Kurdish security forces killed gunmen who had stormed a government building in the Kurdish city of Erbil on Monday and took hostages in an attack suspected of being carried out by Islamic State (IS) militants, security officials said, Armed with pistols, AK-47 rifles and hand grenades, the assailants shot their way into the building housing the governorate from the main gate and a side entrance.

Several thousand residents evacuated two pro-regime towns in northern Syria on Thursday, putting an end to one of the longest sieges of the country s seven-year civil war. Fuaa and Kafraya in Idlib province were the last remaining areas under blockade in Syria and a rare example of pro-government towns surrounded by rebel forces.

Egypt s Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Ahmed Al-Tayeb met on Wednesday with officials from the Christian-Muslim forum, originally established in the UK in 2006, to discuss challenges currently facing religious clerics all over the world. He explained that the main challenge facing clerics, especially in the west, is to spread the true teachings and values of religions, as many societies are subject to a consumer lifestyle far from religious ethics and values.

Islamic State group fighters attacked the house of a Taliban commander in the northern Afghan province of Sar-e Pul on Tuesday, killing at least 15 people as they were attending a prayer ceremony, the provincial governor s office said. The attack, in Sayyad district of Sar-e Pul, followed reports from local officials of fighting between Islamic State group and Taliban militants in other northern provinces over recent days.

At least nine pro-regime fighters died in an overnight strike in northern Syria blamed on Israel, a monitor said Monday. Syrian state media had accused Israel of bombing a military position in Aleppo province late Sunday, in what would be a rare Israeli attack so far north in the war-ravaged country.

Syrian government forces widened their offensive in the country s southwest on Sunday to Quneitra province, a region adjoining the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, a war monitor and rebel sources said. Government forces, backed by the Russian military, have captured most of the southwest s Deraa province in the offensive that began in June.

The chairman of a US House of Representatives subcommittee on national security said on Wednesday that the Muslim Brotherhood has committed numerous acts of terrorism and that the “jihadist ideology” has continued to fuel the group despite its renunciation of violence decades ago. Ron DeSantis said during a hearing held to examine the potential threat the Brotherhood poses to the United States that the group s one year in power in Egypt under president Mohamed Morsi had produced "chilling" results.

Israel launched a Patriot interceptor missile on Wednesday at a drone spotted approaching from Syria, the second such incident in as many months, the Israeli military said. The incident set off air defence sirens on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and the nearby Jordanian border, the military statement said.

Pope of Alexandria Tawadros II held a meeting with the President of Italy Sergio Mattarella on Monday in Rome, discussing various topics related to Christianity in Egypt, such as the outstanding role the Coptic Orthodox Church and Al-Azhar institution played in combating extremism. According to the Ambassador of Egypt to Italy Hesham Badr, Mattarella said that Christians enjoy more peace alongside Muslims and better living conditions in Egypt compared to other countries in the Middle East, where they still suffer conflict and persecution.

Italy hailed Egypt s Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros II for his role in spreading a message of love and tolerance and renouncing violence and terrorism during a visit by the Coptic Pope to Rome. In statements reported by state owned MENA agency, Italy s foreign minister Enzo Moavero Milanesi welcomed on Sunday Pope Tawadros II s visit to Rome, praising his role.

Pope Francis said on Saturday that building walls, occupying territories and religious fanaticism would never bring peace to the Middle East. Speaking at the end of a summit of Christian religious leaders, Francis also repeated his view that the “status quo” of the contested city of Jerusalem should be respected, and backed a two-state solution to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The Syrian government and its Russian ally pounded rebel-held areas of the southern province of Daraa on Thursday with the heaviest air strikes of a two-week-old offensive, an AFP correspondent and a monitor reported. "Hundreds" of missiles and barrel bombs were unleashed before dawn by both Syrian and Russian aircraft, after talks on rebel surrenders broke down on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

A son of Islamic State (IS) militant group s leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has been killed in the city of Homs in Syria, the group s news channel reported on Tuesday. "Hudayfah al-Badri ... the son of the Caliph ... was killed in an operation against the Nusayriyyah and the Russians at the thermal power station in Homs," the statement said. The word Nusayriyyah refers to Syria s Alawite community.

The General Command of the Egyptian Armed Forces on Tuesday issued communiqué no. 25 on recent developments in the military s Operation Sinai 2018. The armed forces launched Operation Sinai 2018 in February to target terrorist and criminal elements and organizations in north and central Sinai, parts of the Nile Delta and the Western Desert. Operation Sinai 2018 involves the army, navy, border patrol, air force and police.

Egypt condemned in the strongest terms a suicide bombing that targeted a Sikh minority in Afghanistan, killing at least 19 people and injuring others. In an official statement, Egypt s Foreign Ministry expressed its sincere condolences to the families of the victims and wished a speedy recovery for the injured, stressing the support of Egypt s government and people in facing terrorism to the government and people of Afghanistan.

Egypt will start implementing on Monday biometric fingerprinting for Egyptians looking to travel to Saudi Arabia for the Islamic hajj pilgrimage, Egypt s tourism ministry announced on Sunday. The ministry said in a statement that the fingerprinting will be take place from 2 to 8 July for those looking to perform the hajj in August.

Egypt s security forces killed four and arrested two members of the terrorist group Hasm, who authorities say were responsible for a failed assassination attempt on a security chief in the coastal city of Alexandria earlier this year. The suspects were killed in a shootout during a security raid on an apartment hideout in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Assiut, the interior ministry said in a statement on Thursday.

Deadly air strikes pounded rebel-held towns across southern Syria on Wednesday, as relief groups sounded the alarm over a Russian-backed push for the region and its main city Daraa. The violence has already ravaged civilian infrastructure in opposition towns, with three hospitals forced to shut down because of heavy raids.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday handed Donald Trump one of the biggest victories of his presidency, upholding his travel ban targeting several Muslim-majority countries and rejecting the argument that it represented unconstitutional religious discrimination. The 5-4 ruling, with the court s five conservatives in the majority, ended a fierce fight in the courts over whether the policy amounted to an unlawful Muslim ban. Trump quickly claimed "profound vindication" after lower courts had blocked his travel ban announced in September, as well as two prior versions, in legal challenges brought by the state of Hawaii and others.

The EU on Monday called for all sides in the Yemen conflict to stop the escalation of violence and ensure the port of Hodeida stays open for vital humanitarian supplies. Yemeni government forces have been waging an offensive to retake Hodeida -- the entry point of three quarters of the country s imports -- from the Shiite Huthi rebels, prompting thousands to flee amid fears of a bloody final showdown.

Egypt s armed forces has finished setting up a counter-terrorism centre in Cairo for the Community Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), it announced on Thursday. The centre is aimed at improving counter-terrorism cooperation and bolstering security, economic and political ties between member countries, the army said.