Israel's foreign policy beyond the Arab world : engaging the periphery / Jean-Loup Samaan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Samaan, Jean-Loup, author.

Series:

Routledge studies in Middle Eastern politics ; 88.

Routledge studies in Middle Eastern politics ; 88

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Israel--Foreign relations.

Israel.

International relations.

Diplomatic relations.

Physical Description:

164 pages ; 25 cm.

Place of Publication:

Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, 2018.

Summary:

For over sixty years, Israel's foreign policy establishment has looked at its regional policy through the lens of a geopolitical concept named "the periphery doctrine". The idea posited that due to the fundamental hostility of neighbouring Arab countries, Israel ought to counterbalance this threat by engaging with the "periphery" of the Arab world through clandestine diplomacy. Based on original research in the Israeli diplomatic archives and interviews with key past and present decision makers, this book shows that this concept of a periphery was, and remains, a core driver of Israel's foreign policy. The periphery was borne out of the debates among Zionist circles concerning the geopolitics of the nascent Israeli State. The evidence from Israel's contemporary policies shows that these principles survived the historical relationships with some countries (Iran, Turkey, Ethiopia) and were emulated in other cases: Azerbaijan, Greece, South Sudan, and even to a certain extent in the attempted exchanges by Israel with Gulf Arab kingdoms. The book enables readers to understand Israel's pessimistic - or realist, in the traditional sense - philosophy when it comes to the conduct of foreign policy. The history of the periphery doctrine sheds light on fundamental issues such as Israel's role in the regional security system, its overreliance on military and intelligence cooperation as tools of diplomacy, and finally its enduring perception of inextricable isolation. Through a detailed appraisal of Israel's periphery doctrine from its birth in the fifties until its contemporary renaissance, this book offers a new perspective on Israel's foreign policy, and will appeal to students and scholars of Middle East Politics and History, and International Relations.

Contents:

First part : the genesis of the periphery doctrine

The intellectual foundations of the periphery

The shaping of Israel's security establishment

Second part : deconstructing the periphery doctrine

The enduring ambiguities of Turkey-Israel relations

The Israeli-Iranian relationship : from close ally to existential threat

Israel's errand in the remote areas of the periphery

Third part : change and continuity in the periphery approach

The new periphery calculus

Towards the periphery of all?

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781138099876

1138099872

OCLC:

1000600975