Owen Kirby, at The Blogs

Owen Kirby

Sep 9, 2025, 12:31 AM

Recent events have dealt Lebanon a generational opportunity, historic even. After decades of victimization at the hands of Hezbollah and its patrons in Tehran, the question now is whether the Lebanese will be allowed to savor the fruits of...

Dec 12, 2024, 3:29 AM

All Changed, Changed Utterly

In the Rose Garden on June 24, 2002, President Bush called “on the Palestinian people to elect new leaders…to build a practicing democracy, based on tolerance and liberty.” At the height of the Second Intifada with Palestinian Authority chief...

Sep 4, 2024, 2:08 AM

Want PA Reform? Return to Oslo

One of the frustrations of U.S. assistance policy - for foreign observers and beneficiaries - is an absence of continuity: new administrations every few years with new priorities; the deleterious rotation of key personnel in key policy positions, both...

Aug 6, 2022, 11:36 AM

Afghan Anniversary

The recriminations are already beginning to fly in print and on air. It was inevitable. With Congressional midterms on the horizon, anything is fair game and the ignominy of American retreat from Afghanistan last summer provides an easy target....

Jul 27, 2022, 12:44 AM

Reading Lebanon’s Electoral Tea Leaves

The first Lebanese parliamentary exercise since widespread 2019 protests over government incompetence and corruption have come and gone. Yes, at the polls on May 15, Hezbollah, among others, suffered a bit of a setback (or embarrassment) - due to...

Feb 13, 2018, 7:03 PM

Mahmoud Abbas: Obstacle or Opportunity?

Palestinian Authority (PA) leader Mahmoud Abbas’ reputation is in a quandary. Depending on one’s perspective, he may either be the last best hope for peace, or one of the reasons hope is fading. The dividing line of opinion is...

Jan 4, 2018, 9:30 PM

Camp David II’s Other Lessons

Is the White House’s not-yet-ready-for-prime-time peace plan in jeopardy? With complications arising from the historic U.S. shift on the status of Jerusalem, odds are increasing that any creative solutions being developed by the American peace team (e.g., the so-called...

About Me

Owen Kirby is a visiting Fellow at the University of Central Florida's Global Perspectives and International Initiatives (ucfglobalperspectives.org). A former director for the Middle East and North Africa at the International Republican Institute (IRI), he has served in both the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development. The thoughts and opinions expressed here are his own.