The administration of President George H. W. Bush from 1989 to 1992 saw several firsts in both American foreign policy towards the Middle East, and in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. At the beginning of the Bush Presidency, the intifada was raging in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and by the time it was over negotiations were already in progress for the most comprehensive agreement brokered in the history of the conflict to that point, the Oslo Accords. This paper will serve two purposes. First, it will delineate the relationships between the players in the Middle East and President Bush during the first year of his presidency. It will also explore his foreign policy towards the Middle East, and argue that it was the efforts of George H. W. Bush, and his diplomatic team that enabled the signing of the historic agreement at Oslo.

This thesis aims to examine both continuity and change in Egyptian foreign policy between 1970 and 1981. The overarching question of this work is: Why and how did President Sadat affect changes in foreign policy? More specifically, the thesis examines the evolution of Egyptian foreign policy in three concentric circles: the Superpowers, the Arab world, and Israel. The broader aim of the thesis is to provide a detailed study of Egyptian foreign policy in this period, which witnessed a multitude of watershed events. The topic is important because Egypt is a leading state in the Arab world, a core actor in the Arab-Israeli conflict, and a strategic ally of the superpowers during the Cold War. The thesis offers a detailed chronological account of Egyptian foreign policy during the 1970s. It advances a revisionist interpretation of the early Sadat years, arguing that there was much greater continuity with the foreign policy of Gamal Abdel-Nasser than is commonly believed. The account ends in 1981, with the assassination of Anwar Sadat and the succession of Hosni Mubarak. It is argued that Sadat not only managed to reverse Nasser’s radical path in foreign policy, but that he also succeeded in institutionalising his most significant policy changes: peace with Israel and the removal of Egypt from the Arab-Israeli conflict. The methodology of the thesis is principally empirical and qualitative in nature. The thesis is based on extensive archival research, recently declassified official documents, memoirs of policymakers in English and Arabic, and oral histories in the form of interviews and transcripts of discussions with former Egyptian policymakers.

This thesis will explore the origins of the U.S.-Israeli alliance during the Kennedy administration. John F. Kennedy provided Israel with the first U.S. weapons sale, issued the first informal security guarantee, and established the first joint security consultations between both nations. Ironically, Kennedy gave these concessions to contain Israel, not to establish closer relations. His primary objective for the Middle East was to improve U.S. relations with Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, seeing Nasser as the path for gaining pro-American sentiments among the Arab population in the region to the detriment of the Soviets. Kennedy unintentionally laid the foundations of the U.S.-Israeli alliance while trying to restrain Israel, fearing Israeli actions would impede his plans. The Palestinian refugee issue, the regional arms race between Egypt and Israel, and Israel's secret nuclear weapons program became three pivotal concerns for Kennedy that unintentionally led to the U.S.-Israeli alliance. / by Michael Bocco. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2008. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, FL : 2008 Mode of access: World Wide Web.

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Tez (Yüksek Lisans) - Süleyman Demirel Üniversitesi, Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Uluslararası İlişkiler Anabilim Dalı, 2008. / Kaynakça var.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2009. / Title from first page of PDF file (viewed February 11, 2010). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 681-712).

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This thesis examines nationalism and colonialism in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and asks the questions: What is the relationship between these ideologies and "national narratives" constructed of collective historical memory? How do these ideologies produce recognizable, sexualized, national bodies? What are the defining characteristics of these national bodies and how do they perform roles from the national narratives? These questions are addressed through a discussion of the role of masculinity in modern Zionism and the state of Israel, in particular how it relates to the land of Palestine and the Palestinian "other". This thesis also addresses anti-colonial resistance movements in Palestine and argues that performative nationalism produces a fetishized commodity that can me labeled "militancy". This militancy is found institutionalized in the popular culture of everything from poetry to political posters. Finally, Palestinian female suicide bombers, like women nationalists before them, do little to challenge how specific nationalist acts of resistance are defined by patriarchal nationalists and sexualized within a "gendered space of militancy".

The ideology of jihad as propounded by the Islamic Resistance Movement of Palestine (H&dotbelow;amas) is the subject of this thesis. It examines what this organization specifically means by jihad. To properly ascertain this meaning, the ideology of jihad from two different time periods has been examined. In the first period, the "classical" age, the ideology of several jurists concerning jihad is introduced. It can be seen that during this period jihad was applicable to both the expansion and protection of Islamic social/political hegemony. In the second, or modern period, the interpretations of jihad by four thinkers commonly known as "Islamic revivalists" are presented. The definitions of jihad in this era were mostly responses of defending and liberating land from colonialism and imperialism; however, in some cases it was also understood as a means to implement the shari'a in Muslim societies. The jihad of H&dotbelow;amas can, for its part, be seen as an amalgam of these ideologies, in that it is largely connected to liberating the land of Palestine from Israeli rule, establishing an Islamic state, and continuing to assist in struggles in other areas beyond the borders of Palestine.

My thesis focuses on modern Palestine and the role of nationalism and fundamentalism in the construction of Palestinian national identity. H&dotbelow;amas provides a case study of Islamic fundamentalism in Palestine. The movement developed during the late 1980's as a reaction to the failures of the secular project. H&dotbelow;amas is a reflection of a region-wide phenomenon. It is not solely a reaction to modernity. Rather, H&dotbelow;amas is the result of specific condition that led to the politicization of Islam after the Intifad&dotbelow;a . Today the nationalist PLO and H&dotbelow;amas struggle to define Palestinian identity and to shape the emerging Palestinian state. / Palestinian national identity like that of other modern nations has been constructed. Nation-building or identity construction in Palestine can be divided into four historical stages. Each stage is characterized by overlapping and competing identities: Ottoman, Arab, religious, local and kinship. These identities are not mutually exclusive and often a combination of identities became prominent historically depending on the internal and external forces pressuring society. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)