Alice Fordham

Iraqi troops are making progress in their battle to retake the western city of Ramadi from the self-proclaimed Islamic State, but the fighting is expected to get tougher as they go.

Like everyone else, the Republican candidates talk about ISIS a lot. And what they — at least Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush — charge is that ISIS is President Obama's fault, because he withdrew troops from Iraq in 2011 — when he should have kept ...

Editor's Note: Jordan is a staunch ally of the US in the war against ISIS. A year ago, it paid a price when one of its planes crashed in Syria and ISIS captured a pilot. NPR's Alice Fordham kept in touch with his family

It was so cold, the ...

Barred from legal work in Lebanon, Syrian refugees are accumulating huge debts as they struggle to pay for rent and other necessities.

Lebanon coordinated a prisoner swap for soldiers who have been held hostage over a year by an al-Qaida-linked Syrian rebel group.

After ISIS took their villages in Iraq, hundreds of members of the religious minority survived on wild plants and tomato paste through a bitterly cold winter on a mountain they consider miraculous.

Yazidis and Kurds have retaken the Iraqi town of Sinjar, which fell to ISIS last year. Yazidis, who have been brutally targeted by ISIS, now warn of dire consequences for those in ISIS-held villages.

As their hometown is freed from ISIS, Yazidis remain wary of returning and of their future in Iraq. Thousands of their men and women are still missing or were killed by the extremist group.

Two Jordanian families mourn sons after the attack on a police training center in Jordan. And as U.S. and Jordanian authorities reveal little, neither family knows exactly how, or why, the men died.

At least five people, including two Americans, were killed when a Jordanian police officer opened fire at a training center near the capital city of Amman. Jordan is an ally in the fight against ISIS.

Prominent Iraqi politician Ahmad Chalabi, who supported the 2003 U.S.-led invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein, died of a heart attack, according to an Iraqi TV report. He was in his early 70s.

A medical clinic for Doctors Without Borders was hit by an air strike in Yemen, where a Saudi-led offensive continues and conditions for civilians are getting dire.

A spark for Israel's current violence is access to al-Aqsa Mosque. A look at failed efforts to share sacred places across the Holy Land shows why neither side trusts the other to keep promises.

Palestinians in East Jerusalem were not often involved in the violence in the past, but this area is the center of the current friction between Israelis and Palestinians.

The Russian air campaign in Syrian gave initial optimism to the Syrian regime but has done little to change the map of the war.

Iraq and the U.S. have vowed to defeat ISIS in Iraq's western province of Anbar. The tribes there want to fight, but their recruits are under-equipped and weak. The country wants more U.S. help.

The celebrated Canadian author has a new book out, The Heart Goes Last, that began as an experimental digital serial. It's a wacky dystopian satire on economic decline and the private prison industry.

Russia carried out a series of airstrikes in Syria Wednesday, giving short notice to the U.S. that it also has planes in the air nearby and is calling out for more coordination.

The Baghdad City of Peace Carnival started four years ago, with a young woman named Noof Assi.

"We started talking to people about a celebration for peace day in Baghdad," Assi says. She's referring to International Peace Day, which is September 21 — and which hadn't been celebrated in the ...

After more than four years of civil war in Syria, what's driving people to Europe in such numbers now? NPR takes a look at the Syrian city of Aleppo to illustrate what Syria has become.