(The following is a transcript of a lecture presented at the Middle East Institute’s conference “The Middle East peace process after the Arab uprisings”.) When Jeremy Bowen, the BBC’s Middle East editor, returned to Jerusalem earlier this month, he was asked by colleagues what story he would be covering. The story seemed evident to Jeremy. …
Israel and Palestine are playing political football, with Palestinian football as the ball. It is a match which Israel is unlikely to win and that could prove to produce a bruising loss. The stakes for Israel‎ are far higher than for Palestine. Israel is effectively on probation as it seeks to definitively defeat Palestinian efforts to …
By James M. Dorsey World Cup host Qatar is discovering the reputational risk involved in hosting high-profile mega sporting events. Qatar Airways’ sponsorship of FC Barcelona is producing exactly the kind of publicity that is a corporate sponsor’s worst nightmare, while a Swiss investigation of the Qatari World Cup bid threatens to expose questionable financial …
By James M. Dorsey The Syrian civil war and Iraqi sectarian conflicts involving “Islamic State” (IS) have had far-reaching consequences for the demographics across the region. Once a relatively ethnically homogeneous autonomous region, Iraqi Kurdistan has seen its demography change radically as large numbers of Arab refugees pour into what was once an independent …
