FIVE YEARS ago Barack Obama delivered a bracing message to Saudi Arabia. “The competition between the Saudis and the Iranians,” he warned, “has helped to feed proxy wars and chaos in Syria and Iraq and MORE
Former White House senior adviser Jared Kushner and his deputy, Avi Berkowitz, have been nominated for the Nobel peace prize for their role in negotiating four normalisation deals between Israel and Arab nations known as the “Abraham Accords”. The MORE
While Israel has sprinted ahead in vaccinating its citizens against coronavirus, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza have yet to begin a widespread immunization campaign. Israel is reportedly paying around 1 billion NIS ($305 MORE
The US flew nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to the Middle East Wednesday in the latest show of force meant to deter Iran, as defense officials remain divided over the risk posed by the regime and the Iraq-based militias MORE
Iraqis have reacted with outrage to Donald Trump’s move to pardon four security guards from the security firm Blackwater who were jailed for a 2007 massacre that sparked an outcry over the use of mercenaries in war. MORE
Former Israeli space security chief says extraterrestrials exist, and Trump knows about it. MORE
Iran will not accept preconditions from a new Biden administration over its nuclear programme and the US must return to a 2015 deal before talks can take place, its foreign minister says. Javad Zarif said MORE
If the Iranians retaliate, giving Mr. Trump a pretext to launch a return strike before he leaves office in January, Mr. Biden will be inheriting bigger problems than just the wreckage of a five-year-old diplomatic MORE
Iran has vowed retaliation after the architect of its nuclear programme was assassinated on a highway near Tehran, in a major escalation of tensions that risks placing the Middle East on a new war footing. MORE
The Israel Defense Forces have in recent weeks been instructed to prepare for the possibility that the U.S. will conduct a military strike against Iran before President Trump leaves office, senior Israeli officials tell me. MORE
Israel has agreed to allow the U.S. to sell “certain weapons” to the United Arab Emirates, opening the door to the sale of F-35 fighter jets to the Middle Eastern country. The agreement, which was MORE
The United States revealed on Thursday it had seized Iranian missiles shipped to Yemen and sold 1.1 million barrels of previously seized Iranian oil that was bound for Venezuela, in the Trump administration’s latest move MORE
“Food security crisis means acute malnutrition among under-fives at highest levels since war engulfed the country.” Almost 100,000 children under the age of five are at risk of dying in Yemen as the country slides back into MORE
“Where’s my favorite dictator?” US President Donald Trump reportedly asked while waiting for his Egyptian counterpart, former general Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, on the sidelines of the G7 summit last year. It should come as no surprise MORE
Hosted by his close ally Donald Trump, Netanyahu will on Tuesday sign agreements with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates that, while falling short of full peace deals, allow the countries to establish open business, direct flights and diplomatic relations. MORE
In retaliation to Trump’s decision to kill a powerful Iranian general earlier this year, it appears the Iranian government is weighing an assassination attempt against the American ambassador to South Africa, U.S. intelligence reports say, according MORE
A huge fire broke out at the Port of Beirut on Thursday, triggering panic among residents traumatized by last month’s massive explosion there that killed and injured thousands of people. It was not immediately clear what caused MORE
Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner will hold talks with U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab in London on Thursday.The top White House aide is flying to Britain on Wednesday night on his way back MORE
Over 44,000 people have signed an online petition to “place Lebanon under a French mandate for the next 10 years” as of Thursday afternoon. The petition on the community petition website Avaaz was reportedly set up by MORE
Europe and Iran have completed their first transaction under a complicated barter system set up to dodge US sanctions on the Islamic Republic. Germany’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday that the creation of the INSTEX mechanism MORE
He has become known as the crown prince of propaganda. Armed with a series of very expensive strategy documents authored by the Boston Consulting Group and branded as his Vision 2030, Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin MORE
Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed victory in Israel’s third election within a year, even as the country looked set for further political deadlock after early counts suggested he was still short of securing a historic fifth term. MORE
“The government of Afghanistan has made no commitment to free 5,000 Taliban prisoners,” President Ghani told reporters in Kabul on Sunday, a day after the accord was signed in Qatar’s capital, Doha. “It is not in the MORE
On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to allow 3,500 new Israeli settlements in a contested region of the West Bank known as the “E-1 zone,” short for East-1. E-1 is an “underpopulated” strip of land located between MORE
Iran said on Tuesday that its top court had confirmed a death sentence for an Iranian man accused of spying for US intelligence. Amir Rahimpour was found guilty of passing along information about Iran’s nuclear MORE