Attacked by All Sides Iraq’s New Government Faces Old Problems
After months of deadlock following the November 2025 elections, Iraq’s parliament approved a new government under Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi on May 14, 2026 — just as the country has become a battleground in the US-Israel-Iran war. Zaidi inherits a daunting brief: reviving a struggling economy, reining in armed factions, and steering Iraq through a perilous regional landscape. Dr. Renad Mansour, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme and director of the Iraq Initiative at Chatham House, joins host Alistair Taylor to discuss the war’s impact on Iraq — from Iran’s militia networks to the surge of attacks on the Kurdistan region — and how it’s reshaping Baghdad’s ties with Tehran and Washington.
The Houthis are a political-military faction and Zaydi religious movement founded in northwestern Yemen in the 1980s. A key member of Iran’s Axis of Resistance with links to other militant organizations in the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa, the group has continued to pose a threat to Western interests on a global scale.
This backgrounder provides an overview of how the Abraham Accords came about, the US interests involved, their economic and strategic consequences, and the prospects for further enlargement going forward.
After a decade of post-Arab Spring isolation, Turkey’s leaders have recognized that their ambition to position the country as an agenda-setter on the world stage requires active engagement in all directions. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s consolidation of executive authority has centralized foreign policy decision-making and tied it to his domestic political priorities, transforming the country’s revisionist approach to one shaped primarily by personal and pragmatic interests.
As the Western Sahara conflict reaches its fifth decade, the territorial dispute remains unresolved and largely unknown. MEI’s Intissar Fakir unpacks the Western Sahara’s complex history and the rival claims by Morocco and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. She examines recent developments, such as President Trump’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over the territory and the collapse of a 30-year cease-fire, as well as the core questions that remain unanswered after half a century.
Podcasts
Middle East Focus
MEI’s flagship weekly podcast on US foreign policy and contemporary political and social issues in the Middle East.
MEI Senior Fellow Brian Katulis engages friends, colleagues, and policy experts in casual conversations on the most important happenings in the Middle East.
Biden's Middle East Trip: What It Means and What’s Next
The main objective of President Joe Biden’s trip to the Middle East last week was to signal to both partners and adversaries that the United States was serious about restoring its strategic position in the region, which has taken considerable hits in recent years.
Ukraine’s critical minerals and Europe’s energy transition: A motivation for Russian aggression?
Russia’s war launched on February 24, 2022, may have partly been motivated by Ukraine’s large reserves of critical metals and their global strategic importance in the production of advanced “green” energy technologies. The cutoff of access to Ukrainian sources, combined with the nature of the partnership between Moscow and Beijing — with China being the largest supplier of the necessary critical minerals — could endanger the very notion of the West’s energy transition.
The Middle East’s worsening dust storms are making it harder to deploy solar energy
Recent months have seen unprecedented levels of dust storms in the Middle East. Hundreds of people were hospitalized because of breathing difficulties; public buildings, offices, and schools were closed; and flights were grounded. Sand and dust storms are not a new experience for the people of the region, but continuous exposure to thick blankets of dust — as seen in April and June 2022 — is quite alarming and has affected local communities and residents across the region from Syria to Iran.
Sudan has a longstanding strategic partnership with Turkey, forged on the basis of shared ideology and fostered by growing economic and political ties, that has proven resilient to regime change. Khartoum has not abandoned its relationship with Ankara despite the ouster of former President Omar al-Bashir in 2019 or the opposition of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt, Turkey’s former regional rivals and more recent cautious partners.
As Turkey’s economic woes worsen, a new currency crisis is approaching
Turkey’s economic problems continue to go from bad to worse. Its foreign trade deficit has reached a monthly average of $8 billion this year. Amid the sharp rise in global energy prices this spring following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the country’s average gross energy imports shot up from $3-4 billion per month to $7-8 billion. A reduction in energy imports and the recovery of tourism this summer have not offset this, and the current account deficit continues to widen.
When elections don’t matter? How new parliamentarians can improve the politics of power-sharing arrangements
Power-sharing arrangements remain a paradoxical phenomenon. As a powerful tool to stop the guns of conflict, they tend to kill the ingredients for peace by preventing politics from changing. Three countries with such arrangements have recently held elections in which outcomes have — ostensibly — led to such political change. Change, however, has yet to materialize and so far the elections have brought more of a perennial companion of power-sharing arrangements: political gridlock.
Pensions, sovereign wealth funds, and industrial policy in the Gulf: A look at fund consolidation
The last few years have seen a lot of consolidation in Gulf financial sectors. Not only do these mergers create economic benefits, the merged entities also become potent tools for economic development. The mega-funds and other major financial institutions are part of a trend where Gulf political elites sidestep ossified bureaucracies and instead centralize power in private entities over which they have even more control.
Egypt as an Eastern Mediterranean power in the age of energy transition
The emergence of Egypt as an Eastern Mediterranean energy hub resulted from a culmination of years of deliberate efforts. Increasingly, Egypt will be able to re-export Israeli natural gas or convert it into blue hydrogen, generate green electricity for export, or utilize its growing wind and solar power capacity to produce green hydrogen.
During two days of meetings in May 2022, members of the Middle East Dialogue, convened by MEI, met in Istanbul, Turkey to discuss pressing issues relating to: i) the effects of the war in Ukraine on the MENA region; ii) current and future projections regarding Gulf relations with Iran, amid the stalemate over a revival of the 2015 JCPOA; iii) the future pathways and security framework for the MENA region; and iv) the Baghdad Declaration of Good Neighborhood Principles for the Middle East. This meeting brought together policymakers, academics, and experts from across the MENA region. This report provides an analytical understanding of the issues discussed and recommendations shared during the meeting.
As Biden and Mideast leaders meet in Jeddah, human security should be urgently on the agenda
As President Joe Biden and several Gulf and Middle East leaders meet in Jeddah, they will be discussing global energy markets, regional security, countering Iran, and building on the Abraham Accords. But in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, and as the Russian war on Ukraine reverberates, half of the countries in the region, and tens of millions of people, are facing desperately worsening socio-economic conditions. If the summit seeks to work toward a more stable Middle East, the U.S. and Gulf leaders should agree on a sustained effort to use part of the region’s windfall from high energy prices to support vulnerable states and societies that are at risk of serious unraveling and instability.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has surrounded himself with those who would indulge him and pose little threat. His circle comprises younger, less experienced but presumably loyal princes in key ministerial positions as well as a few select, savvy, experienced older half-brothers and uncles loyal to his father. There are also several notable royal holdovers from smaller family branches, the odd competent technocrat, and a cadre of minions from across the military and security agencies.
Urban pollution across the Middle East and Black Sea regions: Causes and mitigation measures
The latest IPCC reports clearly indicate that cities — responsible for up to 72% of global emissions — need to be redesigned to stand a chance against the climate crisis. The urban communities of the Middle East and Black Sea regions face some of the most difficult climate change effects. To properly address their challenges, a comprehensive analysis of drivers and strategies to follow is needed.
Despite U.S. President Joe Biden’s meandering efforts to explain his about-face on Saudi Arabia—visiting the country this week after having dubbed it a “pariah” on the campaign trail—there remains much apprehension about his trip on both ends of the political spectrum. Progressives and human rights advocates worry the president will sacrifice U.S. values for short-term Faustian bargains in an attempt to secure cheap oil and expand Arab-Israeli normalization. Republicans and realists, who favor an interest-driven approach to foreign policy, aren’t sure there is enough to be gained by Washington on these fronts to justify a presidential visit.
Industry analysts widely agree that OPEC+ production levels are currently well below the members’ authorized quotas and that any production increases will mainly be met by Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The challenges facing the group are daunting, but if met, seven major OPEC countries could feasibly raise crude oil production while utilizing existing infrastructure, significantly narrowing the global demand-supply gap.
The oldest peer-reviewed publication dedicated to the study of the modern Middle East, MEI’s flagship journal covers politics, society, and culture in the region.
