Known Unknowns and Unknown Unknowns: The US-Israeli War on Iran
Modern wars are fought not only with weapons but with assumptions—and the most dangerous assumptions are often invisible to those making them. Donald Rumsfeld’s...
Iran and the Limits of Maximum Pressure
As the third and seemingly decisive round of talks in Geneva concluded, the Trump administration had avoided diplomatic deadlock — but only by narrowing...
Syrian Refugee Return: A Defining Moment
Freedom’s arrival in Syria remains deeply fragile. Even as the country’s new rulers gain diplomatic recognition, goodwill, and early relief from Western sanctions, Syria...
When Conflict No Longer Moves Oil
Despite escalating conflicts, sanctions, and strategic rivalry across key producing regions, the global oil market increasingly behaves less like a system gripped by scarcity...
Starving the Russian War Machine?
The U.S. Department of the Treasury framed the October sanctions against Russian energy firms as an effort to “starve Putin’s war machine.” Running in...
Iran’s Energy Crisis and Tehran’s Strategic Turn to Russia and China
Following a summer of widespread blackouts and record heat, and in the wake of June military strikes by Israel and the U.S. on its...
Morocco’s Economic Rise—and Its Stubborn Contradictions
Morocco’s recent wave of youth-led protests over unemployment and inequality has laid bare the contradictions behind the Kingdom’s modernization success. It has built world-class...
Israel’s Strike in Doha: A Stress Test for Gulf Mediation and U.S. Security Commitments
On September 9, 2025, Israel staged a lethal airstrike in the heart of Qatar’s capital, Doha, targeting Hamas political leaders housed in a busy...
Between Fragility and Reset: The Future of Iran–Pakistan Relations
Iran and Pakistan have long occupied an uneasy space in one another’s strategic calculus, linked by geography yet divided by history, ideology, and external...
China’s Gulf Strategy Tested by the Israel-Iran Conflict
Since becoming a net oil importer in 1993, China has deepened its ties with the Gulf, transforming the region from a peripheral energy supplier...