Research & Commentary Results

It’s been nearly three years since the Turkish incursion into northern Syria in August 2016, but one central question remains unanswered: What is Ankara’s plan for the area now under its control? This paper examines the complex relationship between local governance and service provision in the Euphrates Shield (ES) area of north Aleppo and the Turkish state. Using secondary sources and interviews with Syrian and Turkish activists and officials, this paper establishes that, first and foremost, Turkey has no coherent policy with regards to local governance in ES.

In May, the European Council adopted the 2018 iteration of the EU Annual Report on Human Rights and Democracy in the World. Promoting human rights has long been a priority for the EU, but in practice the bloc is selective about the human rights violations its analyzes, especially when it comes to the Middle East.

MEI scholars Mirette Mabrouk and Rauf Mammadov join host Alistair Taylor to discuss the region’s energy boom, how significant recent finds are to the global market, and the challenges facing regional energy cooperation.

The U.S. and Iran are locked in conflict. Regardless of the details or culpability regarding the latest attack on two tankers in the Gulf, the conflict is centered on Washington’s “maximum pressure” campaign and Tehran’s response that it will not sit idly by while its economy is brought to its knees. Paul Salem sketches out five possibilities for where things might be headed.

The territorial defeat of ISIS in March 2019 was a significant victory in the fight against terrorism, but the struggle to defeat violent extremism is far from over. Ambassador Edmund Fitton-Brown and Charles Lister join guest host Gerald Feierstein to discuss the latest developments in policy to combat regional terrorist threats.

The growing power of paramilitary groups and the response of Bashar al-Assad’s foreign backers illustrates how local skirmishes over smuggling routes can have much broader geopolitical implications as Russia gains ground at the expense of both the regime and Iran.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Charles Lister, Paul Salem, and Mirette F. Mabrouk provide analysis on recent and upcoming events including military developments in Syria’s northwest, the confirmation of David Schenker as Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, and the approval of amendments to laws regulating Egypt’s judiciary.

In late May, Saudi Aramco signed an agreement to buy 5 million tons per annum of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from San Diego-based Sempra Energy’s planned LNG terminal in Port Arthur, Texas. The deal exemplifies Saudi Aramco’s determination to boost the share of LNG and petrochemicals in its portfolio before its long-awaited public offering in 2021.

In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Birol Baskan, Eran Etzion, Alex Vatanka, and Marvin G. Weinbaum provide analysis on recent and upcoming events including recent regional summits in Mecca to discuss Iran and the Qatar crisis, Benjamin Netanyahu’s gambit to retain power in Israel, and escalating hostilities between the Pakistani military and the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement.

Sometime in June the UN Security Council will vote to approve another six-month renewal of the mandate of the 1000-strong UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) deployed in the Golan Heights. For more than four decades, the UN Security Council has unanimously renewed the mission’s mandate to maintain the ceasefire between Israel and Syria, but this will be the first time it has come up for a vote since President Donald Trump signed a proclamation recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the area of the Golan Heights on March 25th.

As fighting rages across the last opposition-held province of Idlib, the war in Syria has reached its brutal endgame. The Syrian army’s offensive, launched in early May, will not be quick, but rather marks the start of what will likely be a prolonged, violent, and ultimately costly campaign. If the first few weeks of the operation are anything to go by, resistance will be fierce — fiercer than initially expected — and as the world’s attention shifts toward Idlib, the stakes are now higher than ever.

MEI’s Randa Slim and Paul Salem join host Alistair Taylor to discuss the Institute’s conflict resolution program and how Track II diplomacy—or unofficial meetings between adversarial groups—has supplemented state-to-state diplomacy and become a transformative experience for many of its participants.

Over the past few months, an awkward courtship has been going on between Iraq and its two most polarizing neighbors, as Tehran and Riyadh attempt to convince Baghdad of the merits of their respective orbits. While both sides make compelling points, the fact is that Iraq is exceedingly happy to occupy the middle ground, geopolitically and economically, between the two regional powers.

Approximately 10,000-20,000 Afghan men, mostly from the Hazara ethnic group, have fought in Syria in support of the government of President Bashar al-Assad. Organized by Iran and led by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and other affiliated groups, they have gathered under the banner of the so-called “Fatemiyoun” Division. This is the story of one of those men, Mohammed Jalil Dinsta, told through selections from his writings, alongside relevant analysis.