A decade after the initial Oslo Accord was signed in 1993, public opinion on the process it spawned was divided between those who believed it was a promising initiative to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace that was tragically derailed, and those who insisted that it lacked the rudimentary elements of a meaningful peace process. Today, those who… Continue reading Palestinians Continue to be Haunted by the Ghosts of Oslo
Afkar Country: Palestine-Israel
The Persistent Illusion of Palestinian Reconciliation
Representatives of 14 Palestinian political factions, including Fatah and Hamas, were invited to the Egyptian coastal city of El-Alamein on July 30, 2023 for reconciliation talks hosted by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Facing challenges from the recurrent and increasingly violent onslaught by Jewish settlers and Israeli occupation forces throughout the West Bank since the beginning of… Continue reading The Persistent Illusion of Palestinian Reconciliation
Will the Saudi-Iran Rapprochement change anything for the Palestinians?
Amid the zeitgeist of diplomatic rapprochement and normalization in the Middle East—which has recently seen Saudi Arabia and Iran mend ties and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad welcomed at this month’s Arab League summit—the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas took a step forward to repair its own regional relationships. In mid-April, a delegation of senior Hamas officials, led… Continue reading Will the Saudi-Iran Rapprochement change anything for the Palestinians?
Biden’s Strategic Neglect of Palestine is Bound to Backfire
Since the start of its term, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has been reluctant to engage substantively with the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Instead, it has focused its limited efforts on perpetuating the status quo, on the pretext that circumstances are not conducive to initiatives to change it. What can be described as a policy… Continue reading Biden’s Strategic Neglect of Palestine is Bound to Backfire
Could Israel’s New Government Spell the End of the Palestinian Authority?
Israel’s new government, widely seen as the most far-right in its history, has wasted no time ramping up pressure on the Palestinian Authority. The latest volley of travel restrictions against top officials, financial pressure and construction freezes are not new in themselves. But viewed in the context of statements by members of the new cabinet,… Continue reading Could Israel’s New Government Spell the End of the Palestinian Authority?
As PA Loses Grip Over West Bank, Israel Scrambles to Save It
In the northern West Bank cities of Jenin and Nablus, Israeli military raids have become a near-nightly occurrence. So far this year, Israeli soldiers have killed more than 80 Palestinians in the West Bank—the most since 2015—and arrested hundreds of others, in what amounts to a far-reaching campaign to crush Palestinian resistance groups that have… Continue reading As PA Loses Grip Over West Bank, Israel Scrambles to Save It
Twenty Years of Governance Reform: What’s Next for the MENA Region?
In 2002, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) produced a remarkable and far-reaching document titled the Arab Human Development Report. Written largely by Arab authors, the report mobilized a wealth of data to argue persuasively that the lack of socio-economic development within the Arab region is the product of three fundamental deficits in freedom, knowledge,… Continue reading Twenty Years of Governance Reform: What’s Next for the MENA Region?