Ofira Seliktar's Books

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Why So Few Predicted the Collapse of the Soviet Union

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Why So Few Predicted the Collapse of the Soviet Union

By: Ofira Seliktar

Washington's failure to foresee the collapse of its superpower rival ranks high in the pantheon of predictive failures. The question of who got what right or wrong has been intertwined with the deeper issue of "who won" the Cold War. Like the disputes over "who lost" China and Iran, this debate has been fought out along ideological and partisan lines, with conservatives claiming credit for the Evil Empire's demise and liberals arguing that the causes were internal to the Soviet Union. The intelligence community has come in for harsh criticism for overestimating Soviet strength and overlooking the symptoms of crisis; the discipline of "Sovietology" has dissolved into acrimonious irrelevance. Drawing on declassified documents, interviews, and careful analysis of contemporaneous literature, this book offers the first systematic analysis of this predictive failure at the paradigmatic, foreign policy, and intelligence levels. Although it is focused on the Soviet case, it offers lessons that are both timely and necessary.

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Page Count

297

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1317462440

ISBN 13

9781317462446

Navigating Iran

From Carter to Obama

By: O. Seliktar

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Navigating Iran

From Carter to Obama

By: O. Seliktar

This book provides the first full account of America's relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran from Jimmy Carter's presidency to Barack Obama's. It discusses all major facets of Iranian policy of interest to the United States: nuclear proliferation, revolutionary export and support for international terrorism, efforts to undermine the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and violations of human rights. It compares developments in Iran to their perception in Washington, providing the clearest picture available yet of the discrepancies between the complex and elusive Iranian reality and its understanding in the United States.

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Page Count

227

Publisher

Springer

Published Date

ISBN 10

1137010886

ISBN 13

9781137010889

Doomed to Failure?

The Politics and Intelligence of the Oslo Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Doomed to Failure?

The Politics and Intelligence of the Oslo Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

This ground-breaking book examines how and why the much-vaunted Oslo Peace Accords between the Israelis and Palestinians collapsed. The author analyzes the players on both sides of the accords, pointing out the attitudes and actions that serve to undermine peace and promote conflict. On the one hand, she criticizes the Islamist organizations Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad for not tolerating the idea of any true long-term peace with Israel. On the other hand, she scrutinizes the factions for and against Oslo that developed within Israeli government circles, and she calls into question the ability of Israeli intelligence to correctly assess the Palestinian negotiators. By means of such examination, this book poses a fundamental question: Can Islamic fundamentalism ever accept the existence of Israel or will it short-circuit any prospect of peace between majority-Muslim states and their non-Muslim counterparts?

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Page Count

249

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313366187

ISBN 13

9780313366185

Doomed to Failure?

The Politics and Intelligence of the Oslo Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Doomed to Failure?

The Politics and Intelligence of the Oslo Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

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249

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Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313366187

ISBN 13

9780313366185

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Why So Few Predicted the Collapse of the Soviet Union

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Why So Few Predicted the Collapse of the Soviet Union

By: Ofira Seliktar

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297

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Routledge

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ISBN 10

1317462440

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9781317462446

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

By: Ofira Seliktar

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New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

By: Ofira Seliktar

The invasion of Lebanon was the culmination of an extraordinary change which New Zionism created in Israel’s foreign policy system. This book, first published in 1986, examines how New Zionism came to dominate Israeli politics and it investigates the implications of this new ideology for the future of the Middle East. The author agrees that after the creation of the State of Israel, the belief system of the evolving society gradually changed. After the Six-Day War the ideology of Socialist Zionism became increasingly discredited and replaced by the New Zionist quest for Eretz Israel. Hardened by the harsh experience of the continuing Arab-Israeli conflict and enhanced by the threatening image of the enemy, the political culture in Israel became less tolerant and more receptive to the language of New Zionism. As a result, Begin’s Likud came to power in 1977 and quickly changed the whole basis of Israel’s foreign policy. Instead of the cautious pragmatism of Socialist Zionism the Begin government pursued the ‘grand design’ that had enjoyed a long tradition in Revisionist thinking. Although General Sharon was responsible for the actual conduct of the war, it was the New Zionist propensity to use military force to introduce a new order in the Middle East which was responsible for the invasion. The book suggests that it is still too early to assess the full impact of the war in Lebanon on New Zionism. Although the war failed to validate any of the ‘grand design’ tenets of New Zionism, the violent Shiite response in Southern Lebanon may serve to strengthen the New Zionist hard line. This could hasten the annexation of the occupied territories as the final stage of turning the State of Israel into the Land of Israel.

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323

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Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1317442857

ISBN 13

9781317442851

Iran, Israel, and the United States

The Politics of Counter-Proliferation Intelligence

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

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Iran, Israel, and the United States

The Politics of Counter-Proliferation Intelligence

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

This book analyzes the process of evaluating Iran’s nuclear project and the efforts to roll it back, resulting in the 2015 nuclear agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPA). Despite its aura of scientific exactitude, nuclear intelligence is complex and susceptible to methodological disagreements and political bias at the international oversight level—the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)—and within the countries involved in the rollback project – Israel and the United States. To highlight both the technological problems of assessing compliance and the politicization, each chapter in the book uses a real-time comparison of the nuclear developments in Iran, and the perception of Israel and the United States. This methodology yielded some significant results. Essentially, two camps had formed in each country; those who were pushing for an agreement with Iran and those who opposed it. The Israeli intelligence agencies – the Mossad and the Military Intelligence – as well as the highly secretive Israeli Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) which advised them considered the program to be weak and slow moving. The right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that Iran was steps away from the “point of no return,” making it an existential threat to Israel. A virtually identical split emerged in Washington. While the intelligence community and the advising scientists from the National Nuclear Laboratories, considered Iran progress to be relatively modest, the Republicans and the Israel lobby - the Jewish organizations and the Christian Zionists— warned of the imminent danger of a nuclear Iran. With the Obama administration pushing for the JCPOA, a fierce debate took place in Congress. The Israeli intelligence and military chiefs led by the Mossad chief Meir Dagan, which had previously blocked Netanyahu from a preemptive action, quietly supported the agreement. In Washington, the Israel lobby, and the Republicans, helped by Netanyahu, mounted an all-out effort to defeat the deal in Congress. The pro-deal coalition fought back by mobilizing the scientific community, military and intelligence officials, the business lobby, and grassroots Democrats. The JCPOA represents the first successful effort of peaceful counterproliferation. At the same, excessive politicization has clouded its legitimacy and cast doubt about its future.

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Page Count

285

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield

Published Date

ISBN 10

1498569765

ISBN 13

9781498569767

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

By: Ofira Seliktar

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New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

By: Ofira Seliktar

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323

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Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1317442857

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9781317442851

The Politics of Intelligence and American Wars with Iraq

By: O. Seliktar

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The Politics of Intelligence and American Wars with Iraq

By: O. Seliktar

Coming at the heels of September 11, Operation Iraqi Freedom has focused the limelight on the way in which the United States predicts and manages political change. The failure to find WMD and more important, the continued violence in Iraq instead of the hoped for democracy, has engender an acrimonious debate on the motives of the Bush administration and its uses or misuses of intelligence. The question of who got what right or wrong has been fought out along ideological, and partisan lines, with supporters claiming that, given what was known about Saddam Hussein, the decision to change his regime was justified and detractors arguing that a group of largely Jewish neoconservatives, acting on behalf of Israel, manipulated intelligence in order to trick the United States into an unnecessary and costly war. The book provides a systematic and objective analysis of the problems that faced American intelligence in deciphering the behavior of the highly secretive and confusing Iraq regime and its enigmatic leader.

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Page Count

219

Publisher

Springer

Published Date

ISBN 10

0230610404

ISBN 13

9780230610408

Divided We Stand

American Jews, Israel, and the Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Divided We Stand

American Jews, Israel, and the Peace Process

By: Ofira Seliktar

The relationship between Israel, American Jews, and the peace process has been a subject of passionate debate among scholars, political activists, and lay observers alike. This book is the first rigorous attempt to chart the impact of the peace process on the American Jewish community and its relationship with Israel, as mediated by the changing identity needs of American Jews. Overall, the trajectory of this relationship has been from a wide consensus of support for Israeli foreign policy, toward increasing polarization. On one side is the peace camp composed mainly of those whose Jewish-American identity is based on a religious-universalistic definition of Judaism; on the other, those who identify as nationalistic, or orthodox in religious terms, and support a hard-line vision of Greater Israel. The acrimony between the two, combined with demographic change, has undermined Israel as a symbol of Jewish identity in America, and impeded effective lobbying for Israel.

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Page Count

291

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313012199

ISBN 13

9780313012198

Failing the Crystal Ball Test

The Carter Administration and the Fundamentalist Revolution in Iran

By: Ofira Seliktar

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Failing the Crystal Ball Test

The Carter Administration and the Fundamentalist Revolution in Iran

By: Ofira Seliktar

With the Iranian revolution as her focal point, Seliktar offers a systematic analysis of predictive failure in foreign policy at the paradigmatic, policy, and intelligence levels. Seliktar first examines how social science paradigms determine conceptualizations of political change, and then applies that analysis to understanding New Internationalism, the Carter administration's foreign policy philosophy at the time of the Shah's fall from power. Based in part on classified documents seized during the takeover of the American embassy, Failing the Crystal Ball Test is a valuable addition to Middle Eastern studies, international relations, and comparative politics collections. Seliktar engages in a general discussion of the problems entailed in correctly assessing the political legitimacy of foreign regimes, and describes the origins of New Internationalism as influenced by the New Left dependency theories. Examining President Carter's application of New Internationalism to Iran, Seliktar presents an account first of political influences on the predictive process during the early stages of revolution, and then of the administration's misreading of the likelihood of a fundamentalist regime in Teheran.

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Page Count

270

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313002770

ISBN 13

9780313002779

Iran, Revolution, and Proxy Wars

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

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Iran, Revolution, and Proxy Wars

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

This book analyzes the historical quest of the Islamic Republic of Iran to export its revolution to the Muslim countries in the Middle East and beyond. The authors argue that Iran exported its revolution by using proxies such as Hezbollah, the Iraqi Shite militias, and the Houthis. The study unravels the casual chain behind less-known cases of Iranian sponsorship of al Qaeda (Central) and al Qaida in Iraq. It combines rigorous theory with detailed empirical analysis which can add to the current debate about ways to roll back Iran’s revolutionary export.

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Page Count

245

Publisher

Palgrave Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

303029420X

ISBN 13

9783030294205

Iran, Israel, and the United States

The Politics of Counter-Proliferation Intelligence

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

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Iran, Israel, and the United States

The Politics of Counter-Proliferation Intelligence

By: Ofira Seliktar,Farhad Rezaei

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Page Count

285

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield

Published Date

ISBN 10

1498569765

ISBN 13

9781498569767

Identities in Crisis in Iran

Politics, Culture, and Religion

By: Ronen A. Cohen

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Identities in Crisis in Iran

Politics, Culture, and Religion

By: Ronen A. Cohen

Identities in Crisis in Iran aims at finding answers to the questions about the puzzling character of the Iranian identity. The contributors acknowledge that identity, especially when it is faced with fundamental tensions as in the case of Iran, is a phenomenon that is constantly developing via factors involving the private self and common social components. This book addresses the tension many Iranian people face that lie between the Persian culture and the Shi’a religion, women versus men, and culture versus traditions.

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Page Count

199

Publisher

Lexington Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1498506429

ISBN 13

9781498506427

Book's by Ofira Seliktar

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Navigating Iran

Navigating Iran

Doomed to Failure?

Doomed to Failure?

Doomed to Failure?

Doomed to Failure?

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

Politics, Paradigms, and Intelligence Failures

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

Iran, Israel, and the United States

Iran, Israel, and the United States

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

New Zionism and the Foreign Policy System of Israel (RLE Israel and Palestine)

The Politics of Intelligence and American Wars with Iraq

The Politics of Intelligence and American Wars with Iraq

Divided We Stand

Divided We Stand

Failing the Crystal Ball Test

Failing the Crystal Ball Test

Iran, Revolution, and Proxy Wars

Iran, Revolution, and Proxy Wars

Iran, Israel, and the United States

Iran, Israel, and the United States

Identities in Crisis in Iran

Identities in Crisis in Iran

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