Research & Commentary Results

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Charles Lister, Bilal Y. Saab, Eran Etzion, Gonul Tol, Paul Salem, and Randa Slim provide analysis on recent and upcoming events including the Syrian-Iranian downing of an Israeli fighter jet, the critical crossroads of U.S. and Turkey relations, Rex Tillerson’s upcoming visit to Lebanon, and Iraqi reconstruction plans.

On Wednesday, the Bahraini Foreign Ministry announced that the country’s security forces have arrested four members of a “terrorist cell” involved in a bomb attack on an oil pipeline and claimed that the suspects had received training in Iran by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC).

Kuwaiti citizens have lost hundreds of millions of dollars as a result of the collapsing investment firms in Iran, Kuwait’s al-Qabas Arabic daily reported. According to the paper, a sizeable number of Kuwaitis have invested in Iran’s investment institutions that offer returns of more than 20 percent, which is significantly lower than the profit offered by Kuwaiti banks and investment schemes.

Bahrain’s interior minister said on Sunday that Tehran and its regional proxies are supporting militant groups that carry out terrorist actions on the Bahraini soil, Iranian and

View the full issue brief at the Atlantic Council.

The Bahraini government’s claim that Iran was directly involved in an oil pipeline explosion near the Bahraini capital of Manama is the latest sign of heightening tension in the Gulf region. Bahrain’s Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid bin Abdullah al-Khalifa said the blast was the latest example of a “terrorist act” under instructions from Tehran, the state-run Bahrain News Agency reported.

It was the age of nationalism and strong men. Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser had just enacted a new charter that guaranteed his hold on power, unelected and unopposed. Iraq’s revolutionary government was overthrown by Baathists, who had also assumed power in neighboring Syria, while Iran’s Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was entrenching his family’s legitimacy through the so-called White Revolution. The lower Gulf emirates were under British “protectorism,” while Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal was wrestling power from his half-brother Saud.

Welcome to early 1960s Kuwait.

The Bahraini government said today that the country’s security forces have arrested seven members of a cell suspected of carrying out acts of terrorism in the island country, the Bahraini and Iranian media reported.

The crisis which has engulfed the Gulf Cooperation Council (G.C.C.) states since June 5, 2017, leading to an unprecedented diplomatic and economic blockade of Qatar, has effectively split the Gulf into three camps, fracturing the uneasy yet much-lauded unity of an alliance which has long prided itself on stability and security. This essay offers a possible explanation for Bahrain’s contradictory position regarding the crisis, and considers whether Manama can maintain it.

The ongoing Qatar crisis poses a major dilemma for Kuwait and Oman. Consistent with their “neutral” foreign policies, these two Arab Gulf states have maintained ties with Doha and seek to resolve the gravest internal Gulf Cooperation Council (G.C.C.) row since the organization’s establishment in 1981. Officials in Kuwait City and Muscat fear that failure to settle the Qatar crisis will break up the council, which would directly undermine vital Kuwaiti and Omani national interests given the potential for such a scenario to dramatically exacerbate regional geopolitical instability.

Iranian leaders and media outlets today reacted to a decision by Saudi Arabia and several other Arab nations to sever diplomatic and commercial ties with Qatar by blaming Washington and Riyadh for regional tension and discord. Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the chairman of Iranian Parliament’s Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy, said the rising tension is a direct result of President Donald Trump’s visit to the Middle East.

On May 3, 2017, King Hamad Bin Eisa Al Khalifa concluded a four-day trip to Malaysia, the first visit by a Bahraini monarch since the two countries established diplomatic ties in 1974 and the initial leg of a tour that also included stops in Brunei and Thailand. This essay takes a brief look at the development of economic ties between Bahrain and Malaysia in recent years, and considers the prospects for their continued growth in light of the outcome of King Hamad’s visit.

The leader of a prominent Iran-controlled Iraqi Shiite militia group has warned that his forces and other Shiite militant groups will respond to the Bahraini government’s prosecution of Ayatollah Isa Qassim.

Bahrain’s Ministry of Interior said on Sunday that it has dismantled an Iran-backed group that planned terrorist attacks in the island kingdom, including assassination of high-profile government officials.

The U.S. Department of State’s designation of two Iran-backed Bahraini militants as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (S.D.G.T.) has prompted an angry reaction from Tehran. Iran’s Foreign Ministry called allegations by Washington that Tehran supports terrorist activities in Bahrain as “baseless and politically-motivated,” and accused the U.S.