This is the Confused Podcast Series, which features Confused About Syria, Confused About Yemen, and Confused Iraqi podcasts. The series aims to make complex conflict contexts more human, accessible, and honest.
If you’re looking for quick answers about the Middle East and conflict, this may not be the podcast series for you. But If you’re looking to slow down, listen, and sit with complexity, then welcome :)
This is the Confused Podcast Series, which features Confused About Syria, Confused About Yemen, and Confused Iraqi podcasts. The series aims to make complex conflict contexts more human, accessible, and honest.
If you’re looking for quick answers about the Middle East and conflict, this may not be the podcast series for you. But If you’re looking to slow down, listen, and sit with complexity, then welcome :)
Before headlines, before labels, and before 2011, there was a country steeped in culture, memory, and humanity.
In this first episode of Confused About Syria, we leave behind the all-too-common conflict framing to talk about Syria as a place of beauty and diversity – its people, landscapes, identities, and daily life – and consider why understanding this is crucial to making sense of everything that played out in recent years.
Drawing on personal experiences, lived encounters, and years of working across the region, we reflect on first impressions of Syria, reconcile reality with outside narratives, and recall how fear, repression, beauty, humour, and survival have long coexisted. We talk about Syria’s social fabric and regional connectedness and the dangers of reducing people to simplified labels in moments of crisis.
This episode is an invitation to slow down, unpack assumptions, and engage with Syrian society prior to the contemporary conflict, the full understanding of which cannot be understood without such a foundation.
🎧 In this episode:
This is the first of a five-episode series.
Next episode: how 2011 unfolded and why it didn’t start in a vacuum.
In this final episode of Confused About Yemen, Noor Mousa and Rachel Sider look ahead: what kind of future is being imagined for Yemen, and by whom? Is it one country, two, or a more messy reality that doesn’t fit any of the imposed formulas?
From stalled peace talks to quiet deals between armed actors, Noor and Rachel unpack how questions of power, legitimacy, and international involvement shape Yemen’s options, while most Yemenis remain focused on something far simpler: returning home, finding work, accessing services, and living with dignity. They explore why so many people feel shut out of peace processes happening in their name, how long-term displacement and economic collapse affect prospects for peace, and why trust in local elites and international actors is weak.
Despite stagnated diplomacy, the episode also holds space for reasons to hope, including a young population, a strong diaspora, and deep cultural, social, and economic foundations that could support recovery if a lasting political settlement ever takes shape. This is a conversation about Yemen’s future, told from the perspective of those who have watched the same humanitarian warnings repeat for years and believe the country deserves more than protracted limbo.
Episode Notes:
Resources & Recommendations
Books to Go Deeper on Power, Peace, & Yemen’s Future:
How to Follow Yemen’s Peace Process in Real Time:
If you want to keep an eye on Yemen beyond headlines, here are some practical ways to track developments:
Women in Yemen have long held communities together amidst conflict, displacement, economic collapse, and inter-generational trauma. Yet, their stories are often sidelined or simplified in global narratives. In this episode of Confused About Yemen, hosts Noor Mousa and Rachel Sider explore the layered, intimate realities of womanhood in Yemen today.
Drawing on lived experience, fieldwork, and conversations with Yemeni activists and creators, they trace how women navigate war, patriarchy, shifting social norms, and the expectations placed on them both inside and outside the home. From the quiet power of community networks to the courage of women leading local peace efforts, this episode highlights the forms of resilience and resistance that rarely make headlines.
Episode Notes: Resources & Recommendations
If you understand Arabic, you may find this series valuable: a collection of podcasts created by Yemeni women for the Voices for Sustainable Freedom (VFSF) initiative.
Listen here: https://soundcloud.com/ahj-vfsf/tracks
Yemen is often in the news for its conflict, but for centuries it was known as Arabia Felix – the "Happy Land." In this season premiere of Confused About Yemen, hosts Noor Mousa and Rachel Sider take you behind the headlines to share an aid worker’s perspective on life in this complex country.
From growing up hearing stories of Yemen’s greenery and poetry to navigating the realities of a protracted humanitarian crisis, Noor shares her experience living in Aden. Together, Noor and Rachel unpack the history of the North-South divide, the politicization of aid, and the surprising ways life continues despite the war; from ballroom-style dancing to the daily ritual of chewing Qat.
Episode Notes:
Resources and Recommendations
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