U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Monday the United States would closely examine proposed de-escalation zones aimed at easing Syria's civil war but warned "the devil's in the details" and that much needed to be worked out. The deal to create "de-escalation" zones in the major areas...

The Afghan government says the country's air force has pounded ISIS targets in an eastern province where a U.S. military raid last month killed the militant group's top commander. The Interior Ministry said Monday that the airstrikes killed 34 ISIS fighters over the past 24 hours and...

France's President-elect Emmanuel Macron will be tough in negotiations over the terms of Britain's departure from the European Union but will not seek to punish Britain, his economic adviser said on Monday. Jean Pisani-Ferry said that no-one had an interest in a hard Brexit that totally...

 With heavy rains persisting and waters still rising over much of waterlogged eastern Canada, the nation's military on Sunday tripled the number of troops urgently working to evacuate thousands of residents. Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre declared a state of emergency for his city,...

( The Guardian )- Israeli ministers have approved the wording of a new law that would downgrade Arabic as an official language and which states that the right to self-determination in Israel “is unique to the Jewish people”, despite the country’s sizeable non-Jewish minority. The go-ahead...

A gas leak in a coal mine in central China has killed 18 people, local authorities said Monday. The leak happened on Sunday morning when miners were working in the shaft of the mine in Youxian county in Hunan province, according to a statement from the propaganda department of the Communist...

More than 1 million children have fled South Sudan's civil war, two United Nations agencies said Monday, part of the world's fastest growing refugee crisis. Another 1 million South Sudanese children are displaced within the country, having fled their homes due to the civil war, said the...

Emmanuel Macron was due to attend a ceremony marking the Western allies' World War Two victory in Europe on Monday as relieved investment markets celebrated his election as French president. The ceremony in Paris later on Monday marks the 72nd anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany in...

 A 6-year-old Australian boy photographed making an ISIS salute in front of a human body hanging from a cross somewhere in the Middle East was entitled to return to Australia with his siblings, Australia's prime minister said on Monday. But such children who returned from the...

The city of Montreal declared a state of emergency on Sunday afternoon as floodwaters spread from torrential rains that have lashed the city since early on Friday, causing the worst flooding in decades, city officials said. The state of emergency, which gives firefighters extra...

Israeli paramilitary police officers shot and killed a knife-wielding Palestinian teenage girl who tried to attack them at an entrance to Jerusalem's Old City on Sunday, a police spokeswoman said. The incident was the latest in a 19-month-long period of sporadic street attacks by...

Emmanuel Macron was elected president of France on Sunday with a business-friendly vision of European integration, defeating Marine Le Pen, a far-right nationalist who threatened to take France out of the European Union, early projections showed. The centrist's emphatic victory, which also...

Germany's president said Sunday that despite recent disagreement the foundation of his country's relations with Israel remains solid - a reference to a recent diplomatic spat over an Israeli anti-occupation group. Frank-Walter Steinmeier is in Israel on his first foreign trip outside Europe...

( The New Arab )- US President Donald Trump will reportedly give the green light for US-backed Kurdish forces in Syria to oust the Islamic State group from Raqqa city, despite Turkish objections. Trump will tell President Tayyip Erdogan that SDF fighters will go head with the operation to...

Israel's cabinet breathed new life on Sunday into efforts to anchor in law the country's status as a Jewish state, legislation Palestinians have described as an obstacle to peace. A ministerial committee approved a revised version of a bill first proposed in 2011 that declares the "State of...

Archaeologists and conservation experts are meeting in Cairo to discuss the safe transportation of King Tutankhamun's throne, chests and bed from the Egyptian Museum in central Cairo to a new one being built on the other side of the city. Sunday's gathering brought together experts from...

The courtyard of the Louvre Museum in Paris, where French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron was due to speak later on Sunday, was briefly evacuated after a suspect bag was found. Police in the French capital said they made security checks of the area as a precaution and later added that...

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani faced furious protests from victims' families on Sunday when he visited the site of a mine accident that claimed dozens of lives, two weeks ahead of an election. Local news agencies showed people stamping on Rouhani's car and beating the windows as it tried to...

Waterlogged parts of eastern Canada were hit with more rain early Sunday, as freshly deployed troops helped evacuate residents ahead of peak flooding expected in the coming days. Torrential rains combined with runoff from melting snow have caused rivers to overflow their banks, posing a...

After a tumultuous election campaign filled with scandal and surprises, the French public began to vote on Sunday on whether a pro-European Union centrist or an anti-EU, anti-immigration far-rightist will lead them for the next five years. Opinion polls indicate they will pick Emmanuel...