The Supreme Leader used his Nowruz address to launch a strong attack on the United States and make Rouhani the scapegoat for continued American pressure, which augurs poorly for U.S.-Iranian cooperation. In his twenty-sixth Nowruz speech in Mashhad, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterated his radical anti-American position and implicitly criticized Iran’s nuclear negotiating team for violating… Keep reading →
When Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu cancelled his planned visit to Washington recently, many speculated that he was protesting the continued lack of agreement on the amount of U.S. military aid to be embodied in a new ten-year memorandum of understanding (MOU). Vice President Joe Biden, who enjoys a close friendship with Netanyahu, visited Israel… Keep reading →
Strong ground support for moderate rebels would be needed to keep any buffer zone in the northwest from falling under the control of al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate. Read more articles from the TWI series on Syrian safe zones. In theory, Syria’s Idlib province and the eastern part of Aleppo province could serve as safe zones with… Keep reading →
Unfortunate civil unrest could emerge if the jihadist group continues targeting anti-government Turks and Moscow keeps its sights set on Erdogan and his party. In January 2016, The Washington Institute sponsored a daylong workshop on the challenges to U.S. policy in the Middle East posed by new trends in political ideology. This PolicyWatch is part… Keep reading →
If Moscow can get away with boldly flouting U.S. interests in a key American security zone such as the Middle East, where might it interfere next, and at what cost to the international security system? As Secretary of State John Kerry visits Germany for the 52nd Munich Security Conference this week, questions about Washington’s hesitant… Keep reading →
Regional regulators must take steps, as the Iraqi Central Bank has done, to wall off their financial systems from unlicensed or loosely regulated money remitters vulnerable to exploitation by the Islamic State. This week, the entity known as the Foreign Ministers of the Small Group of the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL/Da’esh met in Rome… Keep reading →
Reversing the political, military, and ideological factors that led to the movement’s rise will require substantive projects that are as self-sustaining and nimble as IS has proven to be. The Islamic State brand is an ambitious and seductive vision that has proven to be a tremendous media success. Yet this vision is ultimately tethered to… Keep reading →
The executions earlier this month followed an upsurge in convictions in the Specialized Criminal Court. On Tuesday, al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri responded to Saudi Arabia’s execution of forty-seven people on terrorism charges by urging Saudis to overthrow their royal family. The January 2 executions continue to stir debate about why the death sentences were carried… Keep reading →
Just hours before Pyongyang claimed to have tested a hydrogen bomb, Iran unveiled another underground facility and showed off North Korean-designed long-range missiles. Evidence of North Korea’s January 6 nuclear test is still being analyzed, but already there is doubt about whether it was a powerful hydrogen bomb, as Pyongyang has claimed. Rather, it was… Keep reading →
Washington must act promptly to prevent the execution of a Saudi Shiite leader and the Riyadh-Tehran diplomatic break from imperiling the fight against the Islamic State and the Iran nuclear accord. News of the January 2 execution of forty-seven men accused of terrorist offenses in Saudi Arabia was applauded within Saudi Arabia and by the… Keep reading →
