A POLITICAL BREAKTHROUGH IN SUDAN?

Following months of fighting, Sudan’s current ruling military government and the political opposition have forged a power-sharing agreement.

What happens next in Sudan will depend in large part on the rivalries and divisions that characterize the current regime, which is far from a monolith.

China and Syria: In War and Reconstruction

Traditionally, Syria has not been a strategic priority for China. Nor is it today. However, this does not mean that Beijing has been indifferent to the wide-ranging adverse effects of Syria’s disastrous civil war or to the opportunities that its postwar rebuilding might present.

Turkey, Russia, and the Looming S-400 Crisis

With delivery of the Russian S-400 air defense system to Turkey looming, a new crisis in U.S.-Turkey relations is slowly emerging. While it is obvious that Turkey needs a new air and missile defense system given the security risks in its region, it remains unclear why Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan seeks to acquire the capability from a historical rival and potential adversary instead of through NATO. This decision will likely have major consequences for Turkey and its future geopolitical orientation.

ABU DHABI LOOKS TO SEPARATE FROM RIYADH’S DISASTROUS POLICIES

While the UAE is a close ally of Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi is now seeking to distance itself from Riyadh on critical issues of foreign policy.

Following a string of tanker attacks believed to be perpetrated by Iran, the UAE cited a lack of evidence and declined to blame Tehran, breaking with both Washington and Riyadh.

US and Iran: What is NOT a Smart Policy

Rooting for President Trump to fail in his policy with Iran means calling for empowering and emboldening a theocratic regime that has consistently threatened “Death to America” — with nukes, presumably, if it had the capability, which it is busy acquiring. (Image sources: Ayatollah Khamenei – MEMRI; President Trump – Gage Skidmore/Flickr)

Rooting for President Trump to fail in his policy with Iran means calling for empowering and emboldening a theocratic regime that has consistently threatened “Death to America” — with nukes, presumably, if it had the capability, which it is busy acquiring.

THE DILEMMA OF REPATRIATION

Many European nations are avoiding the responsibility of taking back their citizens who traveled to Iraq and Syria to join the Islamic State; this will only fuel the cycle of radicalization and extremism.

House Homeland Security Committee Takes Aim at Tech Industry’s Failure to Halt Spread of Online Extremist Content

GIFCT Criticism Reiterates Need for Industrywide Standards for Online Extremist Content Removal.

On Wednesday, the U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security held a hearing on social media companies’ efforts to counter online terror content and misinformation. The hearing was called in the wake of March’s New Zealand mosque shootings—in which a terrorist killed 51 people and livestreamed it all on Facebook. A full 24 hours after the livestream, Facebook failed to remove 300,000 reuploads of the attack video. A week later, and then a month later, the Counter Extremism Project (CEP) discovered that the video was still widely available. Tech’s failure to prevent reuploads of known terrorist content sheds light on the failings and ineffectiveness of the industry-led Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT).