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Begin New Search Content Type Policy Brief Author David Makovsky

41. Netanyahu's Victory: Major Challenges for the Likud Party

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
12-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Former Israeli prime minister and recently resigned finance minister Benjamin Netanyahu won the Likud leadership primary on December 19, beating the foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, by a margin of 45 percent to 33 percent. Netanyahu returns to the leadership of Likud, which he vacated after his loss in the 1999 election. Netanyahu's victory comes a day after Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon suffered what his doctors called a mild stroke; he was released from the hospital within forty-eight hours. At seventy-seven, Sharon already shares the record for the oldest Israeli prime minister; David Ben-Gurion was seventy-seven when he resigned in 1963. Sharon turns seventy-eight in February.
Topic:
International Relations, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Middle East and Israel

42. Campaign Season Begins in Israel (Part II): Labor's New Leader, Amir Peretz

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
11-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Amir Peretz's decision to pull the Labor Party he leads out of its national unity government with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon set Israel's new political calendar and precipitated Sharon's decision to bolt the Likud Party and consent to elections in March 2006. Peretz is a veteran labor union leader who won the leadership of the Labor Party on November 10, defeating Shimon Peres, a dominant force in the party since 1974.
Topic:
Development, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Middle East

43. Campaign Season Begins in Israel (Part I): Ariel Sharon Bolts from Likud

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
11-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On Monday, November 21, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon announced that he is bolting the Likud Party and forming a new National Responsibility Party. The Knesset took a preliminary vote to dissolve itself. While wrangling may continue, a final date will soon be set for elections in March 2006. Sharon remains prime minister during the interregnum.
Topic:
Development, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Middle East and Israel

44. Abbas's Missed Opportunities in Washington

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
10-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas returned to Ramallah from Washington last week having missed a key opportunity to spur President George W. Bush to reengage in the Roadmap. Instead, the October 20 joint press conference at the White House concluded with Bush acknowledging that his presidency may not witness the creation of a Palestinian state by 2008. His administration, Bush said, might merely “lay that foundation so that the process becomes irreversible.” The same administration that two years ago endorsed the Quartet's Roadmap to Israeli-Palestinian peace based upon a detailed schedule of commitments now expresses hesitancy on committing to any “timetable” for the creation of a Palestinian state. Bush administration policy has always had a performance-based rather than a time-based approach, but now it is not putting down any time markers.
Topic:
International Relations and Government
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

45. Toward a Quartet Position on Hamas: European Rules on Banning Political Parties

Author:
David Makovsky and Elizabeth Young
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
A key issue in the runup to January's Palestinian parliamentary elections is whether the radical Islamist party Hamas will be allowed to participate and under what conditions. Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and foreign minister Silvan Shalom have insisted that the group disarm, disavow terror, and end its call for Israel's destruction before it is permitted to run in elections. Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas has favored an unconditional acceptance of Hamas's electoral participation, believing that it could coopt Hamas within the Palestinian political fold. However, he said in a Washington Post interview published on September 11, 2005, "A political party plus a militia is unacceptable," but he did not elaborate specific plans that would prevent Hamas from participating in elections as both party and militia.
Topic:
International Relations, Religion, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Europe, Washington, Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

46. Post-Gaza Crises for Religious Zionism in Israel

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Israeli disengagement from Gaza and the northern West Bank settlements has left in its wake three important crises for the religious Zionist movement that spearheaded settlements in Israel. These crises involve the settlers' future relationships with the Israeli public, the Israeli state, and the political secular right. For settlers, these three relationships are now colored by a sense of betrayal, raising the question of whether disengagement will radicalize the ideological settlers.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Relations, and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, and Gaza

47. Sharon, Netanyahu, Disengagement, and Likud Leadership

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
An immediate consequence of Israel's disengagement from Gaza was Benjamin Netanyahu's August 7 resignation as finance minister, making a Likud Party leadership challenge between him and Ariel Sharon virtually inevitable. What will be the impact of such a challenge on Sharon's policy in the postdisengagement period? And how would a Netanyahu challenge affect the chances of a split within the Likud—and perhaps a broader realignment of Israeli politics?
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, and Peace Studies
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, and Gaza

48. On the Verge of Gaza Disengagement

Author:
David Makovsky, Dennis Ross, and Michael Herzog
Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On August 4, 2005, Dennis Ross, Brig. Gen. Michael Herzog, and David Makovsky addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Ambassador Ross, the Institute's counselor and Ziegler Distinguished Fellow and former U.S. Middle East peace envoy, has just returned from a month in the region. General Herzog of the Israel Defense Force is a visiting military fellow at The Washington Institute. Formerly the senior military aide to the minister of defense, he was also an Israeli peace negotiator. Mr. Makovsky, senior fellow and the director of the Project on the Middle East Peace Process at The Washington Institute, is author of the Institute monograph Engagement through Disengagement: Gaza and the Potential for Israeli-Palestinian Peacemaking. The following is a rapporteur's summary of their remarks.
Topic:
International Relations, Peace Studies, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Gaza

49. Gaza Disengagement: Ideological and Political Challenges for the Settlement Movement

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
05-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon's decision to disengage from Gaza and parts of the northern West Bank beginning this summer has earned him the ire of the 8,000 people living in the twenty-five settlements scheduled for evacuation. It has also generated opposition among the quarter-million settlers living in the remainder of the West Bank and their sympathizers within Israel proper. This PeaceWatch seeks to analyze the ideological and political challenges that disengagement poses to these settlers. Future PeaceWatches will examine other aspects of disengagement, including the challenge that settlers pose to disengagement.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Israel, Gaza, and Czech Republic

50. Assessing the Upcoming Bush-Sharon Summit: Clarifying Ambiguity

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On April 11, 2005, President George W. Bush will host Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon at his ranch in Crawford, Texas. The meeting comes at a key juncture, given Israel's planned disengagement from Gaza and the northern West Bank. Mr. Makovsky, who recently returned from a ten-day trip to Israel, the West Bank, Egypt, and Jordan, discussed the upcoming summit at The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum on April 7. This PeaceWatch is based on his remarks.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Gaza, Egypt, and Czech Republic