Turkey has just had its second round presidental election, and Erdoğan has secured his third term - dashing the hopes of the Turkish opposition. But what does this mean for the deep divisions within Turkish society and how is life likely to loo

Salafi Jihadism

Sep 10th, 2021 49m 2s

Salafi-Jihadism has had a huge impact on the societies, policies, and security situations in MENA and abroad. But where did modern Jihadist groups come from, what do they look like today, and what impact has the "War on Terror" had on people li

Turkish drones and the PKK

Sep 1st, 2021 44m 23s

The PKK-Turkish conflict has reached a new phase with Turkey relying more heavily on drones to press the group further and further away from its borders. To talk to us about how Turkey's drone program came to be, where it is going, and how it a

Freedom of the Press in the Kurdistan Region

Feb 15th, 2021 38m 22s

Just how free are journalists in Iraq's Kurdistan Region to report on the facts and what kind of pressure do they face from the ruling KRG authorities? Against the backdrop of a current (15-02-2021) trial against journalists in Dohuk after a de

Israel and the Kurds

Dec 14th, 2020 53m

One of the Middle East's better publisised, but least understood political relationships is that of various Kurdish political actors and the state of Israel. To give background as well as insights on Israel-Kurdish relations is Jonathan Spyer,

Who are the Assyrians?

Oct 7th, 2020 1h 10m

The Assyrians, despite being one of the indigenous communities at the heart of the Middle East as well as being a particularly vulnerable one at that, are poorly understood. A community that used to number at least a million before the 2003 inv

The plight of Afrin's women

Sep 22nd, 2020 47m 33s

Afrin has been occupied by Turkish-backed Syrian armed groups that have recently (as of 09-2020) been accused of what amount to crimes against humanity in a special UN report on the state of the region including the kidnapping for ransom, sexua

Turkey's soft power and the Turkish diaspora

Sep 21st, 2020 52m 38s

Turkey has used tremendous effort in recent years to increase its hard power through building a burgeoning economy as well as modernising its large military. However, it also has a unique soft power resource with a large and politically active

The KRG, the KDP and the PUK

Sep 2nd, 2020 45m 3s

What is the Kurdistan Regional Government? Can we really call it one unified government or are we really looking at the same two KDP and PUK governments from the 90’s with a shiny new label? Explaining the way in which the administration seems

Who Are The Iranian Opposition?

Aug 12th, 2020 52m 59s

Iranian politics is, like most political cultures of the Middle East, extremely complex - and so is the image of the Iranian political opposition. For this episode, to explain the basics of two of the most often mentioned Iranian opposition gro

Nagorno-Karabakh

Jul 22nd, 2020 41m 53s

Nagorno-Karabakh isn't in the Middle East or North Africa, but what happensin this Caucasus region both mimics, as well as has repercussions on what happens in the wider region. In this episode, Joshua Kucera of Eurasianet tells us the history

"Blue Homeland" - Turkish foreign policy in the Middle East

Jul 15th, 2020 56m 14s

Selim Koru, a researcher at TEPAV and a Black Sea Fellow at FPRI joins us in this episode to help explain Turkish foreign policy, how Turkey itself sees its role in the region and helps explain terms like Blue Homeland and Neo-Ottomanism.

Popular Mobilization Units

Jul 7th, 2020 50m 42s

In this episode, we are joined by Fanar Haddad - author of 'Undertanding Sectarianism: Sunni-Shi'a Relations in the Modern Arab World' and a prominent researcher on Iraq's Popular Mobilization Units - to tell us about who the PMUs are, what the

Libya - What are the stakes and what will happen to Sirte?

Jul 1st, 2020 51m 33s

Jalel Harchaoui - a research at the Clingendael institute at The Hague - gives valuable insights into who the main actors are in Libya, what they want and how likely it is that we are going to continue to see an escalation.

The Hendek war and Turkish prison

Jun 26th, 2020 57m 10s

In this episode, we are joined by Jake Hanrahan - a conflict reporter and host of the Popular Front podcast - where we talk about Jake's experiences with the Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey during the breakdown of the Kurdish peace process (as

Who runs Syria?

Jun 26th, 2020 52m 2s

In this episode, Aron Lund explains (as well as anybody can) who runs Syria - who we are talking about when we talk about Damascus - and what prospects look like for governance in Syria going forward.

What is happening in Afrin?

Jun 26th, 2020 1h

In this episode, Alexander McKeever - formerly of Bellingcat and now working with Syrians for Truth and Justice - talks about Afrin. We go through the history of the region, why Turkey invaded, and what evidence there is of the groups now in co

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