via LobeLog
by Mitchell Plitnick
When is a coup not a coup? When calling it that carries repercussions that make a bad situation worse.
US President Barack Obama is struggling with recent events in Egypt. Once again he’s presented with a situation in the Middle East where he has few good options but is [...]
via LobeLog
by Peter Jenkins
So many thoughtful analyses of the significance of Dr. Hassan Rouhani’s election are already in circulation that part of me thinks I ought to spare LobeLog readers one more. As a compromise, I will limit my focus to the election’s implications for a peaceful resolution of the dispute [...]
via Lobe Log
by Mitchell Plitnick
The Obama Administration’s options for avoiding deeper involvement in Syria are dwindling fast. With Russia and Hezbollah increasing their activities on the Syrian front, Obama may have a very hard time fending off the growing domestic and international pressure to take action, if that is what he still [...]
by Charles Naas
At last the Obama Administration has found a reasonable Syria policy. The critics will continue to insist that the US provide arms to the rebels, but it will be difficult to get more traction for this while the initiative with the Russians holds out hopes, although slender, for the beginning of [...]
by Jim Lobe and Joe Hitchon
WASHINGTON, May 18 2013 (IPS) – A nuclear-armed Iran would not pose a fundamental threat to the United States and its regional allies like Israel and the Gulf Arab monarchies, according to a new report released here Friday by the Rand Corporation.
Entitled “Iran After the Bomb: [...]
by Peter Jenkins
Listening, on 15 April, to the House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on US policy towards Iran put me in mind of the inscription Dante imagined over the entrance to Hell: “Abandon hope all you who enter here”.
There seemed no notion among members of the committee that territories beyond the borders of [...]
by Jim Lobe
via IPS News
The surprise accord reached by the U.S. and Russia in Moscow Tuesday to try to convene an international conference to resolve the two-year-old civil war in Syria as soon as the end of this month has been greeted with equal measures of hope and scepticism.
If nothing [...]
via Lobe Log
by Mitchell Plitnick
All eyes are on US President Barack Obama as he contemplates how to deal with the fact that the Syrian government might have crossed a red line he never should have drawn. The Israelis, even while abstaining from pressuring Obama to act in Syria, meanwhile know [...]
via Lobe Log
by Jim Lobe
Apart from a few misjudgements, I think my explanation of the motivations and non-motivations of the invasion of Iraq on its eve stands up pretty well. But you should be the judge. Following is a piece I did on January 30, 2003 for IPS News.
Why Is [...]
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Iranian Elections: Netanyahu, Neoconservatives Are the Big Losers
via LobeLog
by Mitchell Plitnick
Outside of Iran, there is no doubt that the biggest losers in Iran’s election this past weekend were the Likud government in Israel and its supporters, especially neoconservatives, in the United States.
The response of Israel’s Prime Minister to the election of centrist candidate Hassan Rouhani as [...]