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This study investigates emotions conveyed in US presidential speeches and media coverage regarding the Iraq War and the Iran nuclear deal during 2003 and 2015. The researchers gathered and examined news stories about the two policies, all official speeches delivered by George W Bush and Barack Obama, and opinion polls conducted during the respective six-month period in those two years. Nine discrete emotions were coded to capture the valence and volume in the speeches and news media content. The study finds that emotions appear more frequently in the Iraq discourse than in the Iran counterpart. President Bush used more negative emotions while President Obama employed more positive emotions. Emotion in the media coverage is constant and stable across the two policy periods; yet negative emotions are more prevalent than positive counterparts in the media despite distinct foreign policies. The study also examines public opinion trends toward the two policies for inferring potential linkage. This article contributes to the conceptual nexus among emotional persuasion, journalism pattern, and foreign policy-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After the killing of most powerful Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, in US drone strike in Iraq on January 3, 2020, the tensions in the Middle East are growing. Tehran retaliated by firing ballistic missiles at US troops stationed in Iraq. The General's death attracted a lot of concerns from the world as global economy gets directly affected by Middle Eastern tensions. The US forces based in Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan surround almost all of Iran. The situation remains volatile and lot depends on how Iran responds? Any prospect of war would unleash sufferings across the region. This study investigates the challenges posed by the killing of Qassem Soleimani and the role that regional politics and sectarian fault-lines may play in exacerbating the problems. It also discusses the US approach regarding regime change and Pakistan's place in the given context and suggests that Islamabad should pursue a balanced approach that would serve its geopolitical interests as well as domestic stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Iran's policy toward nuclear talks changed not because of Rouhani's election in 2013, but because of Supreme Leader Khamenei in 2011. Yet the future of that agreement, whose significance in Iran is comparable to the 1987 ceasefire with Iraq, depends on continuing political will, which among other issues, could be disrupted by at least three factors inside Iran. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]