Middle Orient

At least five Palestinian boys have gone missing in recent weeks while searching for food aid in northern Gaza, raising alarm among families and rights groups who fear they have been abducted by Israeli forces. The disappearances happened in the Zikim border area between 24 June and 2 August, according …

Bottom Line Up Front Amid major setbacks for Iran and its Axis of Resistance, Iraq’s political leaders are trying to gain firm control over militias that are duly constituted forces but act outside the national chain of command.An armed clash at a government building between security forces and militia commanders …

Five aid workers have been abducted in Syria while delivering supplies to the besieged province of Sweida this week, in what their colleagues told The National was an alarming development. On Monday, seven of eight vehicles carrying privately donated aid from the Damascus suburb of Jaramana were ambushed and looted …

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Iraqi Popular Mobilization Committee (PMC) Chairman Faleh al Fayyadh defended the Popular Mobilization Authority Law against domestic critics during an interview with Iraqi media on August 20.[1] This law, which Parliament has yet to vote on, would likely increase Iran’s influence in the Iraqi political and security spheres by formalizing …

Turkey’s Syria policy didn’t materialize in a vacuum. Rather, it was a reaction to the Arab uprisings that began in January 2011, known as the Arab Spring, which Turkish policymakers interpreted as a providential opportunity. The fall of entrenched dictators (in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Yemen and, eventually, Syria) would, the …

Abstract: The 12-day Iran war may be over, but the threat of Iranian reprisal attacks now looms large, and will for the foreseeable future. European authorities exposed plots in Sweden and Germany even as the war was being waged, and Israeli authorities issued a warning over potential attacks in the …

Latest Developments LAF Begins Process of Consolidating Arms: The Lebanese government claimed on August 21 that it had begun disarming Palestinian factions in the Burj al-Barajneh refugee camp in Beirut, as part of a broader effort to ensure the state’s monopoly on the use of force. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun …

Syrian security forces told Emirati media on August 16 that the Syrian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is preparing a three-pronged offensive to seize Raqqa and Deir ez Zor provinces. This report and others are likely part of an effort by Turkey and some elements of the Syrian transitional government to …

Sur l’échiquier changeant de la géopolitique mondiale, peu d’événements sont aussi importants et aussi peu médiatisés que l’émergence de deux corridors : le corridor de Zangezur et le corridor de David. Ces projets, qui s’étendent du sud du Caucase au nord de l’Irak, ne sont pas seulement des infrastructures : …