Digest of Middle East Studies

Editor's Introduction

In this issue of the Digest of Middle East Studies, we are pleased to present five articles on subjects both timely and important. From the theoretical and reflective to the practical and policy-developing, this issue offers, as always, works that engage both policy and social science concerns. This issue's articles have a broad geographical reach from Morocco to Iran and an equally broad range in terms of topical focus, but within this diversity they all address in one way or another issues of security, policy formation, and identity.

Said Khanafira Mavadat's “Iran in the Sadrist Version of Iraqi Nationalism” investigates and explains Muqtada Sadr's construction of an Iraqi identity that is both specifically Arab and specifically Shiite, through the reshaping of the politically contingent narrative about Iran and Shiite identity and authority in the post-war Iraqi context. National identity issues are also the subject of Tuğçe Ersoy-Ceylan's article “Social Identities in Conflict: Israeli Palestinians and Israeli Jews.” Ersoy-Ceylan takes on a subject matter deeply familiar to observers to draw out new insights about similar identity dynamics in very differently-positioned peoples, offering an analysis grounded in recognition of the common human dynamics of security fears and their consequences.

In “Discursive Delegitimization of Rouhani's Nuclear Diplomacy and the Iran Nuclear Deal by Iranian Conservatives on Twitter,” Hossein Nourani, Mohammad Mohammadian, Reza Sarhaddi, Afsaneh Danesh, and Farzaneh Latifi present an interesting analysis of social media statements by Iranian public figures as a basis for understanding competing discourses with regard to domestic actors and nuclear policy. This research provides insight into both the discourse itself and the use of social media as a tool not only for popular protest but for what might be termed more ordinary political competition among public figures, as actors recognize the utility of Twitter for shaping public narratives of criticism of their opponents.

Micheale Gebru addresses security-related issues in “The Impact of the Middle East and Gulf States' Involvement on the Horn of Africa's Peace and Security,” making use of Regional Security Complex theory to analyze the growing Middle Eastern state presence in the Horn of Africa. This article offers a detailed account of external involvement in the region motivated by economic and foreign policy goals, the latter of which are both locally-centered and also at times connected to proxy competition with other Middle East actors. He finds that on balance, the effect of Middle East presence in the Horn of Africa has exacerbated local conflict and tended to destabilize rather than secure the region.

We are also pleased to offer an article in our occasional “scholarly commentary” category, Jack Kalpakian's “The Lack of Environmental Cooperation in the Maghreb.” As always, these are peer-reviewed articles that deal with important and engaging current issues from the perspective of the application of scholarly expertise. This piece takes as its starting point the urgent issue of the use and preservation of water resources in North Africa, a policy issue complicated by the transnational nature of the resources in question. Applying previous work on strategies for the development of practical policy options, the article traces eight steps of an approach that could promote better and more accessible policy-creation mechanisms in the Maghreb.

As always, we are grateful to the peer reviewers who have offered their time and their scholarly expertise in the review and development of the works in this issue of the journal. I also wish to thank our editorial assistants, Misha Datskovsky and Andrew Noland, whose work makes the publication of the journal possible. We hope that this issue of the Digest of Middle East Studies has much to interest you.