Stabilizing And Rebuilding Iraq (the Middle East In Turmoil)

On December 27, 2008, Israel launched a major military campaign dubbed'Operation Cast Lead'against the Palestinian Islamist militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip in order to counter Palestinian rocket fire and more broadly, to significantly weaken all aspects of Hamas rule in Gaza. On January 3, 2009, Israel began a ground offensive into Gaza intended to eliminate Hamas's willingness or capacity to launch rockets at Israeli towns and cities. As of January 14, Israeli bombings and ground forces had reportedly killed over 1,000 Palestinians, while 13 Israelis had been killed by Palestinian rockets. Some Israeli observers have suggested that neither toppling the Hamas regime nor permanently ending all rocket attacks is a realistic goal. Nevertheless, by temporarily disabling Hamas's military capacity and slowing its rearmament, Israel could ease the frequency and intensity of Hamas attacks in the months ahead as it prepares to deploy new, more sophisticated anti-rocket defense systems. Bringing an end to the conflict and constructing a sustainable order in its aftermath are major challenges with implications for the Gaza Strip's population and infrastructure, Israel's security, and the future Palestinian polity, including the role of Hamas. This book considers the changing fortunes of the Palestinian movement, HAMAS, and the recent outcomes of Israeli strategies aimed against this group. This book consists of public domain documents which have been located, gathered, combined, reformatted, and enhanced with a subject index, selectively edited and bound to provide easy access. This book focuses on rebuilding Iraq's oil sector which is crucial to rebuilding Iraq's economy. Oil export revenues account for over half of Iraq's gross domestic product and over 90 percent of government revenues. Despite 4 years of effort and $2.7 billion in U.S. reconstruction funds, Iraqi oil output has consistently fallen below U.S. program goals. This book addresses the U.S. goals for Iraq's oil sector and progress in achieving these goals, key challenges the U.S. government faces in helping Iraq restore its oil sector and efforts to enact and implement hydrocarbon legislation. This book also reviews the package of legislation currently under consideration, analyzes the positions of various Iraqi political actors, and discusses potential implications for U.S. foreign policy goals in Iraq. Iraq : oil and gas legislation, revenue sharing, and U.S. policy / Christopher M. Blanchard Stabilizing and rebuilding Iraq : Iraqi revenues, expenditures, and surplus / United States Government Accountability Office Rebuilding Iraq : serious challenges impair efforts to restore Iraq's oil sector and enact hydrocarbon legislation / Joseph A. Christoff. Hamas And Israel : Conflicting Strategies And Group-based Politics -- Israel And Hamas : Conflict In Gaza (2008-2009) -- Lebanon : The Israel-hamas-hezbollah Conflict. Nejc Kardelj, Editor. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.