The reality of the Arab-Israeli balance now consists of two subordinate balances: Israel versus Syria and Israel versus the Palestinians. The book analyzes these two balances in detail and their impact on defense planning in each country and on the overall strategic risk to the region as a whole. It covers military developments in each of six states-Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine-and provides an analytical view with charts and tables of how the changing natures of the military and political threats faced by each is impacting its military force readiness and development. The book has the most comprehensive data on past, current, and future military force structure currently available, drawn from the widest range of sources. Responding to the most recent of events in the region, this book is the first to deal with the effects on the Arab-Israeli military balance of the strategic uncertainty created by the Iraqi insurgency and the Iranian nuclear program. It also studies how the Gaza pullout, the Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon, the changing political landscape in Israel, and the threat of nuclear proliferation are having impacts on the Egyptian-Israeli and Jordanian-Israeli peace accords and the prospects for a settlement between the Palestinians and Israelis. The roles of Hezbollah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are analyzed in light of the changing political landscape in both Israel and Palestine. Given the role of Syria in the Palestinian-Israeli affairs, the book also explores the ways that internal instability in Lebanon could escalate into a regional conflict.

This book is devoted to Israel's asymmetric wars, those conducted against irregular armed groups that have attacked it. It seeks to understand the Israeli strategy in the fight against terrorists acting under the guise of civilians or using the population as human shields. The army has implemented a loosely devised, if not simplistic, doctrine of "disproportionate response" since Israel's founding. The results have been mediocre, nearly always leading to the death of innocent Arab civilians and exacerbating anti-Israeli sentiment. Each time it has led to an escalation that is difficult to control and thrown the entire country into an increasingly inextricable situation. Practically every time it has made Israel, the aggressed party, look like the aggressor. What explains such perseverance? This research is based on vast documentation collected in Israel as well as on more than 60 in-depth interviews with officers and simple soldiers, senior counterterrorism officials, politicians, journalists and NGOs.

The Arab-Israeli military balance has steadily evolved in recent years to put more and more emphasis on irregular or asymmetric warfare, and the use of military force for political and ideological leverage - both inside the countries involved and in dealing with their neighbors. Most of this focus is driven by the steady strengthening of Hezbollah, and Hamas in Gaza, but it also includes a nascent nuclear arms race between Israel and Iran in which Israel seems to be strengthening both its long-range nuclear and conventional attack capabilities and is clearly strengthening its missile defense capabilities. At the same time, the conventional arms race has continued to narrow down to two countries. While Egyptian, Jordanian and Lebanese military development should not be ignored, the overall balance continues to center on evolving Israeli-Syrian confrontation and brinksmanship in the region. These shifts do not mean the conventional balance has lost its importance. As the analysis will show, only Israel has been able to effectively plan, budget, procure and recapitalize its forces in order to compete in the regional balance over the 2000-2010 period. This same conventional superiority, however, has been a key reason why other states and non-state actors now increasingly develop their asymmetric and unconventional capabilities to challenge the conventional balance, and to seek to use force and military power in ways that will allow them to avoid or limit conventional combat.

The Arab-Israeli military balance has steadily evolved in recent years to put more and more emphasis on irregular or asymmetric warfare, and the use of military force for political and ideological leverage, both inside the countries involved and in dealing with their neighbors. The fact that Israel is at peace with Egypt and Jordan, and has a significant conventional superiority over Syria, has both been a major factor in stabilizing the peace process and deterring conventional clashes and wars. Yet, it also means that the regional military balance must increasingly be assessed in new ways, and kept in careful perspective. As the analysis will show, only Israel has been able to effectively plan, budget, procure and recapitalize its forces in order to compete in the regional balance over the 2000-2010 period. This same conventional superiority, however, has been a key reason why other states and non-state actors now increasingly develop their asymmetric and unconventional capabilities to challenge the conventional balance, and to seek to use force and military power in ways that will allow them to avoid or limit conventional combat. This, in turn, makes Egyptian and Jordanian stability and commitments to their peace treaties steadily more important, while increasing the potential impact on the regional balance of wild cards, like Russian arms sales, and a shift in Turkish alignments away from Israel and towards the Arab world.

Combined arms warfare (CAW) -- the integration of different arms on the battlefield (e.g., armor, infantry, artillery, aircraft, and engineers) in order to achieve maximal efficiency there -- is as old as war itself. Every army across both time and space that has engaged in combat has practiced one version or another of CAW, whether consciously or otherwise. The Israel Defenxse Forces (IDF) has been no exception to the rule. This book traces the Israeli experience with CAW from the countrys War of Independence in 194749 (against a coalition of Arab states) through Operation Protective Edge in 2014 (against a coalition of Hamas-led terrorist/insurgent groups). It describes and analyzes the IDFs practice of CAW in each interstate war (IW), asymmetrical war (AW), and low-intensity conflict (LIC) that Israel has fought since the countrys establishment in the mid-twentieth century. The book also highlights the Israeli approach to CAW in respect of special operations (SPEC OPS). With no end in sight to the ArabIsraeli conflict, and with further hostilities between Israel and its neighbors virtually assured in the future, Combined Arms Warfare in Israeli Military History constitutes an essential addition to the literature about Middle Eastern warfare. This book is aimed primarily at the academic and research community, but it is fully accessible to anyone with an interest in Israeli military history.

A historical case study concerning the Israeli Army’s response to the Palestinian “Intifada” or uprising in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s provides instructive planning considerations for likely future application of U.S. military force in an asymmetrical threat environment. The monograph specifically analyzes the time period from the beginning of the uprising until the handshake of Rabin and Arafat on the White House lawn September 13th, 1993. Although the theoretical application of the case study is speculative of future environments, this paper attempts to link available historical data to anticipated trends in the international security environment and emerging concepts of operational art. The argument surrounding asymmetrical types of warfare leads into a discussion of the application of IDF lessons learned that may be applied to future U.S. military scenarios.

A study that details the six basic conditions which, if met, enables an army and its country to fight and win the war against terrorism. It also includes : examining the factors that can help drive a wedge between the local population and the insurgent forces, analyzing the principles of war in terms of their applicability to asymmetric warfare and finally, a warning against incorrectly concluding that there is no real military option against terrorist insurgencies.