A Post-War Model for Verifying Iran’s Missile Arsenal
This study proposes a model for constraining and verifying Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal by employing a layered Strategic Verification Model with seven components: comprehensive baseline declarations; missile test and launch monitoring; intrusive inspections; quantitative and qualitative limits on missile capabilities; production controls, especially on solid-fuel manufacturing; a robust enforcement and compliance architecture; and regional confidence building measures.
The 2026 Iran war has made Lebanon a core Gulf security concern, and Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar now have a narrow opportunity to curb Hizballah’s influence by leading reconstruction, strengthening Lebanese state institutions, and tying economic re-engagement to reform.
The Houthis are a political-military faction and Zaydi religious movement founded in northwestern Yemen in the 1980s. A key member of Iran’s Axis of Resistance with links to other militant organizations in the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa, the group has continued to pose a threat to Western interests on a global scale.
This backgrounder provides an overview of how the Abraham Accords came about, the US interests involved, their economic and strategic consequences, and the prospects for further enlargement going forward.
After a decade of post-Arab Spring isolation, Turkey’s leaders have recognized that their ambition to position the country as an agenda-setter on the world stage requires active engagement in all directions. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s consolidation of executive authority has centralized foreign policy decision-making and tied it to his domestic political priorities, transforming the country’s revisionist approach to one shaped primarily by personal and pragmatic interests.
As the Western Sahara conflict reaches its fifth decade, the territorial dispute remains unresolved and largely unknown. MEI’s Intissar Fakir unpacks the Western Sahara’s complex history and the rival claims by Morocco and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. She examines recent developments, such as President Trump’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over the territory and the collapse of a 30-year cease-fire, as well as the core questions that remain unanswered after half a century.
Podcasts
Middle East Focus
MEI’s flagship weekly podcast on US foreign policy and contemporary political and social issues in the Middle East.
MEI Senior Fellow Brian Katulis engages friends, colleagues, and policy experts in casual conversations on the most important happenings in the Middle East.
Political Protests, Global Islam and National Activism: Deciphering the Motivations behind Indonesia’s “Conservative Turn”
This article shows through the examination of the Majelis Intelektual dan Ulama Muda Indonesia (Council for Young and Intellectual Ulama of Indonesia, MIUMI) that the success of Middle Eastern Islamic doctrines has less to do with undermining an “Indonesian” Islam, than adapting their basic tenets to the democratic environment and building bridges to established Indonesian religious institutions. Accordingly, “Indonesian” and “Middle Eastern” Islam are distinctions that are more malleable than they may first appear.
Since Jan. 3, Tunisia has been experiencing scattered protests all over the country. The protests, which continued through the second week of January, follow the entry into force of the national budget for the 2018 fiscal year.
The Iranian naval forces today tested its new medium-range cruise missile during a two-day drill underway in the Sea of Oman, the Iranian media reported.
Hamas wants Khamenei to lead fight against US, Israel over Jerusalem
The representative of the Palestinian Hamas in Lebanon, Ali Barakah, has said that the militant group wants Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to unify the Islamic community and lead the fight against the United States and Israel after Washington’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as the Jewish state’s capital.
Iran deports scores of youth to western Afghanistan
Iran everyday deports hundreds of Afghans, including a sizable number of children and teenagers, BBC Persian reports. According to Afghan officials working on refugee affairs in western Herat Province, which borders Iran, about 500 undocumented Afghans are sent back to Herat through Islam Qala border crossing. The BBC report also reveals that human traffickers entice young men from rural Afghanistan into going to Iran for work opportunities. But many face significant dangers on their journey to Iran or are subjected to deportation even if they reach Iran.
Pence’s pointless peregrination in the Mideast | Monday Briefing
In this week’s Monday Briefing, MEI experts Paul Salem, Robert S. Ford, Randa Slim, and Jonathan M. Winer provide analysis on recent and upcoming events including Vice President Mike Pence’s trip to the Middle East, Turkey’s assault on Afrin, Iraq’s upcoming elections, and the U.N. humanitarian aid plan for Libya.
Manama says Tehran and its regional allies sponsor “terrorist cells” to destabilize Bahrain
Bahrain’s interior minister said on Sunday that Tehran and its regional proxies are supporting militant groups that carry out terrorist actions on the Bahraini soil, Iranian and
Khamenei’s advisor: Iran will stay in Syria and Iraq and help Damascus fight US troops
A top advisor to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei defended Iran’s costly involvement in regional conflicts and called for a long-term military presence in Syria and Iraq, Fars News Agency reported. “Our forces must stay in Iraq and Syria so as to defend Islamic unity. This is because if Iran is not present, no country can be the standard-bearer and guarantor of stability in the region,” said Ali Akbar Velayati, a former foreign minister who holds more than a dozen official positions in the Islamic Republic.
Iran’s Navy reportedly warns off two “coalition warships” in latest dangerous encounter
A senior Iranian naval officer said on Monday that the country’s warplanes warned off two US-led coalition vessels during a military drill in the Persian Gulf, the Iranian media reported. “This morning and in the first hours of the drills, two warships of the coalition which had approached the drills zone to monitor the Iranian Navy units were identified by the Navy drones,” Spokesman of the drills Rear Admiral Seyed Mahmoud Moussavi was quoted as saying by Fars News Agency.
Trump's national security strategy: implications for the Middle East
President Donald Trump came to office to “make America great again.” A year into his first term, the Middle East Institute’s scholars are assessing what this means for the greater Middle East, taking into account President Trump’s initiatives so far, the global and regional reaction to them, and possible consequences for U.S. interests.
Iranian, Russian diplomats meet in Moscow amid looming Turkish offensive in Afrin
Iran’s deputy foreign minister for Arab and African affairs, Hossein Jaberi Ansari, today left Tehran for Moscow to hold talks over the latest developments in Syria and the broader region, the Iranian media reported. Ansari and his accompanying team met with Mikhail Bogdanov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy to the Middle East and African countries, to discuss ways of strengthening cooperation between the two countries in Syria. The two sides reportedly also talked about Yemen and other regional crises.
IRGC commander: We’re chasing US to Eastern Mediterranean and Red Sea
The deputy commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has said that the United States is no longer to “pull off a victory” in the Middle East and claimed that Tehran and its allies are driving the US forces out of the region.
The oldest peer-reviewed publication dedicated to the study of the modern Middle East, MEI’s flagship journal covers politics, society, and culture in the region.
