Gulf and Arabian Peninsula

If the hallmark of al-Qa‘ida was to execute simultaneous spectacular attacks to advance its strategic momentum, the month of Ramadan in June and July showed that the Islamic State (ISIS) is taking this tactic to a new level. Yet the extreme amounts of blood shed during the holy month will likely ultimately weaken ISIS, as tribes and other groups in Syria and Iraq, even more appalled by the organization’s barbarism, unite against it.

The flow of oil and gas from the Persian Gulf to East Asia has rejuvenated the ancient Silk Road, refashioning new networks of collaboration. The energy trade―the backbone of Sino-Middle Eastern ties―has provided the foundation for an increasingly diversified and robust set of relationships between China and the Gulf monarchies. The multidimensional strategic partnership between China and the UAE, in particular, is illustrative of this broader pattern.

This article was first published on NPR’s Parallels blog.

It started so well. When Saddam Hussein’s Iraq invaded Kuwait on Aug. 2, 1990, the United States swiftly cobbled together a broad coalition, unleashed a stunning new generation of air power and waged a lightning ground offensive that lasted all of four days. Iraqi troops were so desperate to quit that some surrendered to Western journalists armed only with notebooks.

Read full article at the Washington Post.

This article was first published on the Huffington Post.

In recent news from Saudi Arabia: religious police filmed berating a fully veiled woman for not wearing gloves; a cleric’s fatwa against women watching football to prevent them from staring at men’s thighs; and a woman sentenced to 70 lashes for insulting her husband on WhatsApp.^[1] At the same time, the Saudi education ministry released statistics showing that women constitute almost 52 percent of university graduates inside the kingdom, while more than 35,000 female Saudis studied abroad in 2014.

This article was first published on Peacefare.net.

Here are some criticisms of the Iran deal that contain at least a kernel of truth; they are worth addressing for the sake of clarifying some of the arguments pro and con.

Read the full article on The National Interest.

The Iran nuclear deal has only one big surprise: it is consistent with the April 2 “parameters”  that preceded it and contains no surprises. No one caved. Nothing got walked back.

MEI interviewed Senior Fellow Alex Vatanka about the historic nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1 that was reached on July 14, 2015, and how it may impact regional dynamics and the long-term relationship between Iran and the West.

What has been the reaction to the nuclear deal?

Read the full article on the Washington Post‘s Monkey Cage blog.

For decades, most refugee crises followed a pattern: A war erupted, usually in a poor country, and beleaguered civilians staggered across the nearest border. The United Nations organized a response, rich nations footed the bill, and aid groups sent in workers to tend to the needy. Even in extreme cases, such as the mass exodus from Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion in the 1980s, the crisis was largely confined to the country at war and a few immediate neighbors.