The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, ending in August 2021, created favorable conditions for Russia to reassert itself as a regional hegemon in broader Central Asia. Historically, as great powers retrench from a territory, the resulting void can be filled either by rival powers or by friendly successor states responsive to …

In Western military thinking, air superiority has long been considered the key to victory. However, achieving complete dominance of the skies not only comes with excessively high costs but is also unrealistic, especially in a near-peer fight. It’s time to reconsider this assumption and focus on building an air force …

In July, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he would be open to hosting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for a visit to Turkey. Normalization will not come easily or soon, but Erdoğan’s push for rapprochement is in itself remarkable. Given the intensity of Turkey’s commitment a decade ago to overthrowing …

In-depth: There are fears that Israel’s military raids in the West Bank, the largest in decades, are fuelled by plans to annex the Palestinian territory. For more than a week, Israeli forces have raided the Palestinian cities of Jenin, Tubas, and Tulkarem in the occupied West Bank – razing infrastructure, …

For many years now, Hezbollah has served as a major instrument of Iran to take over Lebanon, not only as a territory but as a sovereign state. Many Western countries would like to avoid that and invest in the former “Pearl of the Middle East”, led by France. These efforts …

Introduction Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 put an end to European security as a cooperative project. That project was grounded in the so-called Helsinki Decalogue, a declaration within the 1975 Helsinki Final Act that laid out agreed principles of conduct between the West and the Soviet bloc.1 …

Masoud Pezeshkian, who had vowed to form a “national consensus” (vefagh melli) government, could not deliver. Even though a few ministers are from the prior government, the key positions in his administration are given to those who had served in the reformist government of Hassan Rouhani until three years ago. …

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg was arrested during pro-Palestinian protests this morning in Copenhagen. “Students Against Occupation (a pro-Palestinian activist group) and I are in the administrative building of the University of Copenhagen,” Thunberg wrote this morning in the description of a video she posted on her Instagram. “The police …

Israel has been gripped by massive protests after the bodies of six hostages, abducted during Hamas’ terrorist attack on October 7 last year, were retrieved from the Gaza Strip the day before yesterday. Protesters marched with empty coffins, symbolizing the hostages killed by Hamas. “The burden Netanyahu carries is much …

Amnesty International has stated that Israel has unlawfully destroyed agricultural land and civilian structures in the region along the eastern border of Gaza. It was emphasized that such cases of destruction should be investigated as part of accusations of war crimes. In the organization’s statement, it is mentioned that the …