I WILL never know when or why Hakim Anza, a Syrian rebel commander whom I had once trusted, decided to betray me. I would hazard a guess that three years of savage war, combined with reports — rampant in every bazaar of northern Syria — of huge sums paid for the...

GIOIA TAURO, Italy (AP) — The U.S. ship MV Cape Ray arrived Tuesday in the southern Italian port of Gioia Tauro for the unprecedented transfer and destruction of about 1,300 tons of Syrian chemical weapons. The 648-foot (197.5-meter) U.S. government cargo ship has been fitted...

Washington, July 1 (IANS) US President Barack Obama said that about 200 troops arrived in Iraq to protect the US embassy in Baghdad amidst fierce fighting in the war-torn country, a media report said Tuesday. The new troops, who arrived Sunday and Monday, will provide security...

Syrian rebels, including the main Islamist factions, said Monday the creation of a caliphate by the Islamic State (IS) was "null and void". "We see that the announcement by the rejectionists of a caliphate is null and void, legally and logically," the groups said in a statement,...

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BEIRUT (The Daily Star): Saudi King Abdullah appointed Prince Bandar Bin Sultan as his special envoy and Prince Khaled bin Bandar as head of Saudi Intelligence two days after the latter’s dismissal as deputy defense minister. Abdullah had sacked Khaled from his...

(Reuters) - More than 2,400 Iraqis, most of them civilians, were killed in June as Sunni militants swept through the north triggering the country's worst violence in years, the United Nations said on Tuesday. Sunni insurgents led by al Qaeda offshoot the Islamic State in...

(Reuters) - At least 14 people were wounded by mortar fire near an important Shi'ite shrine in the Iraqi city of Samarra, officials and security sources said on Tuesday, as the Shi'ite-led government fights a major Sunni insurgency. A 2006 bombing at the same site, the Imam...

(Reuters) - Israel bombed dozens of sites in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, striking at Hamas after finding the bodies of three missing teenagers whose abduction and killing it blames on the Palestinian Islamist group. Israel's security cabinet, which held an emergency session...

Reuters) - The bodies of three missing Israeli teenagers were found in the occupied West Bank, and Israel vowed to punish Hamas, the Palestinian group it accuses of abducting and killing them. "They were kidnapped and murdered in cold blood by beasts," Prime Minister Benjamin...

(AFP)- The Syrian government signed a deal with a Russian firm Monday for the first phase of an irrigation project for the drought-hit northeast of the war-torn country, state media said. The project, which had been planned before the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad...

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Two Palestinians were shot dead and seven people wounded in a gunfight in southern Beirut on Monday on the edge of the Palestinian refugee camp of Shatila, security sources said. It was not immediately clear what caused the confrontation in the Lebanese...

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia warned the United States on Monday against stepping up support for Syria's opposition, saying it would only bolster a caliphate declared by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in part of Iraq and Syria. Baghdad called for international...

      (Zaman Alwasl) – Wife of the first Syrian Army defectors denied opposition claims over allocating a monthly salary for her displaced family. Ghufran Hijazi wife of Lieutenant Colonel Hussein Harmoush, who still in Syrian regime’s...

Germany were given a major scare before beating Algeria 2-1 on Monday to book a FIFA World Cup quarter-final meeting with France. After a pulsating 90 minutes in Porto Alegre had ended goalless, Chelsea forward Andre...

World Cup 2014: Germany beat Algeria 2-1 in extra time to reach quarter-finals

(AFP)- Jordan's King Abdullah II on Monday appealed for international support to help his country deal with regional turmoil after jihadists in neighbouring Iraq and Syria declared an "Islamic caliphate". "It is important that the international community continue to support...

Nigeria goalkeeper Vincent Enyeama went from hero to zero as his error helped France to a 2-0 FIFA World Cup last-16 triumph. Enyeama, who plies his trade with Lille in the French top flight, made sensational saves from Karim Benzema and...

(Reuters) - A Tunisian diplomat and an embassy worker kidnapped earlier this year by unknown gunmen in Libya arrived at dawn on Monday at a Tunis airport after being freed on Sunday. With Libya's government weak and its armed forces still in formation, armed groups have...

(Reuters) - Militant Islamist fighters held a parade in Syria's northern Raqqa province to celebrate their declaration of an Islamic "caliphate" after the group captured territory in neighboring Iraq , a monitoring service said. The Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot...