GAZA — Israel and Hamas militants have agreed to a United Nations request for a temporary cease-fire in Gaza on Thursday. The truce will last five hours to give Palestinian civilians a chance to restock supplies, repair damaged buildings, and get medical care. But Israel warns it will react if militants fire rockets during the truce. Palestinian officials say the death toll since Israel began its offensive […]
Two car bombings against members of an ethnic minority in northern Iraq and militant attacks on Iraqi soldiers and police officers killed at least 27 people on Friday, Iraqi officials said. The bombings struck in Tahrawa, a village inhabited by families from the Shabak ethnic group, killing seven people. The village is near Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad. Police officials also said that 43 people were […]
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s president-elect Petro Poroshenko have discussed a ceasefire and other possible steps to de-escalate the crisis between their countries in a brief meeting in France, French officials said. The meeting hosted by French President Francois Hollande, before D-Day celebrations on Friday, took place as clashes continued in eastern Ukraine near a border crossing with Russia, killing at least 15 pro-Russian separatists overnight. Putin and […]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — The fevered struggle between Saudi Arabia and Iran for regional dominance has for years aggravated nearly every conflict across the Middle East as the two nations armed, funded and encouraged each other’s adversaries. So it has come as a surprise to many here that even with the region still in tumult, there have been signs that both powers are looking to temper their destructive […]
A suicide bomber and a roadside bomb have struck the convoy of Afghanistan’s presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah as it left a campaign event in the capital Kabul, the Interior Ministry said. Friday’s explosions killed four civilians but left the candidate himself unharmed. In a televised statement shortly after the attack, Abdullah said that several of his security guards had been wounded in the attack. The interior ministry spokesman […]
Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun Hee, South Korea’s richest person, was ordered to appear before an Indian court in a dispute over a $1.4 million payment after losing a motion to avoid presenting himself. Lee should appear on July 14 after his petition was dismissed, Magistrate Ram Karan Yadav of Ghaziabad district court in Uttar Pradesh state said in an order issued June 2. Samsung spokeswoman Rhee […]
Canadian police said they have arrested the 24-year-old man who they suspect shot dead three police officers and wounded two more in the eastern city of Moncton, ending a massive manhunt. The shooting was one of the worst of its kind in Canada, where gun laws are stricter than in the United States and fatal attacks on police are rare. “Justin Bourque arrested by RCMP at 12:10 in Moncton. He is in […]
A view of southwestern Syria in late April, from an Israeli lookout post in the Golan Heights. Israel has placed soldiers in the Golan to stand guard against any Syrian attack. Nicholas Casey/The Wall Street Journal GOLAN HEIGHTS—Each morning after sunrise, soldiers from the Israel Defense Forces stand on a hill and look into their binoculars over two parallel fences topped in barbed wire that stretch out […]
Suspected al-Qaida militants have attacked a military checkpoint in southern Yemen, killing at least 14 soldiers. Yemeni security officials say other soldiers were wounded in the attack, which took place on Thursday near a village in Shabwa province. Yemen is the stronghold of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, one of the terror group’s most active branches. An army spokesman said Thursday that at least 500 al-Qaida militants […]
Acknowledging that Syria will miss the June 30 deadline for eliminating its chemical weapons, the top United Nations official overseeing the arsenal’s eradication said Wednesday it was “very, very critical” for Syria to export the final shipment, which is packed and ready to go but is trapped in an area contested by insurgents in the civil war. The official, Sigrid Kaag, said she would be traveling to […]
WASHINGTON — Weeks before a Black Hawk helicopter lifted off in the dying light of eastern Afghanistan, carrying with it an American soldier who had spent five years in the hands of the Taliban, American officials grew increasingly worried that Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s life might be in jeopardy. A video produced by his captors months earlier had shown him weak and dazed, and there was a growing […]
US President Barack Obama has condemned what he called Russia’s “dark tactics” and “bullying” in Ukraine, prompting President Vladimir Putin to hit back at American “aggression,” as diplomatic wrangling between the two countries escalated. Obama met Ukraine’s president-elect Petro Poroshenko in the Polish capital of Warsaw on Wednesday, and promised years of US support, then blasted Russia and vowed to protect former Soviet states and domains in NATO, […]
A suicide car bomber has targeted the home of a renegade Libyan general who has been leading an offensive against armed groups in Benghazi, military officials say. The attack on the home of General Khalifa Haftar on Wednesday left three people dead and injured four others. There were conflicting reports on whether Haftar was injured in the attack, which took place in the eastern city of Benghazi. Haftar’s […]
Election officials began counting votes in Syria’s presidential election early on Wednesday as polls closed in government-held areas. State-run media reported that voting closed at midnight and that officials began the process of checking the number of votes against lists of registered voters to ensure the numbers matched. Syrians on Tuesday voted in their first election in nearly 50 years, which the incumbent Bashar al-Assad is widely […]
WASHINGTON — Did the search for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl cost the lives of American soldiers? Since last weekend’s prisoner exchange in which Afghan insurgents turned over Sergeant Bergdahl after five years of captivity, a number of the men who served with him have called him a deserter. Some have gone further, blaming him for the deaths of six to eight soldiers. That second claim is hardening into […]
WASHINGTON — The relatives of three United States citizens killed in American drone strikes without trial, including Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical Muslim cleric, have decided not to appeal a federal judge’s dismissal of a lawsuit they filed against Obama administration officials. The lawsuit sought unspecified damages against several top national security officials for the deaths from two drone strikes in Yemen in 2011; the victims also included […]
DUBAI // A drunk, jealous maid who was jailed for seven years for trying to stab another maid to death because she stole her boyfriend had her sentence upheld at the Dubai Court of Appeal on Wednesday. Nepali D P, 28, aided by another person identified in court records as N B, attacked Sri Lankan N S, 32, on April 2 last year. At Dubai Criminal Court last October the […]
PARIS — The three young Frenchmen were arrested as they tried to make their way to Syria to wage jihad. They had not harmed anyone in France or made plans to do so, according to the evidence at their trial in January, but in France these days, seeking to fight in Syria is enough to bring a charge of plotting terrorism — and in this case sentences […]
JERUSALEM — President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority swore in a transitional government on Monday intended to unify the West Bank and Gaza after seven years of division, though the run-up was marred by last-minute disputes over its composition. The move is likely to complicate further the Palestinians’ already fraught relations with Israel and put them under international scrutiny because the new government is supported by […]
Heavy fighting is raging in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, apparently between the armed group Ansar al-Sharia and irregular forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar, a former army general. Witnesses said on Monday that gunfire, which began the day before, could be heard across the city, particularly coming from a special forces army base in a western suburb of Benghazi. At least seven people have died and […]
A controversy over cutting down centennial trees to pave the way for building a military academy in one of Jordan’s shrinking forests is taking center stage once again. Environmental NGOs and activists held an emergency meeting Saturday to halt what they called an illegal chopping of trees by the Jordan Armed Forces in Bergesh forest, near the city of Ajloun – some 90kms north west of Amman. […]
WASHINGTON — During the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States military often carried out dozens of daily operations against Al Qaeda and other extremist targets with heavily armed commandos and helicopter gunships. But even before President Obama’s speech on Wednesday sought to underscore a shift in counterterrorism strategy — away from the Qaeda strongholds in and near those countries — American forces […]
DUBAI // A shopkeeper caught with a large quantity of illegal drugs said he did not know the cars that were chasing him were police. Emirati AK, 40, also said the drugs he had on him were for personal use, even though he was found with 14,500 tramadol pills, 225 grams of hashish, 6.26 grams of opium, 5.05 grams of heroin and 25.75 grams of crystal meth. […]
A Ukrainian military helicopter has been shot down in Slovyansk, killing 14 people including an army general, as rebels and government forces continued fierce battles in the country’s east. The acting Ukraine president, Oleksandr Turchynov, told parliament on Thursday: “I have just received information that terrorists using Russian anti-aircraft missiles shot down our helicopte. It had been ferrying servicemen for a change ofduty.” He said General Serhiy Kulchytskiy was among […]
