Epstein Secrets

clean on its CW holdings or begins to play a game of cat and mouse with the weapons inspectors. President Obama must lay down a clear marker that the United States remains prepared to launch meaningful punitive strikes if the Syrian government balks at surrendering its CW. An unequivocal stance should help con

an nightmare for its dwellers and a focus of criminal and terrorist activity in the eyes of the Jordanian authorities. The bigger question for the Hashemites is what will happen if these people remain permanently in Jordan, changing the makeup and balance of Jordan's population and turning the Transjord

ately needs a Palestinian state in order to preserve its own "Jordanianness"—an issue that is not, in the end, of much concern to the Israelis. The Hashemites know that EFTA_R1_02208417 EFTA02722927 and cannot be comforted by the thought that in the event a Palestinian state fails to materialize, Israe

nce for Hamas as their own ties with the Israelis have gotten colder. And these new allies aren't outliers like Iran and Syria. They are friends of the United States and very much in the center of the international community. Where's Waldo? It's testament to the weakness of Abbas and the PLO that it is Hamas's

nefited from a strong patron in Iran. Hamas, on the other hand, enjoyed no such support. Mubarak's Egypt, Bashar al Assad's Syria, Jordan under the Hashemites and the Gulf monarchies under the influence of the House of Saud all shared a deep interest in keeping Hamas boxed in. Although publically these c

he more reason not to give it to him. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's 2008 talks with Syria (via Turkey) allowed Syria to escape the partial isolation the United States had imposed on it in that decade, with zero gain for Israel. This is not an experiment worth repeating, for the Assad regime is today even more des

r the Ottoman administrative district Filistina. Given the complex politics of the Arabian Peninsula, the British had to find a home for a group of Hashemites, which they located on the east bank of the Jordan River and designated, for want of a better name, the Trans-Jordan — the other side of the Jordan