The US won’t fight fellow NATO member Turkey over the Kurds in Syria, President Donald Trump has said, while also suggesting the Kurds may be releasing terrorist prisoners just to get the US involved. In early Monday tweets, Trump defended his decision to hastily pull American troops and negotiators from the north of Syria, where a Turkish military operation against …

Syrian government troops have reportedly entered Tell Tamer, a town in the middle of the Kurdish-controlled part of the country, amid a continuing Turkish offensive against Kurdish militias. Syrian Arab Army troops entered the town early on Monday, according to SANA. Tell Tamer is a relatively small town, but it’s located on an intersection of several major roads and is …

US President Donald Trump has launched a harsh attack on NATO ally Turkey, threatening to destroy its economy if Ankara takes a planned military strike in Syria too far even though the US leader himself has opened the door for a Turkish incursion. Trump said he would “totally destroy and obliterate” Turkey’s economy if it took action in Syria that …

Iranian authorities have now confirmed the nation is detaining three Australians, with one of them accused of spying for a third country. The details are contained in a brief report from the semi-official Fars news agency, which contains the first information from within Iran about the detention of three Australians. It quotes an Iranian judiciary official saying two Australian travel bloggers …

Qatar has agreed to buy “tremendous amounts of military equipment” and Boeing planes from the United States following a visit by Gulf Nation’s Emir to the White House, according to President Donald Trump. The weapons and commercial deals are tipped to cost tens of billions of dollars, as Mr Trump touted agreements with Qatar — a nation that is regarded as …

US President Donald Trump threatened to obliterate parts of Iran if it attacked “anything American”, in a new war of words with Tehran after it condemned the latest US sanctions and called White House actions “mentally retarded”. Mr Trump on Monday signed an executive order imposing largely symbolic economic sanctions against Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior …

Palestinian officials dismiss $50bn investment and infrastructure proposal, say political solution must be found first. The United States has revealed a proposal to create a $50bn global investment fund for the Palestinians and neighbouring Arab states, designed to be the economic engine of the long-awaited US Middle East peace plan. The plan was posted on the White House website on …

An Australian member of Islamic State (IS) has begged to come home, describing “rivers of blood” flowing inside the group’s self-proclaimed caliphate and a life of horror and misery. Mahir Absar Alam, who was born in Sydney and went to high school in Loxton in country South Australia, urged Muslims around the world not to believe IS’s propaganda and to …

The surviving children of Australia’s most notorious convert to the Islamic State group Khaled Sharrouf have escaped the last brutal battle against the terrorist organisation in Syria and are being held in a refugee camp in the country’s north, as their Australian grandmother pleads for help to bring them home. The ABC has confirmed Sharrouf’s three remaining children — Zaynab, …

Daesh has lost its final shred of territory in Syria, according to US-backed forces which have declared an end to the group’s self-declared caliphate that once spanned a third of Iraq and Syria, . Syrian Defence Force (SDF) spokesman Mustafa Bali took to Twitter on Saturday to announce a “total elimination of [the] so-called caliphate” after IS militants were defeated …