Middle Orient

In 2015, the UAE passed a law against religious discrimination by creating ministries of tolerance, happiness and youth to develop an enlightened community — everyone included.

President Trump declared the “dawn of a new Middle East” as he oversaw the signing of pacts between Israel and two Arab nations, an event he hopes will pave the way for increased stability in a volatile region and cast him as a peacemaker ahead of November’s election.

It has been clear for some time that the United States should do less in the Middle East, despite the attendant risks and costs—a case that we made in these pages last year (“America’s Middle East Purgatory,” January/February 2019). At the time, some welcomed this argument; others balked at it. …

Although it has neither the desire nor the financial or military capacity to actually displace the United States in the Middle East, Russia has become adept at planting itself firmly in the middle of crises and conflicts and establishing itself as an indispensable intermediary at relatively little cost. This has …

Hezbollah should be careful what it wishes for because if the stalemate continues, then chaos could be the perfect setting for a potential Israeli strike.

On August 18, 2020, several days following the announcement of the normalization of relations between the UAE and Israel, which inter alia stated that all Muslims are permitted to visit the Al-Aqsa Mosque and to pray there,[1] the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Palestine, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, issued a fatwa …

Two Lebanese government ministers are to be sanctioned by the US over their support for the Iran-backed Shia militia group Hezbollah and accusations of corruption.

The Islamic Republic is still looking to avenge the death of Qassem Soleimani, officials said. The Iranian government is weighing an assassination attempt against the American ambassador to South Africa, U.S. intelligence reports say, according to a U.S. government official familiar with the issue and another official who has seen …

Ashraf Rifi, Lebanon’s former justice minister and one-time head of the country’s security forces, has told IranWire that the French government had worked to bring about a new government in Lebanon, measures that had included discussion with Iranian officials and Hezbollah. The talks, Rifi said, may well result in an …

“For whatever reason, they’re not that successful at hitting anyone,” Gen. Frank McKenzie says. “I don’t know how long we can count on that continuing.” More than eight months after a barrage of rockets killed an American contractor and wounded four American service members in Kirkuk, Iraq, militia groups continue …