All Policy Analysis by David Schenker

Inspired by events in Tunisia, tens of thousands of Egyptians took to the streets on January 25 in major cities from Alexandria to Cairo, the largest demonstrations to hit the country since the bread riots of the 1970s. The government, which did not initially confront demonstrators in Cairo's Tahrir Square

Today, President Zine al-Abadine Ben Ali of Tunisia stepped down after days of worsening riots and, coincidentally, one day after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton bluntly criticized Middle Eastern leaders during a speech in Qatar, where she accused them of tolerating "corrupt institutions and a stagnant political order." In Tunis

Yesterday, January 12, as Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri prepared to meet with President Obama in the Oval Office, the Hizballah-led opposition withdrew its support from the Beirut government, forcing its collapse. In the next few days, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) is widely expected to announce between two

President Obama assumed office in 2009 with an ambitious Middle East policy agenda. Atop the list of his campaign pledges, then Senator Obama vowed to pursue Israeli-Palestinian peace and re-engage in diplomacy with Tehran and Damascus. Given these grand plans, perhaps not surprisingly the first two years of the Obama

On November 22, 2010, Dina Guirguis, David Schenker, and Leslie Campbell addressed a special Policy Forum luncheon at The Washington Institute to discuss the context surrounding Egypt's parliamentary elections. Held a week after the forum, the elections were reportedly marred by irregularities. Ms. Guirguis is a Keston Family research fellow

On November 9, Jordan conducted its first-ever parliamentary elections monitored by domestic and international observers. I was one of the observers and was impressed by the transparency of the process. Indeed, notwithstanding some isolated incidents of violence, the elections themselves set a regional gold-standard for free and fair balloting. When

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu was in China this month touting the "new cooperation paradigm" between Ankara and Beijing. Just a week earlier, a top political advisor to Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao spent five days in Syria signing deals and planting olive trees in the Golan Heights. The Middle Kingdom

This week, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak brought his son Gamal to Washington to attend the kick-off of renewed Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Back in Cairo, the unprecedented family visit will no doubt reinforce the widespread belief that Mubarak is planning a hereditary succession in the Arab republic. It will also confirm

PolicyWatch 1693 is the second in a two-part series discussing U.S. military assistance to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). This piece addresses the program's future direction, while PolicyWatch 1692 examined the context of the U.S. aid program. Since 2005, Washington has obligated more than $700 million in military assistance to

PolicyWatch 1692 is the first in a two-part series discussing U.S. military assistance to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). This piece examines the context of the U.S. aid program, while PolicyWatch 1693 addresses the program's future direction. The August 3 fatal shooting of an Israel Defense Forces officer by a

Since the 1980s, the Shia terrorist group Hezbollah has not been given to blunt public moralizing about the need for women to wear the veil. It originally made no secret of its desire to convert Lebanon into a Shia Islamic state -- the organization's 1985 manifesto called for the establishment

Yesterday, Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) soldiers opened fire on an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit removing a tree near the border security fence. In the resulting fighting, a senior IDF officer, two Lebanese soldiers, and a Lebanese journalist were killed, making the clash the most intense military engagement in the