Middle East & North Africa
Pro-Democracy Protests Spread to Oman

Pro-Democracy Protests Spread to Oman

Oman’s autocratic monarchy has long been one of the closest U.S. allies in the Middle East. And, as with authoritarian U.S. allies in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, and Yemen, a largely nonviolent, pro-democracy struggle has arisen in Oman as well. Oman is yet one more test of whether the Obama administration will continue to back an autocratic status quo in allied Arab countries or respect the wishes of their people, manifested through large-scale nonviolent action. 

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Neo-Con Hawks Take Flight over Libya

In a distinct echo of the tactics they pursued to encourage U.S. intervention in the Balkans and Iraq, a familiar clutch of neo-conservatives appealed Friday for the United States and NATO to “immediately” prepare military action to help bring down the regime of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and end the violence that is believed to have killed well over a thousand people in the past week.

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How Israel Should Respond to the Arab Revolutions

How Israel Should Respond to the Arab Revolutions

Israel has reacted to these revolutionary events in its vicinity with a very understandable fear. Crisis creates crisis. But it also creates opportunity. Israel can sit passively by and let the events within its neighbor’s borders define and dictate the reality that it will face, or it can seize the moment and be part of the change. By so doing, it can create a better reality for itself, and the region

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