"Syria is the place that still captures the complexities of statehood and society challenges in the Middle East, which tend to elicit perplexities in the policies of most foreign powers. This is partly a function of political geography that goes back millennia, and is not peculiar to our time. Many regional and world armies in the past five millennia — Greece, Rome, Byzantium, Persia, Crusaders, Egypt, Parthia, Ottomans, France, Great Britain, and Islamic dynasties — have repeatedly occupied this land, fought over it, or sought to control it through local proxies."

"Aleppo today is frightening almost beyond description and comprehension. One of the world’s ancient centers of civilization is bombed, sieged, tortured, and starved to death, and hundreds of thousands of fleeing refugees do not know if they will find shelter or live another week. Even then, Aleppo is not the most frightening thing we have to understand these days in this realm of modern urban warfare."

Secretary of State John F. Kerry said in an interview that the United States is nearing a final “crunch time” on Syria — in which it will either make progress toward a cease-fire or begin moving toward “Plan B” and new military actions.

Secretary of State John F. Kerry has for years been trying to produce a diplomatic process that could not just alleviate the suffering in Syria but, in time, end the conflict there. Not long ago, he was optimistic that his efforts were bearing fruit. So much so that after the November talks in Vienna, when Russia and others agreed that negotiations should begin in January, be accompanied by a cease-fire and culminate in elections after an 18-month transition process, the secretary declared: “We're weeks away conceivably from the possibility of a big transition in Syria.”

"This week was full of omens that Syria in its already fractured and suffering condition should look forward to more misery, due to the actions of Syrians as well as foreign powers, amidst slow-moving negotiations for ceasefires and a future political transition. The most intriguing sign of things to come was the official announcement that Saudi Arabia is willing to provide ground forces to fight “Islamic State” (ISIS) in Syria, if the anti-ISIS countries that will meet in Brussels this month agree on a coordinated ground-and-air strategy."

In this Washington Post op-ed, two former U.S. ambassadors, Nicholas Burns and James Jeffrey, make the diplomatic case for America to create a safe zone in Syria. They advocate a much stronger American role to: 1) push for humanitarian corridors into Syria to help civilians under siege from the Assad government and rebel groups and some at risk of starvation; and 2) that the Administration reconsider its refusal to form a regional coalition to engineer a safe zone in northern Syria along the Turkish border where civilians can flee to safety enforced by a No Flight Zone in the same area and; 3) that we should commit American soldiers to help organize and police the zones in order to recruit the majority of the zone's soldiers from our allies and partners.

Republican and Democratic presidential candidates should be able to agree on one stark foreign policy reality: The tide hasn’t turned in the war against the Islamic State. In the 18 months that the United States has been working to “degrade and ultimately destroy” the group, it has grown to become a global force that can strike targets in Europe, Asia, Africa and America.

Let’s say Islamic State fighters attack an Israeli military patrol along the Syrian border. They try unsuccessfully to kidnap an Israeli soldier, and they kill four others. A Jordanian border post is hit, too, and the Islamic State proclaims it has control of Daraa province in southern Syria.

"How should we view and respond to the growing flow of refugees and migrants from, within, and beyond the Middle East? Is this mainly a temporary humanitarian challenge? An occasional security threat? A cultural and political concern for mostly white and Christian Europe? All of these are significant issues that need to be addressed, but perhaps the most important dimension of the growing refugees/migrants situation is what it tells us about the modern condition of the Arab world, and more specifically its critical vulnerabilities in the quality of statehood and the fragility of citizenship..."

This collective policy paper summarizes the main themes of Morocco's recent experience around migration policy. It draws upon many conversations with major stakeholders, group work, and site visits of the 16 Harvard students who participated in the winter field study course in Morocco and Italy, led by Prof. Claude Bruderlein and supported by the Middle East Initiative.