As the world’s attention shifts to the Iran war, Gaza is increasingly disappearing from the international spotlight. But more than six months after the United Nations endorsed a peace plan for Gaza, the humanitarian catastrophe continues. Israeli strikes remain relentless, while major international NGOs and aid groups say critical supplies are still not entering Gaza at anywhere near the scale needed.
How Israel-Backed Sweida Became Syria’s Narcotics Capital
In the early hours of Sunday, May 3, Jordanian F-16 fighter jets crossed into Syrian airspace and launched strikes on at least six locations in the southern province of Sweida. In a statement issued hours later, Jordan’s military said that “Operation Jordanian Deterrence” had targeted “factories, facilities and warehouses used by trafficking groups as launch points for smuggling operations into Jordan.”
Violence, Settlements, and Creeping Annexation in the West Bank
As international attention remains fixed on the fallout from the Iran war, conditions in the West Bank continue to deteriorate. Hosts Alistair Taylor and Matthew Czekaj speak with MEI Senior Fellow Lucy Kurtzer-Ellenbogen about the sharp rise in settler violence, expanding settlement activity, and growing Palestinian displacement across the territory. They examine how recent Israeli legal and administrative measures are reshaping realities on the ground, the implications for Israeli-Palestinian relations, and what the United States should do to play a constructive mediator role.
The renewal of the international agreement on Iran’s nuclear program does not undermine Israeli national security per se but rather a longstanding tenet of Israel’s strategic thinking: that it must be able to fully eradicate any challenge to its military superiority deep inside enemy territory.
The July 2022 leaders’ meeting took good steps on energy and food security, but Egypt and Saudi Arabia can help take the I2U2 to the next level when it comes to regional security.
Refugees First: A New Approach to Middle East Peace
According to UNRWA, there are approximately 6.3 million registered Palestinian refugees across the Arab world. The majority of these are the descendants of the 750,000 Palestinians who were displaced between 1947 and 1949 over the course of Israel’s creation, an event known among Palestinians as the Nakba or “catastrophe.” This paper aims to evaluate past proposals on the refugee question and promote a new refugee-first framework that could produce tangible solutions for Palestinian refugees and for the conflict at large.
Israel’s new Iran strategy complicates regional security
The decades-long confrontation between Israel and Iran is now arguably becoming more dangerous. Amid a lack of consensus among Israeli leaders on how to address this perceived existential threat, calls for applying greater pressure are gaining momentum. The two countries have been engaged in a shadow war for years that includes assassinations, sabotage, kidnappings, and cyber operations, but a new phase of tensions may only bring them closer to a full-scale conflict.
The India-Middle East Food Corridor: How the UAE, Israel, and India are forging a new inter-regional supply chain
The India-Middle East Food Corridor developed organically among the three Asian countries themselves, through private sector, joint venture investments carefully cultivated via bilateral public-private partnerships. The United States’ participation in the corridor could prove beneficial as the U.S. seeks to bolster its presence in the strategic architecture of the Indo-Pacific.
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.
The departure of Hossein Taeb from his post as the head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Intelligence Organization triggered a wave of reshuffling in the command structure of the guardsmen. But the story is more than just a reaction to Iran’s unsuccessful terrorist targeting of Israelis in Turkey and counterintelligence lapses. There are internal power struggles and a natural maturation of the Islamic Republic’s security structure that also likely figured into the decision to remove Taeb.
Fearing a collapse: Palestinian refugees and UNRWA’s worsening financial crisis
In early June 2022, the Advisory Commission of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East met in Beirut. Facing a $100 million budget deficit and the indifference of donor countries, UNRWA’s future is uncertain.
Staying the course … for now: Germany’s MENA policy under the Scholz government
After 16 years under Angela Merkel, Olaf Scholz’s assumption of Germany’s chancellorship on Dec. 8, 2021 marked a new chapter in the nation’s politics. Within the “traffic light” coalition government formed by the Social Democrats, the Free Democratic Party, and the Greens, Annalena Baerbock heads the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Before taking office, the co-leader of Alliance 90/The Greens was known for both her welcoming attitude toward immigrants and her full-throated condemnation of human rights violations by authoritarian governments. The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has no shortage of the latter: According to the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index, 17 out of the 20 countries in the region are “authoritarian” and not one is characterized as a “full democracy.” Beyond human rights, other key MENA policy issues for the new government include Iran, Turkey, ongoing conflicts in the region, and immigration. The challenges are numerous, if well-known, but how will Berlin respond? Is Germany’s policy toward MENA likely to change or remain the same under the new government?
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.
