A Hard Look at the Need for Israeli-Palestinian Security Coordination (AUDIO INTERVIEW)

Analyst Kobi Michael, who helped midwife the original cooperation plan, talks to The Media Line about PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s threats to bring it to an end

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas says that due to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s intent to annex parts of the West Bank, all agreements between the PA and Israel are null and void, including in the all-important sphere of security cooperation.

Abbas has made such threats in the past, and there are conflicting reports as to whether he is following through now.

To learn more, The Media Line turned to Dr. Kobi Michael. Michael is a security analyst and senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies of Tel Aviv University, and is an editor of the institute’s quarterly Strategic Assessment Journal. As a military officer, he was instrumental in setting up and implementing Palestinian-Israeli security cooperation under the terms of the Oslo Accords.