Category: 2. Middle East

A top commander in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) threatened US forces in the region on Monday, the latest in a series of escalatory remarks as President Donald Trump seeks to push the country toward a new nuclear deal.

The head of the IRGC Aerospace Force, Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, made the comments during the Eid al-Fitr prayer in Tehran.

“The Americans have at least ten bases around Iran in the region, which accommodate some 50,000 forces. This means they are…

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer urged dozens of countries to collaborate to dismantle migrant smuggling gangs “once and for all” when he opened an immigration crime summit on Monday.

Starmer is seeking to crack down on would-be asylum seekers arriving in England on flimsy small boats and has brought together delegates from more than 40 nations for the two-day London meeting.

The interior ministers of France and Germany were among those attending the Organised Immigration Crime Summit. China and…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu picked former navy commander Eli Sharvit to head the domestic security agency, his office said Monday, despite the supreme court freezing the incumbent’s dismissal.

Netanyahu moved to oust current Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar on March 21, after citing an “ongoing lack of trust” in the head of the agency.

But after petitions filed by Israel’s opposition and a non-governmental organisation, the supreme court suspended the dismissal of Bar, whose relationship…

Syria’s new government, dominated by interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s inner circle, faces the daunting challenge of gaining the trust of Syrians, as well as that of Western countries to secure sanctions relief.

The transitional 23-member cabinet — without a prime minister — was announced on Saturday, more than three months after Sharaa’s Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) led an offensive that toppled longtime president Bashar al-Assad.

Succeeding the caretaker authorities in place…

For the second consecutive year, traditional Eid al-Fitr celebrations marking the end of Ramadan were absent in Gaza on Sunday, as residents of the Palestinian territory awoke to the roar of Israeli bombardment.

“Eid, which was once a day of family reunions and visits, has now become a day of farewells and funerals,” said Nahla Abu Matar, a 28-year-old mother, speaking to AFP.

Like hundreds of thousands of Gaza residents, she has been displaced from her home in northern Gaza and is now living…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday offered to let the leaders of Hamas leave the Gaza Strip but demanded the group abandoned its arms, as his country kept up its bombardment of the Palestinian territory.

On Sunday morning, an Israeli air strike that hit a house and a tent sheltering displaced Palestinians killed at least eight people, including five children, the Gaza civil defence agency said.

The strike in Khan Yunis came on the first day of Eid al-Fitr, the festival marking…

The head of the Sudanese paramilitary Rapid Support Forces admitted in a speech to fighters on Sunday that the group had withdrawn from the capital Khartoum which rival army forces have retaken.

The comment from RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo came three days after the group said there would be “no retreat and no surrender” and that its forces had “repositioned”, despite the army’s declaration on Thursday that the capital was “free” of the paramilitaries after nearly two years of war.

“I…

The head of the Sudanese paramilitary Rapid Support Forces admitted in a speech to fighters on Sunday that the group had withdrawn from the capital Khartoum which rival army forces have retaken.

The comment from RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo came three days after the group said there would be “no retreat and no surrender” and that its forces had “repositioned”, despite the army’s declaration on Thursday that “the last pockets” of the RSF had been eliminated from Khartoum after nearly two…

Iranian police have dispersed a weeks-long sit-in by demonstrators supporting the mandatory head covering for women, state media reported, after authorities deemed the gathering illegal.

The demonstrators — largely women in black full-body robes — staged the sit-in since last month outside the parliament building in Tehran.

Since Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution, women have been required to conceal their hair in public. However, increasing numbers, particularly in major cities including the…