When tens of thousands of would-be migrants crossed from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta last week, Italy's right-wing prime minister Giorgia Meloni promptly said she would suspend a free-movement accord with Spain, even though Ceuta is excluded from the pact. And when a distressed Moroccan businessman who feared repatriation despite having lived in Italy for 36 years died after being stopped by police two weeks ago in Bologna, with viral footage showing two officers sitting on him to restrain him, the government jumped to the law enforcers' defence. Right-wing media depicted the man as another disorderly migrant causing trouble, highlighting drug convictions in his youth, while opposition politicians accused the government of racism and condoning police brutality. What few did, in public at least, was ask who Abderrahim Fakir really was, and what might have caused his distress – something that sociologists and refugee agencies say reduces an immigra...
Iran is betting it can outlast Washington by turning the Middle East's trade routes, shipping lanes and energy infrastructure into pressure points that steadily raise the cost of confrontation, according to Gulf officials and analysts. Rather than seeking a decisive military victory, Tehran is pursuing a strategy of calibrated escalation aimed at widening the conflict without triggering full-scale war. The goal, they say, is to convince the United States and its allies that containing the crisis is more costly than accommodating Iran's demands over the Strait of Hormuz. The message from Tehran is that unless Washington accepts a new status quo that gives Iran a greater role in Hormuz, the conflict could spread beyond the Gulf. By putting multiple maritime chokepoints and energy assets at risk, Iran believes it can strengthen its hand in any future negotiations. "Iran, from the beginning, has tried to out-escalate the United States by stretching ou...