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On January 8, Bahrain’s high criminal court of appeal upheld the death sentences of Mohammed Ramadan and Hussain Ali Moosa. The two were convicted in December 2014 in the killing of a police officer using confessions secured under torture. The UK Minister of State for the Middle East Andrew...
The assassination of the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, Major General Qassem Soleimani, by the United States on January 3, along with his right-hand man in Iraq, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a surprising move for many. Soleimani’s assassination increased pressure on President Donald Trump in...
On December 22, 2019, the Independent High Commission for Human Rights of Iraq announced the assassination of 26 activists who participated in anti-government demonstrations that began on October 1. Half of the assassinations took place in the capital, Baghdad, and the rest in the...
History is constructed out of symbolic moments. As the year 2020 and a new decade begin, US President Donald Trump has provided the iconic gesture destined to ensure that future memories of both the year and the decade will be focused on his towering personality. How Will Iran Respond to...
A recent article on the BBC using data from the Arab Barometer survey asked the question, “Could Morocco see the next uprising after Sudan and Algeria?” While it was selective in its choice of data points, for example, attitudes toward religion, the point of the article, which echoes...
In the frenzy and fury of yet another UK election that whirls and swirls around Brexit, our politicians are dancing in a conga line of counter-accusations, misinformation and outright lies. Savvy political pundits and sage pollsters assess and debate the direction of travel of the conga line. And...
According to the latest findings of the Arab Barometer, which surveyed approximately 2,400 Moroccans in face-to-face interviews in the fall of 2018, attitudes are largely split along generational lines. While the older generation (50+) still has confidence in the country’s institutions,...
Thanks to the gruesome murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, everyone who may have previously been indifferent to the brutally repressive nature of the Saudi regime should have no illusions about its absolute commitment to repression. Before the Khashoggi assassination, readers...
On November 18, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the US would no longer view Israeli settlements in the West Bank as illegal. The decision breaks with a 1978 State Department finding that settlements were “inconsistent with international law.” The new policy is also...
The wave of unrest that has swept through Iraq has gone from protest to violence, creating tension in the region. The demonstrations, which were initially motivated by discontent over the country’s economic stagnation and rampant government corruption, quickly devolved into chaos....
As the Arab Spring morphed into a bloody civil war in Syria in 2011, there was an opportunity for the country’s Kurdish movement to establish, develop and consolidate an autonomous administration. Kurds in Syria have been under long-time oppression by the government of both Hafez al-Assad and...
