Algeria may be the latest target in efforts to garner further Arab recognition of the Jewish state, despite its Gaza war conduct and rejection of Palestinian national aspirations.
To that end, a Philadelphia-based far-right pro-Israeli organisation, the Middle East Forum, has put Algeria in its crosshairs in an apparent attempt to build pressure on the North African state to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
Algeria would be a prize catch.


Is Algeria Next

Israel is playing a high-stakes game of bluff poker.
The problem is that the stakes are high not only for Israel but also for its foremost supporters, the United States and Europe, as well as Gulf states with which it enjoyed close relations despite differences over Gaza, Palestine, and Iran.
How the US, Europe, and the Gulf respond to Israel's targeting  of Hamas's leadership in exile in Qatar, one of three mediators alongside the United States and Egypt in the Gaza war, is likely to determine whether Israel's gamble pays off.
The fact that Israel failed to kill any of the senior Hamas leaders gathered to discuss an Israeli-endorsed US proposal to end the war and initial responses to the attack don't bode well for Israel.


Netanyahu puts Trump in a bind

Dr. James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture, and co-host of the New Books in Middle Eastern Studies podcast. James is the author of The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer blog, a book with the same title as well as Comparative Political Transitions between Southeast Asia and the Middle East and North Africa, co-authored with Dr. Teresita Cruz-Del Rosario and  Shifting Sands, Essays on Sports and Politics in the Middle East and North Africa.

Netanyahu puts Trump in a bind

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