Political sources on Monday reported progress in efforts to convene a dialogue among Yemen's warring factions as warplanes from a Saudi-led coalition carried out air strikes on Monday against Yemen's Houthi group across the country.
In his battle against militant Islam, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is relying not just on bomber planes and soldiers but on white-turbaned clerics from Al-Azhar, Egypt's 1,000-year-old center for Islamic learning. He wants clerics to counter radicalism in the classroom.
Iraq's Shi'ite paramilitaries said on Tuesday they had taken charge of the campaign to drive Islamic State from the western province of Anbar, giving the operation an openly sectarian codename that could infuriate its Sunni population.
Iraqi forces regained ground from Islamic State militants in western Iraq on Sunday, advancing towards the city of Ramadi one week after it fell to the insurgents.
