The Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey

Hamas’ October 7, 2023, paradigm-shifting attack has prompted Israel to change its defense doctrine with devastating consequences for the Middle East. No longer satisfied with operating on the principle of deterrence, involving regular strikes against Hamas in Gaza and Lebanon, militant Palestinian groups in the West Bank, Yemen’s Houthi rebels, Iranian targets in Syria and the Islamic Republic, a...

In this timely commentary, award-winning journalist and scholar James M. Dorsey unpacks the deeper implications of the recent Iran-Israel escalation. From regional power dynamics to global repercussions, he offers sharp, incisive insights into what this confrontation reveals—and what might come next.

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, is caught between a rock and a hard place. He risks being doomed if he does and doomed if he doesn’t. Despite causing significant damage and Israeli casualties with its missile barrages, Iran is incapable of winning a war against Israel.

The Embassy of the United States in Tel Aviv was temporarily closed after the building sustained minor damage following an Iranian missile strike overnight, US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee confirmed on Monday. Though no injuries or casualties were reported among US diplomatic staff, videos surfaced on the internet showing the consulate building impacted by the concussive force of nearby expl...

Is Israel against a negotiated resolution to Iran’s nuclear programme_TRT 16062025 by James M. Dorsey

Beyond shifting the paradigm of Middle Eastern geopolitics, Israel’s dramatic strikes against Iran are likely to shape the outcome of a battle within the Trump administration over US policy towards the region. The battle, with Israel at its core, pits Make America Great Again proponents against pro-Israel figures in the administration, with Iran constituting a major battlefield. Putting Iran on th...

Iran has vowed a strong response to an Israeli airstrike on its nuclear program early Friday. James M. Dorsey, senior fellow at Singapore’s S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, explains how Tehran is expected to react following Israel’s major military offensive targeting its nuclear and military sites.

To say Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is a highly controversial figure in Israeli politics is, at best, an understatement. Yet, his notion of a forever war against Palestinians resonates with a significant segment of Israeli public opinion, despite differences over strategy, tactics, and the prioritisation of the war’s goals.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu may be grasping at straws in his hope that US President Donald J. Trump will continue to back his refusal to end the Gaza war and resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The prime minister is placing a risky bet that Mr. Trump’s recent suggestion that he is focussing on Iran nuclear negotiations, China, and Russia rather than Gaza means that the continue...

Israel’s throttling of aid for Gaza is as much about weaponizing food and other essential goods as it is about eventually installing a post-war Palestinian administration empathetic to Israeli concerns. Similarly, Israel’s refusal to end the war intends to create space for an alternative to Hamas to emerge as the group’s popularity in Gaza hits rock bottom. So is Israel’s sidelining of the United...

Critics have long argued that Israel’s 58-year-long occupation of Palestinian lands conquered in the 1967 Middle East war has brutalised Israeli society. Israel’s 20-month-old assault on Gaza and the Israeli public’s attitudes towards Gazan Palestinians serve as Exhibit A of the degree of brutalisation. So does last week’s pummelling of two Palestinian public bus drivers by militantly racist fans...

President Trump's Gulf Yatla-Indian Futures 26052025 by James M. Dorsey

The Trump and Netanyahu administrations may diverge on immediate issues, including Iran, Gaza, and Syria, but are weighing a long-term strategy to strengthen Israel militarily while making it less dependent on the United States.

This week, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu accelerated the Jewish state’s travels towards international pariah status by declaring that the Gaza war aims to expel Gazan Palestinians from their homeland. Mr. Netanyahu added resettlement of Gaza’s 2.1 million Palestinians to his war goals after earlier adopting as official Israeli policy a plan to move Gazans out of the Strip first put for...

European members of the world soccer body FIFA staged a dramatic walkout at the world governing body’s congress in Paraguay when President Gianni Infantino arrived late earlier this month. The Europeans accused Mr. Infantino of prioritising his personal political interests by attributing greater importance to meetings with US President Donald J. Trump in Qatar, the host of the 2022 World Cup, than...

The winds didn’t just blow hot when Donald J. Trump recently touched down in Qatar on the first visit ever to the Gulf state by a sitting US president, which generated deals worth US$s1.2 trillion. They also blew cold, chilled by a long-standing, Israel-inspired campaign aimed to sully Qatar’s reputation.

Donald J. Trump and the American economy are two beneficiaries of the president’s Gulf road show. So are the Gulf states, Syria, and Make America Great Again supporters within Mr. Trump’s administration. In less than 24 hours in the kingdom, Mr. Trump received a standing ovation from Arab leaders and hundreds of thousands poured into the streets of Syrian towns and cities to celebrate his lifting...

Syria could be the Middle East’s next exploding powder keg.

Alarm bells went off in Jerusalem and pro-Israel circles in Washington when US President Donald J. Trump this week announced a truce in America’s Red Sea tanker war with Yemen’s Houthi rebels that failed to take Israeli interests into account. Mr. Trump’s announcement of a deal that protects US assets and international shipping but leaves space for continued Houthi targeting of Israel suggested th...

US President Donald J. Trump and Hamas have separately opened a Pandora’s Box that could fuel Middle Eastern fires for years to come. Hamas did so when it unleashed Israel’s assault on Gaza with its October 7, 2023, attack on Israel that killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians. With more than 50,000 dead and tens of thousands wounded and/or maimed for life, Palestinians have paid a stark price....

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s embrace of the global far-right faces a difficult choice. The question for Mr. Netanyahu is whether to maintain Israel’s boycott of Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD), the country’s second-largest political party, and Austria’s Freedom Party (FPÖ) amid an escalating feud between the Trump administration and Germany over attitudes toward the far righ...

Algeria may be the latest target in efforts to garner further Arab recognition of the Jewish state, despite its Gaza war conduct and rejection of Palestinian national aspirations. To that end, a Philadelphia-based far-right pro-Israeli organisation, the Middle East Forum, has put Algeria in its crosshairs in an apparent attempt to build pressure on the North African state to establish diplomatic r...

Netanyahu hardens his position despite pressure to lift the Gaza blockade by James M. Dorsey

The coming days will tell whether it’s crunch time for Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. The litmus test will be whether US President Donald J. Trump forces Mr. Netanyahu to lift his almost two-months-long blocking of the flow of humanitarian aid into war-ravaged Gaza.

Betar, the far-right youth movement of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, is happy to help US President Donald J. Trump curtail pro-Palestinian speech and academic freedoms. That has mainstream American Jews fear that the Trump administration’s crackdown on democratic freedoms of speech, assembly, and academia will fuel anti-Semitism rather than enhance their security.