MEI’s Paul Salem and Randa Slim join host Alistair Taylor to discuss the nationwide protests that have swept through Lebanon and Iraq this week resulting in political and economic turmoil as well as crackdowns by security forces. Where do things go from here?
Once he’s gone, it will have to find a new purpose.
It has now been almost 18 months since Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued 12 demands to Iran and imposed a “maximum pressure” campaign to compel Tehran to change behavior.
It remains to be seen how resilient the protest movement is and how long it can remain mobilized for, especially if political leaders refuse to change their stance.
The increasing involvement of Iran in disinformation and attempted email hacking, in tandem with the revelation of Turla hijacking Iranian hacking infrastructure, risks muddying the waters even further with regard to attributing and countering election interference in 2020.
As protestors take to the streets across the country, Lebanon appears to be heading towards an economic meltdown with severe consequences for Lebanese citizens of all walks of life. We are concerned that failure to tackle current problems immediately and comprehensively could result in spiraling unemployment, uncontrollable inflation, more social unrest, civil strife and a severe deterioration in public health services and other basic resources.
While the Iranians would have preferred it if the Turks had not invaded Syria, it does not change their most immediate policy objective, which is the survival of the Assad regime. As long as the Russians keep the Turks away from Assad’s forces, Tehran will, at least in the short term, be able to manage the consequences of Ankara’s actions.
On Sept. 25, Lebanese President Michel Aoun told the UN General Assembly that Lebanon is prepared to welcome any country’s help in demarcating its land and maritime borders. He was referring to Lebanon’s decades-old border dispute with Israel, the resolution of which has become increasingly important as the country inches closer toward its first oil and gas drilling operations later this year.
MEI experts Paul Salem, Randa Slim, and Bilal Saab join host Alistair Taylor to discuss the massive uprising that has swept across Lebanon since last weekend, including what’s driving the protests, how the government has responded so far, and where things may go from here.
In a move that surprised no one, on Oct. 19 the Afghan election commission said it was unable to announce the preliminary results of the Sept. 28 presidential election as planned, due to delays in processing biometric data. Held amid political uncertainty, terrorist violence, and general skepticism, the September election was the fourth presidential contest in Afghanistan since 2001, when the brutal Taliban regime was toppled in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States.
Lebanon’s current uprising, larger than the Cedar Revolution and rooted in long-held socio-economic grievances, has united protestors across the country in calls for fundamental political change. And this time, Shiites have joined the struggle. This is not a good outcome for Hezbollah — nothing threatens it more than discord within the Shi’a community — and it now finds itself in uncharted territory.
Deep political, familial, and religious ties have allowed Druze communities across the Levant to remain largely unified against external threats, but eight years of violence in Syria and a coordinated campaign by the regime and its allies now threaten to destabilize regional Druze politics and erode the sect’s political and military power. An Iranian-backed campaign by Hezbollah to incite inter-Druze violence in Lebanon has curtailed this unity, laying the groundwork for Hezbollah to expand into Syria’s Suwayda province with impunity.
If the crowds continue to take to the streets, Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s resignation seems inevitable, but what comes next is a big question mark.
With an estimated $1 trillion in natural resources and sitting astride an international crossroads of increasingly critical importance, Balochistan is becoming a stage on which the world’s powers are playing out their ambitions. China, the U.S., and India have all formulated Balochistan policies in the past few years, hoping to utilize the region to achieve wider international goals — and the three countries across which Balochistan is divided, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iran, have been eager to use it as a bargaining chip for their own purposes.
Something had to give. Decades of corruption and criminal mismanagement by Lebanon’s ruling elites — the same clique who have governed the country since its independence in 1943 — have finally led to an economic implosion and a social explosion.