It is a peculiar day for the Arab world when a political leader is accused of pandering simultaneously to the interests of the United States and ultraconservative sheikhs calling for global jihad. But strange bedfellows were made when Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi recently announced that Egypt would be “definitively” severing all diplomatic ties with the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad.

Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference (NDC), which began on March 18 and just reached the halfway point of its six-month mandate, was conceived as a core part of the transition process and is intended to bring together Yemen’s diverse political, social, geographic, and demographic groups to address the most critical issues plaguing the beleaguered country.

The US administration has, at long last, crossed the Rubicon of authorizing lethal assistance to selected units of Syria's armed opposition.

Hezbollah’s involvement in fighting the Syrian regime’s war in Qusayr represents a turning point for Sunni-Shia relations in Lebanon. While sectarian violence there has escalated significantly since war broke out in Syria, Lebanon’s troubles are in fact rooted in Hezbollah’s repeated violation of the country’s sectarian balance over the past eight years; the overt killing of Sunni rebels in Syria is just the latest–though perhaps the most egregious–example.

When Secretary of State John Kerry pressed his Russian counterpart in early May 2013 to help him convene a conference to implement the Action Group on Syria Geneva agreement of June 2012, his motive was honorable and straightforward: cut to the chase and get Syrian opposition and Assad regime representatives into a room to negotiate a transitional governing body for Syria, one that would replace the regime and exercise full executive power.

“Libya is finished.” “It is a failed state.” “There is not much more we can do.”

These are just some of the comments I heard in the course of my visit last week to Tripoli and its surrounding environs. There is indeed widespread pessimism about the future of a viable Libyan state. It seems few people here harbor any illusions about their country’s transition to democracy.

The Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East hosted a roundtable discussion with former member of parliament and founding member of Egypt’s Social Democratic Party Ziad Bahaa-Eldin on the ongoing crisis in Egypt.

Question: Why should the United States intervene militarily in Syria and what could it accomplish?

Answer: The United States would intervene to save lives and to help stabilize the region. It is militarily capable, without putting "boots on the ground," of destroying or seriously degrading the ability of the Assad regime, through shelling and bombing, to slaughter, stampede, and terrorize civilians by the tens of thousands; people whose "crime" is that they live in areas beyond the regime's control.

Yair Lapid, newly appointed finance minister, and the big winner of Israel’s parliamentary elections in January, took office with a clear agenda in mind: to promote social justice and redistribute wealth. As the popular newcomer, Lapid has been afforded an opportunity to tackle major obstacles to economic development including big corporations and unions, privileged groups, and the ultra-Orthodox Haredim community, amid a ballooning budget deficit estimated at $11 billion.

Senior Fellow Frederic C. Hof of the Council's Hariri Middle East Center speaks with host Scott Simon of NPR Weekend Edition about the worsening crisis in Syria and the United States' limited military and political options.