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Atlantic Council blogs provide short-form analyses from Council experts and a wider community of global voices on the world’s most important news stories.
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Rabaa8

MENASource

Aug 14, 2014

Raba’a Remembered: The Human Rights Watch Report

By Elissa Miller

With one year passing since the violent dispersal of the pro-Mohamed Morsi sit-in at Raba’a al-Adaweya Square, Human Rights Watch (HRW) put out an in-depth report detailing what happened on August 14, 2013. While Egyptian authorities placed the death toll at over 600, HRW documented at least 817 deaths, and reviewed evidence of a possible […]

North Africa

MENASource

Aug 14, 2014

EconSource: Morocco to Focus on Stabilizing Currency Reserves in 2015 Budget

By EconSource

Follow the latest in economic news and developments about the Arab transition countries.

MENASource

Aug 14, 2014

Obama Won’t Commit to Syria, But Congress Can

By Jason T. Hunt

The United States began directly fighting the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS, aka ISIL, Islamic State) this weekend through airstrikes on its terrorist forces in Iraq. The strikes helped the Peshmerga forces of the Kurdish Regional Government solidify their defenses, stabilizing one front against ISIS. However, ISIS continues to maintain and consolidate a […]

Iraq Syria

AfricaSource

Aug 13, 2014

Select Countries’ African Trade Partners

By James Attwell and Joshua Meservey

Today’s graphs show selected trading heavyweights and their five largest African trading partners, along with the trade volume by US dollar amount per country. The BRICS countries minus China are presented in a bar graph for ease of comparison.

NATO exercise in Slovakia, June 17, 2013

NATOSource

Aug 13, 2014

NATO Summit Must Make Further Progress on Smart Defense

By Richard Weitz, World Politics Review

Next month’s NATO summit needs to make greater progress on so-called Smart Defense, the alliance-wide effort to get more collective benefits out of individual members’ defense budgets.

NATO Security & Defense

MENASource

Aug 13, 2014

Top News: ISIS Seizes More Territory in Syria

By MENASource

Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) insurgents have seized several towns and villages from rival groups in the Syrian province of Aleppo. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the new territory would open the way for ISIS to advance further westward.

MENASource

Aug 13, 2014

Top News: US Calls on Egypt to Investigate Raba’a Deaths in Response to HRW Report

By EgyptSource

  The United States, on Tuesday, called on the Egyptian government to investigate the violence that left approximately a thousand people dead, according to a recent Human Rights Watch (HRW) report.

MENASource

Aug 13, 2014

EconSource: Economic Confidence Index Declines in the Middle East

By EconSource

Follow the latest in economic news and developments about the Arab transition countries. 

A cave facility in Norway used by the US military, 1997

NATOSource

Aug 13, 2014

Pentagon Increasing Its Arsenal of Weapons in Norway’s Caves

By Dan Lamothe, Washington Post

In the heart of Norway’s countryside, the U.S. military is bolstering its arsenal of weapons with tanks, gun trucks and other armored vehicles along with hundreds of containers of equipment.

Iraq NATO

MENASource

Aug 13, 2014

Saving Syria Is No Fantasy

By Frederic C. Hof

In June 2014, the Obama administration asked Congress for $500 million to train and equip nationalist Syrian rebels battling both the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Assad regime.

Syria