It's not been a good year for the Middle East: continuing genocide in Sudan's Darfur region, another humanitarian crisis in Somalia, 4 million Iraqi refugees meandering inside and outside their country, martial law in Pakistan, violence and uncertainty again in Afghanistan, and on the list goes. There were glimmers of hope, too: Iran may not be going nuclear after all and Israelis and Palestinians are talking again, if barely so. Inevitably, a list of the year's top issues is cursory at best.
1. Darfur/Somalia Humanitarian Disasters
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Since early 2003 more than 300,000 people have died or been killed in Sudan's Darfur region as the Sudanese military and Arab fighters known as Janjaweed continue their ethnic cleansing of non-Arab tribes--with the Sudanese government's tacit backing. African governments are contributing to a United Nations peacekeeping force overdue for deployment in the region, but the 7,000-strong force is not likely to stem the killing for good. In Somalia, in one of the most under-reported stories of the year, war is again raging as Ethiopia invaded, with the West's backing, to smash Islamic forces. There, Africa and the United Nations seem uninterested in intervening.
2. Iraq's Refugee Crisis
Much is being written toward the end of 2007 about refugees returning to Iraq as an indication of that country's improving situation. The reports are overly optimistic, if not simplistic. There are still upwards of 4 million Iraqi refugees, about half of them in the country and half of them outside of it--mostly in Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. Syria is sending thousands of them home. The Iraqi government is unprepared to deal with the crisis. Many of those returning to Iraq cannot go back to their former homes, in neighborhood "cleansed" of one sectarian denomination or another.3. Military "Surge" in Iraq
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Beginning in February, U.S. troops in Iraq swelled by 30,000, reaching 162,000 by late May. The "surge" was designed to suppress sectarian violence and give the Iraqi government another chance at forging reconciliation between Iraqi factions. The violence was somewhat suppressed--but not eliminated. Iraq is still a more violent place in late 2007 than it was in 2004, a year into the American occupation. The surge's gains seem temporary. The Iraqi government has all but given up on national reconciliation. Starting in early 2008, U.S. troops must draw down for lack of replacements.
4. Iran Gives Up on Nukes?
The question mark necessarily glows still. The Bush administration spent much of 2007 building a case for bombing Iran--a case as fraught with unanswered questions, uncertainty and recklessness as the case for war on Iraq turned out to be. By late 2007 Bush himself seemed to have boxed himself into a corner, having threatened "World War III" should Iran continue its alleged nuclear-weapons program. But in early December, the U.S. government's intelligence community released a National Intelligence Estimate that found "with high confidence" that Iran had quit its nuclear-weapons program in 2003. The revelation radically down-shifted the war talk on the administration's end. Besides, Bush is now willing to talk to Iran over Iraqi issues.5. Losing Afghanistan
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Briefly won in 2001, when U.S.-led forces routed the Taliban regime that had been in power since 1996 (and hosted Osama bin laden), Afghanistan is being lost again. The Taliban is resurgent but not victorious. A permanent state of war exists, with big gains neither for the Taliban nor for American and NATO forces, as the two sides keep trading ground. The bigger problem is the Afghan government of Hamid Karzai. It is corrupt and losing face with the Afghan public. Western troops aren't threatening to withdraw. To the contrary. Both France and the United States may increase their military commitment. But as in Iraq, a military solution cannot come before a political solution. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda remains on the Pakistani side of the border.
