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281. Israel’s Priorities in the Eastern Mediterranean:The Tango with Turkey Has Limits

Author:
Eran Lerman
Publication Date:
07-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
The first foreign minister to visit Greece after the swearing-in of Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ new government was Israel’s Eli Cohen – a sign that both countries see the importance of their relationship and the new alignment of forces in the Eastern Mediterranean. While new avenues of dialogue are opening between Jerusalem and Ankara – including a planned visit by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, officially confirmed by Erdogan – Israel’s priorities should remain firm. Pressure to agree to a gas pipeline to Turkey should be resisted. Regarding national security, the partnership with Greece and Cyprus is a game changer, giving Israel vital strategic depth during a conflict. Hence the importance of cooperation with both and support for Cyprus’s freedom to make its own foreign policy decisions.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, National Security, Partnerships, and Regional Politics
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, Israel, Greece, Palestine, and Eastern Mediterranean

282. Israel’s relations with Morocco and the future of the Abraham Accords

Author:
Eran Lerman
Publication Date:
06-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
The time is ripe for Israel to take the initiative rather than wait for pre-arranged reciprocal terms and remove the critical remaining obstacle to full and formal diplomatic relations with the kingdom.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Treaties and Agreements, Bilateral Relations, Normalization, and Regional Politics
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, North Africa, and Morocco

283. Israel must enhance its strategic value to the US

Author:
Efraim Inbar and Eran Lerman
Publication Date:
05-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
The material and political support of the United States is an essential pillar in the national security of Israel.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, National Security, Strategic Interests, and Military Aid
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and United States of America

284. Messy Diplomacy: Western Balkan Countries Facing the Gaza Conflict

Author:
Srđan Cvijić and Vuk Vuksanović
Publication Date:
12-2023
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP)
Abstract:
The ongoing war that Israel is waging in Gaza against Hamas is one of the most consequential conflicts with serious political implications worldwide. The Gaza conflict has already diverted the world’s attention from what has been the most dominant international conflict in the past year and a half: the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Many countries in the Western Balkans are conflicted about what diplomatic stance to take on the Gaza war, primarily whether they should support Israel or Palestine or remain neutral since their decision-making will have to balance their domestic public, as well as their ties with Israel, Muslim countries and, most importantly, the US and the EU. The vote taken on October 26 in the UN General Assembly (hereinafter: UNGA) on the resolution that called for a truce between Israel and Hamas with a strong emphasis on humanitarian factors demonstrated how conflicted the Western Balkan countries were on the current conflict in Gaza. The pattern of division among the Western Balkan countries on this occasion somewhat diverges from the votes cast in different UN fora in the past decade. Whereas Albania and North Macedonia have continued with their previous positions when it comes to their foreign policy toward the conflict in the Middle East, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia have displayed an interesting change.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Hamas, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:
Europe, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, Gaza, and Western Balkans

285. Understanding Hamas’s and Hezbollah’s Uses of Information Technology

Author:
Daniel Byman and Emma McCaleb
Publication Date:
07-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
Abstract:
Hamas’s and Hezbollah’s information technology (IT) strategies heavily reflect their roles in governance. Terrorist organizations like al Qaeda and the Islamic State eschew nationalism in favor of a broad pan-Islamist vision and focus media operations primarily on recruitment and at times operations. In contrast, Hamas and Hezbollah are nationalist as well as Islamist in orientation and favor traditional forms of communication over social media in order to legitimize their political power—a preference reinforced by the policies of technology companies and, in general, the limited capacity of these terrorist groups to use social media without considerable risk. Because Hamas and Hezbollah govern and provide goods, services, and information to their constituents, it is harder to target their IT infrastructure without risking humanitarian consequences.
Topic:
Non State Actors, Hezbollah, Hamas, Information Technology, and Threat Assessment
Political Geography:
Middle East, Palestine, and Lebanon

286. The Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza 2023

Author:
Constantine Antonopoulos
Publication Date:
12-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP)
Abstract:
The ongoing armed conflict in Gaza has given rise to a great humanitarian crisis and a great threat to international peace and security. Hamas’ murderous attacks on Israel and the taking of hostages are grave violations of the law of armed conflict and constitute war crimes. Israel claims that it is not acting in self-defence under the jus ad bellum; instead, it asserts that the legal framework governing its action is the law of armed conflict governing the conduct of hostilities. Israel insists that it is in compliance with international humanitarian law. However, its interpretation of the relevant rules and its understanding of their scope are a matter of contentious debate.
Topic:
Humanitarian Crisis, International Humanitarian Law (IHL), Armed Conflict, and 2023 Gaza War
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Gaza

287. CTC Sentinel: December 2023 Issue

Author:
Michael Knights, Hamdi Malik, Crispin Smith, Phillip Smyth, Austin C. Doctor, and Sam Hunter
Publication Date:
12-2023
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
In the December feature article, Michael Knights, Hamdi Malik, and Crispin Smith outline how over the past two years Tehran-backed terrorist organizations and militias captured the Iraqi state, a development that could have dramatic implications for the regional terrorist threat, regional stability, U.S. interests, and great power competition in the wake of Iran enabling the second deadliest terrorist attack in history on October 7. They write that “Iran-backed terrorists and militias lost the 2021 elections in Iraq yet ended up picking the prime minister anyway and taking charge of the world’s fifth-largest oil producer. This remarkable reversal of fortunes in 2022 was not delivered via the barrel of a gun but rather a series of cool-headed and coordinated moves by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, by Iranian-groomed and militia-controlled judges, and by militia politicians. The country’s oil economy, its freedoms, and its intelligence services are being gutted by militias to ensure their rule is permanent. Yet unprecedented control has not moderated these militias: The Gaza war has shown that these armed factions are also still addicted to militant ‘resistance’ to the United States. The result is the emergence of a terrorist-run state with greater resources than any of Iran’s other proxy networks, hiding behind the façade of a sovereign country.” The attack on Israel on October 7 and its aftermath have underlined the regional threat posed by the broader Iran threat network. Besides Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a multitude of other Tehran-backed Palestinian armed groups participated in the attack, including Fatah splinters and leftist groups. Phillip Smyth examines how Iran built up and managed a constellation of Palestinian ‘Axis of Resistance’ groups from across the ideological spectrum and empowered them to launch an attack that killed 1,200 Israelis. He writes: “Iranian assistance allowed its Palestinian proxies to amass the firepower, messaging know-how, and much of the hi-tech equipment necessary to carry out and propagandize the attack.” Austin Doctor and Sam Hunter examine the evolving threat of improvised explosives devices in the United States. They write: “Violent extremists continue to innovate, drawing on emerging technologies and creative problem solving. The onus of initiative requires that the counterterrorism mission community looks over the horizon to identify emerging threats.
Topic:
Terrorism, Counter-terrorism, Hamas, IED, October 7, and Regional Stability
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Middle East, and Palestine

288. July 2022 Issue

Author:
Amarnath Amarasingam, Marc-Andre Argentino, Graham Macklin, Stevie Weinberg, Rodger Shanahan, and Matteo Pugliese
Publication Date:
07-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
In this month’s feature article, Amarnath Amarasingam, Marc-André Argentino, and Graham Macklin examine the May 2022 extreme far-right live-streamed terrorist attack at a grocery store in Buffalo, New York, in which 10 Black Americans were murdered “in one of the deadliest racist massacres in recent American history.” Their article examines the perpetrator, his pathway to violence, how he plotted the attack, and his writings. They argue that “the Buffalo massacre was not an isolated phenomenon. Indeed, one can only fully comprehend it when considered within a continuum of self-referential extreme-right terrorism inspired by the March 2019 terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand,” that had “a catalytic effect upon extreme-right actors, sparking a chain reaction of mass shootings.” Our interview is with Nitzan Nuriel, the former director of the Counter-Terrorism Bureau in the Prime Minister’s Office of Israel. It is the second in a series of articles and interviews examining the terrorist threat landscape in Israel and the lessons other countries can learn from Israel’s counterterrorism efforts. The series is a joint effort between the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point (CTC) and the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at Reichman University in Israel. Rodger Shanahan “uses data from Australian terrorism trials in the Islamic State era to examine the degree to which mental health issues exist among terrorism offenders and whether there is any causal link.” His findings “support the view that Islamist terrorists’ mental health is largely the same as the general population and finds that there is little evidence to support any causal link between mental health and terrorism.” Matteo Pugliese profiles convicted Islamic State terror planner Muaz al-Fizani, whose jihadi career “spanned two decades and three continents” taking the hardline Tunisian extremist from Italy to Bosnia and Afghanistan and from Tunisia to Libya, from where he helped plan a wave of terror in Tunisia in 2015 that resulted in the deaths of many Western tourists.
Topic:
Counter-terrorism, Far Right, Mass Shootings, and Racism
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, North Africa, North America, Tunisia, and United States of America

289. June 2022 Issue

Author:
Tara Candland, Ryan O'Farrell, Lauren Poole, Caleb Weiss, and Boaz Ganor
Publication Date:
06-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
In this month’s feature article, Boaz Ganor looks at the lessons that should be learned from the spring 2022 terror wave in Israel. His analysis kicks off the “CTC-ICT Focus on Israel” series, a joint effort between the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point (CTC) and the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at Reichman University in Israel. In the coming months, the series will examine the terrorist threat landscape in Israel and the lessons other countries can learn from Israel’s counterterrorism efforts. The two feature analysis articles focus on the foreign fighter problem set in Ukraine and the evolving linkages to far-right extremism of actors on both sides of the conflict. Kacper Rekawek finds that unlike in 2014, “the 2022 conflict has, for the most part, not energized Western right-wing extremists, nor persuaded them to travel. In what is for Ukrainians a war for national survival and a fight to secure a Western democratic future for the country, the allure of the far-right in Ukraine has dimmed. Ukrainian units with far-right histories are now deeply integrated into Ukraine’s armed forces and eschew foreign recruitment, and one of those units, the Azov Regiment, was decimated during the siege of Mariupol. Very few foreign right-wing extremists have been recruited into Ukraine’s International Legion. In fact, anecdotal evidence suggests most of the foreign fighters who have traveled this year to fight on the Ukrainian side are fighting to safeguard Ukraine’s future as a Western democracy.” Don Rassler examines key concerns and questions about the war in Ukraine that are relevant to counterterrorism practitioners. Continuing this month’s focus on the impact of nefarious Russian actions, Christopher Faulkner examines the activities in Africa of the Wagner Group, a Russian private military company closely tied to the Kremlin. He writes: “Wagner’s role in Africa poses a severe threat to the security and stability of African states as well as the strategic interests of the United States and allied nations.” Finally, Tara Candland, Ryan O’Farrell, Laren Poole, and Caleb Weiss assess the rising threat to Central Africa posed by the 2021 transformation of the Islamic State’s Congolese branch.
Topic:
Violent Extremism, Counter-terrorism, Democracy, Islamic State, Far Right, Wagner Group, and Foreign Fighters
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Ukraine, Middle East, Israel, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Palestine, and Central Africa

290. May 2022 Issue

Author:
Gary A. Ackerman, Zachary Kallenborn, Philipp C. Bleek, Paul Cruickshank, Audrey Kurth Cronin, and Jaime Yassif
Publication Date:
05-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
With more than a million Americans dead from COVID-19 and the pandemic associated directly or indirectly with around 15 million deaths globally by the end of 2021 according to World Health Organization estimates, it is essential to reassess the global biological threat landscape, including the possibility that bioterrorists or other bad actors might seek to exploit advances in biotechnology to engineer a future pandemic. In a joint effort, the Combating Terrorism Center and the Department of Chemistry and Life Science at West Point have assembled some of the best and brightest thinkers in the counterterrorism, policy, and scientific communities around the world for their perspectives and analysis on the evolution of the biological threat picture. The result is a two-volume set of special issues, with the second volume being published this month. In the feature article, Gary Ackerman, Zachary Kallenborn, and Philipp Bleek present a bioterrorism classification schema to evaluate the pandemic’s impact on bioterrorism. They assess that “when it comes to bioterrorism, the pandemic probably has not moved the needle much. Although COVID-19 might encourage apocalyptic cults, some radical environmentalists, some extreme right-wing groups, and some Islamist extremist groups toward biological weapons, most other terrorist groups are more likely to be discouraged. The pandemic has bolstered some terrorists’ bio-related capabilities but in at most modest ways. At the same time, lessons from the COVID-19 experience may both help reduce the consequences of a future attack and heighten perceptions of bioterrorism risk.” Our interview is with Shmuel Shapira, who served as Director General of the Israel Institute for Biological Research between 2013 and 2021. Audrey Kurth Cronin argues that “the most significant new risks of [biological] attacks come largely from insider threats by knowledgeable scientists with questionable motives, proxy actors backed by adversarial states, or even those experimenting with new biotechnologies irresponsibly.” She writes that “the old threats of bioterrorism remain, but they are joined by new ones that are falling between the seams of biology and other disciplines, especially engineering, data science, and computer science, and especially at the intersection between molecular biology and artificial intelligence.” Jaime Yassif argues it is vital to “take action to safeguard the life sciences to prevent biotechnology catastrophe, in addition to bolstering law enforcement and intelligence capabilities to more effectively anticipate and prevent bioterrorism and other biological threats.” She writes: “In biosecurity, there is no single solution or intervention that can eliminate all risk. That is why a layered defense is needed, in which multiple interventions in aggregate add up to substantial risk reduction.”
Topic:
Science and Technology, Counter-terrorism, COVID-19, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorism
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Global Focus