Abdulrahman Al-Rashed

In theory, at least, the Arab majority is expected to take a clear stance against Iran over its aggression toward eight Arab countries – six in the Gulf – in addition to Iraq and Jordan. But reality is more complex and far less cohesive. We see some voices and movements not merely remaining silent…

The premise suggests that in its war against Iran, the United States is trying to entangle Gulf states alongside it, only to later abandon them. The question is: Could President Donald Trump walk away from the war with Iran, leave the region, and abandon Gulf countries to face Tehran on their own? …

Merchants of rumors and conspiracy theorists, much like merchants of war, feed off people’s fears and anxieties. With the first shot fired in the conflict, a wave of theories emerged. The most prominent being that the war is nothing more than a US strategic plan against China, aimed at…

Talk of restoring the shah’s monarchy has surged since the start of the current war, more than at any time since the fall of the Pahlavi regime in the late 1970s. Support for the return of Reza Pahlavi, the shah’s son, has been estimated at around one third of Iranians, though such figures are…

Although only one week has passed since the outbreak of the large-scale war, the imbalance in the balance of power is already undermining the capabilities of Iran’s regime, which had long refused to give up these capabilities through negotiations. The outcome is largely expected, despite Iran’s…

A new Iran means an Iran different from the one we have known for four decades. Perhaps a modern civilian system could emerge, or the current system itself but with different policies, moving toward openness, including toward the West, ending its status as a “state of war” and engaging in political…

Major defeats are often born of major miscalculations. The 1967 war between Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Israel; Sharon’s invasion of Beirut and the expulsion of Fatah (PLO) in 1982; Saddam Hussein’s invasion and occupation of Kuwait in 1990 despite the massive military buildup against him. The…

Our region is strewn with long-buried landmines, any one of which could spark unintended consequences. This is not meant to refer to the Saudi-Emirati dispute in southern Yemen, despite it being one of today’s heated issues that could still be resolved through direct talks. Beyond these landmines,…

Ending the nuclear program and stopping external activity could spare Iran foreign intervention that enables internal change by exploiting widespread domestic unrest. The Iranian regime is facing an existential crisis for the first time since the founder of the Islamic Republic returned to Tehran…

The renewed activity of al-Qaeda–affiliated groups in Syria brings us back to reexamining the events that first brought al-Qaeda into Syria. Yes, it is al-Qaeda itself! As an organization that was born and took root in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda was destroyed by the Americans in response to the…