التحليل

Although the latest two-month extension of the Yemeni cease-fire was welcomed by all, the conflict will not end until meaningful pressure is applied on the Houthis to deny them a military victory and force them to accept a political resolution to the war they launched in 2014.

On Apr. 26, Egyptian President Sisi launched a call for political dialogue with all opposition parties except for the Muslim Brotherhood. Many opponents remain skeptical of the government’s recent change of heart. But some regime opponents have started being released from prison, and state media has again begun allowing critics of Sisi back on the air.

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi’s recent, six-day European tour, which took him to Germany, Serbia, and France, aimed to boost his image and status as a central player on the world stage despite widespread criticism of his regime’s human rights record.

Iranian-Turkish trade and economic cooperation has been the all-important platform on which otherwise often tense bilateral relations could survive. With trade and economic ties now weakening, their geopolitical rivalry could sharply re-intensify.

According to UNRWA, there are approximately 6.3 million registered Palestinian refugees across the Arab world. The majority of these are the descendants of the 750,000 Palestinians who were displaced between 1947 and 1949 over the course of Israel’s creation, an event known among Palestinians as the Nakba or “catastrophe.” This paper aims to evaluate past proposals on the refugee question and promote a new refugee-first framework that could produce tangible solutions for Palestinian refugees and for the conflict at large.

On July 25 Tunisians approved a new constitution that will give the president, Kais Saied, expansive new powers, centralizing control of the country while removing many of the existing checks and balances. According to figures from the state electoral body, an estimated 94% of those who voted in the national referendum approved the measure, although turnout, which officials put at 30.5%, was relatively light. Following on from the vote, here’s what can be expected moving forward.

The death of al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in a U.S. drone strike outside Kabul over the weekend is a major counterterrorism achievement — and a much-needed triumph for the Biden administration, for whom anything to do with Afghanistan has become an issue of acute discomfort. Since late 2019, Zawahiri has been thought to have been based in eastern Afghanistan, and a number of U.S. officials have suggested that in public. That by itself would seem to indicate a certain level of awareness of his probable whereabouts, but his death in the capital Kabul is astounding.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s July 19 visit to Tehran will have important repercussions for the region’s evolving security environment as well as the trajectory of Iranian-Russian relations more specifically. Although officially billed as seeking to revive the “Astana peace process” on Syria, the significance of the trip has less to do with the trilateral meeting between Iran, Russia, and Turkey and more with the deepening of ties between Moscow and Tehran.

At the Jeddah summit in mid-July, President Joe Biden declared that “America is back,” a message that was welcomed by Saudi Arabia and Gulf media outlets. But Washington cannot maintain its influence and develop robust relationships in the Middle East without sustained American interest and effort, which have been oscillating with every change in administration.

The U.N.-sponsored truce of April 2022 is the longest pause in fighting Yemen has experienced since the Houthi armed rebellion broke out in September 2014 and the Saudi-led coalition forces intervened six months later. But although there is strong external interest in both extending and expanding the truce given the scale of turmoil in the global arena, credible progress remains lacking, while serious obstacles persist.

Immediately following the outbreak of COVID-19, cyber attacks swept across the Middle East, leaving public and private entities highly vulnerable and transforming the pandemic into both a physical and a digital threat. Despite worldwide physical isolation, many people were more digitally connected than ever before, which vastly expanded the attack surface for eager cyber threat actors. Ransomware attacks, in particular, hit the Middle East rapidly and in great numbers, especially the UAE.

The decades-long confrontation between Israel and Iran is now arguably becoming more dangerous. Amid a lack of consensus among Israeli leaders on how to address this perceived existential threat, calls for applying greater pressure are gaining momentum. The two countries have been engaged in a shadow war for years that includes assassinations, sabotage, kidnappings, and cyber operations, but a new phase of tensions may only bring them closer to a full-scale conflict.  

The India-Middle East Food Corridor developed organically among the three Asian countries themselves, through private sector, joint venture investments carefully cultivated via bilateral public-private partnerships. The United States’ participation in the corridor could prove beneficial as the U.S. seeks to bolster its presence in the strategic architecture of the Indo-Pacific.

With energy security becoming a top priority, the sudden need to find new sources of hydrocarbons dampened Europe’s and the United States’ previously pledged resolve to address climate change and greenhouse gas emissions.

The U.S. and Russian presidents staged high visibility visits to the Middle East in the past week and a half. The visits were designed to assert each great power’s influence in the region at a time of escalating great power conflict. But both presidents cut a diminished figure on the regional stage at a time when leaders in Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia are feeling increasingly empowered.