Israel

As the dust slowly settles down over the battlefields of South Lebanon and North Israel, the major actors in this tragic drama are now debating ways and means to salvage the long stalled Arab-Israel peace process from the wreckage of war and violence in the region. Israel's 34-day military campaign against Lebanon ended in mid-August with no clear victory to either party.

• V. Krishnappa
• January 25, 2007
• IDSA Comments

In the immediate aftermath of the Second Israel-Lebanon War, most observers have concluded that Israel lost its war against Hezbollah. Although at the end of 34 days of violent engagement there is no clear victor or loser, this article, on the contrary, argues that Israel succeeded in achieving the most important among its political and strategic objectives.

• V. Krishnappa
• January 2007
• Strategic Analysis

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's seemingly 'inadvertent' admission of his country's nuclear status in an interview broadcast on German television on December 11 at the start of his trip to Berlin once again focussed world attention on the country's nuclear status. It is widely known that Israel has a nuclear arsenal consisting of about 150-200 weapons from the plutonium produced at the Dimona nuclear reactor, situated in the Negev desert near Beer Sheva.

• S. Samuel C. Rajiv
• December 21, 2006
• IDSA Comments

Since the middle of the 20th century, the Arab-Israeli wars have thrown up a number of military lessons. The most spectacular was a textbook pre-emptive counter air strike in 1967 by the Israeli Air Force (IAF), which destroyed or made non-operational the entire Egyptian Air Force. This demonstrated the need for gaining mastery of the air as a prelude to spectacular ground operations. At sea, a Styx missile fired by an Egyptian missile boat on the Israeli destroyer Eliat validated the idea of anti-ship missiles.

• P. K. Gautam
• August 19, 2006
• IDSA Comments

The conflict involving the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) on two of its borders shows all signs of drawing the entire region into a new round of crisis. Though the current conflict may have been set off by years of hostilities between Israel and its regional adversaries, it is not a simple replay of the previous clashes.

• Rushda Siddiqui
• July 26, 2006
• IDSA Comments

Israel has stepped up its military offensive against Palestine. Codenamed Operation Summer Rain, it began on June 28 in response to the kidnapping of Corporal Gilad Shalit of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). Palestinian militant groups kidnapped Shalit on June 25 when they raided a military post near Kibbutz Kerem Shalom in Israeli territory just outside the Gaza Strip. The militants had infiltrated into Israel through a 300-metre tunnel dug under the Gaza border fence near the military post. Two Israeli soldiers, Lt. Hanan Barak and Sgt. Pavel Slutsker were killed in the attack.

• Namrata Goswami
• July 10, 2006
• IDSA Comments

Two very important elections are set to take place in Israel and in the Palestinian territories - the Israeli Legislative Elections on March 28 and the Palestinian Parliamentary elections for the Legislative Council on January 25. Both events are beset with equal amounts of tension, confusion and turmoil, resulting in extremely strained run up to the elections.

• Tanya Mohan
• January 23, 2006
• IDSA Comments

The resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon from the ruling Likud party in Israel has set off reverberations not only within Israel but at the regional level as well. Many Israelis and Palestinians, both politicians and scholars, believe that Sharon’s decision to leave the Likud has brought about a political earthquake that could realign not just the political configuration within Israel but also have a significant effect on the peace process.

• Tanya Mohan
• December 14, 2005
• IDSA Comments

Israel has finally pulled out from the Gaza strip and parts of the West Bank marking an end to 38 years of illegal occupation of the territory. Israel occupied this land, known as the Occupied Territories, (OT) after winning the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. However, this pullout, under what is known as the unilateral disengagement plan, originally conceived by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, has deeper implications and wider ramifications than simply returning the occupied land to the Palestinians.

• Tanya Mohan
• July 2005
• Strategic Analysis