Middle East & North Africa

Host Aroop Mukharji interviews Dr. Tarek Masoud, the Sultan of Oman Professor of International Relations at the Harvard Kennedy School, about the shifting political dynamics of the Middle East, the region's potential for democratization, and a triple snack of doughnuts, coffee, and Turkish delight.

Confused messaging by the American government on Syria, with presidential tweets and dissonant statements from senior officials, has caused international whiplash in recent weeks. This hasty announcement and its botched implementation have already harmed American credibility and risk inflaming an already complex situation.

I’ve recorded a Q&A with Rami Khouri. Mainly, we talk about Saudi Arabia, the murder of Jamal Khashoggi (whom he knew), and U.S.-Saudi relations. How important is Saudi Arabia to the United States? What is the role of oil? What is the nature of the Saudi government today?

BOSTON — The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s leaks to several American news organizations this weekend that it believes with “high confidence” that Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi has triggered a series of fascinating political contests and confrontations that may profoundly impact several decision-decision-making spheres in Washington, within Saudi Arabia, and between the United States and foreign countries. We enter uncharted terrain here with potentially tumultuous results, largely because of the unprecedented, unpredictable, and mostly uninformed, uncaring, and dangerous nature of the Trump presidency and the rule of Mohammad Bin Salman.

The Middle East Initiative will be well represented at this year's Annual Meeting of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) in San Antonio, Texas November 15-18. Many current and former MEI fellows and affiliates will present research on a broad variety of topics during the conference. Below is a complete list of MEI-related participants, with links to their panels and topics.

BEIRUT — Our continued focus on resolving the facts of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month is important for four reasons that will impact the fate of the Middle East and U.S. policies there for years to come. We will know soon if the killers are held accountable or the world loses attention, succumbs to the allure of the fortunes of oil and gas, and leaves largely unchanged the current power structures of our region. Which of those routes we take will determine whether we generate a more decent, participatory, accountable, and just region, or fall into a death maelstrom of unchallenged and cruel autocracy where money and guns rule, and citizens enjoy neither rights nor humanity.

A seminar with Nermin Allam, Assistant Professor of Politics at Rutgers University - Newark, on her recent book, Women and the Egyptian Revolution: Engagement and Activism during the 2011 Arab Uprisings, (Cambridge University Press, 2017).

Moderated by Hind Ahmed Zaki, Associate at Middle East Initiative, HKS, and Harold Grinspoon Junior Research Fellow, Crown Center for Middle East Studies, Brandeis University.

NPR's All Thing Considered talked to Amanda Sloat, Fellow at the Belfer Center's Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship, about Turkey's investigation into the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Do you get angrier and angrier with every lie and cover-up on the killing of Jamal Khashoggi by the Saudi government, its Arab allies and paid foreign propagandists, and the American president? If you do, I suspect this is because Khashoggi achieved in his life and death something that nobody else in modern history has been able to achieve: Ordinary people, media figures, and politicians throughout the world now appreciate how it feels to be treated like a helpless idiot by an Arab power elite that believes it can manage its citizens with brutality and disdain, without any accountability or consequences.