That the region of the Middle East and North Africa is in crisis is beyond doubt. According to the Trump administration, the fault lies with “Iran’s aggressive behavior” in the region, a perspective enthusiastically shared and promoted by the Netanyahu regime in Israel and the dictatorship of Mohamad bin Salman in Saudi Arabia. But who has been primarily responsible for the instability in the region? Professor Valentine Moghadam of Northeastern looks at the different and conflict forces in play Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey, Iran, and the United States- – and the prospects for peace, justice, and democracy. She calls for normalization of relations with Iran through removal of the sanctions and a return to the Iran Deal.
Valentine M. Moghadam is Professor of Sociology and International Affairs at Northeastern University, Boston. Born in Tehran, her areas of research include globalization, transnational social movements and feminist networks, economic citizenship, and gender and development in the Middle East and North Africa. Professor Moghadam is author of Modernizing Women: Gender and Social Change in the Middle East (first published 1993; revised and updated in 2013).
Sponsored by: First Parish Church Middle East Education Group; UU’s for Justice in the Mid-East- MA Chapter; Massachusetts Peace Action. Watertown Citizens for Peace, Justice, and the Environment is co-sponsoring this event.