In-Depth Coverage

Original Commentaries

11/20/08: Pakistan: Learning the Right Lessons from Iraq —Senator Robert P. Casey, Jr. (D-PA), Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Original Commentary for Middle East Bulletin.
11/13/08: The View from Gaza —Taghreed El-Khodary, New York Times journalist in Gaza and Harvard University Nieman Fellow (2005-2006). Interviewed by Middle East Bulletin.
11/04/08: Getting on the Right Track —Dalia Rabin, chairperson, Rabin Center, and daughter of the late Yitzhak Rabin. Interview with Middle East Bulletin.

Setting the Record Straight

Keeping Focus on Long-Term Objectives

“[W]hile we do need to have a cooperative approach that involves many of our friends and allies in meeting with the Pakistanis, … as we work out with them a rough division of labor, the U.S., I believe, ought to be taking the lead in addressing the issues in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. And given the difficulty of doing so, I suspect that we will not have a great deal of difficulty in convincing them to allow us to take the lead there. But as we all know, there is a real tension between our short-term tactical aims in trying to capture or kill terrorists across the border and militants in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and our longer- term counterinsurgency pacification goals. We very much need to be focusing on the end state. What is it that we want this area to look like? ... In that context we need to have a common agenda with the Pakistani government and very much to include the military on counterinsurgency in that area. There needs to be, therefore, a focus on combining military efforts with economic, development and political development in those areas.”
—Robert L. Grenier, managing director and chairman for Global Security Consulting, Kroll, event, “Partnership for Progress: Advancing a New Strategy for Prosperity and Stability in Pakistan and the Region,” Center for American Progress, November 17, 2008

Middle East Analysis

Partnership for Progress —Caroline Wadhams, Brian Katulis, Lawrence J. Korb & Colin Cookman, Center for American Progress
Dealing With Pakistan Is Risky Business —Lee H. Hamilton, president, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, former chairman, House Foreign Affairs Committee
How Not to Lose Afghanistan (and Pakistan) —Peter Bergen, senior fellow, New America Foundation

Turkey’s Regional Role

February 25, 2008

Dr. Suat Kiniklioglu, Member of Turkish Parliament Justice and Development Party (AKP), event at the Brookings Institution, "Back to the Future: U.S.-Turkish Relations after the Bush Presidency," January 31, 2008:

"Turkey should play a role in the Middle East … if you have followed the visit of President Shimon Peres and President Abbas, right before Annapolis … it was … a growing trend in the region that many actors in the Middle East view us as an impartial partner; that we can engage with the Iranians, with the Saudis, with the Lebanese, with the Palestinians and Israelis. We believe also in the intellectual underpinnings of our foreign policy that former Ottoman geography — that we have a responsibility to be … a constructive partner wherever we can. We are probably not on our own capable of solving or providing the economic political capital to solve the whole thing on our own, but …with our allies, and most importantly the United States, we could be a constructive partner … And in that respect, our role and policy has value."