Middle East News

A Christian pilgrim holds candles at the church of the Holy Sepulcher, traditionally believed to be the burial site of Jesus Christ, during the ceremony of the Holy Fire in Jerusalem's Old City, Saturday, April 19, 2014.

Israeli security forces halted Palestinian Christians -- joined by a U.N. envoy -- participating a pre-Easter procession Saturday in Jerusalem's Old City, an action the envoy sharply criticized but that an Israeli official dismissed as a "non-event."

Syria has destroyed a majority of its chemical weapons material, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said Saturday.

Iran will redesign its Arak heavy water reactor to greatly limit the amount of plutonium it can make, the country's vice-president said Saturday, marking a major concession from the Islamic Republic in negotiations with world powers over its contested nuclear program.

Thousands of Bahraini anti-government protesters, waving national flags and gesturing defiantly, chant slogans during a march organized by opposition groups in A'ali, Bahrain, Friday, April 18, 2014.

An unexpected moment during the Good Friday service in a long-abandoned church in Cyprus' breakaway north illustrated how religion is helping to bring together Christian Greek Cypriots and Muslim Turkish Cypriots on this ethnically divided island.

President Francois Hollande's office said in a statement he felt "immense relief" after learning of the release of Edouard Elias, Didier Francois, Nicolas Henin and Pierre Torres - all said to be in good health despite "very trying conditions" of their captivity.

Canada has a new development partner in the Arab world, and the foreign-aid minister says it could help the Harper government navigate the complex Middle East in the fight against poverty.

For some of the scientists and doctors who helped the world battle the 2003 SARS outbreak, the recent rapid rise in human infections in several Middle Eastern countries caused by a cousin virus is creating a sense of sharp unease.

President Barack Obama signed legislation Friday aimed at blocking Iran's chosen ambassador to the United Nations because of his ties to the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.

A Syrian man carrying on his back his daughter makes his way amid rubble following reported air strikes by government forces in the Aleppo district of Ansari, in the southwest of the city, on April 15, 2014.

A woman walks with her child through the aftermath of a car bomb attack in the crowded commercial area of Karrada, in Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, April 18, 2014.

BAGHDAD: Suspected Sunni Muslim militants killed at least 30 people around Iraq yesterday, including 12 soldiers in an assault on a remote army base in the north, deepening insecurity with a national election just two weeks away.

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan greets members of parliament from his ruling Justice and Development Party during a meeting at the Turkish parliament in Ankara on April 8, 2014.

The Western-allied Arab states of the Gulf Cooperation Council said Thursday the bloc has agreed on the mechanisms to implement a security pact, marking a possible first step toward bridging deep rifts among its six energy-rich states.

The U.S government says its criminal case against a former Blackwater security guard is in jeopardy as a June 11 trial looms on charges stemming from the shootings of dozens of Iraqi citizens in an incident in Baghdad nearly seven years ago.

More than 20 people, many of them health-care workers, have been reported infected with the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus in two distinct clusters - one in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates - likely involving human-to-human transmission since early last week.

Iran's state TV says a magnitude 5.3 earthquake has jolted a sparsely populated district in the south of the country.

Israeli soldiers leave after an operation near the West Bank village of Bilin, near Ramallah October 22, 2013.

This bustling center of Palestinian life is just a 20-minute drive from Jerusalem, but for Israelis it might as well be on the other side of the world.