Russia and Turkey refuse to back down in row over jet downing
RUSSIA — Russia sent an advanced missile system to Syria on Wednesday to protect its jets operating there and pledged its air force would keep flying missions near Turkish air space, sounding a defiant note after Turkey shot down a Russian fighter jet. Underscoring the message, Russian forces launched a heavy bombardment against...
ISIS suicide bomber kills 12 in Tunisia
November 25th, 20150 Tunisian forensics police inspect the scene of a suicide bomb attack in Tunis, Nov. 25TUNIS — Tunisian authorities said on Wednesday a suicide bomber wearing a vest packed with plastic explosive blew up a presidential guard bus a day earlier, killing at least 12 troops in an attack claimed by ISIS.Tuesday's explosion on a main...Yemen’s Socotra burns two tons of qat after island bans drug
YEMEN — Authorities on Yemen's Socotra island burned two tons of the mild narcotic drug qat on Saturday, a shipment seized from smugglers trying to defy last week's ban by the archipelago's governor, local officials said. Yemenis have chewed qat for centuries and although widespread, its use is seen as a social ill by some, sapping...Saudi court sentences Palestinian poet to death for apostasy
Ashraf Fayadh has been sentenced to death by a court in Saudi Arabia.RIYADH — A Saudi Arabian court has sentenced a Palestinian poet to death for apostasy, abandoning his Muslim faith, according to trial documents seen by Human Rights Watch, its Middle East researcher Adam Coogle said on Friday. Ashraf Fayadh was detained by the...ISIS says ‘Schweppes bomb’ used to bring down Russian plane
ISIS' official magazine carried a photo on Wednesday of a Schweppes soft drink can it said was used to make an improvised bomb that brought down a Russian airliner over Egypt's Sinai Peninsula last month, killing all 224 people on board. The photo showed a can of Schweppes Gold soft drink and what appeared to be a detonator and switch...‘Spider in web’ mastermind of Paris attacks killed in raid
The suspected ISIS mastermind of the Paris attacks was among those killed in a police raid north of the capital, France confirmed on Thursday, bringing an end to the hunt for Europe's most wanted man. Authorities said they had identified the mangled corpse of Belgian national Abdelhamid Abaaoud from fingerprints in the aftermath of...Blast at market in northeastern Nigeria kills 32
People at the scene of a bomb blast at a fruit market in the Jimeta area of Yola, Adamawa, NigeriaA blast struck a market in the northeastern Nigerian city of Yola on Tuesday evening, killing 32 people and wounding 80 others, both the Red Cross and National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said. The explosion occurred at a fruit and...U.S. approves $1.29 billion sale of smart bombs to Saudi Arabia
RIYADH — The State Department has approved the sale of $1.29 billion in smart bombs to Saudi Arabia to help replenish supplies used in its battle against insurgents in Yemen and air strikes against ISIS in Syria, the Pentagon said on Monday. The Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), which facilitates foreign arms...Russia to West: Drop Assad condition to unite against ISIS
MOSCOW — Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday the West had to drop its demands about the political exit of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if it wanted a genuinely international coalition against ISIS. Lavrov, who said there was still no agreement about Assad's political fate after international talks in Vienna,...One dead, 8 wounded in West Bank
WEST BANK — At least one attacker opened fire from a car then crashed into a group of pedestrians near a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank Thursday, killing an Israeli and wounding eight people, police and the army said. The army said an assailant was shot, but the condition of the attacker was unclear. The incident...Lebanon arrests man in connection to Beirut bomb attacks
Lebanon's security forces arrested a Lebanese man on Wednesday in connection with twin suicide bomb attacks that killed 44 people in Beirut last week, a security source said. The authorities had arrested five Syrians and a Palestinian linked with the attacks, which took place on Thursday in a crowded residential and commercial area of...Syrian army seizes strategic town in Aleppo countryside
Syrian pro-government forces walk at the Kweyris military air base, in Aleppo, Nov. 11 - AFPDAMASCUS — The Syrian army and allied forces captured the town of Al Hader in the northern province of Aleppo on Thursday, state television said, opening the way for advances into a strategic rebel-held area northern Syria with the backing of...Kurds expect to recapture Sinjar soon
BAGHDAD — Kurdish forces who have launched an offensive to retake Sinjar from ISIS militants expect to enter and clear the northern Iraqi town soon, the Kurdistan regional security council said on Thursday. More than 58 square miles have been seized from the extremist group and dozens of bodies of its fighters were left behind in a...Undercover Israeli troops raid hospital, kill Palestinian
HEBRON — Israeli undercover forces raided a hospital in the West Bank on Thursday, shooting dead a Palestinian during an attempt to detain another man suspected of carrying out a stabbing, the Palestinian health ministry and doctors said. The Israeli army confirmed the raid and shooting but did not have details of the man's condition....Saudi Arabia seizes 48,000 cans of beer disguised as Pepsi
RIYADH — A smuggler has been caught trying to sneak beer into Saudi Arabia, where alcohol is forbidden. Customs officers at the Al Batha border crossing with the UAE discovered the contraband disguised as soda, according to MBC.net. "A truck carrying what first seemed to be normal cans of the soft drink Pepsi was stopped and after......
Explosions rip thorough southern Beirut suburb
November 12th, 20150 Photo: AnnaharBEIRUT — Two explosions ripped through the southern Beirut suburb of Borj El-Barajneh Thursday afternoon.Lebanon's Red Cross reported that 37 people died in the explosions.Last year, Beirut's southern suburbs were repeatedly targeted by al-Qaeda suicide bombers.Initial reports cited by Lebanese media say the explosions...EU moves forward with labeling goods made in Israeli settlements
A worker carries boxes of wine bottles for export at Shiloh Wineries, north of Ramallah/REUTERSThe European Union published new guidelines on Wednesday for labeling products made in Israeli settlements, a move Brussels said was technical but Israel branded "discriminatory" and damaging to peace efforts with Palestinians.Drawn up over......
Two Americans, one S. African shot dead at Jordan security training site
The King Abdullah Training Center where a Jordanian officer went on a shooting spree, Nov. 9AMMAN — Two American military personnel and one South African were killed when a Jordanian officer went on a shooting spree on Monday at a U.S.-funded security training facility near Amman, Jordan's government spokesman said.Mohammad Momani...Power struggle threatens top Tunisia party with collapse
TUNIS — Rival ambitions, insults and accusations of violence have brought Tunisia's ruling party to the brink of collapse as the country struggles to lead the way towards a post-Arab Spring democracy. The secularist Nidaa Tounes party was already weakened by the departure of its leader Beji Caid Essebsi, in line with the...Cyclone kills eight in Yemeni coastal province
A man tries to save a vehicle swept away by flood waters in Socotra Nov. 2SANAA — A rare tropical cyclone struck Yemen's arid eastern coastal province of Hadramout on Tuesday and killed eight people before gradually petering out inland, regional officials said. The storm was the worst the country had suffered in decades and came with...Bomb in northeast Lebanon kills nine
BEIRUT — A roadside car bomb killed at least nine people and wounded four others in northeast Lebanon on Thursday, in an area close to the Syrian border where violence has spilled over from the war next door, security sources said. The blast ripped through a commercial area of the Sabil neighborhood of the town of Arsal. Emergency......
Report: ISIS used chemical weapons in Syria
DAMASCUS — Chemical weapons experts have determined that mustard gas was used in a Syrian town where ISIS insurgents were battling another rebel group, according to a report by an international watchdog seen by Reuters. A confidential Oct. 29 report by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), a summary of...Britain says ISIS likely brought down Russian plane
Wreckage of the Russian plane crash/REUTERSBritain said Thursday there is a significant possibility that the Egyptian affiliate of ISIS was behind a suspected bomb attack on a Russian airliner that killed 224 people in the Sinai Peninsula.Russia dismissed the claim as speculation and Egypt said there was no indication so far that a bomb......
Iraqi politician Ahmed Chalabi who encouraged Bush to invade Iraq dies
Ahmed Chalabi speaks during a news conference in Baghdad, July 15, 2014.BAGHDAD — Ahmed Chalabi, the smooth-talking Iraqi politician who encouraged Washington to invade Iraq in 2003 with discredited information on Saddam Hussein's military capabilities, died on Tuesday of an apparent heart attack.Haitham al-Jabouri, secretary of the...Saudi-led air strike kills 10 Yemeni factory workers
SANAA — Warplanes from a Saudi-led military coalition bombed a bus carrying workers to a factory in the southwestern Yemeni city of Taiz on Thursday, killing 10 of them, medics said. The attack took place as battles for control of Yemen's third-largest city rage, with Gulf Arab countries backing local Islamist militias against the......