Decision Points

Lebanon and Israel held diplomatic talks for the first time in decades after Israel's months-long campaign against Hezbollah. But the ceasefire is shaky: Israel displaced close to a million Lebanese civilians amid fighting with Hezbollah and northern Israelis, with memories of weeks in bomb shelters, fear returning to normal life with Hezbollah still armed.
Host David Makovsky sits down in back-to-back conversations with Lebanese lawmaker Fouad Makhzoumi, Israeli analyst Sarit Zehavi, and Middle East expert Robert Satloff to unpack what’s at stake--and what’s possible-- in Lebanon.
Fouad Makhzoumi is a leading Lebanese member of parliament representing many Sunnis in Beirut.
Dr. Robert Satloff is the Segal Executive Director of The Washington Institute, an independent, nonpartisan Middle East policy think tank.
Sarit Zehavi is the founder and president of Alma, an Israeli institute specializing in security challenges along the Lebanese border. She served for 15 years in the Israeli military's Intelligence Corps and later with its Northern Command.
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After nearly six weeks of war, the U.S. and Iran agreed on April 8 to a fragile two-week ceasefire. But Vice President JD Vance left Pakistan Sunday after 21 hours of high-level talks with the Iranians without making progress toward a deal to end the war. President Trump then threatened to blockade the Strait of Hormuz, the key oil-shipping route that Iran has throttled. However uncertain the road ahead may be, one thing is increasingly clear: in a postwar Iran, the hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps looks set to further dominate the regime’s complex policymaking structure. Host David Makovsky sits down with two leading Iran experts, Suzanne Maloney and Raz Zimmt, to explore how decisions may be made in Tehran during the ceasefire and beyond.
Dr. Suzanne Maloney is vice president and director of the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution in Washington and a former member of the State Department's Policy Planning staff.
Dr. Raz Zimmt is the director of the Iran and the Shiite axis research program at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, Israel.

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As part of Iran’s retaliation for the U.S.-Israeli war, Tehran has targeted the United Arab Emirates with more than 2,000 ballistic missiles and drones. Senior Emirati officials warn that their confrontation with Iran won’t be fleeting and will strengthen their relationship with Israel, including deeper security coordination. But if Iran’s regime emerges from the war intact and vengeful, the Gulf states may have to take a warier stance.
Amir Hayek was Israel’s first ambassador to the United Arab Emirates. Nadim Koteich is a columnist at Asharq al-Awsat and the former general manager of Sky News Arabia.
"Decision Points" is produced by David McGuffin with Zack Apt and Nava Goldstein.
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As the Iran war shakes the Middle East, Hezbollah has fired missiles into northern Israel, and Israel has struck Hezbollah-related targets across Lebanon, including in the capital Beirut, leaving hundreds dead and hundreds of thousands of Lebanese civilians displaced. In this episode of "Decision Points," Washington Institute Senior Fellows Hanin Ghaddar and Assaf Orion join host David Makovsky to explore how Lebanon became the second front in the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran. They break down Israeli military objectives in this new round of fighting against Hezbollah and discuss ways to disarm the radical Iran-backed militia.

Hanin Ghaddar is the former managing editor of Lebanon's NOW news website, a former reporter for several Lebanese newspapers, and an expert on Shia politics in the Levant. Assaf Orion is a former Israeli brigadier general and a fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies, a Tel Aviv-based think tank.

"Decision Points" is produced by David McGuffin with Nava Goldstein and Zack Apt.
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In this special episode of Decision Points, Washington Institute experts Dennis Ross, Dana Stroul, Robert Satloff, and Holly Dagres sit down with the Institute's managing director, Michael Singh, to assess the joint U.S.-Israeli air campaign against Iran and Tehran's intensifying retaliation. They explore President Trump's goals in the conflict, assess the responses from Gulf states targeted by Iran, and discuss the key factors they're watching as the war continues.
Dennis Ross is the former lead U.S. negotiator on Middle East peace and a former top Middle East advisor for both Democratic and Republican administrations.
Dana Stroul is the Washington Institute's research director and served as the Pentagon's top Middle East expert in the Biden administration.
Robert Satloff is the Washington Institute's executive director.
Holly Dagres is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute specializing in Iranian society and the curator of "The Iranist," a newsletter on Iran.
Moderator: Michael Singh is the Washington Institute's managing director and a former senior director for the Middle East at the National Security Council under President George W. Bush.
This episode is an edited version of the original March 2nd event.
Decision Points is produced by David McGuffin with Nava Goldstein and Zack Apt.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.