Syria’s Al-Sharaa Meets Christian Delegation on New Year’s Eve

Head of Syria’s new administration Ahmed al-Sharaa meets with a delegation of senior Christian clerics in Damascus on Tuesday. (New Syrian administration)
Head of Syria’s new administration Ahmed al-Sharaa meets with a delegation of senior Christian clerics in Damascus on Tuesday. (New Syrian administration)
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Syria’s Al-Sharaa Meets Christian Delegation on New Year’s Eve

Head of Syria’s new administration Ahmed al-Sharaa meets with a delegation of senior Christian clerics in Damascus on Tuesday. (New Syrian administration)
Head of Syria’s new administration Ahmed al-Sharaa meets with a delegation of senior Christian clerics in Damascus on Tuesday. (New Syrian administration)

Head of Syria’s new administration Ahmed al-Sharaa received a Christian delegation on New Year’s Eve in Damascus on Tuesday.

The delegation included representatives of Christian sects in a bid to reassure Syria’s minorities over the new rulers that ousted Bashar al-Assad's regime on December 8.

Sharaa was seen wearing a suit and tie as he met with the clerics, who included representatives of the Orthodox, Catholic, Armenian Orthodox, Assyrian Orthodox and Protestant churches, showed photos posted by the Syrian General Command posted on Telegram.

Earlier, a Syrian official told AFP that Sharaa held "positive" talks with delegates of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Monday.

The talks were Sharaa's first with Kurdish commanders since his opposition fighters overthrew Assad and come as the SDF is locked in fighting with Turkish-backed factions in northern Syria.

The US-backed SDF spearheaded the military campaign that ousted ISIS fighters from their last territory in Syria in 2019.

But Türkiye, which has long had ties with Sharaa's Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, accuses the main component of the SDF of links to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has waged a four-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

On Sunday, Sharaa told Al Arabiya television that Kurdish-led forces should be integrated into the new national army.

"Weapons must be in the hands of the state alone. Whoever is armed and qualified to join the defense ministry, we will welcome them," he said.



UN Agency Says Israel Shuts 4 Schools in East Jerusalem

A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
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UN Agency Says Israel Shuts 4 Schools in East Jerusalem

A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says Israeli forces raided four of its schools in east Jerusalem, ordering their closure.

Israel has severed all ties with the agency, known as UNRWA, and bars it from operating in its territory. It says the agency allowed itself to be infiltrated by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, allegations denied by UN officials.

UNRWA said police entered a training center by force on Tuesday, firing tear gas and sound grenades and ordering its evacuation. It said 350 students and 30 staff were present during the raid on the Qalandiya Training Center.

It said police and city officials ordered the closure of three other schools in east Jerusalem, two of which proceeded with the school day.

Israeli police spokesman Dean Elsdunne said police did not enter the UN buildings and that Jerusalem municipal authorities carried out the closures. He said police were deployed to protect the city workers, using “riot dispersal” means in one case where a crowd threw stones at them outside a UN facility.

Roland Friedrich, UNRWA director for the occupied West Bank, including east Jerusalem, said the raids were an “unacceptable violation of United Nations privileges and immunities,” and a “denial of the right to education for children and trainees.”