Why jihadist insurgencies persist

The hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees living in overcrowded Bangladeshi camps fled one crisis but are facing another, writes Sophie Cousins, as monsoon season — just weeks away — threatens to bring with it disease, landslides, flooding and death. Building stronger structures might make sense — except that in an election year, the Bangladeshi government doesn't want to signal that the Rohingya are there to stay. For Foreign Policy.

Shortly after taking office, Barack Obama initiated a "reset" strategy towards Russia, hoping to improve relations. But by 2011, things had gone south. As former US ambassador Michael McFaul describes it, he was sent to Moscow at the time to advance the reset, but instead "presided over its demise." In this Washington Post essay, he recounts his personal experience being the target of a Kremlin disinformation campaign.

This week, Hezbollah declared victory in Lebanon's first parliamentary election since 2009. In this Atlantic piece, David Kenner delves into what's behind the Iran-backed militant Shia group's success. "There are pressures in certain ways, people rely on various parties for their livelihood," explains one former mayor. "So we have this statelet within a state, but in fact the statelet is much stronger than the state."

The split between Donald Trump and his European allies around efforts to preserve the Iran deal was on full display this week. As The New York Times' Steven Erlanger reports, there are signs that patience is wearing thin when it comes to tumultuous American foreign policymaking. Asks one former French ambassador: “How do we make it work with a US leadership that doesn't want to play the role of leader?"