Political Shifts in the Middle East: Iran and Israel
VIEW EVENT DETAILSAs the Biden administration is halfway through its first year, two major elections have taken place in the Middle East – Israel and Iran. For the first time in over a decade, Israel has a new eight-party coalition government led by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. Meanwhile in Iran, conservative Ebrahim Raisi is set to take office as president in early August. The leadership changes in both countries are coming at a pivotal time — the Biden administration is engaged in nuclear talks with Iran in Vienna, and it has only been a little over a month since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect. What are the implications for the Iran negotiations with a more hardline government in Tehran soon coming to power? In Israel, Prime Minister Bennett has already expressed his opposition to the Iran Deal and the current negotiations. How will the Biden administration adjust to the political shifts in the region?
Join us for a discussion with former deputy national security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan under President George W. Bush Meghan O'Sullivan, former U.S. point man for the Middle East peace process Ambassador Dennis Ross, and senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Karim Sadjadpour. Asia Society and Asia Society Policy Institute President the Hon. Kevin Rudd will moderate this conversation, which will explore the implications of leadership changes in the Middle East and the unique opportunities they present.
Speakers
Meghan O'Sullivan is Jeane Kirkpatrick Professor of the Practice of International Affairs and the Director of the Geopolitics of Energy Project at Harvard University’s Kennedy School. She is also the chair of the North American Group of the Trilateral Commission. Her third book, Windfall: How the New Energy Abundance Upends Global Politics and Strengthens America’s Power, was published by Simon & Schuster in September 2017. Between 2004 and 2007, she was special assistant to President George W. Bush and Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan. From July 2013 to December 2013, she was the Vice Chair of the All Party Talks in Northern Ireland. She also served as senior director for strategic planning and Southwest Asia in the National Security Council in 2004; political advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority administrator and deputy director for governance in Baghdad; chief advisor to the presidential envoy to the Northern Ireland peace process; and a fellow at the Brookings Institution. She is on the board of Raytheon Technologies and the Board of Directors of the Council on Foreign Relations. She is a member of the International Advisory Group for the British law firm, Linklaters, a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, a consultant to energy companies, and a Senior Advisor at WestExec Advisors. She is a trustee of the International Crisis Group and a member of the board of The Mission Continues, a non-profit organization to help veterans. She is on the advisory committee for the Women’s Initiative at the George W. Bush Institute, as well as Columbia University’s Center for Global Energy Policy. She has been awarded the Defense Department's highest honor for civilians, the Distinguished Public Service Medal, and three times been awarded the State Department's Superior Honor Award.
Ambassador Dennis Ross is counselor and William Davidson Distinguished Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and a member of the Asia Society Policy Institute's advisory council. He also teaches at Georgetown University’s Center for Jewish Civilization. For more than twelve years, Amb. Ross played a leading role in shaping U.S. involvement in the Middle East peace process, dealing directly with the parties as the U.S. point man on the peace process in both the George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations. He served two years as special assistant to President Obama and as National Security Council senior director for the Central Region, and a year as special advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. He served as director of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff in the first Bush administration, and played a prominent role in U.S. policy towards the former Soviet Union, the unification of Germany and its integration into NATO, arms control negotiations, and the 1991 Gulf War coalition. During the Reagan administration, he served as director of Near East and South Asian affairs on the National Security Council staff and deputy director of the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment. He is the author of five books on the peace process, the Middle East, and international relations, most recently Be Strong and of Good Courage: How Israel's Most Important Leaders Shaped Its Destiny (2019), written with his colleague David Makovsky. Previously, he authored Doomed to Succeed: The U.S.-Israel Relationship from Truman to Obama (2015), which was awarded the 2015 National Jewish Book Award for history. He co-authored Myths, Illusions, and Peace: Finding a New Direction for America in the Middle East (2009) with Mr. Makovsky, The Missing Peace: The Inside Story of the Fight for Middle East Peace (2004), and Statecraft, And How to Restore America's Standing in the World (2007).
Karim Sadjadpour is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he focuses on Iran and U.S. foreign policy toward the Middle East. He is a regular contributor to The Atlantic, and has also written for Foreign Affairs, The New York Times, The Economist, and The Washington Post. He is a frequent guest on the PBS NewsHour, NPR, Charlie Rose, and CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, and has also been on the Colbert Report, the Today Show, and NPR’s Fresh Air. He regularly advises senior U.S., European, and Asian officials and has testified numerous times before the U.S. Congress. He has lived in Latin America, Europe, and the Middle East (including both Iran and the Arab world) and speaks Persian, Italian, Spanish, and proficient Arabic. He is an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, teaching a class on U.S. foreign policy and the Middle East. He has written on Iran and the Middle East through the prism of neuroscience, cinema, satire, and sexuality, and his recent publications include “Ayatollah Machiavelli: How Ali Khamenei Became the Most Powerful Man in the Middle East.” He was previously an analyst with the International Crisis Group, based in Tehran and Washington. In 2007, he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in Davos, and is an Asia Society Asia 21 Young Leader.
The Hon. Kevin Rudd AC is President and CEO of the Asia Society, and inaugural President of the Asia Society Policy Institute. He served as 26th Prime Minister of Australia (2007 to 2010, 2013) and as Foreign Minister (2010 to 2012). He is Chair of the Board of the International Peace Institute in New York, and Chair of Sanitation and Water for All – a global partnership of government and non-governmental organizations dedicated to the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 6. He is a Distinguished Fellow at Chatham House and the Paulson Institute, and a Distinguished Statesman with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He is also a member of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization’s Group of Eminent Persons.