U.S.-backed forces fighting Daesh (ISIS) militants in Syria were removing land mines and clearing main roads in Raqqa on Wednesday, a day after their commanders declared the city was under their control, a spokesman said. Mustafa Bali, spokesman for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- M. Gen Issam Zahreddine, the prominent Republican Guard officer and regime military commander in Deir Ezzor province, has been killed by a landmine, local activists said on Wednesday. The notorious general, 56, who gained fame for footages of slaughtering...

The city of Raqqa has been taken from Daesh (ISIS) but the humanitarian crisis in the region is still escalating, Save the Children said Tuesday. “The military offensive in Raqqa may be coming to an end, but the humanitarian crisis is greater than ever,” the aid group’s Syria director Sonia...

A U.S. delegation has asked Turkey for information and evidence regarding consular staff whose detention has led to a diplomatic rift and suspension of visa services, private HaberTurk television channel reported on Wednesday. Two locally employed U.S. mission staff have been arrested...

Islamic State may still be around, but the Middle East has moved on. The  extremist group’s ouster from its main remaining stronghold of Raqqa  on Tuesday is a watershed moment. But, as Islamic State’s once vast territory has shrunk to a few dwindling pockets in eastern Syria and...

(Bloomberg)- Some Qatari banks are becoming less willing to sell dollars to foreign lenders amid a lingering regional standoff with a Saudi-led alliance, according to people familiar with the matter. Foreign exchange activity between local and international banks is almost at a standstill, the...

TUNIS (Reuters) - Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the most prominent son of the former Libyan leader, is in good health and is following the political situation in Libya from his base inside the country, a Gaddafi family lawyer said on Tuesday. Khaled al-Zaidi said he was in personal contact...

The Libyan capital's Mitiga airport was evacuated on Tuesday and civilian flights were repeatedly suspended as rival armed groups clashed nearby, officials said. Flights had restarted around midday on Tuesday after being suspended for several hours during the morning and the previous...

Israel's government decided Tuesday not to negotiate with a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas if the Islamist movement does not disarm, recognize the country and give up violence. The decision by the security cabinet, announced in a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin...

ANKARA (Reuters) - Twelve people were wounded when a bomb hit a police vehicle in Turkey’s southern Mersin province on Tuesday, broadcaster NTV said, an attack authorities described as the work of terrorists. The attack took place on the street where the local governor’s office is...

BAGHDAD/KIRKUK (Reuters) - The Baghdad government recaptured territory from Kurds across the breadth of northern Iraq on Tuesday, making startlingly rapid gains in a sudden campaign that has shifted the balance of power in the country almost overnight. In the second day of a lightning...

(Reuters) - Two suspected U.S. drone strikes on Tuesday killed 11 people on the mountainous Pakistan-Afghanistan border, following a strike a day earlier that killed 20, government and militant sources said. The attacks came days after a Canadian-American couple held hostage by the...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 9 people killed in Russian airstrikes on the town of Albu Kamal at the Iraqi border as the regime army and allied forces pushed into the remaining ISIS-held districts east of Deir Ezzor province, local activists said. The strikes hit a marketplace in the town...

FIFA's number two Fatma Samoura said Tuesday she hoped the criminal investigations into the sale of World Cup rights to the Qatari-owned beIN Media group will not "disrupt" Qatar's hosting of the 2022 World Cup. Swiss prosecutors said last week a criminal corruption probe targeting...

Somalia is in desperate need for donated blood to treat survivors of a truck bombing in the capital Mogadishu Saturday that killed more than 300 people and injured at least 400 others, a minister said. The bombing was one of the worst such attacks in Somalia. Officials said it bore the...

Turkey's state-run agency says 11 human rights activists - including two local heads of Amnesty International - who were charged with links to terror groups will go on trial on Oct. 25. Anadolu Agency said a court on Tuesday approved the charges of "membership in a terror organization"...

The Syrian regime army and allied forces pushed into the remaining Daesh-held (ISIS) districts of Deir al-Zor city in eastern Syria Tuesday, a Hezbollah military media unit said. Backed by Russian air power and Iran-backed militias, the Syrian army has been fighting in the city since...

U.S.-backed militias have completely taken Syria's Raqqa from Daesh (ISIS), the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Tuesday. The fall of Raqqa city, where Daesh staged euphoric parades after its string of lightning victories in 2014, is a potent symbol of the extremist movement's...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- The Supreme Criminal Court in Amman on Tuesday has sentenced a Jordanian national to death for raping and killing a Syrian refugee child three months ago. The brutal crime against the 7-year-old Syrian child on July 6 has sparked wide anger in Jordan, making...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 47,000 Syrian refugees have returned to Turkey after the 15-day Eid holidays via Bab al-Salama border crossing, while about 7,000 have decided to stay in the northern countryside of Aleppo, the border administration said on Monday.  This week 476...