In recent weeks, the Iran-backed Houthis have fired missiles and drones deep into Saudi Arabia, striking high-profile targets, including Riyadh’s airport and Aramco’s headquarters. The attacks follow a rapid Houthi offensive in September to seize key parts of Yemen’s Red Sea coast, which Saudi-backed government forces are now trying to roll back. Fatima Abo Alasrar, an affiliated scholar at MEI and non-resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute, joins hosts Alistair Taylor and Matthew Czekaj to unpack the latest phase of the conflict. They discuss what the Houthis want, Riyadh’s calculus and search for allies, and how this campaign ties into Iran’s confrontation with the United States.
Geopolitical influence over trade increasingly rests on controlling the systems that make them work. The Middle East illustrates the stakes. US ports, cable corridors, cloud facilities, artificial intelligence (AI) investments, and maritime routes connect regional economies to global commerce while exposing them to external decisions and disruptions. For the United States, the challenge is to translate technological advantage into resilient networks rather than rely on centrality that can itself become a source of vulnerability and coercion.
Bonus Episode: Previewing Israel’s First Post-October 7 Election
Israel is preparing to hold what may be its most consequential election in decades. On October 27, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will face his first electoral test since October 7, 2023. In this bonus episode of Middle East Focus, we present the audio from a recent MEI webinar, hosted in Israel on the eve of the vote. Senior Fellow Natan Sachs is joined by Dr. Shira Efron, Distinguished Chair for Israel Policy and senior fellow at the RAND Corporation, and Neri Zilber, veteran journalist and Financial Times correspondent. They explore what’s at stake in this historic election and how different outcomes could reshape Israel’s domestic politics and the wider region.
Since 1967, Israeli settlements in the West Bank have been a contested feature of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The ultimate disposition of the settlements and ongoing activity related to their growth have repeatedly defied agreement in negotiations over a resolution to the conflict.
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.
The India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) is a proposed multinational infrastructure initiative aimed at upgrading connectivity between the three regions through integrated trade, energy, and digital networks. Announced at the G20 summit in New Delhi in September 2023, IMEC is envisioned partially as a counterweight to China’s international infrastructure project, the Belt and Road Initiative.
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.
MEI Senior Fellow Brian Katulis engages friends, colleagues, and policy experts in casual conversations on the most important happenings in the Middle East.
Kerry’s Proposed “Framework” Offers Way Forward for Israel/Palestine
John Kerry’s extraordinary efforts to make peace between Israel and Palestine through six months of bilateral talks have produced no significant results. Kerry, determined to succeed, is turning to a “framework” that would create a new basis for continued negotiations. The framework has not yet been released. But if it is a clear outline of an American plan for peace, not just a collection of ideas that avoids laying out U.S. positions, it could be a game changer.
Turkey and the Kurds: From Predicament to Opportunity
This report was co-authored by Ömer Taşpınar and was published by the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution on Jan. 22, 2014. Click here to download the full report as a PDF.
As President Obama met his top Afghanistan commanders in the Oval Office on February 4 to discuss his decision to reduce the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, he received a compliment from an unlikely source. Ali Akbar Velayati, the top foreign policy aid to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, called Obama’s Afghan withdrawal policy “wise.”
January 27, 2014 will likely be engraved in the collective memory of the Tunisian people as the day they witnessed the adoption of their first post-authoritarian constitution—a charter that will hopefully pave the way for the country’s democratization. This legal framework was ratified by members of the Tunisian National Constituent Assembly (NCA) in a celebratory atmosphere.
The recent attacks against Egypt’s police and military have raised concerns over the return of the militant insurgency that plagued Egypt during the 1980s and 1990s. Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM), a Sinai-based militant group, has repeatedly and publicly claimed responsibility for the cascade of bombings.
Osama bin Laden may be dead, but his ghost was in Riyadh the other day, hovering over Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah as he issued a decree making it a crime for any Saudi citizen to take part in a war outside the kingdom.
The obvious motivator was the civil war in Syria, where hundreds of young Saudis have been spotted in the ranks of the most radical jihadi groups battling both the government and other less extreme rebels. But the roots of the king’s action, and the problem it was designed to address, can be traced to the 1980s war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
The Rise and Fall of Transitional Justice in Taiwan
Authoritarian rule in Taiwan ended peacefully in the late 1980s. Since then, state institutions and private organizations have repeatedly attempted to address the atrocities committed during authoritarianism (1945-1987). This essay explores the various factors that have determined transitional justice in Taiwan over the last two decades. It demonstrates that post-authoritarian Taiwan has experienced three distinct periods: first, limited apology and compensation (1988-2000); second, attempts at transitional justice that ended in failure (2000-2008); and third, a reversal of all transitional justice mechanisms and a relapse to the past (2008-present). These changes are due in significant part to indigenous conflicts in Taiwan that have not been resolved, but also to global economic and political events that have drastically reduced the focus on democratic governance and accountability.
The situation in Egypt has been very complicated, with the democratic process and path toward transitional justice shifting under four different ruling systems—Mubarak, SCAF, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the interim ruling authorities—over a short period of time. All four systems committed abuses against the people, leaving victims and cases to be investigated. The combination of sharp divisions within society, disagreements about transitional justice itself, and delayed government responses to people’s demands has made the situation particularly charged.
Libya's Political Isolation Law: Politics and Justice or the Politics of Justice?
In May 2013, Libya’s General National Congress (GNC) overwhelmingly passed the Political Isolation Law (PIL). The PIL’s enactment represented a far-reaching attempt to prevent members of the regime of Muammar Qaddafi from holding public office during the country’s transition. But the decision also appeared to fit a precarious pattern of post-conflict accountability in Libya, which has been characterized by acts of vengeance and one-sided justice aimed at anyone associated with the defeated regime. The passage of the law also reflects the current state of political instability in Libya wherein decisions are politically motivated and often forced at the barrel of the gun rather than agreed upon through public consultation and democratic decision-making.
Copts in Egyptian Civil Society: Challenge and Hope in Transition
“Through wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established.” Pope Tawadros II, the Pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church, tweeted this verse of scripture in December 2012. He wrote it as one of a series of daily reflections on the book of Proverbs. This phrase, however, also provides an entry point into the Coptic Orthodox Church and its place in Egyptian civil society. Egypt is in the midst of rebuilding its government and society following an 18-day revolution in 2011, 18 months of military rule that ended with the election of Mohamed Morsi, and the removal of President Morsi one year later by the Egyptian military in July 2013. Egyptian Christians now have the opportunity and challenge to renegotiate their place in Egyptian civil society during this time of unrest and transition. What wisdom, understanding, and vision will Christian clergy and lay leaders put forth in order to co-labor with their neighbors, the state, and other stakeholders to build a new house for Egyptian society? This new vision must be rooted in Copts’ historical experience and include the possibility for new models of engagement and representation.
After weeks of delay tactics by his lawyers, former military ruler Pervez Musharraf could be indicted in early February by a special court in Pakistan for high treason. If he is indicted, Musharraf will be the first serving or retired general in Pakistan’s history to face this particular ignominy.
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.
