Sample Newsletters
Below are summaries of recent editions of the Arab Digest daily newsletter that got our members talking. Please click the links below each summary to read the full newsletter.
What next for Yemen?
Summary: Houthi military ascendancy continues even as the Saudis intensify air strikes placing further challenges on special envoys’ efforts to end the war.
MbS and the domestic front
Summary: Mohammed bin Salman has experienced both rebuffs and successes on the foreign front but it is how well he manages domestic issues that will determine his future and the future of the kingdom.
The new UN Special Envoy to Yemen: what is he facing?
Summary: on 5 September, Hans Grundberg, the new UN Special Envoy for Yemen will take up his post, after a two-month gap since his predecessor left to become UN Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs. So what is the state of affairs facing him? What are his prospects of success where his three predecessors failed?
Semiramis Revisited: a story of the Nakba
Summary: the 1948 bombing of a hotel in an Arab neighbourhood of Jerusalem killed 24 civilians and drove the community out; a descendent of one of those forced to flee investigates a largely forgotten act of ethnic cleansing.
The Beirut explosion: are Israel and Hezbollah responsible?
Summary: On the one year anniversary of the Beirut port explosion, no conclusions have been reached as to what caused it but an Arab Digest member who witnessed the explosion believes that both the Israelis and Hezbollah are to blame. Meanwhile a significant detail has emerged about the amount of ammonium nitrate stored in the port at the time of the blast.
Final curtain on the Arab Spring?
Summary: many are calling the events in Tunisia a coup with President Kais Saied using popular discontent to seize power but Francis Ghilès argues the steps the president has taken were necessary in a country where the economy is collapsing and the Covid pandemic is rampant.
Yemen’s Water Crisis
Summary: in the midst of a terrible war, Yemen is stalked by another enemy, one that Yemenis know far too much about and the world far too little.
Yemen’s flicker of hope
Summary: an Omani peace initiative and Saudi eagerness to end the war may possibly start Yemen on the road to peace but Emirati ambitions and Houthi gains complicate further an already intensely complex crisis.
A water crisis in Iraq
Summary: as global temperatures climb, Basra is experiencing temperatures hovering at 50 degrees while suffering severe water shortages; delays in a massive desalination project are making an already intolerable situation worse.
Women in the Yemeni war
Summary: Yemen’s women bear the brunt of the ongoing war yet are granted only token representation and are largely ignored in UN peace efforts, while being exploited and abused by the various Yemeni factions fighting for dominance.
Using the rule of law to deliver justice for Palestinians
Summary: MP Crispin Blunt says he is “done with false hope” and is launching a new organisation that will seek to use the rule of law to hold Israel accountable for the injustices inflicted on the Palestinian people.
UAE diplomats accused in international gold smuggling syndicate
Summary: the UAE is a key hub for gold trading linked to money laundering, organised crime and terrorist financing. The authorities have promised to clean up their act but a court case in India suggests there is still a long way to go.