America is back to playing regional cop in the Middle East Gaza

It also works to create a unique, credible, and independent platform for defense and security stakeholders from both the United States and the region to more closely interact, exchange views, and share experiences regarding various matters of national security. One exception to this praise is the chapter on Israel by David H. Goldberg, the Research Director at Dynamic Global Information Service in Toronto. The chapter is so unbalanced and one-sided that readers might regard it as pro-Israel propaganda. Goldberg maintains that Iran has a nuclear weapons program and nuclear weapons facilities, even though their existence has not been confirmed by inspection agencies such as the International Atomic Energy Agency. By contrast, he avoids discussion of Israel’s nuclear weapons stockpile, which US Defense Intelligence estimates at a minimum of 80 warheads.

Established in 2002, CMEP furthers its mission through research, convening, publications, and private exchanges. Its scholars reflect varying points of view and work to foster a productive, nuanced, and informed debate. The Israel Democracy Institute’s Peace Index runs monthly surveys on public sentiments in Israel regarding the Palestinian conflict.

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The country’s National Transformation Program (NTP) 2022 report also indicated that 97% of all government services are available digitally, with over 6,000 e-government services working across sectors. Furthermore, all Gulf states have established themselves as reliable providers of humanitarian aid and development assistance. Similar to Germany, such engagement aims to promote regional stability and could result in comprehensive efforts towards project implementation in countries of mutual interest such as Jordan or Iraq. Multilateral organisations based in the Gulf states could serve as interesting cooperation partners in terms of education, youth empowerment, and triangular cooperation.

Effects of Government Mandates and Policies on Public Education in Africa, the Caribbean, and the Middle East is Book IX of the series, Research on Education in Africa, the Caribbean, and the Middle East. The current political system in Iran was designed to allow Iranians to decide their future by themselves without being oppressed by authorities, but in practice only allows a limited democracy. One of the main problems of Iran’s system is the consolidation of too much power in the hands of the Supreme Leader who is elected by the Assembly of Experts for life (unless the Assembly of Experts decides to remove him, which has never happened). The power of the Supreme Leader under Iran’s constitution is almost unlimited and unrestricted in practice. They have been even threatened by death sentence (though all such verdict in recent years have been dropped in higher courts in recent years) and some have been assassinated by the Ministry of Intelligence and militias in the past (no such case has been reported in recent years).

Chapter 5: Republic of Tunisia

A prominent figure in this movement is Saad Eddin Ibrahim who advocates and campaigns for democracy in Egypt and the wider region, working with the Ibn Khaldun Centre for Development Studies[19] and serving on the Board of Advisors for the Project on Middle East Democracy. The decline and fall of the Ottoman Empire set the stage for nationalist movements to emerge in Southwest Asia and North Africa as the Second French Empire, the Italian Empire, and British Empire began to target and colonize the region. The century between 1820 and 1920 saw the Ottoman Empire shrink from encompassing the entirety of the Levant and Egypt, the Balkans, and significant portions of the coastal Maghreb and Arabian Peninsula, to less than half of the modern state of Turkey. During this period, nationalist movements began in reaction to both the spread of nationalism throughout Europe and to European colonial incursion prior to the Ottoman Empire’s collapse.

Wherever protests have been allowed, crowds have filled squares in solidarity with Palestine. As Israel wages genocidal war against the Palestinian people in Gaza, the United States is back to playing regional cop in the Middle East. The Biden administration has warned regional players against attacking its foremost ally and deployed not one but two aircraft carriers to back up its words. The Bush School’s Middle East Program prepares students in the Master of International Affairs and Master of International Policy degree programs for professional careers in government and the nongovernmental sector that require an in-depth knowledge of the Middle East.

He does not mention Israel’s refusal to ratify the Nuclear Weapons Non-proliferation Treaty (something Iran has done) and Israel’s opposition to turning the Middle East into a nuclear weapons free zone, a goal favored by Iran and the other Middle Eastern countries. According to the 2022 annual report of Bahrain’s Information and eGovernment Authority (iGA), online platforms were visited 1.8 million times last year, reflecting the confidence of citizens in the country’s online services. A total of 3.7 million e-requests were processed by Bahrain’s digital government portals, cutting 96% of the service costs.

• The instability and consolidation of power in turn fuels political corruption, feeding the vicious cycle of authoritarianism, corruption and conflict across the Arab world.
• Syria’s police state is institutionalized at an unparalleled scale—authorities have executed thousands of political prisoners in mass hangings since the start of their civil war.
• Other defining events in this transformation included the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the eventual departure of European powers, notably Britain and France by the end of the 1960s.
• In the current conflict between Israel and Hamas, the pendulum is swinging back in favor of the Palestinians, at least on the level of official Saudi statements.

Only a small handful of countries in the Middle East have actually held free and fair democratic elections for the country’s head of state, notably including once again Israel and Tunisia. In 2011, millions of protesters in places like Egypt, Syria, and Tunisia rose up to demand political, economic, and social reforms from their highly repressive governments, which for decades had ruled with unchecked power. This period of region-wide revolution is known as the Arab uprisings (often referred to as the 2010 Arab Spring), and it was a time of promise—a once-in-a-generation opportunity for deep, structural reform.

Browse Politics and International Relations: Middle East government, politics and policy

His research interests include democratic governance, public policy, public administration, and international development. To stop the cycle of violence and corruption, leaders across the Middle East and North Africa must reverse the trend of authoritarianism and open space for all people to participate in decision-making. State institutions must exist to combat corruption and provide support for those most in need, rather than siphoning off public resources to consolidate power for the elite few. After years of stagnation, this year’s CPI decrease must be a wake-up call to take on urgent reforms and protect fundamental rights and freedoms across the region. Across the region, lack of transparency in state security budgets allows funds to be spent without public input, and even for them to be redirected by corrupt actors.

Combining a thematic framework for examining patterns of politics with individual chapters dedicated to specific countries, the book places the very latest developments and long-standing issues within an historical context. This third edition extends its analysis to post-2015 developments in the region, as well as expanding the range of pedagogical features on offer. A number of republics embracing Arab Socialism, such as Syria and Egypt, regularly hold elections, but critics assert that these are not full multi-party systems. Climate change in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) refers to changes in the climate of the MENA region and the subsequent response, adaption and mitigation strategies of countries in the region. The impacts include increase in drought conditions, aridity, heatwaves and sea level rise. The Middle East generally has a hot, arid climate, especially in the Arabian and Egyptian regions.

Hamas and its regional supporters—namely Iran and Hezbollah—have scored a political win for themselves with the surprise attack on Israel. Hamas outshone a beleaguered and corrupt Palestinian Authority, led by the Fatah Movement, and upended an unsustainable status quo. Even though the international community will have to negotiate with Hamas over hostage releases, the organization is unlikely to be accepted as a representative of the Palestinian people in future political negotiations. Iranian officials may be reveling in the attack and seeing it as an assertion of their ability to influence regional developments and derail bilateral peace plans, but how they will capitalize on it once the dust of battle settles is uncertain. MEI’s Defense and Security program provides rigorous and multidisciplinary analysis of the current and emerging defense and security challenges and opportunities facing the United States and its regional partners.

On an EU level, Germany could engage more in the EU-GCC Clean Energy Network that was established in 2010. In addition, the European Green Deal offers opportunities to foster green energy cooperation with the Gulf states on business, political and research levels. After years of stagnation, this year’s deCPI decrease must be a wake-up call to take on urgent reforms and protect fundamental rights and freedoms across the region. And in a region with so much conflict, such budgets are significant – offering substantial gains for corrupt actors.

For some 15 years, Palestine has not been included on the CPI because it lacks at least three data sources drawn from 13 different corruption surveys and assessments required by the Index. In Palestine, significant challenges are triggered by the lack of transparency and integrity of government in both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. While the Palestinian Legislative Council is out of session, the executive has seized control of the law-making process.

Criticism of the Gulf states’ overall human rights records, and specific controversies – such as the war in Yemen and the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi – dominate, leaving little space for discourse about opportunities for productive engagement. Nevertheless, a reassessment and recalibration of Germany’s approach to the Middle East is necessary and overdue. The experience of the last decade has made it abundantly clear that https://www.metadialog.com/government/ instability in the region has direct implications for Germany. Meanwhile, regional and international players are keen to see more pro-active engagement from Berlin in the region. They hope that Germany can become a ‘more “normal” foreign policy actor at last’ that is prepared to assume an ‘anchor function’ in support of regional stability. In that sense, the reaction was very different compared to Türkiye’s actions in the recent past.

• Iran’s foreign minister’s warning of a “preemptive strike by the resistance front” against Israel and the violent escalation on the Israeli Lebanese border are transforming the threat of a regional war into a looming danger.
• The constitution was also amended through a referendum in 1989 with 97% support a few months before Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini died increasing the powers of Supreme Leader.
• Building on Timothy Mitchell’s seminal 1991 exploration of the „Limits of the State,“ this book brings together contributions on the state in the Arab world from the past and present in an edited volume.
• To endorse the addition of a country to the CPI, at least three approved sources are required to be met.
• For research on identity, youth, gender, and other social issues, these online venues provide the most plentiful information, data, or references.

It also highlights the mobilizational capacity of Islam, manifest in both efforts to suppress religious movements in the past and the contemporary rise of Islamist movements that range from peaceful service providers to extremist organizations whose violence escapes convenient explanation. Case studies of Egypt, Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia reveal that different Muslim-majority populations have settled upon divergent frameworks of expressing and protecting their creeds and institutions; such diversity is integral to understanding the texture of social life. The Arab Spring destroyed a recalcitrant dictatorship in Egypt, but the tumult that followed was unprecedented, as Egyptians voted several times in the most democratic elections in history before a military coup returned the country in July 2013 to authoritarianism.