A monitoring group and activists said on Sunday that Syrian rebels had locked people in cages and driven them to areas near Damascus to use as human shields against heavy government air raids. A video posted online by the Shaam News Network, an opposition media outlet, showed men and women in...

The Turkish Coast Guard has rescued 533 refugees and found four bodies in the last 24 hours, the Turkish military said Sunday. The refugees were found aboard boats off Turkey’s western coasts of Izmir, Aydin, Mugla, and Canakkale, the Turkish General Staff said in a statement on its official...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Syrian rebel groups led by Nusra Front have recaptured a ground from regime troops and their allies in the northern and southern countryside of Aleppo, as fighting still underway, rebel commander told Zaman Al Wasl Sunday. Rebels and Nusra Fighters have recaptured al Hwayiz,...

(By Lama Shammas; Translation by Yusra Ahmed) Istanbul/Zaman Al Wasl- In mid-September 2012, Venus, the 17-year old girl, was arrested by the Political Security Branch after her neighbor report to the branch about her activities and her defected father. Her father defected from the Syrian...

Some 130 migrants, most believed to be from Syria, were discovered Saturday in a refrigerated truck on the Bulgarian border with Turkey, Bulgaria’s interior ministry said, adding that the lorry driver had been arrested. A ministry spokeswoman said 38 men, 33 women and 58 children were found...

The United States ramped up its support for Syria's opposition with a pledge of nearly $100 million in fresh aid on Saturday. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia's top diplomat described the timing of the departure of Syrian President Bashar Assad and the withdrawal of foreign fighters as top...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Islamic State fighters took the central town of Mahin east of Homs city for the second time in two years, an affiliate news agency said Sunday, a move set off alarm bells over a nearby ancient Christian town. Activists said the radical group seek to control Syrian regime's...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- The Nusra Front fighters on Saturday have recaptured a ground from regime troops and their allies in the southern countryside of Aleppo, the al-Qaeda branch in Syria said via social media. Nusra Fighters have recaptured al-Qarasi and al Jameeiya hills, and  Maryamin...

The decision by U.S. President Barack Obama to send special forces to Syria is strictly focused on fighting ISIS and does not signify the United States is entering Syria's civil war, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said. "President Obama has made a very strong and forceful and simple...

Turkish jets on Saturday launched bombing raids against ISIS targets in Syria, the day before Turks are due to vote in a parliamentary election, a senior government official said. American jets were standing by to assist and all aircraft involved in the operations returned safely, the official...

At least 70 people were killed and 550 wounded in attacks on a marketplace in a rebel-held area east of the Syrian capital Damascus, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Saturday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights had announced a death toll of at least 59, including five children, in...

 A newly formed U.S.-backed Syrian rebel alliance on Saturday launched an offensive against Islamic State in the northeast province of Hasaka, a day after the United States said it would send special forces to advise insurgents fighting the jihadists. It was the first declared...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 7 people have been killed by Syrian regime in the northern countryside of Homs on Saturday, three of them passed away in a toxic-gas attack, activists said, reporting 35 suffocation cases. Homs Media Center said regime military had fired a missile carrying poisonous...

Russia and Iran must agree to a date and means for Syria's President Bashar al-Assad to quit the country, and agree to withdraw all foreign forces from Syria, Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said in an interview with Sky News Arabia broadcast on Saturday. Arch...

Police arrested 22 people Friday following the deaths of two Syrian media activists at their home in southeast Turkey. Ibrahim Abdul-Qadir and Fares Hamadi were found stabbed to death in Haliliye in the southeastern province of Sanliurfa, medical staff said. Local media reported the men worked...

As his family crammed alongside strangers into a small, exposed makeshift tent in Syria near the border with Turkey, Mohammed Musa slept outside in the mud through the first heavy rainfalls of autumn. A week earlier the 24-year-old, his wife, child, parents and siblings fled...

Germany agreed with Austria Friday to new rules for a more "orderly" passage of migrants, as the death of 17 children at sea highlighted the treacherous journey of those trying to reach Europe. After a week in which tensions flared between the neighbour states, Germany's interior...

At least 91 people, including 17 children, were killed on Friday in attacks on opposition strongholds in the north and outside Damascus, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The deaths came as top diplomats from 17 countries, including Iran and Saudi Arabia, met for the first...

U.S. special operations forces will arrive in northern Syria within the next month to start a wide-ranging advisory mission that will stop short of accompanying fighters on operations against ISIS, a U.S. defense official said on Friday. The senior U.S. official, who briefed Pentagon reporters...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 60 civilians on Friday were killed in the northern province of Aleppo due to regime's deadly airstrikes and missile attacks on rebel-held towns and neighborhoods, activists told Zaman al Wasl. 20 people have been killed in Russian surface-to-surface missile hit...