Epstein Secrets

apital — for the departure of President Bashar al-Assad. In his speech before the non-alignment summit,

cies will push Cairo into EFTA00712755 the camp of the GCC states and Turkey in the context of this Cold War, whose main headline today surrounds Bashar al-Assad's departure or stay. On the other hand, it will also not be easy for Cairo to infiltrate what was achieved by Ankara throughout a decade of its absen

- U.S. ambassador to Israel (twice), assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, special assistant to president, and senior director for Near East and South Asia on the National Security Council -- Martin Indyk has government experience that's hard to match. Lately, though, the Britain-born, A

onale for taking military action now — "a shot across the bow" to halt future chemical attacks, he told PBS — pose risks of their own. If President Bashar al-Assad emerges from a few days of Tomahawk missile barrages relatively unscathed, he will be able to claim that he faced down not only his domestic oppone

arged is the secret hand behind the uprising. In the words of one recently departed senior adviser to Mr. Obama, "the worst outcome would be making Assad look stronger." How did Mr. Obama find himself in this trap? Partly, it was an accident of history: in the early, heady days of the Arab uprisings,

tegic partner. These sources concluded by saying that the most dangerous thing that could have happened would have been for the Iranian axis in the Near East to allow America to isolate its parties. Now, however, the parties of this axis stand over a unified field. A response to "US aggression" will not

on Diehl June 11 -- From one point of view the connection between our troubles with Syria and Iran is pretty straightforward. The Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad is Iran's closest ally, and its link to the Arab Middle East. Syria has provided the land bridge for the transport of Iranian weapons and militants

Israel, would be crippled. It follows that, as the U.S. Central Command chief Gen. James N. Mattis testified to Congress in March, the downfall of Assad would be "the biggest strategic setback for Iran in 25 years." EFTA_R1_02204138 EFTA02720609 Making it happen is not just a humanitarian imperat

ed, he will have no Middle East hands to whom he can turn. Mideast advisor Dennis Ross has left; Jeffrey Feltman, assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, departed for a post at the United Nations; and Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns will in all likelihood leave when a new secretary of s

monitors of committing massive atrocities against its civilian population. The Obama administration, backed by Western alies, accuses the regime of Bashar al-Assad of launching a large-scale chemical weapons attack on August 21 that mocked Obama's "red line" rhetoric and finally elicited a White House threat o

e its relevance in an age of WMD. On Syria, the president will likely cite the thorough UN inspectors report as providing indisputable evidence of Assad's use of chemical weapons (CW). Echoing the marker laid down by Secretary of State John Kerry, he will demand that the UNSC pass a robust resoluti

Groundbreaking political discourse and a thawing of relations might be the first step toward a changed relationship that could remake a Middle and Near East torn asunder by a decade of war, conflict and intense political rhetoric. President Obama would be wise to explore any diplomatic options for Wash