Middle East & North Africa

153 Items

Afghan security personnel guard around the Green Zone,

AP/Rahmat Gul

Analysis & Opinions - Foreign Affairs

The Hearts-and-Minds Myth

| July 15, 2021

Jacqueline L. Hazelton analyzes why the United States fails at counterinsurgency in light of its withdrawal from Afghanistan. She asserts that the belief that democracy is necessary for long-term stability and can flow from the barrel of a gun is rooted in misleading accounts of past counterinsurgency campaigns, such as the Malayan Emergency and the 1948–1954 insurgency in the Philippines.

Arab Spring at 10

James A. Dawson

Analysis & Opinions - Journal of Democracy

The Arab Spring at 10: Kings or People?

| Jan. 01, 2021

Ten years after the onset of the Arab Spring, the Middle East and North Africa are torn between two visions of progress: a democratic one that seeks to replace the leaders who dominate the region, and an ostensibly modernizing one that seeks to replace the people who inhabit it. Though the latter project is currently ascendant, it is likely to founder on its own internal contradictions. Arab publics may be ambivalent about democracy, but the region retains considerable democratic potential.

Israeli Arab politician Ayman Odeh casts his vote in Haifa

AP/Ariel Schalit, File

Analysis & Opinions - Haaretz

Israel Election Results: Netanyahu Will Pull Out All the Stops — Including Military Action — to Hold on to Power

| Sep. 18, 2019

Chuck Freilich writes that Israelis voted to save their democracy. But the country may soon face a severe constitutional crisis if Netanyahu, facing political failure and criminal prosecution, adopts Nixon-style desperate measures.