ایران

After years of foreign policy setbacks, Ankara is trying to mend fences with Israel, Egypt, Iran, and Russia, and the potential implications for the United States are mostly beneficial -- assuming the Turks can actually pull it off.

While the severity of the Sunni extremist threat inside Iran is debatable, the regime's recent operations against suspected terrorists highlight its pattern of exploiting sectarian sentiment to bolster its regional adventurism.

Ali Larijani's projected victory likely won't help Rouhani, who needs ample support from parliament in order to bolster his chances of winning next year's presidential election.

Despite weeks of reformist spin about the spring election results, the decision to name a notorious hardliner as head of the Experts Assembly shows that Khamenei is intent on making life even more difficult for President Rouhani's camp.

In Tehran's alternative reality, there is no risk to doing business in the Islamic Republic because sanctions no longer exist, yet such claims ignore the role that the regime's own actions play in scaring foreign banks away.

Reflecting broad foreign policy themes dating to World War I, U.S. grand strategy in the Middle East since the Cold War has focused on establishing and managing a global security system to contain and deter outside threats. Given Eurasia's demographic and economic/technical strength, a dominant power or powers arising from

While Western officials should remain true to their longstanding support for human rights and civil liberties in Iran, they should nevertheless be cautious about their ability to shape the country's internal dynamics, focusing instead on influencing its regional and foreign policies through a mixture of pressure and engagement.

Few people understand that Iranian banks do not live up to the standards U.S. agencies require of all foreign financial institutions, and that this shortcoming has nothing to do with the nuclear deal.

Until Iran stops engaging in illicit behaviors such as terrorist financing, banks are likely to see prohibitive reputational, regulatory, and other risks to doing business there.