2020: A Year in Review–MES EP.88

2020 is an inflection point. Hosting some of the oldest inhabited cities in the world, the region of west Asia today is nothing but a giant museum, where people can come to visit the past, but catch no glimpse whatsoever of the future due to constant western aggression and intervention.

The western war on Syria has come to a closure, but the country is far from being back on its feet as U.S. sanctions ravage the country’s economy. Lebanon is in no better shape. The country’s cash-strapped economy plunged into free-fall in late-2019, resulting in meltdown of its once thriving banking and tourism sectors. Iraq also suffers from continuous American intervention along with the twin shock of Covid-19 and the collapse in global oil prices.

The most acute escalation of all in 2020 though was the US’s assassination of Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani prompting unending tension that might just keep moving to the front of the queue in terms of a key driver for 2021.