Black-clad fighters, suffering refugees and Western warplanes overhead – these are the mainstays of Iraq and Syria coverage as the Islamic State (IS) continues its campaign. Notably absent from debates…
Lebanese troops enter the border town of Arsal to fight off ISIS.
EPA/Stringer
The Islamic State’s campaign across Northern Iraq and Syria has entered Lebanese territory for the first time. Long affected by the spillover of refugees fleeing its war torn neighbours, the brief battle…
With the Palestinian peace camp among the casualties of the bombardment of Gaza, what does Israel expect to emerge from the ruins?
AAP/Newzulu/Eloise Bollack
If we apply Karl Marx’s dictum that “history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce”, then the Gaza Strip is one of the longest-running tragicomic productions in the world today. It is not hard…
Iraq is rapidly spiralling into a humanitarian catastrophe, with the persecuted Yazidi religious minority facing genocide.
EPA/Mohammed Jalil
US president Barack Obama has confirmed that the US military made targeted airstrikes and carried out a humanitarian operation in Iraq, marking the deepest US engagement in the country since US troops…
Islamic State militants have destroyed sites of great cultural and historical significance in Iraq, such as the tomb of the prophet Jonah in Mosul.
EPA/Stringer
Iraq previously had one of the most multicultural societies in the Middle East. A broad diversity of religions, races and cultures flourished in Iraq, united by common heritage, culture and traditions…
If you’ve got something to say, just say it.
US Dept of State
Tragically, the 72-hour ceasefire brokered between the Israeli Defence Force and Hamas collapsed within two hours – just as shops in Gaza were opening and the fishing fleet setting out to sea for the first…
Was it only 20 years or so ago that Francis Fukuyama proclaimed the ‘end of history’? Fukuyama may have one of the biggest brains on the planet, but he was spectacularly wrong about the idea that Western-style…
When you hear hooves, shout camel, not bioterrorist.
Delpixel/Flickr
The Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) is a tiny, spiky package of fat, proteins and genes that was first found in a dying man in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 2012. Since then, we…
An Israeli Iron Dome missile is fired to intercept a rocket from Gaza.
EPA/Abir Sultan
The breakdown of an initial ceasefire between Israeli forces and Hamas last weekend played out to a familiar soundtrack: the wail of air-raid sirens and the menacing hiss of incoming rocket fire, followed…
Kurdish Peshmerga forces now control their long dreamt-of capital, Kirkut, but the euphoria at the prospect of independence ignores the real practical challenges of statehood.
AAP/Newzulu/Guillaume Briquet
Iraqi Kurds are in a unique position to declare independence in defiance of a seemingly powerless central government in Baghdad following the rapid disintegration of Iraq in the face of the Islamic State…
Right-wing Israelis protesting against left-wing Israelis.
EPA/Abir Sultan
One of the main features of the Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza is an explosion of emotive, poorly informed claims and counter-claims – finger-pointing attempts to excuse today’s violence by recourse to…
Jill Stuart, London School of Economics and Political Science
The United Arab Emirates has announced plans to launch a mission to Mars by 2021. A first for the Arab world, the mission and accompanying Space Agency are a big deal for the UAE – scientifically and politically…
The fresh outbreak of violence between Israel and Hamas has not emerged out of a vacuum, and may yet worsen.
EPA/Atef Safadi
The prospect of another Israeli-Gazan conflict is upon us with the beginning of Israeli ground operations in Gaza. There have been suggestions that the Israeli action will be limited to the destruction…
The world was no longer watching – at least, that was what both Israelis and Palestinians seemed to feel when I visited Jerusalem and the West Bank late last month. Yet the people on both sides of the…
Kurdish soldiers have been forced to defend parts of Iraq from jihadi fighters. What are their chances of gaining independent statehood?
AAP/Guillaume Briquet
Without the bloodshed and destruction associated with the Islamic state jihadis, one of Iraq’s constituent pieces is moving quietly towards establishing itself as a free-standing political entity. Massoud…
Watchful: Iraqi government troops at border with Jordan.
EPA/Alaa al-Shemaree
After a month of fighting in Iraq, the ISIS insurgency has made considerable progress, even if there is now something of a stalemate as Shi’a militias organise themselves and the weak Iraqi Army gets a…
The jihadi fighters in Iraq and Syria include hundreds of Australians.
EPA/Mohammed Jalil
The conflicts in Syria and Iraq are attracting many westerners, including young Australians, as jihadi fighters. Last December, Australian intelligence agencies reported that they were aware of at least…
While Peter Greste may not have personally been guilty of any wrong-doing, he is carrying the can for wrath directed at his employer, Al Jazeera.
EPA/Khaled Elfiqi
The jail sentences handed down to Australian journalist Peter Greste and his Al Jazeera English colleagues have deeply shocked supporters in the west. While spending a few years in an Egyptian prison is…
ISIS appears to be attempting to recruit fighters from Europe via social media.
Twitter
The Sunni rebels in Iraq have made further gains, taking control of important border crossings with Syria and Jordan, the Rutba truck-stop on the main road from Baghdad to the Jordan border and two towns…
Iraqi volunteers join forces to fight ISIS alongside the army.
EPA/Alaa Al-Shemaree
Saad Jawad, London School of Economics and Political Science
The fall of several Iraqi cities to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS, or Da’ish as it is known in Arabic), was a shocking turn of events – shocking, but not totally unexpected. Whatever Tony…
Senior Associate Fellow on the Middle East at RUSI; Associate Professor in Politics & International Relations; Deputy Director of the Centre on US Politics, UCL