TRCB News:Middle East

Armed rebel groups in Somalia are using the Internet for fundraising and recruitment, and they achieve better results through the Web than they do on the ground, a United Nations report said. The report by the U.N. Monitoring Group on Somalia also

Egyptian television on Friday aired new footage of President Hosni Mubarak, who has been recovering in Germany after surgery, showing the 81-year-old making phone calls from hospital. Footage showed Mubarak, wearing a grey cardigan,

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Israel must comply with the Middle East Quartet's call on Friday to halt settlement activity as a means to clear the way for peace negotiations, whereas Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that the

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Friday appointed a new head of al-Azhar, Sunni Islam's most prestigious institution, after the death of its top cleric last week, the official MENA agency reported. Mubarak, who is recovering from

A fresh sense of urgency clouded international talks on the Middle East set for Friday after Israeli warplanes targeted the Gaza Strip in response to a fatal rocket attack. In Israel itself meanwhile, thousands of police braced for the

Iranian opposition activist Amir Jahanchachi unveiled a new project on Friday to provide financial and logistical support to movements opposing the Islamic republic's hardline regime. The scheme, dubbed the "Green Wave," aimed to create

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki held on to his slim overall lead in the nationwide vote tally over his main challenger Iyad Allawi, updated results from Iraq's general election showed on Thursday. Maliki's State of Law Alliance led

Russia will start up the nuclear reactor it is building at Iran's Bushehr atomic power plant in mid-2010, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Thursday. "The launch of the first unit of Iran's nuclear power station should be implemented

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said on Thursday that peace in the Middle East was "impossible" because of the actions of the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. "The establishment of peace in the Middle East is

A hardline Saudi cleric called for demolishing the Holy Mosque in Mecca and rebuilding it in a way that would insure Sex segregation. Sheikh Youssef al-Ahmad told the Saudi-based Bedaya satellite television channel Wednesday that the mosque should be