Making an effort but making little headway: EU Middle East Policy under German Leadership

Summary:

During the preparations for and the term of its EU Presidency, the German government found itself confronted with an intensification of the conflict situations and with new constellations in the Middle East. The map of conflicts must be reappraised, especially in light of Iran’s regional ambitions and its nuclear program.

The list of the interrelated crises, conflicts and wars playing out in the immediate vicinity of the Europeans is long. Instability in Lebanon, with the simultaneous presence of European troops in the south of the country; nearly daily bombings and the ever greater probability of a failed state in Iraq; an Israeli head of government weakened by the Lebanon war; the takeover of the Gaza strip by Hamas in June 2007, and a new quality of the confrontation between Sunnis and Shiites in the region.