US
The National Interest's Robert Merry isn’t too optimistic about President Obama’s ISIS strategy:
Nevertheless, Obama’s approach to the threat—a bombing campaign headed by the United States—is destined to fail, even after it leads, as it inevitably will, to what he swears he won’t let happen—the introduction of U.S. ground forces into the region to counter the ISIS expansion. Obama has failed to heed the wisdom of the U.S. Middle East policy of the 1950s, as explored by Alsop and others at the time. He remains mired in the same thinking that started with George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003 and has generated growing chaos in the region ever since.
Robert Kagan thinks that President Obama is trying to justify inaction abroad by looking at the CIA's past failures:
To demand guaranteed and completely successful outcomes in foreign policy is to demand the impossible, and to refuse to act without such guarantees is never to act at all. Perhaps that is what Obama wants, a justification for inaction, which the CIA dutifully delivered. But if he is genuinely trying to weigh his options, he ought to take another look at those past “failures.” Such a “failure” in Syria would look pretty good right now.
Israel
Liel Leibowitz points out that virtually everyone has misjudged Israel’s new President, who has always held a firm stance on democracy and on the inclusion of Israeli Arabs into Israeli society:
It’s common, of course, for elected officials to change their tune once they take office, abandoning the fiery talk of the campaign trail for milder, more inclusive stuff. That’s not the case with Rivlin. In his previous role as the speaker of the Knesset, he has had several opportunities to demonstrate his commitment to defending the vibrancy of Israeli democracy. When 39 rabbis on official municipal payrolls wrote a public letter in 2010 calling on Jews not to rent their apartments to Arabs, Rivlin thundered that the letter “damages the foundations of the State of Israel” and “shames the Jewish people.” His actions were as steely as his words: When MK Haneen Zoabi returned from participating in the notorious Gaza flotilla that same year, Rivlin stood firm in his refusal to adhere to the demands of many of Zoabi’s colleagues and remove her from the Knesset.
The Washington Institute hosts an event with Ruth Gavison and Stuart Eizenstat about Israel as a Jewish and Democratic state. I’m pretty sure it’s worth a watch (this one is a video):
While Israel's description of itself as a “Jewish and democratic” state may seem obvious and noncontroversial to many, it has important and hotly debated political, legal, and diplomatic consequences. To discuss the meaning and implications of this idea, The Washington Institute is pleased to hold a Policy Forum with Ruth Gavison and Stuart Eizenstat on Friday, October 31.
Middle East
Shadi Hamid has some interesting ideas about the roots of ISIS’ appeal, which is based on some pretty deep, age-old Islamic aspirations:
ISIS draws on, and draws strength from, ideas that have broad resonance among Muslim-majority populations. They may not agree with ISIS’s interpretation of the caliphate, but the notion of a caliphate—the historical political entity governed by Islamic law and tradition—is a powerful one, even among more secular-minded Muslims. The caliphate, something that hasn’t existed since 1924, is a reminder of how one of the world’s great civilizations endured one of the more precipitous declines in human history. The gap between what Muslims once were and where they now find themselves is at the center of the anger and humiliation that drive political violence in the Middle East. But there is also a sense of loss and longing for an organic legal and political order that succeeded for centuries before its slow but decisive dismantling. Ever since, Muslims, and particularly Arab Muslims, have been struggling to define the contours of an appropriate post-caliphate political model.
Ray Takeyh believes that Iran’s leaders would choose poverty over nuclear disarmament:
In the coming weeks, the ebb and flow of the high-wire negotiations are sure to capture headlines. We will see furious diplomacy and foreign ministers journeying back and forth to European capitals. But it already seems clear that Khamenei and the hard-liners are poised to choose nuclear power over economic prosperity — a decision that would probably prove catastrophic for their country. Rouhani may yet be able to temper, for a while, such rash impulses. But by loudly contemplating alternative strategies should diplomacy exhaust itself, Iran seems to be crossing a dangerous threshold.
Jewish World
A new book about Heidegger claims that the famous philosopher took his anti-semitic beliefs more seriously than his defenders assume (review by Gregory Fried):
Drawing on the new material, Trawny makes two related arguments: first, that Heidegger’s anti-Semitism was deeply entwined with his philosophical ideas and, second, that it was distinct from that of the Nazis. Trawny deals with the notebooks that Heidegger composed in 1931–41, which include the years after he resigned as rector of the University of Freiburg, in 1934. As the notebooks make clear, Heidegger was far from an unthinking Nazi sympathizer. Rather, he was deeply committed to his own philosophical form of anti-Semitism — one he felt the Nazis failed to live up to.
Lynette Nusbacher offers a provocative perspective on the Temple Mount. According to her, it's “just a hill” which has never been particularly important as a praying site for Jews:
Jews didn’t ask to pray on the Mount under Byzantine rule. Jews didn’t ask to pray on the mount under Persian rule or Ottoman rule. Jews didn’t ask to pray on the Mount under British rule. (Jews weren’t allowed in Jerusalem at all under Jordanian rule.) Jews, with the exception of Rav Goren and a few who agreed with him, didn’t ask to pray on the Mount under Jewish rule. Now Jews demand to pray there.
The demand is based on the idea that Jews ought to have the right to pray there. Perhaps that right exists, and has existed since the end of the British Mandate. Asserting the right is one thing, but exercising that the right is as an absolute one is something else.
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