AMMAN -- French President Nicolas Sarkozy has confirmed he will make a landmark visit to Syria on Sept. 3-4 in another step toward normalizing their ties and bringing Damascus back into the international fold by reversing a policy of exclusion that has in recent years alienated the country from the West.
JERUSALEM -- The war of words between Israel and Iran, and their proxies and paymasters, is becoming more belligerent as the Middle Easts two arch-enemies display their military prowess before the international media in a further attempt to intimidate each other.
EDITORIAL
The extraordinary European Union summit that French President Nicolas Sarkozy has called for Monday looks likely to decide not simply Europes policy toward a resurgent and aggressive Russia which is talking of a new Cold War, but also the degree to which the worlds richest economy will in future seek to play a diplomatic role to match its wealth.
OPINION
As election time in the United States and Israel draws nearer, the public discourse regarding the "Iranian nuclear threat" is intensifying. Both candidates vying for the U.S. presidency, and a few who would like to win the Israeli prime ministership, have been portraying Iran as a live bomb and an immediate threat to world peace. Indeed, Iran is not a paragon of virtue. Its aspirations exceed by far those that were described in the December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate, which turned around a previous assessment from 2005.
A course about al-Qaida and the rise of international terrorism was one of the most popular last terms at Harvards elite Kennedy school of government. The international students crowding into the schools largest auditorium for the twice-weekly classes were a cross-section of Americans, Europeans and Middle Easterners, and current members of the U.S. army and intelligence community on sabbatical leave. Simply attending it gave me a sense of where tomorrows Western and Westernized elites stand vis-à-vis "the long war."
