Middle East and North Africa
We are an open Haus for innovation and a global liberal think-tank, with the aim of enhancing the values and goals of freedom worldwide. With our activities and publications, we encourage and support individuals in exercising their right of political participation. Our offices in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) work within the frame of freedom and human rights in their national context. Our office is based in Amman, Jordan. FNF MENA has three main programs that encourage inter-country cooperation: MENA-NET | MENA-EU | MENA-GEOPOL. We advise and motivate relevant stakeholders and shape and promote solutions that are based on enhancing individual freedom and responsibility.
News
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Amman Innovation in Politics Forum 2020
This is not a conventional conference. It is experimental journey meticulously designed to reflect the power of ideas through unconferencing methods enabling two-way interaction and communication between our audience and experts.
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Idea, Innovation, and Impact
Through the iValues Awards, we seek to transform values into actions and projects that will help improve politics and policy making in the MENA region. We dissected politics into two main categories: politics as practice and politics as a theory. Through different formats, we created a space to discuss the impact of innovation on our day-to-day interaction with policies and politics and to explore the potential of new methodologies in shaping our behavior towards
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Political rebranding through environmental reforms in Saudi Arabia?
During a work call in March, while giving a presentation on the situation of crude and other commodities’ movement in the Middle East and North Africa region, a news flash on the television screen near me read: ”Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, Mohammad Bin Salman [often dubbed MbS by international media] announced that the kingdom aims to plant billions of trees over the coming decades to increase the global area covered by existing trees.”
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Take Me By The Hand
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Innovate to Investigate
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Iran 1400 Brief: Beyond the Headlines
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MENA on the Map
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ELECTIONS IN MOROCCO: Containing Political Islamism with Mathematics
The Uprisings in the Arab World did not lead to radical change in Morocco, as was the case in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. The regime remained intact and its ruling elite was able to preserve power. However, it was a very important year for Moroccan Moderate Islamists (Parti de la Jeu-nesse et du Dévelopement), as they won elections for the first time in their history taking control of the much-coveted parliamentary majority.
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Iran Dossier
Iran holds its presidential elections on the 18th of June, 2021. Out of the seven candidates, only five have lasted till the last round. While polls are indicating that Chief Justice in Iran Ebrahim Raisi will be the next president, the international observers are closely looking into the reaction of the Iranian people towards the post-Rouhani period.
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Libya’s Wish for Peace
Holding the next elections in Libya on December 24th, 2021, is not fortuitous, but it coincides with the 70th anniversary of the unification of the country by King Driss Senoussi. From the Italian colony in 1911, to the Franco-British colony after the Second World War, Libya quickly became a constitutional confederal kingdom in 1951. The country was made of three provinces: Cyrenaica in the East, Tripolitania in the West, and the Fezzan in the South.
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The Illusion of Peace without the Palestinians Is Fading
Ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and the Islamic Jihad so far holds after more than 4,000 rockets at Israel, with 12 dead, according to Israeli sources, and Israeli air strikes on more than 800 targets in the Gaza Strip, with more than 240 dead, according to Palestinian sources. Military experts believe that Israel achieved in one week as many tactical objectives in Gaza with targeted air strikes, as it did in seven weeks of a costly ground offensive in 2014.
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Syria before the Presidential Election: A Political Theater Inside and Out
Dictator Bashar Al-Assad is having himself confirmed in office on May 26th in order to show strength and secure international aid. Our Syria expert Kristof Kleemann from Beirut explains why the international community should not get involved.
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MENA-EU Cooperation Position Paper
In this paper prepared in collaboration with the European Liberal Forum and the European Parliament, we provide answers to challenges that impede fruitful cooperation between the MENA and EU. Firstly, we explain how complex systems theory such as the modelling of bird flocks can be used to craft more effective coalitions in EU and MENA.
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A Future for Cooperation in an Increasingly Hot Middle East
Climate Change hits the MENA region especially hard, and multiplies existing threats. This raises the need for cross-border collaboration and smart interventions. The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is one of the regions in the world that has been most affected by climate change.
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The Dwindling Shadow of Iran
After several years of Iranian expansion in the region, reaching a high tide level of controlling four Arab capitals as stated by one of President Rouhani’s advisors , there is a growing consensus that Iran’s influence in the region is waning. Nowhere this is more prominent than in Iraq! In 2020, a new Prime Minister, Mustafa Al Khadimi has taken over, resisting Iranian pressure, and clawing back a more ‘Arabist’ stance for Iraq.
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