The leader of an Afghan political group wanted by the US has said that Washington used a false pretext to launch its war on Afghanistan, on the eve of the eighth anniversary of the conflict. 　　Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who leads a faction of the Hizb-e Islami group, said that the war... More

　　Israel "punished and terrorized" civilians in Gaza in a disproportionate attack in its three-week war on the territory earlier this year, a United Nations report has found. 　　Judge Richard Goldstone, who led the inquiry, said he found evidence Israel targeted civilians and used excessive force in the assault, which was... More

　　An Israeli Knesset member says there is evidence showing that deceased Palestinians were stripped bare of their vital organs while in police custody in Tel Aviv. 　　Israeli politician and leader of the Arab nationalist party, Ahmad Tibi, said on Saturday that a medical institution in Israel harvested appendages from the... More

　　Two-thirds of Turks would vote in a referendum to reform Turkey's judiciary, which country's hardline secularist bloc want to block, a poll showed on Saturday. 　　Such backing would suffice to pass planned constitutional changes that could raise tensions between judiciary and military, on the one hand, and the AK Party... More

　　Abu Abdullah has never been charged with a crime, but he has been arrested by Palestinian security forces so many times in the past two years that he has lost count. 　　He has been arrested at work, in the market, on the street, and, more than once, during violent raids... More

　　Turkey has always been a country haunted by conspiracy theories – and not without reason. 　　Western powers nearly succeeded in dividing Turkey between themselves at the end of the Ottoman Empire ... and after the rise of the Soviet Union, new Nato member Turkey was on the frontline of the... More

　　In the Afghanistan war, NATO forces chief Gen. Stanley McChrystal publicly apologized Tuesday for 27 Afghan civilian deaths in a US airstrike. The coalition has begun saying 'sorry' more quickly to civilian deaths, as part of a new hearts and minds strategy. 　　In a video distributed Tuesday in Dari and... More

　　By Majida Abu Rahmah 　　On International Human Rights Day in 2008, my husband Abdallah Abu Rahmah was in Berlin receiving a medal from the World Association for Human Rights. Last year on the same day, 10 December, Abdallah was taken away at 2am by Israeli soldiers who broke into our... More

　　Twaneh School in Hebron has seen some improvements since former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair paid it a visit as UN Middle East envoy last year. 　　The track leading from the school to the new main road joining Jerusalem to Israeli settlements on the south eastern slopes of Palestine is... More

　　Khaled Mishaal, the head of Hamas’s political bureau, stated Monday that the building of the steel wall on the Palestinian-Egyptian borders is a new war against Gaza people and their resistance. 　　In a televised statement, Mishaal recalled remarks made by UNRWA commissioner-general Karen Abu Zaid in which she described this... More

　　The Iraqi government is under increasing pressure to aggressively pursue the prosecution of American military personnel accused of killing Iraqis. 　　The recent decision by Ricardo Urbina, a district judge, to dismiss charges against five security contractors accused of gunning down 17 Iraqis, including women and children, in September 2007 has... More

　　Israel stripped 4,577 Palestinians of right to live in Jerusalem in 2008, blocking residency status, at a faster rate than at any time in the history of the Jewish state, an Israeli rights group said on Wednesday, citing official Israeli statistics. 　　"Revocation of residence has reached frightening proportions," said Dalia... More

　　Abu Abdullah got hooked on painkillers after his house was destroyed and his 12-year-old daughter was killed by Israel's bombardment of the Gaza Strip at the turn of the year. 　　"I'm not an addict," said the 39-year-old father of five, who now lives in a cramped rented apartment in Gaza... More

　　Omsyatte adjusts her green school uniform and climbs gingerly on to a desk at the front of the classroom. The shy 12-year-old holds up a brightly colored picture and begins to explain to her classmates what she has drawn. It is a scene played out in schools all over the... More

　　Israel is waging a covert assassination campaign across the Middle East. 　　They are also suspected of recent killings in Dubai, Damascus and Beirut. While Israel’s Mossad spy agency has been suspected of staging assassinations across the world since the 1970s, it does not officially acknowledge or admit its activities. 　　The... More

　　The Land Research Center (LRC) of the Arab Studies Society in Jerusalem reported that the Israeli authorities conducted 187 violations against Jerusalem in November, and demolished 14 Palestinians homes in addition to issuing orders to demolish 170 homes. 　　The center prepares and publishes its reports in cooperation with the Civil... More

　　The details of the Sunday rocket attack on a house full of women and children in Marjah remain shrouded in mystery, but one thing is certain: the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HiMARS), barred from use by NATO after the killings amid reports of failures, has been returned to duty.... More

　　Awalu Mohamed was one of the first to arrive in the mining village of Kuru Karama to discover burned human remains and corpses thrown into communal wells and sewage pits. 　　"There are so many, many corpses," says Mohamed, of the Jamatu Nasril Islam aid group. 　　He described how 62 corpses... More

　　Palestinians, living in the Gaza Strip under years of Israel siege, are in efforts to donate what little they have to help those struck by the earthquake in Haiti. 　　The reason for the destruction might be different, but Palestinians say they understand Haiti's pain. 　　Gaza is still considered under Israeli... More

　　Israel is denying Palestinians adequate access to clean, safe water while allowing almost unlimited supplies to Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, human rights group Amnesty International has said. 　　"Swimming pools, well-watered lawns and large irrigated farms in Israeli settlements... stand in stark contrast next to Palestinian villages whose... More