Iran and the United States: An Insider’s View

by Peter Jenkins Seyed Hossein Mousavian, the lead author of Iran and the United States: An Insider’s View on the Failed Past and the Road to Peace, has two objectives: to help American readers understand the Iranian perspective on the… Continue Reading

Explainer: The Oil Price Plunge

by Sara Vakhshouri In the past several days—despite the conflicts affecting Iraq, Syria, Iran and Russia—oil prices have been on a downward trend, hitting their lowest number in the past four years. As of October 2014, oil prices are more… Continue Reading

Bookends of America’s Broken Regional Policy

by James A. Russell It’s hard not to cringe watching the United States careen around the Middle East these days, dispensing bombs, money and political fealty in various doses depending on the crisis of the day to a series of… Continue Reading

The US and a Crumbling Levant

by Emile Nakhleh The international media is currently mesmerized by the advance of Daesh (ISIS or ISIL) on the Syrian city of Kobani near the Turkish border, but Arab states and the US need to look beyond Kobani’s fate and… Continue Reading

US Policy Towards Iran Played Big Role in Rise of Sunni Extremism

by Shireen T. Hunter Throughout the recent handwringing about how the US and other Western countries failed to foresee the emergence of ISIS, one factor has been totally ignored, either intentionally or inadvertently: the impact of Washington’s hostility towards Iran,… Continue Reading