For the first time in almost a decade, Lebanese voters went to the polls last weekend and delivered a subtle but important message with regional ramifications. The results will do nothing to ease tensions, instead sharpening enmity between Saudi Arabia and Iran while marginally increasing fears of an impending confrontation between Israel and Iran and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. From a regional perspective, the outcome of the Lebanese election is clear: Iran has grown more powerful inside Lebanon, adding to Tehran’s influence across the Middle East. The election strengthened the hand of Hezbollah, the militant Shiite organization and political party [...]
For much of the past 15 years, Turkey had been one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. The “Turkish miracle” earned plaudits from the global financial elite, drew billions of dollars of investment into the country, and helped the political fortunes of its powerful Islamist leader, the prime minister-turned-president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is now eyeing even more authority in snap elections next month. But those halcyon days of the Turkish miracle are gone. Over the past year alone, the Turkish lira has lost over 10 percent of its value against the dollar, and this week Turkey’s credit rating was lowered [...]
In politics, as in marital disputes, being right is overrated. That lesson was learned the hard way by defenders of the Iran nuclear deal, which President Donald Trump formally pulled the United States out of yesterday. No one, even among the deal’s most ardent supporters, disputes the claim that the agreement is flawed and imperfect from an American perspective. After all, it required compromises and concessions that were necessary to reach a negotiated, rather than an imposed, final agreement. Whether or not those concessions were too generous is a valid subject of debate. It is possible, though unprovable, that Iran [...]
