Actually, drones worry Europe more than spying
It is not data protection and surveillance that produces the most complications for the transatlantic intelligence relationship, but rather America's use of armed drones to kill terrorist suspects.
Middle East and North Africa
Repression and violence after the coup in Egypt
Europe should remember that the elements in Egypt that are now likely to be on top of the political system – the Army, the judiciary, the intelligence services – represent a completely unreformed inheritance from the “deep state” as it existed under Mubarak.
Mubarak’s children come home
This is not a victory for freedom but for the old regime, or more precisely the Egyptian deep-state – a bureaucratic, military, and business elite, that never went away, is considered to be the real power in Egypt and that just reasserted its interests.
Syria: the Kurdish view
This essay forms part of an eight-part ECFR series exploring the regional responses, dynamics and ramifications of the Syrian uprising and civil war. These…
Syria: the view from Israel
Israel’s strategic approach to Syria can be described as wary, pragmatic and broken down into specific micro areas of threats and interests rather than comprising a comprehensive picture of what kind of Syria it would like to see, and what it could do to facilitate this outcome.
Syria: the view from Turkey
The crisis in Syria has presented a profound challenge to Ankara’s orientation towards Damascus, forcing it to adapt to changing conditions on the ground that confounded the expectations of Turkish policy makers – as well as challenging its Zero Problem with Neighbors (ZPwN) foreign policy.
Syria: the view from Lebanon
Tensions in Lebanon, whose political fate has long been intimately tied to Syria, are sharpening rapidly as its neighbour sinks deeper into a sectarian civil war. But a growing number of clashes within Lebanon are now raising fears that a domestic eruption is becoming hard to avoid.
Europe sticks a warning label on the settlements
With no real case to make, the bullying opponents of the European Union's long-delayed plan to label produce from Israeli settlements in the West Bank are crying anti-Semitism, cheapening the term at a particularly inopportune time.
Syria: the view from Jordan
Amman has gradually escalated its anti-Assad posture, providing wider political and military support in a bid to try and prevent the emergence of a chaotic no man’s land on its border, it continues to seek a political deal to end the conflict.
Syria: the view from Iran
This essay forms part of an eight-part ECFR series exploring the regional responses, dynamics and ramifications of the Syrian uprising and civil war. These…