News stories by Kevin P. Clements

TOKYO, Japan, Oct 25 (IPS) - The world and the Middle East do not need another violent conflict. This is a region that has experienced far too much violence over the years. Hamas’ desperate attacks on innocent civilians was intended to provoke an Israeli overreaction that would, among other things, jeopardise Israeli diplomatic negotiations with the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia and create generalised anxiety within Israel. It was also aimed at demonstrating Hamas’ military capacity and vengeance for years of a humiliating blockade of Gaza. Kidnapping Israeli civilians was callous and brutal but part of a plan to use hostages as bargaining chips around the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

President Barack Obama indicated in Prague in 2009 that he was interested in achieving a "world without nuclear weapons." Since that bold statement (which was one of the reasons for his Nobel peace prize) he has been persuaded by his foreign policy advisors and pressured by the Nuclear Weapons Laboratories to put nuclear abolition on hold and to focus instead on issues such as nuclear safety and nuclear security, writes Kevin P. Clements, professor at the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Otago, New Zealand.