China, once a minor player in the Middle East, is expanding its influence throughout the region, both in the Muslim world and Israel. Until quite recently, the Middle East was virtually the preserve of two major powers, the United States and Russia. But in recent years, China has begun catching up. There is no better […]
Israel has signed security agreements with two pro-Western Arab states in the past few months, signalling the emergence of a new and potentially important strategic alliance in the Middle East. On November 24, Israel and Morocco signed a memorandum of understanding in Rabat, the first of its kind between Israel and an Arab state. On February 4, […]
The undercurrents of Ukraine’s current border tensions with Russia are lapping ominously on Israel’s shores. With about 130,000 Russian troops and armor massed along Ukraine’s frontier, fears are growing that Russia may invade Ukraine. Russia denies the accusation, but the United States and its allies are skeptical and believe an invasion could be imminent. Russian President […]
Amnesty International’s controversial report labelling Israel as an “apartheid” state did not surprise the Israeli government in the least. On January 3, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said, “We think that in the coming year, there will be a debate that is unprecedented in its venom and in its radioactivity around the words ‘Israel as an […]
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s former prime minister, regarded Donald Trump’s Middle East peace plan as little more than an opportunity to annex a chunk of the West Bank, says Barak Ravid, an Israeli journalist whose book, Trump’s Peace, was published in Hebrew last month. The Trump administration released its proposal, Peace to Prosperity, on January 28, […]
Extreme Jewish settlers in the West Bank are on a rampage. Violent attacks against Palestinians increased by almost 50 percent in 2021 over the previous year. In the main, the attackers have been Jewish extremists living in illegal outposts that were built without the authorization of the Israeli government. There have been a wave of […]
To no one’s surprise, Iran has carried out its threat to wreak vengeance on the United States for its central role in the assassination of one of its most revered national figures, Qassem Soleimani, who commanded the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. Soleimani and his Iraqi associate, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the commander of the pro-Iranian Popular […]
Justice has finally caught up with Anwar Raslan, a former colonel in Syria’s intelligence service. On January 13, a court in Koblenz, Germany, convicted him of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to life imprisonment. Now 58, he supervised the murder, the torture and the sexual abuse of dozens of prisoners. Though only a cog […]
Last May, as Israel fought its fourth cross-border Gaza war with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, deadly ethnic violence between Jews and Arabs erupted in a string of cities, shocking and disheartening Israelis. Israel’s president, Reuven Rivlin, compared it to a “civil war,” while an Arab member of the Knesset, Aida Touma-Sliman, likened it to the […]
The foreign ministers of Israel and Iran, Yair Lapid and Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, clashed online a few days ago in what can only be described as a futile Twitter exchange. Israel and Iran are the bitterest of enemies due to Iran’s constant calls for Israel’s destruction and its financial and military support of proxies like Hezbollah […]