Israel on September 27 released 24 Palestinian prisoners. Those freed were all members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed group loosely linked to Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas’s Fatah movement. Of the 24, eight will have to return to their cells at 9 p.m. every day. Last month, Israel freed 198 Palestinian prisoners in a gesture aimed at bolstering Abbas’s standing. About 11,000 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli jails.

Meanwhile, the Islamist Ham...

In his address to the 63rd session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Saudi Minister of Foreign Affairs said the nations of the world need to work together to combat extremists who seek to “propogate notions of intolerance, exclusion, racism and hatred.” He used the World Conference on Dialogue held in Madrid last July as a launching pad for continued talks amongst religions and political leaders about how to improve the current social conditio...

The hope to get their voice heard took two Palestinians and an Israeli activist all the way to the US to bring the plight and sufferings of the West Bank village of Aqaba, which Israel plans to wipe off, to world attention.  “We have three goals to achieve,” Donna Baranski-Walker, Executive Director of Rebuilding Alliance, the US NGO that invited the three, reportedly said. “Raise awareness of our cause so hundreds will join us and help save our kindergarten and the v...

A car bomb exploded near a Shiite shrine in southern Damascus on September 27, killing 17 people and wounding 14 others in one of the deadliest attacks to hit Syria in over a decade. The car packed with 200 kilos (440 pounds) of explosives blew up near a security checkpoint on a road to Damascus airport in what Interior Minister General Bassam Abdel Majid told state television was “a terrorist act.” All the casualties were civilians, he said. “A counter-terrorist unit is t...

Unidentified gunmen shot dead the most senior woman police officer in southern Afghanistan on September 28.Lieutenant-Colonel Malalai was killed in her car in an area of Kandahar city where she resumed her job as an officer after U.S.-led forces in 2001 overthrew the Taliban government which had barred women from most outdoor work.

Bandits who kidnapped 19 tourists and Egyptians in the desert have taken their hostages back to Sudan but are now heading towards Egypt.“Security organs on Saturday (September 27) detected the return of the kidnappers... with their hostages into the Sudanese borders,” said Ali Yousuf, director of protocol at the foreign ministry, the official news agency SUNA reported. However, he added that the group now appears to be moving from Sudan towards the Egyptian borders. “It se...