Last Updated 3/7/2023 Following earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, Israel “attacked” in some way Aleppo International Airport rendering humanitarian support delayed as unspecified damage was done to the airport forcing the delay/rerouting of humanitarian aid coming from airplanes. Israeli relations with Syria have never been particularly good, especially as Syria is, in a way, a cousin of Iran. Iran for… Read more »
Last Updated 3/14/2023 Block 6 For the past decade, Iran has been working to become a hegemon in the Middle Eastern region, competing with Turkey, Israel, and Saudi Arabia along with other smaller U.S allies in the area, and has been working on creating a snare around each of the countries listed minus Turkey. Visible in Iranian proxies in Lebanon,… Read more »
Saudi Arabia and Iran have hopefully begun a new age of political friendliness towards one another with political deals being reached through Chinese mediation. Although Saudi Arabia and Iran have had tense relations for the past few decades, Iran has been looking to open talks with the Middle Eastern power house in hopes of becoming a more prominent power figure… Read more »
The US government is beginning to question our ties with Saudi Arabia given their many exposed human rights violations. Congress recently proposed a resolution for the Biden administration to gather information and submit a report to congress detailing Saudi Arabia’s human rights record. This resolution was passed under a provision of the Foreign Assistance Act where congress can vote to… Read more »
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/syrias-assad-says-would-welcome-more-russian-troops-2023-03-16/ This story briefly summarizes the history between Russia and Assad’s Syria, who Russia helped maintain control over the country during Syria’s many internal conflicts. As a demonstration of unity and thankfulness for Russia’s continued support of Assad’s regime, Syria has publicly stated that it supports Russia on the issue of Ukraine and it is willing to house Russian soldiers… Read more »
Link: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/amid-ongoing-lebanese-stalemate-france-renews-sanctions-threat-2023-03-14/ Due to a deadlock in the lebanese government france and by extension the eu has threatened sanctions against them. After Lebanon’s former president’s term ended last October their government has not been able to elect a new lease which has led to rampant corruption and extreme misallocation of funds that has caused an economic crisis with Lebanon’s currency… Read more »
Link: https://apnews.com/article/syria-earthquake-assad-rapprochement-conflict-uprising-reconstruction-9de84b45246c8491be020de6b267ae54 After a massive earthquake devastated Turkey and Syria causing billions of dollars in damages and killing around 50,000 people (6000 in Syria alone) has actually caused Syria to be able to jump into the international world. Syria which has been embroiled in a 12 year long civil war has lost around 226 billion dollars which is about 4… Read more »
Link: https://apnews.com/article/saudi-arabia-china-iran-boeing-biden-d1aad0d6aae71993d7bc7e6336006a72 Saudi Arabia, through a Chinese led deal, has started to re-establish peace talks in iran. Potentially hoping to end a long and fraught relationship that involved Arabia executing a high ranking priest of Iran and then Iranians storming the Saudi Arabian embassy. At the same time Saudi Arabia has also announced a contract to buy Boeing planes for… Read more »
Last Updated 3/1/2023 Block 6 For the past few decades, Iran has been working to achieve nuclear material, enriched enough to be used in a nuclear weapon. Now, Iran has only been enriching uranium to 3.67% as of 2019, this grade of uranium is only put to use in nuclear power plants(Iran has a single Nuclear Power plant) and is… Read more »