International response remains fragmented
As of the fall of 2025, the Gaza Strip is in the grip of a profound humanitarian crisis. After nearly two years of conflict, which began in October 2023, the toll on civilians is catastrophic. Weakened by a long blockade, the enclave’s population now stands on the brink of humanitarian disaster: tens of thousands of people dead, mass displacement, collapsing infrastructure, famine and outbreaks of disease.
Conflict dynamics
The war in Gaza began on October...
The End of U.S. Guarantees? How Recent Attacks Are Redrawing the Persian Gulf’s Power Map
A geostrategic frontier between the Global North and South, the East and West, and the Persian Gulf has always existed. It is situated where vital energy supplies, marine trade, and ideological conflict converge. The Persian Gulf has become a focal point of international interest and attention since the
Arab Spring
uprisings broke out in 2011.
Recent events suggest that tides are changing. Attacks against...
The primary objective of "Kurdish-Turkish reconciliation" is Turkish foreign policy
Upon reaching an agreement with the Turkish state, Turkey has taken the first definitive step towards executing the “
Terror-Free Turkey
” plan, which seeks to find a legal and constitutional approach for the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) to disband and lay down its arsenal. Last October, PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan backed this plan, which was
promoted
by Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet...
Now restraint is giving way to deterrence
In early August, an official statement from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs put an end to yet another potentially useful arms control instrument: the unilateral moratorium on the deployment of ground-based intermediate- and shorter-range missiles has been lifted. Why did this happen, and what comes next?
The end of a long process
The Stabilizing “Basic Principles”: Moscow Reduces Options for Pre-Nuclear Escalation. Russia’s leading experts on the...
The Potsdam Conference, which took place 80 years ago from July 17 to August 2, 1945, stands as a symbol of diplomacy and the negotiation of a new peaceful world order.
A pioneer unit of the Soviet army built a wooden bridge to replace the destroyed Glienicker Bridge and allow the "Big Three "delegations — USA, Russia, Great Britain — to travel from their residences in Babelsberg to the conference venue in Cecilienhof and back.
Just a simple wooden bridge to facilitate diplomacy, communication...
The possibility of a return to extreme-era dynamics cannot be dismissed
The Ukraine conflict may well pave the way for a larger scale Russia-NATO confrontation. While hard to fathom and with everything suggesting that the scenario remains quite unlikely, it relies on nuclear deterrence as its main pillar. But just how effective can it be in averting a conflict?
US President Donald Trump’s statements, and his demands to put an end to hostilities in Ukraine may be interpreted as a sign that the...
If Tehran persists in its accusations and Baku clings to its alliances, the tension between the two will likely remain within the bounds of a "cold war" dynamic
The tension between Iran and Azerbaijan has gone beyond a mere diplomatic spat—it has become a reflection of deeper shifts in the geopolitical balance across the South Caucasus. Tehran has accused its northern neighbor of allowing Israel to use Azerbaijani territory to launch attacks deep inside Iran, an allegation that resurfaced...
The Islamic Republic appears to be deliberately seeking to strengthen Iranian-Islamic identity by combining Islamic revolutionary values with elements of nationalism
For the first time in three weeks, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has made a public
appearance
, attending a significant Shiite Muslim religious ceremony. Reformists and others from Iran's political spectrum have praised Khamenei's come back, which comes amid increased fears of an Israeli assassination attempt. This...
The 2025 summit is a marker of the end of the period of unconditional unification of the Euro-Atlantic community around the “Russian threat”" and very soon the allies will again face the existential question: “Why us?”
The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s summit is traditionally one of the last events of the spring political season in Europe. In late June—early July, the allies “synchronise their watches” on the results of the first half of the year and record agreements for the future...
The actions of Israel and the US are reviving the narrative that some states have the right to develop nuclear weapons and use force only because they consider themselves civilized
His heart is as firm as a stone; Yea, as hard as a piece of the nether millstone.
When he raiseth up himself, the mighty are afraid:
By reason of breakings they purify themselves.
The sword of him that layeth at him cannot hold:
The spear, the dart, nor the habergeon.
He esteemeth iron as straw, And brass as rotten...
