Rebels and Islamist militants launched a fresh assault on east Damascus on Tuesday, just two days before another round of UN-backed peace talks get underway in Switzerland.

The Islamic militant group Hamas has drafted a new political program it hopes will improve ties with neighboring Egypt and the West, and present a more moderate image that will help it get off Western terrorism lists.

Three persons, including two children, were killed, and two others were injured on Monday as a missile fell on Central Sinai.

Syrian government forces on Monday regained control of parts of Damascus that were attacked and captured by rebels and militants the previous day, with the two-day fighting leaving dozens dead on both sides, the military and an activist group said.

Iran says it has reached an agreement with Saudi Arabia for 85,000 Iranian pilgrims to attend the hajj after Tehran boycotted last year's annual Muslim pilgrimage.

Egypt's army said it killed 18 “highly dangerous terrorists” in different parts of the restive North Sinai as well as arrested 37 suspects, two different statements on the army spokesman’s official Facebook page read.

Turkish police on Thursday detained two suspected members of the Islamic State (IS) militant group who were allegedly planning a "sensational attack" similar to the massacre at an Istanbul nightclub on New Year's night, state run media reported.

International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde on Thursday condemned the letter bomb of the fund office in Paris as a "cowardly act."

A second bomb attack hit the Syrian capital of Damascus on Wednesday in an area to the west of an earlier suicide attack, state media said.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday ordered that "blasphemous" content on social media websites be removed or blocked and those posting such material "strictly punished." Blasphemy is a criminal offense in Pakistan and can carry the death penalty. Sharif's tough talk against blasphemy will appeal to his conservative voter base ahead of elections likely to take place next year.

Major General Mamdouh Shahin, the Egyptian defence minister's deputy for legislative and constitutional affairs, told MPs on Tuesday that the army is on the brink of eliminating terrorism in North Sinai.

Syria's air force deliberately bombed water sources in December, a war crime that cut off water for 5.5 million people in and around the capital Damascus, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria said on Tuesday.

Syria's war has killed just over 320,000 people since it erupted six years ago, a monitor said Monday, noting that a fragile ceasefire had helped to slow the rising death toll.

A police officer says a suicide car bomber has detonated near a hotel in Somalia's capital, killing at least six people and injuring four others.

Some 48 families have received apartments in Mostaqbal City, Ismailia governorate, said Father Youssef Shoukry, the pastor of Saint Bishoy Coptic Orthodox Church in Ismailia, who is in charge of the welfare of Coptic Christian families that fled systematic attacks by terrorists in al-Arish, North Sinai.

The Vatican is examining the possibility of Pope Francis visiting Egypt but no dates or schedule have been set, his spokesman said Saturday after Italian reports suggested the trip would happen in May.

A North Sinai police colonel was killed Wednesday night in a bomb attack on a security checkpoint in North Sinai, Egypt’s interior ministry announced.

The Alexandria Criminal Court sentenced on Thursday a defendant to death, charged with first-degree murder and caught on CCTV cameras slaughtering a Coptic alcohol merchant earlier in January.

U.S. and Iraqi officials believe the leader of IS group, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has left operational commanders behind with diehard followers to fight the battle of Mosul, and is now hiding out in the desert, focusing mainly on his own survival.

Palestine’s Hamas movement is moving towards declaring a Palestinian state according to the 1967 borders, without first recognizing an Israeli state, London-based newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reported on Wednesday. Any official statement concerning alterations to the charter, issued by the bloc governing the Gaza Strip, will be verified and released after holding elections in April.

Security authorities in North Sinai reported that seven extremists were killed in different crackdowns across the governorate's cities over the past few days. Three others were injured, and six wanted extremists and five suspects were arrested.