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Periodicals
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Renewing the Direct Negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians
INSS Insight No. 203, August 26, 2010 |
| Brom, Shlomo |
| Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently announced that direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians will be renewed on September 2, 2010 in Washington. The talks will be launched in the presence of Prime Minister Netanyahu, Palestinian Authority President Abbas, and President Obama; also invited to the inaugural meeting are President Mubarak of Egypt, King Abdullah of Jordan, and Quartet emissary Tony Blair. After the initial meeting, the sides will proceed to direct talks, in the United States or in this region, and continue with active American involvement. A similar announcement was also issued by the Quartet. |
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Bushehr, After All
INSS Insight No. 202, August 25, 2010 |
| Magen, Zvi and Asculai, Ephraim |
| August 21, 2010 marked the official inauguration in Bushehr of Iran’s first nuclear power plant, which was built by Russia. It seems that this event finally put an end to the drawn-out ordeal, which in recent years has been used as leverage for international pressure on Iran and has been riddled with question marks. The plant's inauguration was marked by a celebratory ceremony attended by Iran’s vice president and head of its atomic energy organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, and the head of Russia’s atomic agency (ROSATOM), Sergei Kiriyenko. The operation of loading the 163 nuclear fuel rods from Russia began in advance of the ceremony, thereby launching the preparatory stage for the plant’s start-up, which is slated to take place in late September 2010. |
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Greece: A Strategic Alternative to Turkey?
INSS Insight No. 201, August 20, 2010 |
| Eran, Oded |
| In less than a month the prime ministers of Israel and Greece exchanged official visits; each visit was the first of its kind. It is hard to find a precedent for this proximity of visits in the annals of Israeli diplomacy. |
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The Saudi Arms Deal
INSS Insight No. 200, August 17, 2010 |
| Shapir, Yiftah |
| On August 13, several reports appeared in the US media on plans by the Obama administration to sell arms to Saudi Arabia valued at $60 billion over a period of ten years. The reported deal is supposed to include 84 F-15S jets, approximately 60 AH-64D Apache Longbow assault helicopters, and about 70 UH-60 Black Hawk utility tactical transport helicopters. The deal will also include simulators, upgrades for existing fighter jets, and instructional and maintenance packages. |
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Testimony before the Turkel Commission
INSS Insight No. 199, August 16, 2010 |
| Ben Meir, Yehuda |
| The Turkel Commission investigating the flotilla raid began its deliberations last week. Testifying during the first three days were the three central figures connected with the episode: Prime Minister Netanyahu, Defense Minister Barak, and IDF Chief of Staff Ashkenazi. Testimony by the three, most of which was public, has raised some questions, especially regarding the sensitive and vital interface between the political and military echelons. |
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Ten Questions for the Negotiators with Iran
INSS Insight No. 198, August 8, 2010 |
| Asculai, Ephraim |
| In view of the possibility of renewed talks between Iran and the “Vienna Group” (the US, France, Russia, and the IAEA) one cannot but wonder whether this will be “the real thing” or another Iranian time-buying ploy. Although at first Iran delayed the opening of talks, it later recommended to the Vienna Group not to delay the talks. Contrary to the talks that started with the P5+1 in Geneva on October 1, 2009 that were supposed to deal with the whole spectrum of issues between Iran and the rest of the world, the Vienna Group dealt only with the “swap” – the proposed deal whereby in exchange for 3.5% Iranian enriched uranium Iran would receive 20% enriched uranium in the form of nuclear fuel rods for its Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). Iran first agreed to this deal, then opposed, then agreed to a more favorable (to Iran) deal brokered by Brazil and Turkey, but not accepted by the US. |
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Is the Military Option Back on the Table?
INSS Insight No. 197, August 9, 2010 |
| Kam, Ephraim |
| Over the course of July 2010, a few voices in the United States called for a reassessment of a military option against Iran. Some of these figures refused to identify themselves by name, suggesting that they are part of the security or political establishment. Some former senior officials, however, did identify themselves by name. Most notable among them was the former head of the CIA, General Michael Hayden, who explicitly stated in an interview with CNN that an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities is not the United States' worst option. Hayden noted that when he served as the head of the CIA (until February 2009), the military option was at the bottom of the list, but it now seems more likely since all the steps by the United States have proven insufficient to stop Iran from continuing on its path towards a nuclear weapons capability. Hayden's remarks echoed former senators Daniel Coats and Charles Robb and General Charles Wald, former deputy commander of the United States European Command, who as early as September 2009 published a joint article that called for a strong approach towards Iran: if talks with Iran fail, it is incumbent upon the United States to abandon negotiations, prepare for military action in the Gulf area, consider the option of imposing a blockade on Iran, and as a last resort, consider a military strike on Iran, the inherent dangers notwithstanding. |
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The Exchange of Fire on the Northern Border
INSS Insight No. 196, August 9, 2010 |
| Brom, Shlomo |
| The August 3, 2010 exchange of fire between the Lebanese army and the IDF, which led to causalities on both sides, ostensibly demonstrates the fragility of the ceasefire on the Lebanon border, in effect since the end of the Second Lebanon War in August 2006. The current incident dramatizes a scenario in which an erroneous calculation by one of the sides might spark a far reaching military conflict between Lebanon and Israel. In the media and in the Israeli political arena there were those who were quick to allege a connecting thread between this incident and the firing of rockets from the Gaza Strip to Ashkelon and from Sinai to Eilat and Aqaba. They concluded there was a guiding hand behind all of these incidents: Iran. |
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A Repeat Performance: Hamas, Israel, and the Political Process
INSS Insight No. 195, August 4, 2010 |
| Kurz, Anat |
| In late July 2010, a few weeks before the end of the four month period allotted for the Israeli-Palestinian proximity talks, President Obama called again for a renewal of the direct dialogue between the parties. The responsibility for renewing the negotiations was placed equally on Israel and the PA, although over the past few months a slight change was evident in the atmosphere surrounding the international, and especially the American, effort to put a meaningful political process on track. |
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