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October 23, 2025
 

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MIDDLE EAST

The aftermath of an overnight strike attributed to Israel is seen on the Barzeh scientific research center affiliated with the Syrian defense ministry in northern Damascus on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 11, 2024
Israel steps up airstrikes and sends troops deeper into Syria
The Israel Defense Forces said it struck most of the strategic weapons stockpiles in Syria to prevent them from falling into the hands of terrorists.
People hold a banner featuring Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as members of the Syrian community and supporters gather to celebrate the fall of Syrian president Bashar Assad in the face of an offensive by Islamist-led rebels, in Istanbul on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 10, 2024
With Assad’s fall, Erdogan oversees Turkey’s growing regional clout
Erdogan’s clout over his southern neighbor has increased dramatically with the fall of his onetime friend Bashar Assad.
A truck pulls the head of a toppled statue of late Syrian President Hafez Assad, the father of ousted-President Bashar Assad, through the streets of Hama on Friday.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 10, 2024
Assad’s fall shows Russia, Iran and Hamas made a bad bet
That’s not to say the Middle East is entering a bright new era of peace. The collapse of Assad’s regime could cause a revival of the Islamic State.
A sanitary serviceman stands by body bags at the morgue of a hospital in Damascus on Tuesday.
WORLD
Dec 10, 2024
Syria rebels say found dozens of tortured bodies in hospital near Damascus
One rebel shared dozens of photographs showing corpses with evident signs of torture.
The suffering of people with disabilities has been compounded by steep shortages in devices to aid them, including wheelchairs and hearing aids, and in damage to roads, sidewalks and homes with accessible features.
WORLD / Society
Dec 9, 2024
Gaza's disabled people face ‘impossible times’ of chaos and war
The war has forced most of Gaza’s roughly 2 million residents from their homes and has been particularly punishing for people with disabilities and their families.
A woman waves a Syrian opposition flag as she celebrates at Umayyad Square in Damascus on Sunday as celebrations erupted around Syria after Islamist-led rebels swept into Damascus and declared President Bashar Assad had fled the country.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Dec 9, 2024
Assad’s fall in Syria puts world on watch for more Middle East chaos
Multiple Arab and U.S. officials said that a power vacuum could now be dangerous, with memories of Moammar Gadhafi in Libya and Saddam Hussein in Iraq still fresh.
Syrian rebel fighters celebrate near the Clock Tower in Homs on Sunday after rebel forces entered Syria's third city overnight.
WORLD
Dec 9, 2024
Stunned, elated prisoners pour out as Syria's jails are flung open
Throughout the civil war that began in 2011 in Syria, security forces have held hundreds of thousands of people in detention camps known for torture.
A Syrian rebel fighter kisses a child as they gather in Homs after Syria's army command notified officers on Sunday that President Bashar Assad's 24-year authoritarian rule had ended on Sunday.
WORLD / FOCUS
Dec 9, 2024
How Syrian rebels' stars aligned for Assad's ouster
Opposition militias sensed an opportunity to loosen the president grip on power when, about six months ago, they received Turkey's tacit blessing for a major offensive.
People gather at Umayyad Square in Damascus on Sunday. The Islamist-led rebels declared that they have taken the city.
WORLD
Dec 8, 2024
Syrian rebels topple President Assad; prime minister calls for free elections
Syrian rebels seized Damascus, ending President Bashar Assad's 13-year rule and raising uncertainty over a transition led by Islamist group HTS in a war-torn nation.
Rebel fighters hold weapons in front of the Hama governor's building after capturing the city during their advance across northern Syria on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 6, 2024
Syria rebels capture another key city in fresh blow to Assad
Hama lies about halfway between Aleppo, which opposition fighters captured in a shock attack on government-held territory last week, and Damascus.
Displaced Palestinians arrive in the northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 5, 2024
Trump's Mideast envoy in push to reach Gaza ceasefire before inauguration
Steve Witkoff met the prime ministers of Israel and Qatar separately in late November.
Members of a Lebanese NGO clear debris from their office that was damaged in an Israeli strike on a nearby building, in Beirut's southern suburbs on Monday.
WORLD / Society
Dec 4, 2024
In Lebanon, people with disabilities isolated and abandoned by war
More than 900,000 people in Lebanon are classified as living with disabilities, according to the United Nations Development Program.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman meets with French President Emmanuel Macron in Riyadh on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 4, 2024
France and Saudi Arabia planning a conference about Palestinian state
The French president said he would recognize a Palestinian state "at the right moment" and at a time "when it triggers reciprocal movements of recognition."
Anti-government fighters move past abandoned Syrian army military equipment and vehicles southeast of Aleppo on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 4, 2024
Syria rebels 'at gates' of central city Hama
The advance on Syria's fourth-largest city is buoyed by the group's lightning capture of swaths of the north in an offensive that ended four years of relative calm.
Saudi Arabia has executed 303 people this year according to a tally based on official figures.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Dec 4, 2024
Saudi Arabia surpasses 300 executions in 2024
Saudi Arabia executed the third highest number of prisoners in the world in 2023 after China and Iran, according to Amnesty International.
An anti-regime fighter tears off a poster depicting Syrian President Bashar Assad (left) and his brother Maher at the airport in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 3, 2024
Syria flare-up jolts U.S. and offers chance for Trump
The Biden administration has committed more than $1 billion over the past year in humanitarian aid for Syria's displaced.
Members of the Amel Association, a Lebanese non-governmental organization, look out from their damaged branch at buildings destroyed or damaged in an Israeli strike, in Beirut's southern suburbs Hay el-Sellom neighborhood on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 3, 2024
Israel and Hezbollah exchange strikes as ceasefire violations mount
The exchanges of fire put a U.S.-brokered ceasefire between the two in an increasingly fragile position less than a week after it took effect.
An anti-regime fighter operates a truck-mounted gun as displaced Syrian Kurds drive vehicles loaded with their belongings along the Aleppo-Raqqa highway.
WORLD / FOCUS
Dec 3, 2024
Who are the former jihadis now holding Syria's Aleppo?
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) says it no longer has any links to al-Qaida, but it remains blacklisted by the United States and the European Union.
Iraqi military equipment is transported towards the border with Syria on Monday.
WORLD
Dec 3, 2024
Iraqi fighters head to Syria to battle rebels but Lebanon's Hezbollah stays out, sources say
Syria's civil war had been frozen since 2020, with Assad in control of most territory and all major cities.
A displaced woman packs up her family's belongings at a school turned into a shelter in Beirut on Nov. 27.
WORLD / Society
Dec 2, 2024
'We have a lost generation': Lebanon's education crisis
At least 500 public schools in Lebanon, roughly one in two in what is a badly underfunded sector, were converted into shelters in recent months to house people.
Rare female yakuza walks path to redemption in Japan
Retired yakuza Mako Nishimura sorts fallen leaves during a clean-up activity at the Gifu Gokoku shrine in Gifu Prefecture on Sept. 28.
Takaichi makes history as Japan’s first female prime minister
Liberal Democratic Party President Sanae Takaichi reacts to applauding lawmakers after being elected prime minister at the Lower House on Tuesday.
Japanese man sentenced to eight years after rare public accusation of rape
Riho Fukuyama (center) and her husband Yoshiki Fukuyama (left) speak to the media with their lawyer (right) outside the Toyama District Court in Toyama on Tuesday.
Woman arrested for pepper spray assault on Yamanote Line
Emergency vehicles arrive at the JR Otsuka Station in Tokyo Monday following a report that a woman had allegedly injured passengers with pepper spray inside a train on the Yamanote Line.
North Korea fires off ballistic missiles one day after Takaichi named PM
People watch a TV news report about North Korean short-range ballistic missile launches, at the main railway station in Seoul on Wednesday.
In pictures: The day Japan’s glass ceiling finally cracked
Takaichi, surrounded by LDP influencers
London exhibition perhaps sumo's most successful trip abroad
With the recent sumo jaunt to London being essentially a goodwill exercise, <i>rikishi</i> were far more outgoing and relaxed than normal.
Nakatsu keeps its cool as gentrification looms
Shunsuke Takahashi, owner of the cafe Hood by Vargas, says the Osaka neighborhood of Nakatsu feels brighter and calmer with the influx of new businesses.
Japan's first female PM promised more women in her Cabinet. She picked two.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi poses with members of the newly formed Cabinet on Tuesday night.
Who is Minoru Kihara, Takaichi’s new 'cool-headed' spokesman?
Minoru Kihara (second from left) attends a Lower House plenary session on Tuesday in Tokyo.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

The byzantine process for converting a foreign driver’s license into a Japanese one entails mountains of paperwork and significant stamina — unless you're a lucky license holder from a country or region where these requirements are waived.
Driving in Japan isn’t hard. Getting the license is.
By Thu-Huong Ha and Mike Fu

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Maruhachi never sleeps in quest for better futons
Maruhachi never sleeps in quest for better futons

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