Month: August 2016

The Lebanese government has adopted Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s proposal to make the Feast of the Annunciation on March 25 a joint national holiday for Christians and Muslims, the Lebanese daily An-Nahar reported (in Arabic) on Friday. The Feast of the Annunciation, which is called […]

An Egyptian judoka has been reprimanded and sent home by the International Olympic Committee for refusing to shake the hand of an Israeli competitor who beat him on Friday, according to the Associated Press. Islam El Shehaby, who has been described as an an ultra-conservative […]

NNA – Beirut Maronite Archbishop Boulos Matar said, on Monday, that “France is capable of playing a crucial role in restoring peace in the region.” Presiding over Assumption Mass held at the Archdiocese Seat in Ain Saadeh marking Saint Mary’s Day and dedicated to France, […]

NNA – Maronite Patriarch, Mar Bechara Boutros Al-Rahi, on Monday prayed for God the almighty to inspire local and international officials with the much-needed solutions to help people out of the existing crises that have been recently shaking different parts of the world. Rahi prayed […]

It appears that Pentagon has publicly acknowledged that private intelligence contractors are now battling on the ground in Syria along with the US troops, providing “intelligence analysis services”; a fact noticed by the US-based news website The Daily Beast. Pentagon fence © Flickr/ Kevin Harber […]

Thousands of leaked Daesh documents indicate that many initiates were not well versed in Islam before joining the extremists, with records showing some British converts even purchased a Koran and Islam for Dummies from online retailer Amazon. The Associated Press conducted a probe using court […]

PARIS: The jihadi employment form asked the new recruits to rate their knowledge of Islam on a scale of one to three. And the Islamic State group applicants, herded into a hangar somewhere at the Syria-Turkey border, turned out to be overwhelmingly deemed ignorant. The […]

Moscow’s actions following the Syrian chemical weapons attack in 2013 could as well have saved the country from a possible massive strike by NATO forces, Sergey Shoigu, Russia’s defense minister, said. Such a strike could have involved over 600 cruise missiles, he added. “What would’ve […]

Moscow and Washington are in direct talks to resolve the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo, Syria, according to Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu. “We are in a very active phase of talks with our American counterparts both in Geneva and in Amman; we are frequently in […]