Türkiye Brings in New Reinforcements to Syria’s Idlib

File photo of Turkish military reinforcements heading to Idlib.
File photo of Turkish military reinforcements heading to Idlib.
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Türkiye Brings in New Reinforcements to Syria’s Idlib

File photo of Turkish military reinforcements heading to Idlib.
File photo of Turkish military reinforcements heading to Idlib.

The Turkish army on Monday dispatched to their positions in Syria’s eastern Idlib new military reinforcements, including a number of vehicles, tanks and field artillery.
The Turkish military convoy entered Syria via the Kafr Lossin border crossing in northern Idlib. It was later dispatched to Turkish observation posts in Sarmeen, Banash, Nayrab and Taftanaz east the governorate in northwestern Syria. The new reinforcement aims to boost Turkish presence amid the military escalation in the area.
In the past few days, Syrian regime forces and their backed-militias stepped up their attacks on northwestern Syria. Forces stationed in the vicinity of Idlib targeted several neighborhoods in the east of the city with rockets and artillery.
Turkish media outlets quoted civil defense sources as saying that five civilians were injured by Syrian regime forces and their backed Iranian militias who fired at the Saraqib area and the village of Sarmeen in eastern Idlib governorate.
On Sunday, the Turkish forces had targeted positions of the government forces in the city of Saraqib in eastern Idlib with artillery, following a rocket strike carried out by the government forces on Idlib.
The injury of five civilians was confirmed by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which said that Syrian regime artillery forces had fired at Sarmeen city in eastern Idlib governorate. The shells struck the popular market in the city center near the Sarmeen High School for Girls and the ancient Grand ‘al-Kabir’ Mosque, it added.
The Observatory later mentioned that Turkish forces stationed in the “Putin-Erdogan” area fired missiles on regime positions in Saraqib and Khan Al-Sabl near the road between Damascus and Aleppo “M5.”
Meanwhile, regime forces fired highly explosive missiles on the frontlines of Al-Sirmaniya village in Hama countryside and Al-Sheikh Sandiyan village in Idlib countryside. However, no casualties were reported.
Syrian regime forces also bombed the villages of Sfuhn and Al-Baraa in Jabal al-Zawiya, south of Idlib, the villages of Kafar aama and Kafr Taal, west of Aleppo, and the Kabana area in Jabal al-Akrad, north of Latakia.
The regime forces then targeted Hayat Tahrir al-Sham positions in Jabal Al-Akrad.
For their part, Ansar al-Tawhid forces targeted the village of Al-Malaja in Jabal al-Zawiya, south of Idlib, with mortar shells, amid the hovering of intense Russian drones in Jabal al-Zawiya, Jabal Al-Akrad, and Al-Ghab plain in the Hama countryside.
In a separate development, the Turkish security forces “neutralized” five members of the People's Protection Units (YPG), the primary component of the Syrian Democratic Forces in northern Syria, the Turkish Defense Ministry said on Monday.
The YPG members were preparing for an attack in the Euphrates Shield and Peace Spring regions, the ministry said on X.



Lebanon FM Urges Iran to Find ‘New Approach’ on Hezbollah Arms

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi (L) shakes hands with Lebanese Minister of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants Youssef Raggi (R) at the Foreign Ministry in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, 09 January 2026. (EPA)
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi (L) shakes hands with Lebanese Minister of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants Youssef Raggi (R) at the Foreign Ministry in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, 09 January 2026. (EPA)
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Lebanon FM Urges Iran to Find ‘New Approach’ on Hezbollah Arms

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi (L) shakes hands with Lebanese Minister of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants Youssef Raggi (R) at the Foreign Ministry in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, 09 January 2026. (EPA)
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi (L) shakes hands with Lebanese Minister of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants Youssef Raggi (R) at the Foreign Ministry in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, 09 January 2026. (EPA)

Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi on Friday urged his visiting Iranian counterpart to find a "new approach" to the thorny issue of disarming the Iran-backed Hezbollah group.

Lebanon is under heavy US pressure to disarm Hezbollah, which was heavily weakened in more than a year of hostilities with Israel that largely ended with a November 2024 ceasefire, but Iran and the group have expressed opposition to the move.

Iran has long wielded substantial influence in Lebanon by funding and arming Hezbollah, but as the balance of power shifted since the recent conflict, officials have been more critical towards Tehran.

"The defense of Lebanon is the sole responsibility of the Lebanese state", which must have a monopoly on weapons, Raggi told Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, a Lebanese foreign ministry statement said.

Raggi called on Iran to engage in talks with Lebanon to find "a new approach to the issue of Hezbollah's weapons, drawing on Iran's relationship with the party, so that these weapons do not become a pretext for weakening Lebanon".

He asked Araghchi "whether Tehran would accept the presence of an illegal armed organization on its own territory".

Last month, Raggi declined an invitation to visit Iran and proposed meeting in a neutral third country.

Lebanon's army said Thursday that it had completed the first phase of disarming Hezbollah, doing so in the south Lebanon area near the border with Israel, which called the efforts "far from sufficient".

Araghchi also met President Joseph Aoun on Friday and was set to hold talks with several other senior officials.

After arriving on Thursday, he visited the mausoleum of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in a massive Israeli air strike on south Beirut in September 2024.

Last August, Lebanese leaders firmly rejected any efforts at foreign interference during a visit by Iran's security chief Ali Larijani, with the prime minister saying Beirut would "tolerate neither tutelage nor diktat" after Tehran voiced opposition to plans to disarm Hezbollah.


Hamas Says Israeli Strikes on Gaza ‘Cannot Happen without American Cover’

 Palestinians inspect damaged tents at a displacement camp following an Israeli strike in Gaza City, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians inspect damaged tents at a displacement camp following an Israeli strike in Gaza City, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP)
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Hamas Says Israeli Strikes on Gaza ‘Cannot Happen without American Cover’

 Palestinians inspect damaged tents at a displacement camp following an Israeli strike in Gaza City, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians inspect damaged tents at a displacement camp following an Israeli strike in Gaza City, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP)

A Hamas official said Friday that Israeli strikes on Gaza "cannot happen without American cover", the day after Israeli attacks killed at least 13 people according to the Palestinian territory's civil defense agency.

Since October 10, a fragile US-sponsored truce in Gaza has largely halted the fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas, but both sides have alleged frequent violations.

Gaza's civil defense agency -- which operates as a rescue force under Hamas authority -- said Israeli attacks across the territory on Thursday killed at least 13 people, including five children.

In a statement on Friday morning, the Israeli military said it "precisely struck Hamas terrorists and terror infrastructure" in response to a "failed projectile" launch.

"Just yesterday, 13 people were killed in different areas of the Strip on fabricated pretexts, in addition to the hundreds of killed and wounded who preceded them after the ceasefire," Hamas political bureau member, Bassem Naim, wrote on Telegram.

"This cannot happen without American cover or a green light."

Israeli forces have killed at least 439 Palestinians in Gaza since the ceasefire took effect, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

The Israeli military said gunmen have killed three of its soldiers during the same period.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by both sides.

Naim also accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of "evading his commitments and escalating in order to sabotage the agreement and return to war".

He said the Palestinian movement had "complied with all its obligations under the agreement" and was "ready to engage positively and constructively with the next steps of the plan".

Israel has previously said it is awaiting the return of the last hostage body held in Gaza before beginning talks on the second phase of the ceasefire and has insisted that Hamas disarm.

Hamas officials told AFP that search operations for the remains of deceased hostage Ran Gvili resumed on Wednesday after a two-week pause due to bad weather.


Germany Calls on Israel to Halt E1 Settlement Plan

A view of Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, in the West Bank, Sunday, June 18, 2023. (AP)
A view of Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, in the West Bank, Sunday, June 18, 2023. (AP)
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Germany Calls on Israel to Halt E1 Settlement Plan

A view of Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, in the West Bank, Sunday, June 18, 2023. (AP)
A view of Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, in the West Bank, Sunday, June 18, 2023. (AP)

Germany calls on Israel to halt its controversial ​E1 settlement project, said a foreign ministry spokesperson in Berlin on Friday, warning that construction carries the risk of ‌creating more ‌instability in the ‌West ⁠Bank ​and ‌the region.

"The plans for the E1 settlement project, it must be said, are part of a comprehensive ⁠intensification of settlement policy in ‌the West Bank, ‍which ‍we have recently ‍observed," said the spokesperson at a regular government press conference.

"It carries the ​risk of creating even more instability, as it ⁠would further restrict the mobility of the Palestinian population in the West Bank," as well as jeopardize the prospects of a two-state solution, the spokesperson added.