For the past month, several events happened in Moscow related to the problem of radicalization of North Caucasian youth and the replenishment of the Islamic State’s ranks by residents of the Russian Federation. While Russian analysts recycle theories that were relevant a year or two... MORE

Reports emerged in Moscow and Ankara, on June 24, that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan wrote his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, a letter apparently apologizing for the loss of a Russian Su-24 bomber and the death of its pilot. The Russian jet had been shot... MORE

A recent poll among North Caucasian youth by the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM) found that many young people in the region disapprove of the Russian air strikes in Syria. The finding is even more surprising because it comes at the time when Russian... MORE

JORDAN: SUICIDE ATTACK RAISES FEARS IN SYRIA’S NEIGHBOR A suicide car bomber killed six members of Jordan’s security forces and injured 14 others at a military post on the border with Syria, close to the al-Rukban refugee camp on June 21. Following the incident, Jordan... MORE

Last week, Russia’s defense minister, Army-General Sergei Shoigu inspected Russian troops fighting in Syria "under orders of President Vladimir Putin." On June 18, Shoigu visited the Russian operational command center at Hmeymim airbase, near Latakia, from where Russian bombers run sorties against the Syrian opposition,... MORE

Moscow’s intervention in Syria’s civil war has propelled Russia into the center of Middle Eastern politics and substantially enhanced its ties with virtually every Middle Eastern state. Israel is no exception. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently concluded his fourth visit to Moscow in a... MORE

After months of negotiation, the United States finally gave the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) - which is dominated by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and includes the Syrian Arab Coalition (SAC) – the green light to launch its offensive to take the Syrian... MORE

Muslim al-Shishani is the nom de guerre of Murad Margoshvili, commander of the Junud al-Sham (“Soldiers of Syria”) insurgent group operating in Syria. Margoshivili is a Georgian national, but he is also an ethnic Kist, a member of the Chechen sub-ethnic group that lives in... MORE

In recent months, the Federal Security Service (FSB) allegedly thwarted several terrorist attacks on Russian soil by migrants from Central Asia. In April, Russian security services claimed that four citizens of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan were planning terrorist acts in Moscow (Kommersant, May 6), while in... MORE