WorldcrunchUKRAINE, ALL EYES ON MINSKAngela Merkel, François Hollande, Petro Poroshenko and Vladimir Putin meet in a crucial peace summit on the Ukrainian conflict Wednesday in Belarus’ capital Minsk. The leaders of Germany, France, Ukraine and Russia will attempt to find a compromise and broker a durable ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, where clashes between government forces […]
The way ISIS shocks us with its evil prompts fantasies of retaliation. How can we make these thoughts subside? What does it take not to lose our own civilization? Confessions of a monster.
Turns in the war in Syria, as well as shifting resources and alliances across the Muslim world, mean tensions are easing between Israel and both Hamas and Hezbollah.
Once a backer of the Free Syrian Army, a harsh reality caught up with this father of three near Aleppo.
WARRING UKRAINE PARTIES CALL TRUCEPro-Russian rebels in Ukraine have reached agreement with government forces on a humanitarian corridor to allow the evacuation of civilians out of Debaltseve, a key railway hub in the heart of the latest fighting, AP reports. A rebel spokesman said 1,000 civilians would be evacuated today, though it’s not clear where […]
From the capital to the native village of the pilot who was burned alive by ISIS, Jordanians of all tribes and places may mark the first major national Arab movement against the jihadist group.
JORDAN EXECUTES TWO PRISONERS AFTER PILOT BURNED ALIVEJordan hanged two Iraqi prisoners Wednesday in retaliation to the killing of a Jordanian pilot by the terrorist group ISIS. Sajida al-Rishawi, a female jihadist involved in a 2005 bombing that killed 60 people in Amman and whose liberation had recently been requested by ISIS, and Ziyad Karboli, […]
HAGUE ISSUES GENOCIDE RULINGAfter years of investigation, the Hague’s International Court of Justice has ruled that Serbia did not commit genocide against the Croats during the Balkan wars in the 1990s. While acknowledging that crimes had been committed, the court argued that Croatia failed to prove that Serbia had intended to “destroy in whole or […]
Deadly attacks in Tripoli are prompting fears that ISIS is spreading north and west. Others however warn of the spectre of a “counter-revolution” of Gaddafi nostalgics similar to what’s happened in Egypt.
HEZBOLLAH SENDS MESSAGE OF RESTRAINTWhile many feared that yesterday’s deadly clashes between Hezbollah and the Israeli Defense Forces on the Lebanon border might ignite a new war, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Israel had received a message from Hezbollah in which the Lebanese group said it was retreating from further violence, Haaretz reports. According to […]
Just a few months before the Paris terror attacks, and arguably late to the game, France launched a “disindoctrination” program for Islamist radicals that relies on social and religious approaches.
-OpEd- BERLIN — It was supposed to sound aggressive when Prime Minister Manuel Valls told French citizens after the terrorist attacks in Paris that the country would henceforth be in a state of “war.” President François Hollande too addressed the nation in these terms. On the only aircraft carrier France possesses, he announced that the […]
With “Timbuktu,” Abderrahmane Sissako searches deep to make artistic sense of the senseless horrors committed in the name of radical Islam. His movie has been nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 87th Academy Awards.
SAUDI KING ABDULLAH DIES“The Good King Leaves, Salman Becomes Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques,” London-based pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat writes on its front page after Saudi Arabia King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud died early Friday at age 90, three weeks after being hospitalized for pneumonia. Abdullah is succeeded by his 79-year-old half-brother Salman […]
Though both nations have been hit by Islamist terror, Nigeria’s Goodluck Jonathan hasn’t gotten the same global support as France’s Francois Hollande. There are many reasons, but it starts with Jonathan’s own attitude toward his citize
IMF CUTS GROWTH PROSPECTSThe International Monetary Fund has sharply cut its global growth forecast of just six months ago, with almost every economy except the United States expected to grow at a slower pace than previously thought, Bloomberg reports. The Washington-based lender said an economic slowdown in China, recession in Russia, and poor prospects in […]
-OpEd- ISTANBUL — The Turkish authorities all condemned the daily newspaper Cumhuriyet for publishing selections from Charlie Hebdo. From the president to the prime minister, from ministers to parliamentary deputies, the government was united in condemning the Turkish newspaper. Insulting the sacred is unacceptable, they said. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda led demonstrations at mosques around the country, […]
PARIS — Two days after the deadly terror assault on the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, France lived through another day of violence, fear and national soul-searching. A pair of hostage standoffs culminated in simultaneous raids late Friday by police that killed the presumed authors of Wedneday’s attack, as well as a fellow Islamist terrorist […]
DAKAR — Security concerns in Africa currently revolve around two central issues: the anarchy in Libya, and the Boko Haram caliphate that has taken root in Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad. Looking ahead to 2015, the Islamist terrorist threat looms over the continent, even as some question whether the military-driven reaction of African governments may […]
It was a year of far too much bad news for the history books, crunched here into one minute. And there’s more (not always so grim) history to cover. We are launching a daily video feature that squeezes all of world history — well, almost — into less than a minute each day.
As Syria’s civil war rages on, soldiers and supporters manage to finding coves of intimacy amidst the violence around them.
A Swiss NGO convenes representatives of 35 rebel groups in Geneva to talk about the mechanics, and great difficulties, of respecting humanitarian laws when fighting civil wars.
Amid the mayhem of civil war, huge money is to be made from stealing and selling archeological treasures from Iraq and Syria. ISIS ambitions are fueling an already huge black market.
KOBANI — Sardar is a 26-year-old fighter in the ranks of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, known by its Kurdish acronym, the YPG. A former blacksmith, he has taken up arms for the past five years, since he first became involved with the militant group. In his eyes, it is the core of a Kurdish army that will someday represent the future state of Kurdistan. His priority now is to defend the city of Ain al-Arab, also known by its Kurdish name Kobani. The city has been under attack by ISIS since September. “Compared with the weapons used by ISIS, […]
The ISIS terror group believes that if it is Allah’s will, the organization will take over much of the world. But at the moment, Allah doesn’t seem to be on their side.
A policy of war abroad, mixed with tighter border controls at home, won’t meet the challenge.
REYHANLI — At the beginning of this year, Jamal Maarouf was regarded as the new white knight of the Syrian insurrection. Over the course of just a few days in January, Maarouf and his men drove ISIS jihadists out of northern Syria’s Idlib province. Armed by the United States and Saudi Arabia, the leader of […]
RAQQA — Ever since ISIS captured the Syrian city of Raqqa in early 2014, residents have been consumed by fear and caution. The terrorist group has banned a dangerously long list of goods and behaviors, all of which carry a heavy punishment if violated. Most noticeably, ISIS has forbidden women from leaving their homes without the supervision of a male relative, and they must wear what is deemed proper attire, dubbed “the shield” — a long, loose dress that covers them from head to toe. Smoking is banned, while it is also illegal to sell tobacco, recordings of secular music, […]
From the Israeli side of the border, a view of how the whole of the Middle East seems to be maneuvering.
MUNICH — It began nearly a year ago, on the weekend after Christmas. On Saturday night, unidentified individuals broke into a church in the Cologne district of Porz-Urbach. They broke open the safe in the sacristy and got hold of the key to the church. They ended up stealing money from the collection boxes, liturgical […]
In a secret location in the Lebanese capital, a 60-bed hospital treats ISIS and other Islamic extremists whose backers must pay cash in advance. Enemies share doctors where medicine is a blind business, and cash is king.
Yes, it’s a minority, but too many Muslims offer religious justification for violence and subjugation – and we must be free to criticize Islam’s dark side without being branded Islamophobes.
Radical Islamists zero in on young people in the West who are lonely and disaffected by modern life.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sees enemies everywhere: Assad, Kurds, but not the murderous Islamist radical group just across the border in Syria.
Diyarbakir, the “Kurdish capital” of Turkey, is living in fear of the ISIS jihadists who have gained ground across the Syrian border in Kobani. But there is also the old enemy: Ankara.
U.S.-led airstrikes aimed at ISIS are being met with resistance in Syria. Some ask why it took the death of U.S. journalist James Foley for Washington to intervene.
In the end, it has nothing to do with God. From biblical times to crusades and jihad, self-proclaimed “holy wars” are actually driven by power, territory and economic interests.
A steady stream of Syrians are joining the National Defense Force, a loyalist reserve force set up in 2012 by President Bashar al-Assad. For many it’s the only way to make a living.
It shares many of its objectives with the al Qaeda global terror network, but ISIS understands the value of going viral in a whole new way.
Barack Obama is governing in a much different world than his predecessors. How will his foreign policy be remembered? Who does he most emulate? Hint: It’s not Jimmy Carter.