Current Analysis

War Across Boundaries–Perspectives on Iran and a Region Under Siege

On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel launched airstrikes on Iran, initiating a war with wide-ranging consequences for Iran and the broader region and devastating effects for their populations. Already, millions have been displaced and thousands killed. But this war is not a sudden rupture. It is the

The Editors • 28 min read

MERIP updates

Call for Pitches—Visual Art & Cultural Production in the Middle East and North Africa

MERIP is seeking pitches for our Summer 2026 issue exploring visual art and cultural production in the Middle East and North Africa. We invite submissions that center artistic practices and cultural histories while attending to the political, social and material conditions in which art is made and experienced. We welcome

The Editors • 1 min read

Current Analysis

COP27, Alaa Abd El-Fattah and the Dreams of the Revolution—A Conversation with Omar Robert Hamilton and Ashish Ghadiali

On November 6, 2022, COP27 will begin in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, with the aim of delivering on the Paris Agreement and the intention to acknowledge the disproportionate effects of climate change on the Global South, through "Loss and Damage." On the same day, British-Egyptian political prisoner and

The Editors • 12 min read

Current Analysis

Revisiting MERIP Coverage of Israel as an Apartheid State

The recent upsurge in analysis of Israel as an apartheid state has peaked again with Amnesty International’s February 2022 report. The willingness of mainstream non-governmental organizations to use the language of apartheid marks a shift in the terms of the debate—one that builds on a long history

The Editors • 5 min read

Current Analysis

Revisiting MERIP Coverage of Iran and Its Elections

As Iran’s elections approach (June 18, 2021), MERIP revisits recent articles that provide a deeper context for understanding politics in Iran today. The pieces gathered here include a forum re-thinking US-Iranian relations as well as articles examining key elections in Iran over the last 20 years, f

The Editors • 4 min read

Current Analysis

Revisiting MERIP Coverage of Gaza, Jerusalem and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

For more than 50 years, MERIP has provided a depth of analysis on Palestine and Palestinian politics that is unmatched. Here we dive into the archives to highlight both historical and recent MERIP articles that provide key context for the current crises in Gaza and Jerusalem as well as important bac

The Editors • 7 min read

Current Analysis

Revisiting MERIP Coverage 30 Years After the First Gulf War

MERIP’s coverage of the First Gulf War sought to understand the crisis beyond the battlefield kinetics: from Iraq’s August 1990 invasion of Kuwait to the US-led Desert Storm military operation liberating Kuwait and looking beyond to the regional aftermath. Our authors and editors offered historicall

The Editors • 6 min read

Current Analysis

Revisiting MERIP Coverage of the Arab Uprisings

Revolutions are the singular political events that “confront us directly and inevitability with the problem of beginning,” argued Hannah Arendt. MERIP’s coverage of the uprisings of 2011 struggled intensely with this conundrum while cross-regional mobilizations, alliances and confrontations emerged

The Editors • 5 min read

Return to Revolution

The 2019 uprisings in Sudan, Algeria, Lebanon and Iraq, in addition to resurgent protests in Morocco and Jordan—all countries that did not experience revolutionary uprisings in 2011—extend the previous wave of revolts to the rest of the region.

The Editors • 2 min read

Current Analysis

A Tribute to the Palestinian Artist Kamal Boullata

We mourn the passing of the great Palestinian artist, Kamal Boullata, who died on August 6, 2019. Kamal was a dear friend and colleague, and closely associated with MERIP from its earliest days. We offer the following tribute.

The Editors • 11 min read

MER Article

The Politics of Paper Trails

States often hide their accountability in plain sight: in redacted documents, incomplete flight manifests, encrypted data, shredded memos and reclassified archives. They also go to great lengths to keep their internal affairs private: banning oppositional media, jailing investigative journalists and disappearing dissenters. Economic and political elites also obscure accountability in

The Editors • 6 min read

MER Article

The New Landscape of Intervention

Even as the 2000’s saw the return of traditional forms of imperial intervention—with the US deployment of military forces in Afghanistan and Iraq in pursuit of a quixotic and unwinnable War on Terror—there are increasingly new forms of intervention that must be understood, assessed and mapped.

The Editors • 5 min read