France said on Thursday it saw a chance to break the stalemate in Syria's war as Russia now seemed to accept there could be no military solution and preconditions set by some opponents of President Bashar Assad had been dropped. The election of President Emmanuel Macron has provided an...

(Eqtsad)- At the end of 2006, while preparing for the launch of al-Donia television, many employees insisted on knowing who the channel financiers were before beginning work with the channel for fear the channel was funded by a party hostile to the regime. The television channel administration...

Iraqi forces captured on Thursday the wrecked historic mosque of Mosul in which Daesh (ISIS) proclaimed its self-styled "caliphate" three years ago, an Iraqi military statement said. Taking the Grand al-Nuri Mosque hands a symbolic victory to the Iraqi forces which have been battling for...

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Wednesday that the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad appeared so far to have heeded a warning this week from Washington not to carry out a chemical weapons attack. Russia, the Syrian government's main backer in the country's civil war,...

Prime Minister Theresa May faces a major test of whether she can muster enough lawmakers to rule on Thursday when her legislative plan goes to a vote in parliament amid bids by opponents to peel off her supporters with an array of amendments. May's botched gamble on a June 8 snap election...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel huddles with western European allies Thursday to draw up a battle strategy a week before she hosts what is expected to be the most fractious G20 summit in years. With US President Donald Trump preaching "America First" and dismissing climate change, Western...

The Trump administration on Wednesday set new criteria for visa applicants from six mainly Muslim nations and all refugees that require a "close" family or business tie to the United States. The move came after the Supreme Court partially restored President Donald Trump's executive order that...

Israel said it attacked a Syrian military position on Wednesday after a stray mortar shell from fighting in Syria's civil war landed inside the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. The Israeli military said the Syrian shell hit an open area in the northern Golan Heights, causing no injuries,...

Egypt's Cairo airport has started screening passengers arriving from Sudan for signs of cholera because of a reported outbreak there, the head of airport quarantine said on Wednesday. Similar measures are already carried out in Cairo airport for people arriving from Yemen due to an epidemic...

Hamas has begun work on a buffer zone along Gaza's border with Egypt, the movement said Wednesday, as part of an effort to assure Cairo that it's serious about preventing the cross-border flow of weapons and militants. Hamas officials hope the creation of the buffer will lead to an easing of...

It will be "many months" before authorities will be able to give a final death toll for the London tower block blaze, police said on Wednesday while stressing the enormity of the task. "We are many months from being able to provide the number of people who accurately represents the loss of...

US President Donald Trump has accepted an invitation to join his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron at Bastille Day celebrations in Paris on July 14, French and US officials said Wednesday. Trump will attend the traditional military parade on the Champs-Elysees avenue, where US soldiers will...

Brett McGurk, the U.S. special envoy to the coalition against Islamic State visited north Syria on Wednesday and met the council planning to run Raqqa after its capture from the jihadists to assure it of support, one of its members said. The U.S.-led coalition is supporting the Syrian...

Germany football coach Joachim Loew wants more clarity from sports leaders following speculation that doping of Russia's 2014 World Cup squad was covered up. The World Cup-winning coach urged the World Anti-Doping Agency and FIFA to be transparent and identify players implicated. "If...

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte assured troops on Wednesday that he would protect them from any legal action if they accidently kill civilians while battling militants who have besieged a southern city. Duterte ordered the army to destroy the militants aligned with ISIS who attacked...

Islamic State's leaders used spies to root out suspected enemies in their ranks in the countdown to this month's U.S.-led attack on their de-facto capital Raqqa, the wives of three Tunisian fighters who fled the Syrian town said. They described how the leaders had fled Raqqa as pressure...

Iraq's military said on Wednesday it had retaken two more neighborhoods from Islamic State in Mosul's Old City, bringing it closer to total control of the city. The army's 16th infantry division captured Hadarat al-Saada and al-Ahmadiyya, northwest of the historic Grand al-Nuri Mosque which...

US President Donald Trump's warning to the Syrian government not to carry out a chemical weapons attack appears to have worked, Pentagon chief Jim Mattis said Wednesday. "It appears that they took the warning seriously," Mattis said, referring to the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad....

Britain's withdrawal from the European Union could leave the remaining 27 countries with a 20-billion-euro hole in their budget to fill, a commissioner said Wednesday. EU Budget Commissioner Guenther Oettinger, of Germany, called on the bloc to improve the efficiency of its spending in the...

Pentagon chief Jim Mattis accused Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday of making international "mischief" and said America's commitment to NATO remains unwavering. Speaking to students in Germany to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Marshall Plan to rebuild a ravaged Europe...