Aid Group Issues Urgent Appeal for Quake-Hit Syria

Local NGOs set up tents to provide shelter and food for people who lost their homes in a devastating earthquake in the town of Harem near the Turkish border, Idlib province, Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2023. (AP)
Local NGOs set up tents to provide shelter and food for people who lost their homes in a devastating earthquake in the town of Harem near the Turkish border, Idlib province, Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2023. (AP)
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Aid Group Issues Urgent Appeal for Quake-Hit Syria

Local NGOs set up tents to provide shelter and food for people who lost their homes in a devastating earthquake in the town of Harem near the Turkish border, Idlib province, Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2023. (AP)
Local NGOs set up tents to provide shelter and food for people who lost their homes in a devastating earthquake in the town of Harem near the Turkish border, Idlib province, Syria, Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2023. (AP)

The group Doctors Without Borders called Sunday for the "urgent scaling up" of earthquake aid to northwest Syria as it delivered a convoy laden with emergency assistance.

Aid has been slow to reach Syria's rebel-held areas since the February 6 quake killed a combined total of more than 43,000 people across Türkiye and Syria.

"An urgent increase in the volume of supplies is needed to match the scale of the humanitarian crisis," said the French aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

It charged that supplies "currently fail to even match pre-earthquake volumes".

"Aid is trickling in in negligible amounts for the moment," said Hakim Khaldi, MSF's head of mission in Syria. "We emptied our emergency stocks in three days."

"According to UN data, five days after the earthquake, only 10 trucks had entered" opposition-held areas of Syria through the Bab al-Hawa crossing from Türkiye, MSF said.

It added that "in the 10 days following the earthquake, the number of trucks that crossed the border into northwest Syria was lower than the average weekly number for 2022".

A convoy of 14 trucks laden with 1,269 tents and winter kits sent by MSF had arrived in Syria through the Al-Hammam crossing in the Afrin area on Sunday.

"The delivery was arranged outside of the United Nations cross-border humanitarian mechanism," the group said.

Activists and emergency teams in Syria's northwest have decried a slow UN response to the quake in opposition-held areas, contrasting it with the planeloads of aid that have been delivered to government-controlled airports.

Before the quake struck, almost all of the crucial humanitarian aid for the more than four million people living in opposition-controlled areas was being delivered through just one crossing, Bab al-Hawa.

The UN announced on Monday that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had agreed to open two more border crossings from Türkiye to northwest Syria to allow in aid.

Since the quake, the UN has sent more than 170 aid trucks to northwest Syria.

The conflict in Syria started in 2011 with the Damascus regime’s brutal repression of peaceful protests and escalated to pull in foreign powers and global extremists.

Nearly half a million people have been killed, and the conflict has forced around half of the country's pre-war population from their homes.



Three Iraqi Fighters Killed in Strike Near Syria Border

Members of the Iraqi border forces patrol along a concrete wall on the Iraqi-Syrian border, in the town of al-Baghuz in the Al-Qaim district of western Iraq, on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
Members of the Iraqi border forces patrol along a concrete wall on the Iraqi-Syrian border, in the town of al-Baghuz in the Al-Qaim district of western Iraq, on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
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Three Iraqi Fighters Killed in Strike Near Syria Border

Members of the Iraqi border forces patrol along a concrete wall on the Iraqi-Syrian border, in the town of al-Baghuz in the Al-Qaim district of western Iraq, on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
Members of the Iraqi border forces patrol along a concrete wall on the Iraqi-Syrian border, in the town of al-Baghuz in the Al-Qaim district of western Iraq, on January 21, 2026. (AFP)

A strike near Iraq's western border with Syria killed three fighters from former coalition Hashed al-Shaabi on Wednesday, the alliance said.

The fighters from the alliance -- also known as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), now part of Iraq's regular armed forces -- were hit in an US or Israeli strike that targeted their main command centre in Anbar province, AFP reported.

Since the start of the Middle East war, Baghdad has repeatedly denounced attacks on the Hashed al-Shaabi, which also includes brigades belonging to Iran-backed groups.


Israel Says Hit Hezbollah-controlled Gas Stations in Lebanon

Smoke and explosion following an Israeli air defense interception over Kiryat Shmona, northern Israel, on the border with Lebanon, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Smoke and explosion following an Israeli air defense interception over Kiryat Shmona, northern Israel, on the border with Lebanon, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
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Israel Says Hit Hezbollah-controlled Gas Stations in Lebanon

Smoke and explosion following an Israeli air defense interception over Kiryat Shmona, northern Israel, on the border with Lebanon, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Smoke and explosion following an Israeli air defense interception over Kiryat Shmona, northern Israel, on the border with Lebanon, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

Israel's military said Wednesday it had struck gas stations in south Lebanon belonging to a company owned by the Iranian-backed armed group Hezbollah.

"Overnight, the 'Israeli army' struck Al-Amana Fuel Company gas stations in southern Lebanon", the military said.

A map shared with the statement showed the locations of five gas stations the military said it struck, all in Lebanon's south, including two near the country's Mediterranean coast.

The statement added that the Al-Amana fuel company is controlled by Hezbollah "and constitutes fundamental economic infrastructure that supports Hezbollah's military capabilities".

It said Hezbollah receives "millions of dollars of profits" from the company via another Hezbollah-owned association to fund its military activities.

Since the war with Iran broke out, Israel has also bombed Al-Qard al-Hassan, a financial firm with links to Hezbollah.


Four Explosions Heard in Iraq's Erbil

FILED - 11 March 2026, Iraq, Erbil: PAK Peshmerga members stand inside a family home destroyed by strikes at the PAKShar camp in Erbil's Ashkawt Saqa district. Photo: Ismael Adnan/dpa
FILED - 11 March 2026, Iraq, Erbil: PAK Peshmerga members stand inside a family home destroyed by strikes at the PAKShar camp in Erbil's Ashkawt Saqa district. Photo: Ismael Adnan/dpa
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Four Explosions Heard in Iraq's Erbil

FILED - 11 March 2026, Iraq, Erbil: PAK Peshmerga members stand inside a family home destroyed by strikes at the PAKShar camp in Erbil's Ashkawt Saqa district. Photo: Ismael Adnan/dpa
FILED - 11 March 2026, Iraq, Erbil: PAK Peshmerga members stand inside a family home destroyed by strikes at the PAKShar camp in Erbil's Ashkawt Saqa district. Photo: Ismael Adnan/dpa

At least four explosions were heard on Wednesday in the city of Erbil in the autonomous Kurdistan region, AFP journalists reported.

It was not immediately clear what the target was. From a suburb of Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan region, AFP journalists saw interceptions of projectiles over the city, which is home to a major US consulate complex, while its airport houses US-led coalition troops.

Iraq was drawn into the Middle East war after having long been a proxy battleground between the United States and Iran.

Strikes have targeted Iran-backed groups, which in turn have claimed daily attacks on US interests in Iraq and across the region.

Since the start of the war, the coalition's air defenses have repeatedly downed drones over Erbil.

In the past few days daily explosions have been heard over the city, although mostly in the evening.

On Tuesday night, the powerful Iran-backed armed group Kataeb Hezbollah condemned the US presence in Iraq and demanded that every "foreign soldier" leave the country.

The group, which has been designated a terrorist organization by Washington, is part of an umbrella movement known as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which has been claiming daily attacks on US interests in Iraq and the region, and which has always demanded the withdrawal of US troops from the country.