From the Atlas Mountains to Washington: Zineb Riboua’s Journey
Great-power competition in the Middle East is often discussed through the lens of institutions, governments, and long-established experts. But in a recent Breaking Battlegrounds conversation, a different perspective emerged—one anchored in indigenous identity, regional experience, and the global path of a young scholar navigating political landscapes from Morocco to Washington.
Zineb Riboua, research fellow at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, joined the program to discuss her background, her work, and the experiences that shaped her voice in foreign policy.
Amazigh Identity and North African Roots
Riboua began with the foundation of her story—her origins in Morocco and her identity as a Berber, or Amazigh. She explained that the Amazigh represent the indigenous peoples of North Africa, and while they exist across the region, Morocco remains their strongest cultural and demographic center.
The Amazigh language, traditions, and rituals coexist with Arab–Islamic culture, forming a layered identity unique to Morocco. Riboua herself is from an area near the Atlas Mountains, one of the heartlands of Amazigh heritage. That cultural backdrop—distinct but deeply integrated into national life—shaped her understanding of regional dynamics from an early age.
How France, Writing, and Curiosity Led to Foreign Policy
When Chuck Warren asked how she transitioned from Morocco to France and ultimately into foreign-policy analysis, Riboua described a path driven by writing and intellectual exploration.
She originally expected to follow a traditional academic route through a major French school. But once in France, she realized her passion was not in consulting or finance—it was in expressing ideas, engaging debates, and exploring political questions. She had been writing since she was nineteen, running a blog in French that allowed her to test and shape her arguments.
That clarity led to a pivotal decision: instead of staying in France, she would attempt an internship in Washington to see whether foreign policy might be the right direction.
From Internship to Impact at the Hudson Institute
In 2020, Riboua arrived in Washington for her first experience inside the U.S. policy world. Her interest was focused heavily on the Middle East, and she soon began researching China’s expanding role in the region—a topic that would become central to her later work.
She returned to Washington for graduate studies, continued her research, and eventually joined the Hudson Institute as a research fellow. Her portfolio now includes Russian and Chinese involvement in the Middle East as well as the broader regional developments shaping U.S. foreign policy.
Riboua represents a new generation of analysts: rooted in lived regional experience, trained across continents, and deeply engaged in the geopolitical shifts redefining the Middle East and North Africa.
Transcript
Sam Stone: Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. Our next guest up today, Zineb Ribouaua, research fellow with the Hudson Institute Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, writes extensively about geopolitics and great power competition throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Zineb, welcome to the program.
Zineb Riboua: Thank you for having me.
Chuck Warren: So Zineb, you’re a Moroccan Berber, which is a tribe in North Africa. Explain to our audience, who are probably not quite aware of the geography out there, what this is exactly, how big that is, and what does that mean?
Zineb Riboua: Yeah, I’m originally from Morocco. It’s a country in North Africa, looking at the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. Berber is actually, it means the indigenous people of North Africa in general, and they are much more present in Morocco than in other places in the region. There are different Berbers. There are Berbers from the North, the Reef, the Slough, et cetera.
I am much more a little bit next to the Atlas Mountains in Morocco for those who ever visited. And so yes, it’s more of like an ethnicity in Morocco. They speak what is called Amazigh, it’s the language. And they have their own rituals, culture, also mixed very well with the Arab Islamic culture in Morocco.
And so they have distinctive, I would say, identity and political identity in Morocco. And so, this is basically a grand summary of it.
Chuck Warren: So how did you decide, I’m leaving home, I’m going to school in France, and I’m going become a policy expert in foreign policy? What led you to that?
Zineb Riboua: Yeah, so I’ve always been interested in actually writing. I always loved that. Of course, at the time I was in high school, I thought I would just go do a French program, join a big French school, and then maybe stay there or do something else.
But as I was in France, once I landed, I really realized that I was much more someone like to express ideas to write about ideas to actually get into big debates. And I had a I had a blog since I was nineteen. It was it all in French. And so I figured that I don’t think I’m going to be the best consultant or the best investment banker but they’re there are two things or three that I know about politics, my own region, how how things can go.
So I thought, why not just try and go to Washington and do an internship or something and figure out if I’m actually good for that. So yeah, that’s how I came to the United States the first time in 2020. I did an internship, really focused on the Middle East and started an online project on what China was doing in the Middle East and North Africa. And I thought that, yeah, I actually really liked that. Maybe I should just continue my studies.
So I continue my studies in Washington and then I started working at the Hudson Institute as a, as a research fellow. Or I focus mainly on Russia and China involvement in the Middle East but I also cover the the region as the whole and how it impacts U.S. foreign policy.
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