Broaden your horizons with Al-Monitor podcasts, where our contributors deliver the latest news and developments. Be sure to listen and subscribe via your favorite podcast app.
Andrew Parasiliti and Amberin Zaman interview newsmakers each week from the US and Middle East about the latest news and trends in the region, with additional commentary from Al-Monitor’s ‘on-the-ground’ correspondents.
Most Recent: Episode #40
Sam Blatteis, CEO of The MENA Catalysts, explains the continued potential and vitality of the digital economy and high tech sectors in the Gulf, post-COVID; the Gulf’s commitment to the knowledge economy, and how it has become a differentiator in a fragmenting Arab world; why the US is still the partner of choice for Gulf governments, but why and how the US-China competition for influence in the region may be heating up; the synergies between the Gulf and Silicon Valley; and more
Ben Caspit, an Israel correspondent for Al-Monitor, brings you weekly interviews with newsmakers and officials to discuss the latest news in Israel.
Most Recent: Episode #35
Ben Caspit talks this week with Yaron Zelekha, an economist who was formerly the finance ministry's accountant general and is the founder of the New Economy party. Zelekha warns that Israel has no economic policy, and that Israel has no state budget and has not launched any reforms in the past decade. More worrying, he says, is the fact that the citizens of Israel no longer trust their government. “Twenty three percent of the population lives under poverty line. Twenty percent of businesses collapsed this past year. No single country in the West experienced such a business catastrophe,” he says.
We get it: the Middle East can be a complicated place, and sometimes it’s difficult to wrap your head around all the regional conflicts and political drama - that’s where we come in. We’re here to break down the major headlines, talk with experts and journalists, and give you a clearer picture of what’s happening in the region so you can impress your friends and promote our podcast. Sorry, that’s the shameless plug we were supposed to delete. Oh well. Off the Hookah with Phil and Cooper is a production of Al-Monitor.
| Apr. 1, 2020
As the coronavirus crisis continues to grip the world, the markets have been on the shakiest ground yet since the 2008 economic recession - especially with regards to the price of oil. In the last few years, Saudi Arabia and Russia have developed a special relationship to stabilize oil prices in the face of growing competition from the Americans, who for the first time has begun to outpace both countries in terms of production. But when demand for oil began to fall precipitously in the face of COVID-19, the relationship ended in a messy way. Phil and Cooper break down the bad breakup and how it’s affected economies worldwide.
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