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1. PolicyWatch #1252: In the Wake of the Hamas Coup: Rethinking America's 'Grand Strategy' for the New Palestinian Authority

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
06-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Hamas's military takeover of Gaza is the sort of clarifying act of violence that should trigger, among all relevant parties, a period of reassessment. So far, however, it is not apparent that the Bush administration has taken a critical look at the policies that failed -- in the pre-Hamas period -- to help develop the Palestinian Authority (PA) into a truly effective, accountable, transparent government, or -- in recent months -- to impede Hamas's rise or strengthen the forces arrayed against it. Before Washington proceeds too far down the path of propping up President Mahmoud Abbas and resuscitating Fatah without reflecting on how U.S. action (or inaction) contributed to the current situation, the administration should revisit the basic principles underlying U.S. relations with the PA.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
America, Washington, Palestine, and Gaza

2. Assessing What Arabs Do, Not What They Say

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
07-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On July 25, 2006, Robert Satloff and David Pollock addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Dr. Satloff is the executive director of The Washington Institute and the author most recently of the Institute monograph Assessing What Arabs Do, Not What They Say: A New Approach to Understanding Arab Anti-Americanism. Dr. David Pollock, formerly head of Near East research in the U.S. Information Agency, currently works in the Office of the Undersecretary of Global Affairs at the Department of State. His remarks were off the record. The following is a rapporteur's summary of Dr. Satloff's remarks.
Topic:
International Relations, Demographics, and Ethnic Conflict
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, and Arabia

3. Between Palestinian and Israeli Elections: Implications for U.S. Policy

Author:
Robert Satloff, Dennis Ross, and Michael Herzog
Publication Date:
02-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On January 30, 2006, Robert Satloff, Dennis Ross, and Michael Herzog addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Dr Satloff is the Institute's executive director. Ambassador Ross is the Institute's counselor and Ziegler distinguished fellow. Michael Herzog is a brigadier general in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and a visiting military fellow at the Institute. The following is a rapporteur's summary of their remarks.
Topic:
Foreign Policy and Economics
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, and Israel

4. Hamas's Rise and Israel's Choice

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
01-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On January 23, 2006, Washington Institute executive director Robert Satloff addressed the 2006 Herzliya Conference on the Balance of Israel's National Security. Excerpts from Dr. Satloff's remarks follow. “Beware the unintended consequences of sound policies. On June 24, 2002, President Bush announced a major shift in U.S. policy. No longer would fulfillment of diplomatic requirements—that is, acceptance of UN Security Council Resolution 242 or recognizing Israel's right to exist—alone merit the full engagement of the United States in assisting Palestinians as they try to achieve their legitimate rights through negotiations with Israel. From then on, how they handled themselves at home—whether they are corrupt, whether they are democratic, whether they are, as the president said, 'untainted by terrorism'—would all matter.
Topic:
International Relations and Diplomacy
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, and Middle East

5. Alexandria: The Twin Faces of Arab Reform

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
A gathering of Arab civil society activists convened by the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in Alexandria, Egypt, last weekend provided a revealing glimpse into the two faces of reform in the Middle East today. In an opening address, Egypt's president for the past twenty-three years, Hosni Mubarak, presented the traditional case for stability as the touchstone of any reform, the argument dismissed by President George W. Bush as one of the great failed policies of the last six decades. Offering an alternative model of reform in the name of "democratic transformation" were the Alexandria conferees themselves, who issued a closing "declaration" that deserves careful scrutiny with regard to its articulation of operational objectives for reform -- for Arabs and by Arabs. That details of both models were disseminated in a special newsletter by the Egyptian Embassy in Washington this week suggests, at the very least, that the reform impulse has gained enough strength for the Egyptian government to give the conferees a respectful hearing, even if this vision -- radical in implications, moderate in ambitions -- collides head-on with the case that Egypt's veteran president presented to the delegates.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, Arabia, and Egypt

6. The Greater Middle East Partnership: A Work Still Very Much in Progress

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
02-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
The Bush administration has recently circulated to its G-8 partners the details of the Greater Middle East Partnership (GMEP) that Washington hopes will win endorsement at the group's May 2004 summit in Sea Island, Georgia. The GMEP is a core element of the administration's larger Greater Middle East Initiative, which has additional security and political components beyond those outlined in the GMEP. Last week, the English-language website of the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat published what it called the "U.S. working paper for G-8 sherpas" (the latter term referring to the government officials responsible for preparing the event). If this eight-page document is in fact authentic -- a claim that no administration official has disputed -- then the president's "forward strategy of freedom" is likely to remain illusory.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, Arab Countries, and Georgia

7. From Acceptance to Implementation: Next Steps for the Roadmap

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
05-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Israel's cautious approval of the Roadmap opens a new phase in Middle East peacemaking. Although media focus will now turn to the next episode of high-level engagement by President George W. Bush -- perhaps at a Jordan- or Egypt-hosted regional summit in early June -- the real test for Washington and its Quartet colleagues comes in the implementation of the first phase of Roadmap requirements.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, and Arab Countries

8. The Bush Speech vs. The Powell Mission: Assessing Washington's Twin and Competing Middle East Policies

Author:
Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
The best way to view the current situation is by recognizing that there are actually six wars going on simultaneously: 1) the Israeli-Palestinian war; 2) the war against terror; 3) the war against Saddam Husayn and the axis of evil; 4) the war within the Arab world between rulers and ruled; 5) the war among Israelis to determine Israel's future and a long-term strategy; and 6) the war for the heart and soul of the Bush administration's Middle East policy. These wars overlap, intersect, and converge, but they are not the same. One affects the other, usually in negative ways.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Washington, Middle East, and Arabia

9. The Quartet Roadmap, Take Two: Still at Odds with Bush's June 24 Speech

Author:
David Makovsky and Robert Satloff
Publication Date:
12-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Last Friday, while official Washington was still enjoying the Thanksgiving holiday break, the White House stealthily issued Presidential Determination 2003-04, whose first paragraph instructs the State Department to sanction the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestinian Authority (PA) for noncompliance with obligations stemming from the Oslo Accords. This was ostensibly in response to evidence of official PA complicity in acts of violence and terrorism that had become too compelling to ignore. Yet, the very next paragraph orders that the specific sanction applied — downgrading the status of the PLO office in Washington — be waived, citing U.S. national security interests. The end result of this diplomatic two-step is a change in declarative U.S. policy (i.e., for the first time, a formal statement of PA noncompliance), but no change in effective policy.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, and Arab Countries

10. Special Policy Forum Report: From Beirut to Jerusalem: The Arab Summit, Zinni, and Cheney

Author:
David Makovsky, Robert Satloff, and Shibley Telhami
Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
The Saudi initiative for Israeli-Palestinian peace — soon to be presented at the upcoming Arab Summit in Beirut — is in part a tool to address tensions in Saudi relations with the United States after the September 11 attacks. A more important motivation for the initiative, however, is that the Saudi ruling family is concerned about the Saudi public's reaction to the escalation of violence in Israel and the Occupied Territories. In a recent poll, 63 percent of the Saudi public named the Palestinian situation as the single most important issue for them, and an additional 20 percent placed it among the top three most important issues. These statistics should not be taken too literally, but they are an indication of the growing influence that the Palestinian issue has on Saudi and other Arab perceptions of how the Arab world is treated by the West.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, and Arab Countries