A new edition of the Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP)’s Middle East Report is now available online and OPEN ACCESS here:

The coronavirus pandemic is vividly highlighting the fundamental links between people, health and the environment. This issue on nature and politics probes the essential but also sometimes fraught relationships between people and their environments in the Middle East. It provides insights into crucial issues of energy, water and climate change and the political struggles between states and their citizens over environmental stewardship, sovereignty and the allocation of resources. It also takes us into spaces of human-environment interaction that are not so commonly discussed—bird markets, Iraqi landscapes contaminated with toxins, sinkholes around the Dead Sea and Turkish wetlands teeming with wildlife. Through these contributions, “Nature and Politics” offers a critical take on contemporary challenges across the Middle East.

Issue Editors: Jessica Barnes and Muriam Haleh Davis with Guest Editor Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins

Water in the Middle East: A Primer
Jessica Barnes
On Blaming Climate Change for the Syrian Civil War
Jan Selby
Global Aspirations and Local Realities of Solar Energy in Morocco
Atman Aoui, Moulay Ahmed el Amrani, Karen Rignall
Birth Defects and the Toxic Legacy of War in Iraq
Kali Rubaii
Bird Markets, Artisanal Pigeons and Class Relations in the Middle East
Bridget Guarasci
The Unintended Consequences of Turkey’s Quest for Oil
Zeynep Oguz
Terra Infirma – Dead Sea Sinkholes – A Photo Essay
Simone Popperl
The Lost Wetlands of Turkey
Caterina Scaramelli
“Algeria is not for Sale!” Mobilizing Against Fracking in the Sahara
Naoual Belakhdar
An Interview with Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins
Tessa Farmer
“Turkey Wants to be Part of the Nuclear Club” An Interview with Can Candan
Kenan Behzat Sharpe