All along the street, houses have been reduced to rubble in the central Iraqi city of Kirkuk. The work of Kurdish security forces retaliating against Sunni Arabs after a recent ISIS, residents say. Kurdish security forces moved in with bulldozers and excavators and demolished at least 100...

Syrian troops and allied forces advanced overnight seizing Aleppo's Tariq al-Bab neighborhood from rebels as they press an offensive to recapture all of the city, activists said Saturday. The capture of the neighborhood means the government has now retaken around 60 percent of the east of...

(Eqtsad)- The Kurdish Self Administration forced big amount of tax on people and workshops’ owners, which pushed them to leave the northern city of Efrin near Aleppo city. “Running away from taxes which turned me into a “worker”, to them, I have left Efrin to Nile Street in Aleppo, as the...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Armed members of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) broke up a demonstration organized by the Kurdish National Council in the city of Qamishli in al-Hasakah’s countryside on Friday.  Demonstrators were demanding the release of several Kurdish political prisoners. ...

 A senior Syrian opposition official accused Russia on Friday of procrastinating in talks with rebels over Aleppo, signaling no progress in diplomacy which rebels hoped would ease dire conditions in the city where they are in danger of defeat. Buoyed by its rapid capture of several whole...

King Salman bin Abdulaziz has replaced Saudi Arabia's labor minister, state media reported on Friday, after recent statistics showed a rise in unemployment in the world's top oil exporter. In a royal decree read on state television, the king also reshuffled the country's top religious body,...

Syrian regime forces have recaptured half the former rebel stronghold of east Aleppo, a monitor said Friday, in an offensive that has left bodies in streets and sparked global outrage. Rebels put up fierce resistance in the southeastern outskirts of the battered city, but government forces...

This week, France and Germany will be honouring brave women and men who are fighting for the rights of others throughout the world. Maria da Penha from Brazil has used a wheelchair since being attacked by her husband in the 1970s, and now campaigns tirelessly for the protection of women...

Civilians are fleeing from one part of opposition-held eastern Aleppo to another amid a flurry of attacks by the Syrian regime, according to a local civil defense official. "Those we save today are killed tomorrow," Ammar Assalmo, an Aleppo-based civil defense official, told Anadolu Agency....

The Obama administration has declared its support for requiring women to register for the military draft, a symbolic but significant shift that reflects the U.S. military's evolution from a male-dominated force to one seeking to incorporate women at all levels. President Barack Obama has...

(Zaman Al Wasl)-  A rebel body in the embattled Eastern Ghouta suburbs, in statement issued Friday, refused calls for reconciliation with the Syrian regime, urging to keep figh against regime and allied forces.  “We in the Eastern Ghouta are still carring our arms to liberate our...

Turkish prosecutor called Friday called for charges related to a deadly Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound ship to be dropped following diplomatic reconciliation between Turkey and Israel, state media reported. Nine Turkish activists died when Israeli marines stormed the Mavi Marmara as it headed...

(Los Angeles Times)- He was a committed activist, as well as a “real funny guy,” according to his colleagues on the front lines in northern Syria. To his comrades in arms, he was a good fighter, one who said he feared cameras more than bullets. And to friends at home in Northern California,...

Islamic State is likely to launch more attacks in Europe, the EU police agency Europol warned on Friday, with several dozen militants already in place and more possibly arriving as IS faces setbacks in Syria and Iraq. In a report on the threat the Islamist group poses to the 28-nation bloc,...

The Russian military is criticizing the United Nations for dragging its feet on delivering humanitarian aid to the areas of Aleppo, which have been recently seized by Syrian government forces. Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said that the Russian military has...

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier Friday met with Syrian refugees in the Bekaa Valley town of Barr Elias. Steinmeier arrived in Beirut at dawn for a one-day trip to Lebanon. UNHCR has registered some 1.1 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, but the Lebanese government...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- 2000 rebel fighters with their families to leave al-Tal, a northeastern suburb of Damascus on Friday, heading Idlib province after an evacuation deal reached early this week, local activists said. ‘Cleansing rebel pockets’ surrounding the capital as regime media says has been...

Britain will not block attempts by the European Union to forge a closer common defense policy as it negotiates its exit from the bloc, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said Friday. Defense minister Michael Fallon had previously said he would stop the creation of an EU army for as long...

South Korea's scandal-hit leader Park Geun-hye is hoping to convince the country's ruling Saenuri Party to block her impeachment through talks as soon as this weekend, a presidential office source revealed Friday. The National Assembly's opposition bloc agreed on the same day to start...

 President-elect Donald Trump says he will nominate retired Gen. James Mattis to be his defense secretary. Mattis, 66, is a Marine Corps general who retired in 2013 after serving as the commander of the U.S. Central Command. Trump made the announcement Thursday night at a...