World News Insights: Opinion Articles

Last week, the idea resurfaced that Israel may target Iran’s Supreme Leader – as if he were just another easy military target in the fierce war between Israel and Iran, which may soon involve the United States. US President Donald Trump made a point of distancing himself from the Israeli plan,…

After a week in purdah, “Supreme Guide” Ali Khamenei broke his silence on Wednesday with a brief and enigmatic message taped in his current secret location. Well, the location may be secret to most of us but not to Israel and its US allies who claim they know where the “Guide” is hiding. This…

In mid-1964, President Fouad Chehab was counting the days till his presidency ended. The coalition of parties that supported him had a majority of nearly two-thirds in Parliament, and these deputies visited him to explain that they intended to amend the Constitution so that he could be re-elected…

Yesterday, this newspaper published a piece by Saudi columnist Dr. Abdulghani Al-Kindi. “Why Did Israel and Iran’s Clash Surprise the Arabs?” is not merely an important column; it is a text that deserves to be shared, explained, and amplified. It’s a remarkable article about the absence of any…

For at least a year now, Iran and Israel have been fighting a direct conflict, after having waged a shadow war for decades. This is more than a regional power struggle; what we are witnessing is an existential war between two regimes as traditional pillars of deterrence erode, creating trajectories…

It might be safe to say that the relationship between states and armed militias might benefit from revisions of a highly consequential episode of modern Arab history: the Jordanian civil war of 1970–1971. Together, the large Palestinian population in East Jordan, the country’s 482-kilometer…

When a nation’s options are narrowed by dramatic developments, it is left with two choices: gloating or denial... Both affirm that this nation has resigned itself to a life on the margins of history. We Arabs currently constitute a strong majority in West Asia and North Africa. Our…

This war had been brewing for two decades - long anticipated but repeatedly avoided. Both the Iranian and Israeli sides had succeeded in avoiding direct confrontation, limiting themselves to proxy wars, until the October 7, 2023, attack happened. At that point, the Israelis decided to eliminate the…

It’s no simple feat to make Tehran live at the mercy of Israeli fighter jets and for the Israeli army to declare that the skies leading to the Iranian capital are open to its aircraft. It’s no simple feat to make Tel Aviv come under a barrage of Israeli missiles and for its people to come out of…

The war that erupted at dawn last Friday, triggered by a series of painful Israeli strikes on Iran, is unlike any of the region’s modern conflicts. It is not a repeat of the Gaza wars, nor of the Lebanon front. It bears little resemblance to the US invasion of Iraq or the grinding Iran-Iraq war of…

This conflict cannot be resolved with a two-state solution. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stressed this point recently, warning the Security Council that hope for a two-state solution may dissipate entirely. This conflict cannot be settled through perpetual war and the firepower…

In South Lebanon, the faces of the massacre’s survivors were terrifying and harrowing. Amid the rubble of what used to be homes, the people are visibly apprehensive, in pain, and broken. No one was celebrating Eid-Al-Adha, not even the children. Both north and south of the Litani River, everyone in…