The Taliban have opened a "political office" in Qatar preparatory to talks with Kabul and the US—after years of propaganda about the US defending women's rights in Afghanistan.
Some 5,000 US troops are in Jordan to participate in the multi-national Eager Lion exercises—just as Iran is sending 4,000 Revolutionary Guards to support Syria's Bashar Assad.
Iraq unveiled an ambitious energy strategy to ramp up oil production to 4.5 million barrels per day by the end of next year—as sectarian violence escalates.
A Bahrain court issued sentences to three activists for taking part in anti-government protests as well as attempting to kill a police officer in a clash at a Shi’ite village.
Lebanon’s hashish heartland of the Bekaa Valley is increasingly embroiled in the civil war raging across the border in Syria, with a wave of sectarian clashes and abductions.
Turkey sees in the battle for Qusayr a strategy to create an Alawite mini-state within Syria, purged of Sunni Muslims, to which the ruling elite can withdraw for a last stand.
Turkey will build a 2.5-kilometer wall along the Cilvegözü post on the border with Syria, near where a twin bomb attack killed 51 and wounded more than 100 earlier this month.
Israeli missiles struck a research center near Damascus, as massacres of Sunni families by pro-government militias are reported from Syria’s coastal Alawite stronghold.
The most senior member of Saddam Hussein’s inner circle still on the run, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, is said to be leading a band of insurgents from the Naqshbandi Sufi order.
Israel's claim that Syria has used chemical weapons comes as rebel militias have assumed positions near the line of control in the Golan Heights.
Following last month's claims about al-Qaeda biggie Sulaiman Abu Ghaith having been sheltered by Iran, Canadian authorities boast breaking up an Iran-backed Qaeda plot.
As the Friends of Syria summit opened in Istanbul, US Secretary of State John Kerry announced $100 million in new “non-lethal” aid to the Syrian opposition.
