LONDON - The U.S. hand of support offered to a new push for peace in the Middle East could well turn out to be the kiss of death for the peace process. The London Meeting on Supporting the Palestinian Authority agreed Tuesday that Lt. Gen. William Ward from the U.S....
Lebanon’s Hollow
‘Cedar Revolution’
Two years after the invasion and conquest of Iraq, and what have we gained? An Islamic state in Iraq, a looming confrontation with Syria, and the increasingly likely prospect of Lebanon reverting to a state of civil war. Hosni Mubarak is pledging to hold "elections"...
A Republic, Not a Democracy
As Herr Schroeder was babbling on in Mainz, during his joint press conference with President Bush, about a need for carrots to coax Tehran off its nuclear program, Bush interrupted the chancellor to issue yet another demand that "the Iranian government listen...
All Set for War With Syria
The broader implications of the Feb. 14 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was seen by many as the embodiment of the Lebanese people's efforts to rebuild their country in the aftermath of its 15-year civil war, are yet to unfold. A Sunni...
Lebanon: Background and Forecast
It is often pointed out that presidents get too much praise and blame for the economy, since the domestic economy has its own rhythms. We are now going to see everything that happens in the Middle East attributed to George W. Bush, whether he had much to do with it or...
Turkey Imagines the Unimaginable
The Feb. 15 Christian Science Monitor describes a situation that, to anyone familiar with American-Turkish relations in the post-World War II period, is almost beyond imagining: an American attack on Turkey. According to the Monitor's story, "The year is 2007....
Attacking Iran: I Know It Sounds Crazy, But…
Here's the strange thing. In the decade that followed the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, nuclear weapons more or less disappeared from American sight despite a near-nuclear war in South Asia, despite the fact that the U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals continued...
Recruiting Iraq Vets Against the War
Why pick a military town as the site for an antiwar rally? As a veteran and a resident of Fayetteville, N.C. near Ft. Bragg, I can think of at least 50 reasons. Each of those reasons has a name and each were members of our community prior to their deaths in...
A Nation Within a Nation Takes Shape
ARBIL - Two years and three elections after the fall of the Saddam regime, Kurdistan is taking shape as a nation within a nation. Kurds voted Jan. 30 for the Iraqi National Assembly, for a Kurdish parliament, and for local government through the governorate councils....
Tel Aviv Blast Spreads New Unease
JERUSALEM - For now it is just the recriminations that have resumed flying back and forth between Israelis and Palestinians, not yet the bombs, missiles, and bullets in the same numbers as during the height of the Intifada. But the fatal Palestinian suicide bombing of...


