The United States has increased direct funding to rebel groups fighting in Damascus and southern Syria, ramping up pressure on president Bashar Al Assad after negotiations in Geneva ended in deadlock. Last week, as the Syrian regime   delegation in...

  Over the last two weeks, Obama administration officials have signaled - sometimes intentionally, sometimes not - that a worst-case scenario is emerging in Syria. Peace talks are at a virtual standstill. An emboldened President Bashar al-Assad has missed two...

Aid agencies working in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem expressed alarm on Friday at a spike in Israeli demolitions of Palestinian property coinciding with renewed U.S.-backed peace negotiations. The statement by 25 aid organizations said the number of demolitions...

    A series of local truce deals in and around Damascus between the Syrian regime and rebel forces are being used for short-term political gain and are likely to be short-lived, opposition sources predict. The truces, struck in the key rebel-held areas of Yarmouk,...