Middle East

Ethiopia has dismissed reports that it’s filling a massive reservoir behind a new hydroelectric dam, as the colossal infrastructure project strains ties between three African nations that all rely on the River Nile for water. Egypt has previously threatened to go to war over the dam. Almost 10 years of …

Turkey sent between 3,500 and 3,800 paid Syrian fighters to Libya over the first three months of the year, the US Defense Department’s inspector general concluded in a new report, its first to detail Turkish deployments in Libya’s war. The quarterly report on counterterrorism operations in Africa by the Pentagon’s …

French authorities are opening an investigation into accusations of complicity in acts of torture against the powerful crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, sources said Friday. Multiple sources with knowledge of the case told AFP that a French investigating magistrate had been mandated to take on the …

His poll numbers are sinking, protests are growing and economically punishing restrictions have just been reimposed: surging coronavirus cases in Israel have left Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu encircled by trouble. After a late-night cabinet meeting, the government on Friday announced that stores, markets, and various other public spaces would be …

Al-Sisi’s recent remarks suggesting Cairo could arm Libyan tribes amount to ‘interference in Libyan internal affairs’ Libya condemned the president of Egypt for recent comments suggesting Cairo could arm Libyan tribes against the internationally recognized government. Speaking to Al Jazeera TV, Libyan Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Al-Qablawi criticized a recent …

A Japanese rocket carrying the first Arab mission to Mars will blast into space on Monday, after being delayed by bad weather, the launch company said Friday. The lift-off of the United Arab Emirates’ “Hope” probe, originally planned for Wednesday, is now set for 6:58 am Monday (21:58 GMT Sunday) …

Libya’s National Oil Corporation (NOC) triumphantly said on 10 July that it was lifting force majeure on oil exports, heralding a new phase in a ruinous civil war that has ravaged the leading North African energy exporter. It proved embarrassingly premature as the state player was forced to reimpose the …

Nabil Shaath, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas’ close aide, announced on Wednesday that 23 European Union (EU) countries stand with Palestine against the Israeli plan to annex large swathes of occupied West Bank, Al Watan Voice reported. The only two European states which have not yet announced their stance …

Saudi-led military aircraft have carried out fresh deadly strikes in Yemen, this time targeting a residential area in the northern province of al-Jawaf, as part of the Riyadh regime’s ongoing aerial bombardment campaign against its crisis-hit southern neighbor. Local sources told Yemen’s Arabic-language al-Masirah television network that the fighter jets …

Egypt is readying its military for a possible intervention in neighbouring Libya, according to a former top-ranking member of its armed forces. The country has been conducting land and sea exercises over the past few days and their size shows that Cairo is serious about moving its forces into Libya …

Turkey has been on the receiving end of attacks by French-made Rafale jets in Libya and is looking to activate its Russian-made S-400 missiles as a countermeasure, according to the Eurasian Times news website. Itamilradar, an Italian news website, and Turkey’s pro-government Sabah daily also recently reported on Ankara mulling …

Several Turkish, Russian soldiers were wounded on Tuesday when a bomb attack hit a joint patrol in northern Syria’s M4 highway. Russia’s Defence Ministry said a roadside bomb detonated and hit a joint Russian-Turkish patrol in Syria, injuring three Russian soldiers, Russia’s RIA news agency reported. Several Turkish soldiers were …

Sudan has declared a state of emergency in part of the conflict-ridden western region of Darfur after violence and unrest in two towns, state news agency SUNA said. The African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (Unamid) said it had sent a team to Kutum town in North Darfur state following …

The eastern-based Libyan parliament, which supports the Libyan National Army (LNA), has given go-ahead to the Egyptian armed forces to intervene in the Libyan conflict, citing AMN. In early June, Egypt put forward the Cairo peace initiative, outlining a path for a political settlement in Libya and calling for warring …

Iran’s Judiciary Spokesman Gholam Hossein Esmaeili said that an individual, a Defense Ministry retiree, was executed last week due to his spying for the CIA. Speaking in his weekly presser on Tuesday, he said that Reza Asgari, a retiree of Defense Ministry’s aerospace has been executed after the ruling was …

The liftoff of the United Arab Emirates’ Mars orbiter was postponed until Friday due to bad weather at the Japanese launch site. The orbiter named Amal, or Hope, is the Arab world’s first interplanetary mission. The launch was scheduled for Wednesday from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan, but …

Yemeni forces have carried out a major military operation against military and strategic positions in southwestern Saudi Arabia, a military spokesman says. Brigadier General Yahya Saree, the spokesman for Yemen’s Armed Forces, said in a statement on Monday that many drones and high-precision ballistic missiles were used in the operation. …

The imf’s energy producers are expected to earn $270 billion less in oil revenue compared to last year as the region’s economic heavyweight, Saudi Arabia, sinks deeper into recession amid the coronavirus pandemic, according to the International Monetary Fund’s outlook released Monday. The international lender expects an overall economic contraction …

A fire broke out at a facility belonging to the Shahid Tondgooyan Petrochemical Company in southwest Iran but was quickly contained, the official IRNA news agency reported on Sunday, citing a local official. The fire was caused by an oil leak but did not lead to any casualties or financial …

Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah movement has agreed to provide the United Nations with access to an abandoned oil tanker that risks causing environmental disaster off the western coast of the country. Two unnamed UN sources, familiar with the matter, announced the news in interviews with Reuters on Sunday, a few days …