Middle East

Last week, representatives of the internationally-recognized Libyan government in Tobruk, and the General National Congress (GNC) – the Islamist-dominated rival authority in Tripoli – signed a U.N.-brokered agreement to form a unity government, which was quickly endorsed by the...

The establishment of counterterrorism policies effective throughout the Muslim world requires the strengthening of democratic movements that prevent the emergence of local and regional branches of Al Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS, by its acronym in English) , and the promotion of moderation and tolerance in education. To...

There is an old colloquialism amid the discourse in democratic political philosophy which holds that, most of the time anyway, a nation gets the government it deserves. Let’s spend a moment unpacking what this colloquialism means, and then another...

The Belfer Center’s The Iran Nuclear Deal: A Definitive Guide is a commendable discourse on one side of the coin of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) regarding Iran’s nuclear program – namely, the side which focuses on what Iran...

  The final episode of this year’s worst reality television show — the GOP presidential primary contest — airs on CNN tonight. The final Republican primary debate of the year will likely bring more of the same: lots of colorful...

On November 24, a Turkish F-16 fighter jet downed a Russian SU-24M ground bomber near the Turkish-Syrian border after it violated Turkish airspace over the southern tip of Turkey’s most southern province of Hatay. The clash resulted in the...

It’s almost all over. A parliamentary election for Egypt’s House of Representatives, which has dragged on for over a month and has been about as boring as it has been complicated, is drawing to a close. There have been...

Executive Summary While not as large as in many other Western countries, ISIS-related mobilization in the United States has been unprecedented. As of the fall of 2015, U.S. authorities speak of some 250 Americans who have traveled or attempted to travel...

Appearnces to the contrary, not all states and regimes in the Middle East are collapsing. Recent elections in Egypt and Turkey produced the results desired by their respective presidents – Egypt’s Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan....

The October bombing of a Russian airliner above Sinai, followed quickly by the November Paris attacks, created a broad international consensus that the Islamic State (ISIS) is on the march and must be stopped. The United States had acknowledged as much—at least rhetorically—over...