Middle East Forum

Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and a founder of the National Iranian American Council, has sat at Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian's table in New York three Septembers running: 2024, 2025 and 2026. In a Middle East Insider special edition, MEF Executive Director Gregg Roman assembles the record. Official photographs from Iran's presidency, reporting by the Associated Press and Iran International, a broadcast host on tape and Parsi's own post place him at the sessions with Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi during the UN General Assembly. Tehran's state press has cited him 86 times since the start of 2024. At 10:04 p.m. on election night he posted: "Let's be frank. The Democrats didn't win the midterms. Iran did." Why it matters: Quincy's transparency page says staff may accept in-kind support from foreign governments to attend convenings, with management approval. Roman writes that whether a seat at the Iranian president's table falls under that rule, and who approved it, is a question for Quincy. He grades each document and sets out what the record does not show. Read more: https://lnkd.in/eAVcefcu #MiddleEastInsider #Iran #QuincyInstitute #ForeignInfluence #UNGA #MiddleEastForum

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Iran-Backed Militias View Divisions in Washington as Opportunities to Strengthen Their Own Positions

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"We're not talking about two million dollar interceptors." Bernard Haykel of Princeton University on the cheap drones that reach the Houthis, and why he suspects more of Iran's money goes to bribing Omani officials. From The MEF Podcast. Full episode: https://lnkd.in/eRRKk4f3 Views expressed are the guest's own.

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"This is a survival regime." Bernard Haykel of Princeton University on why, if its existence is threatened, Saudi Arabia would tie up with Israel and let the question of Palestine recede. From The MEF Podcast. Full episode: https://lnkd.in/eRRKk4f3 Views expressed are the guest's own.

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UNIFIL's mandate on Israel's northern border expires on December 31, 2026. Amine Ayoub writes in MEF Online that the end of another U.N. mission, MINURSO in Western Sahara, shows Israel what comes next. MINURSO deployed in 1991 to organize a referendum that never took place. After a Russian veto deadlocked the Security Council on October 30, its mandate expired and the U.N. announced its liquidation on November 1. UNIFIL, with 7,565 peacekeepers from 46 countries and a $555.82 million budget, kept relative calm for 17 years but never had a mandate to forcibly disarm Hezbollah. The IDF reported tunnels and weapons within about a kilometer of its positions. Why it matters: Ayoub draws four lessons from Morocco, which never entrusted its security to the U.N. flag: do not outsource vital defense, build durable realities on the ground, anchor security in bilateral understandings with Washington and regional partners rather than multilateral consensus, and prepare now for the border after the peacekeepers leave. Read more: https://lnkd.in/e58ay2pN #Israel #Lebanon #UNIFIL #WesternSahara #Morocco #MiddleEastForum

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Democrats will hold the House and the Senate in January. They will hold the gavels, the confirmations, and the money. They will not hold the veto: the Democratic caucus has at least 54 Senate seats, and an override takes 67. In a special Long View edition of Middle East Insider, MEF Executive Director Gregg Roman sets out what the new majorities can and cannot do on the Iran war, the aid to Israel, and the campaign against Islamist influence at home. The past two years of action against Islamist organizations came from executives, governors, and prosecutors, not from votes in Congress, so no vote in Congress reverses it. The federal court order of May requiring the CAIR Foundation to name its foreign donors stands. The test is Texas, where a new governor can rescind the state's designation of CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood. Why it matters: The partners exist in both parties. Thirty-one House Democrats voted for the DETERRENT Act in March 2025. The Forum will put eight asks to the new chairmen by name, from the DETERRENT Act and the Brotherhood designations in statute to a successor framework for aid to Israel signed by the end of fiscal 2027. Read more: https://lnkd.in/ewpxis76 #Congress #Iran #Israel #Islamism #MiddleEastInsider #MiddleEastForum

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In their own words, on their own video, Michigan Islamist preachers curse America and pray for jihad. Their institutions took $47.4 million in public money.

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The Middle East Quarterly asked "End American Aid to Israel?" in the fall of 1995. On Tuesday, President Trump said American military aid to Israel ends in December. In Middle East Insider Issue 074, MEF Executive Director Gregg Roman traces the 31 years in between: Prime Minister Netanyahu's 1996 pledge to Congress to begin reducing assistance, the economic grant phased out over the decade after 1998, and military aid that grew instead, to $38 billion in the 2016 memorandum that runs through September 2028. Congress appropriates every dollar, and from January Democrats will hold both chambers. In July the House rejected an amendment to strike the $3.3 billion, 314 to 104. Why it matters: The Forum's position is to end the aid from strength and on purpose, under a signed agreement. Roman sets out what that agreement needs: a framework signed by the end of fiscal 2027, a glide path to 2038, missile-defense funding doubled to $1 billion, export-control relief, and Israeli institutions to carry the change. No such framework has been signed yet. Read more: https://lnkd.in/eNmK2tHQ #Israel #ForeignAid #USIsrael #Congress #MiddleEastInsider #MiddleEastForum

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