Dilbar Ali Ravu, 10, is kissed by his aunt, Dalal Ravu, as Yazidi children are reunited with their families in Iraq after five years of captivity with the Islamic State group, March 2, 2019.
AP Photo/Philip Issa, File
Interviews with the Yazidi survivors of IS attacks that killed 3,100 people in 2014 reveal the emotional, cultural and spiritual scars of religious persecution.
Protests in Sahel al-Nour in Tripoli, Lebanon.
Photo courtersy of Omar El Imadi
Site of some of the most iconic images from the ongoing protests, Lebanon’s second largest city, Tripoli is a place of contrasts and extremes.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan shake hands during a joint press conference following their talks in the Black sea resort of Sochi on October 22, 2019.
Sergei CHIRIKOV / POOL / AFP
The EU’s rhetoric after Turkey’s military incursion in Syria has not been backed by concrete action or a persuasive engagement with Erdogan’s government.
Lebanese protesters formed a 105-mile human chain connecting geographically and religiously diverse cities across the country, Oct. 27. 2019.
AP Photo/Bilal Hussein
Lebanon’s 1989 peace deal ended a civil war by sharing political power between religious factions. That created a society profoundly divided by religion – something today’s protesters hope to change.
Iraq’s 2005 constitution created a flawed political system built on sectarianism.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces at al-Omar oil field in Deir Al Zor, Syria, at the announcement that they had ended the Islamic State’s control of land in eastern Syria, March 23, 2019.
Reuters/Rodi Said
Kurdish women have fought on the front lines of military battles since the 19th century. A scholar explains the origins of Kurdistan’s relative gender equality in a mostly conservative Muslim region.
Kurdish fighters in Syria say the U.S. is abandoning its allies and potentially empowering the Islamic State by withdrawing from northeastern Syria and allowing a Turkish assault, Oct. 7, 2019.
AP Photo
Since defending northern Syria from the Islamic State, Kurdish people have established an egalitarian society where women are equal, democracy is direct and religious freedom is guaranteed.
A fighter from the Syrian Democratic Forces in Baghuz, Syria in March 2019.
Ahmed Mardnli/EPA
Why the US decision to withdraw troops from northern Syria is so dangerous.
Turkish and US troops on patrol in northern Syria. President Donald Trump has announced he plans to withdraw US troops from the region, paving the way for great destabilisation.
AAP/EPA/Sedat Suna
National security isn’t just about warding off physical attacks. It’s also about understanding cultural forces that drive a society to think, feel and act in certain ways, a political scientist says.
In the city of Beersheva, election banners promote Likud and Netanyahu in Russian and Hebrew as of September 15, 2019.
Hazem Bader/AFP
Immigrants and their descendants residing in the poorest peripheral cities of the state are the main supporters of the right, and Netanyahu in particular.
Trump addresses the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters, Sept. 24, 2019.
AP Photo/Mary Altaffer
The US has historically asked for international support when brewing conflicts in the Middle East boiled over.
The ban followed revelations of sheep suffering and dying from heat stress on voyages from Australia to the Middle East after a disturbing video was revealed.
AAP Image/ Trevor Collens
Davide Tanasi, a digital archaeologist, thinks it’s a pity when historical artifacts are locked away in storage. He’s working to fix this by sharing them as 3D models.
Saudi Arabia and Israeli in balancing act after strikes on Iran-backed militias.
An Islamic State photo purports to show the destruction of a Roman-era temple in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra in 2015.
Islamic State/Handout via Reuters
After Imran Khan’s visit to the White House, what lies ahead for his relationship with Donald Trump?
Footage released by Iran’s Sepah News reportedly shows Revolutionary Guard Corps boarding the British-flagged tanker Stena Impero.
EPA/Sepah news handout
The wisest course from here would seem to be reopening discussions with Tehran about Gulf security and an American-imposed sanctions regime. But this will be easier said than done.
Syrian tribes have found themselves on competing sides of Syria’s ongoing civil war.
Youssef Badawi/EPA
Senior Associate Fellow on the Middle East at RUSI; Associate Professor in Politics & International Relations; Deputy Director of the Centre on US Politics, UCL