Middle East

Break Up in the Gulf

By Bilal Y. Saab

On March 5, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Bahrain announced that they had withdrawn their ambassadors from Qatar, claiming that Doha had been violating a clause in the Gulf Cooperation Council charter banning interference in the domestic affairs of fellow GCC members. The decision, unprecedented in the GCC’s history, hints at significant […]

What Ukraine’s Crisis Means for the Syrian War

By New Atlanticist

Edward Joseph, at Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies, notes the uncertainty over Russian intentions in Syria, and over the effect of of the Russian-Ukrainian crisis on Moscow’s role in Syria. He writes that now is the time for US diplomacy to test Russia on Syria with a new diplomatic effort there. An excerpt […]

Syria’s Neglected Refugee Crisis Presents Opportunity To Revitalize US Policy

By J. Trevor Ulbrick

President Barack Obama’s Syria policy is in the doldrums. Adrift in a sea of sectarian conflict and buffeted by savvier global and regional players, US policy has never seemed more rudderless. With a second round of peace talks in Geneva ending without “even agreement on how to negotiate,” President Obama has asked his top aides […]

Constitution-Making in Libya: What Lessons From Tunisia?

By Geoffrey Weichselbaum and Duncan Pickard

The constitution adopted in Tunisia at the end of January represents the region’s best chance at achieving an elusive goal: sustainable democracy based on the rule of law. Next door, Libya two weeks ago elected a Constitutional Assembly to attempt the same.

Zooming in on Syria: Adapting US policy to local realities

By Faysal Itani & Nathaniel Rosenblatt

The key to ending the crisis in Syria is a better understanding of local players and power dynamics. By viewing the conflict through a local prism, the United States and its Western allies can help build a coherent, capable, and legitimate opposition, which is an essential ingredient for any political transition or even negotiations. In […]

Syria and Ukraine: Cause and Effect?

By Frederic C. Hof

In 1961, a young US president with an active, inquisitive, open, and skeptical mind learned the hard way that the world can be cruel; that behavior regarded in polite society as restrained, rational, and reasonable can be processed by the bullies of the world as weakness to be exploited.

What Ukraine Means For Syria

By Edward P. Joseph

As outrageous and unsettling as Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine is, the fact remains that the real killing continues to take place in another area of Russian interest: Syria. Indeed, more than a quarter of the 136,000 Syrians killed in the war have died over the past five months alone.

Adapting US Policy to Local Realities in Syria

As the conflict in Syria enters its fourth year, US policy has consistently failed to achieve its stated object: a negotiated political transition based on the mutual consent of the regime and opposition. The United States and its Western allies have focused on summits and high-level diplomacy as the most effective means to that laudable […]