Deep explainers for a region that refuses to be simple. Each file is a living page: faction dossiers, one relationship grid, the flips, the sources, a visible date. When the news changes, the file changes, and the changelog says so.https://beirutdesk.com/en-ushttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/03-war-scorecard/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/03-war-scorecard/Six actors, what each one says, what each one is doing, and where the fighting or the bases actually are, read side by side, with three chains of contradiction the official language is built to hide.Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/05-gaza/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/05-gaza/The transition has a UN mandate, a Board of Peace, a high representative, a Palestinian technocrat committee and an authorized security force. The committee has no confirmed entry into Gaza. Hamas dissolved its oversight body but kept ministries and policing. Israel controls more than 60 percent. The July disarmament roadmap remains contested and unimplemented.Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/06-axis-before-after/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/06-axis-before-after/In 2023 one network ran outward from a central sponsor: a state ally and land bridge in Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen, and Iran-aligned factions in Iraq. In 2026 the same names remain, but the Syria route is severed, leaderships have been replaced, and the network is under pressure rather than radiating from a centre.Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/07-sudan/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/07-sudan/Two armed forces, two governments claiming the same state, and a set of external backers that are reported or alleged rather than declared. The map reduces to one line running from Darfur in the west, through Kordofan as the contest zone, to the army-held east. The UN calls it the world's worst humanitarian crisis.Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/08-libya/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/08-libya/The state is split between two power centres, but the money is not. Oil revenue runs through one national oil company into one central bank, and both governments depend on the same stream. The division is political; the plumbing is shared. That is what makes the central bank the pressure point.Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/01-june-26-deal-decoded/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/01-june-26-deal-decoded/The June 26 framework is not a single swap. It is a repeatable sequence in which Israeli redeployment, Lebanese army control, Hezbollah disarmament and outside verification must unlock one another. Rome narrowed the pilot-zone process, while Reuters alone reported movement on a verifier shortlist. The next geography, verifier and timetable still do not exist as jointly confirmed, operational facts today.Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/02-lollar-autopsy/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/02-lollar-autopsy/A 2018 bank dollar did not sit in a labeled drawer. It became part of a pooled balance sheet. Banks placed foreign-currency funds at Banque du Liban, which paid unsustainably high rates, while the banking system financed the sovereign. As foreign-exchange holdings dwindled, balance sheets deteriorated. Recovery depends on loss recognition, bank reviews, repayment timing and who absorbs the gap.Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/04-syria/https://beirutdesk.com/state-of-play/04-syria/Ten actors, forty-five relationships, one grid. Eighteen months after the fall of the House of Assad, the men who took Damascus sit in its ministries, their former enemies hold seats or refuse them, and the powers that fought over Syria now negotiate over it. If you find this confusing, you are reading it correctly.Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT