Education

Florida's Republican state Sen. Randy Fine speaks with the media after winning the 6th District race to replace GOP former Rep. Michael Waltz, who is now President Donald Trump’s national security adviser on April 01, 2025 in Ormond Beach, Florida.

Qatar slams US lawmaker over allegations of funding anti-Israel protests: What to know

Rep. Randy Fine criticized Qatar for allegedly backing Gaza war-related protests at American universities after the Pentagon said Qatari pilots would start training in the US, leading to a denial and rebuke from Doha.

usaid

Feature

How Trump's USAID cuts threw Lebanon's education system into tailspin

Students benefitting from USAID programs in Lebanon have been left in limbo after President Donald Trump ordered a freeze of international aid.

Mayah Hamadeh

By Mayah Hamadeh

Iraqi displaced students, who fled clashes between pro-government forces and Islamic State (IS) group jihadists, sit in a classroom at the Hamdaniya University for internally displaced people on Jan. 31, 2016, in Arbil, in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region.

Indian teachers gravitate to Iraq's Kurdistan as New Delhi's soft power grows

While the US’ presence in the Kurdistan Region — and the Middle East more broadly — is defined by its security role, India’s approach is defined by its soft power.

Winthrop Rodgers

By Winthrop Rodgers

In Sulaymaniyah, reporting on Kurdish issues

Pro-Palestinian protesters set up a tent encampment during a demonstration in front of Sproul Hall on the UC Berkeley campus on April 22, 2024, in Berkeley, California.

Over 20 US universities join in Gaza protests: What we know

A pro-Palestinian encampment at Columbia University has sparked similar protests throughout the United States, as well as France, eliciting both praise and condemnation as authorities in some areas attempt to disperse the crowds.

Latest News

Dubai floods bring travel to halt after heaviest UAE rainfall on record

Dubai floods

United Arab Emirates

In Iraq's Kurdistan Region, teacher strikes highlight schooling crisis

Iraqi teachers and civil servants protest on Oct. 7, 2015 in Sulaimaniyah, in Iraq's Kurdistan region.

Analysis

How much damage will Israel’s Smotrich funding cut do to east Jerusalem, Arab towns?

JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images

Rina Bassist

By Rina Bassist

In Paris, reporting on Israeli politics and European affairs

Breaking

Last Updated: July 2, 2023, 3:04 am

US return to UNESCO leaves Israel in awkward spot

ALAIN JOCARD/AFP via Getty Images

Females gather during morning prayers for Eid al-Adha at Al-Shami Mosque in the Nile Delta city of el-Mahalla el-Kubra, some 120 kilometers (74 miles) north of the capital Cairo, Egypt, July 20, 2021.

Culture

Egypt launches first women's fatwa councils

Many Egyptian Muslim women are happy with the launch of the first four women's fatwa councils, as they can now ask female preachers for religious fatwas on private matters.

This picture taken on March 28, 2022, shows a view of Mufti Hassan Khaled School in Lebanon's capital.

Culture

Lebanon’s economic crisis threatens education sector

Lebanon’s education sector, once prized throughout the Middle East as a regional leader, has been witnessing an irreversible mass exodus with hundreds of professionals in the teaching sector leaving.

Orthodox computer

Israel advances digital literacy project for ultra-Orthodox

Israel’s ministry of trade and industry estimates that many ultra-Orthodox are digitally illiterate, but much of the community avoids the internet by choice.

Parents wearing protective masks and their children arrive at a school entrance.

Culture

Abu Dhabi private schools returning to in-person classes

Remote education has led to difficulties for students throughout the world, including in Middle Eastern countries.

United Arab Emirates

A university student crosses the border from Ukraine by foot in Barabas, Hungary, on Feb. 28, 2022.

Returning Egyptians share nightmares of fleeing war in Ukraine

Egyptian students who fled the Russian war in Ukraine recount the details of their repatriation.

A Syrian refugee child sells flowers in the street in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.

Children's education at risk in Lebanon due to economic crisis

More than 700,000 kids are at risk of never returning to a classroom due to rising poverty, while thousands have dropped out of school to engage in child labor or get married.

This photograph shows an Ukrainian armoured personnel carrier (APC) BTR-4 destroyed as a result of fight not far from the centre of Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, located some 50 km from Ukrainian-Russian border, on Feb. 28, 2022.

Iraqi students stranded in Ukraine

Iraqi students are stuck in Ukraine and seem unable to flee due to the Russian invasion of that country.

Beirut university

Culture

Lebanese seniors get second chance at education

Hundreds of elderly in Lebanon enroll at the University for Seniors division of the American University of Beirut — some to fight boredom, others to achieve long-lost dreams.

Syrian children circumambulate a model of the Kaaba during an event to teach children the rites of pilgrimage, in the rebel-held town of Douma, eastern outskirts of Damascus, Syria, Aug. 29, 2017.

Jihadist group seeks influence in Syria’s Idlib via religious schools

The influence of religious schools is growing in Idlib, with their fundamentalist curricula under the supervision of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

Pupils attend a class at the Mahaba school in Ezbet al-Nakhl, a shanty town north of the Egyptian capital Cairo, on Oct. 13, 2018.

Egypt moves to redress teacher shortages in public schools

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi instructed the appointment of 30,000 new teachers annually for a period of five years, but some warn that the shortfall is so large that even this figure won’t do.

People wave Turkish flags and portraits of modern Turkey's founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, during a rally organized by main opposition group the Republican People's Party, on July 24, 2016, in Istanbul's Taksim Square.

Turkish teen suicide revives secular-pious debate

The debate over the place of Islam in public life remains among the most contentious in Turkey.

A protester rides a motorbike with his dog during a protest against the appointment of new Bogazici University rector Melih Bulu in the Kadikoy district on Feb. 2, 2021 in Istanbul Turkey.

Rights groups, world politicians urge release of student protesters in Turkey

European parliamentarians and rights groups are calling for Turkey to end the detention of two students behind bars for three months for protesting the government-appointed rector of Bogazici University.