Research & Commentary Results

Hours after President Donald Trump signed a legislation imposing new sanctions on Iran (as well as on Russia and North Korea), the Iranian government announced that it will take “appropriate and proportionate” retaliatory measures, including further empowering the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.) and its elite Quds Force. “The aim of these sanctions is to scare economic firms from dealing with Iran,” said Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi. “But Europe will continue economic exchanges with Iran,” he added.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif’s handshake and brief conversation with his Saudi counterpart Adel al-Jubeir received mixed reactions inside Iran. While some described their meeting as an encouraging step to improving ties between the two neighbors, others criticized Zarif for seeking friendship with Riyadh. The two top diplomats exchanged diplomatic pleasantries on the sidelines of the Organization of Islamic cooperation (O.I.C.) summit in Istanbul on Tuesday.

Both the Trump and Obama administrations have made defeating ISIS the United State’s number one priority in the Middle East. In Syria, this focus led the United States to support the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (Y.P.G.) against ISIS. One of the major contributing factors behind this decision was that the Y.P.G. was not actively hostile to the Syrian regime, unlike the Syrian opposition. U.S. support for the Y.P.G.

Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani said today that the country’s committee monitoring the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action – the nuclear agreement Iran signed with the United States and five other world powers two years ago – has determined that the latest U.S. sanctions violate the accord and added that the committee has filed a complaint with the Iran-P5+1 Joint Commission about it.

Qais al-Khazali, the secretary-general of Iraq’s Asaib ahl al-Haq armed group, has accused the United States, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Turkey of supporting the Islamic State in Iraq and the broader region, according to Iran’s Fars News Agency. “The heroic forces of Hashd al-Shaabi [Popular Mobilization Forces] easily chop the heads of these forces,” he said while describing the Islamic State as the “special forces” of the United States and its allies.

Prominent Iraqi Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s weekend visit to Saudi Arabia has raised concerns in Tehran. While the Iranian government and media outlets affiliated with the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.) largely refrained from commenting on Sadr’s trip and his meeting with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, some conservative newspapers and Iranian analysts cautioned that the Saudi government is attempting to court Iraqi Shiite leaders to influence Iraqi politics at the expense of Iran’s interests.

Leaning toward Riyadh?

Jerusalem’s Old City is a tinderbox that could  set off a regional conflagration. This is a demonstrably true statement: when Ariel Sharon, then an opposition politician, stood surrounded by security guards on the steps in front of the Dome of the Rock in September 2000, and proclaimed that it would remain in Israeli hands forever, the consequence of his populist blustering was the Second Intifada.

The chief of staff of Iran’s Armed Forces has

The Saudi-led Arab Peace Initiative is losing its value in the wake of Egypt’s decision to return the Red Sea islands of Tiran and Sanafir to Saudi Arabia, and the latter’s participation as a security guarantor of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty.

Last month, the Egyptian parliament, bucking widespread public and institutional opposition, acknowledged Saudi sovereignty over the islands.

Most attention has focused on the dispute over sovereignty, which has been under Egyptian administration for more than half a century. But the real significance of the deal lies elsewhere.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Eran Etzion, W. Robert Pearson, Charles Lister, Alex Vatanka, and Randa Slim weigh in on the implications of Israel-Palestinian violence for U.S. foreign policy, Turkish involvement in the Gulf crisis, al-Qaeda’s response to the U.S. decision to terminate support for a program arming anti-Assad Syrian rebels, confrontational U.S. policy towards the Iran nuclear deal, and a former Iraqi Prime Minister’s power play.

Yemenite pop music has seen a resurgence. The band A-Wa (pronounced “ai-wah,” informal Arabic for “yes!”) and their infectious blend of Yemenite folk, electronic, and hip-hop music can be heard all over the world—from Cairo taxi cabs to Dubai pool parties and Parisian nightclubs. The band, whose mission is to elevate Yemenite music on the international stage, is composed of three Israeli sisters of Yemenite heritage.

Avi Gabbay, the new leader of Israel’s Labor party, stormed through his first primaries with surprising ease. Fifty-two percent of the 30,000 actual voters decided to crown the new contender, who only joined their party seven months ago. Gabbay, a former minister for environmental protection in Netanyahu’s government and a member of the center-right “Kulanu” (“All of Us”) party, had resigned in May 2016, citing “wrongdoings” in connection with the government’s natural gas policies.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Charles Lister, Marvin G. Weinbaum, Yousef Munayyer, and Alex Vatanka provide analysis on recent events including the battle for Mosul, corruption in Pakistan, Mahmoud Abbas’s trip to China, and Rouhani’s difficult second presidential term.

Mosul Turning Ugly, Raqqa Front Slows
Charles Lister, Resident Fellow

A senior Iranian cleric warned today that “no American place in the world will remain safe if the United States commits a mistake against Iran.” Ayatollah Mohammad Ali Movahedi Kermani, an interim Friday prayer leader of Tehran, told a large gathering of worshippers today that the United States aims to weaken the will of the Iranian people through economic pressure in order to get them to oppose the regime.

The leadership of Harakat al-Nujaba, an Iranian-supported militia group fighting in Syria and Iraq, has announced that its forces have launched an operation to seize territory from the the Islamic State in southeast Syria near the shared border point with Iraq and Jordan. The statement released by the group said the paramilitary forces had captured “large parts” of southeastern desert in Syria, including “important” villages of Um al-Raheel, Abu Khashaba, and Berket al-Miyah.