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21. Turkey and Iran: Parallel Islam imperialist ambitions for the Middle East

Author:
Jonathan Spyer
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
Neither Ankara nor Tehran want a strong Iraq, or a strong Syria. On the contrary, the fragmentation of these countries suits both.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Imperialism, Regional Cooperation, and Leadership
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

22. Assessing the US strategy in Iraq

Author:
Jonathan Spyer
Publication Date:
04-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
Only an integrated political, military and economic strategy targeting the Iranian system in all its aspects, with a long-term commitment to local allies and the mission, can succeed.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Conflict, Strategic Interests, and Intervention
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Middle East, North America, and United States of America

23. Israel-Iraq Cooperation in 2019: Security Challenges and Civilian Warming

Author:
Ronen Zeidel
Publication Date:
03-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Mitvim: The Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies
Abstract:
The final months of 2019 were marked by widespread, prolonged protests throughout Iraq, which began in October. Baghdad was the focal point of the demonstrations, which were directed at the ruling political elite and the state backing it: Iran. Prime Minister Adil AbdulMahdi resigned at the end of November, throwing official Iraq into a political vacuum and guaranteeing that any premier appointed to replace him would be considered an interim ruler and as such, his government would only be accepted by the weakened political elite, but not by a significant part of the population. This article reviews the changes that occurred in 2019 in the nature of Israel-Iraq cooperation, as they relate to diplomatic, security, economic and civilian aspects.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Bilateral Relations, and Civilians
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

24. Trump, the Middle East, and North Africa: Just Leave Things to the Proxies?

Author:
Sven Biscop
Publication Date:
03-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
EGMONT - The Royal Institute for International Relations
Abstract:
When Trump says that he wants NATO to take more responsibility in the Middle East, what he means is that he wants the European allies to do more. He is campaigning for re- election and has promised to bring the boys (and girls) home for Christmas. And of course, in Iraq American troops are less than welcome these days, after the targeted assassination of Iranian General Soleimani near Baghdad airport (3 January 2020). In late 2019, Trump had already withdrawn most troops from Syria, and now the peace agreement with the Taliban (29 February 2020) will allow him to draw down the US military presence in Afghanistan too. And the US is considering pulling its troops out of the Sahel as well. What does this mean for Europe?
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, Military Strategy, and Assassination
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, Iraq, Iran, Middle East, Syria, and North America

25. Securing the Participation of Women in Iraq’s Reconciliation Program

Author:
Kristin Perry
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Middle East Research Institute (MERI)
Abstract:
The inclusion of women is critical to the success and sustainability of reconciliation efforts. To date, however, the government of Iraq has failed to prioritize women’s participation in its national reconciliation program. In the development of the second Iraqi National Action Plan (INAP), the federal government has an opportunity to rectify this legacy and restore the social contract with its female constituents. This policy brief examines current gender deficits throughout Iraq’s reconciliation process and offers relevant recommendations.
Topic:
Women, Feminism, Reconciliation, and Sustainability
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and Baghdad

26. The Transformation of the Iraqi-Syrian Border: From a National to a Regional Frontier

Author:
Harith Hasan and Kheder Khaddour
Publication Date:
03-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Over the past nearly two decades, the presence of a variety of state and nonstate military and security forces has transformed the Syrian border district of Bukamal and the neighboring Iraqi district of Qa’im. Following the end of the self-proclaimed Islamic State’s caliphate, Iranian-backed militias began to play a major role in the area, turning it into a flashpoint between Iran and its allies on the one side and the United States and Israel on the other. The strain of tensions and the threat of instability are liable to ensure that this heavily securitized part of the border will remain a magnet for conflict for years to come.
Topic:
Geopolitics, Islamic State, Conflict, and Borders
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Middle East, and Syria

27. Will COVID-19 Mark the Endgame for Iraq’s Muhasasa Ta'ifia?

Author:
Ahmed Tabaqchali
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Iraq’s sectarian-based political system has depended on oil rents since 2003 to ensure its legitimacy and buy loyalty. Already running out of steam and challenged by protesters, it faces a major new test due to the drop in oil prices caused by the COVID-19 crisis. Unable to maintain its expensive patronage system, and in the absence of any real political reform, the days of the Muhasasa Ta’ifia may be running out.
Topic:
Reform, Protests, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

28. In the Footsteps of Martin Luther King: Will We Witness a Revolution Against Racial Discrimination in the Middle East?

Author:
Saad Salloum
Publication Date:
07-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Afro-Iraqis, who number around 400,000, continue to suffer from racial discrimination and marginalization despite their repeated attempts to demand equality. This paper shows the struggle of black people in Iraq through the struggle and activism of Jalal Dhiab, founder of the Free Iraqi Movement, to restore a forgotten revolution and awaken an identity that has long been marginalized in Arab historical writings, in order to defend the rights of this minority and to combat racial discrimination against it in Iraq.
Topic:
Social Movement, Minorities, Discrimination, Protests, and Racism
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

29. How Demographics Erode the Patronage Buying Power of Iraq’s Muhasasa Ta’ifia

Author:
Ahmed Tabaqchali
Publication Date:
07-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Iraq’s post-2003 political order, characterized by Muhasasa Ta’ifia with political sectarian elites using employment in public services to strengthen clientelism, has become economically unsustainable. The author’s earlier paper for the Arab Reform Initiative examined the impact of the drop in oil prices on the system. This article examines how Iraq’s growing demography erodes the patronage buying power of the sectarian elites, even though spending on clientelism has mushroomed over the years.
Topic:
Demographics, Inequality, and Elites
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

30. Eliminating the Protests? The Motives and Circumstances of Basra Assassinations

Author:
Yaseen Taha Mohammed
Publication Date:
09-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Since the October 2019 protests calling for reform and an end to corruption, the Iraqi city of Basra has been the scene of a chilling spree of assassinations of activists. To date, no one has yet been held to account for these crimes that have spread fear in protestors’ ranks. This paper highlights the profile of the activists, the circumstances of the killings, and the possible motives behind them in the context of Iranian influence in Iraq, the approaching anniversary of the protests and the elections scheduled for next year.
Topic:
Social Movement, Political Activism, Elections, State Violence, Protests, and Assassination
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

31. Russia and Iraq Deepen Energy, Military Ties

Author:
John C. K. Daly
Publication Date:
12-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Jamestown Foundation
Abstract:
As the United States hastens its drawdown of troops in Iraq before the January 20 inauguration of President-elect Joseph Biden, Russia is seeking to fill the developing geopolitical vacuum there. On November 25, following discussions in Moscow with Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, Russia’s top diplomat, Sergei Lavrov, remarked that Russian energy firms have invested billions of dollars in the Iraqi oil industry. “When it comes to energy, the largest Russian companies are working in Iraq together with their partners. These are Lukoil, Rosneft, Gazprom-Neft and Bashneft. All four have invested more than $13 billion in the Iraqi economy,” Lavrov told journalists (Interfax, November 25). He added that Moscow was also prepared to increase arms deliveries to Baghdad, stating, “We are ready to meet any Iraqi needs for Russian-made military products. Our country has traditionally played and continues to play a very important and significant role in ensuring Iraq’s defense capability and equipping its army and security forces, including in the context of continuing terrorist threats” (Mid.ru, November 25).
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Energy Policy, Bilateral Relations, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:
Russia, Iraq, Eurasia, and Middle East

32. Ninewa: Barriers to Return and Community Resilience – A Meta Analysis

Author:
Henriette Johansen and Kamaran Palani
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Middle East Research Institute (MERI)
Abstract:
The sustainable return of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Iraq occupies many international donor projects and resources. However, in the context of the Ninewa province, this problem is not straightforward. Both the concept of displacement and expectation of return are complicated by a long history and atrocious waves of violence, including war, genocide, state-discrimination and systematic demographic changes. Displacement is ingrained in the history of Ninewa and forms part and parcel of community narratives about survival, identity and belonging. In this way, displacement cannot be conceptualized as a linear process or a uniform experience, but rather as a transformative experience conditioned on geographical, gender and identity factors. This report is a meta-analysis of the vast literature on Ninewa IDPs and the barriers to their return. It covers important analytical and contextual gaps with firsthand research to inform and enhance stakeholder policies.
Topic:
Displacement, Discrimination, Community, and Identity
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

33. Ninewa: Initiative Mapping of Sustainable Returns & Stabilization Efforts

Author:
Henriette Johansen, Kamaran Palani, Kristin Perry, and Dlawer Ala'Aldeen
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Middle East Research Institute (MERI)
Abstract:
Stabilization initiatives in Iraq require specialized efforts in each of its diverse districts, which should be based on an in-depth understanding of their history and population compositions. Although coordination between stakeholders continues to improve, subject to various agendas and donor expectations, international and national organizations working on stabilization efforts are dealing with historically deep structural and social cohesion challenges (See Barriers to Stability and Return: A Meta-Analysis report). Following the liberation of Mosul from the Islamic State (IS) in 2017, Ninewa governorate and its districts have had the most severe living conditions for returnees. This is largely due to the significant housing and infrastructure destruction in many areas, combined with slow reconstruction and compensation processes. In Ninewa’s post-war context, concerns continue to rise with the prolonged mode of displacement, particularly in the areas of protection, infrastructure, demining, livelihood, housing-land-property, social wellbeing, basic services, social cohesion and reconciliation. Through an analysis of the current initiatives in Ninewa, this report highlights critical challenges relating to stabilization and the return of internally displaced persons (IDPs).
Topic:
Political stability, Displacement, Diversity, Sustainability, and Social Cohesion
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

34. Decentralisation in Iraq: Process, Progress & a New Tailor-Made Model

Author:
Dlawer Ala'Aldeen
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Middle East Research Institute (MERI)
Abstract:
The Iraqi state has become increasingly fragile for decades and is plagued with instability, social conflicts and wars. Many drivers have contributed to the country’s intractable fragility, one of which relates to its highly centralised and poorly institutionalised governing system, which has failed to manage centre-periphery tensions and integrate local communities into the country’s polities. Rebuilding Iraq’s governance along the lines of its democratic Constitution, which adopts decentralisation at its core, will be a critical step toward stabilisation, reconstruction, and socioeconomic recovery. The Iraqi Council of Representatives adopted two transformative legislations in 2008, namely Law No. 21 of the Governorate not Incorporated into a Region, and Law No. 36 of the Provincial, District and Subdistrict Council elections. These put Iraq on a decentralisation pathway that is still evolving. However, after more than a decade of experimentation, the decentralisation process has failed to tackle the on-going crises of legitimacy and a lack of trust in government. It has failed to address problems of rampant corruption, inefficiency and an inability to improve the lives of citizens. It is, therefore, paramount to review the existing system and propose ways forward, hence this timely report. Here, Nineveh is used as a representative governorate to review the challenges facing the decentralisation process and explore possible models that can be piloted.
Topic:
Sovereignty, Governance, Fragile States, State Building, and Decentralization
Political Geography:
Iraq and Middle East

35. Iraqi Kurdistan: Priority issues for international mediation

Author:
Michael Knights
Publication Date:
07-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Middle East Research Institute (MERI)
Abstract:
In the last decade, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) has seen many moments of crisis – budget cuts, Daesh’s assault on Erbil, the halving of oil prices (twice!) and armed conflict with the Iraqi government over Kirkuk. Today’s situation feels different and arguably worse than these episodes: there’s COVID, a deep oil recession in Baghdad and Kurdistan, intensifying tensions with Turkey and Iran, and an unpleasant undercurrent of resentment against the Kurds among many of the MPs in the Baghdad parliament. What makes this moment uniquely dangerous, however, is the near-breakdown of cooperation between the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). Iraq’s Kurds have shown that they can weather any storm when they pull together as a people. The KRI’s international partners tend to support the Iraqi Kurds more effectively when the two parties work in harmony, but often back away when they cannot identify a cohesive counterparty to deal with in the KRI. International memories of the intra-Kurdish civil war in the 1990s undermined the Kurdish cause in Iraq in the 2000s, when the Kurds’ greatest opportunity for self-governance lay before them. Looking forward, it is clear that the futures of Iraq and the KRI are linked. If Baghdad’s economy and currency collapses, so does Kurdistan’s. If the Kurdish people starve, the blame will fall on Baghdad. If the Islamic State returns, it will emerge first in the strip of disputed territories between federal Iraq and the KRI. The success of U.S. policy in Iraq is the success of both the fifteen provinces of federal Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, not one or the other. The U.S.-Iraq strategic dialogue will continue in the late summer, hopefully including a visit of the Iraqi leadership to Washington DC. This presents an opportunity to re-energize the role of the U.S. and international partners in the issues facing the KRI. It is important to stress the importance of a multilateral mission to support intra-KRI cohesion and Baghdad-KRI relations because America does not have all the answers on Kurdistan, nor does it tend to focus enough attention there. U.S. power and leadership are most effective when combined with the perceptive insights and good instincts of many other partners on Kurdistan, such as the French, British, and Canadians, to name just a few. There is an argument that the U.S.-Iraq Strategic Framework Agreement should either have a specific working group or committee on KRI issues (or on decentralization more generally), or a cross-cutting mechanism that ensures the KRI is worked into each of the security, political, economic and energy working groups. The list of topics that require persistent attention is quite long. Most important, the KDP and PUK need to be led towards a de-escalation that will allow the region to speak with one cohesive voice in Baghdad and with international partners. This is a foundational issue that affects all the other issues the KRI faces. An adversarial relationship between the two parties undermines everything that is attempted in the KRI and is deeply off-putting for international partners and potential investors. It can result in armed standoffs, affecting key industries like LPG trucking, or in security crises such as the Zina Warte armed confrontation between KDP and PUK Peshmerga in mid-March 2020. Almost nothing – from oil and gas investment to counter-terrorism to fighting COVID to negotiations with Baghdad – works as well as it should due to the KDP-PUK schism. It would be magical thinking to imagine that the two parties can easily reconcile. Even so, the U.S. and its various partners should prioritize efforts to get the powerful leaders in the same room to hammer out a minimal level of cooperation and start a dialogue, however stilted or tense at the outset. The U.S. and other internationals also need to help Baghdad and the KRI complete the promising steps that have been taken on political, security and economic cooperation. The Kurds worked well with former premier Adel Abdul-Mahdi’s government in Baghdad, and they have overcome their initial caution towards a change in Baghdad to support the new Prime Minister Mustapha al-Kadhimi, another old friend. For the Kurds, however, the relationship will be almost solely judged on what it delivers in terms of budget support. Having watched six Iraqi prime ministers negotiate and renegotiate budget deals with the Kurds every year for over a decade, the U.S. is intimately familiar with every possible configuration of give and take – more so than the Iraqi and Kurdish leaders themselves. What has always been clear is that politics trump economics in such discussions: typically, the solution is political and the numbers and formulas get fudged to fit the required compromise. This is why, for the remainder of 2020, Kurdistan will probably keep selling its oil and gathering customs revenue while Baghdad will provide a reduced top-up to the Kurdish exchequer each month, which is basically what has been happening for the last two years. A lot of discussion tends to end up right back where the parties began. This pattern of recurrent budget crises is not sustainable for two reasons. First, the annual showdown complicates an already fraught budgeting process and Iraqi MPs are becoming more hostile to the KRI economy every time the cycle is undertaken. Second, the KDP and PUK are increasingly fighting over the revenue-sharing mechanism, with Sulaymaniyah seeking more direct transfers from Baghdad or other guarantees of a fair share. The U.S. and its international partners need to back a multi-year arrangement that has buy-in at the highest levels: the Iraqi Prime Minister, speaking for a sizable bloc in Iraq’s body politic, and key leaders within the KDP and PUK. This is yet another reason why the two parties must be able to sit down together at the highest political levels. The sweet spot for a Baghdad-KRI budget deal would seem to be about $800mn per month, requiring the KDP and PUK to agree on a no-blame, non-politicized and permanent reduction of KRI obligations (salaries, social services and allowances) by about 30%. The U.S. and other internationals need to put strong and well-intentioned pressure on the KRI to appoint an empowered and dedicated Minister of Natural Resources to salvage investor confidence in the energy sector, which will serve as a signpost for the KRI’s future non-oil investors. A quick win for Baghdad-KDP-PUK cooperation may be possible in the realm of counter-terrorism. The Iraqi Counter-Terrorism Service, the KDP-led Counterterrorism Department (CTD) and the PUK-led Counter-Terrorism Group (CTG) are three highly professional services that work closely with the international Coalition against Daesh. They have worked together before and can work in the disputed areas with relative ease now. The creation of joint counter-terrorism coordination centers should initially focus on these elite units and their related intelligence arms, not necessarily the “big military” units like the Iraqi Army, Federal Police and Peshmerga. One important symbol for Baghdad-KRI cooperation could be an investment in the deployment, for short periods, of some Iraqi Air Force F-16 aircraft to the airports in Erbil and Sulaymaniyah. These fighter-bombers were notoriously viewed as a stick that Baghdad might use against the Kurds, but today the F-16 fleet and its American technicians are struggling to stay in service as Iran-backed militias surround their operating base at Balad. Perhaps an out-of-the-box idea might be to cycle a fragment of the F-16 fleet through the safe operating environments of Erbil and Sulaymaniyah, as the Italian Air Force did with a small complement of Eurofighters during the war against Daesh. The common thread in all these options is a desire to “go big” in the Baghdad-KDP-PUK relationship, and for international players to encourage and support new thinking. The Kurdistan Region is currently cycling downwards, with less stability and less attractiveness as an investment environment, largely because Kurdish leaders are allowing themselves to be divided by personality politics. The U.S. intervention in Iraq in 1991 helped to free the Iraqi Kurds and the intervention in 2003 saw the U.S. ask those same Kurds to rejoin Iraq on the basis of U.S. guarantees. It is time to begin to make good on those guarantees. U.S. intervention transformed Iraq from a dictatorship to a democracy (imperfect, like all democracies), but an equally great transformation would be to help create an Iraqi state at peace with all of its components, first and foremost its Kurdish population. That moment can and should start in earnest now.
Topic:
Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Governance, Peace, and Mediation
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, and Kurdistan

36. The Human Cost of U.S. Interventions in Iraq: A History From the 1960s Through the Post-9/11 Wars

Author:
Zainab Saleh
Publication Date:
10-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University
Abstract:
For decades, U.S. policy actions towards Iraq have had devastating consequences for the Iraqi people. This paper situates the U.S. “war on terrorism” in Iraq since 2003 within a longer trajectory of U.S. intervention in that country since the 1960s and shows that we can only understand the full human costs of current interventions when we see them in broader historical context. The author, Zainab Saleh, an assistant professor of anthropology at Haverford College, was born in Iraq and lived there until 1997. Later, she conducted ethnographic research with Iraqis who had migrated to London since the late 1970s. The Iraqis she knew and met felt they were pawns at the mercy of global powers. When the U.S. invaded Iraq and brought down Hussein in 2003, Iraqis saw the United States' true motive as continuing a well-established pattern of pursuing U.S. economic interests in the region. Since the 1960s, Iraqi arms purchases have bolstered American military-industrial corporations and stable access to Middle East oil has secured U.S. dominance in the global economy. The paper tells the story of one Iraqi woman, Rasha, who was forced by the violence in her country to flee to London. Rasha’s displacement and her family’s history of dispossession – her father imprisoned, her family impoverished, friends murdered and her own life threatened – show the deep human effects of decades of U.S. intervention. In 1963, under pretext of protecting the region from a communist threat, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency backed a coup by the Arab nationalist Ba‘th party after Iraq nationalized most of its oil fields. During the 1980s, the United States supported Saddam Hussein’s regime and prolonged the Iran-Iraq War in order to safeguard its national interests in the region, including weakening Iran to prevent it from posing a threat to U.S. power. After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, U.S. policy shifted from alignment to “dual containment” of Iraq and Iran, a posture which culminated in the Gulf War of 1991 to drive Iraq out of Kuwait. In the 1990s, the United States justified its imposition of economic sanctions by claiming a goal of disarming Iraq of weapons of mass destruction and protecting allies. In 2003, the U.S. packaged its invasion of Iraq as delivering U.S. values—namely, freedom and democracy—to the Iraqi people. Saleh writes, “The imperial encounter between Iraq and the United States has made life deeply precarious for Iraqis. For decades, they have lived with fear for their own and their family’s lives, the loss of loved ones and homeland, the realities of economic hardship, and the destruction of the fabric of their social lives.”
Topic:
Foreign Policy, War, History, Counter-terrorism, and Military Intervention
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, North America, and United States of America

37. Israel's Relations with Key Arab States in 2019

Author:
Yitzhak Gal, Haim Koren, Moran Zaga, Einat Levi, and Ronen Zeidel
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Mitvim: The Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies
Abstract:
Israel-Jordan: Continued Deterioration / Yitzhak Gall Israel-Egypt: Strategic Warming, Civilian Coolness? / Dr. Haim Koren; Israel-UAE: Warming Relations, Also in Civilian Affairs/ Dr. Moran Zaga; Israel-Morocco: Warming from the Bottom Up / Einat Levi; Israel-Iraq: Security Challenges and Civilian Warming / Dr. Ronen Zeidel
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Foreign Policy, Public Opinion, and Civilians
Political Geography:
Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Arab Countries, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and UAE

38. Preventing Recidivism of Islamist Extremists

Author:
Sofia Koller
Publication Date:
07-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP)
Abstract:
Dresden and in a Paris suburb in October 2020 as well as the shooting in Vienna in November 2020 painfully reminded the European public of the threat that Islamist extremism and terrorism continue to pose in Europe. Especially worrysome is the fact that two of these attacks were apparently carried out by recently released terrorist offenders. In both cases, the alleged attackers had been in contact with deradicalization programs. This raises the question of how to prevent or reduce recidivism and potential violence.
Topic:
Terrorism, Violent Extremism, Radicalization, and Islamism
Political Geography:
Iraq, Europe, France, Syria, and Austria

39. Understanding Israel’s War in the ‘Grey Zone’

Author:
Jonathan Spyer
Publication Date:
12-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
Israel seeks to disrupt Iran’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons, and to reverse the Iranian project to entrench its forces in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
Topic:
Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Military Strategy, Conflict, and Regionalism
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Middle East, Israel, Lebanon, and Syria

40. Egypt-Jordan-Iraq: Another Middle East Axis in the Making?

Author:
Joshua Krasna
Publication Date:
09-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS)
Abstract:
Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan seek to develop a regional bloc in the geographical center of the Arab world. But all three countries are poor and dependent in for economic largesse on more wealthy partners, so their regional aspirations and strategies will necessarily be limited.
Topic:
Security, Diplomacy, Regional Cooperation, and Conflict
Political Geography:
Africa, Iraq, Middle East, Egypt, and Jordan