Iraq's elite Counter-Terrorism Service said on Monday it had arrested the "administrative chief" of the Islamic State group after his arrival at Baghdad airport. The man, known as Abu Naba, was detained in October as he was "getting into a taxi, just after landing in Baghdad", CTS spokesman...

Israel's Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz has invited President Michel Aoun to direct talks in Europe on their countries' disputed maritime border, a rare outreach between nations still technically at war. Israel and Lebanon opened indirect negotiations on the border dispute under US and UN...

Israel Monday sent a delegation to Sudan, its first since last month's announcement of normalization of relations between the two countries, a senior Israeli official said. For days there have been rumors in Jerusalem that a delegation would visit Khartoum in the wake of the accord...

Turkey prevented German forces belonging to a European Union military mission carrying out a full search of a Turkish cargo ship that they suspected of taking weapons to Libya, both countries confirmed on Monday. Soldiers from the frigate Hamburg boarded the Turkish freighter, the...

Ten years ago, a wildfire of revolts in the Arab world touched off an unlikely series of events that swelled, then dashed many hopes, and irrevocably changed the region. From the quickfire collapse of seemingly invincible regimes to the rise and fall of a jihadist caliphate in its heart,...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in an apparent message to U.S. President-elect Joe Biden, said on Sunday there should be no return to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal abandoned by President Donald Trump. Biden, who takes office on Jan. 20, has said he would rejoin the accord if Tehran...

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Sunday defended his tour of Gulf Arab states and the Trump administration's continued efforts to squeeze Iran, even as a new U.S. administration led by Joe Biden prepares to enter the White House in January. Although Pompeo has not taken questions from...

A sharp rise in coronavirus infections in the Gaza Strip could overwhelm the Palestinian enclave's meagre medical system by next week, public health advisers said on Sunday. Gaza, where the dense and poor population of 2 million is vulnerable to contagions, has logged 14,000 coronavirus...

Iraq's Salahaddin province declared three days of mourning from Sunday over a deadly attack blamed on the Islamic State group, as some criticised authorities for failing to fight back jihadists. Late Saturday, a roadside bomb hit a civilian car on an open road near Mt. Makhoul, about 200...

Israel said Sunday its military struck Hamas targets in Gaza in response to a rocket attack launched from the Palestinian enclave. The Israeli air force struck two rocket ammunition manufacturing sites, a military compound and "underground infrastructures", the Israel Defence Forces said....

Exactly one week since the second official lockdown began, Lebanon confirmed 1,628 new coronavirus cases and 10 deaths Saturday, bringing the total number of registered cases in the country to 115,242.

Turkey reported 5,103 more coronavirus patients over the past 24 hours, according to Health Ministry data released on Friday. The country's overall tally now stands at 435,273, the ministry announced. A total of 3,019 more patients recovered over the past day, bringing the tally to...

Iran has instructed allies across the Middle East to be on high alert and avoid provoking tensions with the U.S. that could give an outgoing Trump administration cause to launch attacks in the U.S. president's final weeks in office, Iraqi officials have said. The request - delivered by a...

Children of some 33,000 Palestinians living behind barbed wires in Hebron, the Palestinian city in the southern West Bank, 30 kilometers (18 miles) south of Jerusalem are subjected to daily harassment while passing through Israeli military checkpoints. On eve of World Children Day, speaking...

Lebanon’s authorities signed a contract this month with a German company to clear dangerous material stored for more than a decade at Beirut port, the site of a seismic blast in August that killed about 200 people and wrecked swathes of the capital. Combi Lift, which signed the contract...

Israel has accused Lebanon of changing its position in talks on their disputed maritime border and warned it could lead to a "dead end" that would be damaging for the whole region. The two countries, which remain technically at war, opened negotiations on the border dispute under US and UN...

For Naela Abu Jibba, a mother of five who lives and works in the Gaza Strip, taking the road less travelled has become a way of life. The first woman taxi driver in the Islamist-run Palestinian territory, the 39-year-old has become a target of sexist jibes about her abilities behind the...

A blast struck the Al Arish-Al Qantara natural gas pipeline in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula on Thursday, three witnesses told Reuters. They said flames and thick plumes of smoke rose from the pipeline, describing the scene from their vantage points in and around the city of al-Arish....

The United States will require that imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank be labelled as having been "Made in Israel" or "Product of Israel", Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement on Thursday. According to a Nov. 16 statement by four Republican senators,...

 Iran will impose "severe restrictions" across many areas of the country on Saturday in an effort to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, President Hassan Rouhani said. The Islamic republic has not imposed a full lockdown since it reported its first Covid-19 cases in February....