In the flurry of activity since Paris was attacked, the reasons it happened in the first place risk being forgotten.
As President Barack Obama extends America’s military presence in Afghanistan, Australia is determining what’s next for its military role.
Dan Peled/AAP
After 14 years of continued military presence and a decision by President Obama to keep US forces in Afghanistan, what is the next step for Australia’s role in the Afghanistan war?
Islamic State is symptomatic of a disturbed and troubled social order. The vast crisis of dislocated people and communities is being expressed in anger, intolerance and perverted notions of honour.
The failure of African states to adequately address their racial, ethnic, cultural, religious and economic differences provided the fertile ground on which rebel groups now prosper.
President Barack Obama and his inner circle follow the assassination of Osama bin Laden, which made headlines worldwide but is seemingly unimportant four years on.
EPA/Pete Souza/White House handout
Memories of the killing of Osama bin Laden are fading, but the legacies of al-Qaeda and the war on terror’s many ‘own goals’ haunt us in the form of multiplying threats and lost civil liberties.
When Australians hear about Foreign Minister Julie Bishop’s dire warnings and counter-terrorism raids, they could lose historical perspective on the threat posed by Islamic State.
AAP/Mal Fairclough
Dire government warnings and counter-terrorism raids in our suburbs paint a picture of the worst threat Western nations have ever faced. A little historical perspective is in order.
When not employing the description ‘death cult’, Prime Minister Tony Abbott prefers to use the name Da'esh because the group ‘hates being referred to by this term’.
AAP/Lukas Coch
The terrorist group now calls itself Islamic State, but the many names by which it is known reflect both its own evolution and the deliberate choices others make in how they refer to it.
Smokescreen? A Saudi air strike in Sanaa.
EPA/Yahya Arhab
Saudi Arabia’s campaign in Yemen has had unclear strategic consequences and a terrible humanitarian cost. But does anyone believe it’s really over?
Under the leadership of both Ayman al-Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda has failed to reproduce an event that has shaken the international order since 9/11.
EPA
Whether you fear or welcome a challenge to the world’s existing power structure, the main focus of attention is on when China will begin to translate its increasing influence into genuine global leadership…
A Shia Houthi gunman muses on the US’s tactic of choice.
EPA/Yahya Arhab
On January 31, Harith al-Nadhari, a senior al-Qaeda figure who praised the Charlie Hebdo attackers, was killed by a US drone strike. This is the first drone strike in Yemen for a number of weeks, and it…
‘Yemen is safe’ – for how long?
Wadia Mohammed/EPA
Events in Yemen are moving fast: the US-backed president, Abd Rabbuh Manṣūr Hadi, has been deposed by Shia rebels, after a “slow coup” that saw the Iran-backed Houthi militia take effective control of…
The first thing that I noticed in the gruesome pictures of two gunmen fleeing the scene of their attack on Charlie Hebdo was that the men were dressed from head to toe in black. It might sound strange…