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COVER STORY: MIDEAST
A Plan of Attack For Peace
Daniel Klaidman 1/3/2009 12:00:00 AM
In the remorseless logic of the Middle East, war is diplomacy by other means. This was true when Anwar Sadat launched a surprise attack on Israel in October 1973, a move that gave him the credibility and stature in the Arab world to make peace six years later with the Jewish state. It is also true today as Israel continues its assault on Hamas in Gaza, attacks that were prompted by Hamas missile strikes on Israel. The recent violence has reportedly cost more than 400 lives and left over 2,000 wounded; on Saturday, Israeli ground forces began moving in. Much of the outside world, not without justification, views the Gaza campaign as yet another atavistic explosion of Arab-Israeli violence that will, once again, set back the efforts for peace. But these strikes were not simply a reaction; they were a calculation.
INTERNATIONAL
A Return to Deterrence
Kevin Peraino 12/28/2008 12:00:00 AM
Of all Israeli casualties in the 2006 war with Lebanon, the loss of the Jewish state's aura of invincibility was perhaps the most devastating. For the better part of the preceding 40 years—since its lightning victory in the 1967 Six Day War—Israelis were devoted to that image as a security guarantee in one of the world's roughest neighborhoods. "Deterrence" is one of the most frequently used (and overused) words in the Israeli lexicon; the concept has been raised almost to cult status. To Israelis it is much more than a strategic abstraction. For many, it is a rule that has been learned by rote. Historian Amatzia Baram recalls how his mother used to recite a Yiddish proverb to drive home the point: "Over the bent tree, all the goats will jump."
ECONONY
Picking Winners
12/15/2008 12:00:00 AM
The decision, when and if it comes, to pump taxpayer funds into the ailing U.S. auto industry (NYT) reopens an old debate about the wisdom or even ability of the federal government to choose winners and losers in the economy. Opposition in the U.S. Senate that killed a bill (WSJ) to do just that on December 11 shows strong doubts remain, though many say that is a bridge already crossed—the government made the decision in October to allow Lehman Brothers to fail while protecting firms like Morgan Stanley, AIG, and later Citigroup from collapse—many argue there is a difference between financial firms and U.S. industrial giants like Detroit's Big Three automakers.
BUSINESS
The Big Bang of Bailouts
Jeffrey E. Garten 12/13/2008 12:00:00 AM
It is now frighteningly clear that the world's dramatic financial rescue efforts are both unprecedented in scope and creativity, and wholly inadequate. Despite the round-the-clock labor by exhausted officials on a number of continents, the medicine is not taking. We stand on the threshold of a calamity that goes well beyond the rupture of the banking system and the deepening of a global recession and that leads to major political instability and conflict. The needed response is a big-bang global bailout that is even bigger than what we have seen so far, one that puts governments in front of the contagion rather than always one step behind, and that is large and sweeping enough to restore confidence.
INTERNATIONAL
Why Israel Isn’t Angry
Kevin Peraino 12/3/2008 12:00:00 AM
The smoke has finally cleared after last week's botched hostage rescue at the Nariman House Jewish center in Mumbai, but in some Israeli security circles, the sniping has started anew. Defense Minister Ehud Barak complained last week that India's commandos hadn't performed up to Israeli standards. Other Israeli counterterror experts griped that the operation had taken far too long to unfold. "They should have come from many angles—through windows, through walls," says Lior Lotan, an Israeli security consultant who once commanded the military's hostage-negotiation squad. "I didn't see any deception, any diversion, any surprise element at all." Israeli paramedics reported that some of the hostages appeared to have been killed accidentally by their would-be rescuers; their stories were splashed across the front page of the local newspaper in Jerusalem.
UNCOOL CHRONICLES
Aso Plays a Cold Card
Kate Dailey 11/1/2008 12:00:00 AM
Japan's newly elected prime minister, Taro Aso, is mad for manga, the comic books that embody Japanese pop-culture cool. Analysts say Aso's been playing up his passion in order to woo young voters. Bad news for Aso then that manga sales in Japan are down for the first time in 12 years, indicating waning interest.