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1671. Toxic Legacy: Hunger, Oppression, Migration, and Health in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

Author:
Leonard S. Rubenstein
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
During the 1990s, economic mismanagement, political oppression, natural disaster, and loss of external subsidies after the end of communism led to a calamitous decrease in food production in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). The public health infrastructure, including water and sanitation systems, drug distribution and supply chains, and local clinics and hospitals, also deteriorated. At least half a million people died of starvation and millions more suffered acute or chronic malnutrition. Malnutrition increased vulnerability to disease at a time when the health system was incapable of effective response. Fifeen years later, neither health nor the food systems have recovered as the economy persistently stagnates. Health continues to be a low priority for the government. The availability of food is insufficient to meet population needs, hospitals and clinics are significantly ill-equipped, the medical workforce lacks appropriate training, and corruption in drug distribution is pervasive. Malnutrition and anemia, as well as diseases associated with poor sanitation, remain widespread. Over the last few years, DPRK has begun to accept international assistance to address health system needs, most notably to vaccinate children. Although these initiatives address some infrastructure needs, the continued centralized control of health and the lack of open discussion about key issues renders the possibility of reforms sufficient to meet the health needs of the people of North Korea dim. During the economic crisis, tens of thousands of North Koreans migrated to China despite harsh measures imposed by both governments to restrict border crossing and a refusal by China to give legal status to the migrants. To a limited extent, migration ameliorated the health impact of the crisis by stimulating illicit cross-border trade and informal markets that increased some North Koreans' access to food. Even after a disastrous effort by the DPRK government to shut the markets down in 2009, they are re-emerging. China's encouragement of these markets, along with regularizing the status of migrants in China, could advance its own economic interests as well as contributing to improving the health of North Koreans.
Topic:
Communism, Economics, Health, Markets, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
China, Israel, and North Korea

1672. Letter to the Editor: Talking to Hamas

Author:
Robert Pastor
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Foreign Affairs
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Daniel Byman ("How to Handle Hamas," September/October 2010) correctly argues that peace between Israel and the Palestinians via a two-state solution requires the involvement and acceptance of Hamas. However, he overstates the difficulty of securing Hamas' agreement to a cease-fire and understates the problem of gaining Israel's agreement. Moreover, although Byman acknowledges the importance of Palestinian reconciliation, he does not identify a key reason for its failure.
Political Geography:
Israel and Palestine

1673. The Muslim Brotherhood: On the Record

Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
The following sampling of comments by Muslim Brotherhood leadership in Egypt explains the group's position in the current crisis and its attitudes towards the United States, Israel, and the rest of the Arab world.
Topic:
Democratization, Islam, and Insurgency
Political Geography:
United States, Israel, Arabia, and Egypt

1674. On the Record

Author:
Mohammed ElBaradei
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
"For years, the West has bought Mr. Mubarak's demonization of the Muslim Brotherhood lock, stock and barrel, the idea that the only alternative here are these demons called the Muslim Brotherhood who are the equivalent of Al Qaeda's... I am pretty sure that any freely and fairly elected government in Egypt will be a moderate one, but America is really pushing Egypt and pushing the whole Arab world into radicalization with this inept policy of supporting repression."
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
United States, Iran, Israel, Arabia, Egypt, and Vienna

1675. "Getting Beyond Taiwan? Chinese Foreign Policy and PLA Modernization"

Author:
Michael A. Glosny
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
Since the mid-1990s, China's military modernization has focused on deterring Taiwan independence and preparing for a military response if deterrence fails. Given China's assumption of U.S. intervention in a Taiwan conflict, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) has been developing military capabilities to deter, delay, and disrupt U.S. military support operations. The 2008 election of Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou, however, has contributed to improved cross-strait economic and political cooperation and dramatically reduced the threat of Taiwan independence and war across the Taiwan Strait. Cooperation has included full restoration of direct shipping, flights, and mail across the strait, Taiwan's participation in the World Health Assembly, regularized cross-strait negotiation mechanisms that have already reached several agreements, and the recent signing of the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Climate Change, Diplomacy, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
China, Israel, Taiwan, and Asia

1676. Popular Nationalism in China and the Sino-Japanese Relationship: The Conflict in the East China Sea

Author:
Erik Beukel
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
Abstract:
The Sino-Japanese relationship is a highly complex one, marked both by Japan's aggressive wars from the 1930s on and the present economic interdependence between the two countries. Focusing on the role of the territorial conflict in the East China Sea, this DIIS Report considers how China's leaders handle anti-Japanese nationalism by adopting a Janusian stance and pursuing both China's basic interest in close economic relations with Japan and also domestic stability. After a review of Chinese and Japanese sovereignty claims in the area and of the rise of nationalism since the early 1980s, four crises over the East China Sea are examined to identify the character of and changes in China's policy. For the last ten years China's leaders have attempted to conduct a more pragmatic policy towards Japan and evade the pernicious shadow of history. But this policy faces critical problems both in a growing popular nationalism in China and in the Japanese government's lack of willingness to restrain their own nationalists and the absence of legal possibilities for them to do so.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Economics, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
Japan, China, Israel, and Asia

1677. Security developments in East Asia: what implications for the EU?

Author:
Nicola Casarini
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
East Asia is home to some of the most important trading partners of the Union. China is foremost among these, ranking second only to the US - in 2009, EU-China trade totalled a massive €296 billion - while the EU is China's most important trading partner. Japan is the sixth-largest trade partner of the EU - in 2009, EU-Japan trade was almost €92 billion. South Korea is the EU's eighth-largest trade partner and the EU has become South Korea's second largest export destination - total trade in 2009 was above €53 billion. Furthermore, on 6 October 2010 the EU and South Korea signed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) which is the most ambitious bilateral trade agreement ever negotiated by the EU, and the first with an Asian country.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Japan, China, Europe, Israel, Asia, and South Korea

1678. The War Over Containing Iran

Author:
Andrew Krepinevich, Shahram Chubin, Karim Sadjadpour, Eric S. Edelman, Dima Adamsky, Diane De Gramont, and Evan Braden Montgomery
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Foreign Affairs
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
How would the Israeli defense establishment respond if Iran went nuclear? Is Washington focusing too much on military containment at the expense of political containment? And is a grand bargain with Tehran possible?
Topic:
Cold War and War
Political Geography:
Iran, Washington, and Israel

1679. From the Editor

Author:
Rashid I. Khalidi
Publication Date:
12-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Can Palestine achieve liberation unilaterally by state-building and economic growth, despite the ongoing constraints of a suffocating occupation? Is a two-state solution of any sort still possible, and is it even desirable? What more can we learn about key turning points in Palestine's history like 1917 and 1948? The articles and essays in this issue of the Journal address these and other concerns about Palestine.
Topic:
Intelligence and World Bank
Political Geography:
Israel and Palestine

1680. Mahal and the Dispossession of the Palestinians

Author:
Dan Freeman-Maloy
Publication Date:
12-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
The participation of thousands of overseas volunteers (the Mahal) in Zionist military operations conducted throughout the 1948 war has received insufficient critical attention. Mainly English-speaking World War II veterans recruited by the Zionist movement in the West for their expertise in such needed specializations as artillery, armored warfare, and aerial combat, the Mahal's importance to the military effort far exceeded their numbers. Situating their involvement within the broader historical context of Western support for the Zionist project, this article examines their role within the Haganah and Israel Defense Forces (particularly in aerial and armored units) in operations involving the violent depopulation of Palestinian communities. IN 1948, thousands of overseas volunteers traveled to Palestine to take part in Zionist military operations. While various accounts of their participation are available, the record of those Zionist combatants formally designated as Mahal (from the Hebrew Mitnadvay Hutz La'aretz, “volunteers from abroad”) has been distorted in deference to conventional Zionist historiography. The Mahal recruits are generally depicted as “forgotten heroes,” as historian David Bercuson describes them in The Secret Army. Providing the foreword to a study published amidst Israel's jubilee celebrations in 1998, Binyamin Netanyahu praises the “contribution to the struggle for liberation” made by Mahal fighters. “For them,” the authors of the study explain, “justice lay entirely on the side of the Jews”. The various memoirs written by volunteer combatants themselves likewise emphasize heroics in the service of a just cause. Yitzhak Rabin summarizes the standard narrative in his forward to one such volume: “The contribution of this small band of men and women is a glorious chapter in the story of Israel's struggle for freedom.” Estimates vary regarding the number of Mahal personnel interspersed throughout the Zionist forces. An initial Israeli census produced an estimate of 2,400, a figure now roundly considered low. Bercuson asserts that there were “more than 5,000 foreign volunteers who served with the Israeli forces”; Benny Morris cites an estimate of “more than 4,000.” A short study published by Israel's Ministry of Education in 2007 puts the figure at approximately 3,500. In any event, with total Israeli troop levels nearing 100,000 by the end of 1948, the significance of Mahal combatants did not lie in their numbers. “Mahal's special contribution,” in the words of David Ben-Gurion, “was qualitative.” Mostly English-speaking veterans of World War II, Mahal recruits devoted specialized skills to the Zionist military effort. Their expertise in modern military organization, artillery, armored warfare, naval, and aerial combat crucially facilitated the development (and early application) of Israeli military power. This “glorious chapter,” as Rabin calls it, has gradually been written into the “heroic version” of Israel's establishment. The role of foreign recruits in the political and demographic transformation of Palestine effected in 1948 merits a more critical recounting. What is recorded in the annals of Zionist historiography as Israel's War of Independence was experienced by Palestinians, some 750,000 of whom were displaced from their homes in the process, as colonial conquest. Widespread ethnic cleansing was among its principal features—a painful reality made more so by the denials, disinformation, and even celebrations that have surrounded it since. The present article reexamines the record of Mahal recruits in this light. THE POLICY OF COERCION AND ITS INTERNATIONAL UNDERPINNINGS From its establishment in 1897, the World Zionist Organization (WZO) pursued its ambitions concerning Palestine through organizational activity in Europe and North America and a strategic orientation toward the paramount imperial powers of the time. This approach succeeded in spectacular fashion during World War I when the Zionist movement secured British sponsorship for the creation of a Jewish “national home” in Palestine—a sponsorship given force by Britain's occupation of Palestine during the war and incorporated into its subsequent rule over Palestine under a Mandate approved by the League of Nations. With the growth of the prestate Jewish settlement (the Yishuv) during the period of British Mandatory rule (1922–1948), the center of Zionist decision making gradually shifted from Europe to Palestine. The WZO presidency of Chaim Weizmann, anchored in London, was overtaken by the leadership of David Ben-Gurion, based primarily “in the field.” But militarily as otherwise, the strength of the Yishuv remained heavily dependent upon international support. Funds from Western affiliates of the WZO—notably, the United Palestine Appeal (UPA), which channeled North American funds to Palestine through the Keren Hayesod (Foundation Fund)—were allocated according to the priorities of the Zionist Executive, including building military capacity. In matters of formal politics and diplomacy, the WZO operated in post-World War I Palestine as the Jewish Agency, which enjoyed formal juridical standing within the British Mandatory regime. Its military arm, the Haganah, though formally illegal, in practice also received important (albeit uneven) support from British authorities. This was most significant during the Palestinian Arab rebellion of 1936–1939, when sections of the Haganah were equipped and trained by the British to help put down the uprising within the framework of “Special Night Squads” and the Supernumerary Police force. Their experience bolstered the Haganah's capacities and contributed to shaping its military doctrine, particularly its preference for night-time assaults on Arab villages. By the late 1930s, as Nur Masalha has shown, leading Zionist decision makers were engaged in frank internal discussions regarding the prospect of forcibly expelling (or “transferring”) Palestinians to clear the way for a Jewish state. The fate of statist Zionism and its quest for a Jewish demographic majority would thus rest on coercive power. In a June 1938 discussion of transfer with the Jewish Agency Executive, Ben-Gurion emphasized that although the Zionist movement should seek Arab acquiescence, it “must enforce order and security and it will do this not by moralizing and preaching 'sermons on the mount' but by machine guns, which we will need.” “For Ben-Gurion,” writes biographer Shabtai Teveth, “the Yishuv's relationship with the Arabs of Palestine was now a military and not a political question.”
Political Geography:
Britain, Israel, and Palestine