WORLD ROUNDUPVenezuela’s Civil-Military Alliance Is Being Stretched | Advance by Separatists Has Reshaped Yemen’s Civil War | Iranian Unrest Is About More Than the Economy, and more

Syria’s Incomplete Security Transition Has Left Gaps for Islamic State to Exploit  (Haian Dukhan and Rahaf Aldoughli, The Conversation)
The US military launched a wave of strikes against targets in central Syria on December 19 in response to an attack on US forces near the ancient city of Palmyra one week earlier. That attack saw a lone Islamic State (IS) gunman kill two US service members and one American civilian at a fortified base in the city.
The perpetrator, whose identity has not yet been released, had recently enlisted in Syria’s internal security forces. He had reportedly already attracted suspicion from local security leadership over his possible extremist sympathies.
The attack has exposed deep vulnerabilities within the Syrian transitional government’s security architecture. It also illustrates how IS has adapted from being a territory-holding “proto-state” into an insurgent movement designed to exploit Syria’s institutional weaknesses.

Venezuela’s Civil-Military Alliance Is Being Stretched — If It Breaks, Numerous Armed Groups May Be Drawn into Messy Split  (Rebecca Hanson and Verónica Zubillaga, The Conversation)
The immediate political void left in Venezuela by Nicolás Maduro’s abrupt removal from power has been filled by the former vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, who was sworn in as interim president on Jan. 5, 2026.
But the situation is far from stable. Rodríguez represents just one of multiple and competing interests within a Venezuela elite composed of a precarious civil-military alliance officially committed to a leftist populist ideology called Chavismo.
Delcy and her brother Jorge Rodríguez, the longtime right-hand man of Maduro, are the leading faces of the civilian factions. Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello and Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López, both members of the armed forces, represent its military interests.
Even this rough civilian-military split represents just the institutional dimensions of power in Venezuela. There are also numerous armed groups and organizations with distinct interests that will respond differently to what happens in the coming days and weeks.

“Neither Gaza nor Lebanon!” Iranian Unrest Is About More Than the Economy − Protesters Reject the Islamic Republic’s Whole Rationale  (Kamran Talattof, The Conversation)
A familiar slogan has echoed through the streets of various Iranian cities in recent days: “Neither Gaza nor Lebanon, I sacrifice my life for Iran.”
That phrase has been chanted at protests that have sprung up around Iran since Dec. 28, 2025. The spark of the uprising and bazaar strikes has been economic hardship and government mismanagement. (Cont.)