Can ISIS Be Defeated Without the Kurds?
Fehim Tastekin, Al-Monitor
Turkey insists Rojava's People's Protection Units must be excluded from the fight against the Islamic State on the Menbic-Jarablus front.
Fehim Tastekin, Al-Monitor
Turkey insists Rojava's People's Protection Units must be excluded from the fight against the Islamic State on the Menbic-Jarablus front.
Matthew Continetti, National Review
We’ve tried calling for settlement freezes, for direct negotiations, for proportionality, and for evenhandedness while ignoring Palestinian incitement, Palestinian terror, Palestinian corruption, Palestinian incompetence in the provision of even the most basic public services. What has that gotten us? Hamas remains in Gaza as knife-wielding terrorists murder wantonly in Jerusalem. Some legacy.
Andrew Bacevich, Politico
In the War for the Greater Middle East, the United States chose neither to contain nor to crush, instead charting a course midway in between. In effect, it chose aggravation. With politicians and generals too quick to declare victory and with the American public too quick to throw their hands up when faced with adversity, U.S. forces rarely stayed long enough to finish the job. Instead of intimidating, U.S. military efforts have annoyed, incited and generally communicated a lack of both competence and determination.
Doug Saunders, G&M
A more equal world, were discovering, does not make people happy. But if we tread gingerly, it could still make a lot of people less miserable.
Andres Oppenheimer, MH
The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are preparing to put out their annual Latin American economic forecasts, and they won’t look pretty. Judging from what I heard in interviews with their top regional economists, Latin America’s overall economy will contract for the second year in a row in 2016.
Hussein Ibish, National
Plainly, trust has been frayed. What's required therefore, particularly in the run-up to Barack Obama’s upcoming trip to Saudi Arabia and meeting with the GCC leaderships, is serious attention to repairing that basic sense of confidence in each other.
Muhammad Amir Rana, Dawn
Some segments in the government excuse their inability to intervene in banned groups’ spaces by claiming that these groups have extensive organisational structures and are apparently not anti-state. Another argument they provide is that these groups believe in the Constitution of Pakistan. However, while such groups may differ with terrorist organisations on their road maps and strategies, they share almost similar goals and objectives.
Nick Cohen, The Guardian
Connoisseurs of the grotesque filed the referendum in that bulging folder of moments when the far left and far right fell into a clammy embrace. Britains anti-Europeans said it showed Britain could leave the EU in June. Everyone else made the mistake of concentrating on more pressing concerns. They should have paid attention. The continents extremists could be our future.
Wil Sands, Narratively
One immigrant’s 25-year journey reaches from Sierra Leone to Spain, through piracy at sea, terror on land, the allure of adventure and the shame of a family left behind.
Bayoumy et al., Reuters
One unintended consequence of the war in Yemen: Al Qaeda now runs its own mini-state, flush with funds from raiding the local central bank and levying taxes at the local port.
James Kirkup, Daily Telegraph
At least until his underwhelming election campaign, Mr Goldsmith was very popular among practising Conservatives; many last year suggested his nomination guaranteed them victory in London. But as Mr Cameron knows and Mr Goldsmith is learning, pleasing party members and wooing the wider electorate are rather different things. Tories choosing their next leader would do well to remember that.
Michael Werz, Spiegel
When he first came to power, Turkish President Erdogan embarked on a path of modernization. But the growth of a new elite withered those reforms and now, an autocracy is taking hold. It is time for the West to rethink its relations with Turkey.
Walter Mead, TAI
What’s forgotten among all the grousing by President Obama and Donald Trump about ‘free riding’ allies is this basic fact of international life: the Pax Americana was intended to suppress global geopolitical and military competition by providing a framework for international security. That benefitted the world by making countries safer at a lower cost and by assuring people that their national defense and access to world trade and markets did not require them to build huge military establishments.
Liz Sly, Wash Post
The suicide bomber who blew up a youth soccer match late last month left barely a dent in the hard, dry earth, and only a faint scorch on a concrete wall nearby. But he gouged a chasm of grief in the heart of the small community that lost more than two dozen of its sons in a single moment, at 6:15 on the evening of March 25.
Asher Schechter, Haaretz
Gaffes aside, Sanders’ embarrassing New York Daily News interview actually illuminates one of the underrated strengths of his campaign.