The most recent cross-border hostilities between Afghanistan and Pakistan show how tensions have crossed a dangerous threshold.
Saudi Arabia has stepped up its efforts to unify and restructure Yemen’s anti-Houthi forces after the rapid expansion and sudden implosion of the United Arab Emirates-backed secessionist Southern Transitional Council following Abu Dhabi’s military withdrawal from the country.
MEI Senior Fellow Mohammed Soliman joins hosts Alistair Taylor and Matthew Czekaj to discuss his new book, West Asia: A New American Grand Strategy in the Middle East. The book argues that it is time for the United States to move decisively away from nation-building and focus instead on order-building, outlining a framework for a new regional order that links Europe to the Indo-Pacific. Soliman also shares how he conceived of the core ideas behind his book and explains why his thesis is especially relevant in today’s geopolitical, economic, and technological landscape.
In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Eran Etzion, Gerald Feierstein, and Robert S. Ford provide analysis on recent and upcoming events including Israeli PM Netanyahu’s upcoming trip to Moscow, Saudi FM Adel al-Jubeir’s upcoming visit to Cairo, and the developing agenda for the Geneva 4 Syria peace talks.
Netanyahu to Make Another Trip to Moscow
Eran Etzion, MEI Scholar
The ambassador of Maldives to Saudi Arabia has said that his government refused an Iranian offer to launch a radio station in the South Asian island country.
The Iranian media extensively covered Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud’s recent trip to Malaysia. State-run and semi-official outlets close to the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.), in particular, discussed in details the growing economic and trade ties between Riyadh and Kuala Lumpur.
Iran’s Fars News Agency (FNA), a mouthpiece of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.), has published interviews with Iraqi politicians and militia commanders about Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir’s February 25 visit to Baghdad and its potential implications for the war against the Islamic State and for Iraq’s relations with Iran.
Note: The latest issue of MEI’s Monday Briefing e-mail incorrectly linked to this page. If you’re looking for the Monday Briefing for March 6, click here.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s official trip to Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Qatar has prompted anxiety in Tehran. Erdogan arrived in Riyadh on Monday night after a visit to Bahrain, and he is scheduled to go to Qatar next.
The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.) media outlets continue to justify and encourage attacks by Yemeni Houthi rebels against Saudi Arabia. I.R.G.C.-affiliated Fars News Agency, for example, ran a number of news stories and commentaries today glorifying the Houthis’ latest attacks against Saudi military targets, including a recent attack targeting a Saudi warship and a scud missile that the Houthis claimed hit a military base near the Saudi capital.
Hardline Iranian media are enthusiastically speculating that the conflict in Yemen will soon enter a more dangerous phase with the intensification in the use of missiles by the Yemeni rebels.
Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled al-Sabah has arrived in Tehran today to deliver a message from Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on a strategic dialogue between the Gulf Arab states and Iran, the Iranian and Arab media report. “Gulf states have a true desire that relations with Iran are normal and based on international law,” Sabah said on Tuesday after attending the inauguration of a NATO center in Kuwait.
In an interview with an Arab television station, the former Iranian foreign minister and the present head
In the latest example of Iranian interference in Iraq, a top Iranian general has said that the presence of the Saudi consulate in Erbil, the capital of Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, is not “just
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.
