(Washington Times)- Stepping up the drive to clear out Islamic State’s last strongholds in Syria and Iraq, Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and increasingly influential adviser, arrived Monday with Joint Chiefs of Staff head Gen. Joseph Dunford for talks in Baghdad with top Iraqi...

The Trump administration's failure to keep senior adviser Jared Kushner's trip to Iraq secret isn't standard practice for top U.S. officials visiting warzones. Such trips are usually kept quiet, with the cooperation of journalists, until the officials arrive in order to ensure maximum security....

 French maritime authorities have rescued six Iranian migrants whose fishing boat was sinking in the English Channel as they sought to reach Britain. The overnight rescue effort took more than two hours because extremely thick fog complicated efforts to find the boat, the CROSS maritime...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Rebel factions in southern Damscus suburbs of Yalda shut down the only crossing with the besieged Yarmouk Camp over security concerns, accusing  ISIS of targeting civilians.  Zaman's local reporter in southern Damascus said that the military factions in Yalda have...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 100 civilians, including two children, were killed in a toxic gas attack by the Syrian regime early Tuesday that released "toxic gas" on a town in northwest Idlib province, activists said. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said those killed in the town of Khan...

By Abdul Salam Haj Bakri (Zaman Al Wasl)- Syrian rregime supporters in coastal Latakia city have been dismayed by the terrible noise made by Russian planes while taking off and landing in Hmeimim airbase. Residents also complained that the fighter jets fly low over cities and towns and...

Turkey is planning new offensives inside Syria against groups deemed terrorist organisations by Ankara, even after the completion of its six-month-long operation in the country’s north, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday. Turkey announced last week that it had completed the Euphrates...

The United States does not believe that the Syrian people want President Bashar al-Assad as their leader any longer, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on Monday. Haley was asked about U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's remarks in the Turkish capital Ankara on...

The European Union and the U.N. host a two-day conference starting Tuesday on Syria's future, with Russian-backed President Bashar Assad as firmly in place as ever despite efforts to oust him. EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini has billed the gathering in Brussels as a follow-up to...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Syrian regime helicopters dropped two containers of toxic gas on al-Hubait town in northern Idlib province, causing 20 breathing difficulties, local activists said Monday.   The regime warplanes have conducted at least 26 raids on al-Hubait and neighboring towns south of...

Syrian regime forces intensified their bombardment of opposition-held areas around Damascus on Monday and besieged city of Douma northeast of capital, the latest in the regime's push to erase battlefield advances made by insurgents in March. Airstrikes on the rebel-held Damascus suburb of...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- The Syrian regime has resumed its military operations in T4 airport in Syria derert after breaking ISIS two-month siege, sources said Monday. Su-24 and Su-22 warplanes have returned to service in the military airport near Palmyra after breaking the siege enforced by the...

Syria's six-year conflict has caused at least $16 billion in damage to agriculture - about a third of the country's GDP - a U.N. agency said on Monday, calling for more funds to salvage local food production as millions go hungry. Fighting has led to extensive crop and livestock losses and...

(Daily Mail)- For years, Abboud Jan's gun repair shop in the northeastern Syrian city of Hasakeh catered exclusively to local hunters, but the country's devastating six-year war has changed all that. "We used to repair just hunting weapons, but things have changed with the crisis," says the...

British Prime Minister Theresa May has begun a visit to Jordan where she is to announce plans to send more British military trainers to help the kingdom's air force in the fight against ISIS extremists. Jordan's royal court said Monday that May and Jordan's King Abdullah II toured a military...

The family of an Italian graduate student tortured to death in Egypt is urging Pope Francis to seek information about the case during his upcoming visit to Cairo. The parents of Giulio Regeni made the appeal Monday at the Italian Senate on the same day the Vatican released details of...

Russian security agencies found an explosive device at a metro station in central St. Petersburg and made it safe, the National Anti-Terrorist Committee said in a statement on Monday. The device was found at the "Ploshchad Vosstaniya" metro station, a different location from where a blast...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- A high-ranking Syrian official told fellow Lebanese officials that the regime sees Syria's real population as 12 million people, ignoring 12 more million live abroad on the borders and neighborhood countries, a Lebanese daily said Monday. The official supposedly continued...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least 74  regime officers and soldiers from Tartus province have been killed in the last two weeks, pro-regime news feeds and activists said. The mourning posters have been sweeping the streets and pro-regime social media of coastal province. 15 officers were among...

 U.S. President Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, flew into Iraq on Monday with the top U.S. military officer to get a first-hand assessment of the battle against ISIS from U.S. commanders on the ground and to meet Iraqi officials. For Kushner, who has not been to Iraq before,...