Category: Blogs

The Dual Threats to Western Values

By Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Wall Street Journal

The abhorrent beheading of two American journalists and a British aid worker shocked the world. So did the tragic downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine.

Indirect Repression: When Reason is Eliminated

By Amr Hamzawy

The Egyptian regime is currently ruling the country via strategies of increased repression, which is exercised both directly and indirectly. This is seen in its attempts to improve the economic and social conditions in the country, and in its populist rhetoric based on the myth of the “saving hero,” and the reinstatement of autocracy as […]

Top News: Muslim Brotherhood Leader Sentenced to Life in Prison for Murder and Inciting Violence

By MENASource

The Giza Criminal Court sentenced on Monday Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie and fourteen others to life in prison for murder and inciting violence. The fifteen defendants were tried for violence, which occurred following the ouster of former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in Giza’s Bahr al-Azam neighborhood on July 15, 2013. Violent clashes broke […]

Are We Giving ISIS Too Much Credit?

Ramzy Mardini, nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, recently wrote in The Washington Post about the possibility of the Obama administration’s overestimation of the threat posed by the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). It’s an interesting question.

We Can’t Destroy ISIS Without Destroying Bashar al Assad First

By Frederic C. Hof

On Wednesday evening, President Obama took 14 minutes to articulate, in clear and persuasive language, a counter-terrorism strategy “to degrade and ultimately destroy the terrorist group known as ISIL.”

5 Ways for NATO, US to support Ukraine

By Jan Lodal, Washington Post

The Ukrainian military is capable of defending this line if it is given adequate NATO support, led by the United States. Five packages are needed:

Egypt’s Role in Libya: Lessons Learned from Iraq

By Nader Bakkar

Taking an in-depth look at what role Egypt can play in the current crisis in Libya reveals that a full military intervention, a limited military incursion, or a ‘surgical operation,’ are wrought with negative repercussions. But what of a collective Arab or international military intervention?  What of an indirect intervention to provide intelligence or logistical assistance […]

Top News: Anti-ISIS Meeting Kicks Off in Paris

By MENASource

French President Francois Hollande called on Monday for a global response to counter ISIS, as leaders of twenty-six countries gathered in Paris to discuss how to fight against the militant group.Tehran ridiculed the international conference on the jihadist threat that opened in Paris on Monday, insisting the Islamic State cannot be defeated without the support […]