The Russian Aerospace Forces have conducted airstrikes in Syria based on intelligence provided by the US-led coalition, the Russian Defense Ministry reported. The Pentagon later denied that cooperation took place.   [...]

Six Russian long-range Tu-22M3 bombers launched airstrikes on Daesh arms and ammunition depots in Syria's Deir ez-Zor, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Tuesday.   [...]

Russia, Iran and Turkey have announced they will establish a trilateral mechanism to support the ceasefire in Syria. In a joint statement issued at the end of talks in Astana, they said the Syrian opposition should take part in Geneva peace talks on the issue. [...]

Moscow and Ankara are carrying out their first joint military operation against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) in the Syrian province of Aleppo, the Russian Defense Ministry has announced. [...]

Since becoming the US Commander-in-Chief in 2008, Barack Obama charted a thinly veiled anti-Russia course that many failed to anticipate or appreciate due to the media-generated hype of “hope and change” that accompanied his rise to power. [...]

Iran says it rejects any participation by US representatives at the scheduled Syria peace talks in Astana, Kazakhstan. Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said he believes US and UN representatives should be invited to the meeting. [...]

The liberation of Aleppo by the Syrian Army delivers a "heavy blow" to all terrorist groups which have been fighting in the country for over four years, according to Argentine journalist Leandro Albani. Leandro has worked as a reporter in the Middle East for the magazine Sudestada and websites such as Resumen Latinoamericano and Marcha.org. [...]

Russia’s UN envoy Vitaly Churkin hit back at his US counterpart, Samantha Power, at a UN Security Council meeting, saying that she was not Mother Teresa and represents a country with a long record of violations. Power and Churkin both spoke at a UN Security Council meeting on Aleppo in New York City on Monday. [...]

Earlier this month, Chinese Admiral Guan Youfei visited Syria. Few details were made available on the specifics of Beijing's cooperation agreement with the Syrian military, but the pact itself represents a landmark shift both in the military sense and from the perspective of international geopolitics, says French political analyst Thierry Meyssan. [...]

Far-right Austrian Freedom Party (FPO) presidential candidate Norbert Hofer has called for a ban on naturalization of Turkish residents in Austria until dual citizenship issues are resolved and said that his country could still leave the EU if Turkey joins the bloc. [...]

China’s recent announcement of an increase of its humanitarian support for the Syrian people and that it would provide additional training to the Syrian forces comes as a “headache for the US,” according to the American media. “As if the multi-party war in Syria weren’t complicated enough, it now appears that the People’s Republic of China has decided to take a more active role in t [...]

Anti-war advocates are launching an 11th-hour bid to stop U.S. Congress from approving a $1.15 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia in its fight against Houthi rebels in Yemen, which was announced earlier this month.Chief among them are the activist group CODEPINK and U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), [...]

Russia's current actions in the Middle East show how Moscow can catch the West by surprise, according to Thomas Avenarius, a journalist writing for the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung. It seems that the West has been caught by surprise by Russia's current actions in the Middle East, [...]

Turkey's foreign minister has recalled its Austrian ambassador for "consultations" in the wake of a rally held in Vienna in support of the PKK. "In response to recent events, we have withdrawn our ambassador from Vienna for consultations and to review our relations with Austria," Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told reporters. [...]

Russian officials have reached out to Ankara to request access to the American-built base as a convenient launch pad for airstrikes in the Syrian theater, but it remains to be seen whether such cooperation will roil NATO’s feathers. Russia has called on Turkey to provide access to NATO’s Incirlik Air Base, the critical launch pad for US and coalition airstrikes in Syria [...]

Earlier this week, a senior Chinese military officer visited Damascus to discuss closer ties between Syria and China. Guan Youfei, director of the Office for International Military Cooperation of China's Central Military Commission, met Syrian Defense Minister Fahad Jassim al-Freij, Xinhua reported. [...]

The U.S. government, having illegally sent American troops into Syria, is now threatening to attack the Syrian military if it endangers those troops, an Orwellian twist that marks a dangerous escalation, explains Daniel Lazare. War, like politics, is filled with surprises. While the focus in Syria has been on a U.S.-backed rebel offensive in Aleppo [...]

Washington’s neocon hypocrisy surfaced again with the furor over Russia using an Iranian base to launch airstrikes against terror groups in Syria, while the U.S. uses other Mideast bases for the same purpose, as ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar notes. We should reflect on the meaning of Russia’s use of a base in Iran for staging airstrikes in Syria, and about what lessons we could learn from t [...]

Ankara wouldn’t mind it if Russia used the Incirlik airbase for its anti-terror missions against Islamic State terrorists in Syria, Turkey’s Prime Minister Binali Yildirim hinted on Saturday, but acknowledged that no such requests have been made. “Turkey opened Incirlik airbase to fight Daesh [Islamic State, formerly ISIS/ISIL] terrorists. It is being used by the US and Qatar. [...]