Carnegie Middle East Center
- Follow Carnegie
- Search
- Global Resources
Global Centers
Languages
Coercive diplomacy—when both elements of the approach are carefully synchronized—can deliver. On the other hand, coercion without diplomacy can lead to huge blunders.
As the most powerful external actor involved in the conflict, Washington’s signals matter. Trump’s call appears to rest on a mistaken but well-trodden narrative, advanced by Haftar’s forces, his Arab backers, and his western sympathizers.
The Trump administration’s moves might be just saber-rattling, but they could easily propel the United States toward a military confrontation with Iran.
The Trump administration made the choice last May to withdraw from a flawed but still highly functional arms control agreement. A year on, it has not developed an alternative to replace it or turn back Iran’s influence in the region.
The Trump Administration’s “deal of the century” will bury the two-state solution.
Stuck in the present and with no viable perspective for positive change, Iranian citizens feel powerless.
Neither leader appears to want escalating conflict—yet that’s precisely where things seem to be headed.
It has been a rather long learning curve for New Delhi to separate presumed transcendental religious solidarity and the logic of national self-interest in engaging the Middle East.
Given that the S-400 deal with Russia could have such adverse consequences for the U.S.-Turkey bilateral relationship, the real question is how this transaction was allowed to get so close to the finish line?
The decision by the Trump administration to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a foreign terrorist organization marks another dangerous step in the relentless campaign Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Advisor John Bolton are waging to provoke a U.S.-Iranian military conflict and topple the regime in Tehran.
U.S. partners forced by proximity to rub elbows with the IRGC might worry that unavoidable contacts could make them subject to U.S. sanctions.
The United States cannot solve all of Libya’s manifold problems, but the next several weeks offer a crucial window, and decisive American diplomacy could make all the difference.
The political and socio-economic devastation left by the regime in Algeria will pose an immense challenge on the country.
By toppling the Justice and Development party in Ankara and Istanbul in Turkey’s local elections, the opposition has shown that Erdogan’s ruling party is not an invincible force.
Protests have stopped President Abdelaziz Bouteflika from seeking another term, but it won’t change the military’s domination of the political system.
Zarif’s considerable diplomatic talents, coupled with his lack of authority, have meant that history will more likely remember him as more an enabler rather than a restrainer.
It is the disdain of the regime that gives the Algerians the strength to say enough is enough.
As New Delhi prepares to host the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, India must come to terms with an unfamiliar idea—“nationalism in Arabia”.
For both the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, the new emphasis on separating religion from politics and confronting “political Islam” is not a question of defining an abstract theory of the state. It is a considered response to the grave challenges they face.
President Trump has defined his presidency in terms of the successes and failures of his predecessors, especially when it comes to wars in the Middle East.