Kimberly Jones

Kim­berly Jones, a fac­ulty asso­ciate in North­eastern University’s Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, ana­lyzes Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s visit to Afghanistan on the eve of the one-​​year anniver­sary of the killing of Osama bin Laden.

Last week, a U.S. staff sergeant sta­tioned at a mil­i­tary out­post near Kan­dahar, Afghanistan, allegedly opened fire on Afghani civil­ians, killing 16 men, women and chil­dren in their vil­lages. The Tal­iban vowed vengeance for the civilian deaths, and the inci­dent prompted demands by many for an imme­diate with­drawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. We asked Kim­berly Jones, a fac­ulty asso­ciate in North­eastern University’s Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, to ana­lyze the pos­sible impli­ca­tions of this devel­oping situation.

Rela­tions between Iran and the U.S. have dete­ri­o­rated in recent months, as America has sought to tighten eco­nomic sanc­tions aimed at Iran’s nuclear pro­gram and Iran has responded by threat­ening to close the Strait of Hormuz, cut­ting off seaborne access to Per­sian Gulf oil. We asked pro­fessor Kim­berly Jones, the asso­ciate director of the inter­na­tional affairs pro­gram and a fac­ulty asso­ciate in the Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, to ana­lyze the com­plex rela­tion­ship between the Middle Eastern nation, the U.S. and the rest of the world.

Former Libyan dic­tator Moammar Gad­hafi met a vio­lent death at the hands of rev­o­lu­tionary forces last Thursday in his home­town of Sirte, less than a year after he vowed to perish rather than con­cede defeat to a pop­ular uprising. We asked Kim­berly Jones, a fac­ulty asso­ciate in North­eastern University’s Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, to ana­lyze the impact of Gadhafi’s death on the nation of Libya and its poten­tial effect on global per­cep­tions of the Arab Spring.

Last week, fed­eral author­i­ties dis­rupted an alleged plot involving the assas­si­na­tion of Adel Al-​​Jubeir, the Saudi Ara­bian ambas­sador to the U.S., as well as sub­se­quent attacks on Saudi and Israeli embassies. Offi­cials claimed the plot was con­ceived in Iran. We asked Kim­berly Jones, a fac­ulty asso­ciate in North­eastern University’s Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, to explain how these alle­ga­tions may affect inter­na­tional relations.

The prospects for peace between Israel and Pales­tine, and U.S. policy on the com­pli­cated issue, cap­tured the world’s atten­tion ear­lier this month, as Pres­i­dent Obama deliv­ered a major speech on the Middle East, fol­lowed by a day­long meeting between the pres­i­dent and Israeli Prime Min­ister Ben­jamin Netanyahu and Netanyahu’s sub­se­quent address to Con­gress. Kim­berly Jones, a fac­ulty asso­ciate in Northeastern’s Middle East Center for Peace, Cul­ture and Devel­op­ment, assesses the impact of these developments.

Fac­ulty asso­ciate in Northeastern’s Middle East Center defines the role and effec­tive­ness of no-​​fly zones in quelling threats to global peace and security