A Republican U.S. senator touring the Middle East this week got access to Saudi royals that some in the State Department at times, lately, could only dream of. That includes a three-hour session ending at 3 a.m. with Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the kingdom’s intelligence chief and...

A unit of Russian security forces is training to fight Islamist militants battling in Syria  on fears they may migrate from the Middle East conflict to join an insurgency in the North Caucasus, Chechnya's Kremlin-backed leader said. The Kremlin is worried that Russian-born...

The United States sees value in getting to know Islamist militias in Syria, in order to better understand their intentions in the civil war there and their possible links with al Qaeda, the top U.S. military officer said on Wednesday. General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the U.S. Joint...

  Jihadists in northern Syria have kidnapped more than 50 Kurds in the past three days, in the second such case of mass hostage-taking since July, a monitoring group said Thursday.   The kidnappings come months into major battles for control of several...