Arab Digest podcasts

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is the journalist and author Elias Jahshan. Elias, who edited This Arab is Queer, an anthology of LGBTQ+ Arab writers, talks about the power of language and of music and food to hold truth to power, to challenge intolerance and repression and to push forward the struggle for liberation in the Arab world. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to joi...

The Baker Institute's Kristian Coates Ulrichsen joins Arab Digest editor William Law for a conversation about the extremist regime Benjamin Netanyahu has assembled and how far-right ministers like Itamar Ben-Gvir in provoking provocations against Palestinians are creating a dangerous new environment, a tinderbox which needs only a single spark to set off a major regional conflagration. Sign up NOW...

Kurdish-American journalist Sirwan Kajjo joins Arab Digest editor William Law in this week's podcast. Sirwan is just back from the Kurdish Region of Iraq (KRI) and he brings to the table his analysis of the current situation, including tensions between Erbil and Baghdad over oil revenues and the ongoing struggle for supremacy between the two families who control the KRI, the Barzanis and the Talib...

Arab Digest editor William Law welcomes the Palestinian journalist and commentator Nour Odeh to the podcast. A recent UN General Assembly decision to seek an opinion about Israel's occupation has wide-reaching implications, ones that Israel is clearly rattled by. Against the backdrop of the most extreme government in Israeli history, Nour explains the importance of the decision for the cause of Pa...

Annelle Sheline from the Washington-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft joins Arab Digest editor William Law for a conversation about US foreign policy in the Middle East. Two years into the Biden presidency perceptions about America and its role have shifted dramatically in the region but the president and his advisors seem locked in a belief that little has changed. Sign up NOW at...

Author and blogger Amal Ghandour joins editor William Law as his guest on the Arab Digest podcast. Their conversation about Lebanon, Jordan and the wider Arab world takes as its point of departure Amal's latest book This Arab Life which is both an intensely personal memoir and a ruthlessly honest assessment of the past, the present and the near future of a region riven by social, political and eco...

On 21 January, 2022 we podcast Lina al-Hathloul’s powerful Testament of Courage. She spoke about her sister Loujain, the Saudi women’s rights activist and for all prisoners of conscience and their families. Lina is Head of Monitoring & Comms @ALQST_ORG and co-author of the children’s book Loujain Dreams of Sunflowers. In honouring the courage and resilience of human rights defenders and their fami...

Sami Hamdi, the CEO of The International Interest, joins Arab Digest editor William Law for a wide-ranging, fast-paced and thought-provoking review of a tumultuous year for the MENA region as alliances shifted and fissures emerged with new tensions flaring up even as old ones eased. The podcast wraps up with Sami's take on what to look for in 2023. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join th...

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is Gulf State Analytics CEO Giorgio Cafiero. With relations between the US and key GCC players fraying, China has upped its game seizing both economic and diplomatic advantage. But with Washington remaining the Gulf's security guarantor, the GCC will need to tread a balanced line. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club and start rec...

Arab Digest editor William Law asks Libya expert Tarek Megerisi to give his assessment of the current situation. His diagnosis is that yes the country remains in a downward spiral but with a new UN special representative in place there is some reason to believe that this seemingly intractable conflict may, possibly, be heading into a more positive space. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to j...

Arab Digest editor William Law welcomes back Helen Lackner, a leading expert on Yemen to talk about her latest book Yemen: Poverty and Conflict, published by Routledge. The book builds on her profound experience in the country over several decades and is an invaluable primer on its extraordinary history and on current issues that threaten Yemen including the ongoing war, climate change and foreign...

Arab Digest editor William Law welcomes back Egyptian analyst Maged Mandour. Their conversation this weeks looks at how international finance has enabled President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to continue his mega-projects spending binge as the military tightens its iron grip on the economy and ordinary Egyptians are plunged ever deeper into poverty. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club...

Arab Digest editor William Law welcomes back Jim Krane to the podcast. Jim is an energy research fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute in Houston. Their conversation focusses on the remarkable partnership that has grown up between Saudi Arabia and Russia and how the Saudis are very effectively using oil and the rediscovered clout of OPEC+ to leverage geopolitical advantages. Sign up NOW at A...

Arab Digest editor welcomes Qatar University's Dr Ali Bakir as the podcast heads to Doha. In a wide-ranging conversation they talk about how Qatar is responding to the criticism it is receiving ahead of the World Cup, Sharm el-Sheikh and COP27, the implications for the Gulf of the US mid-terms and how Qatar's ally Türkiye seeks to consolidate gains in the region with a soft power agenda. Sign up N...

RUSI associate fellow Samuel Ramani joins Arab Digest editor William Law to discuss Putin's flagging image in the Middle East, how his stratagems in Libya and Syria are playing out, relations with the Israelis as Netanyahu returns, Türkiye's role in getting grain moving again and how the Middle East is weighing up its relationship with a leader who in provoking a war has stumbled badly. Sign up NO...

Francis Ghilès, associate senior researcher at the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs, is Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week. Algeria, like other hydrocarbon producers, has experienced a huge windfall thanks to the war in Ukraine. The question is will the country see itself return to a position of prominence in North Africa and beyond or will it once again squander the opport...

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is Dr Andreas Krieg, assistant professor at the Defence Studies Department, King's College London. With global turbulence and turmoil running high the Gulf remains an island of stability but faces challenges as the war in Ukraine plays out, relations with Washington fray and the UK, a longtime GCC ally, staggers from one political crisis to the next...

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is Dr Renad Mansour, senior research fellow and head of the Iraq Initiative at London's Chatham House. He has just returned from Baghdad and this wide-ranging conversation explores Iraq's political impasse and the structure that is responsible for it, the culture of violence and the enigmatic and powerful populist cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Also on the...

As turmoil roils the ruling Conservative party, Arab Digest editor William Law is in conversation with the Middle East analyst Michael Stephens. They explore how political instability and economic uncertainty in the UK are accelerating the decline of Britain's status in the region. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club and start receiving our daily newsletter & podcasts.

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is Lina Khatib, director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the London-based think tank Chatham House. Their conversation focusses on the political and business elites that are plundering Lebanon. Ordinary people are suffering huge deprivation, with 80% of the population now below the poverty line, as the economic crisis caused by the...

The Arab Digest podcast conversation this week takes a hard look at US foreign policy in the Middle East under President Joe Biden. Digest editor William Law's guest is Jon Hoffman, a geopolitical analyst and commentator. Hoffman sees Biden's approach as a continuation of decades of failed policies that have served neither the US nor the people of the region well. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for...

After a tumultuous week which saw the death of Queen Elizabeth and the rout of the Russian army in Ukraine, the Middle East analyst and author Kristian Coates Ulrichsen returns to the podcast to discuss in detail his recent tweets with Arab Digest editor William Law. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club and start receiving our daily newsletter & podcasts.

Arab Digest editor William Law's guest this week is the Yemen and Jihadist expert Dr Elisabeth Kendall. She assesses the enduring threat of AQAP - Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula - and the extent to which the movement can exploit both the war and the current truce in an attempt to reassert its terror bona fides. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club and start receiving our dail...

Kicking off a new podcast season, Arab Digest editor William Law is in conversation with the Palestinian academic Dr Dalal Iriqat. Their conversation examines both the current and the historic situation of the Palestinian people and their resilience in the struggle to secure human rights and end the Israeli occupation. Sign up NOW at ArabDigest.org for free to join the club and start receiving our...

On 10 October 2021 we podcast Maged Mandour’s incisive assessment of the military industrial dictatorship President Sisi is building in Egypt. Maged is a political analyst who writes openDemocracy’s “Chronicles of the Arab Revolt” column, covering the affairs of the Arab world with a special focus on social change in the post-Arab Spring Middle East. He is also a Sada writer for the Carnegie Endow...