Leftist Secularism Faces Uncertain Future in Kurdish Rojava
Syria’s Kurds – led by the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its military arm the YPG – have received much attention for their role as […] More
Kurds
The Promises and Perils of Syrian Kurdistan
Syria’s Kurds are best known for the role that their military arm, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), currently play as the military backbone of […] More
Rethinking the U.S. Alliance with Kurdish Fighters in Syria
As the ISIS “Caliphate” in Syria and Iraq faces annihilation in coming weeks, the U.S. must rethink relations with its highly problematic but effective ally […] More
As ISIS Falls, Border Battles Loom
The U.S.-led military campaign against ISIS in Iraq and Syria appears to be nearing its end. In Mosul, Iraqi military forces are now pushing into […] More
The Complex State of Play in Eastern Syria
The territorial battle against ISIS is nearing its final stages in Iraq and Syria. In Iraq, U.S. coalition-backed Iraqi forces have trapped the remaining ISIS […] More
The Kurds Can Fight: Now They Need to Govern
Iraqi Kurdistan has been relatively stable in an otherwise troubled region. Unhappy with Iraq as their home, Kurds have fought successive Iraqi regimes since being […] More
Making Iraq Great Again
It is probably not a bad thing that U.S. President Donald Trump recently dispatched Jared Kusher, his son-in-law and his Administration’s jack-of-all-issues, to Iraq. As […] More
Why Syria’s Kurds Are America’s Key Ally
Before the civil war, few outside the Middle East had ever heard of Syria’s Kurds. Syria has by far the smallest Kurdish population of the […] More
Syrian Kurds – Forgotten No More
Syria has by far the smallest Kurdish population of any country with major Kurdish minorities. However, in the last two years, the Kurds of Syria […] More
The Battle for Raqqa – It’s Complicated
Though the battle to defeat the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in Mosul is slowly reaching its denouement, the campaign to take the […] More
Dealing with Turkey: Don’t Expect Miracles
Turkey has once again been very much on Europeans’ minds. This time, the issue has been about the Turkish referendum on April 16 over whether […] More
Syria: A Tactical—Not Strategic—Ceasefire
The agreement between Turkey and Russia stipulates a halt to the fighting throughout Syrian territory from midnight on December 29, with the exception of areas […] More
Syria: Options Remain If America is Willing to Take Them
One of the biggest foreign policy challenges that President-elect Donald Trump will face is Syria. Here are how things look on the ground today and […] More
Incoherent U.S. Policy Will Doom Raqqa Campaign
Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter’s assertion that the battle to dislodge the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) from Raqqa “starts in the next […] More
Telling Friend from Foe in Syria
Following the aggressive Russian and Turkish interventions in Syria, it can be difficult to tell where the various parties in the conflict stand. Between the […] More
Iraq’s Grim Prospects Post ISIL
In the coming months, and possibly weeks, the Iraqi Security Forces, with the help of a diverse group of fighters spanning the Iraqi political spectrum, […] More
Objective: Mosul
With the Islamic State (ISIS) having lost more than 40 percent of its territory in Iraq since its height of control in January 2015, all […] More
Syria: No End In Sight
As the Syrian civil war progresses with no end in sight, Rob Richer, former Associate Deputy Director for Operations at the CIA and member of […] More