Monday Briefing: Assad’s narco-state enriches itself as Syrians face a spiraling economic and humanitarian crisis
اقرأ تقرير MEI الأسبوعي الذي يتضمن تحليلات الخبراء للتطورات الإقليمية الرئيسية للأسبوع المقبل.
اقرأ تقرير MEI الأسبوعي الذي يتضمن تحليلات الخبراء للتطورات الإقليمية الرئيسية للأسبوع المقبل.
The Dec. 30 vote at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) regarding Israel reflected once again that the international community does not generally accept the Israeli narrative regarding the Palestinian issue. It also highlights that the Palestinian issue, while not a top priority on the global agenda, is still one of concern around the world.
Ten of the most important or far-reaching events and trends that dominated the MENA region in 2022.
Should the Turkish government make good on its threats to launch yet another military incursion into northern Syria, it would lead to a sharp escalation in violence in a country afflicted by a more-than-decade-long brutal conflict. Not only would Turkey’s military incursion have significant immediate effects on civilians and combatants in Syria, but it could also reverberate further throughout the region and world.
اقرأ تقرير MEI الأسبوعي الذي يتضمن تحليلات الخبراء للتطورات الإقليمية الرئيسية للأسبوع المقبل.
The December 2020 Moroccan-Israeli normalization deal has evolved from a vehicle enabling Morocco to gain long-sought U.S. recognition of its claims on Western Sahara to a broader strategic partnership with Israel. But the relationship further strains relations with neighboring rival Algeria.
Over the years, recognition of clear, long-term, and structural developments in how the Jewish Israeli electorate votes has been neglected, glossed over, or lost behind reactions to electoral cycles. And the pro/anti-Netanyahu paradigm — which routinely serves as a crude substitute for “right” versus “left” — has helped delay a reckoning and a fork in the road for a host of constituencies.
On Sept. 30, 2013, then Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced what he termed a “democratization package,” which lifted the decades-old ban on women wearing headscarves in many state institutions. A month later, when four female MPs wearing headscarves walked into the Turkish parliament, many thought the long-running controversy on the issue was finally over. But the headscarf recently returned to the center of the Turkish political debate when the leader of the main secularist opposition party, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, announced that he would introduce legislation to protect that right.
Since winning the Israeli elections on Nov. 1, Benjamin Netanyahu leads a bloc that is ideologically homogeneous in ways never before seen, with a majority of religious nationalists and ultra-Orthodox parties set to enter government and likely to work cohesively for the next four years, unlike in the past.
The Ukraine grain export deal, which Turkey helped mediate over the summer, was saved last week to much fanfare; but the central unaddressed issue remains lifting Russia’s illegal blockade of Ukrainian ports, so Ukraine can freely trade with the world.
اقرأ تقرير MEI الأسبوعي الذي يتضمن تحليلات الخبراء للتطورات الإقليمية الرئيسية للأسبوع المقبل.
The Turkish economy’s foreign exchange liquidity problem is getting worse. The current account balance has been in the red this year with a monthly deficit of around $5 billion. The government has so far managed to avoid a repeat of the December 2021 currency shock by restricting capital mobility, further tightening regulations in October 2022.
On Nov. 1, Israel’s democracy was shaken, perhaps as never before. It is not so much that former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been returned to power, but that if he does become prime minister again, as seems overwhelmingly likely, it will undoubtedly be with crucial support provided by the “Religious Zionism” party, which includes “Jewish Power,” the vehicle of the veteran neo-Kahanist Itamar Ben-Gvir.
The Iranian regime is pointing the finger at Israel and the U.S. for allegedly orchestrating the nationwide protests. But while the U.S. and Israel both might have an interest in shaping and aiding the protest movement once it began, this large-scale mobilization of the Iranian public is a result of the regime’s own policies.
اقرأ تقرير MEI الأسبوعي الذي يتضمن تحليلات الخبراء للتطورات الإقليمية الرئيسية للأسبوع المقبل.