The Kurdish forces now provide the necessary boots on the ground in the framework of Operation Inherent Resolve. However, the strong backing of the Kurds presents a number of challenges and difficult balancing acts for Western and regional actors.
Topic:
Political Violence, Defense Policy, and Counterinsurgency
The European council's decisions on the common Security and Defence policy (CSDP) in December 2013 and the process that now follows should be used by EU member states as a means to progressively empower the CSDP within a short-term future.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Regional Cooperation
The greatest challenge to the stability of the Arctic actually comes from outside the region itself, but there are still strong reasons to be optimistic about security in the Arctic region.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Climate Change, and Natural Resources
Social accountability as a tool for development planning is gaining foothold in international donor circles. It is concerned with the responsibility and responsiveness of state authorities, as well as the ability of citizens to make claims and hold those who exercise power to account for their actions.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment
Ensuring gender equality with respect to land rights is hailed as a key element of the recent land reforms, but actual results in this respect are limited. Achieving gender equality requires a comprehensive focus on land, family and other laws, including customary, pertaining to land and on their implementation on the ground.
Topic:
Civil Society, Gender Issues, Governance, and Reform
The group's legal challenge will likely succeed for now, but the EU can reinstate the ban by relying on the plethora of evidence from European terrorism cases involving Hamas. In the latest sign of the legal troubles facing the European Union's designation regime -- the authority under which governments can freeze funds and economic resources of illicit actors -- the EU General Court is expected to annul the terrorist designation of Hamas on December 17. The judgment comes on the heels of a similar action in October that annulled the Council of the European Union's designation of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on similarly procedural grounds. Although the new judgment is not expected to acquit Hamas of charges related to violence, it comes at a time when the group's terrorist and militant activities are on the rise. And like the LTTE, Hamas will surely point to the judgment as "evidence" that it is not a terrorist entity.
Incitement by Palestinians and Israelis against each other should be penalized rather than explained away or dismissed. The omnibus spending bills just passed by the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives include one obscure yet potentially significant provision on the issue of incitement in the Israeli-Palestinian arena: a reiteration of the requirement that the Palestinian Authority (PA) act to end its official incitement against Israel as a condition for continued U.S. funding. This provision should be enforced, not evaded as has been the case until now.
Matthew Levitt, Prince Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, and Hedieh Mirahmadi
Publication Date:
12-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
An in-depth conversation on the challenges of battling jihadist ideology in the ISIS era. On December 16, His Royal Highness Prince Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein of Jordan, Matthew Levitt, and Hedieh Mirahmadi addressed a Policy Forum at The Washington Institute. HRH Prince Zeid is the UN high commissioner for human rights. Levitt is the Institute's Fromer-Wexler Fellow and director of the Stein Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence. Mirahmadi is the director of World Organization for Resource Development and Education (WORDE), a nonprofit dedicated to preventing radicalization. The following is a rapporteur's summary of their remarks.
The conservative Gulf Arab states are functioning more cohesively again after a year of diplomatic tensions, but questions persist about political reform, economic integration, and demographic issues. The thirty-fifth annual Gulf Cooperation Council summit, held December 10 in Qatar, was probably the most efficient meeting the group has ever held. With the diplomatic schism between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain papered over three weeks earlier, Emir Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani hosted the rulers of Kuwait and Bahrain, as well as senior substitutes for the ailing leaders of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Oman.
Political Geography:
Kuwait, Arabia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, and United Arab Emirates
Absent more robust international intervention, the regime remains essentially unopposed in the air, allowing it to continue pursuing its strategic objectives and killing civilians with relative impunity. Prior to the ongoing civil war, the Syrian Arab Air Force (SAAF) was never considered a key component of the Syrian military. Routinely bested by the Israeli Air Force and equipped with a mostly aging fleet of Soviet-era aircraft, it was not seen as an important player in the regional military landscape. The war has changed that, however, raising the SAAF to a prominent role in the struggle to preserve the Assad regime. Since spring 2012, air operations have become a strategic element in the conflict, allowing the regime to strike anywhere in the country with virtual impunity, contributing to the opposition's failure to consolidate control of territory, and supporting a wide variety of military operations. Along the way, the air force has been involved in some of the worst regime attacks on civilians. The SAAF's central role in regime preservation and human-rights violations make it a logical and morally justifiable target for foreign intervention, whether in terms of direct allied air operations or enhanced assistance to the opposition.