This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
President Obama’s Energy Policy
In the past, the Lebanese Armed Forces’ (LAF) inability to confront or deter Israel was reflected as political weakness for the Lebanese government vis-à-vis Hezbollah. Israel’s withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000 heralded a growing political role for Hezbollah. This role was further enhanced by the 2006 war with Israel, with Hezbollah claiming victory and consolidating its influence within the LAF and the government.
Cairo’s Ring Road, a peripheral highway linking the city’s core to surrounding districts, is an eight-lane free-for-all, with cars, buses, and overloaded trucks weaving randomly at high speeds. “I for one consider it to be an off-road, not a highway,” says Mahmoud Mostafa Kamal, editor of the online Arabic-language automotive magazine, el-Tawkeel (The Dealership).
Tunisia will hold its first presidential elections on Sunday, November 23. Main candidates include former Interim Prime Minister Beji Caid Essebsi of the Nidaa Tounes Party, Moncef Marzouki of the Congress for the Republic (CPR), and Mustapha Kamel Nabli, a former governor of the Central Bank of Tunisia. The Islamist Ennahda party did not present a candidate, wrongly assuming that it would regardless become the strongest voice in politics.
At the height of harsh authoritarian rule of the Suharto era, Islamic political activism was often the focus of the most intense of state repression. Because the Indonesian Communist Party had been destroyed in the 1960s, only Islamic organizations possessed the potential to mobilize substantial grassroots support. Thus, they were considered a particular threat to the centralized and rigid authoritarianism of Suharto’s New Order regime.
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
Current Situation
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
Four years after the uprisings that broke the mold of the old Middle East, 2015 promises to be another year of tumultuous change. The eruptions of 2011 unleashed decades of pent-up tensions and dysfunction in the political, socioeconomic, and cultural spheres; these dynamics will take many years, if not decades, to play themselves out and settle into new paradigms and equilibriums.
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
As Syrian President Bashar al-Assad gazes across Damascus from his palace on Mount Qasioun, he can be grateful to his Russian, Iranian, and Hezbollah allies that he is still in a position to enjoy such a view.
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
Ankara and Washington once again are wide apart on regional objectives. Not since 2003 and, for some, not since Cyprus in 1974 have the two capitals seen the same crisis so differently. Moving back onto the same page will require a series of concrete steps. President Obama reportedly has ordered a review. One of its main objectives should be to bring Turkey and the United States closer together on goals and tasks each will undertake. The United States cannot build a stable coalition without Turkey, and Turkey cannot accomplish its aims without the United States.
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has gone through a number of different phases in its long history. It is possible—though only time will tell—that a new phase is beginning now, but not a particularly hopeful one.[1]
This paper is part of an MEI scholar series, titled “Obama’s Legacy in the Middle East: Passing the Baton in 2017.” Click here to view the full project, or navigate using the table of contents to the right.