Yasser Allawi interviews a Syrian smuggler, Abu Yazan, on the process of transporting refugees to Europe via Turkey.

Nawzat Shamdeen takes a look at marriage laws in Islamic State–controlled Mosul. Read more »

This article originally appeared here on ForeignPolicy.com on Monday, March 28, 2016.

The war between the Turkish military and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is back, and it seems more ferocious than ever. Over the past six months, an estimated 500 civilians have been killed in fighting between Turkish security forces and the Kurdish insurgent group. In February and March, PKK suicide bombers struck at the heart of Turkey’s capital, killing a total of 67 people within steps of the prime ministry and in Ankara’s bustling Kizilay neighborhood. All the while, the Turkish military has laid siege to the towns of Cizre and Nusaybin, PKK strongholds in the southeast, razing apartment blocks and sending desperate civilians fleeing. Read more »

Ali Sokmen is an analyst covering Turkish affairs for Control Risks, the global business risk consultancy.

After having voted four times over the past two years, many Turkish citizens think they have seen enough ballot boxes. Turkish politicians seem to disagree. Read more »

Nicholas Glastonbury and Defne Kadioglu discuss the salient role of urban governance in the conflict between the Turkish government and its Kurdish southeast. Read more »

On Saturday there was a horrific bombing in Istanbul that killed four and injured thirty six. It is the fourth attack in Turkey in six weeks. The country is under grave threat from the self-declared Islamic State, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons, known as the TAK. Ankara has fingered a suspect named Mehmet Ozturk, who is believed to be a Turkish member of the Islamic State, for the weekend’s violence. One would think that the Turkish press would spend its time looking into the attacker’s background, trying to understand who his accomplices are and how he got past Turkey’s rather intensive security. Many journalists are doing just that, but the Turkish newspapers Aydinlik and Sabah had something different in mind for their readers this weekend. Aydinlik’s front-page headline screamed “Barkey’s Bombs Exploded.” The “Barkey” in the headline is Professor Henri J. Barkey of Lehigh University and the director of the Middle East Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars in Washington. For its part, Sabah reported “Istiklal Bomb Threat From CIA” with a picture of Barkey (which Aydinlik had also included). Read more »

Dmitry Gorenburg and Michael Kofman argue that Russia intends to remain entrenched in the Syrian conflict, even after withdrawing troops from the region.

Kamal al-Ayash explores the dangerous route families use to escape from Fallujah to Baghdad, Turkey, and Europe. Read more »

This article originally appeared here on ForeignAffairs.com on Tuesday, March 15, 2016.

Nearly seven years ago, U.S. President Barack Obama traveled to the Turkish capital, Ankara, to address the country’s parliament. Turkey was second only to Russia in its need of a “reset.” The war in Iraq had damaged Washington’s ties with Ankara, which had warned of the dangers of a U.S. invasion and paid a price for its destabilizing effects. The new U.S. president’s gauzy rhetoric before the Grand National Assembly about how Turkish and Americans soldiers stood shoulder-to-shoulder “from Korea to Kosovo to Kabul” and his admiration for “Turkey’s democracy” seemed to hit exactly the right notes. It was the dawn of a new era in which close relations with a large, prosperous, democratizing, predominantly Muslim country would exemplify a more constructive, less belligerent course for U.S. foreign policy. Read more »

Just as I was heading out the door yesterday, I received a message from my friend Timothy Kaldas with just two words: “They caved.” I knew exactly what he was referring to. The Central Bank of Egypt determined that it could no longer defend the Egyptian pound and devalued the currency a whopping 13 percent. You can now exchange a U.S. dollar at a bank in Cairo for about nine pounds, which is great for tourists, if there were any. It is about time Egyptian banking officials took this step, which immediately injected some confidence in the financial markets and among investors. It may seem beside the point to ask why it took them so long, but the answer to that question might tell observers something about what to expect next from Egypt’s economic policymakers. Read more »

Giulio Regeni, in his last article before his death, finds that Egypt’s independent trade unions remain willing to defy the state.

Benoit Challand examines the alienation of Tunisia’s youth and its implications on jihadi recruitment. Read more »

Is Egypt melting down? It has an insurgency, a currency crisis, a brazen and brutal security apparatus that is sowing dissent, a phony political process, and a leader who has lost his grip. These are, at least, the reasons that have been outlined in various commentaries and analyses over the last few weeks or so. It may have reached a crescendo when President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi gave his disastrous (by all accounts) “Egypt 2030” speech. The Egyptian historian Khaled Fahmy called Sisi’s performance Qaddafi-esque. For those keeping score, that is not a compliment. Sisi rambled, wagged his finger at those in attendance, demanded that they only listen to him, and offered a number of loopy ideas for resolving Egypt’s indebtedness including putting himself up for sale. Despite the tough times, Egyptians—who are preternaturally hilarious—put their president up for sale on eBay. He was fetching more than $100,000 before the sale was taken down. Of course, Egypt’s present tribulations are no joke, but I wonder if much of the commentary, especially those parts of it related to Sisi, is not misleading. Egypt may be melting down, but I do not believe it is because the Egyptian president “has lost his grip,” if only because he never had one. Read more »