It’s been a more-than-usual eventful week in the Middle East. Russian-backed forces made yet more significant military gains in defeating US-sponsored proxies in Syria, with a fearsome display of long-range Russian air and naval firepower against militant hold-outs near Deir ez-Zor. That was while Russian President Vladimir Putin was greeted in the Iranian capital Tehran…
The sudden resignation of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri raises a number of questions. To fast track the main relevant events of the last decade or so, Hariri was Saudi Arabia’s favourite kid on the Lebanese block. After all, his father was a close friend and a business partner of Prince Fahed, who later on…
It seems that matters are coming to a head in the Middle East. For many states, the coming period will likely prove to be the moment in which they determine their futures — as well as that for the region as a whole. The immediate peg for “crunch time” is Russia’s fast-track proposal of a conference…
For the moment it looks as if Russian three-dimensional geopolitical chess moves in the turbulent Middle East have thrown a giant monkey wrench into Washington plans to create an independent Kurdistan. In September the Kurdish population in Iraq voted apparently overwhelmingly for creation of an independent Kurdistan that would control some of the richest oil…
Geopolitics becomes a lot easier if we can discern repeating patterns. For example, the common thread through the crises in Ukraine, Libya and Syria is a clever but ruthless playbook of regime-change. This stratagem of toppling governments while appearing noble should perhaps be called the “geopolitics of crocodile tears.” There were times in history when…
The Syrian army says it has liberated the eastern city of Deir ez-Zor, the terrorists’ last stronghold on the west bank of the Euphrates River, from the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), SANA news agency reported. https://cdnv.rt.com/files/2017.11/59fc4eeafc7e93c71c8b4567.mp4 “Units of the Syrian Arab Army, in cooperation with the allied and supporting forces, have accomplished the mission…
