January 30:Iraq holds its first parliamentary elections since the ouster of Saddam Hus-
sein nearly two years earlier. The United Iraqi Alliance, a coalition of Shiite parties,
wins about 48 percent of the vote and will dominate the transitional parliament,
the chief responsibility of which is to draft a constitution. An alliance of Kurdish
parties finishes second with 26 percent of the vote. Most Sunni politicians boycott
the election.
February 8:Israeli prime minister Sharon and Palestinian president Abbas declare a
mutual cease-fire, which Abbas has persuaded Hamas and other groups to observe.
February 9:Saudi Arabia holds its first elections—for city council seats in Riyadh—
the first round of municipal elections promised by Saudi leaders in 2004.
February 14:Former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri is assassinated by a car
bomb in Beirut that kills another 16 people and sparks a series of massive demon-
strations against Syria, which is widely assumed to be behind the killing.
April 26:Syria announces that it has completed its withdrawal of military forces and
intelligence operatives from Lebanon. Syria had begun the withdrawal in March, after
a presence of almost thirty-years, as a result of the intense international pressure gen-
erated in large part by the February 14 assassination of former prime minister Hariri.
April 28:The transitional Iraqi parliament approves a still-incomplete list of govern-
ment officials, headed by President Jalal Talabani (a Kurd) and prime minister
Ibrahim al-Jaafari (a Shiite and head of the al-Dawa Party).
May 3:An Iraqi cabinet led by Prime Minister Jaafari is sworn in.
May 4:The UN Security Council praises Syria’s “significant and noticeable progress”
toward compliance with its Resolution 1559, demanding the withdrawal of foreign
forces from Lebanon.
May 29:Lebanon begins parliamentary elections, the first held since 1972 without the
threat of civil war or the military presence of outside powers, notably, Syria and
Israel. A coalition of anti-Syrian parties wins a majority of seats, but the Shiite mili-
tia Hizballah (aligned with Syria) wins a sizable minority.
June 23:Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the mayor of Tehran, is the surprise winner of pres-
idential elections in Iran, defeating former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
July 20:Speaking in Cairo, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice calls for political
reforms in Egypt and other Arab countries and says democracy is a chief goal of
U.S. policy in the Middle East: “For sixty years, my country, the United States,
pursued stability at the expense of democracy in this region here in the Middle East,
and we achieved neither,” she says.
August 15:Israel begins closing Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip, part of a plan
for total Israeli withdrawal from that territory. The last civilian settlers will leave
Gaza on August 23, and the Israeli military will closes all its posts there by Sep-
tember 12. Palestinians engage in widespread looting of property the Israelis left
behind, hampering international plans to revive the Gazan economy.
August 31:In Baghdad, hundreds of people die in a stampede at a bridge over the
Tigris River when rumors spread of a suicide bomber in the crowd. Some reports
put the death toll at close to 1,000.
September 7:Egypt holds its first multi-candidate presidential elections, although
restrictions on opposition candidates minimize the degree of competition. Incum-
bent president Hosni Mubarak receives 88.6 percent of the vote, but turnout is less
than 25 percent.
CHRONOLOGY OF THE MIDDLE EAST, 1914–2007 693