Syrian state media says 2 Israeli airstrikes on the Syrian capital and a western suburb have killed 15 people

Associated Press

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syrian state media says 2 Israeli airstrikes on the Syrian capital and a western suburb have killed 15 people.

Latest stories

  • Uyghur fighters in Syria vow to come for China next

    A Uyghur militant group that helped to topple Bashar-al Assad has vowed to take the fight to China.

  • Fears mount for Syria’s minorities as video emerges showing rebel fighters executing suspects

    Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), has become Syria’s new strongman, replacing the Alawite regime of Bashar al-Assad. Once a partner of al Qaeda, Jolani now speaks the language of tolerance towards Syria’s ethnic and religious minorities and told his fighters to refrain from extrajudicial violence. Videos emerging on social media, including one apparently showing the execution of four suspected regime collaborators, suggest that not all of his fighters are following hi

  • Why Israel captured Syria’s tallest mountain just hours after Assad fell

    Israel wasted no time after Bashar al-Assad’s fall to bomb all the Syrian military assets it wanted to keep out of the rebels’ hands – striking nearly 500 targets, destroying the navy, and taking out, it claims, 90% of Syria’s known surface-to-air missiles.

  • Bloody siege ends Myanmar army control of western border

    Insurgents seized Myanmar's border with Bangladesh in one of the bloodiest battles of the civil war.

  • A Syrian soldier's story: Why Assad's army didn't fight for him

    STORY: Just weeks ago, Farhan al-Khouli was manning a military outpost in Idlib, northern Syria, for Bashar al-Assad's army.The story of his desertion - one of many - shows how Assad's army crumbled as the rebels advanced.Khouli's commanding officer called to say a rebel convoy was heading their way.They were just three men, badly paid and demoralized, one deemed unfit by his superiors to bear arms.They were meant to be nine but others had bribed their way out.They should stand and fight, the officer said.Instead Khouli put his phone on airplane mode, changed into civilian clothes, dropped his rifle and fled.Ending up in Damascus, now taken by the rebels, where he got this job at a horse stable.On the road he saw other groups of deserting soldiers.“Those who were with me in the room, I no longer know anything about them. Everyone went in a different way, some went this way, others went that way. I wanted to reach the highway, because if I reached the highway, I would no longer worry. I reach Hama, I reach Homs, I have no problem. I saw all the people gathering. It was over, they fled, the whole area was gone. I said praise be to God, I am here, by God Almighty, when they said that the whole area had fallen, I started to cry with joy.":: November 29, 2024Reuters spoke to a dozen sources, including Syrian military and security sources and allied militia commanders. As Aleppo came under attack in late November, army units were not given a clear plan but were told to work it out for themselves, two Syrian security sources said. Within two weeks, the rebels had toppled Assad's brutal regime. His army lacked leadership and a defense strategy, the sources said, and had lost much of its command structure - the Iranian military advisors and militia allies such as Hezbollah - who'd left as war with Israel escalated.The army also lacked loyalty, as Khouli's story describes.Khouli didn't want to sign up but says he was forced to. He ended up at that remote post in Idlib because he'd tried to desert once and been jailed for it.One former major told Reuters the use of forced conscripts was a "fatal mistake." Khouli says he had to do heavy manual labor in extreme heat and cold.Reuters was not able to verify the details of his experiences.He says he was paid $40 a month and went hungry.“We used to get sugar, and we used to get ghee, and we used to get oil, but it all went away, it used to get stolen, and we wouldn't see any of it. What we received was a pot of bulgar wheat, mostly bulgar, I mean, we used to go 4 or 5 days with only bulgar, and each person had a pinch of tomato and potato. Each person received his portion, I mean, it wasn’t enough to fill you up.”:: North Hama, Syria:: Released December 1, 2024In 2020, the army had 130,000 personnel, according to the IISS think tank, depleted by the long civil war and functioning more like a militia.A U.S. official told Reuters Washington was learning of high-level desertions and military forces changing sides in the days before Assad fell.Corruption went up through the ranks.Colonel Makhlouf Makhlouf served in an engineering brigade stationed in Hama but deserted before the city fell on December 5.He said if anyone complained about corruption they were questioned at a military court, which happened to him more than once. A serving senior military intelligence officer told Reuters anger had been building against Assad personally within the military, especially over the past year......including among core high-ranking supporters from his minority Alawite community.Despite his army past, Khouli says he has no fear for the future. "I'm happy and at ease," he says. "I'm not afraid at all."

  • North Korean troops performing well on battlefield, say Russian bloggers

    North Korean troops have captured a village from Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region, Russian military bloggers have reported.

  • Battered corpses show the horrors of life and death under Syria’s Assad

    The 35 or so bodies were found in a military hospital in the Syrian capital of Damascus, days after the regime fell. They are believed to be among the last victims of Assad.

  • British chemicals found in Assad’s drug factories that funded regime

    As the rebels swooped down from the north, Bashar al-Assad’s narcotics smugglers hastily tried to burn the evidence. They failed.

  • Syria's interim PM hails 'the birth of a nation' at Friday prayers

    STORY: :: Syria's interim PM calls for mercy and unity as he leads Friday prayers at the Umayyad Mosque:: December 13, 2024:: Damascus, Syria:: Mohamed al-Bashir, Syrian Caretaker Prime Minister:: "Have mercy. You should be merciful. You should take Syria as a symbol of freedom. Let Syria be a symbol of mercy.":: "Victory and the liberation of the land is not just about breaking chains or raising flags. It is the birth of a nation, the restoration of dignity, and the writing of history.":: "He (ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad) thought his rule would last forever, but God brought him to ruin, just as He did to Pharaoh."Since Sharaa's Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group swept Bashar al-Assad from power on Sunday (December 8) at the head of a rebel alliance, its bureaucrats - who until last week were running an Islamist administration in a remote corner of Syria's northwest - have moved into government headquarters in Damascus.The appointment of Mohammed al-Bashir, the head of the regional government in HTS' enclave of Idlib, as Syria's new interim prime minister on Monday (December 9) underlined the group's status as the most powerful of the armed groups that battled for more than 13 years to end Assad's iron-fisted rule.

  • China FM says 'deeply concerned' about Syria in talks with Egypt counterpart

    China's foreign minister Wang Yi told his Egyptian counterpart on Friday that Beijing is "deeply concerned" about the situation in Syria, as the two top diplomats met in the Chinese capital."The two sides are deeply concerned about the current situation in Syria and call for respect for Syria's sovereignty," Wang told journalists, urging the prevention of "terrorist and extremist forces from taking advantage of the chaos".

  • Russia ‘not leaving’ two main bases in Syria

    Russia is pulling back its military from northern Syria and posts in the Alawite Mountains but is not leaving its two main bases, four Syrian officials told Reuters.

  • Syrian Shi'ites and other minorities flee to Lebanon, fearing Islamist rule

    Tens of thousands of Syrians, mostly Shi'ite Muslims, have fled to Lebanon since Sunni Muslim Islamists toppled Bashar al-Assad, fearing persecution despite assurances from the new rulers in Damascus that they will be safe, a Lebanese official said. At the border with Lebanon, where thousands of people were trying to leave Syria on Thursday, a dozen Shi'ite Muslims interviewed by Reuters described threats made against them, sometimes in person but mostly on social media. Their accounts reflect fears of persecution despite promises of protection by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) - the Sunni Islamist group which has emerged as the dominant force in the new Syria but is far from being the only armed faction on the ground.

  • BBC ‘portrayed Palestinian gunmen killed in Gaza as innocent civilians’

    Palestinian gunmen killed in Gaza have been repeatedly portrayed as innocent civilians by the BBC, it has been claimed.

  • Georgia ruling party elects loyalist president amid constitutional crisis

    Georgia's ruling party on Saturday voted for a far-right former footballer to become president in a controversial election process, amid a deepening constitutional crisis and weeks of mass pro-EU protests.An electoral college, controlled by the ruling Georgian Dream party and boycotted by the opposition, elected Mikheil Kavelashvili with a comfortable majority of 224 votes as the country's next figurehead leader for a five-year term, the central election commission said.

  • G7 to meet on Syria, government pledges 'rule of law'

    G7 leaders will attempt Friday to forge a common approach to the new government of Syria, which has pledged to protect the rule of law after years of abuses under ousted president Bashar al-Assad."A judicial and human rights committee will be established to examine the constitution and then introduce amendments," he said, pledging that "rule of law" would be instituted.

  • Blinken makes unannounced trip to Iraq as international community grapples with Syrian regime collapse

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken made an unannounced visit to Iraq Friday to meet with Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani as the international community grapples with the implications of the Syrian government’s collapse.

  • US officials have been in direct contact with the Syrian rebel group that ousted Assad, Blinken says

    American officials have been in direct contact with the terrorist-designated rebel group that led the overthrow of Syrian President Bashar Assad, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Saturday. Blinken, speaking at a news conference in Jordan, was the first U.S. official to publicly confirm contacts between the Biden administration and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, which led a coalition of armed opposition groups that drove Assad from power and into asylum in Russia last weekend.

  • Last bone surgeon in northern Gaza killed, Palestinians say

    Dr Sayeed Joudeh had come out of retirement to help during the war between Israel and Hamas.

  • UCLA police chief who was criticized over Gaza protest violence is out

    The police chief for the University of California at Los Angeles, who was criticized for the handling of a violent mob attack in May on pro-Palestinian activists encamped at UCLA, has left the campus police department. "December 10, 2024, was former UCLA Police Chief John Thomas' last day with UCLA and the UCLA Police Department," the department said on Thursday. UCLA Police Captain Scott Scheffler will serve as interim police chief until a permanent chief is selected, the department added.

  • Thai police detain 2 suspects after a bomb in a border province killed 3 and injured scores

    Thai police on Saturday said two suspects were in custody as authorities investigated a bombing in the north that killed at least three people and injured dozens of others. An explosive device was thrown into a crowd during an outdoor performance at an annual festival in Umphang town in Tak province, which borders Myanmar, on Friday just before midnight, according to the Association of the Umphang Rescue Groups. Local police said at least 48 people were injured and that police have not yet pressed charges against the suspects as the investigation is ongoing.