NGOs and Think Tanks Government and Politics of the Middle East Oakland Campus Guides at University of Pittsburgh

Jordan has defied predictions of collapse for nearly the entire century of its existence. The kingdom is dependent upon foreign aid and international support, squeezed in a conflict-ridden regional neighborhood, ruled by a monarchy implanted by British colonialism, and featuring a society cleaved by questions of identity and belonging. Yet a combination of factors, from institutional strategies of governance to geopolitical machinations, have enabled the ruling Hashemite monarchy to persist. This chapter surveys the panorama of religious communities in the MENA, a Muslim-majority region but with Jewish-majority Israel and smaller Christian and non-Abrahamic minorities dispersed throughout. It weighs how religiosity prefigures public attitudes and preferences on social and political issues. It also highlights the mobilizational capacity of Islam, manifest in both efforts to suppress religious movements in the past and the contemporary rise of Islamist movements that range from peaceful service providers to extremist organizations whose violence escapes convenient explanation.

Many reasons explain this, from Israeli policies and international complications to the failures of governance and unity by Palestinian leadership, as well as Hamas. As life under occupation continues to economically deteriorate and global actors continue to propose new peace deals in the post-Oslo era, it does not appear the solution that seemed most reasonable not long ago – a two-state compromise, with a Palestine and Israel co-existent – is possible any longer. Establishing spaces for current and former officials and experts to engage in problem-solving dialogues in which they discuss emerging political and security trends in the region, resolution of conflicts, and broader issues related to regional security. This series examines new ways of understanding democratization and government in the Middle East. The varied and uneven processes of change, occurring in the Middle Eastern region, can no longer be read and interpreted solely through the prism of Euro-American transitology. Seeking to frame critical parameters in light of these new horizons, this series instigates reinterpretations of democracy and propagates formerly ‘subaltern,’ narratives of democratization.

CPI 2019: Middle East And North Africa

And we can deploy our diplomats with the vision that our actions should seek to advance freedom, fight corruption, and end poverty. And even if governments are resistant to this approach, it doesn’t mean that a smart foreign policy can’t find ways to make some progress on those three key areas. It isn’t as if we are going to shutter our embassies and go home; we have to use them for good. The flip side of this, though, is that things won’t always turn out how we want them to. For example, on the democracy front, when countries do hold elections, we must learn to live with the results, whether we like them or not; that doesn’t mean we need to be friends with governments we despise.

The Biden administration has warned regional players against attacking its foremost ally and deployed not one but two aircraft carriers to back up its words. Finally, because this is happening at a time when the United States has declining influence in the region, it is all the more important that we undertake this effort in partnership with an international coalition, starting with some of our NATO allies. In Washington, we need to remember that we play second fiddle to ordinary citizens on the ground.

Blinken Meets With el-Sisi in Egypt to Discuss Plight of Palestinians in Gaza

Women’s sporting events are now an integral part of national health and wellness transformation agendas as governments get keen to improve health and fitness levels in women. The Middle East is both the most urbanised and one of the fastest urbanising regions in the world. Two-thirds of Middle Eastern populations live in cities – well above the global average of 50%.

In addition, international organizations have maintained close contact with Yemeni actors in reporting on the ongoing conflict. The best source for data on the Yemeni war at the close of the 2010s, including interventions and airstrikes by outside actors, is the Yemen Data Project. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs provides a useful site on Yemeni developments. Finally, the Yemen Peace Project is an advocacy organization delivering information about the war. The Arab Spring destroyed a recalcitrant dictatorship in Egypt, but the tumult that followed was unprecedented, as Egyptians voted several times in the most democratic elections in history before a military coup returned the country in July 2013 to authoritarianism.

Government and Politics of the Middle East – Oakland Campus

Despite its limits, closer ad hoc coordination with relevant regional players in terms of migration management, development cooperation, education and social resilience could form an additional flexible instrument in Germany’s Middle East policy. The coalition contract – essentially the three governing parties’ joint statement of intent for their time in power – sets out plans for a highly normative foreign policy approach. The government wants to focus more on human rights, labelling them the ‘most important protecting shield of individual dignity’, and seeks to promote multilateralism and diplomacy in order to counter-balance non-democratic and authoritarian regimes. This certainly sets the tone for any engagement with governments across the Middle East, as does a new national law to more strictly regulate arms exports. According to the coalition contract, the Merkel administration’s embargo on arms exports to states involved in the Yemen war – specifically, Saudi Arabia and the UAE – will remain in place.

The first stop is Phenix Center’s Guide to Jordanian Politics, which maps out the cabinet and parliamentary composition. But Since 2011, many newspapers and creative outlets within the country have emerged to take advantage of the free media space, providing a bounty for researchers. In terms of broadcast media, the National Company for Radio and Television began to stream online in the early 2000s various programs for Moroccans living abroad; it streams daily news clips in Spanish, Tamazight, French, and Moroccan Internationale is a Tangiers-based radio station that plays a fun, eclectic mix of music (Moroccan, American, African, Middle Eastern, and European) and broadcasts official news in Arabic and French.

Israel’s Netanyahu Forms Unity Government to Direct War

The Middle East is very diverse when it comes to religions, many of which originated there. Islam is the largest religion in the Middle East, but other faiths that originated there, such as Judaism and Christianity,[43] are also well represented. Christian communities have played a vital role in the Middle East,[44] and they represent 40.5% of Lebanon, where the Lebanese president, half of the cabinet, and half of the parliament follow one of the various Lebanese Christian rites.

Has peace treaties with Jordan and Egypt but is losing support internationally, especially in Europe. The social agenda is a top priority for Middle Eastern governments moving forward and is the hallmark of the change sweeping across the region. Employment, poverty, accessibility and regulatory/ judicial reform are issues that underpin this critical area. Proudly supporting our government and public sector clients as they pursue their powerful national transformation agendas. Each of the countries examined here carries its own unique media sphere, including social media, broadcast stations, daily newspapers, and blogs.

Prospects for peace with Israel weakened by the Arab spring and divisions between PLO in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza, isolated by Israel and anti-Islamist military in Cairo, and by chaos in Syria. Israel blamed Hamas for murder of three teenagers in the West Bank and launched crackdown. Western-backed Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas looks weak, with nothing to show for security cooperation with Israel. The country’s prospects depend on the ability of its dysfunctional post-2003 political system to become more inclusive – after its Shia prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, provoked an angry backlash from minority Sunnis who have never got used to losing the status they enjoyed under Saddam Hussein. The fall of Mosul and the capture of disputed Kirkuk have given the already autonomous Kurds, now exporting oil independently, a far stronger position. The US, Britain and their allies shied away from overt intervention even when Assad crossed Barack Obama’s “red line” and used chemical weapons against his own people.

A deeply fractured polity at the best of times, Lebanon has suffered in the wake of the war in Syria and is hosting more than one million refugees. Hezbollah’s defence of Assad has exacerbated tension with the country’s Sunni community, with several bomb blasts blamed on hardline groups. On July 18, the attackers again executed Infostealer.Clipog on Computer 3 before creating an SSH tunnel using Plink to access RDP services. This is followed by the same unknown batch script being executed several more times. Political tensions and geopolitical instability has pushed investment and increased defense spending across the Middle East.

Iran-backed hackers dwelled for 8 months in Mideast government’s system, report says

His research interests include ethics and integrity, performance management, and digital governance. Bizarrely, as the US is offering Israel unconditional support, there is no sign that it is privy to its specific war plans, or its endgame. Hence, President Joe Biden advised the Israelis in a prerecorded interview on Sunday against “a new occupation of Gaza”, warning it would be “a big mistake”. There has been hardly any American mention of the Palestinians’ plight during a week of vicious Israeli bombardment of Gaza, except in the context of them being used as “human shield” by Hamas.

Corruption was one of the main criticisms of the governments when the civil wars began. Now these states have collapsed, and the countries are facing the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, with the population in dire need of food. The current regimes retain their grip on power, but the governments have done little to direct resources to support the people. Fighting has collapsed the infrastructure, leaving much of the population without access to clean water, health care and food.

As GCC governments and enterprises continue to evolve, they’ll be inclined to invest more in new capabilities and technologies as part of a long-term, holistic framework. The MENA region is still perceived as highly corrupt, with little progress made towards controlling corruption. State employees siphon money from procurement processes intended to rebuild, while other officials avoid accountability on many counts, even for the port explosion for which there is evidence suggesting they knew of the risks. A 2020 anti-corruption law took important steps to correct some of these issues, but it’s still insufficient. Gaps remain in transparency in appointments for the anti-corruption commission and the subsequent public procurement law passed in 2021.

Its output was information about SIDs, names, object classes, and principal sources of local user groups and their members in a structured format. During this latest attack, Crambus deployed three previously undiscovered pieces of malware, along with the PowerExchange backdoor, a known backdoor that hadn’t yet been attributed to Crambus. In addition to malware, the attackers made use of a number of living-off-the-land and legitimate tools. Our objective is to disseminate and apply survey findings in order to contribute to political reform and to strengthen institutional capacity for public opinion research. If you have any questions about how we are supporting government transformation, please complete the below form and we’ll contact you as soon as we can. Governments in the Middle East have set very ambitious transformation plans and visions.

The analogy with ISIL goes a long way to providing Israel with carte blanche to wage a “long and painful war” against Gaza. By August, the hackers had used a tool to scan for vulnerabilities, including the Log4j bug, on other machines on the network. Dick O’Brien, principal intelligence analyst on the Symantec Threat Hunter Team, told Recorded Future News that there were several new tools involved in the intrusion, including three new pieces of malware. In Saudi Arabia and the UAE, the bottom half earn one of lowest proportions of income at the world, at 8% and 9% respectively. Now let’s turn to Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco, where the situation is very different than Iraq and Lebanon, but whose citizens still suffer from varying degrees of the similar problems of stagnant wages and lack of democracy. As we continue working to renew our societies and institutions, many in Africa and the Middle East are still grappling with the devastating socio-economic consequences the pandemic brought.

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• Increased optimism and confidence in the Middle East sports sector has attracted investments from Middle East sovereign wealth funds and government-backed investment groups.
• After years of stagnation, this year’s deCPI decrease must be a wake-up call to take on urgent reforms and protect fundamental rights and freedoms across the region.
• The Islamist al-Nahda party, close to the Muslim Brotherhood, stands out for accepting the need for power-sharing with rivals and playing down interest in Sharia law.
• The Regional Platform provides a cost-effective remote solution by offering clients access to shared support services in the same time zone, including in the areas of contracting, management, legal, financial management, program, and technical support.
• By September 2015, 136 countries (over 70 percent of UN member states) had granted it state recognition.