King Abdullah of Jordan is slated to meet President Obama at the White House on Friday. Though meetings between the two leaders are frequent and even commonplace, it is still noteworthy that the Hashemite leader is meeting the president just four weeks after hosting him in Jordan. World leaders don’t meet that frequently unless there is something urgent to discuss, and there is: Syria. Read more »

Significant Developments

Palestine. Palestinian Authority prime minister Salam Fayyad’s resignation was accepted over the weekend by President Mahmoud Abbas. Fayyad will reportedly remain in the post until Abbas names a replacement. Political tensions rose between the two Palestinian leaders in early March when Finance Minister Nabil Qassis announced he was quitting. Fayyad accepted the resignation, but was overruled by Abbas, in contravention of the Palestinian Basic Law–in effect challenging the prime minister’s authority to hire and fire cabinet ministers and sparking a constitutional crisis. Read more »

Significant Developments

Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared poised to form a new government today with Yair Lapid, leader of the Yesh Atid party, and Naftali Bennett, leader of the Habayit Hayehudi party. The coalition agreement is expected to be signed tomorrow. Read more »

“Ghannouchi, assassin, criminal…Tunisia is free, terrorism out.” –Demonstrators against Tunisia’s ruling party Ennahda during Chorki Belaid’s funeral

“Morsi is an employee who works for us. He must do what suits us, and this needs to be made clear.” – Ahmed Mansour, a doctor Read more »

“We don’t want old faces. We tried that…We are worried…We can help Jordan not go the same way as Syria and Egypt.” –Khalid Hammad, 28, a lawyer who voted in Amman, in support of a friend, a fellow lawyer who was a first-time candidate Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Syria. Syrian president Bashar al-Assad gave his first speech in nearly seven months on Sunday, outlining a “peace plan” that ruled out any negotiation with Syria’s armed rebels. UN-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi called Assad’s speech “uncompromising” and said that the Syrian president could not be part of any transitional government-the closest Brahimi has come to calling for Assad’s resignation; Syria’s foreign ministry called Brahimi “flagrantly biased.” Russian and U.S. diplomats are scheduled to meet with Brahimi tomorrow in Geneva. Read more »

Last week I posted my take on the most significant Middle East developments of 2012. The ten developments that I identified, in chronological order, were:

1. The cold war with Iran heats up
2. The Muslim Brotherhood’s election in Egypt
3. Syria’s descent into civil war
4. The Innocence of Muslims anti-American riots
5. The killing of U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi
6. Political unrest in Jordan
7. The Israel-Hamas November conflict
8. The United Nations recognition of Palestine as a non-member state
9. International failure to stop Syria’s bloodshed
10. The Muslim Brotherhood’s struggle to consolidate power in Egypt

Read more »

Here it is: the second annual Middle East Matters year-end roundup listing the ten most significant Middle East developments of 2012. Since this blog focuses on the interplay between U.S. policy and the region, the items selected were those deemed most noteworthy from an admittedly American foreign policy perspective. This was a tumultuous year in the region, and many items on this list could have been deemed the single most significant. So in roughly chronological order are MEM’s top ten for 2012: Read more »

Significant Middle East Developments

Egypt. Tens of thousands of protesters poured into Cairo’s Tahrir Square today to demonstrate against Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi and the draft constitution that was approved late last night by the Islamist-dominated constituent assembly. The proposed document is slated to go to Morsi tomorrow for his approval and an announcement of a date for a popular referendum. Read more »