Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Defense Minister General Abdul-Fattah Sisi will almost certainly become Egypt’s next president, but at the cost of taking Egypt back to the first republic.
Much hinges on how Russia and Iran are approached by the Friends of Syria group, which will have to rethink their approach to opposition representation at negotiations and, more importantly, how a transitional process in Syria will unfold in practice.
The United States and Russia should present Syrians of all persuasions with a practical template against which to measure both the regime’s and the opposition’s willingness to find a genuine political solution.
The nature of the Syrian revolution is particularly complex. A deeper social reading on Syria is required to further understand the violence in Syria and the importance of its timing during the Arab uprisings.
Until the Arab governments undertake security sector reform, the Arab Spring countries—and others that have experienced post-conflict transition, such as Iraq—risk lapsing into new, hybrid forms of authoritarian rule and descending into ever-widening civil strife.
A civil war in Lebanon has been prevented thus far. But the growing vacuum of constitutional authority is undermining the ability of the executive branch to meet coming challenges.
Syria’s newest Islamist party has admirably liberal ambitions. But it lacks the substance to become a viable, functioning party able to survive the current conflict.
If Kerry’s proposal doesn’t include an agreement to eventually end Israeli control of Palestinian territories, then his economic plan simply becomes another iteration of a failed strategy.
The evolving impact of the Syrian crisis on Jordan is apparent as military operations in Syria are coming closer, posing a challenge for the government already suffering from the burden of accommodating 1.3 million Syrian refugees.
A Saudi plan to build a new national army for the Syrian opposition is polarizing the rebels and potentially undermining Riyadh’s objectives in Syria.
