• "Why Iran Is Gambling on Hamas," Foreign Affairs, November 1, 2023.
• "Small Countries, Big War," Foreign Affairs, April 10, 2023.
• "The Folly of Iran’s Hard-Liners," Foreign Affairs, October 11, 2022.
• "Iran Won't Back Down," Foreign Affairs, November 2, 2021.
• "No Matter Who Is U.S. President, Iran Will Drive a Harder Bargain Than Before," Foreign Affairs, October 20, 2020.
• "What Does The Iranian Election Tell Us?," The New York Times, February 25, 2020.
• "Is There A Way Out of The Iran Crisis?," The Washington Post, October 3, 2019.
• "As Islamism Fades, Iran Goes Nationalist," The New York Times, April 3, 2019.
• "The Saudi-Iranian Rivalry: Factional Politics All the Way Down," Policy Roundtable, H-Diplo/International Security Studies Forum, February 20, 2018.
• "Why Iran's Elections Matter," Council on Foreign Relations, February 24, 2016. 
• “Why the Triumph of Moderates is a Setback to Iranian Democracy,” The Washington Post, March 9, 2016. Reprinted in Iran’s 2016 Election, Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS) Studies, vol. 29, March 15, 2016.
• “Iran’s Russian Turn: The Start of a New Alliance,” Foreign Affairs, November 12, 2015.
• “Iran’s Alarmed Conservatives Anticipate Confrontation,” in Confrontation or Conciliation:
How the Nuclear Agreement is Reshaping GCC- Iran Relations, The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, August 13, 2015.
• “The Danger of (Mis)Perceptions after the Iran Deal,” The Washington Post,  August 3, 2015.
• “How to Interpret Iran’s Islamic Rhetoric,” The Washington Post, July 7, 2015. Reprinted in Islam and International Order, Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS) Studies, vol. 15, July 22, 2015.
• “How Iranians are Debating the Nuclear Deal,” The Washington Post, April 21, 2015. Also in Iran and the Nuclear Deal, Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS) Studies, vol. 13, April 29, 2015.
• “Strategic Anti-Americanism in Iran from the Hostage Crisis to Nuclear Talks,” The Washington Post, November 4, 2014.
• “Iran’s Nuclear Politics: Regime Security vs. Factional Interests,” Iran Matters, Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center, March 24, 2014.
• “Iran’s Pragmatic Turn,” Foreign Policy, September 12, 2013

           Selected as one of the Middle East Channel’s top ten op-ed pieces of the year

• “Supreme Showdown in Tehran,” Foreign Policy, February 4, 2013.
• “Islam: The Solution that Wasn’t,” in Building a Shared Future: Religion, Politics, and the Public Sphere, eds. Emmanuel Kattan and Yasir Suleiman, London: British Council/University of Cambridge, 2012.
• “How Iran Really Sees Turkey,” Foreign Policy, November 3, 2011.
• “Iran’s Green Movement and the Grey Strategy of Patience,” Foreign Policy, April 30, 2010. Reprinted in The People Reloaded: The Green Movement and the Struggle for Iran’s Future, eds. Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel, New York: Melville House Publishing, 2010.
• “How Iran Sees the Sanctions,” Foreign Policy, September 22, 2010.
• “Who Wrote the Koran?,” The New York Times Magazine, December 7, 2008.