Toxic Wars of the Middle East

The Middle East has been ground zero for the major chemical attacks of the past 40 years. From the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88), to the Persian Gulf War (1991), to the Syrian Civil War (2011-present), countless civilians and soldiers have been exposed to chemical agents and hundreds of thousands of survivors live with the long-term consequences of these bombs. Yet, there has been limited scholarly and public work about chemical warfare and the traces it leaves behind in the region: from its illicit international trade, to the lives of survivors post-exposure, to the environmental disasters these bombs unleash. Narges Bajoghli is a media and political anthropologist and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Watson Institute. Joost Hiltermann is Program Director for the Middle East and North Africa for International Crisis Group. We spoke with the recently during a break in the Middle East Toxic Wars conference here at the Institute. You can read a transcript of this episode here: [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KqQPaut1nUVZ543Z0SKMgWk2rK8JVG7y/view?usp=sharing]