From the Middle East Quarterly*

Following a lengthy period during which Hamas bombarded southern Israel unopposed, Israel finally attacked Gaza in an attempt to cripple Hamas’s fighting capabilities. The ensuing conflict in December 2008 and January 2009 led to a high casualty count on the Palestinian side. Even before the war ended, the U.N. Human Rights Council, a body thought biased against Israel, met at the behest of the Organization of the Islamic Conference in a special session to condemn the Israeli assault and to call for a mandate to carry out a fact-finding mission designed to investigate the conflict.

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By Barry Rubin

I’m not going to bash or rant about a Newsweek article about Turkey by Owen Matthews–shocking and dangerous as it is–but rather talk about what is wrong and inaccurate about it. That article is part of a new wave of defeatism sweeping the West, though it still remains subordinate to the more ostensibly attractive idea that there is no real conflict or at least one easy to fix by Western concessions.

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by Daniel Pipes*

The arrest and indictment of top military figures in Turkey last week precipitated potentially the most severe crisis since Atatürk founded the republic in 1923. The weeks ahead will probably indicate whether the country continues its slide toward Islamism or reverts to its traditional secularism. The denouement has major implications for Muslims everywhere.

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By Barry Rubin

The Department of Defense has just released its new Quadrennial Defense Review Report for 2010. What does it say about the Middle East? Far less than you’d expect in terms of space but still some extremely important points about what might involve the United States in future wars there.

Aside from some scattered references on the need for more civilian nation-building experts, funding the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and energy conservation efforts (that’s an area, no doubt, where money could be saved), that region takes up less than two pages, about two percent, of the 97-page report.

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By Barry Rubin

“War,” said General William Tecumseh Sherman, “is Hell.” He knew what he was talking about. Sherman’s march through Georgia and into South Carolina at the end of the Civil War helped end the Civil War while destroying a lot of civilian homes, farms, and towns.

His strategy was to inflict such terrible punishment on the South that it would surrender faster, thus saving lives. His men did things shocking to Americans even after such a bloody conflict, burning plantations and destroying everything in their wake. Ironically, though, even Sherman’s deeds have been exaggerated.

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By Jonathan Spyer

In the last week, senior Israeli policymakers made statements of an uncharacteristically bellicose nature regarding Syria.

It is unlikely that these statements were made because of sudden random irritation toward Israel’s hostile northeastern neighbor. Rather, the statements probably constituted part of a message of deterrence to Damascus.

The need to project deterrence itself derives from a series of significant changes currently under way on the ground in Lebanon — reflecting Syria’s ever tighter alignment with Hizbullah and the pro-Iranian regional bloc of which it is a part.

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by Patrick Knapp*

The Obama administration is caught on the horns of a dilemma. On the one hand, it has welcomed the Gulf Security Dialogue (GSD) as a chance to further “mutual interests” with Persian Gulf states, but, on the other, it has sought pragmatic engagement with the Islamic Republic–the greatest threat to gulf security. Michael Knights, a Persian Gulf expert at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, noted in September that the “rapid advances” of the military forces of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) were the result of the dialogue. He predicts that they “may eclipse Iranian capabilities in the gulf within ten years.”[1] Yet the GSD’s initiatives are inadequate and need a foreign policy that stresses relationships and ideals. If policy within the gulf is to be dominated by short-term pragmatic demands, it may turn out to have unwanted consequences for other alliances in the region. That in turn could well have a negative impact on the United States.

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by Andrew Whitehead

The military is considering charges against at least eight officers who “failed to use ‘appropriate judgment and standards’ in overseeing the career of” Army Maj. Nidal Hasan, and that their actions should be investigated immediately.”

Hasan stated, in front of colleagues, that “non-believers were infidels condemned to hell who should be set on fire”. Remarkably, he made this statement at an hour-long presentation on the Koran in front of dozens of fellow officers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Hasan was supposed to be speaking to medical issues, not the Koran and Islam.

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by Raymond Ibrahim*

Islam must seem a paradoxical religion to non-Muslims. On the one hand, it is constantly being portrayed as the religion of peace; on the other, its adherents are responsible for the majority of terror attacks around the world. Apologists for Islam emphasize that it is a faith built upon high ethical standards; others stress that it is a religion of the law. Islam’s dual notions of truth and falsehood further reveal its paradoxical nature: While the Qur’an is against believers deceiving other believers — for “surely God guides not him who is prodigal and a liar”[1] — deception directed at non-Muslims, generally known in Arabic as taqiyya, also has Qur’anic support and falls within the legal category of things that are permissible for Muslims.

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by Daniel Pipes*

Invited recently by the newly formed Pechter Middle East Polls to ask three questions of 1,000 representative Egyptians and 1,000 urban Saudis, the Middle East Forum focused on Iran and Israel, the countries that most polarize the region. The results are illuminating.

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A briefing by Shannen Rossmiller*

Shannen Rossmiller is a former judge and pioneer of cyber counter-terrorism. Her work has led to the capture of several Al-Qaeda operatives. Regarded an expert on spotting the signs of Islamist radicalization, she contributed to a 2008 Pentagon study — a study which, according to her, was not only ignored due to political correctness, but could have prevented the Fort Hood massacre. On December 15, Ms. Rossmiller addressed the Middle East Forum via conference call.

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by Michael Rubin*

Announcing the results of his administration’s first policy review on Afghanistan more than eight months ago, President Barack Obama declared, “I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaida in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future.” To achieve those goals, the president explained, “we need a stronger, smarter and comprehensive strategy.” Unfortunately, the strategy Obama announced tonight will not achieve it.

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by Daniel Pipes*

When a Muslim in the West for no apparent reason violently attacks non-Muslims, a predictable argument ensues about motives.

The establishment — law enforcement, politicians, the media, and the academy — stands on one side of this debate, insisting that some kind of oppression caused Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, to kill 13 and wound 38 at Ft. Hood on Nov. 5. It disagrees on the specifics, however, presenting Hasan as the victim alternatively of “racism,” “harassment he had received as a Muslim,” a sense of “not belonging,” “pre-traumatic stress disorder,” “mental problems,” “emotional problems,” “an inordinate amount of stress,” or being deployed to Afghanistan as his “worst nightmare.” Accordingly, a typical newspaper headline reads “Mindset of Rogue Major a Mystery.”

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Politically correct incompetents within our own military ignored warning signs that Fort Hood terrorist Major Nidal Malik Hasan was some kind of Islamist nutcase. Thirteen innocents are dead and at least 16 are wounded at the hands of this murderer. So now we find that, “Hasan worshipped at a mosque led by a radical imam said to be a ’spiritual adviser’ to three of the hijackers who attacked America on Sept 11, 2001.” From the UK’s Telegraph:

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By Jonathan Spyer

The explosion in the south Lebanese village of Tayr Felseir offers the latest evidence of the way in which Hizbullah is rebuilding its infrastructure following the Second Lebanon War in 2006. In the pre-2006 period, Hizbullah maintained its military infrastructure in open countryside areas often declared off-limits to all but the movement’s personnel. The rebuilt infrastructure, by contrast, has been constructed within the fabric of civilian life in south Lebanon. This process has taken place largely undisturbed by the Lebanese and UN military personnel conspicuously deployed throughout the south.

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