Jerusalem Post

Former Abbas aide Ghaith al-Omari described the meeting as one of maintenance rather than decisiveness, given Israeli political developments and other hindrances to the process.

He said that while chances of an agreement appeared dim, the sides had a vested political interest in keeping the process going.

"You can feel a real concern that they don't want to see it collapse," said Omari, now with the Washington-based American Task Force for Palestine, pointing to a White House meeting as helpful in that respect. LINK more

Afshin Molavi, a fellow at the New American Foundation, refers to Dubai as Iran's "lungs;" without Dubai, Iran cannot breathe. For Dubai, on the other hand, the relationship only boosts its already flourishing economy. LINK

America will triumph in Iraq. But for how long? And what unintended consequences will Americans and Israelis discover a decade from now? A century from now?

Those are questions provoked by the work of Isaiah Berlin, a man who lived long enough and saw far enough to understand the contradictions of grandiose idealism.

Berlin, born in Riga, Latvia, in 1909, witnessed the disaster of World War I up close. Moving to England, he then lived through the Depression, the rise… more