World News Insights: Opinion Articles

In May 2022, nine months after the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan, I visited a girls’ secondary school that was still open in the north in spite of a ban on education for girls above sixth grade. Communities in the area, which has a long history of valuing education, had refused to comply…

On June 28th, the Conference Marking the 70th Anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence was held in Beijing. Chinese President Xi Jinping attended the conference and delivered an important speech. Four sub-forums focusing respectively on the Contemporary Value of Asian Wisdom, the…

Over the broad era of the past century and a half, the world witnessed four major developments that we have come to recognize as major setbacks. In 1914, the First World War broke out and "crowned" Europe’s "belle epoque" in a manner no one had anticipated. Indeed, since the Franco-Prussian War…

The first presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump captivated the world and drew everyone’s attention. Indeed, the US is the most powerful empire in history, but another reason for all of this interest is worth noting. This was the first time in history that one of the candidates…

The Iranian presidential elections taking place today could be exceptional by every metric, especially in terms of the situation of the region and the globe. Iranian decision-makers want a hardliner suitable for this moment fraught with major crises that Iran itself- not only in its spheres of…

Today 68 million Iranians are supposed to elect a new president of the Islamic Republic from among six pre-approved candidates. We said “are supposed to” because it isn’t clear how many of those eligible to vote, including those in exile, have registered to do so. The early election caused by the…

Journalists traveling with US Presidential Envoy Amos Hochstein have reported that he did not want to come to Beirut during his recent trip to the region. He felt certain that nothing new would come of the visit, but senior White House and State Department advisers told him that he should make a…

Contrary to the American political tradition, where "federalism" is a concept with positive connotations, the French experience offered a different meaning. The term may have been used as a slur for the first time following the French Revolution of 1789, when cities across France witnessed…

By regarding Hajj, I mean the general affairs of pilgrims and arrangements that - God willing - ensure their safety and security, facilitate their movement, improve the quality of the services provided to them, and allow them to perform their rituals in safety and tranquility. I am not referring to…

News from Lebanon indicates a daily shift towards a more grim and pessimistic outlook. Despite claiming to oppose this trend, many parties seem to be sliding further into worsening conditions, like sleepwalkers heading towards disaster. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned days ago that …

Debates are perilous for incumbent presidents, and for obvious reasons — they have everything to lose and little to gain. Richard Nixon, overshadowed by John Kennedy in the first televised presidential debate in 1960, declined to debate George McGovern as an incumbent in 1972. Gerald Ford’s…

In the past decades, the Middle East has given birth to warriors who dreamed of exhausting the West. Through the “invasions of New York and Washington,” Osama bin Laden dreamed of luring the American army into Afghanistan, hoping to inflict on it the same fate of the Soviet Red Army. He did not…