Iran

Policy Analysis on Iran

Middle East 2017: Challenges and Choices - Strategy with Michael Singh

Where does the Middle East fit into America's global strategy, and is the rise of Russian and Chinese great-power competition in the region a permanent new reality or an anomaly that the next president can reverse? This episode of the Institute's Near East PolicyCast podcast features a conversation with Michael

Nov 4, 2016

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Michael Singh

Brief Analysis

Iran Faces Challenges in Implementing Its FATF Action Plan

Despite agreeing on an action plan, Tehran has far to go to meet international standards aimed at countering money laundering and terror financing.

Oct 26, 2016

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Katherine Bauer

Articles & Testimony

Hezbollah's Criminal Networks: Useful Idiots, Henchmen, and Organized Criminal Facilitators

Hezbollah's broad web of shady 'facilitators' provide an attractive means of quickly moving and laundering massive amounts of illicit money, but they also reveal the supposed 'resistance' group as the criminal enterprise it has become.

Oct 25, 2016

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Matthew Levitt

Brief Analysis

Beware of Muqtada al-Sadr

Oct 19, 2016

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Phillip Smyth

Brief Analysis

How Iran's Involvement in Yemen Could Draw America into the War

Along with Iran's heightened anti-American rhetoric and local naval deployments, the recent Houthi missile attacks against U.S. vessels raise fears that Tehran's clients may take the war into a new and more dangerous phase.

Oct 17, 2016

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Farzin Nadimi

Brief Analysis

Missile Attacks on the USS Mason: Principles to Guide a U.S. Response

After three antishipping attacks in two weeks by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, Washington should take firm steps to prevent this from becoming the new normal off Yemen's coast.

Oct 12, 2016

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Jeremy Vaughan
Michael Eisenstadt
Michael Knights

In-Depth Reports

The Shiite Clergy Post-Khamenei:

Balancing Authority and Autonomy

This Research Note takes a hard look at the Iranian regime's expanding totalitarian tendencies and the implications for the dwindling autonomy of Iran's clerics.

Oct 11, 2016

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Mehdi Khalaji

Brief Analysis

Is Iran's Recent Muscle Flexing More Than the Usual Show of Force?

Tehran continues to boast about military capabilities that bolster deterrence, but ambiguities in its definition of national interests raise concerns about how it will wield its new offensive weapons and increasingly assertive policies.

Oct 7, 2016

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Farzin Nadimi

Brief Analysis

Houthi Antishipping Attacks in the Bab al-Mandab Strait

Yemeni rebels successfully attacked a UAE military vessel with what appeared to be an Iranian cruise missile, raising the need for a stronger U.S. role in the strategic waterway.

Oct 6, 2016

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Alex Almeida
Jeremy Vaughan
Michael Knights

Fikra Forum

On Saudi Arabia and Iran: Tread Lightly

However hard it seems for Iran to fight against the United States’ “soft war,” nothing appears easier and less costly than mobilizing Iranians worldwide against Saudi Arabia or poisoning their consciencewith anti-Arab sentiments.

Oct 4, 2016

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Mehdi Khalaji

Fikra Forum

Preparing for Regime Change in Iran

With some Arabs leading the call, various dissidents like the Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK) core of the NCRI are accelerating their calls for regime change in Iran.

Oct 4, 2016

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Raymond Tanter

Brief Analysis

Iran Shows Off Its Bounty of Crashed Drones and New UAVs

The IRGC has sought to prove the resilience and technological prowess of its new UAVs by displaying them next to recovered models from other countries, but it may also be trying to mask key shortcomings.

Oct 4, 2016

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Farzin Nadimi

Articles & Testimony

Why Iran Is More Dangerous Than the Islamic State

Arabs and Israelis are in the same boat, facing Iranian-backed threats all around them and yearning for Western leadership on how best to roll back the regime's destabilizing policies.

Sep 29, 2016

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Moshe Yaalon

Brief Analysis

Turkey's Rewarming Ties with Iran

The two countries appear to be compartmentalizing their shared and divergent interests in Syria and Iraq, but such an approach is highly vulnerable to unexpected military incidents and other factors.

Sep 29, 2016

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Soner Cagaptay

Brief Analysis

What Trump and Clinton Said (and Didn't Say) About the Middle East

With a few exceptions, the candidates focused more on debating the past than offering ideas and prescriptions for today's Middle East challenges.

Sep 27, 2016

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Robert Satloff

Articles & Testimony

Iran's 'Resistance Economy' -- and Stalled Reform Efforts

Rather than honoring its pledge to comply with international norms on money laundering and terrorist finance, Iran may point to two prominent banks in particular as safe spaces for Western engagement.

Sep 23, 2016

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Matthew Levitt
Katherine Bauer

Multimedia

Middle East 2017: Challenges and Choices with Amb. James Jeffrey

There's no stopping Iranian ambitions if Moscow has Tehran's back, warns Ambassador James Jeffrey, unless the United States is prepared to "get real" about its Middle East engagement in the next presidential administration. The former American ambassador to Iraq and to Turkey, Jeffrey explains the importance of setting, and upholding

Sep 22, 2016

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James Jeffrey

Brief Analysis

Clinton vs. Trump on Key Middle East Issues: Prepping for the Debate

Read what both candidates and their parties have said about Syria, ISIS, the Iran nuclear deal, U.S.-Israel relations, and host of other pressing regional issues.

Sep 22, 2016

Maps & Graphics

Brief Analysis

What Will Year Two of Russia's Syria Intervention Bring?

Moscow and Iran are already several steps ahead of Washington in shaping the war's potential endgame, so the next administration will need to be mindful of Putin's likeliest strategies and strongest levers if it wants a different outcome.

Sep 14, 2016

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Fabrice Balanche

Video

Brief Analysis

U.S.-Iran Competition: Prospects and Limits of Cooperation

Three experts discuss whether the contentious history of U.S.-Iranian relations stems more from unrealistic American expectations and missed opportunities, or from the Islamic Republic's strategic decision to oppose Washington's interests.

Sep 13, 2016

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Jay Solomon
James Dobbins
Dennis Ross

Supported by the

Viterbi Program on Iran and U.S. Policy

Today, the Islamic Republic of Iran poses the most serious and urgent set of security challenges to the United States and its allies in the greater Middle East. Since the Khomeini revolution in 1979, Iran has sought to export its radical ideology through the use of terrorism, subversion, and support to ideological fellow-travelers throughout the Muslim world.

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Featured experts

Farzin Nadimi

Farzin Nadimi, a Senior Fellow with The Washington Institute, is a Washington-based analyst specializing in the security and defense affairs of Iran and the Persian Gulf region.

Patrick Clawson

Patrick Clawson is the Morningstar Senior Fellow and Research Counselor at The Washington Institute.

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Policy Analysis on Iran

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