August 30, 2018
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Alastair Sloan A key UN body has ruled that genocide was committed recently by the Burmese military. The atrocities, widely reported at the time, were against the Rohingya people, an ethnic...
August 25, 2018
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Alastair Sloan It is sometimes hard to see why the war in Syria gets so much coverage in Britain, while the war in Yemen is all but ignored; it feels like...
Step on to any plane heading to Riyadh tomorrow and you will rub shoulders with returning Saudi families, pilgrims, oilmen and a new swell of eager Western consultants, clutching...
August 9, 2018
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Alastair Sloan The Canada-Saudi spat looks set to accelerate as the Kingdom’s central bank ordered its fund managers to withdraw hundreds of millions of dollars in equities, bonds and cash from...
July 31, 2018
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Alastair Sloan The impact of the anti-Qatar embargo continues to have strange consequences beyond the Gulf. Somalia is increasingly compromised by its schizophrenic approach to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE...
July 18, 2018
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Alastair Sloan As the world focuses on Vladimir Putin’s attempts to break up the EU and NATO, overlooking how he has already done the same with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)...
Published in:
Article,
EU,
Europe & Russia,
GCC,
International Organisations,
Middle East,
NATO,
Opinion,
Qatar,
Russia,
Saudi Arabia July 11, 2018
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Alastair Sloan The start of July has been a day-by-day microcosm of the struggles of Bahraini activists against one of the most repressive regimes in the world. Only thanks to the...
July 2, 2018
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Alastair Sloan The connection between Europe’s reticence about taking-in refugees and the dramatic rise in Islamophobia since the early 2000s cannot be decoupled. Were these refugees not largely from Muslim backgrounds,...
June 26, 2018
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Alastair Sloan The United Arab Emirates has succeeded in one of the most brilliant reputation-laundering operations of modern times. Nearly all of the outrage mustered by Western liberals, leftists and hard-working...
June 18, 2018
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Alastair Sloan As Islamophobia rises across Europe, one Muslim world leader seems to be totally indifferent to the phenomenon. The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Shaikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, is...
June 6, 2018
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Alastair Sloan When a Polish MP first announced that mysterious planes were landing in the night in a forest, eyebrows were raised, eyeballs swung upwards, and some MPs even broke out...
May 19, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Has Iran reached its peak? It increasingly feels that way. Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, through the war in Syria since 2012, and with the lifting of sanctions...
May 14, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and Donald Trump are the American triumvirate who have just passed judgement on the survival of the Iran nuclear deal. There could not be three...
May 1, 2018
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Alastair Sloan When he first came to power the world leader Vladimir Putin most admired was Tony Blair. This fact is little known, rarely acknowledged, and frankly scary. In fact, Blair...
April 19, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan As Iraqi regular and irregular forces gathered on the edges of Mosul in spring 2016, flanked by Kurds and assisted quietly by Special Forces from several Western countries, Donald...
April 10, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Ignore the theological failings of Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi for a moment, and the enormous degree of violence and bigotry that his group practiced. It is time to give the...
Published in:
Afghanistan,
Africa,
Article,
Asia & Americas,
Iraq,
Mali,
Middle East,
Opinion,
Pakistan,
Saudi Arabia,
Syria,
UAE,
Yemen April 2, 2018
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Alastair Sloan In April 2016, a UN official wrote to the British government expressing the international organisation’s thanks for hosting Maina Kiai. The former Kenyan human rights activist was the special...
March 29, 2018
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Alastair Sloan As the church bells rang in the New Year of 2018, Norway announced that it would be cutting arms sales to any country fighting in Yemen. A couple of...
March 15, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan The appointment of Mike Pompeo as the new US Secretary of State by Donald Trump will not signal a change in Washington’s Middle East policy. It doesn’t mean that...
Published in:
Africa,
Article,
Asia & Americas,
Egypt,
International Organisations,
Israel,
Jordan,
Middle East,
Opinion,
Palestine,
Saudi Arabia,
UN,
US March 9, 2018
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Alastair Sloan It was a tale of two protests. The first was on Monday, when pro-democracy demonstrators braved a blizzard outside the Bahrain Embassy in London to salute the arrest and...
March 1, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Eighty per cent of Iraq’s immediate humanitarian needs have been met by Iraqis themselves, as they seek to rebuild vast swathes of the country post-Daesh. The push for the...
February 20, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Benjamin Netanyahu is at it again, waving props around to prove that Israel is under threat from Iran. This time it was the wreckage of an Iranian drone, wafted...
February 14, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan Exactly a hundred years ago, a famine which had been growing slowly across Iran suddenly hit the whole country. The disaster would go on to claim anywhere between a...
January 30, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan As a new row erupts over a proposed law in Poland criminalising use of the term “Polish death camps,” the Israeli Prime Minister has naturally weighed in. Netanyahu has...
January 29, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi was briefly famed last week when it became known that he attended the now-infamous men-only charity dinner for some of the country’s wealthiest CEOs, with...
January 26, 2018
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Alastair Sloan Walk along any High Street in Britain and ask passers-by who causes more civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria, the West or Russia, and you will almost certainly hear...
January 15, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan It too often falls between the cracks of the Palestine debate that the land squabbles in the holy land are not a two-way religious dilemma. As Patriarch Theophilos III...
January 2, 2018
|
Alastair Sloan This year will see the last of the centenary commemorations of World War One. Remarkably few of such events held since 2014 have considered the war in its “World”...
December 27, 2017
|
Alastair Sloan Only a few weeks ago, Benjamin Netanyahu had it all. He had done the impossible and been able to announce that the Gulf States were on Israel’s side. What...
December 19, 2017
|
Alastair Sloan In an op-ed for a special annual edition of The Economist, Benjamin Netanyahu calls his country “Innovation Nation”. The Israeli Prime Minister writes that “people everywhere benefit from Israeli innovations...
December 15, 2017
|
Alastair Sloan Rumours abound that the Royal College of Art, perhaps the most prestigious art school in Britain, is contemplating the opening of a branch in Dubai. Speculation centres on a...
December 1, 2017
|
Alastair Sloan A new report from the British Israel Communications and Research Centre (BICOM) presents itself as an “independent” critique of Jeremy Corbyn’s foreign policy in the Middle East. The eleven-page...
![Rohingya Muslims who fled from the ongoing military operations in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, line up for food aid at a refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh on September 20, 2017 [Safvan Allahverdi / Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/20170920_2_25840842_26043666.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
A key UN body has ruled that genocide was committed recently by the Burmese military. The atrocities, widely reported at the time, were against the Rohingya people, an ethnic...![Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud (2nd R) in Washington, United States on 23 March 2018 [Bandar Algaloud/Saudi Kingdom Council/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Crown-Prince-of-Saudi-Arabia-Mohammad-Bin-Salman-in-Washington20180323_2_29404989_31966489.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
It is sometimes hard to see why the war in Syria gets so much coverage in Britain, while the war in Yemen is all but ignored; it feels like...
Step on to any plane heading to Riyadh tomorrow and you will rub shoulders with returning Saudi families, pilgrims, oilmen and a new swell of eager Western consultants, clutching...
The Canada-Saudi spat looks set to accelerate as the Kingdom’s central bank ordered its fund managers to withdraw hundreds of millions of dollars in equities, bonds and cash from...
The impact of the anti-Qatar embargo continues to have strange consequences beyond the Gulf. Somalia is increasingly compromised by its schizophrenic approach to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE...![President of Russia Vladimir Putin in Qingdao, China on 9 June 2018 [Iranian Presidency/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/20180609_2_30818794_34515759.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
As the world focuses on Vladimir Putin’s attempts to break up the EU and NATO, overlooking how he has already done the same with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)...![bahrain-flag [file photo]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i2.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/images/article_images/flags/bahrain-flag.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
The start of July has been a day-by-day microcosm of the struggles of Bahraini activists against one of the most repressive regimes in the world. Only thanks to the...![Image of Syrian refugees at a refugee camp in Turkey [Abdulghani Arian/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/20161101_2_19892824_15613911-1.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
The connection between Europe’s reticence about taking-in refugees and the dramatic rise in Islamophobia since the early 2000s cannot be decoupled. Were these refugees not largely from Muslim backgrounds,...
The United Arab Emirates has succeeded in one of the most brilliant reputation-laundering operations of modern times. Nearly all of the outrage mustered by Western liberals, leftists and hard-working...![The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Shaikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahya seen with President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, during the former's trip on Serbia on June 21, 2017 [Screengrab / indeksonline.rs]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Tan2017-6-21_202528191_0-e1529319461559.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
As Islamophobia rises across Europe, one Muslim world leader seems to be totally indifferent to the phenomenon. The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Shaikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, is...
When a Polish MP first announced that mysterious planes were landing in the night in a forest, eyebrows were raised, eyeballs swung upwards, and some MPs even broke out...![Iranian President Hassan Rouhani attends the extraordinary meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) at the Lutfi Kirdar International Convention and Exhibition Center in Istanbul, Turkey on 13 December, 2017 [Emrah Yorulmaz/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2017_12-13-Extraordinary-Summit-of-the-OIC20171213_2_27493105_28815116.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Has Iran reached its peak? It increasingly feels that way. Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, through the war in Syria since 2012, and with the lifting of sanctions...
Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and Donald Trump are the American triumvirate who have just passed judgement on the survival of the Iran nuclear deal. There could not be three...
When he first came to power the world leader Vladimir Putin most admired was Tony Blair. This fact is little known, rarely acknowledged, and frankly scary. In fact, Blair...![Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) and US President Donald Trump (R) in Hamburg, Germany, on 7 July 2017 [Russian Presidential Press and Information Office/Anadolu Agency ]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i2.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/20170707_2_24611342_23837905.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
As Iraqi regular and irregular forces gathered on the edges of Mosul in spring 2016, flanked by Kurds and assisted quietly by Special Forces from several Western countries, Donald...![Daesh militants wave their flag [REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/2016-09-28_ISIS-Daesh-fighter-waves-flag-from-car.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Ignore the theological failings of Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi for a moment, and the enormous degree of violence and bigotry that his group practiced. It is time to give the...![British armed police patrol streets around the Manchester Arena stadium in Manchester, United Kingdom on 23 May, 2017 [Lindsey Parnaby/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i2.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20170523_2_23840258_22433586.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
In April 2016, a UN official wrote to the British government expressing the international organisation’s thanks for hosting Maina Kiai. The former Kenyan human rights activist was the special...![People search for survivors after air strikes were carried by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen on 23 August 2017 [Mohammed Hamoud/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20170823_2_25390514_25188687.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
As the church bells rang in the New Year of 2018, Norway announced that it would be cutting arms sales to any country fighting in Yemen. A couple of...![Mike Pompeo US Secretary of State [Wikipedia]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/sksss.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
The appointment of Mike Pompeo as the new US Secretary of State by Donald Trump will not signal a change in Washington’s Middle East policy. It doesn’t mean that...![British Prime Minister Theresa May (L) greets The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammad bin Salman al-Saud (R) on the steps of No.10 Downing Street, as he arrives for a meeting in London, United Kingdom on 7 March, 2018 [Kate Green/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307_MBS_Theresa-May-11.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
It was a tale of two protests. The first was on Monday, when pro-democracy demonstrators braved a blizzard outside the Bahrain Embassy in London to salute the arrest and...![Displaced children, who fled from Daesh violence, are seen at Debaga Camp in the Makhmour area near Mosul, Iraq [Reuters/Azad Lashkari /File Photo]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/20160830_Iraqi-children-refugees-who-escaped-Daesh-at-Debaga-refugee-camp-Mosul-Iraq.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Eighty per cent of Iraq’s immediate humanitarian needs have been met by Iraqis themselves, as they seek to rebuild vast swathes of the country post-Daesh. The push for the...![Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu holds up a piece of wreckage he claims is from an Iranian drone that was shot down by Israel on February 10, at the 54th Munich Security Conference (MSC) in Germany on 18 February, 2018 [Andreas Gerbert/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/netanyahu-at-munich-conference-2018-e1519139153174.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Benjamin Netanyahu is at it again, waving props around to prove that Israel is under threat from Iran. This time it was the wreckage of an Iranian drone, wafted...![View of the UK parliament and the River Thames on 23 March 2017 [Ray Tang/Anadolu Agency]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/20170322_2_22568718_20171717.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Exactly a hundred years ago, a famine which had been growing slowly across Iran suddenly hit the whole country. The disaster would go on to claim anywhere between a...
As a new row erupts over a proposed law in Poland criminalising use of the term “Polish death camps,” the Israeli Prime Minister has naturally weighed in. Netanyahu has...
Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi was briefly famed last week when it became known that he attended the now-infamous men-only charity dinner for some of the country’s wealthiest CEOs, with...
Walk along any High Street in Britain and ask passers-by who causes more civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria, the West or Russia, and you will almost certainly hear...![Image of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem Theophilos III is seen inside the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, West Bank on 6 January 2017 [Wisam Hashlamoun/Apaimages]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/2-17_1_6-The-Greek-Orthodox-Patriarch-of-Jerusalem-Theophilos-III-060117_WIH_00-1.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
It too often falls between the cracks of the Palestine debate that the land squabbles in the holy land are not a two-way religious dilemma. As Patriarch Theophilos III...
This year will see the last of the centenary commemorations of World War One. Remarkably few of such events held since 2014 have considered the war in its “World”...![Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu (L) speaks during US President Donald Trump's (R) visit to Israel Museum in Jerusalem on 23 May 2017. [Israeli Government Press Office/Haim Zach/Handout]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20170523_Trump_Netanyahu-1.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
Only a few weeks ago, Benjamin Netanyahu had it all. He had done the impossible and been able to announce that the Gulf States were on Israel’s side. What...![A driver can be seen using Israeli made technology Waze [Kārlis Dambrāns/Flickr]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2013_4-25-Sony-RX1-waze8680434590_ca9054d76e_o.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
In an op-ed for a special annual edition of The Economist, Benjamin Netanyahu calls his country “Innovation Nation”. The Israeli Prime Minister writes that “people everywhere benefit from Israeli innovations...
Rumours abound that the Royal College of Art, perhaps the most prestigious art school in Britain, is contemplating the opening of a branch in Dubai. Speculation centres on a...![Image of Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn [file photo]](https://web-archive.nli.org.il/National_Library/im_/https://i1.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/jeremy-corbyn-1.jpg?resize=500%2C333&quality=75&strip=all&ssl=1)
A new report from the British Israel Communications and Research Centre (BICOM) presents itself as an “independent” critique of Jeremy Corbyn’s foreign policy in the Middle East. The eleven-page...