The consequences of the Geneva Accords – known as “Yalta 2” (June 16, 2021) – for the wider Middle East are about to reach a new stage: foreign forces occupying parts of Syria are about to withdraw. After 12 years of massacres, the war against the Syrian Arab Republic is ending. President Bashar al-Assad went…
The U.S. should do everything it can to ensure that the Middle East is a nuclear weapons-free zone, Brian Cloughley writes. The Biden administration insists that it develops policy and takes action in accordance with the “rules-based international order” which “can generally be described as a shared commitment by all countries to conduct their activities…
In his briefing at the UN Security Council, the organization’s Special Envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, proposed taking advantage of the relative halt in military hostilities in the country to bring together the main regional and international parties concerned. According to the official, this should be done for the sake of preliminary negotiations on confidence-building…
A year of diplomatic relations between the United Arab Emirates and Israel has proven to be mutually beneficial. The question is whether the assumptions underlying the UAE’s initiative that led three other Arab countries to also formalise their relations with the Jewish state will prove to be correct in the medium and long term. UAE…
Washington considers that Iran is and always will be hostile to the U.S. and there is no indication whatever of desire to initiate discussions The UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Lebanon, Najat Rochdi, is concerned about the crisis in the country and reports that “Extreme poverty rose threefold during the past two years. More and more…
Executive Summary • Given longstanding U.S. economic ties to the Arab Gulf states, the withdrawal of the U.S. military would not mean the United States is departing from the region. Even if it did signify that, however, China would be unlikely to fill the vacuum. A U.S. decision to maintain a military presence in the…
