Middle East Research and Information Project

Critical Coverage of the Middle East Since 1971

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MER Article

Reporting from Tunis
Members of the Tunisian Journalists Union support imprisoned Moroccan journalists Omar Radi and Souleimane Raissouni, on World Press Freedom Day, 2021. Jdidi Wassim/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Reporting from Tunis

In the aftermath of the 2011 revolution, Tunisian journalist Bassam Bounenni published an article on the dissident digital news site, Nawaat. In it, he criticized the media’s practices under fallen dictator Zine el-Abidine Ben ‘Ali (1987-2011). For the media to play a role in the new political order, he
Thomas Serres • 11 min read
Normalizing the Surveillance State—Cybersecurity Cooperation and the Abraham Accords
Under Secretary Silvers on a panel February 3, 2023 with Israel National Cyber Directorate Director General Gaby Portnoy, Head of the UAE Cyber Security Council Mohamed Al Kuwaiti, CEO of the Bahrain National Cyber Security Center Shaikh Salman bin Mohamed bin Abdulla al-Khalifa and Director General of Morocco’s General Directorate of Information Systems Security El Mostafa Rabii. Photo by DHS, public domain.

Normalizing the Surveillance State—Cybersecurity Cooperation and the Abraham Accords

The new, and not-so-new, cyber dimension of Arab-Israeli normalization.
Marwa Fatafta • 9 min read
India, Israel and the Coordination of Control
A municipal worker cleans the road ahead of a visit by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Ahmedabad, India, January 15, 2018. Amit Dave/ReutersNSUI activists protest against Modi’s government for using military-grade, Israeli spyware Pegasus to monitor political opponents, journalists and activists. New Delhi, India, August 2, 2021. Mayank Makhija/NurPhoto via Getty Images

India, Israel and the Coordination of Control

How Modi is weaponizing the 'Israeli Experience' to target dissent.
Abdulla Moaswes • 14 min read
Perspective—Recognizing and Repairing the Harm to Iraq’s Minority Communities
Displaced Iraqis from the Yezidi community at a camp for internally displaced persons in Khanke, in Dohuk province, January 20, 2023. Safin Hamed/AFP/via Getty Images
MER Article

Perspective—Recognizing and Repairing the Harm to Iraq’s Minority Communities

As the Costs of War project has documented, the US invasion of Iraq and its aftermath (including interventions, the rise of militant groups and terror attacks) resulted in more than three hundred thousand deaths due to direct violence. Twenty years later, the knock-on effects of war on Iraq’s environmental
Hannibal Travis • 6 min read
The Political Logic Behind Iraq’s Fragmented Armed Forces
Iraqi Security forces are heavily deployed on the Jumhuriya (Republic) bridge leading to Baghdad’s Green Zone, during a demonstration by supporters of Iraq’s influential Shi’i cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on September 28, 2022, in conjunction with the parliament’s first session in two months. Ameer Al-Mohammedawi/dpa via Getty Images
MER Article

The Political Logic Behind Iraq’s Fragmented Armed Forces

On the cusp of losing power following a poor performance in the October 2021 election, Iraq’s Fateh Alliance and its Popular Mobilization Forces—a coalition of armed factions under the umbrella of the Iraqi state—sent protesters to occupy parts of Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone. The winner
Renad Mansour • 7 min read
The Rise and Fall of Kurdish Power in Iraq
Security forces intervene in a demonstration by university students as they protest the failure of the Kurdistan Regional Government to increase the financial allowances allocated to complete their education. (Later photos show they set fire to the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan building in the background.) Sulaymaniyah, November 23, 2021. Fariq Faraj Mahmood/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
MER Article

The Rise and Fall of Kurdish Power in Iraq

More than thirty years after its founding, the KRG faces an uncertain future.
Bilal Wahab • 11 min read
Two Decades of Uneven Federalism in Iraq
A bridge over the Shatt al-Arab river, formed by the confluence of the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers, in the southern Iraqi city of Basra. (Hussein Faleh/AFP via Getty Images)Iraq with governorate boundaries. Map by the United Nations.
MER Article

Two Decades of Uneven Federalism in Iraq

Transforming the centralized Iraqi state into a federal state was one of the most pressing political goals for the engineers and so-called nation builders behind the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. Proponents of federalism, like the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), saw it
Hamzeh Hadad • 8 min read