Number of results to display per page
Search Results
92. No Reason for Kurdish Surprise
- Author:
- Lazar Berman
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
- Abstract:
- Once again, Kurds are complaining of “betrayal.”
- Topic:
- International Cooperation, Military Strategy, Hegemony, Conflict, and Foreign Interference
- Political Geography:
- Turkey, Middle East, Syria, Kurdistan, and United States of America
93. Rojava Sundown – A Retrospective
- Author:
- Jonathan Spyer
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
- Abstract:
- Islamic State, that most malignant expression of the Sunni Islamist trend, was the natural enemy of this emergent Kurdish autonomy.
- Topic:
- Terrorism, Minorities, Islamic State, Conflict, and Autonomy
- Political Geography:
- Middle East, Syria, and Kurdistan
94. Northern Syria and Israel
- Author:
- Efraim Inbar
- Publication Date:
- 11-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
- Abstract:
- Israel must adapt as quickly as possible to the evolving situation in northern Syria, while continuing to adhere to self-reliance and invest in its military.
- Topic:
- Civil War, Military Strategy, Hegemony, and Conflict
- Political Geography:
- Russia, Iran, Middle East, Israel, and Syria
95. Israel, Europe and Russia: A New Paradigm?
- Author:
- Emmanuel Navon
- Publication Date:
- 11-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
- Abstract:
- Israel is expected by its European interlocutors to condemn Putin over his misdeeds, yet Israel wants to avoid frictions with Russia in order to maintain a free hand to operate against Iranian targets in Syria.
- Topic:
- International Cooperation, Military Strategy, Hegemony, Conflict, Foreign Interference, and Regional Power
- Political Geography:
- Russia, Europe, Iran, Middle East, Israel, and Syria
96. Access for What? Elevating Civilian Protection and Quality Access for Humanitarian Action in Syria
- Author:
- Melissa Dalton and Hijab Shah
- Publication Date:
- 03-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- The Syrian conflict has produced humanitarian consequences of harrowing and tragic proportions. With an estimated 500,000 Syrians killed, the war has prompted the world’s greatest refugee flow since World War II.1 There are 6.2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) within Syria and 5.3 million refugees in neighboring countries (a total 13 million people affected—for context, the total population estimate for pre-war Syria was 20 million). From January to December 2018, there were an estimated 1.6 million population movements.2 Civilian protection is the most important focus for international humanitarian efforts given the complexity of the Syrian conflict, myriad state and non-state armed actors involved, and continuing incentives for parties to the conflict to use humanitarian access as a political tool.
- Topic:
- Political Violence, Humanitarian Intervention, Conflict, and Civilians
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Syria
97. ‘Peace’ in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Yemen
- Author:
- Anthony H. Cordesman
- Publication Date:
- 08-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- In fairness, peace almost always consists of a pause in the fighting that becomes a prelude to war. Taking modern Europe as an example, the Napoleonic wars were punctuated by failed peace attempts, and then led to the rise of Germany and a whole new series of wars with Austria, Denmark, and France. The repressive peace settlements following Europe’s upheavals in 1848 set the stage for decades of new rounds of conflict and revolution. World War I led to World War II, and then led to the Cold War and now to the Ukraine. Nevertheless, the current U.S. efforts to support peace negotiations in Afghanistan and the Middle East seem remarkably weak even by historical standards. In the case of Afghanistan, “peace” is being negotiated without even the same cosmetic level of local government participation that occurred in Vietnam. It is being negotiated when there is no political stability to build upon, and no apparent prospect that the coming election can bring real unity or effective leadership.
- Topic:
- Diplomacy, Military Strategy, Conflict, and Peace
- Political Geography:
- Afghanistan, Africa, Iraq, Middle East, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and Gulf Nations
98. The Return of ISIS in Iraq, Syria, and the Middle East
- Author:
- Anthony H. Cordesman and Abdullah Toukan
- Publication Date:
- 09-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- The U.S., its European allies, and its Strategic Partners in the Middle East achieved a significant victory in breaking up the ISIS protostate – or “caliphate” – in Syria and Iraq. This break up has sharply reduced the fighting against ISIS in Iraq, and in Eastern Syria. The U.S.-led Coalition did not, however, fully defeat ISIS in either Iraq or Syria or eliminate ISIS and other forms of extremism as serious threats. It did not bring lasting stability to Iraq or end the Syrian civil war, and it did not eliminate the threat from ISIS and other extremist groups in the rest of the MENA area. This analysis covers two important aspects of the crisis in Iraq and Syria since the break of the “caliphate.” First, it summarizes key official reporting on the resurgence of ISIS as a serious threat in both Syria and Iraq. Second, it puts ISIS in perspective – showing that it did not dominate the violence and levels of terrorism in Syria even at its peak, and noting that ISIS is only one of the major threats to stability in Iraq.
- Topic:
- Terrorism, Military Strategy, ISIS, and Conflict
- Political Geography:
- Iraq, Middle East, Syria, and United States of America
99. U.S. Complicity in the 2014 Coup in Kiev as a Violation of International Law
- Author:
- A. Vyleghanin and K. Kritsky
- Publication Date:
- 01-2019
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- International Affairs: A Russian Journal of World Politics, Diplomacy and International Relations
- Institution:
- East View Information Services
- Abstract:
- FIVE YEARS AGO, a coup d’état took place in Kiev. Following demon- strations and arson attacks, a mob seized several government institutions, including the administration building and residence of the constitutional- ly elected president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovich. Some members of the Ukrainian president’s security detail who were protecting his residence from illegal seizure were wounded and killed.1 Alexander Turchinov, one of the coup leaders, began serving as the president of Ukraine even though no Ukrainian presidential election had been held. The coup in Kiev led primarily to the U.S. assuming a leading role in Ukraine’s governance – something it had neither during the period of the Russian Empire nor the Soviet era. The February 2014 overthrow of the president in Kiev that took place without elections and in violation of the Ukrainian Constitution de facto divided the country into regions that recognized the new authorities in Kiev and those that opposed the coup (primarily the southern and eastern regions of Ukraine). This occurred not only because the Ukrainian presi- dent was unconstitutionally removed from power but primarily because the “installation” of the putschist government was accompanied by vio- lence, and ethnic and linguistic persecution. In March 2014, the Autonomous Republic of Crimea left the new, “post-coup” Ukraine in accordance with the provision of the UN Charter on the right of peoples to self-determination. Subsequently, following a referendum in Crimea, a treaty on Crimea’s reunification with Russia was signed. A confrontation between the new regime in Kiev* and residents of Donetsk and Lugansk Regions turned into a protracted armed conflict. The forcible replacement in Kiev of a constitutionally elected head of state (Yanukovich) with an unconstitutional leader (Turchinov) directly impacted Russia’s national interests. Russians and Ukrainians lived together within a single state, the Russian Empire, from the 17th century until 1917. During the Soviet period, the border between the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic did not have international legal significance. It was an administrative bor- der. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the independent UN member states (Russia and Ukraine) that replaced them continued to maintain close economic and other ties. Their continued integration, including through joint participation in the Customs Union, objectively met the strategic interests of Ukraine and Russia. A friendly Ukraine is also important to Russia from a national securi- ty standpoint, considering NATO’s expansion toward Russia’s borders that began in the early 1990s – i.e., NATO’s absorption of all former member states of the Warsaw Pact, including Poland and even the former Soviet republics of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Russia’s leadership has repeatedly stressed the inadmissibility of dragging Ukraine into NATO. Words about “fraternal” relations between the peoples of Russia and Ukraine are no exaggeration: Millions of family members (both Russians and Ukrainians) live on opposite sides of the Russian-Ukrainian border,2 and at least one-third of Ukraine’s population speaks Russian as a native language. In this context, it is not surprising that Moscow considered the U.S.- orchestrated seizure of power from the head of state in Kiev an event affecting its vital interests. Something else is remarkable: The U.S. administration said that the events in Ukraine, far away from the American mainland, “constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”4 Westerners promulgated a very different assessment of the forced ouster of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich in 2014. The U.S. called it a “people’s rev- olution” and said that the mob action organized in part by the U.S. ambas- sador in Kiev (including the killing of Berkut fighters, the state guard of the Ukrainian president) was a legitimate way of expressing the will of the “Ukrainian people.”
- Topic:
- International Cooperation, International Law, Military Strategy, and Conflict
- Political Geography:
- Russia, Europe, Ukraine, Middle East, South America, Syria, Venezuela, North America, and United States of America
100. Syria’s Civil War Is Now 3 Civil Wars
- Author:
- Jonathan Spyer
- Publication Date:
- 03-2019
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
- Abstract:
- The fight to depose Assad is over. The battle over his regime’s boundaries has no end in sight.
- Topic:
- Civil War, Terrorism, Military Strategy, Islamic State, and Conflict
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Syria