(The Guardian)- Her hair was tastefully curled, her makeup flawless and discreet. Asma al-Assad’s tone, too, was impeccably sober when she gave her first television interview in eight years earlier this week. Like all Syrians, she told her interviewer in her light London accent, she felt...

(Vox)- The hot new policy idea in Washington is the hottest old idea: direct US military intervention in Syria’s civil war. In the past several months, the siege of the rebel-held eastern part of the city of Aleppo has dramatized the war’s terrible cost. In the last debate, Hillary...

(theguardian)- Speaking at the Conservative party conference last month Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, set out a vision of Britain as a “soft power superpower”, projecting values through influence, ideas and the power of persuasion. If ever there were a time and a place for exercising...

(Bloomberg)- Vladimir Putin’s backing for the relentless air bombardment of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo has provoked some foreign governments to accuse Russia of carrying out indiscriminate attacks on civilians. The U.S. and some European Union countries including Germany are...