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August 26, 2026

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Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani (C) watches as US special envoy for Syria Tom Barrack prepares to sign an agreement in Damascus on September 16, 2025. Shaibani announced on September 16 a plan backed by Jordan and the United States to restore calm to Druze-majority Sweida province, which witnessed deadly violence in July. (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA / AFP) (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA/AFP via Getty Images)

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Israel recalibrates Syria policy, explores path to security deal

Israel is rethinking its hard-line Syria policy and seeking to repair ties with US envoy and Donald Trump's confidant Tom Barrack amid a push for a security agreement with Damascus.

In Tel Aviv, reporting on national security, Israeli politics, defense

Palestinian militant group Hamas police officers stand guard as people attend the opening of the Fatah party's eighth general conference at Al-Azhar University in Gaza City on May 14, 2026.

Ex-defense minister: Israel in ‘worst possible’ Gaza situation as Hamas gains strength

Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant criticized the Israeli government for allowing Hamas to retain control over half of the Gaza Strip.

A merchant ship "Jabotinsky" (former "Altalena"), chartered by Jewish military group Irgun Zvaei Leumi to carry weapons for Israeli fighters, burns near Tel Aviv beach, after being shelled by the Haganah, Israel, June 27, 1948.

Wreck of ship sunk by Israeli military in Irgun clash found after 78 years

The wreck of the Irgun underground's Altalena ship, bombed by the Israeli military in 1948 and deliberately sunk in 1949, was located off Israel's coast at a depth of 1,650 feet.

Latest News

Israel tightens election safeguards as public distrust surges: What to know

ilia YEFIMOVICH / AFP via Getty Images

Analysis

Why Turkey sees Israeli strikes in Syria as warning over its military role, Mecca Pact

A Turkish soldier from the 1st Border Regiment Command looks out over the border wall to Syria during alert drills at a military outpost on the Turkey/Syria border on March 2, 2017 in Kilis, Turkey.

Barin Kayaoglu

By Barin Kayaoglu

In Ankara, reporting on geopolitics and national security

Analysis

Turkey bets on US deconfliction as Israel widens Syria red lines

Turkey/Syria border

Ezgi Akin

Rina Bassist

By Ezgi Akin , Rina Bassist

Analysis

Israel fears Turkey’s Syria ambitions and doubts Trump will stop them

ANKARA, TURKEY - JULY 7: U.S. President Donald Trump (L)shakes hands with with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (R) during a formal arrival at the Bestepe Presidential Palace during the NATO summit on July 7, 2026 in Ankara, Turkey. Leaders from NATO's 32 countries, plus NATO allies like Ukraine, gathered in the Turkish capital to discuss a range of issues involving spending targets, defense industrial production, and support for Ukraine, among other topics. (Photo by Emrah Gurel - Pool/Getty Images)

In Tel Aviv, reporting on national security, Israeli politics, defense

Samuel Wendel

Senior Analyst, Middle East Business & Tech

In Washington, DC, reporting on regional business and tech

Adam Lucente

News and Business Correspondent

In New York City, reporting on regional news, militancy, climate change

Jack Dutton

Chief Business Correspondent

In Bristol, reporting on regional business, climate change, AI, tech

Ben Caspit

Israel Columnist

In Tel Aviv, reporting on national security, Israeli politics, defense

Francesco Schiavi

In Bologna, reporting on security, defense, economy, governance

Rina Bassist

Associate Editor (Israel)

In Paris, reporting on Israeli politics and European affairs

The White House on US President Donald Trump's last full day in office, in Washington, DC, on January 19, 2021. - President Donald Trump began his final full day in the White House on January 19, 2021 with a long list of possible pardons to dish out before snubbing his successor Joe Biden's inauguration and leaving for Florida. On January 20, 2021 at noon, Biden will be sworn in and the Trump presidency will end, turning the page on some of the most disruptive, divisive years the United States has seen sinc

Trump issues pardons related to Israeli spying, Iran sanctions on last day in office

The now former president pardoned the Israeli handler of American spy Jonathan Pollard as well as an Iranian-American man who was charged with violating Iran sanctions, among dozens of others.

Hanna Nasir, head of the Palestinian Central Election Commission, gives a press conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah, on January 16, 2021. - Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas announced yesterday dates for the first Palestinian elections in more than 15 years, setting legislative polls for May 22 and a July 31 presidential vote.
Abbas's Fatah party, which controls the Palestinian Authority based in the occupied West Bank, and the Hamas Islamists, who hold power in Gaza, have for years expressed int

Israel wrestles with allowing east Jerusalem Palestinians to vote in PA elections

With a new US administration in place, Israel must decide whether to allow Palestinians in east Jerusalem to vote in the legislative and presidential Palestinian elections scheduled for spring and summer.

A billboard by The Lincoln Project is seen in Times Square on October 25, 2020 in New York, depicting Ivanka Trump presenting the number of New Yorkers and Americans who have died due to Covid-19 along with her husband Senior Advisor to the President Jared Kushner, with a Vanity Fair quote. - The Lincoln Project, is defending its right to erect billboards in Times Square critical of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner,after an attorney for President Trump's daughter and her husband threatened to sue. (Photo by T

Netanyahu rival hires Lincoln Project for March election

Former Likud senior Gideon Saar hopes the veteran American strategists can help him win the next elections and topple Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Former Chief Rabbi of Israel Yisrael Meir Lau gets vaccinated against COVID-19 coronavirus at Sourasky Medical Center (Ichilov) in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv, on December 20, 2020. - Israel has ordered 14 million doses of the vaccine -- covering seven million people, as two doses are required per person for optimal protection -- from Pfizer as well as US biotech firm Moderna. The vaccine will be rolled out at 10 hospitals and vaccination centres around Israel for healthcare workers from Sunday, ac

Israel’s chief rabbi calls for day of fasting, prayer for pandemic victims

Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau has called on Jews in Israel and across the globe to fast tomorrow and to pray for the dead and infected.

Blinken: 'Vitally important' to engage with Israel, Gulf on Iran nuclear deal

Antony Blinken also said the administration would immediately review the terror designation of Yemen's Houthi rebels.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu stands in front of a screen showing the president of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades, during a video conference with European leaders in order to discuss challenges and cooperation between various countries in dealing with COVID-19 coronavirus, at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem on March 9, 2020. (Photo by MENAHEM KAHANA / AFP) (Photo by MENAHEM KAHANA/AFP via Getty Images)

Netanyahu proposes international corporation to battle pandemics

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed to six other heads of states that they join forces to combat the current and future pandemics in a more coordinated manner.

A billboard depicting Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) and US President Donald Trump side by side with a slogan in Hebrew which reads "Netanyahu, a different league", in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv, on January 10, 2021. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP) (Photo by JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images)

Netanyahu’s campaign: a superhero challenged by small-time politicians

As rivals keep garnering low scores in polls, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu portrays himself as a mega statesman and his opponents as lightweights.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wears a face mask against Covid-19, bearing the US and Israeli flags, during a meeting with US special representative for Iran at the prime minister's office in Jerusalem on June 30, 2020. (Photo by ABIR SULTAN / POOL / AFP) (Photo by ABIR SULTAN/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Netanyahu lays out campaign for US to maintain course on Iran

Israel is hoping that the new US administration will conduct an intimate strategic dialogue with Israel’s allies in the region before making a final decision on the Iran nuclear issue.

A syringe and vials of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine are pictured at the Sheba Medical Center, Israel's largest hospital, in Ramat Gan near the coastal city of Tel Aviv, on January 14, 2021. - Israel's initial vaccination rollout appears to be unfolding successfully, with some two million citizens having received the first of two required injections of the Pfizer-BioNTech jab, a pace widely described as the world's fastest per capita. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP) (Photo by JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Image

Israel starts vaccinating prisoners after delay

After Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit warned that keeping them lower in the queue was illegal, Public Security Minister Amir Ohana ordered the prison services to start vaccinating elderly inmates.

A Palestinian workers fills up a truck transporting water from a freshwater plant that extracts water from wells and sells to people in the town of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza Strip, on November 18, 2020. - The densely-populated Gaza Strip has long lacked sufficient drinking water, but a new project helps ease the shortage with a solar-powered process to extract potable water straight from the air. (Photo by SAID KHATIB / AFP) (Photo by SAID KHATIB/AFP via Getty Images)

Israel provides Gaza with machines to extract water from air

An Israeli firm donated generators producing drinking water from air to the Gaza Strip, which faces an acute water shortage crisis, amid controversy about cooperation between the two sides.

Israeli-Arabs divided on Netanyahu’s electoral blitz

The visit of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Nazareth, with very little objection from local residents, reflected growing rejection within Israeli-Arabs of the Joint List party.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the anti-coronavirus vaccination facility in the northern Israeli Arab city of Nazareth on January 13, 2021. - A group of Arab Israelis demonstrated against Netanyahu's visit to the fascililty in their city. Since July, thousands of Israelis have rallied each week to protest against the prime minister and the economic fallout from the pandemic. (Photo by Gil ELIYAHU / POOL / AFP) (Photo by GIL ELIYAHU/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Is Israel’s Arab Joint List breaking up ahead of March elections?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu campaigns in Nazareth for the Arab vote.