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Middle EastFound 14 headlines Saudis, Egypt snatch US-backed peace track from Turkey. Assad is willingDEBKAfile Exclusive Report May 12, 2009, 9:32 PM (GMT+02:00) 
Gen. Bahjat Suleiman One reason for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's urgent visit to Damascus Tuesday, May 5, according to DEBKAfile's intelligence sources, was to thwart a Saudi-Egyptian move to snatch the indirect Syrian-Israeli peace track backed by Washington from Turkey. The Iranian president came too late. Syrian president Bashar Assad had meanwhile decided to appoint one of his must trusted intelligence officers, Gen. Bahjat Suleiman, as Syrian ambassador in Amman and head of potential peace delegation.
How did an US air strike in Sudan morph into an Israeli attack?DEBKAfile Special Report April 1, 2009, 10:08 AM (GMT+02:00) 
Egypt's Al-Shurooq first broke the story showing US planes attacking in Sudan DEBKAfile's military and intelligence sources trace how an air strike on an Iranian arms convoy bound for Gaza, uncorroborated by witnesses or any other direct evidence, is being puffed up by flights of fancy between West and the East. "Sources" in Sudan and Egypt attributed the attack to US planes based in Djibouti, whereupon Washington "sources" hit back by pinning it on Israel. The US, Sudan, Egypt and Israel each have their own stakes in playing up or playing down the event. Find out why in DEBKAfile's Special Report below.
Middle East Quartet reconvenes in Moscow next springNovember 11, 2008, 10:40 AM (GMT+02:00) While Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni and Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas promised to keep on negotiating during the run-up to Israel’s election, DEBKAfile reports the current lull – due to political changes in the US and Israel – is likely to continue until early next year. The negotiations led by outgoing prime minister Ehud Olmert and Livni have been conducted until now amid a media blackout, eliciting concerned questions in Israel about “how much they have given away in secret.”
Israeli-Syrian peace track breaks up amid shakeups in Jerusalem and DamascusDEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 7, 2008, 2:31 AM (GMT+02:00) 
Syrian FM Walid Mualem joins exodus of officials in Jerusalem, Damascus DEBKAfile’s Exclusive Middle East sources reveal that not only has prime minister Ehud Olmert’s chief of staff and lead negotiator with Syria, Yoram Turbowicz, decided to resign, but Syrian foreign minister Walid Mualem, the leading proponent of talks with Israel in Damascus, is also on his way out. Turkey, envisaging the breakdown of its initiative, has hared off in a new direction, a bid to mediate between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas.
Olmert to Obama: By late 2009, early 2010 Iran will be able to assemble nuclear bombDEBKAfile Special Report July 28, 2008, 10:57 PM (GMT+02:00) 
Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert told visiting US Senator Barack Obama Wednesday night, July 23 that within little more than a year, Iran would be able to assemble all the components for a nuclear bomb. Earlier, senior Israeli defense sources reported that Iran is set to receive Russian S-300 anti-air missiles for fighting off strikes against its nuclear facilities by early September, seriously complicating any air attack.
Found 14 articles The Arab Summit Is Distinguished by the Prominence of Its AbsenteesMarch 27, 2006, 1:58 PM (GMT+02:00)
The two-day 18th Arab League Summit opening in Khartoum Tuesday, March 28, looks like being a semi-washout. The rulers who announced their non-attendance were Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi, Tunisia’s Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali and Oman’s Sultan Qaboos.
The Arab foreign ministers who laid out the agenda and drafted final resolutions agreed on one issue: deep resentment of the US-Iranian dialogue on Iran. The two powers had no business discussing Iraq directly without co-opting a representative Arab voice, they declared.
For lack of leverage on all the prime issues confronting the Arab world, Iraq, Lebanon, Darfur, the Palestinians, the ill-attended Arab summit can do little but stand by and watch while others make the running. Rafsanjani Mulls Quitting Presidential RaceJune 21, 2005, 1:22 PM (GMT+02:00) 
21 June: By Monday night, June 20, rumors were swirling around Tehran that Iran’s non-elected strongman, Ayatollah Ali Khameni had found a way of rigging the presidential election. Round one took place last Friday, June 17, and the run-off is scheduled for Friday, June 24. The favorite, former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, barely pulled ahead of a contestant who popped up out of the blue, the extremist Tehran mayor Mahmud Ahmadinez. He faces him again on Friday.
Rafsanjani, speaking of a “tarnished” election, was not alone. The Guardian Council was forced by more such accusations to allow a recount of 100 randomly selected vote boxes in between rounds.
DEBKAfile’s Iranian experts maintain that “spiritual ruler” Khameini would never have left the presidential election to chance. A special brew must have been cooked up in his bureau for a near nonentity like Ahmadinez to pick up 5.7 million votes compared with the charismatic former president Rafsanjani’s 6.1 million ballots. Reformist candidate Dr. Mostafa Mo-In, who came in fifth, accused the all-powerful body of spending millions to mobilize hundreds of thousands of Islamic militiamen to get a hardliner president voted in. By any true standards, Mo-In should have done much better in a country where half the electorate is under 30 and pining for a better life and democratic liberties. Another complainer was former majlis speaker Hojjat-ol Eslam Mahdi Karrubi, a reformist candidate widely expected to place second. He was blunter than Mo-In, charging a general call-up had been arranged on voting day for Revolutionary Guards officers, men and reservists who were sent to cast their ballots for the Tehran mayor. The Middle East Club of Four Is Founded in SharmFebruary 8, 2005, 11:36 PM (GMT+02:00) 
United we stand!
The most significant feature of the four-way summit that took place on Tuesday, February 8, at the Egyptian Red Sea resort to Sharm el-Sheikh, was that it was the first time in Israel’s 57 years’ life that one of its leaders was asked to join three Arab rulers at any forum without outside mediators or an international aegis. The key to this unique event was embodied in President George W. Bush’s directive Thursday night, February 3, to secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, not to show up at the Middle East summit. The European Union followed her lead, as did Arab leaders who planned to attend like the King of Morocco, the emir of Qatar and the Tunisian president. Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon, the newly-elected Palestinian Authority chairman, Mahmoud Abbas – Abu Mazen, Jordan’s King Abdullah and their beaming host, President Hosni Mubarak, were thus thrown together alone and confronted with the task of forging a form of accord. Hashemite Dynasty Shows the Flag at Gulf of AqabaOctober 21, 2004, 11:20 AM (GMT+02:00) 
Shortly before the October 7 Sinai bombings at Taba and Nueiba, inhabitants of the Israeli Red Sea resort of Eilat noticed some strange goings-on across the bay in the Jordanian port city of Aqaba. The answer to the riddle was not long coming. One morning, they awoke to the sight of an enormous flag flying from a 136 meter- (446 foot) high pole. The flag, measuring 80 meters (262 feet) by 44 meters (144 feet), was almost the size of an American football field, a towering presence even against the backdrop of the 1,200 meter (3,900 feet) -high mountains behind Aqaba. It was the flag of the Hashemites. Through the many upheavals and disasters visited on them, the Hashemites never gave up their claim of common descent with the Prophet or their vision of returning to their roots, the Hijaz, now the western Red Sea province of Saudi Arabia. Israeli Settlements Come under… MI6 SurveillanceJune 13, 2004, 11:55 AM (GMT+02:00) 
The Israeli government is getting ready to offer down payments to voluntary evacuees from 21 Gaza settlements and four West Bank locations that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon plans to remove by the end of 2005. This move is designed to stimulate departures and jump the gun on two major delaying factors: the cabinet only approved the Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon’s disengagement outline; voting on settlement removals is not due until March 2005 and then it will be piecemeal. Secondly, compensation to departing settlers entails long and tiresome legislation, whereas down payments do not. Broad hints that the first comers will get the best deal have been thrown out already. The bargaining is clearly about to begin. |
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