World

UK Sends Senior Officials to Meet 'Interim Syrian Authorities'

This is Beirut 16/12 21:40 - Reading : 1 minute(s)

United Kingdom Syria Hayat Tahrir al-Sham David Lammy

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy said on Monday that the UK has sent senior officials to meet with Syria's new leadership. It follows the fall earlier this month of the Assad regime to Islamist-led rebels, including Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which has its roots in Al-Qaeda. HTS has renounced jihadism but remains proscribed as a terrorist ...

Israeli Minister Declares Significant Progress in Gaza Hostage Negotiations

This is Beirut 16/12 21:05 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Israel Katz Israel Gaza Hostages Gaza Hamas

Israeli negotiators have "not been this close to an agreement" for the release of hostages in Gaza since the November 2023 truce in the war between Israel and Hamas, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Monday. "We have not been this close to an agreement on the hostages since the previous deal," Katz told members of the Israeli parliament's ...

Israel Trying Via Russia to Locate Famous Spy's Remains in Syria

This is Beirut 16/12 20:40 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Israel Eli Cohen Syria

Two Palestinian officials told AFP on Monday that Israel, via Russian mediators, was seeking to locate in Syria the remains of famous Israeli spy Eli Cohen and missing soldiers. Israel for years has been trying to find and repatriate the body of Cohen, and in 2021 a war monitor said Russian forces had been searching the Yarmuk Palestinian refugee ...

Syrian Soldiers Hand in Weapons, Hope for Quiet Lives

This is Beirut 16/12 19:35 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Syria Bashar al-Assad Syrian army

When Syria's new government put out a call on social media for soldiers and police to lay down their arms and register with the authorities, Kamal Merhej was happy to oblige. "I don't like the army, I want to get back on track with my life without anyone to give me orders," the 28-year-old told AFP. He spent nine years in the army, posted to the ...

Iran Shuts Down Power Plants Due to Fuel Shortages

This is Beirut 16/12 18:30 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Tehran Iran Electricity

Several power plants in Iran have been shut down due to a fuel shortage exacerbated by a cold wave straining energy supply, local media reported on Monday. Iran, a major energy producer, holds the world's second-largest natural gas reserves, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), and ranked as the seventh-largest crude ...

Germany's Scholz Loses Confidence Vote, Triggering Early Elections

This is Beirut 16/12 18:10 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Europe Germany Olaf Scholz elections

Germany's centre-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz lost a confidence vote on Monday after weeks of turmoil, setting Europe's biggest economy on the path to early elections on February 23. The Bundestag vote, which Scholz had expected to lose, allows President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to dissolve the legislature and formally order an election. The ...

Flash Villas, Cars and Drugs: Assad's Legacy in Latakia

This is Beirut 16/12 17:55 - Reading : 4 minute(s)

Syria Bashar al-Assad

The drive winds between manicured lavender-lined lawns to a crescent-shaped home with a gleaming swimming pool on the Syrian coast: Bashar al-Assad's holiday hideaway disgusts those who now come here. "To think that he spent all that money and we lived in misery," spat Mudar Ghanem, 26. He is grey-skinned and his eyes are sunken after spending ...

Assad Denies 'Planned' Exit From Syria, Calls New Leaders 'Terrorists'

This is Beirut 16/12 16:15 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Syria Bashar al-Assad Russia

In his first remarks since he was deposed, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Monday said he fled Syria only after Damascus had fallen and denounced the country's new leaders as "terrorists". An Islamist-led rebel alliance launched a lightning offensive from its northwest Syria bastion on November 27, swiftly capturing major cities from ...

Syria War Monitor Says Israel Struck Military Targets on Syrian Coast

This is Beirut 16/12 14:30 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Israel Syria Tartus strikes

Israeli strikes targeted military sites in Syria's coastal Tartus region overnight, a war monitor said Monday, calling them "the heaviest strikes" there in years. "Israeli warplanes launched strikes" targeting a series of sites including air defense units and "surface-to-surface missile depots", the Syrian ...

Syria's Kurds Call for End to All Military Operations in the Country

This is Beirut 16/12 13:20 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Damascus Turkey USA Washington

Syria's Kurds, who run a semi-autonomous administration in the northeast, called Monday for an end to all fighting in the country and extended a hand to the new authorities in Damascus. Hussein Othman, the head of the administration's executive council, called for "a stop to military operations over the entire Syrian territory in order to begin a ...

Israel Seeking to 'Expand Borders' Through Golan Plan: Turkey

This is Beirut 16/12 12:05 - Reading : 1 minute(s)

Damascus Israel Turkey Golan Syria

Turkey on Monday denounced an Israeli plan to double the population living in the occupied and annexed Golan Heights as a bid to "expand its borders". "This decision is a new stage in Israel's goal of expanding its borders through occupation," the foreign ministry said in a statement condemning the move. Israel's government on Sunday approved a ...

The Fall of the Captagon Empire: Assad’s Regime and the Drug Trade

Vanessa Kallas 16/12 11:10 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Hezbollah Middle East Captagon Syria

The Assad regime has fallen, leaving behind the largest Captagon empire in the world. For years, the regime relied on the multibillion-dollar Captagon market to finance its war efforts, support allied militias like Hezbollah and circumvent international sanctions. Recent seizures of Captagon factories and pills in former regime strongholds ...