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In-Depth Issues:

Peace Canal Deal for Thirsty Middle East - Conal Urquhart (Guardian-UK)
    Ministers from Jordan, Israel, and the PA will Monday sign an agreement to pave the way for the construction of a canal that will link the Red Sea to the Dead Sea.
    The canal will generate electricity, provide fresh water, and prevent the Dead Sea from drying up.
    It will draw water from the Red Sea at Aqaba in Jordan, raise it 170 meters above sea level, and then let it fall to the Dead Sea which, at 400 meters below sea level, is the lowest place on earth.
    The project will consist of 110 miles of canal, tunnel and piping, and the electricity provided by the water will provide for pumping the water in the initial stages and power a desalination plant.
    There are also plans to construct holiday resorts and a water park along parts of the route.

Fatah Militants Shut Gaza Election Offices - Nidal al-Mughrabi (Reuters)
    Witnesses said 20 masked militants belonging to Abbas's Fatah movement burst into Central Elections Committee (CEC) premises in central Gaza on Sunday and closed them "until further notice," protesting at Fatah losses in last week's municipal ballot.
    "We tried to explain to (the gunmen) that we had nothing to do with the local elections, that we were responsible only for preparing the parliamentary election, but they wouldn't hear of it," said regional CEC coordinator Jamil al-Khaldi.

Sharansky to Join Shalem Center - Gil Hoffman (Jerusalem Post)
    Natan Sharansky signed a one-year contract to serve as a "distinguished senior fellow" at the Shalem Center, a Jerusalem-based independent research institute, where he will research and write a book on Israel's role as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

Maccabi Tel Aviv Wins Euroleague Basketball Title - Again (Euroleague.net)
    Israel's Maccabi Tel Aviv became the first basketball team to win consecutive Euroleague titles since 1991 by downing Spain's Tau Ceramica 90-78 Sunday in the Euroleague Final in Moscow.

A Lens on Dialogue - Liel Leibovitz (New York Jewish Week)
    Documentary filmmaker Isidore Rosmarin has produced "Blood and Tears," weaving together interviews as well as file footage, graphics, and animation to survey the Middle East conflict from its birth in biblical times to its bloody present through the viewpoints of everyone from the most ardent Zionist to fundamentalist Muslims or American scholars.

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What Do the Iraqi Insurgents Want? - Hiwa Osman (Washington Post)

• The relative hiatus in violence in Iraq that took place after the January elections is over. In the week since a new cabinet was formed, about 250 Iraqis have been slaughtered in car bombings and other bloody attacks.
• The insurgents are actually several groups who possess different motivations and long-term objectives: those who were fired from their jobs in the military and other government institutions for being members of the Baath party but who don't really believe in Saddam Hussein's doddering old brand of Arab socialism, the die-hard Baathists, and the pro-al-Qaeda Islamist militants mostly under the command of Abu Musab Zarqawi.
• The foot soldiers who make up the Baathist part of the alliance have a military background. Many of them would gladly go back to their jobs in order to have a better standard of living and avoid risking their lives.
• Directing these lower-level combatants are the former high-ranking army, security, and intelligence officers of the Baathist regime. They have managed to reassemble some of their old spy networks, and their ability to instill fear is evident.
• Their goal is simple: The return of Baathist rule through a military coup. To do that, they are willing to make common cause with people who do not share their secular outlook.
• The Islamist militants have their own foot soldiers: supporters who have poured across the mostly open borders from neighboring countries. These people are particularly useful to the Baathists because they provide a supply of willing suicide bombers.
• Syria has been an important base and way station for these foreign fighters. Intelligence shows that after a typical jihadi decides he wants to fight the Americans in Iraq, he contacts mosques in Damascus known for recruiting mujaheddin for the holy war in Iraq. Often these recruitment campaigns are funded by senior Syrian officials. Syrian intelligence trains him on how to disguise his identity and how to handle explosives and ammunitions. An Iraqi journalist who recently visited Syria said being there felt like being back in Saddam's Iraq. "The place was heaving with sons of Baathists and former regime officials," he observed.
• Iran is also harboring and training members of other militant groups. Iran is assisting the radical Islamist group Ansar al-Islam, a mostly Iraqi Kurdish affiliate group of al-Qaeda, and the Ansar Al-Sunnah, which claimed responsibility for the suicide attack in Irbil that killed more than 50 people last week.
• One wants a return to rule by Saddam or some other Baathist; another wants a Taliban-style Iraq. But they're all waiting for the United States to leave.

  The writer, an Iraqi Kurd, is the training director for the London-based Institute for War & Peace Reporting in Iraq.