تعليق

في الشرق الأوسط، قد تكون الصفقات بين الأعداء محفوفة بالمخاطر وتستمر لسنوات. لكن الصفقات الأخيرة في مجال الطاقة أظهرت براغماتية وديناميكية جديدة يمكن أن تتغلب فيها أمن الطاقة والاهتمام بقومية الموارد على العقبات السياسية الإقليمية. قد تساعد صادرات الغاز الإسرائيلية إلى جارتيها الأردن ومصر في الحفاظ على اتفاقات السلام الهشة، مع تسريع الخطط الوطنية للاستقلال في مجال الطاقة عبر مصادر الطاقة المتجددة. 

The Middle East Institute (MEI) is deeply saddened by the passing of William H. Webster, a distinguished former member of our Board of Governors and longtime Governor Emeritus.

It has been a remarkable week for Lebanon. President Aoun, Speaker Berri, and Prime Minister Salam have acted in unison, never something to be taken for granted in Lebanon. Moreover, they have done so on a topic that has been wrongly taboo since the Taef Accord: restoring the Lebanese state’s monopoly of arms and confronting Hezbollah’s challenge to state sovereignty. It is an unprecedented step and required courage and determination. These three leaders and their teams deserve enormous credit. It was difficult but the right decision.

Whatever you think about events since October 2023, a fundamental shift in the balance of power has occurred in the Middle East.

The dilemma for Washington and its regional partners is what to do now to bring lasting security for all those who in the past were compelled to live in the shadow of threats and violence by Iran and its Arab proxies. That next phase could be even harder.

Read more in This is Beirut

مع اقتراب أيام الصيف الحارة في شهر أغسطس، يسعدنا أن نشارككم قائمة مختارة من الكتب الصيفية التي تضم بعضًا من الكتب المفضلة لدى نائب الرئيس لشؤون السياسات كين بولاك عن المنطقة. تغطي القائمة مجموعة متنوعة من الموضوعات المهمة والمثيرة للاهتمام، وتقدم توصيات لأي شخص مهتم بتعميق فهمه للشرق الأوسط.

(Washington, DC, July 25, 2025) – The Middle East Institute (MEI) congratulates former Board of Governors member John K. Hurley on his confirmation by the US Senate to serve as Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the US Department of the Treasury.

Recent developments in Syria are causing surprise and confusion. In a bold move, President Trump and his administration acquiesced to requests from the Turkish and Saudi leadership and lifted most sanctions on the Ahmed al-Sharaa regime, his Salafist HTS movement, and Syria itself. It did so without conditionality, without much effort to understand the character, intentions, and capabilities of the new power in Damascus, and without a plan to use this windfall as leverage.

Ross Harrison is the author of Decoding Iran’s Foreign Policy, a new book published by I.B. Tauris.

A career in American diplomacy in the Middle East is a humbling affair. Whenever you heard well-meaning American officials speak of the birth pangs of a “new Middle East,” you knew it was time to update the embassy’s evacuation plans and re-stock its bunkers. 

And if anyone in charge spoke of peace in Lebanon of all places, you knew to supplement the evacuation plans with an IQ test for anyone so detached from reality. For the history of American-Lebanese relations is one strewn with inflated expectations and deflated ambition. And not a few corpses. 

In the seven months since Syria’s former president Bashar al-Assad was overthrown, 78 foreign governments and multinational bodies have descended on Damascus to engage with Syria’s new interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa and his transition team.

The Middle East has been reshaped and a bold new approach can ensure it holds, but the clock is ticking. Iran, the regional bully for decades, has been defanged and there is a now a window of opportunity to make this new Middle East permanent.

The 12-day war between Iran, Israel, and the United States has ended, but the dust has not yet settled. Many official voices in Tehran are warning that the war can resume at any moment. Iran now faces deepening economic turmoil, political uncertainty, and hard choices about its nuclear future. The central question is whether the Islamic Republic will emerge stronger through nationalist mobilization or weaker, exposed by vulnerabilities it long sought to deny. No doubt, Iran’s leaders stand at a true crossroads.

تقوم الإمارات العربية المتحدة والمملكة العربية السعودية، ومنطقة الخليج بشكل عام، بوضع أنفسها في موقع يمكنها من أن تصبح دعامة خلفية محتملة للذكاء الاصطناعي في الأسواق الناشئة في آسيا وأفريقيا، مما يمهد الطريق لنموذج شراكات في مجال الذكاء الاصطناعي يتماشى مع نموذج الولايات المتحدة، والذي يمكن أن يتفوق على الصين في سباق الذكاء الاصطناعي العالمي مع مرور الوقت.

While most international media are focused on what will happen today or this week between America and Iran, the real story is much bigger—the complete turning of the tables on Iran.

Where is Ali Khamenei? That is the question on the minds of many Iranians and foreign observers in the aftermath of the 12-day war between Iran and Israel. As missiles rained down and retaliatory strikes escalated, one voice was conspicuously absent: that of the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic.