Levant

Why the Coming Iranian Elections Will Challenge the Biden Administration

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei seems inclined to promote a candidate who will quash dissent over someone who could work with the West.

Who Started the Gaza War?

America did

The Realignment

On Iran, Biden is finishing what Obama started. And his top advisers are all on board.

Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker: Late April

Late April Trends

Syria

Human Rights

Strengthen the Alliance with Israel to Contain China

The End of Arab Nationalism

How the Abraham Accords put the final nail in the coffin of a bad idea.

Another Bold Strike Against Iran

The killing of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh demonstrates Israel’s capabilities and constrains Biden’s options.

Get Ready for a New Type of Israeli War

The focus until now has been on when and where Israel strikes, and not what is being destroyed. But that is now changing.

New Sanctions on Assad Aim to Prevent Atrocities

In 2013, the regime of Bashar al-Assad received a report that opposition forces had captured and killed an employee of the defense ministry. That report was false. The man — a photographer from the...

The U.S. Is Right to Push to Extend the U.N. Arms Embargo on Iran

It’s not every day that Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, borrows from the lexicon of international relations theory. Highlighting the Islamic Republic’s proliferation of conventional...

Bringing the Middle East Back Home

The American Orientalist Class attempts to paint a fantasy Middle Eastern landscape on the American canvas

Lebanon’s Interwoven Fantasy Worlds All Lead to War With Israel

How much should America pay to maintain the fraying fabric?

The Islamic Revolution vs. Donald Trump

Iran and Ayatollah Khamenei are more influential today than at any time since 1979.

U.S. Sanctions Leader of Pro-Iran Terror Group in Iraq

Another member of Tehran’s “Axis of Resistance,” a constellation of pro-Iran proxies and partners, has been sanctioned by Washington. On Feb. 26, the U.S. Department of State designated Ahmad al-Hamidawi,...

Trump rejects the fake separation between Iran and its militias

No longer playing Iran's game

The New Rocket Threat to Israel

The latest fighting in Gaza is the tip of the iceberg

The Syrian Front

Discussing America’s stake in the Middle East has increasingly become a shell game where our “interests” can quickly disappear depending on the changing sentiments of the president.   The trajectory...

Troubles Mount in Lebanon

Episode 43