Middle East Update

Stepping into the ongoing American debate on Iraq, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned an AIPAC gala dinner Monday night March 12, about the danger “premature” withdrawal from the country would pose for Israel, echoing the words of US Vice President Dick Cheney to the same forum earlier in the day.

MK Arye Eldad advises PM and Defense Minister to ’start packing their belongings’
Israel’s Winograd Committee appointed to probe the handling of last summer’s war in Lebanon has announced that its interim report would include criticism of individuals in the government and the defense establishment - particularly Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister Amir Peretz and [...]

Direct talks yield little progress despite “positive” atmosphere
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas agreed Sunday March 11, that the Arab League’s ‘Saudi initiative’ could serve as a basis for promoting a diplomatic process ahead of the implementation of the internationally backed ‘roadmap peace plan’ for Palestinian statehood.

The Israeli government has approved the creation of a railway linking Jordan to the northern Israeli port of Haifa, the cabinet announced on Sunday, March 11. Most of the projects will be concentrated in the Jordan Valley and will include the construction of a cross-desert canal system linking the Red Sea and [...]

Israel should pursue a strategy of “open nuclear deterrence” towards Iran if international attempts to halt Teheran’s nuclear ambitions fail, a London think tank argued in a report released Monday.

Ali Resa Asgari, 63, a general in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards, former deputy defense minister, and longstanding rival to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appears to have defected to the US taking with him a treasure trove of his country’s most closely guarded secrets, the UK Times reports.

It means for the first time, Hizb’Allah’s adversaries may have [...]

The Israeli Navy opened fire at Palestinian boats suspected of weapons smuggling trying to infiltrate Gazan waters from Egypt early Sunday morning, March 11, The suspected smugglers were ordered to halt by an Israeli naval ship and, when they did not do so, the ship fired shots in warning, and then towards the boats. [...]

Syria has positioned thousands of rockets on its border with Israel capable of striking major towns across the north of the country and is in the midst of preparing for a large-scale military escalation. This deployment, coupled with other recent reports of Syrian troop mobilization, is seen in Israel as an indication that [...]

Fighting erupted in the northern Gaza Strip on Sunday March 11, and a Hamas gunman was killed, the first fatality in such clashes since the Islamist movement agreed with its Fatah rivals to form a unity government a month ago.

President Bush has approved a request to deploy 4,400 additional U.S. troops to Iraq, officials said.