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61. International Intervention in Gaza: Options and Obstacles

Author:
Scott Lasensky
Publication Date:
06-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
The international response to the Hamas takeover of Gaza has largely focused on building support for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, including announcements by the United States and the EU that the 15-month aid embargo was ending, with assistance to be channeled through the "emergency" government led by Salam Fayyad. But the Hamas takeover has also led to a variety of calls for greater international intervention in Gaza, well beyond the work of the UN and other aid agencies, the Egyptian mediation team, and the European Union monitoring force at the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention and International Relations
Political Geography:
Middle East, Arab Countries, and Egypt

62. Iraq's New Political Map

Author:
Phebe Marr
Publication Date:
01-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
In 2006, a new group of Iraqi leaders came to power through elections. In the absence of strong bureaucratic and military institutions, the qualities and skills they bring to bear and their capacity and willingness to cooperate, especially across ethnic and sectarian lines, will determine whether Iraq collapses into chaos or moves forward toward stability. Three characteristics of these leaders are striking. First is how new and inexperienced most of them are. Rapid political mobility and change in ministers was prevalent in previous cabinets, but it has intensified in this government. This degree of change has made it difficult for leaders to acquire experience in national governance, create institutions, establish networks across ministries, and cultivate constituencies outside the central government. Second, the current leadership is still dominated by “outsiders”—exiles who have spent much of their adult life outside Iraq, or by Kurds who have lived in the north, cut off from the rest of Iraq. Most of these exiles have spent time in Middle Eastern, not Western, societies. “Insiders” who lived in Saddam's Iraq and endured its hardships are still a minority. This fault line between insiders and outsiders helps explain some of the lack of cohesion in the government. Third, and most important, many of the current leaders have spent the best part of their adult life engaged in opposition to the Saddam regime, often in underground or militant activities. Those who had any affiliation with, or simply worked under, the old regime have still found it very difficult to gain entry. The result has been a profound distrust between the new leadership and those with some association with the old regime. The continuation of the insurgency has helped this political struggle metamorphose into an ethnic and sectarian war. A fourth parameter is emerging as significant: the development of political parties and groups, often accompanied by militias. While ethnic and sectarian divisions in Iraq have grabbed most of the headlines, it is these parties and their constituencies that are shaping the political agenda and are likely to be determinative in the future. The most important of these parties now occupy seats, not only in the assembly but in the government. They include the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), Da'wah, and the Sadrist movement in the dominant Shi'ah United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), the Kurdistan Democratic party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) in the Kurdistan Alliance, Tawafuq (Iraqi National Accord) among the Sunnis, and the weaker Iraqiyyah (Iraqi) ticket among the secularists. Each of these parties has different positions on issues and different constituencies to satisfy; in a number of cases these cross ethnic and sectarian divides. Among the most important of these common interests are (a) economic development, (b) oil legislation, (c) management of water resources and the environment, and (d) the role of religion and the state. Even more divisive issues, such as federalism and a timetable for withdrawal of multinational forces, find allies on one or another side of these issues among different ethnic and sectarian groups. This suggests that despite ethnic and sectarian strife, a new political dynamic could be built in Iraq by focusing on one problem at a time and dealing with it by encouraging party, not communal, negotiations. Although such agreements will take time, they may provide a means of gradually building much-needed trust and a network of people and institutions that can work across ethnic and sectarian boundaries. Such a process will have a far better outcome over the long term—an intact, more durable Iraqi state, than the ethnic and sectarian divisions now being pushed by events on the ground and by some outside policy analysts.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and Kurdistan

63. The Bottom Line on Iran: The Costs and Benefits of Preventive War versus Deterrence

Author:
Justin Logan
Publication Date:
12-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
It appears increasingly likely that the Bush administration's diplomatic approach to Iran will fail to prevent Iran from going nuclear and that the United States will have to decide whether to use military force to attempt to delay Iran's acquisition of a nuclear weapons capability. Some analysts have already been promoting air strikes against Iran, and the Bush administration has pointed out repeatedly that the military option is “on the table.” This paper examines the options available to the United States in the face of a prospective final diplomatic collapse.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Economics, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Iran, and Middle East

64. Iraq's Evolving Insurgency and the Risk of Civil War

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
04-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The rising insurgency in Iraq has become a “war after the war” that threatens to divide Iraq and thrust it into full-scale civil war. It dominates the struggle to reshape Iraq as a modern state, has become a growing threat to the Gulf Region, and has become linked to the broader struggle between Sunni and Shi'ite Islamist extremism and moderation and reform throughout the Islamic world.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Islam, and Insurgency
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and North Africa

65. Dividing Iraq: Think Long and Hard First

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
05-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
I was originally asked to address the five areas where our country has the most need to invest more for its security. This, however, is not the approach I would currently take to either issues involving national security or federal spending. In fact, my approach is almost the opposite. I am not a “spend without taxing” Republican, and I don't find much to celebrate in a President and Congress that have done the worst job of fiscal management in our nation's post-World War II history, if not our nation's entire history.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention and Development
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and North Africa

66. Iraq and the Kurds: The Brewing Battle over Kirkuk?

Publication Date:
07-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
As all eyes are turned toward efforts to stabilise Iraq, the conflict that has been percolating in Kirkuk remains dangerous and dangerously neglected. That struggle is equal parts street brawl over oil riches, ethnic competition over identity between Kurdish, Turkoman, Arab and Assyrian-Chaldean communities, and titanic clash between two nations, Arab and Kurd. Given the high stakes, the international community cannot afford to stand by, allowing the situation to slip into chaos by default. It needs to step in and propose a solution that addresses all sides' core concerns without crossing their existential red lines. The most viable negotiated outcome, which a special UN envoy should mediate between leaders of Kirkuk's communities as well as representatives of the federal government and the Kurdish federal region, would rest on the following provisions: Postponing the constitutionally-mandated referendum on Kirkuk's status which, in today's environment, would only exacerbate tensions; Designating Kirkuk governorate as a stand-alone federal region falling neither under the Kurdish federal region nor directly under the federal government for an interim period; Equitable power-sharing arrangements between Kirkuk's four principal communities; and continued reversal of past abuses, including managed return of those who were forcibly displaced by previous regimes; facilities and compensation for those brought by previous regimes (including their offspring) who agree to leave voluntarily; resolution of property disputes via the established mechanism; and a process by which former Kirkuk districts can either be restored to Kirkuk governorate or remain where they are.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention and Security
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, Kurdistan, and Kirkuk

67. One Year after the Cedar Revolution: The Potential for Sunni-Shiite Conflict in Lebanon

Author:
David Schenker
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Acting Lebanese interior minister Ahmad Fatfat arrived in Washington June 20 for his first official visit in his new capacity. The U.S. trip comes one month after a radical Sunni Islamist organization was legalized in Lebanon, and just weeks after thousands of Shiite Hizballah supporters rioted in Beirut after the broadcast on LBC television of a comedy skit satirizing Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah. These developments highlight growing tensions between Sunnis and Shiites in Lebanon. Unchecked, this dynamic could lead to a resumption of the type of conflict that has long plagued Lebanon and threaten the gains of the Cedar Revolution.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Development, and Religion
Political Geography:
United States, Washington, Middle East, and Lebanon

68. Preventing Turkey's Popular Slide away from the West

Author:
Soner Cagaptay
Publication Date:
04-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Iran's nuclear program presents one more issue on which Washington sees Middle East developments in a different light than does the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government in Turkey. Since coming to power in November 2002, AKP leaders have pursued rapprochement with Damascus and enhanced dialogue with Iran. In March 2006, the AKP welcomed Hamas leaders in Ankara. It is surprising that Turkey, a traditional bastion of Western policies in the Middle East, is promoting close ties with anti-Western actors that have hurt Turkey for decades—Syria provided safe haven to the terrorist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and Iran supported the PKK and radical Islamist terrorists. Why do the Turkish people not resent such policies? The Iraq war and the U.S. agenda for political transformation in the Middle East have clashed with the Turkish people's desire to preserve the Middle Eastern political landscape. What is more, U.S. inaction against the PKK's Qandil enclave in Northern Iraq is angering most Turks in the way Syrian and Iranian support for the PKK upset them in the 1990s. Turkish confusion and anger toward the United States stands in sharp contrast with the improved image of Syria and Iran in Turkey. Meanwhile, with AKP discussing Middle Eastern politics in terms of Islamic codes, some Turks now identify with the region through Islam and not their national identity. The challenge for Washington is to find a way to prevent Turkey's popular slide away from the United States.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Iran, Washington, Turkey, Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Syria

69. After Intervention: Public Security Management in Post-Conflict Societies - From Intervention to Sustainable Local Ownership

Author:
Anja H. Ebnöther and Philipp H. Fluri
Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Austrian National Defence Academy
Abstract:
The transition from interventionist (military) peace-keeping to local (civilian) ownership of public security management has proved not only to be a severe challenge for most peace-keeping operations and their civilian administrators, but also a reason for such operations being prolonged at tremendous cost. In many cases, peace-keeping operations and/or other international agents rapidly became part of the local economy, and thus contributed to the preservation of the status quo rather than to a sustainable process leading toward local governance; meanwhile local police organs - often remnants of the winning force in the antecedent conflict - remained tribal or clannish in their approaches and interests. They could thus hardly be seen as enforcement agencies of a law which remains equally applied to all citizens.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Conflict Prevention, Security, Development, International Organization, and War
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and Balkans

70. Iran's Security Challenges and the Region

Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:
The following summary addresses key aspects that emerged from the discussion at the Ninth Liechtenstein Colloquium on European and International Affairs held in Triesenberg, Principality of Liechtenstein on March 17-20, 2005. The colloquium focused on Iran and included an in-depth discussion of the nuclear issue. Since the LCM is conducted under strict off-the-record rules, no attribution is provided. Attending participants included high-level Iranian offi cials involved in the ongoing negotiations with the EU, as well as representatives and experts from the United States, the EU, Russia, and India.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Security, Nuclear Weapons, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, Iran, Middle East, and India