Publications

The May 19 deaths of President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in a fiery helicopter crash has created a challenge that Iran’s lead…

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s death comes at a particularly precarious time for the Islamic Republic. While important, considering the monumental news, Sup…

On his recent visit to the United States, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia` al-Sudani proposed a bold new relationship with America, basing it on the joint S…

Years of shadow conflict between Israel and Iran, which included targeted assassinations as well as cyberattacks, gave way in April to direct confrontation and…

Rare are the occasions when a purportedly capable country’s determined military response to attack turns out to be a mere theatrical performance. Such was the …

Despite the Israeli war on Gaza killing nearly 30,000 Palestinians, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has clung to the Abraham Accords, which it signed with Israe…

Since 2021, Turkey has been resetting its policies in the Middle East and has started to reconcile with its rivals in the previous decade—Egypt, Israel, Saudi …

On January 17, the Biden administration announced it was adding Yemen’s Houthis (also called Ansar Allah) to the US terrorist list. The move returned the rebel…

After enduring weeks of regional tension, including Houthi rebel attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and on American commercial vessels, the Biden administratio…

While the Biden administration, with Qatar’s support, has succeeded in securing a deal with Israel and Hamas for a combat “pause,” it remains to be seen if thi…

The war on Gaza has for all intents and purposes reinstated the centrality of the Palestinian issue to the regional and international politics of the Middle Ea…

The United States has recently bolstered its military presence in the Middle East as the Israeli war on Gaza escalated. Bolstering this presence is meant to de…

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shi`a al-Sudani completed his first year in office on October 27 with a mixed record of successes and failures owing to objective…

In the space of just over two weeks, Israel’s war on Gaza has upended Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shai` al-Sudani’s year-long careful balancing of Iraq’s for…

At some point, the tactical balls Tehran has been juggling could fall to the ground with unpredictable or dangerous strategic results.

Watching Kuwait’s seemingly dysfunctional political scene gives one the impression that the country is on a course toward endless instability and disorder. Las…

Over the first weekend of August 2023, Saudi Arabia convened an international summit on the war in Ukraine. Held in Jeddah and attended by representatives from…

Under President Ebrahim Raisi, Iran has carved out an overseas agenda that is a patent departure from the country’s 1979 Revolution-era notion of “neither East…

The US military has recently significantly increased its presence in the Arabian Gulf, a show of force aimed primarily at deterring Iran from attacking or hara…

Saudi Arabia and the United States are conducting complex negotiations in order to achieve a tripartite agreement that would include normalization between the …

The recent redeployment of Iran’s dreaded “morality police” signals much more than a victory for the country’s hardliners. Instead, it seems to be part and par…

The last few weeks have witnessed an active diplomatic movement between Tehran and Western countries, especially the United States, regarding resolving the cri…

Saudi Arabia and the UAE are waging a quiet struggle to determine who will emerge as the Arabian Gulf’s—and maybe the Arab world’s—preeminent power.

Kristian Coates Ulrichsen discusses the current state of Saudi-US relations as Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman seeks to chart a new course in domestic and for…

Iran today is not nearly as isolated as Washington had hoped and it has scored some impressive successes in advancing its regional agenda.

Egypt and Iran appear to be moving toward a closer relationship and a mending of ties. In recent months, officials from both countries have engaged in multiple…

Saudi Arabia’s announcement last month of surprise oil production cuts reverberated around the world. The cuts consisted of a voluntary reduction of 500,000 ba…

Politicians and commentators are warning about the consequences of an emerging “Ukraine fatigue” in the second year of the Russian invasion of the country. The…

In Yemen, the Southern Movement calling for separation between the North and South of Yemen is controversial. For those who oppose it, it is a simple secession…

The crisis had been building for months when, on March 20, 2003, this author stood with a group of military officers deep inside the Pentagon, watching a telev…

Desalination has been identified as one technology that could help solve Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries’ water scarcity problem. Desalination is a co…

Now that China has brokered a renewal of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia, it must translate that achievement into real tangible benefits. After all, fo…

In June 2017, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi consented to ceding sovereignty over the islands of Tiran and Sanafir to Saudi Arabia. However, nearly si…

The signing of a joint trilateral statement by senior national security officials from Saudi Arabia and Iran in the presence of Chinese officials in Beijing on…

On March 20, 2003, the United States led an invasion of Iraq supposedly meant to halt its development of weapons of mass destruction. Lacking the support of th…

In the closing scene of the 1942 film Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart, walking off into the fog with his occasional nemesis as they plan their next move together, …

Nothing so perfectly expresses the failure of nation-building in Iraq as the cry of protesters in 2019, when they chanted, nureed watan, “we want a country.” T…

While the central role that China recently played in renewing diplomatic relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia underscores the United States’ declining influ…

There is consensus among scholars and observers that the protests that erupted in Iran in September 2022 represent a defining moment in the contemporary histor…

Reducing US commitments in the Middle East and pivoting to Asia has been a hot topic among foreign policy analysts and Middle East experts since the idea was p…

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is 83 years old. And while he has lived long enough to see the 44th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution, the s…

Recruitment of children as actual or auxiliary soldiers in Yemen’s ongoing war is one of the most dire developments in the conflict since its initial eruption …