The al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front has abducted the leader of a U.S.-backed rebel group in north Syria, opposition sources and a monitoring group said, in a blow to Washington's efforts to train and equip fighters to combat Islamic State.
Turkish jets launched their heaviest assault on Kurdish militants in northern Iraq overnight since air strikes began last week, hours after President Tayyip Erdogan said a peace process had become impossible.
The head of one of Iraq's fiercest Shi'ite militias called the U.S.-led coalition's campaign against Islamic State ineffective and accused Washington of lacking the will to uproot radical Sunni jihadis controlling large swathes of Iraq and Syria.
NATO offered political support for Turkey's campaign against militants in Syria and Iraq at an emergency meeting on Tuesday, and President Tayyip Erdogan signaled the alliance may have a "duty" to become more involved.
An Australian nurse alleged to have given medical assistance to Islamic State militants fighting in Syria could face arrest for violating tough new security laws when he lands in Sydney on Friday, police and officials said.
The stench of uncollected refuse in the streets of Beirut is a stark reminder of the crisis of government afflicting Lebanon, where politicians divided by local and regional conflicts have been unable to agree on where to dump the capital's rubbish.
The United Nations envoy for Syria has voiced deep concern about civilians in the city of Zabadani, the focus of an offensive by the Syrian military and Lebanon's Hezbollah aimed at wresting control of the area from insurgents.
Iran will not accept any extension of sanctions beyond 10 years, an official said on Wednesday, in the latest attempt by its pragmatist government to sell a nuclear deal with world powers to skeptical hardliners.
The man suspected of killing five members of the U.S. military in Tennessee last week was in Qatar at least once during a 2014 trip to the Middle East, according to two U.S. government sources who said reasons for the stopover were still unknown.
Prime Minister David Cameron will set out a five-year strategy on Monday to tackle extremism in Britain, an issue he will describe as the "struggle of our generation" - vowing to take on those responsible for radicalising young British Muslims.
Hours before the Tennessee shooting that killed five U.S. servicemen, the suspected gunman texted a close friend a link to an Islamic verse that included the line: "Whosoever shows enmity to a friend of Mine, then I have declared war against him."
A man who beheaded his boss, pinned the head on a fence and tried to blow up an industrial gas plant will be investigated on terrorism charges, France's chief public prosecutor said on Tuesday, dismissing the suspect's claim that his act was not motivated by connections with Islamist militants.
A year after Islamic State declared a caliphate on territory seized in Iraq and Syria, the al Qaeda splinter group faces military pressure from a U.S.-led coalition but remains a potent force holding key cities, the Pentagon said on Monday.
Syria's foreign minister said in Moscow on Monday Russia had promised to send political, economic and military aid to his country, where the army is coming under some of the heaviest pressure since the start of the civil war.
Islamic State fighters killed at least 145 civilians in an attack on the Syrian town of Kobani and a nearby village, in what a monitoring group described on Friday as one of the worst massacres carried out by the hardline group in Syria.
Hundreds of Syrian refugees who had fled into Turkey crossed back on Monday, witnesses said, as a border gate reopened a few days after Islamic State militants were ousted from the frontier town of Tel Abyad forces by Syrian Kurds.
President Vladimir Putin reaffirmed Russia's support for Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad on Friday and said he opposed any use of external force to try to end the Syrian civil war.
Russia said it has made some suggestions on how blame could be determined for chemical weapons attacks in war-torn Syria and will discuss the issue on Friday with the United States, which is pushing for the creation of a team of U.N. investigators.
A year after declaring his caliphate, it is clear that the secret of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's success is the army and state he has built from the remnants of Saddam Hussein's military, and the allegiance he has won or coerced from alienated Sunni Muslims in Iraq, Syria, and beyond.
Islamic State militants have set up giant television screens in the Iraqi city of Ramadi and are using them to proclaim that they will seize more Iraqi territory after capturing the provincial capital last month, residents said.
Hundreds of migrants brought to Italy after being rescued at sea camped on streets near Rome's Tiburtina train station and gathered in Milan's main terminal on Thursday, making a brief stop on their journey to northern Europe.
