This thesis analyzes Israeli counter-terrorism strategy and its effectiveness. Because of ongoing suicide attacks from Palestinian and other terrorist organizations, Israel will continue to have an aggressive counter-terrorism strategy. It will study how the impact of past wars, campaigns, and deadly terrorist attacks influenced the thinking of past and current leaders. By gauging the actions, and sometimes nonactions, of the international community, the Israeli government declined to become paralyzed by U.N. and world-wide condemnation of its aggressive counter-terrorism strategies. The Israelis vehemently believe the security of the nation relies on what the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), the Israeli Security Agency (ISA), and Shin Bet do to counter terrorism, not outside governments. The IDF, ISA, and Shin Bet employ three different measures in an attempt to thwart terrorist attacks both in Israel and the Occupied Territories. Defensive, operative, and punitive measures are used in different phases of terrorist attacks in an attempt to protect the lives of Israeli citizens. Of all the three measures used by the IDF and other security agencies, defensive actions have by far been the most effective to date is included.

The motivation for writing this thesis derives from the lengthy conflict between Israelis and Palestinians and its effects on Jews who have been engaged politically and intellectually in challenging a paradigm most prevalent among Australian and other diasporic Jewry since the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948. The paradigm asserts that Israelis’ right to live safely within secure borders must be of exclusive concern. To challenge this exclusively therefore, by speaking in support of Palestinian justice and needs for similar basic conditions of life which have not yet been met, is viewed by many Jews as disloyalty and even as antisemitism. Australian Jewry has become known as Zionism’s ‘last bastion’. What were the particular conditions in Australia that led to Zionism and identification with Israel becoming the key symbol of Jewish identity within the Jewish community? The Zionist project has been sustained by deeply held metaphors. These include the historically-based claims and lived experiences of victimisation and vulnerability as Jews, whether individual and collective. Through revealing and synthesising the complexities and contradictions that are inherent in Jewish-Zionist subjectivities today, the thesis hopes to illuminate more generally questions of identity formation, diaspora and community, power and victimisation, and the unifying force of discourse. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Thesis (M.A.)--West Virginia University, 2009. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 148 p. : ill., (some col.), col. maps. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 138-148).

This thesis examines the initiation and dynamics of accommodation in protracted conflicts in the developing world characterized by important stakes and major asymmetries. The case study is the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and in particular Palestinian strategy from 1991--2000. This thesis argues that external politico-military concerns are the main explanatory factors affecting the pursuit of accommodation in this type of case. Powerful third parties play a significant role in initiating/mediating processes of accommodation and in providing assurances/incentives to encourage its pursuit. Bilateral conditions, especially perceptions of irreversible decline by the weaker party and solid expectations of reciprocity from its opponent, are the key factors in generating meaningful accommodative moves. Difficult economic conditions serve as an additional spur for the pursuit of accommodation while difficult political conditions act as a constraint. However, established leaders with strong nationalist credentials have greater room for manoeuvre on foreign policy issues.

The imbroglio of Jerusalem is arguably at the center of the Arab-Israeli conflict and presents an impasse to establishing peace. Its capacity to evoke powerful emotions is the key to understanding the connection between politics and sacred.1 The intent of this work is to closely examine the connection between politics and holy space by analyzing how Hamas' use of Jerusalem's sanctity and space for its symbolic value during the first Intifaḍa (1987--1993) contributed to simultaneously fueling the Intifaḍa and creating the potential to thwart peace in a number of ways: by portraying the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as a continuation of the conflict between the Muslim and Jewish communities in seventh century Arabia; justifying the Muslim Palestinian claim that Israel is an illegitimate entity on Islamic land; rejecting any form of negotiation or peace process as un-Islamic; mobilizing the masses; justifying armed struggle for Jerusalem in the form of jihad; gaining political influence; and presenting an alternative to the national-secular agenda of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). / 1Roger Friedland and Richard D. Hecht, "The Politics of Sacred Spaces: Jerusalem's Temple Mount/al-haram al-sharif" in Sacred Places and Profane Spaces: Essays in the Geographics of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, ed. Jamie Scott and Paul Simpson-Housley (New York: Greenwood Press, 1991): 23.

The study suggests that two domestic conditions are critical to foster opportunities for sustainable peace between formerly conflicting societies. The conditions are defined as social capital and political integration. These are explored in the context of Israeli and Palestinian societies following the signing of the Oslo Peace Accords in 1993 and through 1999, just one year prior to the outbreak of the al-Aqsa Intifada. / Social capital refers to networks of association. Strong networks of relationship are important because they are positively associated with a community and/or society's ability to foster social cohesion, to problem-solve and cope with growing uncertainty such as that exemplifying the period of transition from conflict to peace. / Income inequality is inversely related to social capital. Communities and societies characterized by growing income inequality are typified by diminishing social capital, hence receding capacity to weather the impact of major societal change. / The term political integration refers to the relationship between a government and its citizens. In politically integrated societies citizens share a sense that government is concerned with their welfare and hence their loyalty is expressed through support of the government, its programs and policies. Growing political fragmentation, a lack of abidance, and the breakdown of relationships between civil society and government mark politically disintegrated societies. Political integration is particularly relevant in the aftermath of the signing of a peace agreement when domestic sectarian divides threaten to undermine the national entity that must maintain the delicate balance attained by formerly conflicting societies. / Social capital and political integration are the outcome of greater or lesser human rights: social and economic, civil and political. The persistence of inequality, social and economic, civil and political, wears down the relationships between members of a society and between citizens and their government. / Analysis of standard social and economic indicators in Palestinian and Israeli societies suggests that despite the promised peace dividend social and economic inequality persisted and in some instances worsened between 1993 and 1999. Analysis of civil and political conditions in both societies suggests that political disintegration as opposed to growing integration characterized the six-year period.

Thesis (M.A.). / Written for the Institute of Islamic Studies. Title from title page of PDF (viewed 2008/05/13). Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Teachers College, Columbia University, 1992. / Typescript; issued also on microfilm. Sponsor: William Sayres. Dissertation Committee: Betty Reardon. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 129-133).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of North Texas, August, 2009. / Title from title page display. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--Florida State University, 2004. / Advisor: Dr. Peter Garretson, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Dept. of History. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed Sept. 22, 2004). Includes bibliographical references.