Arab Spring
Could the Covid crash spark another Arab Spring?
They said we were going to uncouple from the Middle East. Barack Obama, they said, was going to pivot to…
Falling back
Ten years on, the Arab Spring’s legacy is hopelessness and helplessness
How did mild-mannered eye doctor Bashar al-Assad end up a mass murderer?
‘How did this mild-mannered eye doctor end up killing hundreds of thousands of people?’ someone wondered about Bashar al-Assad in…
Diary
One strange consequence of my job as a foreign correspondent is discovering beautiful places when terrible things happen in them.…
Don’t abandon Tunisia!
It needs – and deserves – British visitors more than ever
Anniversary fatigue
There’s a part of me that thinks OK, we’ve heard enough now, one year on from the beginning of the…
Why does no one blame Cameron for Libya?
Call me petulant, but I’m not sure Britain is getting enough credit for our fine, fine work in Libya. The…
Ones to watch
Back on political duty with CNN in election week, I came across a dead rat in Downing Street. It had…
Arab spring
Last weekend BBC Arabic celebrated 77 years since John Reith (as he then was) launched the first foreign-language service of…
General paralysis
America has let Egypt’s old military oligarchs take hold again. Must it carry on paying for them, too?
Leave Ukraine to the Russians
‘You can’t always get what you want,’ chorused Mick Jagger, ‘but if you try some time/You just might find/You get…
How to run a revolution
Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood should have learnt from Nasser
Arab Spring
Two hundred and forty-years ago next Tuesday, Thomas Gray was buried in his mother’s grave in Stoke Poges churchyard. In…
The real Arab Spring
Middle East protest has its roots not in Islam but in frustrated enterprise
Lessons from Egypt
Democracy and holding elections are not the same thing. There could be no better demonstration of this than the experience…
