Policy Analysis

Optimism on Biden in Iraqi Kurdistan is driven by historical ties. But contemporary political views on U.S. policy in the region may shape the Biden presidency in new, less comfortable ways.

Libya's political process will require input from all its people, including women, youth, and minorities, to ensure a government that governs the country fairly and legitimately.

For two decades and running, diplomatic efforts have noticeably omitted the regional states most directly in the line of Tehran’s fire, including Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.

A senior Treasury official explains the department's growing mission to prevent terrorists, proliferators, human rights violators, and corrupt government officials from abusing the global financial system.

The conflict continues because none of the local parties is strong enough to win, weak enough to lose, or incentivized toward peace, but the Biden administration can do something about the latter problem.

An in-depth study on how the group's outreach and proselytization activities evolved before, during, and after its jihadist state-building project in Iraq and Syria.

Iran and the “Resistance Axis” are poised for another round of “strategic patience,” which, if ignored, will serve to the detriment of the United States, its allies and partners.

Drone campaigns have greatly culled the group’s leadership, but leaders are replaceable, and the guided-attack model seen in Pensacola could be a significant force multiplier for any locally rooted affiliates who seek to strike abroad in the coming years.

In addition to publicly condemning the violent repression of demonstrations, Washington should urge its Kurdish allies to stop stalling on economic reforms at home and budget negotiations with Baghdad.

November 2020 polling reviews an Emirati public split on major foreign policy questions, from peace with Israel to the U.S. election and the rift with Qatar.

To contain corrupt actors and facilitate reform, the international community must provide alternatives to Hezbollah pharmaceutical and food programs while filling gaps that the group is unable to address.

This article originally included a polling error. The article has been updated to reflect the corrected data. Read the corrected article.

The new U.S. administration will have a brief, early window to exert leverage, but Erdogan’s asymmetric relationship with Moscow may keep him from substantially altering Turkish policy on the S-400 dispute and regional issues.

New polling data provides a window into popular Saudi views of the Abraham Accords and other foreign policy concerns facing the kingdom.

The country need not be a top foreign policy priority, but the Biden administration would be wise to invest in Iraqi security, unity, and democracy amid competition with Russia, China, and Iran.

After years of military cooperation in a conflict that has displaced millions of Syrians, the Assad regime and Russia arranged for a two-day conference that began on November 11 in Damascus, which they presented as a means to move forward on the issue of Syrian refugees and displaced persons. In

Drastically lowered revenues, changing energy markets, political squabbling, and a new U.S. administration may eventually break the cartel’s cyclical status quo.

Moscow conducts far more soft-power activity in the region than one might suspect, using subversive and opaque versions of the same tools employed by the West.

Challengers to Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are proliferating, with two breakaway parties drawing particular notice. In December 2019, Ahmet Davutoglu, who served under Erdogan as foreign minister and then prime minister, formed Gelecek (Future) in an attempt to resurrect a gentler version of the Justice and Development Party (AKP)

Tehran aims to earn hard currency for its relatively cheap military hardware, ideally boosting its leverage in Baghdad at a fraction of the cost that the United States has been spending there.