Commentaries

Iran’s contemporary influence is neither a late byproduct of the 1979 Islamic Revolution nor analytically sound to reduce, in a simplistic and reductive manner, to a distant Safavid origin-as if Iranian history had not been marked by ruptures, inflections, and profound transformations. Rather, as multiple junctures in its history suggest, Iran has, over centuries, accumulated layered configurations of political and…

The contemporary geopolitical landscape is undergoing a profound structural transformation driven by the maturation of what is best understood as digitized capitalism. In this emerging paradigm, traditional market dynamics and democratic processes are being replaced by platform-based economies, generating the rapid accumulation of unprecedented wealth and power among a new class of technological elite-Digital Lords. This class now commands vast…

In a development that reveals the scale of transformation underway in the Lebanese file, the discussion is no longer confined to how to contain the war or mitigate its repercussions. It has shifted to a deeper level concerning the redefinition of Lebanon’s regional position, the limits of its actual sovereignty, and the shape of the internal balance possible amid the…

At first glance, the paradox of the current landscape appears stark. Donald Trump’s rhetoric seems chaotic, erratic, and deeply personalized-closer to impulsiveness than to strategy. Meanwhile, the conduct of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, particularly in expanding theaters of conflict and broadening target ranges, is widely perceived as a form of irrational gambling. Yet this reading is, in all likelihood,…

The pilot and professor of geopolitics-who has combined the mayoralty of Tehran with the speakership of parliament-now emerges as a potential negotiator and a figure poised to shape the contours of a political transition. The name of Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has recently emerged as that of a figure who has accumulated a rare breadth of experience across…

In the context of the current regional war, internal measures in Jerusalem are being transformed into part of a broader politicization of emergency. As Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde argue, securitization is the process through which an issue is moved beyond the ordinary rules of political practice by presenting it as an existential threat that justifies recourse to exceptional[1] measures.…

It comes as little surprise that Iraq has become one of the central arenas of confrontation and a direct theater in today’s regional war. The 2003 U.S. invasion, the expansion of Iranian influence, the scale of external interventions, and the overlap of local and regional actors on its territory have collectively transformed Iraq into a contested space, both a battlefield…

In a notable incident in the Yarmouk Basin area in the western countryside of Daraa Governorate, several residents received emergency warning messages on their mobile phones classified as “maximum severity.” The alerts were delivered in four languages-Arabic, Hebrew, English, and Russian-and were accompanied by audible alarms and automatic phone vibrations, including an automated audio reading of the message’s content. The…

It is no longer sufficient to analyze Donald Trump’s speeches in order to construct an analytical framework for understanding the strategic objectives and perceptions of the United States in the current war with Iran. Trump’s rhetoric has clearly become a tool of strategic deception, as demonstrated twice in relation to the strikes on Iran. At the same time, it serves…

Many observers of the ongoing war between Iran, the United States, and Israel have been questioning the positions of China and Russia-to which one may add the position of Vietnam. Yet the prevailing Arab political culture-often adorned with notions such as honor, solidarity, and standing with the “just cause”-reflects a persistent conflation between political values and individual moral values, making…