The following is an article I wrote for the American Foreign Policy Council.  It was originally published here at the Washington Times.

The Obama administration appears to have set its sights on Syria as part of its efforts to turn over a new leaf on Middle East policy. Recent days have seen a spate of diplomatic overtures by Washington to the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Asad.

These initiatives have ranged from an administration authorization of spare parts for Syrian aircraft to the very public visit to Damascus of Sen. John Kerry, the new chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The following is an article I wrote for the American Foreign Policy Council.  The original is available here on their website.

Israel’s nearly three week-long offensive against the Hamas terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip ended days before the inauguration of Barack Obama as president in Washington. Now, attention in the U.S. and Israeli governments turns to the thorny questions of how to create a durable ceasefire, keep Hamas isolated, and ensure that it cannot rearm. And, as policymakers in Washington are beginning to find out, doing so requires solving the issue of the smuggling tunnels that run from Egypt to Gaza.

Over the years, the game in Gaza has had a familiar ring to it: Hamas launches rockets toward Israeli population centers and Israel responds with a pinpoint strike of its own. Every so often, civilians are killed on both sides. The outside world, meanwhile, yawns with indifference.

No longer. The expiration of its six-month ceasefire with Israel earlier in December prompted Hamas to resume large-scale hostilities, launching hundreds of rockets against Israeli civilian population centers. However, over the past week, Israel’s government has demonstrated unequivocally that it is no longer prepared to simply implement piecemeal responses, as it has done for years against the de facto Islamist government in Gaza.  Instead, it has launched a major offensive, Operation Cast Lead, that Defense Minister Ehud Barak has announced could last weeks if not months. So, what can Israel now hope to achieve politically by using its military?

Below is a blog that I thought was worth posting from my colleague, James Robbins, Senior Fellow in National Security Affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council.  It covers the absurd notions of proportionality that have been buzzing around newsrooms with Israel's offensive in Gaza.  The original is posted here.

By: James Robbins

Criticism of Israel for using excessive force in combating Hamas in Gaza fails to make several critical distinctions between the contesting parties. Hamas chose not to renew the six-month ceasefire that had created a modicum of peace ("state of calm," officially) in the area. Hamas then resumed indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets in Israel. Israel’s response, by way of contrast, seeks to target only Hamas and its infrastructure, and any civilian casualties are unintended, unwanted, and usually the result of Hamas placing its weapons and command posts in civilian neighborhoods.

With the expiration of the six-month lull in Hamas rocket fire into Israel, the IDF is set to invade Gaza and attack Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure.  There are several reasons for the timing of Israel’s operation.  Firstly, many in Israel’s security establishment never signed on to the purpose of the cease-fire to begin with.  It merely granted Hamas a respite from Israeli attacks while giving them the opportunity rearm and better train themselves.  For two years, since Hamas’s takeover of Gaza in 2007, they have been working hard to develop their military power with Iranian assistance using Hizballah as a model.  The new rockets they have smuggled in pieces through tunnels from Egypt now have the capacity to strike the outskirts Beersheba.  Since more fighting is inevitable given Hamas’s pledge to destroy the Jewish state, it is better to attack when they have fewer weapons at their disposal.  A ceasefire only works in Hamas’s favor.

The following is an article I wrote for the American Foreign Policy Council.  It was originally published here at the Jerusalem Post.

As the new president-elect begins to weigh the carrots and sticks he can employ when dealing with the Middle East, he will run into the question of how to handle Syria.  Bashar al-Asad was the first to reach out with a telegram to Mr. Obama on November 7 that “expressed hope for constructive dialogue so that the difficulties can be overcome which have hampered the advance of peace, stability and progress in the Middle East.”

The list of these “difficulties” is indeed long.  The regime in Damascus supports terrorist groups such as Hizballah and Hamas, continues to destabilize Lebanon, strives to become a nuclear power, and is politically and tactically wedded to Iran – and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The following is a blog I wrote for the American Foreign Policy Council.  The original is available here on their website.

“Terrorist aggression” is what Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Mu’allim termed the U.S. raid into Syria that either captured or killed Abu Ghadiya. The daylight attack took place five miles inside Syria in the town of Sukkariya near Abu Kamal. Syrian television claimed nine people were killed and 14 were wounded in the operation. A native of Mosul, Iraq, the 32-year old Ghadiya has been in charge of al-Qaeda’s extensive Syria network since 2005, when the organization declared an Islamic Emirate in Al Qaim along the Iraqi border. In February, U.S. intelligence sources named Badran Turki Hishan al-Mazidih (a.k.a. Abu Ghadiya) as al-Qaeda in Iraq’s top operative in Syria, tasked with funneling foreign fighters, weapons, and cash into Iraq.

The war on terror may never be the same.

On June 12, the court rewrote the rules for the Guantanamo detainees in the landmark case known as Boumediene v. Bush. The 5-4 majority opinion authored by Justice Anthony Kennedy concluded that the foreigners held at the U.S. Navy's Guantanamo Bay facility were protected by the U.S. Constitution's habeas corpus protections.