Gaza’s future on hold

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 5 May 2026

On April 19 the New York Times, citing two senior Hamas officials, reported that Hamas is prepared to hand over to the Palestinian administrative committee the thousands of automatic rifles and other weapons used by its police and internal security forces in Gaza.  The officials framed this as a significant concession because Hamas, having re-established its authority over roughly half of the Strip, had so far adamantly refused to surrender its weapons. 

The Palestinian administrative committee (formally the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza) is one of the bodies created under the Board of Peace, the high powered controlling group led by US President Donald Trump, set up to oversee the ceasefire arrangements.

What is apparently on offer ​falls well short of the full disarmament and demilitarization specified in the Trump 20-point peace plan for Gaza, which requires Hamas’s military wing​ to be disarmed and disbanded.

The offer conveyed by the Hamas officials presupposes that both the Board of Peace and its Palestinian administrative committee are up and running.  That, however, is nowhere near the present position. While both bodies formally exist on paper and have begun limited activity, neither yet operates as a fully functioning, governing authority in Gaza. The Board of Peace is still consolidating its role and membership, while the Palestinian committee is only partially active.

The Board held a first convening session on February 19, at which members and observers pledged roughly 17 billion dollars in reconstruction funding (10 billion from the US, 7 billion from member states).  At that meeting Nickolay Mladenov, a Bulgarian politician who has been given the title of High Representative for Gaza, said the process of recruiting a new transitional Palestinian police force had begun and "just in the first few hours we have 2,000 people who have applied". 

That hopeful beginning did not lead on to a successful outcome. The plan envisaged a new 5,000-member police force operational in Gaza by late April, but recruitment proceeded at a snail’s pace because of the vetting required to exclude applicants with Hamas connections and past members of the security forces of the Palestinian Authority.  According to the most current assessment, the transitional Palestinian police force is not even close to being deployable.

Mladenov has said the Palestinian police force must be the primary law-and-order agency in Gaza, ​but supported by the International Stabilization Force (ISF), another body under the overall authority of the Board of Peace.  ​Created ​by UN Security Council Resolution 2803​, the ISF is described in the Gaza peace plan as a multinational agency charged with overseeing the disarmament of weaponized groups​ and ​liaising with both Israel and Egypt to ensure the security of Gaza.  ​It is intended to act in conjunction with the newly trained and vetted Palestinian police force.

​What of the Board of Peace?  It exists, and is functioning mainly as a diplomatic and financial coordinating body concerned with organizing pledge conferences, framework decisions and appointments, but it is not yet a fully operative administrative government in Gaza in the conventional sense. It is eventually envisaged as having sweeping legislative and executive authority over Gaza’s transition.

The top​ tier of the Board of Peace is composed of Trump and senior international figures, some named explicitly and others, at the moment, merely invited.  Among the named members are US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, former UK prime minister Tony Blair, and President of the World Bank Ajay Banga.  ​No less than ten heads of state have accepted the invitation to join the Board;  others are still considering.

Immediately beneath the top tier is the operational body known as the Gaza Executive Board.  Some members, like Witkoff, Kushner and Blair, are drawn from the main Board.  A whole range of others including diplomats, ministers and generals come from countries including Turkey, Qatar, Egypt and the Netherlands. It is described as in a “formation” phase.

Beneath the Executive Board is the 15-member Palestinian technocratic committee – one of the basic new bodies envisaged in the Gaza peace plan​. Explicitly described as “apolitical”, it is intended to stand apart from Hamas, Fatah and other factions, and its members are to be “independent technical experts” or “qualified” professionals, not party functionaries. The committee ​was to be the lowest tier of the new Gaza governance structure, tasked with day‑to‑day administration and service restoration. 

It has in fact been formally constituted, and is headed by Dr Ali Sha’ath, a former Palestinian Authority deputy minister.

The committee has issued a mission statement describing itself as ​charged with “restoring ​fundamental services” in Gaza and “rebuild​ing civil institutions,” with priority on security, electricity, water, healthcare, and education. Although ​it has indeed engaged in early administrative and planning work, so far it has had a minimal effect in control​ling Gaza’s territory, security, and political life.

 Not one of these bodies, however, from the Board of Peace down, is yet a fully empowered governing institution in Gaza. In fact there is no single Gazan authority that can say it has both the mandate and the tools – police, budget and bureaucracy – to govern in a comprehensive way.

The failure to disarm Hamas – let alone wrest the governance of nearly half of the Gaza Strip from its hands – inhibits all efforts to restore normality to the daily life of its inhabitants.  The possibility, yet to be tested, that Hamas is prepared to surrender its stock of small arms is encouraging, but the body it is prepared to deal with – the Palestinian administrative committee – is not yet fully functional.  

Has Gaza a hopeful future under the terms of Trump’s peace plan?

Confidence in a post-Hamas structure needs to be earned.  Mistrust in the imposed conditions of the peace plan could be allayed by providing greater transparency about the governance architecture, perhaps by inviting ​some appropriate Palestinian​s ​onto the Board of Peace.  Perhaps Gaza’s governance could eventually be linked to a wider national framework and future elections.  The partially operative institutions that already exist could play a constructive transitional role.

Gaza’s future may be on hold, but despite disruptive efforts like the Global Sumud Flotilla, happily scotched, the green shoots of hope have started to sprout.

  

Some straight thinking about Lebanon

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 29 April 2026 

          On the evening of April 23 newscasts reported that, following talks at the White House, US President Donald Trump had announced that the Israel-Lebanon ceasefire, due to end on the 27th, would be extended by three weeks. Discussions would continue. The same bulletins carried news of a heavy rocket strike by Hezbollah into northern Israel. 

          No-one could deny that face-to-face Israel-Lebanon negotiations are long overdue – most would say by many decades. The two countries have been technically at war for 78 years. Lebanon’s participation in the attack by the joint Arab armies in 1948 on the new-born state of Israel has never been formally resolved, as it was with Egypt and Jordan.

          For the same reason no mutually agreed international border exists between Lebanon and Israel. The old British Mandate-era lines were never re‑demarcated after 1948. The current provisional land boundary is the UN’s “Blue Line”, endorsed in UN Security Council Resolutions. A joint agreement on an internationally recognized border is long overdue.

          Both these matters are certainly in need of resolution. But the current negotiations are presented by Trump and much of the media as talks leading to a deal that would require Israel to cease military operations within Lebanon, and Hezbollah to cease launching rockets, missiles and drones into northern Israel.

          Not many voices are raised to point out that this agenda is a fiction. The Lebanese delegation is not in a position to negotiate on behalf of Hezbollah. In fact Lebanon is at the table precisely because the government is unable to control Hezbollah, which retains enough power within Lebanon to continue acting as a “state within a state”. What Lebanese president, Joseph Aoun, and his government want – without being able to acknowledge it openly – is Israel’s support, and perhaps help, in eliminating Hezbollah’s ability to act unilaterally in support of Iran’s revolutionary regime.

          According to the terms of the November 2024 Hezbollah-Israel ceasefire agreement, negotiated via US mediators, Hezbollah forces were to have moved out of the region between the Litani river and the Blue Line by January 26, 2025, and been replaced by the Lebanese army.

          Achieving this desirable state of affairs – an objective first set out in UN Resolution 1701 back in 2006 – has been frustrated for 20 years by a combination of Hezbollah’s dominance within Lebanon, and the weakness of successive Lebanese governments in countering it.

          The 2024 deal proved equally ineffective in curbing Hezbollah, but it did produce one positive result. Ever since Lebanese President Michel Aoun’s term ended in November 2022, parliament had repeatedly failed to elect a successor, largely because Hezbollah and its allies blocked agreement. After the ceasefire Hezbollah allowed Joseph Aoun to be elected President and the new government to be installed.

          The new government immediately began conducting negotiations with US Special Envoy Tom Barrack aimed at disarming Hezbollah, establishing the state’s monopoly on weapons, and asserting government control in Lebanon.

          On August 5, 2025 the Lebanese cabinet instructed the army to develop a comprehensive plan to bring all weapons in the country under the control of state security forces, thereby ending Hezbollah’s autonomy.        

        One month later Lebanon’s army chief Rodolphe Haykal presented the government with a scheme designed to ensure that, by the end of 2025, Hezbollah would be fully disarmed and military hardware would be held exclusively by Lebanon’s state forces. The cabinet authorized the army to begin implementing it at once. Hezbollah leaders immediately made it clear that they opposed being disarmed.

          The army made some progress in dislodging Hezbollah from areas of southern Lebanon, but it soon became clear that the government simply lacked the power to implement the plan. So from March 2026 onward Aoun began pushing the idea of face‑to‑face talks with Israel as part of a broader strategy that would ultimately bring Hezbollah’s weapons, and therefore Hezbollah itself, under state control.

          For presentational purposes the opening steps would be about ceasefire and Israeli withdrawal. Hezbollah’s disarmament would be presented as the logical next stage. The obvious fact that the government was in no position to offer an Hezbollah ceasefire was conveniently sidelined.

          The reality is that the government will be able to undertake Hezbollah disarmament only once it has brought the organization fully under state control, and this will only be possible with Israel’s help and support. How else is Hezbollah to be brought to its knees? Aoun implicitly recognized this when, on March 9, he issued his four‑point proposal calling for “direct discussions with Israel under international auspices”.

          In a national televised address, Aoun defended direct talks with Israel, an enemy state, as “not weakness,” stressing they are aimed at protecting Lebanese civilians and preventing a Gaza‑style devastation in the south.

          In fact, preventing further devastation within Lebanon is dependent not on offering an unenforceable ceasefire, but on Hezbollah’s actions. If it continues to support Iran with missile strikes into Israel, then Israel has reserved the right to strike back.

          As Aoun frames the situation for public consumption, he steers completely clear of any suggestion of a Lebanon-Israel collaboration in disempowering Hezbollah. Hezbollah still enjoys the support of much of the Shi’ite population, and he is fearful of civil conflict.

          The diplomatic track with Israel is designed to create the conditions in which the argument for Hezbollah’s independent arsenal erodes, and full state control becomes politically feasible.

A more realistic assessment, perhaps, was made by Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter. Standing outside the State Department after the first session of direct Israel-Lebanon talks, he told reporters: “We discovered today that we’re on the same side of the equation… We are both united in liberating Lebanon from an occupation power dominated by Iran called Hezbollah.” He also said that “the Lebanese government made it clear… that they no longer want to be ‘occupied’ by Hezbollah.”

           Trashing Leiter’s portrayal as propaganda, Hezbollah refuted the suggestion that Lebanon is “united” with Israel against it. As for the Lebanese government, it has neither endorsed nor repudiated Leiter’s impression of the situation. The question is: regardless of whether it is totally accurate, is it “true” in the sense of reflecting where Lebanon and Israel actually stand?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled:
"Israel and Lebanon’s complicated talks: Is Hezbollah’s disarmament possible?", 29 April 2026:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-894321

The Houthis join in

 Published in Eurasia Review, 27 April 2026

       The Houthis, who currently dominate northern and western Yemen and most of the country’s population, have decided to participate actively in the US-Iran conflict.  After nearly a month of remaining on the sidelines, on March 28 they signaled their entry into the war by firing a barrage of ballistic missiles at Israel.  Most were intercepted, and no casualties were reported.

​         Within roughly 24 hours a second wave of cruise missiles and drones was launched, and were again intercepted.

Since then the group ​has fired ballistic missiles at the Tel Aviv area, and on April 4 the IDF reported that a missile launched from Yemen fell in an open area in Israel without casualties or damage.  Missile and drone attacks in the Red Sea and against US​ naval targets​ have ceased for the moment, though the threat persists.

            The Houthis are fully aligned with the philosophy underlying the hardline revolutionary Iranian regime.  They proclaim their beliefs and purposes on their flag.  Sandwiched between the words “Allah is great” and “Victory to Islam”, both in a suitable green, come inscribed in blood-red: “Death to America”, “Death to Israel”, and the unequivocally antisemitic:  “A curse on the Jews”. 

             It would be an mistake, however, to assume that these basic articles of faith are the major motivators of the Houthi leadership.  Unlike Iran’s other proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, both well embedded in their respective territories, ​ the Houthis’ primary concern is not anti-Israel operations.  They have their own fish to fry.  For a decade or more the Houthis have sought to extend their rule over the whole of Yemen​.  Although they have won control of a large segment of territory, and rule an estimated 70–80% of Yemen’s population, the country remains fragmented. They are not recognized by the UN or internationally as the government of Yemen​, and as a result the Houthi leadership prioritizes battlefield gains in Yemen above any success they may achieve in external military operations.

The nation’s internationally recognized government​ is the Republic of Yemen, whose executive authority is vested in the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) chaired by Rashad Muhammad al‑Alimi. It was formed in April 2022 specifically to unify anti‑Houthi factions and to negotiate a ceasefire and political settlement with the Houthis. The PLC has operated from the southern city of Aden and from exile in the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh.

Its authority has often been contested, specifically by south Yemeni forces. The Southern Transitional Council (STC), backed by the United Arab Emirates, claimed broad control of southern areas in late 2025.  Saudi Arabia led a diplomatic effort to bring the STC within the ambit of the national government, and in early 2026, following negotiations in Riyadh, STC leaders announced the group’s dissolution.  That declaration was immediately contested by other STC bodies and leaders, and although the south now nominally falls under a single pro‑government, Saudi‑managed framework, the region remains deeply fractured and politically explosive.

As for the Houthis, they have no interest in negotiating a ceasefire or political settlement with the recognized government.  Their focus is on defeating government forces and wresting control of the remainder of Yemen from the PLC.

Who are these Houthis?  They are Zaydi Shi’ites, a minority group which actively opposed the man who emerged in 1990 as president of the Unified Republic of Yemen, Ali Abdullah Saleh.  In 2011 Saleh fell victim to the so-called Arab Spring. In the face of a popular uprising, he reluctantly resigned the presidency and allied himself with the Houthis, his former enemies. 

Yemen’s military including its air force remained largely loyal to Saleh.  Supported by them, and with weaponry from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Houthi troops overcame government forces in September 2014, and took control of large areas of west Yemen.  They finally captured the capital, Sana’a.  Saudi Arabia, alarmed at Iran’s expansion into the Arabian peninsula, intervened in March 2015 to beat back the Houthis, and ​in reaction Iran increased its financial and military support to the​m.

As a result the Houthi-Iran relationship changed.  From Iran assisting the Houthis in their domestic struggle for power, it quickly turned into the Houthis becoming Iran’s proxy in its regional bid for dominance.

With the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza conflict, Iran further boosted the Houthis’ role.  They became an essential component of Iran’s so-called “axis of resistance”, attacking Israel by air and sea.

The Bab el-Mandeb Strait – a strategic sea passage at the very foot of the Red Sea – is flanked to the east by Yemen’s Houthi-occupied coastline.  Claiming to target vessels directly connected to Israel, the Houthis began attacking shipping passing through the Strait, and continued to do so largely indiscriminately for nearly two years. 

Inside their territory the Houthis, under Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, their leader since 2004, have built an intrusive supervisory system (mushrifin) that penetrates ministries, local government and neighborhood structures, using control over salaries, fuel, food and jobs to secure obedience.  Economic policy is geared to sustaining this apparatus – capturing revenues from customs, telecommunications and fuel, channeling benefits to loyal elites and militias, and creating new financial centers and patronage networks. Maintaining internal security, keeping local patrons sweet, and financing domestic military operations consume most of the regime’s effort.

Anti‑Israel operations help the leadership convince the population that their privations are the necessary price of “resistance”. It reinforces their internal control, and Yemen remains their primary arena of concern and action. 

It is these considerations that motivate the Houthi’s anti-Israel activity. They are willing partners in Iran’s effort to pressure and, in the long term, eliminate Israel, and they vigorously appropriate the Palestinian cause in their rhetoric. It serves their regional image and their public standing. ​Yet even as they escalate their anti-Israel military involvement, their core calculation remains unchanged.  Their main interest is in the consolidation, and eventual expansion, of their grip on Yemen.

​ This will remain their primary concern.  To signal their continued commitment to Iran’s war effort, they ​will probably persist with their occasional missile and drone attacks against Israel and US-linked targets, though they will surely try to avoid a level of retaliation that could seriously endanger their hold on Yemen.

Published in Eurasia Review, 27 April 2026:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/24042026-the-houthis-join-in-oped/

Lebanon and Syria – deals with Israel are possible

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 15 April 2026

    Israel is technically at war with both Lebanon and Syria – and has been for the past 78 years, ever since the attack in 1948 by the joint Arab armies on the new-born state of Israel. ​ Although Israel concluded peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, none have been negotiated with neighboring Lebanon or Syria.  Yet both have recently been seeking to hold discussions with Israel.

On March 9 Lebanon’s president, Joseph Aoun, outlined a four‑point plan aimed at controlling Hezbollah and bringing peace to his country.  In addition to calling for a “total ceasefire,” Hezbollah’s disarmament, and international support to strengthen the Lebanese Armed Forces, to universal surprise he proposed direct Lebanese‑Israeli talks under international auspices.  And on April 11 Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that his cabinet would begin ceasefire and Hezbollah disarmament talks with Lebanon “as soon as possible.”  The first round took place in Washington on April 14 and have led to a short-term ceasefire, a harbinger of more permanent arrangements.

As for Syria, it was in July 1949 that the Syrian-Israeli conflict was brought to an end by means of an armistice concluded under UN Security Council auspices.  It was not a peace treaty. Following the 1973 Yom Kippur war, in which Syria joined Egypt in a joint attack on Israel, the 1974 Agreement on Disengagement similarly states that it “is not a peace agreement”, and provides only for a ceasefire supervised by the UN.  

  The position was not affected by the overthrow of the Assad regime in December 2024. Syria and Israel still have no diplomatic relationship and remain formally at war.  Potentially Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa – once closely associated with al-Qaeda – is a major threat to Israel’s security.  And yet, from the moment he was appointed on January 29, 2025, he has been asserting his intention to normalize relations with Israel.

His first major decision was to suspend the Assad-era constitution.  Since then, as interim president, Sharaa seems to have made every effort to distance himself from his al-Qaeda connection, and to present himself as moderate and pragmatic. 

On July 12, following conflict between Druze and Bedouin armed groups, the Druze-majority region of Sweida in southern Syria was engulfed in armed sectarian clashes. The violence involved extrajudicial executions, massacres, burning of villages, and looting.  Over 1,500 people were killed, and militias affiliated with the new regime in Damascus joined in the attacks. 

In reaction Israel honored the promise it had made to the Druze community following an earlier incident.  It mounted air strikes, targeting Syrian tanks and an airfield in southwestern Syria. On July 15 Netanyahu and defense minister Israel Katz issued a joint statement:  “Israel is committed to preventing harm being inflicted on the Druze in Syria, owing to the deep covenant of blood with our Druze citizens in Israel and their historical and familial link to the Druze in Syria. We are acting to prevent the Syrian regime from harming them...”

Even so, in a statement on July 16, 2025, Sharaa sought conciliation with Israel.  The nation did not fear war, he said, but in reaching out to Israel “we have put the interests of the Syrians before chaos and destruction.”

He was as good as his word.  Over the past year, Israel and Syria have held a series of low‑profile, US‑mediated negotiations that have gradually taken on a more structured character. The talks have covered security issues and also updating the 1974 disengagement framework in light of Israel’s post‑Assad military push beyond the Golan Heights.

Syria has been represented by its new foreign minister, Asaad al‑Shaibani, while Israel’s interests have been in the hands of strategic affairs minister Ron Dermer. 

        After at least one early, largely unpublicized encounter in Paris in mid‑2025, Dermer and al‑Shaibani met again in Baku on July 31, 2025, in a high‑level session devoted to the deteriorating situation in southern Syria. Subsequent rounds convened in Paris in late summer 2025, and then on 5–6 January 2026, with US envoy Tom Barrack mediating and French officials acting as hosts. Some media reports also refer to additional working meetings, including at least one five‑hour session in London in September 2025.

On September 17, during a media briefing to reporters in Damascus, Sharaa described a security pact with Israel as a “necessity” for Syria.  Such an agreement, he added, would need to respect Syria’s airspace and territorial unity.  He said that Syria is seeking “something like” the 1974 Israel-Syria Disengagement Agreement concluded after the Yom Kippur War.  It established a formal ceasefire, and separated opposing forces by creating a demilitarized zone and a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the Golan Heights.  He did not categorize such a pact as normalization, since Syria’s position is that the Golan Heights and related issues would first need to be resolved.

Sharaa also mentioned that in July a Syria-Israel deal had been “four to five days” away, but the outbreak of violence in Sweida had derailed it.

The US was deeply involved in the agreement known as the Sweida roadmap, publicly announced on September 16 in Damascus. The negotiations leading to it were one reason for delaying the broader Israel-Syria security pact that was on the table at the time. Now the US is playing a mediating role in the current round of Syria-Israel security discussions.  

These on-going Syria–Israel contacts embody real potential to reduce the risk of a wider regional war.  They can clarify rules of engagement in southern Syria, and establish channels for crisis management. Even a modest security arrangement could create a platform for more substantive diplomacy over time. The problem is that they are fragile, and could easily crumble.

By contrast, the Lebanon–Israel talks were built on more substantial foundations.  Both parties seek to bring Hezbollah under control. There is, moreover, the recent precedent of successful, US‑mediated technical bargaining over maritime boundaries.  They focused on a clearly defined, border‑and‑security agenda that officials on both sides see as “solvable”.

In fact, the two tracks are linked.  The tangible progress made in the Lebanon-Israel talks provide the cooperative atmosphere necessary for Syrian-Israeli negotiations to succeed. Suddenly a glimmer of hope for a restoration of peace along Israel’s northern borders is appearing.  It needs to be fostered assiduously.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled "Are deals with Lebanon and Syria possible for Israel?", 16 April 2026 :
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-892708

Published in Eurasia Review, 17 April 2026:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/17042026-lebanon-and-syria-deals-with-israel-are-possible-oped/

Neutralizing Hezbollah

  Published in the Jerusalem Post, 9 April 2026 

The Lebanese government, under its president Joseph Aoun, has been making a determined effort to assert its authority over the rogue Iranian-backed terrorist Hezbollah organization that once operated inside Lebanon as a virtual “state within a state”.  Although much weakened by Israel’s military and other more covert operations, Hezbollah is still too powerful to be controlled by the government.  Since it entered the war on March 2 in support of Iran, it has been launching an average of 150 rockets a day into northern Israel, some coordinated with Iranian missile attacks.

The Lebanese presidency and cabinet have declared Hezbollah’s cross‑border attacks “unlawful” and not authorized by the state, stressing that no non‑state actor has the right to drag Lebanon into war.

On March 9 Aoun outlined a four‑point plan calling for a “total ceasefire,” Hezbollah’s disarmament, and international support to strengthen the Lebanese Armed Forces, coupled with direct Lebanese‑Israeli talks under international auspices.  In an online conference with senior EU officials, Aoun described the plan as a path towards "permanent security and stability arrangements on our borders", but declared it was conditional on a halt to Israeli strikes inside Lebanon.

Perhaps as a sign of the sincerity of his intentions, on March 24 Aoun declared Iran’s ambassador-designate Mohammad Reza Sheibani persona non grata, and gave him five days to leave the country.  Lebanon objects to the close connection between Hezbollah and Iran’s hardline Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, accusing the IRGC of “commanding Hezbollah’s operations” in the current conflict.

On March 30 it emerged that Sheibani, backed by Iran and its Hezbollah supporters, had refused to leave.  Iran has stated unequivocally that its ambassador to Lebanon would remain in post.  A standoff between the Lebanese government, in its efforts to control Hezbollah, and Iran – which regards Lebanon as its colony – has developed.  Lebanon has not enforced its own decision – for example by closing the Iranian embassy, or attempting an arrest of Sheibani.  In fact the situation has settled into a symbolic but revealing deadlock.

            Israel and Lebanon are similarly in a state of frozen animation, and have been for nearly 80 years.  The two countries are still technically at war – the war launched on the nascent state of Israel in 1948 by the joint Arab armies.  In all that time no peace treaty or armistice has been negotiated between them, and there have been no diplomatic relations or official channels of communication.  Any interchanges have been indirect, via the UN, international mediators, and back‑channel contacts.  Only UN Security Council Resolution 1701 and subsequent arrangements have provided a formal framework for the cessation of hostilities along the border.

All of which makes Aoun’s recent apparent overture the more unusual. Whether it can lead to direct negotiations is highly unlikely, given the current situation.  Israel is establishing a security buffer zone inside southern Lebanon, which it describes as a temporary defense measure rather than a permanent occupation. At the same time it is undertaking extensive airstrikes against Hezbollah infrastructure and fighters, including in Beirut. 

Even so, on March 13 the Qatar-funded Caliber news medium reported that Aoun had proposed a one-month truce with Israel, pledging to use the period to achieve the disarmament of Hezbollah.  This proposal was communicated to Israel through US Ambassador to Lebanon, Michael Issa, but like so many emanating from the Lebanese government, has simply withered on the vine. 

The official Israeli position is that the Lebanese government, in accordance with a number of prior agreements and commitments, is responsible for disarming Hezbollah. If it cannot achieve that, Israeli officials have argued that the war will end only when Hezbollah no longer poses a threat to Israel from Lebanese territory.

In short, Israel has not signaled any readiness to enter political talks with Beirut a long as its relationship with Lebanon is dominated by active hostilities.  But the door is not shut fast.  Even though Lebanon’s infrastructure is affected by the ongoing military offensive, and civilian deaths and displacements continue to mount, Israel does not describe current operations as a conflict with the Lebanese state, but as self‑defense against Hezbollah.

            The political gap between the Lebanese and Israeli governments is wide, but not unbridgeable.  From Israel’s perspective Hezbollah is lodged firmly within the Lebanese arena, and it holds the Lebanese state responsible for its disarmament.  The Lebanese administration does not disagree, for it is trying to distance the state from Hezbollah’s actions, is openly seeking help to bring the terrorist organization under state control, and has signaled its readiness to negotiate.

On March 31 the EU’s Diplomatic Service issued a statement on behalf of 10 states, including the UK, asserting that the responsibility for the current conflict in Lebanon “lies with Hezbollah,” adding “We strongly condemn Hezbollah’s attacks in support of Iran against Israel, which must cease immediately.”  They expressed their “full support to the government and people of Lebanon,” and called for “direct political negotiation between Lebanon and Israel, that can contribute to putting a durable end to this conflict and set the conditions for peaceful regional coexistence.”

There is another factor at play.  Lebanon’s next parliamentary elections, originally scheduled for May 2026 but now delayed until 2028, could consolidate Hezbollah’s strength, or signal its decline.  Aoun has managed to achieve a breathing space of two years in which to ensure that the state gains the upper hand in its struggle with Hezbollah.  It is because he acknowledges that the government is not powerful enough to achieve this without help, that he has floated the idea of direct Lebanese‑Israeli talks under international auspices.

Negotiations, perhaps leading to joint military operations, could eliminate Hezbollah’s constant onslaught on Israel’s northern border, and would justify Israel’s withdrawal from the buffer zone it is establishing in southern Lebanon.  ​If such talks were ever to be arranged, Hezbollah would undoubtedly attempt to disrupt them, so Israel's participation would have to be dependent on firm security guarantees, perhaps underwritten by international enforcement.  

Unlikely the possibility of face-to-face talks may seem, but should the potential, however remote, of a collaborative Lebanese-Israeli effort to strike down Hezbollah – with Israel for once in lockstep with international opinion – be rejected out of hand?  

Published in the Jerusalem Post on 9 April 2026, and in the Jerusalem post online titled: "Lebanon vs Hezbollah: A standoff between state sovereignty and Iranian influence" on 7 April 2026:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-892224

 

 

Kurds: Iran won’t fall without a ground offensive

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 31 March 2026 

Putting to one side, just for the moment, President Donald Trump’s talk of highly promising ceasefire negotiations involving an unnamed senior Iranian leader, media outlets report that some 50,000 US troops are already in the Middle East, with the Pentagon bringing in a further 5,000 Marines, and some 2,000 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division, some of whom have already sailed or are being flown in.   A further surge of 10,000 ground troops is under consideration.

On March 19 the UK’s Daily Telegraph quoted the leader of one of the main Kurdish armed groups, Babasheikh Hosseini, saying that the Iranian regime will not fall without a ground offensive which must involve Kurdish forces.

“If we are not on this battlefield,” he said, “the end of the regime will either not occur, or be delayed by a lot.”

            Hosseini is the general secretary of the Khabat Organization of Iranian Kurdistan, a long‑standing Iranian Kurdish opposition party, based in exile in Iraqi Kurdistan. On February 22 Khabat became one of five founding members of a new “Coalition of Political Forces of Iranian Kurdistan” (CPFIK).  A number of think tanks and commentators now adjudge the CPFIK a significant new factor in the Iranian opposition.  The coalition’s objectives include overthrowing the Islamic Republic and creating a democratic Kurdish entity in Iranian Kurdistan, on the lines of the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq. 

In practice these twin aims are only partly viable.  The coalition can certainly coordinate opposition and support protest, but its most ambitious goals – toppling the Islamic Republic and securing Kurdish self-determination – could be achieved only as part of some larger initiative, and with substantial military support.

There is, of course, a long and distinguished history of close military collaboration between the US and Kurdish fighters.  Together they defeated ISIS both in Iraq and in Syria.

In Iraq, Peshmerga forces were key in the 2017 defeat of ISIS.  In Syria the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), with its major Kurdish element, became the main US-backed ground partner in 2015.  The territorial defeat of ISIS in Syria was announced in March 2019.

The CPFIK has unified five major Kurdish parties after years of internal fragmentation.  A firm and clearly defined Kurdish stance is a strength in a situation where the various Iranian opposition entities are fragmented.  Kurdish unity is an example of disciplined coordination that other opposition elements could emulate.

As the price for their cooperation, the Kurds require support for Kurdish autonomy within a restructured Iran.  Cooperation will be fragile if opposition figures regard Kurdish demands as a separatist threat.  It would be politic to accept them as part of a post-regime settlement.

A major player on the scene is Reza Pahlavi, the son of the late Shah, who has been living in exile since leaving Iran in 1979 in the wake of the Islamic Revolution. 

In 2013 he launched an umbrella movement – the Iran National Council – and has since worked hard attempting to unite monarchists, secular democrats, and defectors around a post-Islamic Republic transition.

Presenting himself as a figure recognized and respected by the vast majority of the Iranian people, Pahlavi is offering to lead the nation into a new, post-revolutionary future.  He specifically does not seek a restoration of the monarchy above any other form of constitutional democracy, but advocates a referendum of the Iranian people through which they would select the form of constitution they prefer. 

As an instrument for regime change, however, Pahlavi’s network is not by itself a realistic mechanism for toppling the Islamic Republic. His strongest asset is symbolic: he is in his very person a link to Iran’s past – and nostalgia for the pre-revolutionary past has been a feature in the vast popular demonstrations in recent years.  Pahlavi could  serve as a rallying point and a unifying force holding disparate opposition forces together.

There is a snag.  At the moment Pahlavi’s published roadmap and public messaging do not accord with Kurdish aspirations.  He promises equal individual rights and non‑discrimination for Kurds and other minorities, but stops short of endorsing a federal “Iranian Kurdistan” on the Iraqi model.  In fact he stresses territorial integrity over any ethnically defined region with self‑rule. Moreover he has urged Kurds and other minorities not to use the present conflict “to press for separation”.  But Kurdish alliance statements in 2026 explicitly reaffirm Kurdish rights and federal‑style autonomy “within a unified Iran.”  A failure to reach some form of compromise could rule out a collaboration between the Pahlavi organization and the CPFIK – and that means the formidable Kurdish fighting force.   

How much might that matter?  Pahlavi has never received a positive endorsement from US President Donald Trump.  The furthest Trump would go is to say that he would be fine with Pahlavi if Iranians themselves accepted him, but on March 3 Trump is reported as saying: “It seems to me that somebody from within maybe would be more appropriate.”  On March 22 he said the US had held talks with a “top person” in Iran and had identified “major points of agreement”.  On March 23 he told reporters that Washington was in contact with the “right people” in Iran and that the US and Iran were “in negotiations right now.”

Tehran has consistently denied that talks were in progress.

America’s natural allies on the Iranian scene are clearly the Kurds, and in particular the formidable Kurdish Peshmerga fighting force.  It had been thought that Trump had more or less ruled out US boots on Iranian soil, but the facts seem to point to a build-up of American forces in the region.

Meanwhile accounts have appeared in the media of limited desertions and refusals to obey orders by both the Iranian police and the regular army.  These reports, if accurate, could be taken as an indication that, given large-scale anti-government demonstrations​, a neutralized IRGC​, or some form of direct attack, defections to the popular cause from within both forces is not out of the question. 

A military defeat of the Iranian regime backed by popular support is not, perhaps, entirely beyond the bounds of possibility.

Published in the Jerusalem Post and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Iranian regime faces pressure as Kurds, US strengthen cooperation", 31 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-891658

 

How Iran aims to win the war

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 24 March 2026

   ​         The success or failure of the US-Israeli military operation in Iran hangs in the balance​.   It is very largely dependent upon how ​"success​" is finally adjudged.

Since February 28 the Iranian regime has sustained a massive armed offensive, and as a result its resources and its infrastructure have been substantially depleted.  US President Donald Trump has on several occasions detailed the vast losses Iran has ​incurred, and hinted that he is on the verge of declaring victory.  At other times he has indicated that he has considerably more in reserve by way of military power,​ including the possible use of American troops, to be used in loosening Iran’s grip on international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, and ensuring the unconditional surrender of the regime. 

Trump has been criticized for the apparent inconsistency of his various statements, which to some seem ill considered.  They are, however, just as likely to be a deliberate strategy aimed at keeping the enemy, and perhaps the world at large, guessing as to his calculated and detailed plans for the end-game.

Meanwhile Iran, far from seeking as early an end to the war as possible – on the face of it the obvious course to follow – is continuing to attack states that host Western military bases and to disrupt international shipping and thus the global oil market. On March 15 foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran had “never asked for a ceasefire”.

In fact the regime seems to be conducting what Eric Mandel, writing in the Jerusalem Post on March 16, calls “a war of attrition”.  The loss of its current leadership through targeted assassination is unlikely to affect this survival strategy.

The March issue of Foreign Affairs carries an article by Robert Pape, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, entitled: “Why Escalation Favors Iran”. 

In it Pape explains why Iran, despite its weaker conventional military power, paradoxically benefits from broadening and extending the current conflict. The core of his argument is that Iran is pursuing a strategy he calls “horizontal escalation” — namely, expanding the scope, geography, and duration of the conflict, in order to shift it from direct military contest toward political endurance and strategic costs.

Pape contends that Iran knows it cannot defeat a US-Israel alliance in a direct military confrontation. Instead, it is changing the nature of the conflict.  By using regional proxies, attacking economic targets and disrupting international commerce, Iran can vastly increase the political and economic costs borne by its stronger adversaries and their allies.

The strategy draws on historic precedents. One example is the Vietnam war.  The North Vietnamese and Vietcong forces out-maneuvered the US by escalating the war “horizontally” into the towns and cities in the south.  The US won every battle over 11 bloody years, but lost the war. 

Another is the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and America’s in 2001.  Both operations ended as classic “wars of attrition”, where the insurgent side wore down the occupier over time until domestic political support and strategic patience eroded.

The Soviets entered Afghanistan expecting a short stabilization mission, but were drawn into a decade-long counter-insurgency that Gorbachev later called a “bleeding wound,” with mounting casualties, economic strain, and political embarrassment.  The mujahideen, backed by Pakistan, the US, and others, used sanctuary, terrain, and time to ensure the conflict was prolonged and costly, rather than decisive.

The later US campaign similarly morphed into an open-ended effort against an adaptive insurgency – in this case the Taliban and its allies – that aimed to outlast Western domestic will and unity, rather than to defeat US forces tactically in set-piece battles. 

Finally both the Soviets and the US acknowledged defeat and withdrew their forces.

According to Pape, Iran’s current actions – rapid retaliatory strikes, disruption of regional infrastructure, and resilience even after leadership losses – are meant to demonstrate to their opponents and to the world in general that the regime can sustain a long conflict.

This strategy transforms the confrontation into a test of political will rather than battlefield superiority, a test the Iranian regime may believe it is capable of winning.  The longer it drags on, the more it works in Iran’s favor.  It disrupts energy markets, strains host-country tolerance for US bases, and erodes domestic and allied political support for an open-ended campaign. Unless Washington adjusts its strategy to account for these dynamics, Pape warns, the US and Israel may have “bitten off more than they can chew” and risk losing control of the war they initiated.

What is the slowly accumulating danger for the US-Israel alliance?  By broadening and prolonging the conflict, Iran could impose mounting costs and heavy political pressure on the alliance, and gradually wrest control of the war’s trajectory from its stronger opponents.  In short, continued escalation risks putting the US and Israel into a strategic trap. 

For example, the longer the conflict continues, the harder it becomes for rulers in the Gulf – and particularly Abraham Accord partners – to sustain their relationship with Israel without sacrificing legitimacy at home.

          A protracted war would also reshape American politics. Sizable elements of Trump’s political coalition have been wary of Middle Eastern entanglements, and have accused the administration of simply following Israel’s lead.  The longer US military operations continue, the greater the danger of fractures widening within Trump’s political supportive base – as exemplified by the resignation on May 17 of Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center.

Transatlantic strains could also follow. The US could be in difficulties if, faced with the dangers of a prolonged and economically disastrous war, European states decided to limit their support or constrain the use of their territory.  US strategists would also obviously be factoring into their calculations the danger of the conflict escalating beyond the confines of the Middle East.

          Out of this complex military, political and economic maelstrom, there is a real danger that the US-Israel alliance could end by plucking defeat from the jaws of victory.  It would be a hollow victory indeed if, in the final analysis, the revolutionary regime remained in power in Iran.  It has to be swept away.


Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Political, economic pressures mount as US-Israel war with Iran continues", 24 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-890897

Published in Eurasia Review, 27 March 2026:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/27032026-how-iran-aims-to-win-the-war-oped/

Revolutionary Iran must be toppled

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 17 March 2026

On March 8 Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of Ali Khamenei who was killed in a targeted strike on February 28, was announced as Iran’s new Supreme Leader.  He has not been seen in public from that day to this, and the speculation is he may have been badly wounded in that strike. His first address to the people was read for him by a TV news anchor.

If US President Donald Trump had been hoping that Iran’s new leader would be open to negotiate a better future for its people, he has been sadly disappointed.  Mojtaba Khamenei is very much his father’s son.  He is generally viewed as hardline and anti-West politically, and strongly aligned with the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps). 

In short the regime’s elite has done its best to reconstitute itself and proceed on its quest to achieve the basic purposes of the Islamic revolution that, half a century ago, swept away Iran’s Pahlavi dynasty.  Ever since, most world leaders have been unable, or perhaps unwilling, to acknowledge the underlying motivation of its instigator, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.  They have also refused to accept that the same objectives have driven the regime ever since.

In his writings before the revolution, and in his speeches after, Khomeini affirmed repeatedly that the foundation stone of his philosophy was to impose Shiite Islam on the whole world by destroying Western-style democracy and its way of life.  To achieve this aim, he identified Israel and the United States (and also, at one time, Soviet Russia) as his prime targets.

“We wish to cause the corrupt roots of Zionism, Capitalism and Communism to wither throughout the world,” said Khomeini.  “We wish, as does God almighty, to destroy the systems which are based on these three foundations, and to promote the Islamic order of the Prophet.”

By this he meant his strict Shiite interpretation of Islam, for elsewhere he had declared that the holy city of Mecca, situated in the heart of Sunni Saudi Arabia, was in the hands of “a band of heretics”.

   Ever since 1979 the world could have recognized, if it had had a mind to, that the Iranian regime has been engaged in a focused pursuit of these related objectives – the destruction of democracy and the global imposition of Shiite Islam – quite impervious to any other considerations.  Instead, wishful thinking has governed the approach to Iran of many of the world’s leaders.

The administration of then US President Joe Biden maintained the tradition, inherited from his years as vice-president to Barack Obama, of seeking an accommodation with the regime. 

A clear-eyed look at the facts would have shown that the Iranian regime did not intend to become one of the comity of civilized nations.  To do so would have negated the revolution’s fundamental purposes, to which the ayatollahs remained unshakably committed. 

In the words of Khomeini, its founder: “We shall export our revolution to the whole world.  Until the cry 'There is no God but Allah' resounds over the whole world, there will be struggle.”

His successor, the recently deceased Khamenei, was a devout disciple.  Like Khomeini, he considered the revolutionary objectives so supremely desirable – even, perhaps, divinely approved – that any means were justified in furthering them, regardless of the human or political consequences.  Accordingly both leaders authorized a continuous succession of terrorist operations, most carried out by proxies to maintain the fiction of Iranian deniability.

Immediately following the revolution Iranian militants seized the US embassy in Tehran and held more than 50 people hostage for 444 days.  This was followed in 1983 by the bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, resulting in 63 deaths.  Later that same year Hezbollah bombed the US Marine Barracks in Beirut resulting in the deaths of 241 US and 58 French troops.

Bombing campaigns and hostage taking continued in the Middle East and Europe during the 1980s, and in the early 1990s Iran-inspired terror operations expanded to South America.  In 1992 Hezbollah bombed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires causing 29 deaths, following this two years later by bombing the city’s AMIA Jewish Community Center, which killed some 85 people.  Meanwhile Iran continued to supply funding, weapons, training, and operational guidance to sustain continuous Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi and militia attacks against Israel, Iraq, Syria, and Gulf states. 

As Hamas’s primary sponsor, the Iranian regime was undoubtedly complicit in its bloodthirsty attack into Israel on October 7, 2023. 

What explains the palpable failure by most of the world’s leaders to perceive what was plainly discernible?  The mistake was the same as the world made in the case of Adolf Hitler.  Few who read his Mein Kampf, first published in 1925, thought he meant what he said.

But the philosophy underlying Hitler’s political beliefs was there, in black and white, for years before he was in a position to implement it.  If politicians, or opinion formers, had taken it seriously, his rise to supreme power could have been thwarted.  He could have been prevented from maneuvering his way into becoming Germany’s Chancellor in 1933.

In the same way not enough scholars and political leaders bothered to look into the philosophy underlying Iran’s 1979 revolutionary leader, Khomeini, or to take seriously the burning religious conviction that motivated him, and subsequently the policies of the Islamic Republic.  The regime’s unceasing effort to acquire a nuclear arsenal was integral to its underlying purpose.  Whatever other strategic or political advantages nuclear arms might confer, it was only as a nuclear power that Iran could achieve its basic aim of eliminating Israel and confronting the Great Satan, America.

   If the Iranian regime is permitted to remodel itself under a new Supreme Leader, no amount of negotiation will dislodge it from its fundamental revolutionary purpose, as first propounded by Ayatollah Khomeini.  Nothing will induce it to reject the deluded vision of an Israel-free Middle East and an entire world subject to Shiite Sharia law.  That is why the future peace of the Middle East depends on Iran’s governing structure crumbling in the coming weeks under the sustained US-Israel aerial bombardment. Trump has demanded “unconditional surrender”.  He cannot declare total victory while Iran remains a theocratic dictatorship under the ayatollahs, led by a Khamenei.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Mojtaba Khamenei’s rise means Iran’s revolution is far from over," 17 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-890086

Published in Eurasia Review, 31 March 2026

https://www.eurasiareview.com/20032026-revolutionary-iran-must-be-toppled-oped/