Middle East and North Africa

Palestinian Territories

  • Middle East and North Africa
    Why is Norway Glorifying Terror?
    Why is Norway glorifying the murder of children? The best single explanation for why it has been impossible to achieve an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement is that Palestinians continue to honor terrorists who murder Israelis, and to teach their children that such killers are Palestine's greatest citizens and models. Dalal Mughrabi was the leader of the "coastal highway massacre" of 1978, a bus hijacking in which 37 Israelis, including 12 children, were murdered. She has three schools named after her, plus parks, plazas, and the like. Now she has a new "cultural center" named after her--and Norway helped pay for it. The invaluable Palestine Media Watch tells the story: In another show of admiration for terrorist murderers and according to the Palestinian Authority's policy of presenting them as role models for Palestinian youth, the Palestinian NGO "Women's Technical Affairs Committee" (WTAC) has named a youth center for women after the terrorist murderer who led the most lethal attack in Israel's history.   The Dalal Mughrabi Center is a joint initiative of the NGO, the PA, the UN, and the Norwegian government! The center's name sign prominently includes the logos of: - The PA Ministry of Local Government  - UN Women - The Norwegian Representative Office to the PA  Last year, Norway acted to ensure that its considerable aid to the Palestinians does not go into cash payments to convicted terrorists. But it is still supporting terror. This new center "will focus especially on the history of the struggle of Martyr Dalal Mughrabi and on presenting it to the youth groups...." In other words, its focus is teaching children that killing Israelis is the most admirable thing a Palestinian can do. And Norway is paying. A similar situation in Europe, or in Norway itself, is unthinkable: Would they permit a youth center named after Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian who killed 77 people in 2011? But when it comes to killing Israelis, a different morality appears to apply. Norwegians should consider their country's contribution to the "Martyr Dalal Mughrabi Center," the official name, to be a continuing source of shame. UPDATE: Norway has acted. The Foreign Minister has demanded that Norway's name be taken off the Center, and has demanded that Norwegian aid moneys used be refunded. Hats off to Oslo for this quick reaction to Palestine Media Watch. But here's a question: why does it take an NGO to discover this?  Why don't donors like Norway keep track themselves? How many other examples are there where European aid moneys are being spent to glorify terror?
    Blog Post by Elliott Abrams May 26, 2017 Pressure Points
  • Donald Trump
    President Trump’s Peace Efforts Require A Regional Approach
    President Donald Trump’s non-stop flight from Riyadh to Tel Aviv is being described as the first ever non-stop flight between Saudi Arabia and Israel. That the Saudis allowed this direct flight, usually banned, reflects the fact that the relationship between Israel and Saudi Arabia, like that of Israel with a number of Gulf states, has been quietly but perceptibly thawing in recent years. This thaw reflects the growing convergence between Israel and the Sunni states of the Arab world, all who share a view that Iran is the biggest threat to their security and regional stability. Matching that convergence was the message conveyed by President Trump, first in Saudi Arabia and then in Israel, of a geo-strategic shift in U.S. policy. It was just one year ago that then-President Obama, seeking a modus vivendi with Tehran, said that America’s Gulf allies need to “share the Middle East” with the Iranians. That view of the Middle East was decisively repudiated this week, with Trump clearly aligning the United States with the majority of the Sunni Arab world, and Israel, against Iran. Yet despite this shift and some hints of an improved tone, President Trump carried no explicit public message of peace from Riyadh to Tel Aviv on Air Force One. Nor did he explain—either in Riyadh, or in Israel—the specific possibilities for peace between Israel and the larger Arab world. Instead, President Trump focused on Palestinian President Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu as the committed partners for peace, adding only that the Arab world would like to see the two leaders reach a bilateral agreement. Without integrating the leaders of the Arab states he just met in Riyadh into a new framework for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, President Trump is unlikely to achieve the peace he seeks. The Arab states have a crucial role to play, both in incentivizing the Israelis to make sacrifices for peace, and in supporting the Palestinians in concluding a conflict-ending agreement with Israel. Perhaps most striking was President Trump’s choice not to mention the Arab Peace Initiative (API), which Israel and the Arab states agree can serve as a basis for a comprehensive approach. While the API, when proposed by Saudi Arabia in 2002, originally offered peace between Israel and the Arab world after a complete Israeli withdrawal to boundaries existing prior to the 1967 Six Day War, the proposal has since been modified by the Arab states to make it more palatable to Israel. For several years now, the Arab states have suggested that the plan can serve as a basis for negotiations, and that progress toward Israeli-Palestinian peace can be met with parallel progress toward peace between Israel and other Arab states. Recognizing these changes, Netanyahu last year broke over a decade of official Israeli silence and spoke positively at the Knesset of the API. Contrasting with President Trump’s focus on Israeli-Palestinian peace and his relative silence regarding a regional approach are the comments of Israeli and Arab officials themselves. In Riyadh, it was Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Jubeir who praised President Trump for going to Israel as part of an effort to move away from conflict toward partnership. And it was Netanyahu who noted alongside President Trump that the only variable that may have changed to make peace more attainable is the regional environment, noting that “common dangers are turning former enemies into partners. And that’s where we see something new and potentially something very promising.” Perhaps in the weeks and months ahead, President Trump will seek to exploit the regional goodwill he hinted at and which exists to facilitate Israeli-Palestinian peace. Other than the new Middle East regional environment, there is little to suggest that myriad obstacles that have prevented a bilateral peace agreement between Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Abbas before can now be overcome, particularly pursued the same tried and tested way through direct bilateral negotiations. Unless President Trump adopts a new approach—one that integrates the Arab states as active participants in support of a deal, not as bystanders to another round of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations—there is scant reason to believe the new U.S. president will have any greater success in brokering a peace deal between these two Middle Eastern leaders than did the previous administration.
    Blog Post by Robert Danin May 22, 2017 Middle East Matters
  • Palestinian Territories
    Palestinian President Abbas’ Washington Challenge
    Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas faces one of the greatest negotiating challenges of his political career on Wednesday when he meets President Trump at the White House: He must convince many skeptics in Washington that he is willing and able to sign the “ultimate deal” that President Trump seeks. As the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) leader, Abbas has twice before been presented far-reaching peace proposals—once by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in 2008, and a second time by President Obama at the White House in March 2014. In both instances, Abbas did not reject the offers. Nor did he say yes. Instead, he did not relate to them, thereby leaving the question lingering to this day for many outside observers as to whether the 82-year old president is too constrained to provide yes for an answer. It is not that Abbas has failed to demonstrate political courage in his life-long career rising through the ranks of the PLO. He was among the vanguard of those Palestinians committed to non-violence in the nationalist struggle with Israel. Advocating peaceful reconciliation with Israel was politically risky and personally dangerous. He continues to boost security coordination with Israel, despite domestic pressure to abandon these efforts. Yet since becoming the leader of the Fatah party, the PLO, and the Palestinian Authority (PA) all at once, he has also projected an image of passivity and rigidity within negotiations with Israel. This is not to exonerate the role Israel plays on the other side of the table or others facilitating those talks. But it does raise questions about Palestinian limitations. Today, Abbas faces a paradox: The only way he can realize his avowed goal of ending the conflict and establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital is through negotiations with Israel. Yet he is deeply constrained from negotiating concessions necessary to realize these goals. A President Without Gaza One source of constraint is structural-- his rule extends to only part of the territory previously controlled by the Palestinian Authority. He lost control over Gaza when Hamas fighters violently took over the coastal strip in 2007. Since then, Palestinians have lived with two rival leaderships: Abbas’ Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas’ Islamist rule in Gaza. Historically, Hamas has been the champion against a two-state solution and Abbas’ non-violence, negotiations, and security cooperation with Israel. The assumption during negotiations since 2007 has been that a peace deal will attract Palestinians away from Hamas and its rejectionism once the Palestinian people are presented with the prospect of the benefits of an agreement. Yet the opposite has seemed to be far more likely: Hamas is poised like a sniper to shoot down any agreement or progress towards peace, labeling possible negotiating concessions Abbas makes as a betrayal of the Palestinian patrimony. When meeting President Trump on Wednesday, the Palestinian leader will have to explain how he can overcome Hamas’ spoiler role and help produce an agreement, despite the Gaza leadership’s opposition. Abbas will likely point to recent measures he has taken against Hamas in Gaza, such as cutting fuel subsidies and electricity payments, to demonstrate his willingness to challenge Hamas' leadership. A Legitimacy Crisis A second major constraint on Abbas’ ability to sign a peace agreement is his own flagging political standing. He is in the thirteenth year of a presidential term that was originally meant to be limited to four years with no sign of new elections anytime soon owing to the territorial split with Gaza. Abbas has also failed to appoint a deputy or successor for any of his top leadership roles as head of Fatah, head of the PLO, and head of the PA. Abbas recently sought to bolster his standing last November by holding a General Conference of his ruling Fatah party. While that move may have temporarily solidified his standing and set back rivals, Fatah is hardly popular. The last time Fatah and Hamas competed in parliamentary elections, Fatah candidates took a beating in what was seen mainly as a protest vote against them. In the subsequent decade, Fatah has done little to reform or rejuvenate itself and thereby remove the sources of popular discontent. As Ghaith al-Omari, a former negotiator and advisor to Abbas, points out, the Palestinian leadership is facing a “severe legitimacy deficit” due to its failures to deliver political achievements and its “record of poor governance and corruption and its highly restrictive grip on political space.” Omari notes, “If these issues of legitimacy remain unaddressed, no leader can conclude peace—no matter what the terms of the deal may be.” Challenged Within His Base This lack of popularity and fledgling legitimacy has contributed to a third challenge now facing Abbas: an incipient leadership challenge within his own Fatah party. Just two weeks ago, Marwan Barghouti, the Fatah leader imprisoned by Israel on five counts of murder and membership in a terrorist organization, launched a hunger strike that is as much a challenge against Abbas as it is against Israel. Barghouti, often polled as the most popular Palestinian rival to Abbas, was one of those marginalized by Abbas last November. He kicked off this hunger strike of over a thousand Palestinians imprisoned in Israel with an op-ed in the New York Times portraying himself as an illegitimately-incarcerated Palestinian Nelson Mandela. As Abbas prepared for his upcoming meeting with President Trump, businesses and schools were shuttered throughout the West Bank and East Jerusalem in solidarity with the prisoners. In flexing this political muscle from prison, Barghouti is not only challenging Abbas’ leadership, but further constraining the Palestinian president’s freedom to maneuver in Washington and in future dealings with the prisoners’ jailers: Israel. A Decisive Moment President Abbas meets on Wednesday a new U.S. president keenly interested in forging a comprehensive conflict-ending peace agreement, not in pursuing an open-ended peace process. Abbas must now convince President Trump on this visit that, despite the recent negotiating history and seemingly insurmountable Palestinian constraints, he can conclude the peace agreement Trump seeks. Moreover, he must decisively answer the question that looms large for many in Washington: Does Abbas seek a legacy as the man who ended the conflict with Israel and created a Palestinian state? Or does he seek to be the nationalist leader who stood tough resisting Israel and international pressure, albeit peacefully, and refused to concede one inch of Palestine’s historic rights?
    Blog Post by Robert Danin May 1, 2017 Middle East Matters
  • Palestinian Territories
    Teaching Palestinian Children to Value Terrorism
    Peace between Israel and the Palestinians does not, fundamentally, depend on who is doing the negotiating, how skilled they are, and other such diplomatic matters. Fundamentally it depends on the desire for peace. A new study of Palestinian textbooks finds that Palestinian children are being taught to glorify and value terrorism and violence. The study, called "Palestinian Elementary School Curriculum 2016–17: Radicalization and Revival of the PLO Program," was conducted by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (in Jerusalem) and can be found here. The study's summary begins with this:               The new Palestinian curriculum, which includes new textbooks for grades 1–4, is significantly more radical than previous curricula. To an even greater extent than the 2014–15 textbooks, the curriculum teaches students to be martyrs, demonizes and denies the existence of Israel and focuses on a “return” to an exclusively Palestinian homeland.   Within the pages of the textbooks children are taught to be expendable. Messages such as: “the volcano of my revenge”; “the longing of my blood for my land”; and “I shall sacrifice my blood to saturate the land” suffuse the curriculum. Math books use numbers of dead martyrs to teach arithmetic. The vision of an Arab Palestine includes the entirety of what is now Israel, defined as the “1948 Occupied Territories.”   That is not the way to prepare children for peace. Here is how the grade 4 math textbook teaches math:               The number of martyrs of the First Intifada during 1987–93 totaled 2026 martyrs, and the number of martyrs of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Intifada in the year 2000 totaled 5,050 martyrs while the number of the wounded reached 49,760. How many martyrs died in the two Intifadas?   Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will be in Washington this week. The teaching and glorification of terrorism and violence should be at the top of the agenda with him. For decades, such matters were considered peripheral to the serious business of diplomatic negotiations. But the negotiations start, stop, and go nowhere. Meanwhile another generation of Palestinian children learn in schools and play in parks named after murderers. That's what is really serious, and that's what Mr. Abbas should be confronted with this week.                        
    Blog Post by Elliott Abrams May 1, 2017 Pressure Points
  • Israel
    The New York Times Calls a Convicted Terrorist a "Parliamentarian"
    Today the New York Times ran an op-ed by Marwan Barghouti, and described him as "a Palestinian leader and parliamentarian." Period. In his op-ed, Barghouti states that he was first arrested at age 15, then again at age 18, and he alleges physical abuse by Israeli interrogators. But nowhere does the Times tell readers what he was convicted of doing. Here is an account of the proceedings from the Washington Post in 2004: Barghouti was found guilty of ordering attacks that killed a Greek Orthodox monk in the West Bank in 2001, an Israeli at the Jewish settlement of Givat Zeev in 2002 and three people at the Seafood Market restaurant in Tel Aviv in 2002. He was also convicted of one count each of attempted murder and membership in a terrorist organization.... Television news footage of the trial showed Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian legislature, responding to the convictions in a low voice, saying in Hebrew, "This is a court of occupation that I do not recognize. "A day will come when you will be ashamed of these accusations," said Barghouti, 44. "I have no more connection to these charges than you, the judges, do. The judges cannot judge on their own. They get their order from above." The three-judge panel said there was insufficient evidence to prove Barghouti's guilt in another 21 deaths that were originally part of the indictment.... Israeli Justice Minister Yosef Lapid said, however, that the verdict "demonstrates the independence of the Israeli courts. The fact that in most of the accusations he is found not guilty is clear evidence that his case was given a fair trial." The Israeli newspaper Haaretz gave further detail:   The court ruled that Barghouti was directly responsible for a January 2002 terror attack on a gas station in Givat Zeev in which Israeli Yoela Chen was murdered. The attack, the judges said, was carried out at his direct order in revenge for the assassination of Raed Carmi. Barghouti had admitted his responsibility for this attack.   The attack in which a Greek monk was murdered in Ma'aleh Adumim on June of 2001 was also carried out at the instruction of Barghouti, the judges said. The former Tanzim leader, the court ruled, also approved the March 2002 attack at Tel Aviv's Seafood Market restaurant in which three people were murdered, as well as a car bomb attack in Jerusalem.   Didn't Times readers have the right to know any of this? They did, and the by-line the Times allowed Mr. Barghouti is a shameful abdication of responsibility to readers.
    Blog Post by Elliott Abrams April 17, 2017 Pressure Points
  • Israel
    The Trump Administration Settles In on Settlements
    Israeli settlement activity has been in the news this past week because the Trump administration is steadily defining its policy. What has emerged is a good policy: sensible, flexible, and realistic. Which is to say, it’s a lot like Bush policy. Obama policy had made construction in the settlements a sore point for eight full years. This was one reason among many for the constant tension between the government of Israel and that of the United States during all of Mr. Obama’s term in office. What are the terms of the agreement between the Netanyahu government and the Trump administration? First, there is no written agreement and that’s a good thing. There are understandings. That means there can be some arguments, but no accusations that "you’re violating what you signed!" Second, the Trump administration understands that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital and does not view construction there as "settlement activity." Third, there will be no new settlements built except the one being created for the people evicted from Amona, a settlement deemed illegal by the Israeli Supreme Court. Netanyahu apparently persuaded the administration that he had made that commitment last year, before the Trump presidency, and needed to keep it. Fourth, new construction in settlements in the West Bank will be in already built-up areas, or if that’s impossible, as close to them as possible. Fifth, there will be some restraint in the pace of settlement expansion. Sixth, apparently Netanyahu agreed not to permit new "outposts" to be built--small groups of houses erected without government permission. And finally, there will be no annexation of land in the West Bank. This is very close to the Bush-Sharon understandings of 2003 and 2004. Our "deal" was no new settlements, no seizure of additional land for settlements, construction in already built-up areas, and no financial inducements to move to a settlement (e.g. a cheap, government-provided  mortgage). The goals are the same: to limit the physical expansion of settlements so that the Israeli footprint in the West Bank does not become larger and larger; to keep most population growth in the larger blocks that will remain with Israel in any final status agreement; and to prevent this issue from occupying center stage and being a constant irritant to the two governments. This is smart. The alternative approach, that of the Obama administration under George Mitchell, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, and Barack Obama, was not. By treating all construction--in Jerusalem, the major blocks, and the smallest outlying settlements--exactly the same, that Obama approach created a huge Israeli consensus against U.S. policy. The Trump approach is politically sensible: most Israelis do not think of construction in Jerusalem or the big settlements like Ma’ale Adumim to be anything like construction in some tiny settlement far beyond the Israeli security barrier. So this deal should be sustainable. There will no doubt be arguments, as noted, over some questions: for example, is some new apartment house really as close to the already built-up area as it can be? But we dealt with such matters in the Bush years. The prime minister’s office would call, we’d discuss what was planned, and we would not allow these things to sour the terrific relationship between the president and the prime minister, or between the two governments. That’s the way it should be, and that appears to be what President Trump has in mind.  
    Blog Post by Elliott Abrams April 2, 2017 Pressure Points
  • Israel
    What’s the Palestinian Contribution to Peace?
    The Trump administration’s Middle East policy is developing, and most recently a key adviser to the President, Jason Greenblatt, visited Jerusalem and Ramallah. The full content of his talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials is secret, as it should be. Still, it is clear that the President would like to move the parties forward toward a peace agreement. According to various press reports there was a good discussion of how Israeli settlement activities might be limited, and of steps that might be taken to improve the Palestinian economy. These are important subjects to cover, but there is another one that simply must be on the table (and perhaps it was). The list of subjects must include with what the Palestinians will give, not just what they will receive. Prof. Efraim Inbar, founding director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, put it this way in a critical commentary on Mr. Greenblatt’s visit:   He stressed how important it was to President Trump to stimulate the Palestinian economy and improve the quality of life for Palestinians. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assured Greenblatt that he is fully committed to broadening prosperity for the Palestinians and sees it as a means of bolstering the prospects for peace. According to the press release, the two discussed concrete measures that could support and advance Palestinian economic development. It is odd to offer carrots to the Palestinians before they have committed to returning to the negotiations table they left in March 2014. The impulse to give out carrots displays the conventional wisdom of the international community (including Jerusalem): that the Palestinians must be well fed to prevent their erupting into violence. This attitude has led to continuous financial support to the PA despite the growing awareness that a large proportion of that aid is channeled to terrorists and their families. Short-term calculations of this kind only prolong the conflict. Indeed, the campaign of terror that started in September 2000, dubbed the Second Intifada, took place after several years of economic progress during which the Palestinian standard of living was the highest in history. The many carrots provided did not overcome the Palestinians’ appetite for political achievements; nor did it channel their energies from terror to the negotiating table.   The channeling of aid to terrorists and their families to which Prof. Inbar refers is the payment to convicted terrorists by the PLO. Congress is increasingly hostile to continuing American aid while that continues, and already the UK has stopped giving any cash to the Palestinians for this reason. There is also the matter of "incitement," meaning statements and actions by the Palestinian Authority (PA) that glorify terror and demonize Israel and Jews. In the last few decades, under presidents of both parties, the United States has said this must stop but has never penalized the PA when it did not. To repeat, Trump policy is just taking shape and we do not know what forms of pressure were or will be put on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. But what we do know for sure is that, as Prof. Inbar says, it would be a mistake to give the PA and PLO concessions in return for nothing and then hope for the best. It would be a mistake to reward Abbas merely for returning to negotiations he should never have left and that are not a favor to the United States or to Israel. As Trump policy develops, let’s hope it treats the Palestinians as political actors (not objects of charity) with the power to make consequential decisions. And wrong decisions should have consequences, as should correct ones.  
    Blog Post by Elliott Abrams March 22, 2017 Pressure Points
  • Israel
    U.S.-Israel Relations
    Podcast
    CFR's James M. Lindsay and Robert Danin examine President Donald J. Trump's priorities on Israel.
    Podcast with James M. Lindsay , Robert McMahon and Robert Danin February 17, 2017 The President’s Inbox
  • Israel
    President Trump: Peace Processor
    President Donald Trump’s evolving views on Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict appear to be coming into greater focus as he prepares to welcome Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House later this week. Over the past few months, Trump has expressed two broad sentiments seemingly in tension with one another. In his first interview after the November 2016 vote, then President-elect Trump reiterated a previously expressed desire to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, calling it “the ultimate deal.” His desire to pursue such a deal has been matched, however, by a second strand of thinking, reflecting an admiration not only for Israel but also for its far-right settlers. The Israeli settlement movement opposes the idea of a Palestinian state and seeks Israel’s annexation of the entire West Bank. The president seemed to be reinforcing his earlier financial support for the settlement enterprise when he appointed staunch settler supporter and fundraiser, David Friedman, to become the next U.S. ambassador to Israel. Friedman immediately announced his intention to live in Jerusalem, not Tel Aviv, since, he suggested, President Trump would soon be recognizing the Holy City as Israel’s capital. For months, many Middle East observers have wondered how President Trump will reconcile these two strains in his thinking—the quest for the ultimate deal and his support for the settlers who claim all the land as their own. One indicator emerged over the weekend when Israel’s largest circulation Israeli daily newspaper, Israel Hayom, published an interview with President Trump. The president had dined at the White House the night before with the free tabloid’s pro-settlement founder and financier, Sheldon Adelson. In a seeming rebuke to his dinner guest of the night before, President Trump clearly stated his concerns about continued Israeli settlement activity and their potential to impinge upon peace-making: “The [settlements] don’t help the process, I can say that. There is so much land left. And every time you take land for settlements, there is less land left.” That could only have meant: land left for the Palestinians. But lest there remain any ambiguity, President Trump stated clearly: “I am not somebody that believes that going forward with these settlements is a good thing for peace.” At that moment, President Trump acknowledged not only the tension between continued settlement expansion and peace making efforts with the Palestinians, but his clear preference for peace-making. In doing so, Trump fell into line with 50 years of American thinking that has seen Israeli West Bank settlement expansion as unhelpful, at best. Lest the Israel Hayom interview be taken as a one-off, Netanyahu disclosed yesterday to his cabinet that two days after his inauguration, President Trump had privately informed the prime minister of his intention to pursue an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal. Told by Netanyahu that the Palestinians are unwilling to make a deal, Trump’s response was, according to the Israeli leader: “They (the Palestinians) will want, they will make concessions.” Having been put on notice by Trump of his intention to pursue Israeli-Palestinian peace, Netanyahu told his cabinet: “we mustn’t get into a confrontation with him.” How President Trump intends to pursue peace and how he will succeed where his predecessors have all stumbled is yet to be determined. It seems that President Trump himself is not yet sure. He is taking a decidedly different approach in launching his efforts than that of his predecessor, President Barak Obama, who announced his intention of resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with fanfare just two days after his inauguration. In contrast, President Trump is gradually revealing his intentions while consulting in an uncharacteristically low-key fashion with regional partners. Yet Donald Trump, in one stark and unmistakable way, is no different than the eight presidents that preceded him: He is clearly and unambiguously a peace-processor.
    Blog Post by Robert Danin February 13, 2017 Middle East Matters