ISIS

Islam Karimov is one of the two heads of the former Soviet states who had been ruling the country since independence in 1991. The other one is the president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev (age 76). After Karimov’s death, a country where power was centralized in one man, risks falling into destabilization.

The West should seek the further weakening of Islamic State, but not its destruction. A weak but functioning IS can undermine the appeal of the caliphate among radical Muslims; keep bad actors focused on one another rather than on Western targets; and hamper Iran’s quest for regional hegemony.

« Islamisation de la radicalité » ou «radicalisation de l’islam»? C’est pour avoir soutenu que la radicalité des jeunes Occidentaux candidats au djihad préexiste à leur islamisation, qu’Olivier Roy est l’objet d’une âpre controverse. Gilles Kepel lui a en effet récemment consacré dans «Libération» une tribune assassine ironiquement titrée «“Radicalisations” et

Turkish forces intervened in Northern Syria, officially “against terrorists” (it is a custom now for nearly everybody operating in Syria, to do it under pretext of combating terrorism). But for most observers, the real aim of the operation is to stop the advance of Kurdish forces to the west of the river Euphrates.

By John Feffer Donald Trump may be a bigot and a bully, but it’s hard not to applaud when he pisses off the stuff shirts at...

CNN proclaimed the child “the face of Syria’s civil war,” while the anchor-woman theatrically burst into tears recounting his story. The New York Times called him “a symbol of Aleppo’s suffering,” while USA Today published a short editor’s note reading, “This Syrian boy is Omran. Will you pay attention now?”

Henry Kissinger reminds us that in international relations, states do not have permanent friends or enemies, only interests. That lesson reverberated Tuesday in St. Petersburg, where Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan let bygones be bygones with his "dear friend, the esteemed Vladimir" in an ironic (and somewhat excessive) display of diplomatic reconciliation.

Photos purporting to depict British special forces operating on the Syria-Iraq border are believed to be the first photo evidence of UK troops on the ground in Syria. The pictures show heavily armed troops in patrol vehicles near a recent battle scene.

The Obama administration announced on Monday the beginning of US air strikes in Libya against ISIS targets, marking the fourth country the United States is currently bombing with the goal of “degrading and destroying” the terror group. A campaign that began two years ago this Sunday has now, 50,000 bombs and 25,000 dead ISIS fighters later, expanded to a whole new continent.

Aleppo's rebel-controlled districts are now surrounded by the Syrian army and Shiite militias that support it. Having pursued just this objective since January 2014, when the Syrian regime began heavily bombing the city's eastern districts to drive out the civilian population, Assad and his allies can now claim a major victory. Russian air support proved decisive in the effort, crushing rebel defenses with a barrage of ordnance.