Middle East Research and Information Project

Critical Coverage of the Middle East Since 1971

Steve Niva

Steve Niva teaches international politics and Middle East studies at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. He is the current editor of Middle East Report and MERIP publications.

MER Article

Editorial (Summer 2018)

The articles in this issue of Middle East Report illuminate some of the sources of displacement, dispossession and loss found throughout urban areas in the contemporary Middle East, which often produce the very population outflows that militarized border zones seek to contain. The merciless killing by Israeli snipers of over

Steve Niva • 2 min read

MER Article

Trump's Drone Surge

Less than a year into Trump’s presidency, the world’s policeman is back, now armed with a Twitter account. Flying largely under the media radar, the US military is flexing its muscles around the world—and in some areas it is going on the offensive. Since Trump took office, the United States has quie

Steve Niva • 20 min read

Current Analysis

Manhunting in Africa

The penultimate scene in the recently released film Captain Phillips, about the 2009 seizure of the US-flagged cargo ship Maersk Alabama by Somali pirates, depicts the methodical precision with which a Navy SEAL Team 6 unit identified and then captured or killed the pirates during their doomed attem

Steve Niva • 5 min read

Current Analysis

Israel's "Operation Mow the Lawn"

One can only imagine the nods of self-satisfaction when an Israel Defense Forces planner came up with “Pillar of Cloud” to name Israel’s subsequent eight-day aerial assault on Gaza. By lifting this metaphor from several well-known passages [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillar_of_a_cloud] in the Tora

Steve Niva • 6 min read

Current Analysis

The “Matrix” Comes to Libya

Within days of the deadly assault on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, the skies over Libya began buzzing [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/22/us/politics/benghazi-and-arab-spring-rear-up-in-us-campaign.html?_r=0] with American s

Steve Niva • 4 min read

Current Analysis

Drones Over Israel

Two stories regarding Israel and drones appeared last week, illustrating both the dangerous new world of drone proliferation and Israel’s major role in making that possible.

Steve Niva • 3 min read

Current Analysis

Romney's Remnants

In Egypt, popular sentiment runs high against those dubbed fuloul (leftovers or dregs), the epithet for politicians and former officials associated with the immense corruption and despotism of the Mubarak regime. Anti-fuloul sentiment ultimately doomed Mubarak’s final prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, t

Steve Niva • 5 min read

Current Analysis

"Green on Blue": Message Not Received

American and NATO media handlers are in message control mode trying to contain the fallout from the escalation of insider killings of American and NATO soldiers by trained Afghan forces, known in military parlance as “green on blue” attacks. The latest rash of insider attacks [http://www.nytimes.com

Steve Niva • 4 min read