Epstein Secrets

e inflicted by Moammar Gaddafi. This humanitarian imperialism quickly became an exercise in regime change. But the prolonged attempt to assassinate Gaddafi from the air made no provision for a replacement regime. The Benghazi committee should hear from Alan J. Kuperman of the Lyndon B. Johnson School

6984 the hope of attracting an intervention. This increased the rate of killing there tenfold. And since Gaddafi fell, "sophisticated weapons from Gaddafi's arsenal — including up to 15,000 man-portable, surface-to-air missiles unaccounted for as of 2012 — leaked to radical Islamists throughout the reg

ia, ISIS would not be on the rampage. A plague on both their houses! It's unseemly to fight Washington's talk-show wars over the myriad dead of the Levant. The facts are plain enough. The United States invaded Iraq in 2003 because of its weapons of mass destruction program. However Iraq did not have a

s and, on present evidence, a bloody stalemate that further destabilizes the region. It's distasteful to contemplate dialogue with leaders such as Gaddafi and Assad who, to put it bluntly, have blood on their hands. But this approach is worth exploring if it can foster a transition to a democratic go

can see that Alawite leadership will not leave power without a long and bloody fight. Recreating a sphere of Turkish-modeled Sunni influence in the Levant may be a long-term goal for Ankara, but the Turkish government is certainly not prepared to pay the near-term cost of civil strife in Syria spillin

the patient queueing of Egyptian voters or, perhaps, the self-immolation of Tunisia's Mohammad Bouazizi? Or will it be something less heroic, like Gaddafi hounded like a rat out of his drainage pipe in Libya? Or something profoundly cruel, such as the YouTube video of a Syrian man buried alive by shov

Russia's power and influence in the Middle East and Mediterranean. Israel shares the U.S. interest in cutting off Iran and Russia's reach into the Levant. However, security considerations surrounding the unknown variables of a post-Assad Syria appear to have created a divide between U.S. and Israeli

aim to Fame Michael Tomasky Article 2. Stratfor Israeli-Arab Crisis Approaching George Friedman Article 3 The Financial Times Why Assad need not fear Gaddafi's fate Ed Husain Article 4. The Christian Science Monitor Libya endgame: Lessons for Syria's protesters Bilal Y. Saab Article 5 Foreign Policy Assad'

ed the existence of Muslim states, like the Arab monarchies, it is now itself threatened. Mubarak, Syrian President Bashar al Assad and Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi all represented the old Pan-Arab vision. A much better way to understand the "Arab Spring" is that it represented the decay of such regimes that were

rned with the fall of the Syrian regime. Syria has been Iran's one significant ally, one strategically positioned to enhance Iranian influence in the Levant. Its fall would be a strategic setback for Iran at a time when Tehran is looking to enhance its position with the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. Iran, wh

ians and, on present evidence, a bloody stalemate that further destabilizes the region. It's distasteful to contemplate dialogue with leaders such as Gaddafi and Assad who, to put it bluntly, have blood on their hands. But this approach is worth exploring if it can foster a transition to a democratic gover

and Syria. In both cases, the insurgents are seen in the West as the "good guys," battling corrupt, autocratic leaders. Personally, I wish that both Moammar Gaddafi and Bashar al-Assad would give up power tomorrow. But that doesn't seem in the cards: Both leaders have shown they're willing to kill thousands of th

s can see that Alawite leadership will not leave power without a long and bloody fight. Recreating a sphere of Turkish-modeled Sunni influence in the Levant may be a long-term goal for Ankara, but the Turkish government is certainly not prepared to pay the near-term cost of civil strife in Syria spilling

he headquarters of the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, and in Yemen, where counterterrorism is king, interests trumped values. You didn't hear Obama make any "Qaddafi must go"- style speeches directed against Bahrain's ruling Khalifa family or Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_030073 --- PAGE BR

, nationalism, and socialism. Ibn Khaldun's analysis was based on his native North Africa, but it can be adapted to the conditions of the Mashreq, or Levant-where similar historical conditions prevailed. As Albert Hourani explained in his magisterial History of the Arab Peoples (1991), 'asabiyya is a forc

y, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as well occasionally makes some correct analysis. Last week, while comparing the uprising in Libya against the Moammar Gadhafi regime and the growing unrest in the Syrian street against the Baathist regime of Bashar al-Assad, the prime minister correctly said Libya and Syria

icy over nearly 3,000 years. For convenience, we will use the term "Israel" to connote all of the Hebrew and Jewish entities that have existed in the Levant since the invasion of the region as chronicled in the Book of Joshua. As always, geopolitics requires a consideration of three dimensions: the intern