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The Beginning of the End of the Arab-Israeli Conflict?
(Strategic Assessment-Institute for National Security Studies) Dr. Dan Schueftan - In its familiar format, the Arab-Israeli conflict is fading away and we are now witnessing the beginning of the end. This is not the dream of peace that was promised by the Oslo process. It is possible that the threats to Israel have actually increased because of the actions of Iran. It certainly does not signal the end of the conflict with the Palestinians. What is new is Israel's success in breaking the pan-Arab front against it, and in convincing the majority of the Arab countries to effectively acknowledge in their policy that a strong Israel is an essential condition for their survival. Violence and instability in the region remain as they were, but the axis of struggle is not between Israel and "the Arabs"; it is between an Arab-Israeli coalition, on the one hand, and Iran's Islamic Revolution and Erdogan's Turkey, on the other. Most of the Arab states are unwilling to go to war against Israel, contribute concrete and significant national assets to the struggle against it, or refrain from cooperation with Israel on matters of importance to them. These positive trends depend predominantly on the image of Israel's power in the Arab environment. The writer is head of the International Graduate Program in National Security at the University of Haifa.