BEIRUT (Reuters) - Islamist militants holding 19 Lebanese soldiers seized during an incursion into Lebanon said on Friday they had demanded the release of Islamist prisoners in exchange for letting their captives go. Two commanders close to the group holding the soldiers,...

All Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip have refused to extend a three-day truce with Israel, the militant Hamas group that dominates the enclave said Friday, as the ceasefire ended. "All the Palestinian factions, including Hamas, have agreed not to renew the ceasefire because...

(Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama said on Thursday he has authorized air strikes against Islamist militants in Iraq to protect American personnel and launched humanitarian assistance to prevent a genocide of members of a religious minority who have fled their homes....

The Obama administration is considering US air strikes and humanitarian air drops to help besieged religious minorities chased up a mountain by militants in Iraq . The move comes as Qaraqosh, Iraq's largest Christian city, was all but abandoned as the jihadist group Islamic State (...

(Reuters) - Islamic State militants extended their gains in northern Iraq on Thursday, seizing more towns and strengthening a foothold near the Kurdish region in an offensive that has alarmed the Baghdad government and regional powers. The advance forced thousands of...

(Reuters) - Mediators worked against the clock on Thursday to extend a Gaza truce between Israel and the Palestinians as the three-day ceasefire went into its final 24 hours. Israel has said it is ready to agree to an extension as Egyptian mediators pursued talks with...

(Reuters) - An Iraqi government air strike on a Sharia court set up by Islamic State militants in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul killed 60 people on Wednesday, the office of the prime minister's military spokesman said. The Islamic State judge who ran the court was among...

BEIRUT: At least 10 civilians were wounded Thursday after a homemade bomb was tossed under the al-Khanaq bridge in Lebanon's second largest city Tripoli, a security source told The Daily Star. Earlier reports had suggested that Tripoli citizen, Issam al-Shaar was killed in the...

(Reuters) - Kurdish forces attacked Islamic State fighters near the Kurdish regional capital of Arbil in northern Iraq on Wednesday in a change of tactics supported by the Iraqi central government to try to break the Islamists' momentum. The attack 40 km (25 miles) southwest of...

(Reuters) - Yemeni security forces killed at least nine suspected al Qaeda militants on Wednesday when they tried to ambush troops heading to eastern Yemen to bolster state authority there, state media reported. General Abdel-Rahman al-Halili, commander of the first military...

(Reuters) - Executed former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein's Sunni tribal allies moved his body from a family plot eight months ago, fearful that Shi'ite militias would harm it, a tribal leader told Reuters on Wednesday. The caution paid off for Saddam's supporters and perhaps...

(Reuters) - An Egyptian court upheld death sentences on Wednesday against 12 Muslim Brotherhood supporters convicted of killing a police officer last year, judicial sources said. Judge Moataz Khafagy first passed the sentence against the men in June and referred the case to...

(Reuters) - A Gaza ceasefire was holding on Wednesday and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, echoing Israel's position, linked a lifting of blockades of the devastated enclave to Hamas giving up its rocket arsenal. Israel withdrew ground forces from the Gaza Strip on Tuesday...

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanese state media say clashes have broken out in a border town held by Islamic extremists from neighboring Syria after a negotiated truce collapsed overnight. The cease-fire, mediated by Muslim clerics, was meant to help end four days of fighting in the town of...

BEIRUT (AP) — The Lebanese army agreed to a 24-hour cease-fire in a border town held by Islamic extremists from Syria Tuesday to allow for negotiations for the release of captive soldiers and evacuate casualties, a senior Lebanese security official said. The agreement appears to...

(Reuters) - Israel pulled its ground forces out of the Gaza Strip on Tuesday and started a 72-hour ceasefire with Hamas mediated by Egypt as a first step towards negotiations on a more enduring end to the month-old war. Minutes before the truce began at 8 a.m. (0500 GMT),...

(Reuters) - Israel and Islamist Hamas were expected to hold their fire for three days starting on Tuesday, under terms of an Egyptian-brokered truce, while launching negotiations to cement a long-term deal to end a four-week Gaza war. The ceasefire was the latest of...

Beirut, Lebanon - Clashes between Syrian fighters and the Lebanese army continued for a third day in the northeast Lebanese town of Arsal, as many residents fled and others were caught in the violence and forced to stay behind. At least 11 Lebanese soldiers were killed...

BEIRUT (Reuters) - A group of Lebanese Sunni Muslim clerics urged Lebanese Sunnis on Monday to protest until the army halts its bombardment of a border town attacked at the weekend by Islamist militants. The Muslim Clerics Association called for a complete halt to the...

(Reuters) - The Lebanese army advanced on Monday into a border town attacked by Islamists at the weekend in the most serious spillover of the three-year-old Syrian civil war into Lebanon, and the Beirut government said the deadly assault would not go unpunished. With army...