The fourth year of the Sylke Tempel Fellowship was dedicated on the topic "China's Influence on Israel and the Middle East".

The last decade has brought major geopolitical changes in and for the Middle East. After the so-called Arab Spring, in 2011, and the increased withdrawal of the US and Europe from the region, China has intensified its engagement in the region. However, the significance of this engagement, the impact of Chinese investments as well as (security) policy consequences have only been marginally addressed in both German and Israeli discourse, up until now.

The 2022 Sylke Tempel Fellowship was dedicated to questions regarding Chinese influence on Israel and the Middle East. From multiple perspectives, the program highlights key aspects of a topic that will shape not only the future of the Middle East, but also U.S. and German foreign policy toward the region.

Here you can meet our Fellows of the 2022 cohort.

Partner organizations
Our cooperation partners 2022 were the American Jewish Committee (AJC) Berlin, the European Leadership Network (ELNET), the foreign policy magazine Internationale Politik (IP) and Women in International Security Deutschland e. V (Wiis.de) and the Bar-Ilan University. From 2020 to 2022, the program was under the patronage of Sigmar Gabriel, former German Foreign Minister and Chairman of Atlantik-Brücke, and from 2021 to 2022 also under the patronage of former Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.

2022 Program

To create opportunities for exchange with experts and discuss China's role in the Middle East, we organized several online workshops during the Fellowship. Among others, we spoke with political scientists from the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) about China’s geopolitics and infrastructure projects in the Middle East. We also hosted hands-on workshops on journalistic writing and the production of podcast series.

In September 2022, the Fellows travelled to Israel for a week. There, they discussed Israeli-Chinese relations, talked with journalists, and explored new geopolitical developments in the region. You can find out more about the research trip here.ael for a week. There, they discussed Israeli-Chinese relations, talked with journalists, and explored new geopolitical developments in the region. You can find out more about the research trip here.

Publication
The articles written by the 2022 Sylke Tempel Fellows were published in a special issue of Internationale Politik entitled “China and Israel: On Power and Markets”. You can download the magazine in German or English here.

Concluding Conference
In December 2022, the concluding conference of the Sylke Tempel Fellowship took place at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP) in Berlin and via Zoom. Under the title “China and Israel: Foreign Policy, Trade, and Influence in Unsteady Times,” our Fellows engaged in dialogue with international experts and presented their research projects. You can find more information on the concluding conference here.

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