Less than three weeks after Israel and Turkey officially restored full diplomatic relations, following an acrimonious break of four years, a Turkish naval vessel docked in Haifa in an unmistakable sign that the normalization process has begun in earnest. The Kemalreis, a frigate, arrived in Haifa on September 3 to participate in a NATO exercise alongside […]
Regrettably, Russia has stepped up its criticism of Israel of late, with the Russian embassy in Cairo and Russia’s Foreign Ministry having issued hypocritical critiques of Israel in the past week. Most recently, Russia’s embassy in Cairo posted a screenshot of a tweet Yair Lapid, the Israeli prime minister and foreign minister, posted in April bemoaning […]
On August 8, a day after the conclusion of Operation Breaking Dawn, Israel’s three-day preemptive military campaign against Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid offered its two million Palestinian inhabitants a viable path to peace. In a television address from the headquarters of the Israeli armed forces in Tel Aviv, Lapid […]
It was a case of deja vu all over again. The latest outbreak of cross-border fighting in and around the Gaza Strip petered out in the waning hours of August 7 following a ceasefire brokered by Egypt. The three-day conflict was the most intense round of warfare since the fourth Gaza war in May 2021, which […]
Ayman al-Zawahri, a jihadist writ large, lived and died by the sword. After assuming the leadership of Al Qaeda following Osama bin Laden’s assassination in 2011, he promised to “terrify” the United States with a spate of terrorist attacks. “Blood for blood,” he boasted in a theatrical video released about a month after American commandos killed […]
Israel’s bilateral relations with Russia have been on a downward spiral since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Amid this somber development, Russia has upgraded its relationship with Iran, Israel’s greatest enemy. Annoyed by Israel’s condemnation of its aggression and Israel’s shipment of humanitarian and non-lethal military supplies to Ukraine, Russia has exerted pressure […]
American- sponsored talks aimed at finally resolving Israel’s maritime border with Lebanon have been progressing relatively well since the resumption of mediation efforts by U.S. diplomat Amos Hochstein last month. By his estimation, Lebanon has dropped its demand for part of the Karish natural gas field, which is fully claimed by Israel and is recognized […]
U.S. President Joe Biden’s whirlwind visit to Israel, his tenth in nearly 50 years, was a striking reaffirmation of Israel’s deep bonds with the United States and a stark demonstration of their differences over two major issues. The Jerusalem Declaration, a joint statement issued by Israel and the United States, hailed their strategic partnership and […]
U.S. President Joe Biden will confront a daunting array of issues during his whirlwind visit to the Middle East from July 13-16. Biden will spend the first leg of his trip in Israel. There he will meet the caretaker prime minister, Yair Lapid, and his predecessor, Naftali Bennett, who met Biden at the White House […]
Diplomatic efforts to reboot the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement appear to be at an impasse once again following unsuccessful indirect talks between the United States and Iran in Qatar late last month. European Union mediators conducted the negotiations, which ended in a deadlock after two days and left the agreement, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of […]