The trial in absentia of four Hezbollah members accused of murdering former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri in 2005 opens at a UN-backed court on Thursday, with sectarian violence an undiminished threat at home. Nine years after the huge Beirut car bombing killed billionaire...

Lebanon: A suspected suicide car bombing killed at least four people and wounded 42 others in a bustling neighborhood in the northeastern town of Hermel Thursday, a security source told The Daily Star. The blast occurred during the morning rush hour near the town’s...

Syrian rebels have made a progress in the industrial zone of Sheikh Najjar near Aleppo city against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Zaman Alwasl reporter said. Since a fortnight, the Syrian Revolutionaries Front and the nascent Mujahedeen Army, the...

Donors meeting in Kuwait have pledged nearly $2.4bn in humanitarian aid for victims of the Syrian war, which the UN chief says has left half the population in need of urgent help. Millions of Syrians have been driven from their homes as a result of the crisis, now in its...