Middle Orient

The US administration might be open to a position shift on the Syrian file to secure the flow of cross-border international aid to Syria, a prospect that may spoil Turkey’s calculations in Syria and particularly in Idlib. Although humanitarian aid to Syria was hardly a top agenda item during President …

Despite his hardline credentials, Iran’s foreign policy is likely to remain unified under the new president. Ebrahim Raisi was elected as the new president of the Islamic Republic of Iran on June 19. The official inauguration will take place in early August. How will the relationship between Iran and Iraq …

The president-elect said Iran wants “interaction with the world” and called on US President Joe Biden to lift all sanctions. Days after his landslide victory, Iranian President-elect Ebrahim Raisi said on Monday that his new government will focus on engagement with regional neighbors. “Iran wants interaction with the world,” Raisi …

While tensions between Israel and Iran have been omnipresent in the Middle East for decades, the prospect of open military conflict between the two countries has never seemed closer than it does now. Over the past few months, the two rivals have escalated an undeclared naval war featuring unclaimed attacks …

Jean-Yves Le Drian told a French TV station there is still a long way to go to improve Turkey-France relations, mentioning Syria, Libya and the eastern Mediterranean. The French and Turkish presidents had a cordial meeting earlier this week. France’s top diplomat said there is a “verbal cease-fire” between France …

Iran’s new president, Ebrahim Raisi, represents the hardliners within the Islamic Republic. In this Q&A, Crisis Group experts Ali Vaez and Naysan Rafati explain why the U.S. should nevertheless persist in working to restore the 2015 nuclear deal to its full promise. What distinguished these elections in Iran? No Iranian …

Hard-line cleric Ebrahim Raisi has been declared the presumptive winner of Iran’s June 18 presidential vote, which was marred by the disqualification of prominent moderates that paved the way for Raisi’s path to presidency. Concerns have been raised that Raisi’s rise to power could bring more social and political restrictions …

U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Sunday downplayed the importance of the election of hardliner Ebrahim Raisi as the new Iranian president, saying that whether the United States ultimately rejoins the international pact to restrain Tehran’s nuclear program will depend on decisions made by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. …

Over the past three decades, various initiatives for regional cooperation in the South Caucasus have been proposed, including the “Peaceful Caucasus Initiative” (Eduard Shevardnadze), “Stability Pact for the Caucasus” (Suleyman Demirel, on January 16, 2000), “Caucasus Stability and Cooperation Platform” (Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, August 13, 2008), and “United Caucasus” (Mikheil …

According to the WSJ report “the Biden administration is sharply reducing the number of US antimissile systems in the Middle East in a major realignment of its military footprint there. The US is moving up to eight Patriot air defense batteries from key countries in the Middle East, according to …