Eyad Abu Shakra

The Tango In Gaza… And Its Destructive Repercussions

It has been around a month and a half since the October 7 operation in the Gaza Envelope; skepticism is increasing and the risks are accumulating. Setting to one side the bravado shown by Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who have talked about changing maps and claimed…

Gaza: Questions Imposed by The Logic of Things

After over 20 days since the “2023 Gaza War” erupted, I can confidently assert that the balance on the battlefield in this asymmetric conflict seems to favor the Israeli forces. Indeed, we have the materialization of events and developments that many, including myself, had anticipated. Among…

The Regional Dimension of the Tragedy In Gaza

It seems that we do indeed live in a world that despises the sensible and is enchanted by populist showmen. We understand the fact that the truth is the first victim of war, and any doubts that may have remained were dispelled by the heart-wrenching “Gaza war” that began two weeks ago. As…

Gaza 2023: The War of Fallen Illusions

I cannot exactly tell which of leaderships of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad or Hamas ordered the launch of the latest "Gaza War". But frankly, given the enormity of what we have seen and what we may still see, such a question becomes insignificant. What happened has happened; and Benjamin…

The UK May Have Just Returned to Two-Party Politics

Many things have changed since the departure of Jeremy Corbyn’s populist Leftist leadership of the British Labor Party, in 2020; following its crushing electoral defeat in 2019. Neutral observers and rational party members had expected such an outcome. Labor’s share of the vote dropped to 32% -…

Arab Concerns Ignored by the International Community

The last few days, the Middle East witnessed two visits by two senior Iranian and American officials, as well as Iraq’s general elections. But if the nature of the visit of Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian was clear and widely mentioned in the media, I can claim no knowledge of the…

Raisi-Macron … A New Version of Sykes-Picot?!

Somehow, one may say that few regional and international powers did not “contribute” to the formation of the new Lebanese cabinet. However, this cabinet is nothing more than a “crisis management team”. Its task is to deal with a problem whose solution would be an inseparable part of the much larger…

The Baghdad Summit and Iraq’s Regional Role

Nothing in my life fills me with shame more than the fact that I have never visited Iraq! This is a cause of sadness, pain, regret and unrivalled sense of loss; and why not, if Iraq was part of me and my family’s history even before I was born. Impressed by Iraq (where he lived for 10 years)…

Lessons Learnt From Afghanistan

Within few hours both Herat and Kandahar fell to the Taliban. The fall of Afghanistan’s third and second most populous cities, respectively, meant that the fate of the capital Kabul would not be different. As expected, the first reaction from the major Western powers, which had troops and…

President Raisi and his Arab 'Protectorates'

It is understandable that foreign dignitaries and officials would attend the swearing-in ceremony of a UN member state’s president, as what happened during the swearing-in ceremony of Ebrahim Raisi as President of Iran. This is normal practice, regardless with those guests are from friendly…