Middle East & Africa

Argument

Masters of Disasters?

The global humanitarian system is cracking under the weight of perpetual crisis. There are some 125 million people in need of humanitarian aid this year, ...

Dispatch

Freed From the Islamic State, but Far From Free

DOHUK, Iraq -- During her 19 months of captivity under the Islamic State, Nofa Mahlo, a 37-year-old Yazidi woman from Baa’j, lived each day not ...

Feature

Hiking the ‘Rat Tracks,’ Hunting for al-Shabab

GARISSA AND MANDERA, Kenya – The men who form Kenya’s first line of defense against the Somali militant group al-Shabab wear sneakers or rubber tire ...

Shadow Government

How the State Department’s Human Rights Report Treats Friends — and Adversaries

What should be made of the flare-up between Morocco and Washington over the State Department’s latest human rights report? It devotes more pages to Moroccan violations ...

Passport

Watch: Chaos Erupts In Green Zone As Protesters Breach Defenses

In a show of discontent with the Iraqi government’s loose grip on security and slow pace of reforms, protesters once again stormed Baghdad’s Green Zone, ...

The Cable

SitRep: EgyptAir Wreckage Found; NATO Debates Libya Ops

Wreckage found. After some initial confusion, Egyptian authorities announced on Friday that they had indeed found wreckage from EgyptAir Flight 804 floating in the ...

Report

Flight 804: Slipping Through the Cracks

If the Egyptian airliner was taken down in a terrorist attack, it represents a monumental security failure at France’s Charles de Gaulle Airport.

Feature

‘The Shrapnel Finds Us Wherever We Hide’

NUBA MOUNTAINS, Sudan — “They surrounded us, killed kids and women, burnt the village. We waited until nightfall, and then we escaped to the mountains,” ...

Passport

ISIS Is Training Indonesian ‘Cubs of the Caliphate’ to Kill for the Cause

The children wear camo. They practice martial arts. They fire handguns and rifles in sync, as a proud instructor looks on. They burn their Indonesian ...

Argument

The Bandits’ Banker

ABUJA, Nigeria – Last week, British Prime Minister David Cameron was caught on video describing Nigeria and Afghanistan as “fantastically corrupt” and “possibly the two ...

Passport

UAE to Women: Don’t Check Your Husbands’ Phones

The United Arab Emirates would apparently rather deport women and take their money than let them stand up to cheating husbands. An expatriate living there ...

Passport

Live Blog: EgyptAir Flight Disappears Over Mediterranean

Early Thursday, EgyptAir Flight 804 disappeared over the eastern Mediterranean Sea while en route from Paris to Cairo, raising immediate fears that the Islamic State ...

The Cable

SitRep: Chinese Fighters Intercept U.S. Spy Plane; House hits Trump

Unsafe at any speed. On Tuesday, two Chinese J-11 jet fighters intercepted an American surveillance plane flying over international waters in the South China ...

Car bomb attack at marketplace in Baghdad

The Cable

U.S. Worried ISIS Playing a New Game in Baghdad

American commanders are growing concerned that a recent spate of deadly bombings in Baghdad will cause the Iraqi government to lose focus on an upcoming ...

Voice

Mercenaries Are the Silent Majority of Obama’s Military

Last weekend, the New York Times published one of what will be many takes on President Barack Obama's legacy as commander in chief. Retroactively shoehorning ...

Passport

5 Things You Need to Know About Israel’s New Putin-Loving Defense Minister

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu just fired a well-regarded defense minister known for his close ties to Washington and replaced him with one known for ...

Passport

The Perilous Work of Clearing Bombs Left by ISIS

Even in retreat from advancing Iraqi forces, who have retaken nearly half the territory seized by terrorists, the Islamic State still leaves a deadly legacy: ...

The Cable

SitRep: White House Threatens Veto of Defense Bill

We’ll throw down. There’s a fight brewing over the 2017 Defense Department budget, and right in the middle of the scrum is how to ...

Voice

The Donald vs. the Blob

Barring a bizarre and unforeseen turn of events, next November American voters will have to choose Hillary Rodham Clinton or Donald Trump to be the ...

Passport

Watch: New Footage Shows Kenyan Police Beating Political Protesters

Kenyans don’t go to the polls for a national election until next year. Opposition protesters are already taking to the streets, however, and so are ...

Shadow Government

For Middle East Peace, Look to Israel’s Arab Partners

Speculation is rife that President Barack Obama will make one final stab at putting his mark on the Middle East peace process before he leaves office. ...

Dispatch

A Hundred Tiny Hezbollahs

SAYYIDA ZAYNAB, Syria — This southern Damascus suburb is awash with death. Every day brings news of a fresh martyr. No sooner do I exit ...

Argument

Don’t Blame Sykes-Picot for the Middle East’s Mess

Sometime in the 100 years since the Sykes-Picot agreement was signed, invoking its “end” became a thing among commentators, journalists, and analysts of the Middle ...

The Cable

U.S. Navy Officer Sacked Over Iran Incident

The U.S. Navy said Thursday that an officer overseeing two boats that mistakenly veered into Iranian waters in January has been relieved of command over ...

Dispatch

Iran Has More Volunteers for the Syrian War Than It Knows What to Do With

TEHRAN — When 59-year-old Asghar Abyari learned that his son Abbas would soon head off to war in Syria in late December 2015, he was ...

Passport

Hajj Closed to Iranians After Year of Discord

Last year, almost 75,000 Iranians went on the hajj — the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, a requirement of Islam, that many scrimp and save for ...

Operation to retake Mosul from Daesh begins

The Cable

SitRep: Can Iraq Keep it Together?; Ben Rhodes Making it Happen

How long can Iraq keep it together? Continued ethnic rivalry, a grinding war with the Islamic State, low oil prices pulling the economy down, ...

Passport

Now Who’s Being Rude? British Leaders Snub the Countries They Once Ruled

The British Empire may have unraveled decades ago, but that apparently hasn’t stopped the queen and her current prime minister from still thinking themselves better ...

Iraqi Kurdish Forces Launch Offensive Against ISIS Near Kirkuk

The Cable

Oil Politics: Iraqi Kurdish Official Calls for Country’s Split

Just hours after the Islamic State hit multiple sites in Shiite neighborhoods across Baghdad, killing over 90 civilians, the governor of Kirkuk province in the ...

The Cable

Saudi Arabia Vows to Retake Sanaa if Peace Talks Fail

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly said the only way to resolve the year-long civil war in Yemen is through a negotiated political solution. But a Saudi ...

Passport

Bombs Rip Through Baghdad in Grim Reminder of Islamic State’s Might

Iraqi and American officials have for weeks touted successes in pushing back the Islamic State from nearly half of the territory it controls in Iraq. ...

Argument

In the Event of the Islamic State’s Untimely Demise…

The power of the Islamic State is waning. With its loss of Ramadi and Palmyra over the past several months, and the steady advance of ...

The Cable

SitRep: U.S. Tanks in Putin’s Backyard; Stealth Planes to South China Sea

Tanks on the Black Sea. For the first time ever, the U.S. Army has sent Abrams tanks to take part in an exercise in ...

The Cable

No Death Penalty For Alleged Benghazi Ringleader

The United States will not pursue the death penalty against Ahmed Abu Khattala, the man charged in connection with the September 2012 attacks on a ...

Podcast

Examining Sy-raq

[protected-iframe id="e6938f9bf92d6caed824118d3fadecb8-71129472-95483623" info="https://player.megaphone.fm/PNP6275415394" width="100%" height="200" scrolling="no"] David Rothkopf, Lara Jakes, Hisham Melhem, and Kori Schake come together for this week’s prognosis for what may be ...

Shadow Government

Saudi Arabia Begins to Imagine Life Without Oil

Saudi Arabia appears to be making plans for life beyond oil. Following hints from Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the country on April 25 released its "Vision ...

The Cable

White House Spin Doctor Tries to Unspin Situation He Spun Himself Into

Things are getting meta for White House Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes. In a profile published last week in the New ...

Dispatch

The Other Reason Africa’s Elephants Are Dying

NEAR AMBOSELI NATIONAL PARK, Kenya — When he was a young Maasai warrior in the 1980s, Noah Nakutit killed elephants and a lion to prove ...

The Cable

SitRep: Outside the Wire, Fighting ISIS

On the ground. Are American forces in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan? Firefights, special operations raids, bombing runs, artillery strikes, and casualties attest to ...

Argument

Mozambique’s Invisible Civil War

On April 28, local and Portuguese news outlets reported the discovery of a mass grave in central Mozambique containing some 120 bodies. A hasty inspection ...

Dispatch

Muqtada al-Sadr’s Revolution

Muqtada al-Sadr has long served as the spark in a volatile Iraq. When the Shiite cleric ordered his followers to fight U.S. forces in 2004, ...

Report

Iran’s Hollow Threats to Close the Strait of Hormuz

This week, Iran has escalated a war of words over American access to the Persian Gulf and threatened to close the vital waterway to U.S. ...

Passport

Watch: Putin’s Conductor of Propaganda Plays a Show in Palmyra

Russia wants the world to know that its robust military role in Syria is reintroducing beauty to the war-torn country. In the ancient city of ...

Passport

How the World’s Hardest-Working Dictator Won Re-election

In 1979, Francisco Macías Nguema was enjoying his 11th year in power as president for life in Equatorial Guinea -- a tiny, former Spanish colony ...

Passport

Turkey’s Prime Minister Resigns Over Muted Differences With Erdogan

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s quest to consolidate power has claimed one of his closest and highest-profile allies: Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu. In his resignation ...

US hands over 4 light attack aircraft to Afghan MoD

The Cable

SitRep: Exclusive: Joint Chiefs Chairman on Afghanistan’s Aviation ‘Gap’

Quiet in Aleppo. It’s hard to say how long it will last, or if it may be a first a step toward eventually ending ...

Argument

Al Qaeda Is About to Establish an Emirate in Northern Syria

Al Qaeda has big ambitions in Syria. For the past three years, an unprecedented number of veteran figures belonging to the group have arrived in ...

The Cable

After Weeks of Bloodletting, U.S. Reaches Deal on Cease-fire in Aleppo

After some of the most intense fighting between Syrian government forces and rebels in months, the United States announced a new cessation of hostilities agreement ...

Dispatch

Foiled Kenya Anthrax Plot Hints At Islamic State’s Scramble For Africa

NAIROBI — Kenyan authorities claim to have foiled a “large-scale” biological terrorist plot by militants linked to the Islamic State (IS), raising fears that the ...

The Cable

Intense Firefight, Hasty Rescue Effort, and the Death of a Navy SEAL in Iraq

The battle started just after dawn with a bulldozer, then a truck bomb. And it ended with a U.S. Navy SEAL dying at a Kurdish ...

Passport

Tom and Jerry, Terrorists of the Cartoon World

If a well-loved children’s cartoon were to ever epitomize the Islamic State’s boundless appetite for violence, it would be Tom and Jerry. In nearly every ...

Feature

Decoder: North Korea’s Maritime Industry

On Feb. 28, the cargo freighter Jin Teng, flying the flag of Sierra Leone, arrived in the Philippines. It was using what’s known as a “flag ...

The Cable

SitRep: Pentagon Eyeing Eastern Europe, Trump Says Generals Won’t be Allowed to Talk

More of everything in Eastern Europe. The Defense Department has already outlined plans to send a third U.S. Army brigade to Eastern Europe to ...

Report

MSF Blasts U.S., Russia, Syria, and Saudi for Hospital Strikes

In a stinging rebuke, the president of French medical relief agency Medecins Sans Frontieres on Tuesday accused several governments, including the United States, Russia, Saudi ...

Feature

The Blood Rubies of Montepuez

Some 40 percent of the world’s rubies lie in one mining concession in Mozambique, where a troubling pattern of violence and death contradicts the claim of “responsibly sourced.”

Feature

Daesh and Cultural Alzheimer’s

"Daesh is engaged in a destructive frenzy. Through decapitations and massacres, it annihilates people who don’t embrace its vision of Islam. It also sacks antiquities: ...

Passport

Watch: Turkey’s Parliament Erupts into Another Fistfight

These days, Turkish parliamentarians are fighting their legislative battles with fists rather than words. On Monday night, for the second time over the last week, ...

Voice

Art Is a Window to the Arab World’s Soul

The Egyptian soldiers looked incongruous, armed yet peaceful. The layering of an amateur shot of a Cairo street in upheaval over a traditional Japanese screen ...

The Cable

SitRep: American Killed in Iraq, as Aircraft Carrier Pounds ISIS

Combat. A U.S. servicemember was killed in northern Iraq Tuesday morning, Defense Secretary Ash Carter told reporters while traveling in Stuttgart, Germany. "It is ...

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