THE death of Iran’s Princess Ashraf in Dubai turned the focus on a defining cultural metaphor of our times — an unequal contest between waning riparian civilisations of which she was a part, and a noxious upstart culture that came with the advent of desalinated water, in which she perished. Read Here – Dawn
Gulf Arab states rallied dutifully behind Saudi Arabia when it cut relations with Iran, recalling their ambassadors and cancelling flights to Tehran in solidarity with the oil-rich kingdom after its embassy in Iran was torched by protesters. But all apart from Bahrain stopped short of severing ties… Read Here – Zawya
When Mohammed bin Salman was just 12 he began sitting in on meetings led by his father Salman, the then governor of Saudi Arabia’s Riyadh Province. Some 17 years later, at 29 and already the world’s youngest defence minister, he plunged his country into a brutal war in Yemen with no end in sight. Read […]
What the map shows is that, due to a peculiar correlation of religious history and anaerobic decomposition of plankton, almost all the Persian Gulf’s fossil fuels are located underneath Shiites. This is true even in Sunni Saudi Arabia, where the major oil fields are in the Eastern Province, which has a majority Shiite population. Read […]
Rising tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran have put Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) on the spot again, providing a fresh example of how its Islamist/Sunni-driven “strategic plans” for the Middle East can be undermined by unforeseen developments. Read Here – Al Monitor
As the cold war between Iran and Saudi Arabia heats up, the Barack Obama administration is trying to straddle the fence and not take sides, but its actions tell a different story — they all seem to favor Tehran. Read Here – Bloomberg
The rule of thumb in the Middle East is that diplomacy often—too often—makes progress only to be overtaken by unforeseen violence on the ground. It’s happening again. Tensions between the Islamic world’s rival powers—the Sunni monarchy of Saudi Arabia and the Shiite theocracy in Iran—that erupted over the New Year’s weekend now jeopardize a string […]
Make no mistake: The rulers of the Saudi Kingdom bear responsibility for Nimr’s arrest, his conviction on trumped up terrorism charges, and now his execution. Nimr’s death pours gasoline on the smoldering discord in the region and risks a conflagration that could transform Saudi Arabia’s oil-rich Eastern Province into a quagmire such as that which Saudi […]
Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran and Shi’ite Muslim Iran’s top leader predicted “divine vengeance” for Saudi Arabia’s execution of a prominent Shi’ite cleric. Read Here – Reuters Who was Amir Baqir al-Nimr?
When Secretary of State John Kerry convenes Syria peace talks in New York on Friday, the fate of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad will be a main topic of debate. But despite widespread agreement that Assad has committed shocking war crimes—and a new report chronicling the atrocities—U.S. officials say the question of bringing Assad to justice […]
looking beyond borders 