Shana Cohen

Prime Minister Sudani has been delicately balancing between maintaining bilateral relations with Washington and ensuring political support for his cabinet from pro-Iran hardliners in Baghdad. Both sides have conflicting expectations from the prime minister, and delivering on his promises will come down to his ability to convince each to compromise. But Sudani’s task has now become even more challenging as Iraq finds itself in the middle of direct confrontation between Iran and Israel.

The Iranian strike against Israel was a first of its kind. Its mere occurrence sets a precedent that will have a long-term impact and require Israel to weigh new considerations when planning future military operations against Iranian assets.

Though Tehran continues to engage the government in Kabul in a pragmatic fashion, Iran and the Taliban are not traditional friends or allies; they share an uneasy relationship. There is a sectarian angle to their differences and a long-standing dispute over water resources. Yet Iran has sought to normalize relations due to broader geopolitical considerations, security concerns, and perceived economic opportunities.

Less than 10 years after seizing power in Yemen, the Iran-backed Houthi militia continues to evolve — and so do the threats emanating from it. After several years of negotiations, it now seems likely that the Houthis and Saudis will reach a peace agreement, and it is worth considering how such a deal could change the group’s trajectory. This report examines a number of possible futures that could develop in Yemen over the next 1-2 years based on shifting capabilities, interests, and alliances.

In a significant and surprising turn of events, on the evening of April 5, a prominent Iraqi leader in the Syrian Sunni Islamist group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, Maysar bin Ali al-Juburi, also known as Abu Maria al-Qahtani, was reportedly killed in an attack in Idlib’s northern countryside.

For the last few months, people around the world have been closely following the ongoing brutality of the war in Gaza. Pictures of Palestinians fleeing south and looking for relatives under the rubble, videos of children searching for food and water — these and more have been circulating on social media and news networks every day since October 7. 

As the war in Gaza approaches its seventh month, the settler movement has been raging its own separate war against none other than the Israeli military itself. While Israeli society is still healing from the devastation of Oct. 7 and tens of thousands of Israelis are displaced from their homes near the Gaza Strip and the northern border, the settlers have launched campaigns against the Head of the Central Command, advocated for resettling Gaza, and escalated tensions with the Israeli military.

Read MEI’s weekly briefing featuring expert analysis of key regional developments for the week ahead.

Iran is a key stakeholder in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Tehran does not have a deciding vote on the outcome of the current war in Gaza, but it does have plenty of capacity to shape the future course of the conflict. Iran is, after all, among the top backers of Hamas, both in terms of diplomatic support and as a supplier of military materiel and knowhow.

Six months since the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel and subsequent outbreak of war in Gaza, the deadly and devastating conflict looks no closer to concluding. Is it still possible to achieve a sustainable cessation of hostilities and restart the conflict-resolution process? To get there, what are the incentives and disincentives that could be constructed for the two main combatants, Israel and Hamas?

On this week’s episode, Murat Somer – Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Istanbul’s Ozyegin University – and MEI Turkey Program Director Gonul Tol join MEI Editor-in-Chief Alistair Taylor to discuss the main opposition party’s surprising victory in Turkey’s March 31 local elections. In what some are calling a “red wave,” the Republican People’s Party (or CHP) notched up victories in both major cities and smaller towns and villages, winning control of Turkey’s 5 largest metropolitan areas and 35 of its 81 provincial municipalities. 

At the COP28 in Dubai last December, 74 countries, organizations, and multinational development banks officially linked climate change and conflict for the first time in the conference’s history by signing the Declaration on Relief, Recovery, and Peace. This declaration recognizes that countries affected by conflict and fragility are significantly more vulnerable to the effects of climate change and calls for the scaling up of climate finance to help them better prepare for and respond to climate impacts