Category: Middle East
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The Treasury has named its Iran campaign Operation Economic Outcast and expanded secondary sanctions across five categories: aviation, digital assets, gold, shipping and technology. Each one corresponds to a specific route money and goods take when the banks are closed to you.
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Hospital officials say four people including two children were killed in central Gaza on Monday. The Israeli military says it struck weapons stored inside mosques after issuing warnings. What the law actually requires when a protected site is used militarily.
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Palestinian sources say Israeli missiles destroyed a desalination plant in Sheikh Radwan. The Israeli military says it struck Hamas weapons depots inside mosques and did not target the plant. Both accounts are set out here, along with what the law protects.
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Around 1.3 million Syrians went home during 2025, and 4.9 million remain refugees. Washington’s removal of Syria from its terrorism list changes the country’s economic prospects on paper. Whether it changes anyone’s decision depends on electricity, housing and paperwork.
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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent promised an “economic D-Day” against Iran and then announced something narrower: deadlines for other countries to end their commercial ties with Tehran, with penalties held in reserve. The gap between the language and the measures is the story.
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The US State Department formally rescinded Syria’s designation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism on 24 August, ending a label first applied in 1979, and also removed the terrorist designation of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham. Here is what the decision changes, what it leaves in place, and why it happened now.
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Washington has announced an “economic D-Day” against Iran; Tehran’s security chief says countries joining sanctions are enemies, while its president defends a lapsed memorandum. Why Iran is saying two things at once, and what would make the announcement real.
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Syria and Israel held US-mediated de-escalation talks in Jordan on Monday, while Washington publicly condemned Israeli drone strikes in Syria. Why an ally is criticising an ally, what “de-escalation” deliberately excludes, and what would show progress.
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A “new phase”, a “position of power”, and a promise of “more failures” — three phrases from three leaders in one day. What each construction is actually doing, why the speaker matters more than the words, and the four indicators that cost something.
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A soldier missing in Lebanon since 1982 was buried in Jerusalem on Friday, 44 years on. Why burial is treated as a debt owed to the dead, what the Mount of Olives signifies, and why the same obligation makes remains a bargaining chip.