What You Might Have Missed: November at Middle East Uncovered
Last month’s essential reads, all in one place.
This month, we followed the region closely as communities grappled with repression, stalled transitions, and the heavy legacy of unfinished revolutions. Whether in Yazidi efforts to reclaim political agency or in youth-led demands for transparent governance, readers gravitated toward the stories of those in the relentless pursuit of dignity and autonomy.
What drove this month’s biggest stories:
Yazidis reclaiming political representation in Iraq’s parliament through clean, community-backed leadership
Hamas splintering under pressure, reshaping Gaza’s internal landscape, and putting innocent civilians at risk
Fathers in Afghanistan choosing to secretly educate their daughters at home despite the tightening Taliban restrictions
Youth movements in Iraq challenging a stagnant political order and demanding the constitution live up to its ideals
New debates over extremism, identity, and influence—the implications of which reach far beyond the region’s borders
Top Read Stories
After years of being politically sidelined, Yazidis now have a voice in Baghdad. Murad Ismael’s parliamentary win gives voice to a community still fighting to return home. By for Interviews & Spotlights
For Murad, winning the seat was the easy part. What comes next is a nearly impossible to-do list. He represents a district that has had no mayor for eleven years, a region contested by national powers, militias, and neighboring states. He carries the hopes of 150,000 IDPs who want to go home but have no homes to return to. He speaks for families who still wait for news of 2,700 Yazidis still missing or in captivity. And he wants compensation for survivors whose lives were broken but never rebuilt.
The terror group is splintering between hardliners and pragmatists. For civilians in Gaza, that divide is dangerous. By for Field Dispatch
The administration must confront the fact that there is no unified Hamas to negotiate with, and every agreement risks being sabotaged by the faction that feels betrayed. The pragmatists cannot deliver disarmament without triggering internal conflict because the hardliners will never accept it.
Hamas’s tragedy is that it has become a prisoner of its own mythology. The movement that vowed never to compromise or surrender now finds itself trapped: any pragmatic move is seen as betrayal, while continued resistance ensures destruction.
Lorenzo Vidino reveals how a foreign ideological movement embedded itself into American institutions. His report shows that extremism can thrive when it learns to speak the language of democracy. By for Interviews & Spotlights
Vidino’s conclusion is measured but deeply unsettling. Many of the organizations he documents have evolved, distanced from their founders, and adapted to a democratic context. But the question remains whether they have truly changed—or whether they have intentionally learned to speak the language of democracy more fluently.
For policymakers, journalists, and scholars, The Muslim Brotherhood in America is required reading. It challenges the notion that extremism must be violent to be dangerous and reminds readers that ideology can thrive under the protection of free societies.
From Beijing to Moscow to Tehran, every major power sees opportunity in the airbase the U.S. left behind. For Washington, Bagram’s loss is less about the base itself than America’s narrowing influence. By for The Argument
What’s notable about Bagram today is how its meaning keeps evolving. During the Cold War, it was a fortress. During the War on Terror, it was a logistics hub. Now it’s a mirror, reflecting the strategic anxieties of every major world power surrounding it.
For the U.S., the question is less whether it could retake Bagram and more whether it should. The era of massive overseas bases is giving way to lighter, rotational presences and partnerships built on intelligence and technology. The symbolism of Bagram—fixed, monumental, and expensive—belongs to an earlier model of power projection.
Under Taliban rule, Afghan fathers struggle to stay hopeful for daughters they can no longer protect, and for a future that feels increasingly out of reach. By for Field Dispatch
A generation of girls and boys is watching their dreams slip away. As opportunities narrow with each new decree, fathers like Haady, Khalid, Sayed, Ahmed, and Najib feel powerless to intervene. Yet many still try, teaching lessons at home, reading to their daughters in secret, and finding small, safe ways to keep their girls’ minds alive. Around them, life is changing, but their beliefs remain the same as they long for a future in which girls can learn, work, and live without fear.
Young Iraqis are done waiting for leaders to deliver. They want a state that works, and they’re willing to fight for it. By for Field Dispatch
Iraq’s constitutional crisis determines who controls resources, who enforces justice, and who speaks for the state.
This new generation understands that. If Iraq’s second century is to differ from its first, it will be because its youth insisted that the constitution finally mean what it says. Their struggle is not against the state, but for the one envisioned a hundred years ago—a sovereign state, independent and free.
Lebanon’s institutions are crumbling, yet President Joseph Aoun has avoided confronting the forces accelerating their collapse. As reforms stall, the nation edges closer to irreversible decline. By for The Argument
If the presidency does not step into its role and confront the forces eroding the republic, Lebanon risks crossing a threshold where no institution can bring it back. And at that point, the darkness will not be a metaphor. It will be the reality of a state in free fall, with no guarantee that what it loses in the process will ever be rebuilt.
Also in November
The Iran-Iraq War Shaped Their Lives. Their Art Tells the Story. Keiany and Shamsavari grew up in the shadow of one of the 20th century’s deadliest wars, and its ghosts still shape their work.
Teaching the Language of the Enemy. A Palestinian teacher challenges his Israeli students to see Arabic as more than the tongue of their adversaries.
The Shifting Global Order and Its Implications for the Middle East ( Part 2). The decline of global order is no longer driven by authoritarian challenge alone. Democracies are unraveling from within, undone by grievance politics, supremacist nostalgia, and technology.
Reviving the Lost Art of Reading in Iraq. The country’s literary spirit survived dictatorship and war. Can it survive the age of distraction?
Neglect and Isolation Leave Afghanistan Defenseless Against Disaster. Successive earthquakes expose a nation weakened by years of war and authoritarian rule. Bureaucracy, sanctions, and the exclusion of women have turned natural crises into human-made catastrophes.
Fifteen Years After My First Vote, Iraq Still Waits for Democracy. Iraq still holds elections, but authority lies elsewhere. For many voters, participation has become less an expression of faith in government than a refusal to give up.
November’s reporting showed a region refusing to surrender. These are the forces pushing the Middle East forward despite every obstacle.
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