Israel & Occupied Palestinian Territories Archives

Why We Must Learn from Past Pitfalls in Israeli-Palestinian Peace

In September 2023, the Middle East Institute in Washington DC held a conference – in partnership with the European Council on Foreign Relations – on the topic of the Oslo Accords. The conference commemorated 30 years since Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization Yasir Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin signed the Accords on the White House lawn.

The consensus at the conference, however, was somber. It seemed to most participants and speakers that the Oslo Accords had largely failed, entrenching a one-state reality predicated on Palestinian subjugation. In a discussion of possible solutions, a co-panelist at one point argued that the Palestinians would have to wait 50+ years and democratize the Israeli system slowly, as African-Americans once did in the context of the Jim Crow south. I disagreed; based on the palpable anger and frustration among Palestinians at their deteriorating conditions, and some of the trends I saw in public opinion polls, I argued that the Palestinians would be unlikely to wait and pursue such a strategy.

Two weeks later, Hamas attacked Israel on October 7^th. The mass violence that many analysts, including myself, had warned about was unfolding. Since then, the Gaza Strip has been entirely destroyed, with 90% of Gazans displaced, likely over 10% of the population killed, and much of the infrastructure decimated. The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as well as many other human rights organizations around the world including in Israel, have characterized the Israeli war on Gaza as genocide.

If we are to move forward in a fruitful direction from this horror, any future attempt at an enduring peace must be informed by how the failures of past peace processes led to the tragedies of the present.

Why Oslo Failed

The last two years are proof that the Oslo Accords did indeed fail to prevent violence, improve living conditions, or move towards a two-state resolution to the conflict. There are three main reasons why the Oslo effort failed to this extent.

First, the PLO and Israel were not evenly matched prior to the peace process negotiations. One party was a nuclear-armed state with advanced military capacity; the other a national liberation movement on its last leg, having been driven out of Jordan and Lebanon and reeling from dwindling support. And, most importantly, the asymmetry in their positions was not corrected for in the peace process. The PLO recognized the state of Israel and thus accepted the loss of much of historic Palestine, whereas Israel only had to recognize the PLO as a representative of the Palestinian people (a fact already internationally recognized by the UN and other relevant parties).

Thus, as Daniel Kurtzer, the former US Ambassador to Israel, has stated since: “The Oslo agreement was full of holes. The mutual recognition was asymmetrical, and that was to hurt the Palestinian negotiating position for years to come.”

Secondly, because the main mediator in this process was the United States, this asymmetry was exacerbated further. As many involved in the negotiations have since confirmed, the US took the position of “acting as Israel’s lawyer,” thus introducing severe bias in the process of mediation and negotiation.

Thirdly, the Oslo process was predicated on shrinking the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from a full discussion of self-determination for all Palestinians with the right of return for refugees down into a diminished discussion of possible statehood in remnants of the occupied Palestinian territories. This was in tension with the fact that the Palestinian liberation movement included the aspirations of all Palestinians – including those who were citizens of Israel, who resided in Jerusalem, and who were scattered in diaspora communities across the globe. Oslo reduced this aspiration, and these constituencies, who were previously represented (albeit imperfectly) in the PLO, were no longer parties to the process.

Oslo’s Impact on Palestinian Politics

The Oslo Accords also led to the creation of the Palestinian Authority, which in principle continued to be subordinate to the PLO as a representative body. In reality, the PA sidelined the PLO’s role entirely and became the main relevant actor in Palestinian politics. Moreover, the structure of the Oslo Accords led to the entrenchment of the Palestinian Authority, especially following the second Palestinian uprising from late 2000 to early 2005. In order to ensure that the security threats and “collapse of order” unleashed by the years-long uprising never could happen again, the US helped to expand the PA’s security sector, reducing their role in the occupied territories as a “subcontractor of occupation” while preventing democratic accountability. As a result, Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been unable to impact their leadership or policy direction since 2007, and political elites have increasingly diverged from the will of the people. Most recently, the international community has supported Mahmoud Abbas in his effort to change election laws in order to prevent opposition, Hamas included, from ever winning office again. Thus every part of the Palestinian political landscape is now afflicted with a crisis of legitimacy.

Polling shows this legitimacy crisis clearly. The Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has remained president since he was first elected in 2005, supported by the US intent on remaking the Middle East region in the aftermath of 9/11. Since then, he has overstayed his term limits. Today more than 80% of Palestinians want him to resign, according to the latest poll. Furthermore, the approval rate for the Palestinian Authority as a whole is 21%. The Hamas government in Gaza does not fare better. In a poll conducted Oct 6, 2023, only 28% of Palestinians in Gaza chose Hamas as their preferred party.

Why the Palestinian Public Matters

These dynamics should be relevant to policymakers around the world involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and negotiations between the two parties. The reasons are two-fold. First, given the international (and specifically American) role in the construction of the Oslo framework and its maintenance at the expense of Palestinian self-determination, many Palestinians blame this state of affairs on international actors and see this as proof that their aspirations are not taken seriously by the international community. American policy for the past three administrations at least would justify this impression, as both President Trump and President Biden pursued Arab-Israeli normalization deals and left the Palestinian issue to fester.

Secondly, the legitimacy crisis is not an issue confined to internal Palestinian politics but impacts the resolution of the conflict. Palestinian political leadership that is seen as illegitimate will not have the mandate to enter into negotiations with Israel, or compromise on any aspect of the conflict. For this reason there is not a great deal of support for any peace plan – whether two-states or one-state. Although 45% of Palestinians say they support a 2-state solution, 56% believe that the two-state solution is no longer practical due to settlement expansion and 61% believe that the chances for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel in the next five years are “slim or non-existent.” It is clear from these numbers that no political leadership, Palestinian or international, has been able to articulate a doable and serious vision of future peace.

Palestinians are outraged at the genocide in Gaza that has been allowed to unfold, the mass displacement and ethnic cleansing of parts of the West Bank, and the deteriorating conditions of their everyday life even prior to the latest war, which the international community ignored. And the only Palestinian political leadership that is deemed acceptable by international actors is one that is illegitimate at home and among much of the diaspora, and that has not and cannot articulate a political vision for a just resolution to the conflict.

Lessons from Comparative Examples

There is only one way forward from this stagnate state of affairs: taking Palestinian agency and self-determination seriously. To do so, the international community and all relevant actors to this conflict must apply the lessons of prior peace negotiations, not just in Israel/Palestine but around the world. These lessons are: public input, inclusion, and accountability.

In the case of Northern Ireland, all parties to the conflict were included in the peace process. This included armed groups on both sides of the Protestant-Catholic divide. Most importantly, the peace process took public input into account, ensuring not one but two referendums to garner buy-in and legitimacy for the peace process. Both the people of Northern Ireland and the people of the Republic of Ireland voted to approve the Good Friday Agreement. This public input was crucial in moving the process forward, and ultimately ended the sectarian conflict since 1998.

In scenarios of severe violence and genocide, the international community must also ensure accountability for war crimes. The case of Yugoslavia, and the subsequent conflict in Bosnia & Herzegovina, demonstrates the importance of accountability – as well as what happens when accountability is not guaranteed by the peace process. The Serbian leadership responsible for war crimes following Yugoslavia’s breakdown were held accountable, taken to the Hague to answer for their role in the conflict. The international community in that instance demonstrated a commitment to upholding international law and punishing violations of the Geneva Conventions.

However, in Bosnia & Herzegovina, political groups that launched a genocide against Bosniak Muslims were largely rewarded in the peace process, given a semi-autonomous region within the new state. This region, Republica Srbska, continues to destabilize the country and threatens to upend the fragile peace.

The Way Forward

To ensure a successful and sustainable peace process in the case of Israel-Palestine, the international community cannot afford to ignore these lessons. The Palestinian people must have a say in the process – that means ensuring the leadership that represents them is democratically elected, and that means taking seriously their approval of the final contours of an agreement. Moreover, all parties to the conflict must be included to ensure the legitimacy of the process, including armed groups. The inclusion of armed groups in the Northern Ireland case indeed ensured their disarmament, and avoided the emergence of spoilers that threatened the progress of the negotiations. A similar logic can be applied in this case. Palestinian civil society actors have already articulated what this might look like; the Palestinian National Initiative for instance has generated proposals for the democratic renewal of the PLO. The international community must engage with these initiatives seriously.

The international community must ensure the peace process holds the perpetrators of war crimes accountable
The Palestinian diaspora must be included in the peace process in a meaningful way, within the contours of a revitalized and democratic Palestine Liberation Organization
Any leadership that represents Palestinians in negotiations must be democratically elected
Those elections must be open to participation from political movements with armed factions to prevent them from acting as spoilers to the peace process
The peace process must be multilateral, rather than a project of an invariably biased US foreign policy

Thirdly, given the severity of the violence in Gaza, and the almost complete annihilation of life in the Gaza Strip, the international community must ensure the peace process holds the perpetrators accountable. The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory found Israeli leaders Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog, and former defense minister Yoav Gallant directly responsible for genocide. One cannot imagine a peace process having any legitimacy without addressing violations of international law and war crimes of this magnitude. Initiatives such as The Hind Rajab Foundation have pursued legal action against “perpetrators, accomplices, and inciters of violence against Palestinians.” Similar attempts to hold war criminals accountable were used in the Syrian case after the civil war, with activists utilizing universal jurisdiction, in particular in European court systems, to pursue Assad-regime criminals around the world. There should be formal support for accountability by governments, rather than rely on civil society actors to fill this gap alone.

Finally, in the Israel-Palestine case, we can also deduce two additional recommendations. First, given that the power imbalance between Israel and the Palestinians is so severe, mediation of the peace process must ensure that this power imbalance is accounted for. In previous attempts at Israeli-Palestinian peace, the US did not act as an unbiased mediator – instead heavily weighting the outcome in Israel’s favor time and time again. We now have irrefutable proof that this dynamic only destroyed the possibility of peace, and increased the level of suffering and violence since. In any future process, the US cannot control the process alone.

Secondly, it is important to address all parties to the conflict, and communities that have been ignored in previous iterations of the peace process. As previously mentioned, this includes Palestinians in the diaspora, Palestinian citizens of Israel, and Palestinians in Jerusalem. Inclusion of these communities not only goes farther in legitimizing the process and addressing the full scope of Palestinian aspirations, but also has the added benefit of engaging with communities with different perspectives on, and relationships to, Israeli society.

Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, especially younger generations, have only ever understood Israeli society through the context of violent occupation. Formally including these communities in the peace process thus also has the potential of generating new policy solutions and forcing changes within the Israeli regime as well.

Dana El Kurd is associate professor of political science at the University of Richmond and senior non-resident fellow at the Arab Center Washington. El Kurd is a researcher of Arab and Palestinian politics, with a focus on authoritarianism and US intervention.

Enforce the War Crimes Act Against Americans Who Committed Them In Gaza

Abdelhalim Abdelrahman is a Palestinian-American political analyst, host of the Uncharted Territory Podcast and a Marcellus Policy Fellow alum at the John Quincy Adams Society advocating for a restrained U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East centered around American laws and respect for Palestinian human rights.

Following the October 7th, 2023 attacks, Israel embarked on a series of military operations that human rights organizations, legal experts, and U.N. special rapporteurs recognize as constituting a number of war crimes and other violations of international law, including the crime of genocide. The involvement of US citizens as Israel Defense Forces (IDF) personnel in Gaza–and possibly in other roles in the territory–has raised questions of whether Americans may have committed war crimes in Gaza.

The Guardian published a report in September 2025 on Daniel Rabb, a U.S.–Israeli citizen from Chicago operating as a sniper in Gaza. Raab is part of the Paratrooper Unit 202, a sniper division of the IDF, for which Raab’s parents helped fundraise over $300,000. Raab, reports the Guardian, says he shot Salem Doghmosh “simply because he tried to retrieve the body of his beloved older brother Mohammed.” This goes against International Humanitarian Law regarding the recovery of the dead. The Guardian story also quotes Asa Kasher, co-author of the Israeli Defense Forces’ ethics code, stating that “if you see someone recovering a body or helping a wounded person, that’s a rescue operation, it should be respected. Someone like that should not be shot.”

Accusations that Americans committed war crimes in Gaza have not been limited to those US citizens who served in the IDF. While allowing a trickle of aid into Gaza, Israel’s government prevented the United Nations from delivering aid for much of 2025, instead disbursing lifesaving supplies through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), created with the involvement of the U.S. Department of State and Israel. However, the United Nations estimated that, by August 1, 2025, over 850 Palestinians in Gaza had been killed near GHF distribution sites, largely from fire by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

On May 27, 2025, the New York Times reported that the opening of aid distribution sites by the GHF was marred by chaos and gunfire near some of the sites. On June 2, CNN reported that hundreds of Palestinians had received gunshot wounds outside an aid site run by GHF. On July 2nd, the Associated Press reported that two US contractors speaking on condition of anonymity claimed that fellow GHF contractors had “regularly lobbed stun grenades and pepper spray in the direction of the Palestinians.” AP reported that one of the contractors “said bullets were fired in all directions — in the air, into the ground and at times toward the Palestinians, recalling at least one instance where he thought someone had been hit.” Videos provided by one of the contractors “include conversation between English-speaking men discussing how to disperse crowds and encouraging each other after bursts of gunfire,” according to the AP report.

In July 2025, Democracy Now interviewed U.S. Army Veteran Anthony Aguilar about his experience in Gaza with UG Solutions, the security subcontractor working with the GHF. He told Democracy Now that the aid distribution sites had “become death traps.” He also said “[w]e are using indiscriminate force, targeting civilians, escalation of force that goes far beyond the measures of appropriate, against an unarmed, starving population.”

In August, CBS News interviewed another individual claiming to be a GHF whistleblower under the alias “Mike,” who also asserted that American subcontractors and the IDF deliberately targeted Palestinian civilians near aid sites. The GHF vigorously denies the claims that its contractors fired on any Palestinian civilians.

Under the 1996 War Crimes Act, Congress and the Department of State have the authority to investigate and charge citizens and dual nationals who facilitate war crimes. While federal level action is unlikely under the Trump administration, members of Congress, civil society, and groups leading strategic litigation should press to use U.S. law to hold both the Israeli government and individual perpetrators accountable.

The War Crimes Act

Although the United States’ engagement with international war crimes prosecution is complex, under statutory law, U.S. nationals can be held domestically accountable for war crimes. The War Crimes Act, passed in 1996 by unanimous consent in the Senate and voice vote in the House, criminalizes a range of conduct constituting “grave breaches” of the Geneva Conventions, when committed by U.S. nationals or members of the U.S. armed forces. The scope of the WCA is significant: conduct committed overseas is not exempt from prosecution under U.S. law if the perpetrator is an American national.

Conduct by U.S. citizens and dual nationals in Gaza, like firing on civilians, could constitute a “grave breach” under the Geneva Conventions. This offers a legal basis for the Department of Justice to open WCA investigations against Americans credibly alleged to have committed war crimes.

The DOJ should immediately create a War Crimes Task Force, which would actively investigate credible allegations of war crimes committed by U.S citizens in Gaza. This task force should have expertise in international humanitarian law, open-source forensics, and conflict-zone investigations. This step would make clear that American citizenship is not a means to evade responsibility, and would allow the U.S. government to enforce the War Crimes Act to help prevent future impunity. Such an effort would also likely clear the path for a long-overdue accounting of war crimes committed by people serving in the US military, such as the 151 cases uncovered by The New Yorker and the Pulitzer Center in 2024.

Disarming Dangerous ‘Allies’

While the War Crimes Act allows for charges to be brought against perpetrators, the State Department and Department of Defense are obliged under the Leahy Laws to prevent continued military aid to foreign military units “where there is credible information implicating that unit in the commission of gross violations of human rights”. There is potential for overlap: if an American is serving in a foreign military unit committing abuses, they could be charged under the War Crimes Act, and their unit should be flagged for rigorous vetting under the Leahy Laws, though the crimes need not overlap for either measure to be useful.

The Leahy Laws offer another tool to prevent the use of American weapons in human rights abuses. Initially passed in 1997, and expanded/reaffirmed since, the Leahy Laws prohibit U.S. security assistance to any foreign security force unit “about which” credible information exists of gross violations of human rights, including but not limited to torture, extrajudicial killing, and enforced disappearance. The Leahy laws prevent specific military aid from continuing to be provided to units found in violation, but the laws do not at present ensure such units are barred from receiving assistance given to the foreign country’s military as a whole, after which the distribution of that aid makes it non-traceable, and can leave it in the hands of specific units that violate human rights. Patrick Leahy, the former Senator whose name the Leahy laws bear, argued in spring 2024 that the laws should be applied to Israel. “Unlike for most countries,” he wrote, “U.S. weapons, ammunition and other aid are provided to Israeli security forces in bulk rather than to specific units. The secretary of state is therefore required to regularly inform Israel of any security force unit ineligible for U.S. aid because of having committed a gross violation of human rights, and the Israeli government is obligated to comply with that prohibition.”

To date, the Leahy Laws have been used to impede funding to suspect units in Colombia, Pakistan, Egypt, Ukraine, and elsewhere, but as Leahy himself noted, since “the Leahy law was passed, not a single Israeli security force unit has been deemed ineligible for U.S. aid, despite repeated, credible reports of gross violations of human rights and a pattern of failing to appropriately punish Israeli soldiers and police who violate the rights of Palestinians.”

Congress and State should end that double standard. Accountability and integrity under US law demands that the Leahy conditions should be upheld in every instance, even and especially when friends and allies commit war crimes.

Daniel Raab’s Israeli Sniper Unit 202 should be subject to rigorous Leahy Law vetting, reasserting that U.S. military assistance—training, intelligence, equipment, etc.— can and will be withdrawn on credible allegations of unlawful attacks. Other units responsible for war crimes, like the targeting of civilians, should be identified in the open source or news reporting and similarly be made ineligible for U.S support under the Leahy Laws.

Policy Recommendations

Congress must do its job to ensure oversight and transparency. It should require the State Department to make regular public reports on investigations of U.S. nationals under the War Crimes Act, as well as the results of Leahy vetting. Congress can and should hold oversight hearings to demand the executive branch take action (or explain its inaction) when such violations come to light. The U.S. government should coordinate with U.N. fact-finding missions, NGOs, and international prosecutors and share evidence it has that can be used to corroborate allegations. It should be absolutely clear, through public messaging by the State Department, that U.S. nationals are not exempt from accountability mechanisms for violations committed anywhere.

Enforce U.S. Law on U.S. Nationals who commit war crimes
Increase Leahy Vetting on units seen in open source to be violating human rights
Ensure Oversight, Transparency, and International Cooperation when it comes to withholding arms and prosecuting war crimes

As the second anniversary of October 7 passes, and the tenuous terms of a ceasefire are once again agreed to, the genocide in Gaza remains a humanitarian and legal crisis. American citizens and nationals have been directly implicated in the violence, raising profound questions of accountability. Washington possesses legal tools, like the War Crimes Act, and legally mandated procedural obligations, like arms withholding under Leahy Laws—but has lacked the political and moral courage to utilize them. Enforcing these statutes, such as conditioning aid, arms embargoes and enhancing transparency, are essential steps toward upholding international law, deterring future violations, and ensuring that American citizenship is never misused as a shield for war crimes.

The United States cannot credibly demand accountability for atrocities in other conflicts (e.g Russian war crimes in Ukraine) while it simultaneously shields Americans who may be complicit in war crimes in Gaza

If serving in a foreign military is a free pass to immunity, then citizenship, and by extension the law, loses meaning. The U.S. must not create that precedent. The threat, however small, of prosecution or conditioned assistance will have a deterrent effect: knowing that one’s military actions may later have legal and reputational consequences will push compliance with IHL.

While the present administration may disregard the harm done to national reputation as undermining U.S. strategic interest, unaddressed accusations of grave human rights violations by U.S. citizens abroad carries real diplomatic risk for Washington. Ignoring it erodes trust with allies and partners that expect and demand the U.S. to uphold its own laws.

Editor’s note: This piece has been updated for clarity and to include the GHF’s denial of claims by cited sources.

Two Years Later: Five Recommendations for a Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza and Ensuring Human Security in Israel and Palestine

Two Years Later_ Five Recommendations for a Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza and Ensuring Human Security in Israel and Palestine
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Trump’s Gaza plan is a litany of lies and empty promises

September 29, 2025 — Following President Trump’s meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu at the White House, and the Trump administration’s release of a “21-point plan” to end the conflict in Gaza, Matt Duss, Executive Vice-President at the Center for International Policy, released the following statement:

“The world desperately needs an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, whose people have endured unspeakable horror over these past two years. Unfortunately, the 21-point plan released by the Trump administration today, while thankfully walking back from Trump’s previous goal of expelling Gaza’s people, contains numerous opportunities for Netanyahu to renege on his commitments, as he has repeatedly done in the past. It is not clear who has agreed to which terms of Trump’s plan, or whether Trump himself understands what is in it. Trump and Netanyahu’s remarks today were a litany of lies about the last 30 years, not a promising foundation for peace.

“Despite his claim of being close to a deal, Trump’s statement that Israel will have ‘full US backing’ to “‘finish the job’ in Gaza if his plan is not agreed to stood out most clearly. This would be more of what we have seen not only the last nine months, but the last two years, as the United States has unconditionally armed and subsidized a genocide in Gaza.”

“The path to a desperately needed peace remains the same as it has for nearly two years: using leverage and pressure on Israel to achieve a ceasefire that stops its atrocities, frees all hostages, ends the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and supports a real path to Palestinian liberation, without which the region will not know real security.”

The Danger of Loyalty Tests in U.S. Foreign Policy

Sina Toossi is a senior nonresident fellow at the Center for International Policy.

Shahed Ghoreishi was a career‑level press officer who drafted a single, straightforward line for the State Department press office: “We do not support forced displacement of Palestinians in Gaza.” A short time later his proposed language was cut, and days after that he was fired — an action colleagues told reporters sent a “chilling message” through the building that veering from the administration’s framing could threaten a person’s job.

That is far more than a personnel dispute. It is a window into a deeper pathology in U.S. foreign policy: a system — inside government and across its think tanks, media, and political circles — that too often punishes facts, rewards conformity, and makes it perilous for professionals to tell leaders what they need to hear.

Social scientists have a name for this dynamic: groupthink. Far from being an abstract academic idea, it describes what happens when teams value unity over truth. Psychologist Irving Janis, who coined the term, defined it as “a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action.”

In other words, the stronger the pull of conformity, the weaker the capacity for independent judgment. The result, Janis warned, is a deterioration of decision-making: mental efficiency declines, reality testing erodes, and moral judgement falters.

The process is easy to spot: decisions made within small, insulated circles create pressure to conform. Those who disagree either stay silent or are pushed aside, a false sense of consensus emerges, and what Irving Janis called “mindguards” step in—members who shield leaders from uncomfortable information and preserve the illusion of unanimity. The consequences are serious. Scholars of U.S. foreign policy have linked this very pattern to disastrous mistakes, from fatally flawed contingency planning to the manipulation and misuse of intelligence that paved the way for war.

That explains why Ghoreishi’s firing should make us uneasy. It communicates to tens of thousands of public servants that nuance can be dangerous, that raising inconvenient facts is a political liability, and that professional judgment may be judged less on merit than on loyalty to a preferred frame.

Protect honest debate

Public debate only works when people are willing to risk being unpopular in order to correct mistakes. As legal scholar Cass Sunstein has noted, dissenters who bring forward inconvenient facts are “to be prized,” because even one honest voice can puncture a false consensus. But when criticism is immediately treated as a political attack, the cost of speaking rises too high, and people choose silence instead.

When organizations go after people’s motives instead of addressing their arguments, real debate is replaced by character assassination. The Ghoreishi case was not just a routine decision by a manager; it was driven by a political appointee with an ideological agenda, and it was followed by a vicious smear campaign from far-right activist Laura Loomer. The message to career officials was unmistakable: even language consistent with long-standing U.S. policy could end a career. Such a culture silences public servants and leaves leaders deaf to the truth.

The consequences of manufactured consensus are not hypothetical. They were on full display in the run-up to the Iraq war, when insulated teams, reinforced by pressure from the top, narrowed intelligence assessments and sidelined skeptics. It was a textbook case of groupthink. Iraq proved that when dissent is punished, institutions lose the very safeguards that can prevent catastrophe.

Re‑center evidence over ideology

Good foreign policy begins with clear-eyed diagnosis and an honest weighing of costs and alternatives. Too often, though, the language of government cables and committee deliberations favors a politically convenient frame over a messy truth. The result is policy built on selective intelligence, comforting assumptions, and incomplete evidence.

Research on group decision-making shows why this happens. Some cohesion can help teams move faster, but only if dissent is protected and confirmation bias kept low. Once conformity takes hold and critics are silenced, decision quality quickly collapses. As Cass Sunstein warns, that fragile balance breaks down when powerful voices dominate, turning healthy teamwork into conformity, self-censorship, and collective error.

That is why reforming how decisions are made is urgent. Leaders should be required to hear out alternative analyses, include minority views in the record, and respond directly to objections from skeptics. These are not box-checking exercises. They are simple guardrails that make it harder for institutions to ignore inconvenient evidence before locking in a course of action.

Safeguard public servants

If we want honest debate, we must make dissent less costly. The scholarship is blunt: dissent must be rewarded or at least protected, especially when it benefits the public interest. That requires stronger safeguards for career staff and whistleblowers, real channels for internal disagreement, and institutional incentives that value critical review over blind loyalty.

But rules on paper only go so far. Culture ultimately decides whether people speak up or stay silent. In today’s climate, self-censorship is rising. Fear of reputational damage leads many to hold their tongue, and that instinct seeps into elite institutions where insiders are reluctant to challenge prevailing narratives. The Ghoreishi case makes the point: it taught public servants not just what language is permitted, but what truths are too dangerous to even raise.

Ultimately, even the healthiest institutions need outside pressure to stay honest. That is why external checks are indispensable. A free press and a Congress willing to investigate provide the counterweights to executive overreach and groupthink. These mechanisms are not partisan weapons; they are structural safeguards. By forcing leaders to explain their decisions, confront inconvenient facts, and stay accountable, they keep the system honest, and the country safer.

Why defending dissent is patriotic and vital for national security

Dissent is often painted as disloyalty. In reality, the opposite is true: telling leaders uncomfortable truths is a patriotic duty. When analysts, diplomats, or generals speak up, they reduce the chances that the nation will stumble into unnecessary wars, misjudge adversaries, or ignore the human costs of reckless policies.

That is why Shahed Ghoreishi’s firing should alarm anyone who cares about sound statecraft. It signals a climate where loyalty to the script outweighs telling the truth. And when silence becomes the safer career path, the nation loses its best safeguard against small mistakes growing into strategic disasters.

The fixes are not complicated. Institutions can create formal channels for dissent, assign rotating devil’s advocates, test plans against adversarial analysis, and shield career professionals from political retribution. These steps will not prevent every mistake, but they will make policy sturdier and leaders better informed.

History shows that even a single dissenter can break a false consensus and steer a group back toward sound judgment. Protecting those voices is not weakness; it is prudence. It is how democracies learn, adapt, and survive.

U.S. Move to Sanction a U.N. Official is Rogue State Behavior

July 10, 2025 – In response to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s move to impose sanctions on Francesca Albanese, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, on the basis of her due cooperation with International Criminal Court (ICC) processes, Center for International Policy Vice President for Government Affairs Dylan Williams issued the following statement:

“Secretary Rubio’s decision to impose sanctions on a United Nations official for the proper exercise of her duties is another egregious attack on international norms and the rule of law by the Trump Administration. Punishing U.N. officials for doing their jobs, like the administration’s sanctioning of International Criminal Court officials and their families earlier this year, is rogue state behavior that undermines global and human security, while providing succor to human rights abusers and war criminals around the world.

“It is clear that UN Special Rapporteur Albanese was targeted for saying what countless international law experts, historians and prominent statespeople have themselves concluded: Israel is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide, in Gaza. Yet one need not agree with Albanese’s or any other U.N. or ICC official’s assessments or characterizations to defend the basic principles of due process and the rule of law. The Trump Administration’s hostility to the integrity of legal proceedings and its persecution under the color of law of those with whom it disagrees should be opposed as vigorously in international settings as it is domestically.

“We call on U.S. lawmakers to unequivocally condemn this latest abuse of power by the Trump Administration. We also encourage countries that are party to the Rome Statute of the ICC to take appropriate measures to uphold their obligations in response to these sanctions, including invocation of the European Union’s ‘blocking statute’ to prevent compliance with U.S. sanctions with extraterritorial reach.”

Netanyahu’s Dangerous Plans Advance Amid U.S. Visit

War crimes and crimes against humanity continue in Gaza without a workable ceasefire:

Dozens of civilians in Gaza continue to be killed by Israeli forces almost every day, both by ongoing bombings and near “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” aid distribution sites, around which mass deaths have become so routine, they have been dubbed “killing fields” for Palestinians seeking food amid starvation caused by months of near-total blockade on aid.
Netanyahu continues to reject proposals that would allow experienced humanitarian aid agencies to resume essential aid delivery or commit Israel to steps toward a permanent ceasefire, while he and Trump advance plans to relocate Palestinian civilians from Gaza that constitute the crime against humanity of forced displacement – i.e., ethnic cleansing.
Trump continues to arm and abet Israel’s war crimes with new shipments of U.S. weapons, in violation of both international humanitarian law and U.S. law.

Advancing Israeli war crimes in the West Bank threaten to further destabilize the Middle East:

Israeli settlers backed by U.S.-armed Israeli forces have increased violent attacks against Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank, with deadly incidents rightly being likened to “pogroms” against civilians who Israel is obligated by international law to protect.
Settler attacks are part of an accelerating campaign of forced displacement that also involves Israel bulldozing Palestinian communities and removing their residents from their land.
Ministers and senior lawmakers from Netanyahu’s own Likud party are pushing the Prime Minister to officially annex the West Bank, with the Trump administration saying it “stands with Israel and its decisions” when asked about possible annexation of the occupied territory.

Iran’s nuclear activities unleashed and unmonitored as hawks pivot to push for more war:

While Trump continues to say that last month’s U.S. attack on Iran “obliterated” its nuclear program, it is clear the strikes did not destroy the program, and have not only set it back by far less than the 2015 Iran Deal, but likely further incentivized Iran to seek nuclear weapons.
In a widely predicted move, the Israeli government and war hawks are already floating the idea that additional military action is needed to address Iran’s nuclear activities, raising the possibility of further U.S. involvement in hostilities that could become another major conflict.
Diplomacy toward a new agreement to limit Iran’s nuclear activities will only succeed if Trump avoids making maximalist demands – like insisting on zero uranium enrichment in Iran – based on the mistaken notion that he destroyed Iran’s program, rather than further incentivized a dash for nuclear weapons by the regime.

Building Humane Foreign Policy On Moral Outrage

Andrew Leber is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science and the Middle East & North African Studies Program at Tulane University, and was a cofounder of Fellow Travelers Blog.

Since late 2010, U.S. policy towards the Middle East treated the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as something that could be safely left on the back burner while dealing with more pressing concerns – chiefly the desire to contain Iran’s nuclear program. Now events have come full circle, with Israel’s expansive response to Hamas’ October 7 attacks finally pulling the United States into a direct military engagement with Iran.

In condemning President Trump’s decision to send B-2 bombers halfway around the globe (without congressional approval), critics have understandably raised the specter of a protracted military engagement in the Middle East, akin to the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

War Powers Resolutions are a good start in avoiding U.S. involvement in the Israel-Iran war, but won’t be enough to de-escalate and build peace.
To meaningfully constrain Israel and build peace, the United States should use the massive amount of arms sales and other forms of security assistance it provides annually as leverage.
Progressives have an advantage in adopting an “all-of-society” approach to forming and sustaining U.S. Middle East policy.
A sustainable policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will require shaping U.S. public opinion and cultivating a broader regard for the well-being of others.

Yet Trump’s actions also highlight the limits of a politics of restraint rooted in conserving American “blood and treasure” from foreign military adventures. While successive U.S. presidents have been constrained by the ultimate unpopularity of the Iraq War, the flip side of a historical memory overwhelmingly focused on U.S. (rather than Iraqi) casualties is a sense that almost any military action is permissible so long as it avoids committing ground forces.

“No ground forces were used in the strike,” Trump noted in his subsequent letter to Congress justifying the strikes. This rhetoric channels executive legal arguments across administrations and President Obama’s own emphasis on “no boots on the ground” in overseas military operations. Even during his first term, Trump embraced drone strikes and airpower as a way to project U.S. power abroad, in many ways a continuation — albeit with even less regard for civilian casualties — of Obama’s own “light-footprint” approach to military intervention.

Still, merely limiting the direct risks to U.S. forces is no recipe for peace or human well-being, as the Obama administration found in facilitating a Saudi-led military intervention. Even in the absence of broader military commitments, present U.S. support for Israel’s “might makes right” foreign policy poses enormous reputational and material risks to the United States.

Only concerted efforts to build popular concern for the shared humanity of others, as happened in limiting U.S. support for military intervention in Yemen, will lay the groundwork for regional peace that is more than a pause between fighting. The alternative is a continuation of the Global War on Terror: carrying out (or otherwise facilitating) attacks on actors, organizations, or even states deemed threatening to the United States and its partners, with little in the way of popular or congressional oversight.

The Yemen-War Model

The progressive foreign policy movement already has experience addressing the moral hazard of U.S. security commitments in the Middle East, namely Saudi Arabia’s protracted military intervention in Yemen. There, as with Israel, sources of leverage were clear: arms sales that sustained the Saudi war effort and diplomatic cover that justified the intervention in terms of Saudi national security concerns.

As with Israel’s war in Gaza (albeit on a much smaller scale), the United States was perceived as facilitating mass suffering by providing Saudi Arabia with material and moral support for sustained attacks on Houthi forces in Yemen. U.S. leverage was also understood as critical to restraining Saudi Arabia given the absolute monarchy’s suppression of any domestic dissent. While Israel is far more open to domestic dissent than the Kingdom neither criticism by prominent former officials nor protests by the families of Israeli hostages in Gaza has meaningfully restrained Prime Minister Netanyahu in Gaza. An overwhelming majority of Jewish Israelis back the latest attack on Iran, even if some quibble with the timing. Additionally, free speech within Israel itself is under threat, with state raids on bookstores in East Jerusalem, sanctioning Israeli media critical of government actions in Gaza, and stifling of dissent within the Israeli armed forces itself.

Moral outrage over the war’s humanitarian toll and Saudi Arabia’s humanitarian abuses, not rational cost-benefit analysis, ultimately pushed members of Congress – including some Republicans – to pass successive War-Powers resolutions and take other legislative action aimed at curtailing U.S. security support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen and blocking U.S. arms sales to the kingdom. This moral outrage did not appear overnight, but was actively built by a broad coalition of activists, and turbo-charged by Saudi Arabia’s assassination of media figure Jamal Khashoggi.

While the Trump administration ultimately overrode Congress in direct terms, and maintained most arms sales to Saudi Arabia, senior officials nevertheless began to push Saudi and other Gulf leaders toward peace talks. Joe Biden in turn made ending support for the Saudi intervention part of his presidential campaign, and empowered a special envoy to seek a diplomatic solution to the conflict in 2021. (The Biden administration continued security coordination with Saudi Arabia, however, leaving its Yemen policy open to charges of being both too hawkish and too dove-ish.) Restraint ultimately worked in Saudi Arabia’s favor as well, with a de facto truce by 2022 insulating the kingdom from the Houthi force’s efforts to pressure Israel amid the ongoing Gaza war.

Of course, any restraint of Saudi Arabia was (in retrospect) playing on “easy mode.” Saudi Arabia has little domestic constituency in the United States, at least outside of the Beltway, and to the extent that Americans have strong feelings about the kingdom they tend to be negative. Even then, any “restraint” of Saudi military activities by the United States has been partial at best and highly contingent on other U.S. policy priorities.

Israel, by contrast, is overwhelmingly supported by one half of the United States’ two-party political scene, and by a fiercely devoted constituency within the Democratic Party’s supporters as well. While negative U.S. views of Israel are on the rise, it is hard to imagine a presidential candidate for either party labelling the country a “pariah” on the campaign trail anytime soon.

What is to be done?

In the near term, War-Powers legislation – as recently attempted by Tim Kaine in the Senate, and proposed by various members in the House – is the clearest tool for weighing in on the Executive’s opaque decision-making. It is good for Congress to flex its oversight muscles, for individuals and advocacy organizations to support these efforts, and to remind the President and security partners overseas of the domestic fallout of military action abroad.

Yet even within the Democratic Party, leaders struggle to meaningfully criticize Israeli actions – while drawing distinctions regarding committing U.S. forces – while other members openly long for regime change in Iran. It will require a far more concerted effort to demilitarize U.S. policy towards the Middle East at the strategic level, and to ensure that future administrations do not simply shunt the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the back burner once more.

At the local and state level, this means building and maintaining spaces to talk about Israel, Palestine, and the U.S. role in this long-running conflict – something that can no longer be taken for granted, even on private university campuses. It in turn means supporting political candidates who oppose a “Palestine exception” to free speech, while recognizing practical limits on the type and tenor of critiques they make of Israel.

In terms of shaping mass attitudes, it means integrating demands for Palestinian liberation into broader advocacy of a rights-based internationalism – as many pro-Palestinian advocacy organizations across the United States have already done.

Progressives recognize the need to build popular buy-in to global norms long taken for granted in foreign policymaking, from respect for international humanitarian law to the belief that the United States is safer when it cares for the well-being of others. The best counter to charges that U.S. policy singles out Israel for criticism – beyond noting the fact that few countries receive the same level of U.S. diplomatic and military support – is to demand that the same standards apply to Emirati involvement in Sudan’s civil war, or to our own country’s treatment of resident non-citizens.

When it comes to Israel per se, this means continuing to convey the risks of underwriting a “might makes right” approach to regional security. In engaging persuadable U.S. supporters of Israel, it means taking seriously concerns about rising antisemitism while continuing the slow, steady work of insisting that the state of Israel be judged by its actions as a state.

And at the level of national policy, it means forcing elected and appointed officials to recognize that U.S. ties to any security partner cannot take the form of writing blank checks for states bent on exacerbating human suffering – whatever their justifications. For those willing to listen, this can take the form of advocacy; for those unwilling, this should take the form of primarying them or, for appointees, their patrons.

It also means accepting, as both the Biden and now the Trump administrations have found, that Israeli war crimes in Gaza, and the fundamental injustice towards Palestinians of Israel’s one-state reality, cannot be walled off from more “strategic” considerations of the U.S. national interest rooted in avoiding costly interstate conflict.

Trump’s New Arms Transfer to Israel Deepens US Complicity in Gaza War Crimes

July 1, 2025 – In response to the U.S. State Department approving a proposed sale of joint direct attack munitions (JDAM) and related support to Israel, Security Assistance Monitor (SAM) Director, Ari Tolany, issued the following statement:

“The Trump administration has a valuable opportunity to exercise leverage with Israel to advocate for improved humanitarian access to Gaza, a ceasefire, and regional de-escalation. Instead, it has chosen to grant Israel more of the very bombs used to totally destroy Gaza and slaughter its people.

Joint direct attack munitions and other systems for munitions guidance are often marketed as a tool to mitigate civilian harm through more precise targeting. In the hands of a government like Benjamin Netanyahu’s, which has no political will to protect civilians, however, these weapons become tools to precisely target aid workers, journalists, and structures indispensable to the survival of the civilian population.

Under international law, Israel has an obligation as an occupying power to facilitate humanitarian access to Gaza. Instead, it has turned nominal aid distribution sites into killing fields. The billions of dollars of weapons, aid, and logistical support the United States has provided to Israel for more than 20 months mean that the United States is complicit in bringing about the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza. By continuing to supply weapons that have a substantial likelihood to be used to facilitate gross violations of international humanitarian law, the United States runs the risk of being legally liable for aiding and abetting war crimes. After 20 months of failure to enforce U.S. law, Congress should use all means at its disposal to prevent the transfer of these JDAMs, and other weapons likely to be used in war crimes.”

Expanding Use of Emergency Arms Authorities Requires More Congressional Oversight

Janet Abou-Elias is a research fellow at the Center for International Policy and co-founder of Women for Weapons Trade Transparency.

In late May, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a quietly damning report on the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) – a statutory tool that allows the president to transfer defense articles and services from U.S. stockpiles to foreign partners without advance congressional approval. The findings show that in the rush to meet wartime needs, the Department of Defense (DoD) has repeatedly neglected basic statutory safeguards intended to protect U.S. force readiness and fiscal discipline.

Yet while the report’s spotlight is on Ukraine, another drawdown mechanism is operating with even less public accountability: the War Reserve Stockpile Allies–Israel (WRSA-I) program. Both PDA and WRSA-I reflect a concerning drift away from the core principles of legislative oversight and budgetary transparency in U.S. security assistance.

Congress should act on the GAO’s findings by:
Mandating O&M assessments for all PDA drawdowns and requiring public reporting on their outcomes;

Applying equivalent oversight standards to WRSA-I, including disclosure of drawdown quantities and conditions, and reinstating valuation thresholds;

Establishing centralized tracking mechanisms across DoD to monitor cumulative impacts on U.S. stockpiles, regardless of the drawdown authority used;

Codifying replenishment requirements, particularly for frequently used programs, to avoid ad hoc budgeting that undermines strategic planning.

The Oversight Shortfalls in PDA

Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the United States has used PDA to transfer more than $31.7 billion in arms to Ukraine, as well as over $1 billion to Taiwan and Haiti. The GAO found that the DoD failed to conduct required Operations and Maintenance (O&M) budget impact assessments for 21 of the fiscal year 2024 PDA packages it reviewed, highlighting a persistent gap in oversight despite the scale of transfers authorized.

These assessments are not optional. They are required under the law to evaluate how pulling from U.S. stockpiles might affect military readiness, sustainment, and operations. The Pentagon has been on notice since at least 2016, when GAO first recommended that military services develop clear guidance for performing such evaluations. Nearly a decade later, that guidance remains nonexistent.

The report also confirms that replacement funding for PDA drawdowns is not guaranteed as it depends on discretionary congressional appropriations. While Congress has so far allocated over $45 billion to replenish what was sent to Ukraine, this process is ad hoc and susceptible to political delays. The absence of required impact assessments means policymakers are often voting on replacement funds without a clear understanding of operational tradeoffs or baseline stockpile metrics.

WRSA-I: A Parallel Drawdown Program with Even Less Scrutiny

While PDA has rightly come under scrutiny, another statutory mechanism has largely escaped public debate: the War Reserve Stockpile Allies–Israel (WRSA-I). Originally intended to pre-position U.S. materiel for contingency use in the Middle East, WRSA-I has, over time, evolved into a quasi-permanent drawdown channel for direct transfers to Israel, especially during military escalations.

Between 2023 and 2024, U.S. officials authorized multiple shipments from WRSA-I to Israel during its military attacks on Gaza. Unlike PDA, which requires at least limited congressional notification, WRSA-I transfers occur with almost no reporting obligations to Congress or the public. As a result, we know very little about what munitions were transferred, how often, and what consequences – logistical, operational, or political – they may have produced.

This lack of transparency is not incidental; it is the product of a decade of statutory dilution. Legislative amendments in the 2014 and 2021 National Defense Authorization Acts have gradually lowered the oversight threshold for WRSA-I by relaxing valuation limits and broadening eligibility for use. These changes were not widely debated and were often embedded in larger omnibus legislation.

The program’s legal scaffolding has shifted in ways that increasingly bypass both congressional oversight and traditional foreign aid processes. While framed as a logistical asset, WRSA-I now functions in practice as an off-budget arms channel – one that, like PDA, circumvents Foreign Military Financing (FMF) and arms export controls that would normally trigger review by congressional committees or the public.

A Broader Institutional Concern

The parallels between Presidential drawdowns and the use of War Reserve Stockpile for Allies- Israel reflect a broader institutional pattern: U.S. security assistance is increasingly moving through emergency or pre-authorized mechanisms that operate outside of standard deliberative and oversight processes. In both cases, the executive branch has taken advantage of flexible authorities in the name of responsiveness – while neglecting the due diligence, reporting, and budgeting that Congress has required by law.

This is not just a bureaucratic failure. It raises fundamental constitutional concerns about the erosion of Congress’s Article I powers to authorize spending and oversee foreign military engagements. When weapons are transferred through opaque stockpiles or drawn down without proper assessments, it undermines the transparency and accountability that are essential to democratic control of the military.

Recommendations

Congress should act on the GAO’s findings by:

Mandating O&M assessments for all PDA drawdowns and requiring public reporting on their outcomes;
Applying equivalent oversight standards to WRSA-I, including disclosure of drawdown quantities and conditions, and reinstating valuation thresholds;
Establishing centralized tracking mechanisms across DoD to monitor cumulative impacts on U.S. stockpiles, regardless of the drawdown authority used;
Codifying replenishment requirements, particularly for frequently used programs, to avoid ad hoc budgeting that undermines strategic planning.

Absent these reforms, programs like Presidential Drawdown Authority and War Reserve Stockpile for Allies- Israel risk becoming permanent fixtures of a shadow aid architecture – one that enables short-term arms transfers at the expense of long-term democratic oversight.

Country: Israel & Occupied Palestinian Territories