When the Strait of Hormuz closed in March, fertilizer prices spiked within weeks, triggering a food security crisis across North Africa and the Sahel. Host Alistair Taylor is joined by MEI Senior Fellow Intissar Fakir to explore what it means for the region, unpack the link between food security and regional stability, and assess how the strait’s reopening could impact those affected.
This backgrounder provides an overview of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), a regional political and economic alliance comprising six states in the Arabian Peninsula: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
A Strategic Conundrum: Pakistan’s Transit Corridor to Iran as Lifeline or Liability
The US-Iran standoff over the Strait of Hormuz — disruptive to global trade and energy flows, and devastating for debt-burdened economies — has handed Pakistan an unexpected geoeconomic opportunity, one that may persist even if the framework agreement announced on June 14 results in a lasting peace and permanent reopening of the strait. But seizing it will have interlocking consequences for Islamabad’s ties with Tehran, Washington, and the Gulf states.
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.
For those who study the countries and regions that surround it, the Black Sea is many things — a global trade thoroughfare, a zone of contestation, a cradle of civilizations, and a dying ecosystem. But, curiously, one of the more opaque factors is whether the Black Sea region — the states and polities on its littoral and immediate hinterland — is a region at all.
This week’s briefing on recent news and upcoming events in the region featuring Randa Slim, Alex Vatanka, Mirette F. Mabrouk, Marvin G. Weinbaum, W. Robert Pearson, and Rauf Mammadov.
Iraq’s long-running electricity dilemma is now a daily source of public misery. The struggle of the power generation and distribution system to keep up with relentless demand caused by almost free electricity, especially as temperatures soar to record levels of over 120 degrees, is likely to get worse without reforms.
يتعرض استقرار لبنان حاليا لتهديد أكبر مما كان عليه في أي وقت منذ نهاية الحرب الأهلية عام 1990. الانفجار الهائل الذي شهده مرفأ بيروت في الرابع من آب/أغسطس الجاري الذي أودى بحياة المئات وجرح الآلاف وتسبب بأضرار مادية تقدر بمليارات الدولارات، لم يترك أثرا عميقا على أجساد ومعنويات اللبنانيين فحسب، بل غيّر أيضًا الأطر المرجعية للقوى السياسية المعارضة في البلاد. لقد اتخذ الصراع السياسي الآن بعدا وجوديا.
Beirut will rise again from the ashes, like it always has. But the real rebuilding that must occur is not physical in nature. It is political. Nothing will truly change in Lebanon unless the country’s corrupt and incompetent leaders, who have been in power for decades, are unseated.
America must stay focused on Georgia's de-occupation and transatlantic path
This week marks the 12th anniversary of Russia’s wonton invasion of Georgia. While the world was fixated on the Summer Olympics in Beijing, an invasion force comprised of hundreds of Russian tanks and armored vehicles passed through the Roki tunnel on the Russian–Georgian border.
What does China’s growing engagement in Afghanistan mean for the US?
On July 27, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi held a video conference with his counterparts from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Nepal to suggest expanding their pandemic cooperation and proposed extending the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor into Afghanistan. Although the details about what this quadrilateral framework would entail and how it would work are unclear, any movement toward its institutionalization would be a serious challenge for the United States.
حلقة 5: انفجار بيروت وتبعاته السياسية — مع بول سالم ورندى سليم وفراس مقصد
ما هو الأثر السياسي لانفجار بيروت؟ كيف يمكن أن تكون ردة فعل الشارع؟ وهل هناك إمكانية لتغيير حقيقي في الطبقة السياسية في لبنان؟ ما هو الدور الذي يحاول ماكرون القيام به في لبنان وهل سيتمكن المجتمع الدولي من لعب دور إيجابي؟ وماذا عن الدول الإقليمية؟
The annual Conference of the Parties (COP) was initiated by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1995 to assess progress made by UN members in dealing with climate change. Some meetings have had practical and measurable outcomes, such as the Kyoto Protocol of 1997. But arguably the most well-known meeting is the 2015 COP21 in Paris, also known as the Paris Agreement.
Paul Salem and Randa Slim join host Alistair Taylor to discuss the immediate aftermath of Tuesday’s massive explosion in Beirut, which killed over 150 people and left as many as 300,000 homeless. The blast caused extensive damage across the city, and compounds the stress of Lebanon’s preexisting political, economic, and health crises.
After months of under-reported cases and relaxed lockdown measures, the rapidly spreading COVID-19 pandemic has gripped government-held areas. A worrying rise in daily deaths and infections, especially in Damascus, has left Syria facing what could be its biggest challenge yet.
Moscow and Ankara will continue uneasy cooperation
As Russia partially reopens international travel amidst the ongoing pandemic, Turkey is in the top three countries for resumed Russian flights. Moscow also touts possible space cooperation with Turkey amidst tensions with the US on this issue. Despite disagreements between Moscow and Ankara over Syria, Libya, and the broader Black Sea region, Russia and Turkey remain determined to cooperate. But the relationship remains unequal.
The EU steps up its engagement in Yemen, but is it enough?
The conflict in Yemen poses a real threat not only to its immediate neighborhood, but also to global players such as the European Union. Although the country is located relatively far away from the EU’s external borders, instability on the Arabian Peninsula could seriously affect European interests and security.
Beirut-based art and documentary photographers Chantale Fahmi, Vicky Mokbel, and Marwan Tahtah join guest host Kate Seelye to discuss their efforts to capture the aftermath of Lebanon’s long civil war as well as the street protests that erupted on October 17, 2019 in response to the corruption and political mismanagement that triggered Lebanon’s financial collapse. Their’s are among works on display in “Lebanon Then and Now: Photography from 2006 to 2020,” an interactive virtual exhibit hosted by the MEI Art Gallery now through September 25. Visit the show now at www.mei.edu/art-gallery
To recognize or not to recognize: EU recognition of Palestine
Recognition of a Palestinian state is one of the potential responses European Union states are mulling in response to an Israeli annexation of territory in the West Bank, with the foreign minister of Luxembourg, for example, declaring such a move “inevitable” in the event of annexation.
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.
