A major thunderstorm hit the Gulf region on Thursday night with heavy rain lashing parts of Abu Dhabi, Dubai and the Saudi capital Riyadh, which was the scene of major flooding earlier this week.   Earlier climate forecasts compelled the...

  Seven leading Islamist rebel groups in Syria say they are joining forces. A statement posted online said Ahrar al-Sham, Jaysh al-Islam, Suqour al-Sham, Liwa al-Tawhid, Liwa al-Haqq, Ansar al-Sham and the Kurdish Islamic Front had agreed to a "gradual merger". It said the new...

Fighting for a key military base outside Syria's main northern city of Aleppo killed at least 15 pro-regime militiamen on Thursday, a monitoring group said. "Fifteen members of the National Defence Forces were killed in fighting against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant,...

Saudi Arabia has asked its citizens to leave Lebanon due to the risk of political violence in the country, where twin suicide bombings near Iran's embassy in Beirut killed 25 people this week. Riyadh has issued several similar calls in the past two years as the...