausting a number of other options over the decades, including everything from all-out invasion and regime change to quiet diplomacy and open negotiations. Israel’s overall response was not disproportionate when considering the enemy Israel was fighting. Read More »
Discussing how Israel should respond to war crimes accusations diverts the agenda away from Hizballah – a terrorist group that committed war crimes in the recent war that far exceed in gravity and quantity all those Israel is accused of. Hizballah launched thousands of rocket and mortar attacks on northern Israel, deliberately targeting civilians in violation of the laws of war. Read More »
From North Africa to Iran, Hizballah General Secretary Hassan Nasrallah’s war has captured the imaginations of millions of Muslims. However, popularity of this sort in the Arab world seldom translates into anything substantive in political or strategic terms.
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Israel is not better off strategically than it was at the beginning of the war; this in itself is a Hizballah victory. Israel must prepare to win the next round decisively. The IDF knew that Hizballah could not be defeated without a major ground operation: its plan did not fail – it was never implemented. Read More »
From July 13 to August 13, the Israel Police reported 4,228 rocket impacts inside Israel from rockets fired by Hizballah. No geographical area in the world has sustained such a large quantity of rocket strikes since the Iran-Iraq war in the early 1980s. Most rockets fired by Hizballah at Israel were taken from the Syrian arsenal rather than from Iran. On most occasions, the rocket warhead contained anti-personnel munitions, a mixture of explosives and steel balls. Read More »
Instead of the war being about Israel’s right of self-defense, Hizballah was able to turn it around so that the issue on the international agenda became Israel’s destruction of Lebanon. Israel should have been seen as the victim. We were being attacked. We were the ones who fulfilled all of the requirements of the game. We were true to the international border, we restrained ourselves, we held back. Why should it be that once we start attacking, we immediately start to lose. Read More »
In May 2000, Israel completed a full withdrawal from Lebanon in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 425 from 1978. Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah, however, the "liberator of the South," did not recognize the new border. His patrons in Iran ordered continued jihad against Israel. The Israeli withdrawal in 2000 did not lead Hizballah to become just another political party, and the belief that this would occur was an illusion._x000D_ Read More »
The U.S.-French draft resolution calls for a "full cessation of hostilities" by the warring parties. It demands the "immediate" halt by Hizballah of all attacks. Regarding Israel, there is also a demand for the "immediate" cessation of military operations; however, Israel is only expected to halt "offensive military operations." Read More »
As intense discussions continue on the terms of a "sustainable cease-fire" and a "robust international force" that would end the latest war in Lebanon and prevent renewed conflict, many of the elements suggested appear highly unrealistic. All of the elements envisioned in such a framework are highly problematic, to understate the case. Read More »
Israel’s current military operations to uproot Hizballah and to destroy it as a formidable military and terror organization is not merely an operation against another determined terror group like Hamas in Gaza. Hizballah has a disciplined, well-trained army with sophisticated weaponry, backed directly by Syria and Iran. Read More »
Since the 1982 Lebanon War, the United Nations Security Council has repeatedly demanded that all foreign forces leave Lebanese territory. This evacuation of outside armies and terrorist groups was rightly seen as the prerequisite for the pacification of the volatile Israel-Lebanon border and the restoration of Lebanese sovereignty. _x000D_ Read More »
The Palestinian religious, academic, and political elites teach an ideology of virulent hatred of Jews. The killing of Jews is presented both as a religious obligation and as necessary self-defense for all humankind._x000D_
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Iran is moving steadily to a nuclear weapons capability, European diplomatic efforts notwithstanding. The “window”; within which Iran might be stopped short of the finish line is closing quickly. But many Europeans argue that Iran will, of necessity, act as a responsible nuclear power in order to avoid catastrophic destruction. Read More »
The U.N.’s oil-for-food scandal was placed center stage last year, but with Iraqi elections fast-approaching, there is another scandalous development at the U.N. that is beginning to receive national attention: How Syria, which served as a member of the U.N. Security Council from early 2002 through the end of 2003, has been continuing to back international terrorism and even turning itself into the main line of supply for the current insurgency in western Iraq. Read More »
The Bush administration never said that it went to war against Iraq in order to retaliate for the destruction of the World Trade Center and the attack on the Pentagon. It did warn that Iraq could transfer its prohibited weapons of mass destruction to terrorist groups, especially to al-Qaeda. Read More »
In seeking democratization for the Middle East, the U.S. sees as its models Japan and Germany following World War II, both defeated in war and reconstructed in its aftermath. Let us remember that Israel paved the way for the Americans by halting Iraq’s nuclear plans in 1981, a demonstration of strategic cooperation between Israel and the U.S.
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Hizballah is an international terrorist organization that has been killing Americans and other Westerners for decades. Indeed, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said if al-Qaeda is the B-team of terrorism, Hizballah is the A-team. Hizballah has a very large capability to do harm throughout northern Israel, with hundreds of Grad missiles, dozens of short-range missiles like the "Fajar 3" and "Fajar 5," and longer-range rockets of Iranian make that can reach 40-70 km. Read More »
Hizballah is an international terrorist organization that has been killing Americans and other Westerners for decades. Indeed, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said if al-Qaeda is the B-team of terrorism, Hizballah is the A-team. Hizballah has a very large capability to do harm throughout northern Israel, with hundreds of Grad missiles, dozens of short-range missiles like the "Fajar 3" and "Fajar 5," and longer-range rockets of Iranian make that can reach 40-70 km. Read More »
The Palestinian assertion that Sunni and Shiite terrorist groups do not cooperate is baseless and historically wrong. Recent history has demonstrated that there are few religious-ideological barriers in the world of international terrorism. The secular Ba’athist regime in Syria works closely with Hizballah, as a secular Ba’athist regime in Iraq has developed ties to al-Qaeda.
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The Middle East "road map," designed to implement the peace initiative presented by President Bush on June 24, 2002, is based on a number of extremely optimistic assumptions, and successful implementation depends on fundamental changes in the environment.
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Syria remains one of the worst state-sponsors of international terrorism, providing a haven for leaders of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Islamic Jihad, and Hamas. Syria sponsors Hizballah in Lebanon, an international terrorist organization with a global reach that, before 9/11, had killed more Americans than any other terrorist group.
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Many television viewers were surprised when U.S. Senator Bob Graham declared on "Meet the Press" on July 7 that there are "more urgent" priorities facing the United States than dealing with Saddam Hussein. Read More »
Ironically, the post-September 11 international environment has not reduced Syria’s traditional support of international terrorism, but rather led Damascus to follow a dangerously escalatory policy. Read More »
[Editor's Note: After Syria's appearance at the Madrid Peace Conference, we must remind ourselves with whom Israel must deal. The U.S. needs to be reminded, too; hence, this Special Report.] Read More »
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