MIDDLE EAST

An attack on the Yemeni Presidential Palace by suspected Al-Qaeda militants triggered a fierce gunfight and led to the deaths of five guards, as the militants hit back after the launch of an army offensive aimed to crush them. President Abdrabuh Mansour Hadi was not in the palace when the gunmen attacked at a checkpoint outside the compound. Hadi only …

The Yemeni army took control of the important al-Qaeda stronghold Azzan in the Shabwa province as its offensive against them entered its tenth day on Thursday. The army’s offensive had begun on April 29th in the country’s central and southern provinces, where US drone strikes have killed several al-Qaeda suspects in the last month. In its statement, the Defense Ministry, …

The head of the Joint Mission of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the United Nations (OPCW-UN) today called for safe and unfettered access to the remaining eight per cent of Syria’s chemical weapons material that needs to be removed and destroyed. Speaking to reporters after a closed-door briefing to the UN Security Council, Special Coordinator Sigrid …

On Thursday, a luxury hotel converted into an army base was blown up by Syrian rebels in the heart of Aleppo after they tunneled under the front lines which divide the city. State television has not confirmed if the attack on the famous Carlton Citadel Hotel, right across the road from the UNESCO-listed citadel in the city, had resulted in …

10,000 Arab Israelis on Tuesday rallied in northern Israel to demand the right to return for all Palestinian refugees. The rally took place in the village Lavi, built on the wreckage of the Palestinian village Lubya, which was, until 1948, home to 2,726 Palestinians. During the Arab Israeli conflict in 1948  about 400-500 Palestinian villages were depopulated, destroyed, occupied and …

Fighting between Jihadist groups ISIL and the Al-Nusra killed 63 people in Eastern Syria on Monday despite the al-Qaeda chief’s call for a ceasefire, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The clashes between the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Al-Nusra Front have prompted over 60,000 people to abandon their homes in the oil-rich region. …

May 6, New York- On Monday NBC refused to accept a petition signed by more than 5,000 people calling on the network to end its involvement in the action series DIG, which will be set and shot in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian city of East Jerusalem. Representatives from Adalah-NY: The New York Campaign for the Boycott of Israel, Jewish Voice for …

Israeli organization Zochrot will release the I-Nakba phone app on the eve of Israel’s Independence Day, on 5th May at 20:00. Nakba, the Arabic word for “catastrophe”, will let users of the app locate any Arab village abandoned in the 1948 war on an interactive map, add comments, photos, and data and learn about the history of the village, including …

Gunfire stopped distribution of food today in a besieged Palestinian refugee camp, a United Nations spokesperson confirmed today, reiterating demands that the UN agency assisting Palestinian refugees be allowed to safely and without interruption distribute substantial quantities of food and other humanitarian assistance inside Yarmouk. Spokesman Chris Gunness said the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the …

The Syrian government and opposition rebels on Friday reportedly agreed to a deal which will allow opposition fighters besieged in the city of Homs to withdraw during a ceasefire. The deal means that all but one district in the city, once called the “capital of the revolution”, will be under government control again. Britain-based monitoring group The Syrian Observatory for …