- April 28, 2024
Middle East
Israeli Conundrum: ‘How to Deal with Iran’
By RAMZY BAROUD Israeli officials face a conundrum that may take more than military muscle-flexing to resolve: how to deal with Iran? The solution to this dilemma will require no less than sheer political genius. It must be frustrating for Israeli policymakers and their friends and backers elsewhere to stand idle as Iran openly carries […]
Forget the Headlines: Iraqi Freedom Deferred
By RAMZY BAROUD As US combat troops redeployed to the outskirts of Iraqi cities on June 30, well-staged celebrations commenced. The pro-US Iraqi government declared “independence day” as police vehicles roamed the streets of war-weary Iraq in an unpersuasive show of national rejoicing. US mainstream media joined the chorus, as if commemorating the end of […]
Ahmadinejad Re-elected: Israel and Obama’s Iran Puzzle
By RAMZY BAROUD The election victory of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is likely to complicate US President Barack Obama’s new approach to his country’s conflict with Iran. The reason behind the foreseen obstacle is neither the US nor Iran’s refusal to engage in future dialogue but rather Israel’s insistence on a hard-line approach to the […]
Obama’s Speech: Great Oratory, Wrong Message
By RAMZY BAROUD If great oratory is a prerequisite to peace, justice, and human rights, then President Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo, on June 4, shall be enough to cure every ill afflicting every Muslim nation. But since rhetoric never solved any real problem, one is left to question the wisdom behind Obama’s touted speech, […]
Can Obama Work His Magic on Arabs?
By RAMZY BAROUD Among many major misconceptions pertaining to Arabs and Muslims is the common belief that they are a weak-willed, irrelevant collective, easily influenced and effortlessly manipulated. This mistaken assumption underscores the very ailment that has afflicted US foreign policy in the Middle East for generations. As media pundits and commentators began their drum-rolling in […]
Netanyahu’s New Quest: The Game is On
By RAMZY BAROUD "We’ve accomplished quite a few things, and I think the most important one is to cement the principle that the path to peace is through negotiations and not through violence." These were the ‘encouraging’ words modestly uttered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, during a joint press conference with the US president. […]
Clinton’s Unpromising Start
By RAMZY BAROUD Incongruous. One can hardly think of a more suited term to describe the new US administration’s approach to peacemaking in the Middle East. Though there is little evidence that previous US administrations had genuinely attempted to play a balanced role in forging a just peace between Israel and the Palestinians, many hoped […]
Middle East ‘Spies’: A New Front for Gaza’s Conflict
By RAMZY BAROUD The reverberations of the Israeli war on Gaza are still felt throughout the Middle East. One could in fact speak of a silent war being waged in the region. Now that Israel’s clear intentions in Gaza – discrediting Hamas and ultimately ousting them from their democratically elected position – resulted in utter […]
Not the Last Dispatch: Al-Zaidi Story Just Beginning
By RAMZY BAROUD On December 14, 2008, Iraqi journalist, Muntazer Al-Zaidi threw his shoes at then-US President George W. Bush. On February 20, 2009, Al-Zaidi received a short trial of 90-minutes by the Baghdad Central Criminal Court. On March 12, Al-Zaidi was sentenced to three-years in prison for assaulting a head of state during an […]
Durban II: Politicizing Racism
By RAMZY BAROUD Many countries are set to participate in the Conference against Racism, scheduled to be held in Geneva, April 20-25. But the highly touted international meet is already marred with disagreement after Israel, the United States and other countries decided not to participate. Although the abstention of four or more countries is immaterial […]
Change the Lobby
By RAMZY BAROUD One cannot emphasize enough the stranglehold Israel’s lobbying infrastructure has on US foreign policy. The events of recent weeks undoubtedly attest to this. “The special relationship” that has been historically fostered between the US and Israel in fact, is often a relationship of leverage, manipulation and intimidation, and often leads to the […]
For Palestinians, Obama’s Message is Crystal Clear
By RAMZY BAROUD When former President George W. Bush departed for his final trip home, that very moment represented an end of a long and unbearable nightmare, one that Bush epitomized until his last day in office. Americans may decry what we can finally dub as the ‘Bush legacy’, for it brought economic ruin, but […]
Gaza: A New Middle East Indeed
By RAMZY BAROUD As Israel unleashed its military fury against Lebanon for several weeks in July-August 2006, it had one major objective: to permanently ‘extract’ Hezbollah from the South as a fighting force, and to undermine it as a rising political movement, capable of disrupting, if not overshadowing the ‘friendly’ and ‘moderate’ political regime in […]
Unscripted: Green Zone Theater and the Shoe Drama
By RAMZY BAROUD The plot, so unexpectedly, thickened in Iraq on a Sunday like no other. The two main actors – US President George W. Bush, and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki – took to the stage to perform another well-rehearsed press conference. The scripts were ever so predictable: Bush to tout the ‘progress’ achieved […]
Iraq’s ‘Remarkable’ Security Charade
By RAMZY BAROUD World media rashly celebrated the ‘historic’ security pact that allows for US troops to stay in Iraq for three more years right after the Iraqi parliament ratified the agreement on Thursday, November 27. The approval came one week after the Iraqi cabinet did the same. Thousands of headlines invaded media outlets, largely […]
Unsettling Signs: Buzzwords, Politics and US Elections
By RAMZY BAROUD There are a few buzzwords that every American politician, aiming for high office must utilize, even if disingenuously, to have a reasonable chance at getting elected. President-elect, Barak Obama’s constant use of terms like ‘hope’ and ‘change’ contributed greatly to the overwhelming support he has experienced by the American public. Many, admiringly […]
Bush’s Last Bullet: Why the US Attacked Syria
By RAMZY BAROUD The sovereignty of an independent, stable country that has carried out many constructive moves in recent months and weeks, which could have surely contributed to the stabilization of the Middle East, has been violated, its borders breached and its civilians killed. But when the country targeted is Syria, an Arab country, and […]
The Palin- Biden Debate: High Time to Move Beyond Clichés
By RAMZY BAROUD One should rightly assume that the weight of the US financial crisis, the full impact of which is just beginning to unravel, and the widening military debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan, would compel new thinking amongst leading US politicians. And then again, maybe not. Aside from tactical and rhetorical differences, presidential candidates […]
Life after Bush: Forecasting Peace in Palestine
By RAMZY BAROUD President Bush sounded much less uncertain of his peace "vision" when he received Palestinian Authority’s Mahmoud Abbas in Washington on Sept. 25. Certainly much has changed since the Nov. 2007 conference in Annapolis, Maryland, where Bush and his secretary of state Condoleezza Rice exhorted that a Palestinian state can only be created […]
The Syria-Israel Peace Gambit
By RAMZY BAROUD Few would argue that the indirect Israel-Syria talks through Turkish mediation, which were first announced 21 May, were a sign of political maturity and readiness for peace. In fact, while the discussions seemed concerned with the occupied Syrian Golan Heights and Israel’s desire for security at its northern borders, the true objective […]
Global Realignment: How Bush Inspired a New World Order
By RAMZY BAROUD The series of unfortunate and costly decisions made during the two terms of the Bush administration, combined with economic decline at home, might devastate the US’s world standing much sooner than most analysts predict. What was difficult to foresee was that the weakening of US global dominance, spurred by erratic and unwise […]
Obama Joins the Club
By RAMZY BAROUD The exit of Bush from the White House is already anticipated in the Arab region with sighs of relief. But what is ahead under the next US president; more of the same, regardless of who wins, or change? True, Obama has promised some degree of withdrawal from Iraq and a level of […]
Legalizing Occupation: Bush’s Last Manoeuvre in Iraq
By RAMZY BAROUD When US forces descended on Baghdad five years ago, they seemed unstoppable. Military arrogance had reached an all time high, and it seemed only a matter of time before the same frenzied scenario took place in Teheran, Damascus, and elsewhere. As it turned out, festivities began dwindling almost as soon as they […]
Engaging Syria: Losing Ground
By RAMZY BAROUD On 15 May, President Bush gave a speech before the Israeli Knesset decrying "radicals and terrorists" (basically anyone who opposes the United States and Israel). His archaic references to the "promised land" and "chosen people" certainly appealed to the equally outdated and exclusivist views of many, though not all, Israeli Knesset members […]
John Hagee’s Not-So-Bright Vision
By RAMZY BAROUD The recent uproar surrounding Pastor John Hagee is only remarkable in the sense that it took so long in coming. The fundamentalist pastor of the 19,000-member Cornerstone "mega-church" in San Antonio, Texas has long shown himself to be not just anti-Semitic, but also anti-Islamic and anti-Catholic. It doesn’t take much probing to […]
US Terrorism Report: Selective Data, Wrong Lessons
By RAMZY BAROUD The data provided in the US State Department’s annual terrorism report for 2007 points to some interesting if puzzling conclusions. The much publicised document, made available 30 April via the State Department’s website, makes no secret of the fact that Al-Qaeda is back, strong as ever. It also suggests that violence worldwide […]
The US Palestine-Israel Fairytale
By RAMZY BAROUD A memorable quote in Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer Abroad (1894) still carries a wealth of relevance. He writes, "They own the [holy] land, just the mere land, and that’s all they do own; but it was our folks, our Jews and Christians, that made it holy, and so they haven’t any business […]
The Coming Uncertain War against Iran
By RAMZY BAROUD When Admiral William J "Fox" Fallon was chosen to replace General John Abizaid as chief of US Central Command (CENTCOM) in March 2007, many analysts didn’t shy from reaching a seemingly clear-cut conclusion: the Bush administration was preparing for war with Iran and had selected the most suitable man for this job. […]
Will Iraq War Define US Elections?
By RAMZY BAROUD As the race for the presidential nominations progresses, the stances of and attitudes towards both Republican and Democratic candidates continue to bring up causes for concern, in terms of their past behaviour, current appeal and general trustworthiness. Republican Mitt Romney’s exit has practically assured Sen John McCain’s victory in his party. While […]
Guantanamo as a Symbol
By RAMZY BAROUD 11 January marked the sixth year anniversary of the establishment of the Guantanamo detention camp. Mere months after the start of the 2001 United States invasion of Afghanistan, a large cargo plane landed in a US military base in Cuba’s Guantanamo Bay, bringing in a group of hunchbacked, orange-clad, blindfolded, "terrorist" suspects, […]
