Netanyahu has sought to direct the blame for the debacle of Oct. 7, as well as the subsequent failures in the management of the war, squarely on the Israeli security establishment, while avoiding taking personal responsibility that would cost him his job.
On April 17, Russian and Azerbaijani officials confirmed that the Russian peacekeeping forces deployed in Karabakh since November 2020 had begun pulling out from the region. The reasons behind the decision remain a matter of intense debate; but it is possible to draw several important conclusions from its timing and consequences.
Expert regional analysis by MEI scholars and contributors.
Anti-migration policies in Libya, Tunisia, and Niger have had dire consequences, as highlighted by the more than 25,000 migrant deaths in the Mediterranean since 2014, a figure that does not fully capture the extent of the tragedy. To address these failures will require substantial policy changes and an evolution in approach to the migration issue.
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Israeli leaders insist that the extreme destruction in the Gaza Strip is unavoidable given Hamas’ use of “human shields” and the fact that the militant group has embedded itself among the civilian population and routinely operates from civilian structures like hospitals and schools. But far from explaining the current devastation, the questionable “human shields” charge has become a way to shield Israel from legitimate scrutiny and accountability.
In recent months, Israel’s situation in the Red Sea has grown increasingly challenging in the security, economic, and diplomatic spheres. But the country is in a better position to meet these challenges and threats by leveraging the strategic regional partnerships it has developed over the past several years.
After Hamas’s unprecedented attack against Israel on Oct. 7, the siren song of Saudi-Israeli normalization risks wrecking the US-Saudi relationship against the rocks of stubborn geopolitical realities. An interim less-for-less approach in US-Saudi negotiations that doesn’t immediately require Senate approval nor is beholden to a much less certain Israeli-Palestinian peace process could set the stage for an even more consequential “mega deal” down the line.
This month marks the 45th anniversary of the founding of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Mohsen Sazegara, a non-resident scholar with MEI’s Iran Program, was one of the group’s founders and a member of its first board of commanders. He later became a journalist and a reformist political activist. He was arrested and imprisoned four times before ultimately leaving Iran. He was interviewed by MEI in early May.
The recent blow-for-blow strikes by Iran and Israel are bound to result in some introspection in Tehran. It is the first time since the launch of the “Axis of Resistance” some 20 years ago that Tehran has to choose whether it wants to center its entire national security strategy around the conflict with Israel. Going forward, Tehran could choose to handle this conflict through political and diplomatic means rather than via the Axis of Resistance.
The month of April saw a series of unprecedented escalations in the long-simmering Iranian-Israeli conflict, with both countries launching missile and drone attacks against the other’s territory for the first time in history.
In the wake of these strikes, what will be the impact on the regional security and political environment going forward, what is needed to stabilize the new rules of the game, and how can US diplomacy help to facilitate that process? MEI has asked its experts to weigh in.
The Biden administration set forth five main objectives in reaction to the Oct. 7 Hamas attack against Israel and ensuing war in the Gaza Strip. Six months into the Israel-Hamas war, the Biden administration has not achieved enough progress toward these goals, although it has avoided some of the worst-case scenarios. Success is hampered in part by tensions stemming from the fact that some of the tactics and policy approaches are at odds with each other.
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A version of this article was originally published on the Substack “Thinking Middle East.”
This week marks one year of Sudan’s brutal civil war, when the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) started battling in the capital city of Khartoum. Far from silencing their guns, the two sides continue to fight fiercely to devastating effect; and with scant global attention or outcry, the Sudanese war has quickly become the world’s worst forgotten conflict.