By Abd al-Jalil al-Marhoun

Seen through the prism of geopolitics, interactions related to security in the Arabian Gulf are - in principle - closely connected to the reality of more general regional security. This perspective can also be expanded to include the impact on the wider scope of regional and international policies.

There are eight countries that reside on the shores of the Arabian Gulf: the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) - Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, The United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, and Oman - and Iraq and Iran. Traditionally, the Gulf was divided into three zones: Iraq in the north, Iran in the west, and the six GCC countries (also known as the inland Gulf countries) in the east.

By Ramananda Sengupta

'We do have a defence relationship with India, which is no secret. On the other hand, what is a secret is what is the defence relationship. And with all due respect, the secret part of it will remain secret.' - Mark Sofer, Israel's ambassador to India, in a recent interview given to OutlookIndia.com.

India and Israel were born within months of each other. While the former became an independent state on the 15 August 1947, the latter was born on the 14 May 1948, following the decision of the United Nations to partition British Mandate Palestine.

By Juan Cole

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last week in Toronto that, in the wake of the G20 conference, Turkey will no longer routinely give Israeli military aircraft permission to fly in Turkish airspace. The announcement came as Turkey forbade an Israeli military air-plane (taking officers on a visit to the sites of Nazi death camps for Jews in Poland) to fly over its territory. The Turkish press denies that the destination of the plane influenced the decision. Future Israeli military overflight permission will be granted on an ad hoc basis.

By Lamis Andoni

Barack Obama, the US president, is pushing for direct negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians. A resumption of direct talks would be his first "peace-making achievement" in the Middle East since he took office more than a-year-and-half ago. But, barring a surprise halt to Israeli settlement building in occupied East Jerusalem, the Palestinians will not hold direct talks with Israel. And even if the US were to succeed in bringing the two sides together, there will be no breakthrough as long as Israel remains unwilling to end its 43-year occupation.

Exactly a year ago, in June 2009, the then-recently installed American president, Barack Obama, made a landmark speech in Cairo symbolically to "reset" US relations with the Muslim world. He eloquently addressed critical challenges facing the US in the Muslim world and rhetorically offered a new paradigm, a new beginning, for managing relations between "America and Islam".

By Afro-Middle East Centre

On Tuesday, 1 June 2010, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivered a ferocious speech in Turkey's parliament, condemning Israel for its attack on a flotilla of aid ships bound for Gaza, early on Monday 31 May 2010. Between 9 and 16 activists and aid workers - mostly Turkish - were killed in the raid in an act that has seen widespread international criticism for Israel's excessive use of force. South Africa's Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) added its voice to a chorus of international condemnation for the acts leading to the deaths of civilians, issuing a demarche to the Israeli ambassador in South Africa.

Erdogan called Israel's raid on the ships carrying civilians and humanitarian aid "a bloody massacre which deserved every kind of curse". Speaking at a parliamentary group meeting of his Justice & Development (AK) Party, Erdogan said the "predawn attack in the Mediterranean Sea was one of the heaviest blows on the conscience of the humanity." The ship that bore the brunt of the Israeli attack, and on which the killings took place, was flying a Turkish flag and belonged to a Turkish relief organisation.

By Mark Lynch

The Obama administration's new National Security Strategy has been released today. It goes a long way towards providing a coherent framework for American foreign policy and national security. The document explains what the administration has been doing and offers a roadmap to where it wants to go. The most interesting -- and strongest -- part of the NSS deals with the administration's new approach to al-Qaeda. The most problematic is the gap between its strong commitment to civil liberties and the rule of law and its practice thus far with regard to things like drone strikes.

In May 2010, Turkey agreed to a groundbreaking 'uranium trade deal' with Iran. A closer examination of Turkey's foreign policy reveals how it is elevating its position among the society of states.

Remarks by South African Deputy Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Ebrahim I Ebrahim, at the opening of the international conference organised by AMEC on 'Locating Ethnic States in a Cosmopolitan World: The Case of Israel', Colosseum Hotel, Pretoria, South Africa, 12 April 2010

Programme Director,
Distinguished Guests, 
Ladies and Gentlemen

Thank you for inviting me to this Conference whose over-arching theme is a difficult and delicate matter, that of state-craft in a cosmopolitan and ever-changing world.

Programme Director,

I have noticed that the Conference Programme boasts a long list of solid academics, experts and social activists, so indeed I look forward to reading the outcomes of your deliberations on such a critical question. Precisely because of the nature of the theme and related issues that you will be dealing with, I am certain that you will not only confine your deliberations to abstract concepts and theories, but bring them down to basics and reality.

I need not remind this gathering that you will not be dealing with an issue that has remained in the corridors of academia, but is an issue that has impacted on the course of history, that has a direct bearing on a many a human life, and that has been a divisive feature in the discourse on international peace and security. So I hope, most sincerely, that you will assume the task you have placed upon yourselves with the seriousness that it requires.

Istanbul/Brussels: Turkey's sometimes controversial new Middle East activism is an asset to the EU and U.S., and attractive in the region, but only if Ankara pursues its long-standing integration with the West.

Turkey and the Middle East: Ambitions and Constraints, the latest International Crisis Group report, assesses the country's growing regional engagement within the broader frame of its foreign and trade policy. In the past several years, Ankara has launched multiple initiatives aimed at stabilising the Middle East by facilitating efforts to reduce conflicts and engaging in multilateral regional platforms.

The Afro-Middle East Centre (AMEC) is boasting big names for an international conference on Israel that it will host in April in Pretoria. Foreign speakers include Avi Shlaim, Azzam Tamimi, Ali Abunimah, Ilan Pappe and Shlomo Sand, while local speakers include former minister Ronnie Kasrils, former deputy minister Aziz Pahad, and current Deputy Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Ebrahim Ebrahim.

By Ramananda Sengupta

The savage attack on Kabul hotels housing Indian workers on 26^th February 2010 – the fourth major attack on Indian interests in Afghanistan since July 2008 – is part of the proxy war between India and Pakistan fought on Afghan soil. Both South Asian nations see Afghanistan as a critical element of their strategic sphere of influence.

A day before the hotel attacks, though neither side admitted it officially, Afghanistan had brought the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistan together in Delhi. The 25^th February meeting was the first between India and Pakistan since the Mumbai terrorist attack of November 2008.

by International Crisis Group

As a rule, Iraq’s post-Saddam elections have tended to magnify pre-existing negative trends. The parliamentary polls to be held on 7 March are no exception. The focus on electoral politics is good, no doubt, but the run-up has highlighted deep-seated problems that threaten the fragile recovery: recurring election-related violence; ethnic tensions over Kirkuk; the re-emergence of sectarianism; and blatant political manipulation of state institutions. The most egregious development was the decision to disqualify over 500 candidates, a dangerous, arbitrary step lacking due process, yet endorsed by the Shiite ruling parties. Under normal circumstances, that alone might have sufficed to discredit the elections. But these are not normal circumstances, and for the sake of Iraq’s stability, the elections must go on. At a minimum, however, the international community should ramp up its electoral monitoring and define clear red lines that need to be respected if the results are to be considered legitimate. And it should press the next government to seriously tackle the issue – long-neglected yet never more critical – of national reconciliation.

Al-Jazeera Centre for Studies
and Afro-Middle East Centre

The London Conference, held at the end of January 2010 in recognition of, and support for, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, was the sixth  international conference on Afghanistan to be held since the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. It was also a consolidation of the resolutions of the Istanbul Summit, held a few days earlier, which brought together the presidents of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Turkey and called for dialogue with the Taliban or, rather, with “the moderates among them”. The first significance of the London conference is that it revealed the failure of the military option, and gave legitimacy to the Taliban and to whoever has talks with them.

By Henry Siegman

Summary

The continued expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank seems to have finally locked in the permanence of Israel’s colonial project. Israel has crossed the threshold from the Middle East’s only democracy to the only “apartheid regime” in the Western world. But outside intervention may offer the last hope for a reversal of the settlement enterprise and the achievement of a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict. Since the US is no longer the likely agent of that intervention, it is up to the Europeans and to the Palestinians themselves to fashion the path to selfdetermination in the occupied territories. Essential to the success of these efforts is setting aright the chronic imbalance of power between Israel and the Palestinians. If left to their own devices – including, as some have proposed, to reconcile their conflicting historical “narratives” – the further usurpation of Palestinian lands, and the disappearance of the two state option, is all but ensured.

At the end of the phase known as the “Afghan Jihad”, most Arabs and Muslims who participated in the Afghan war returned to their homelands. Some formed the nucleus for the dissemination, in their countries, of the ideas that they carried or developed during the “jihad” period. The al-Qaeda organisation, based on the principle of global jihad, is the most prominent embodiment of these “new” ideas; new when compared to the ways that other Islamic organisations have evolved.

Differences exist in the manner in which the various al-Qaeda “branches” emerged; they vary not only in the means and methods of work but even, in some cases, in their objectives. These differences depend on circumstances prevailing in the countries where each al-Qaeda member organises. Nevertheless, there has been a common understanding that the original birth home – Afghanistan – provides the fundamental guidance to the organisation.

This paper examines al-Qaeda in three critical locations, which recently rose to prominence, in the Islamic world. It discusses the movement and some of its members; the methodology and activities of the organisation; its local and periodic objectives; its ideologies and influence; and will chart future trends for the organisation. The three locations studied here are: Pakistan and Afghanistan, Yemen and the Arabian Peninsula, and Somalia.

Early in December 2009, and after lengthy consultations, United States president Barack Obama announced his strategy in Afghanistan. At first glance, it seemed as if the approach chosen by the U.S. president aimed at the Afghanisation of the conflict; pitting Afghans against Afghans. It also seemed that his plan was based on a specific target date by which he wanted to get American troops out of the battlefield which was inaugurated by his predecessor.

Indeed, Obama’s announcement makes the war in Afghanistan an American war more than in any other period since October 2001, the date that the invasion of Afghanistan began.

By Sourav Roy

Come April 2010, officials from the sleepy Polish municipality of Morag will be gearing up for perhaps their most critical assignment in the new decade. Their job will be to provide Polish military officials overall support for the deployment of American Patriot missiles barely seventy kilometres from the Russian border. Targeted to be fully functional by the middle of this year, the main battery of this missile system will contain up to eight intercepting missiles, manned by about 100 American soldiers deployed at Morag. The Poles recently acknowledged that Morag had been strategically chosen by the Obama administration to offer the best military support and technical propping system for American forces in Europe. In other words, it will help cement America’s position as the big bullying brother in Eurasia.

Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

The first anniversary of Barack Obama’s inauguration as President of the United States came this week. The sharpest criticism of Obama’s first-year record on domestic and economic affairs came from the Nobel prize-winning economist, New York Times columnist, and Princeton professor Paul Krugman.

This line from Krugman encapsulates the concern many of us have:

“I’m pretty close to giving up on Mr. Obama, who seems determined to confirm every doubt that I and others ever had about whether he was ready to fight for what his supporters believed in.”

Unfortunately, this assessment applies just as well to Obama’s approach to foreign policy. For us, Obama was an attractive candidate, first of all, because of his campaign commitment to end not just the war in Iraq but also “to end the mindset” that led the United States into that war. We and others hoped that Obama’s courageous pledge to make “engagement” a pillar of his foreign policy, especially with countries like Iran, would be seriously pursued. In his inaugural address, his first television interview with Al-Arabiyya, and his Nowruz message to “the people and leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran”, Obama’s early references to engaging Iran on the basis of “mutual interests” and in an atmosphere of “mutual respect” seemed promising to many.

by Aisling Byrne

“Sincerely speaking,” said General Dayton, “as far I am concerned, Hamas is a political issue. I do not interfere in this matter.” He continued: “I would appreciate if you do not ask me political questions because, as a soldier, I do not speak in politics.” Such innocuous protests from General Dayton – who, since 2005, has been the US Security Coordinator for the Palestinians – are untrue: Dayton is a political actor who essentially is overseeing and facilitating a process of political cleansing in the West Bank, the consequences of which are damaging, if not disastrous, for the Palestinian national project, for political reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas, and for political engagement and prospects for peace. In essence, Dayton’s work serves to enforce Israel’s occupation, even if this is not its explicit intention.

The United Nations (UN) fact-finding mission on the Israeli attacks on Gaza from December 2008 to January 2009 has slammed Israel for committing serious war crimes and breaches of humanitarian law, saying that these may amount to crimes against humanity.

The 575-page report (6.8MB) by the four-person mission, headed by South African Judge Richard Goldstone, was released on 15 September 2009, and a presentation to the UN’s Human Rights Council in Geneva is scheduled for 29 September.

The Afro-Middle East Centre (AMEC) hosted an academic seminar in which specialist historian, Faisal Devji, presented a paper on "al-Qaeda, Jihad and the Democratization of Islamic Authority".

The presentation focused mostly on an analysis of the rhetoric of al-Qaeda. Devji proposed that the group uses the language of "human rights" to carry out its operations.

He also focused on the opportunities for new forms of Islamic authority to be borne out of opposition to al-Qaeda, specifically democratized authority. The text of Devji's presentation can be read here.

The Afro-Middle East Centre (AMEC), yesterday hosted a dinner for Malaysian former Deputy Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim, with a number of community leaders, activists and politicians.

Anwar was the Deputy Prime Minister of Malaysia, serving under Mahathir Muhammad, from 1993-1998. He also served as Minister of Finance of Malaysia from 1991 to 1998, and, before that, as Education Minister.

The Executive Director of the Afro-Middle East Centre, Na'eem Jeenah, last week presented two papers at a conference convened by the Osgoode Hall Law School at York University in Toronto, Canada. About 60 speakers presented papers at the conference, which had the theme "Israel/Palestine: Mapping Models of Statehood and Paths to Peace".

The three-day conference, from the 22 to the 24 June 2009, attracted some 200 participants from all over the world. Despite attempts by the Zionist lobby in Toronto to pressurise the Canadian government, which indirectly funded the event, to review the conference, it went ahead and was a massive success. The first day witnessed a protest outside the university gates organised by the Jewish Defense League.

Na'eem's first paper was entitled "Islam, Islamists and Statehood in Palestine". The second paper, which was co-authored with Salim Vally, Senior Researcher at the Education Policy Unit at the University of the Witwatersrand, was entitled "The National Question and a future Palestinian/Israeli state and society: Comparisons with South Africa".

The Afro-Middle East Centre invites women to register for an eight-day introductory Arabic language course. This intensive course aims to provide a solid foundation in the Arabic language, with a focus on conversation and reading. Women of all ages are welcome to apply to attend the course, which hopes to provide a comfortable and somewhat-informal learning environment. Course participants will also be invited to attend an Arabic Expo on Saturday, 4th July, where Arabic teachers and students will interact.