The huge US decision about entering the Iran-Israel war feels strangely familiar. For the last fifteen years or so, my graduate level Elliott School course on the International Relations of the Middle East has included a simulation exercise built around the scenario of Israel requesting that the United States join
Vali Nasr's new book offers a guide to how Iran will likely respond to Israel's war. Israel's surprise attack on Iran has upended many long-held assumptions about regional order and security in the Middle East. Over the first four days of the war, Israel
What is it really trying to achieve... and can it succeed? Last night, Israel launched a major military strike against Iran, killing a number of its senior military commanders and taking shots at key nuclear sites. The strike came only days before the sixth round of the US-Iran nuclear talks
Plus a full new roundup from the MENA academy! Syria's new government has made significant progress in recent weeks, but still has a tough road ahead of it. On the positive side, the Trump administration appears to be following through on its commitment during the Saudi Gulf summit
A report from the launch conference of a major project challenging our field. Apologies for not posting for a while – end of the semester and final copy edits on America's Middle East have kept me busy. I am just now finishing up a short trip to New York
Plus regional order, racialization, Gulf politics, and all the new research in the MENA Academy! I've been writing a lot about regional politics this week because of Trump's visit to the Gulf. But the MENA Academy never rests. Seriously, I don't think it ever
On Monday, I published a piece in Foreign Affairs laying out all the strategic issues and context to Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar. Now that he's made his big speech in Riyadh, and has taken off for Doha, how did it all
Middle East Politics and the Academy
This week's trip to the Gulf has everyone guessing. My new article previews the issues and the stakes. Most of the optics around Donald Trump's upcoming visit to the Gulf this week has been around his search for investment and deals, and the almost unbelievably brazen
Plus, a rich new weekly roundup of scholarship on the Middle East. As regular readers know, Shibley Telhami and I have for several years been tracking the views of Middle East academic experts about threats to academic freedom, antisemitism, and other critical campus issues. Today, Bright Line Watch released its
I'm thrilled to announce the publication of POMEPS Studies 55: State and Regime Violence. Based on a POMEPS workshop jointly organized with Toby Dodge at LSE's Middle East Centre last fall, and edited and introduced by me, this collection brings together a diverse, top-notch group of
Why does nobody seems to notice anymore? For the last two months, Israel has maintained a complete blockade preventing food, medicine, and other humanitarian assistance from reaching the remnants of Gaza. Food and supplies stockpiled during the brief ceasefire have mostly run out, warns the World Food Programme, and little
Book review essays and podcasts about new publications on the Middle East are a regular feature of Abu Aardvark's MENA Academy. Two longtime areas of my research focus are Islamist movements and Arab media. Especially before the 2011 Arab uprisings, I published regularly about the transformative effects of
Welcome to The Ghost of Abu Aardvark! I decided to leave Substack because of its well-documented Nazi problem and its consistent promotion of highly objectionable authors and ideas. If you subscribed to the Substack blog, hopefully the transition to Ghost will be smooth and easy; please let me know if
And welcome to the resistance, APSA.
No. Here's why... and why that's dangerous.
Plus a special focus on recent academic work on Syria's Post-Asad transition
Why does Trump hate Tunisian olive oil and American allies?
Plus Columbia promises to airdrop pro-Israeli faculty into departments and deportations accelerate.
Plus why I'm not renewing my APSA membership or attending the 2025 conference.