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Clashes between government troops and Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria’s Aleppo killed at least nine people on Tuesday, mostly civilians, in one of the worst flare-ups between the sides in months. The implementation of a March deal to merge the Kurds’ semi-autonomous administration and military into Syria’s new Islamist government has largely stalled.Tensions have occasionally erupted into clashes, particularly in Aleppo, which has two Kurdish-majority neighbourhoods.Both sides traded blame over who started Tuesday’s fighting, which continued into the night and is among the deadliest violence between the government and Kurdish forces since the toppling of Bashar al-Assad more than a year ago. It also adds to concerns about progress on the integration deal.On Tuesday morning, the US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said factions affiliated with the government “targeted the Sheikh Maqsud neighbourhood”.By evening, the SDF said the death toll in the Kurdish-majority Sheikh Maqsud and Ashrafiyeh districts had risen to four civilians including two women and a child.It reported “indiscriminate artillery and missile shelling” on the areas, including “the use of drones… direct sniper fire and heavy-weapon fire”.Sheikh Maqsud and Ashrafiyeh have remained under the control of Kurdish units linked to the SDF, despite Kurdish fighters agreeing to withdraw from the areas in April.- Stalled integration -In a statement carried by state news agency SANA, the defence ministry said the SDF targeted “a number of neighbourhoods in Aleppo city adjacent to the districts it controls”.SANA reported five people killed by SDF fire — four civilians including a child, in addition to a member of the defence ministry personnel.The agriculture ministry said two of the dead were workers at a research centre.”The SDF is again proving that it does not recognise the March 10 agreement and is trying to undermine it,” the defence ministry said.Civil aviation authorities announced “the suspension of flights to and from Aleppo airport for 24 hours and their diversion to Damascus airport” due to the violence, SANA reported.Governor Azzam al-Gharib announced schools, universities and government offices in Aleppo city would be closed on Wednesday and public events cancelled, citing “the current situation and the targeting of several hospitals and institutions by indiscriminate SDF artillery shelling”.The SDF controls swathes of Syria’s oil-rich north and northeast, and supported by a US-led international coalition was key to the territorial defeat of the Islamic State group in Syria in 2019.The March agreement on its integration into the state was supposed to be implemented by the end of 2025.- ‘Lay down’ weapons -In Ankara, Turkish Defence Minister Yasar Guler said “the PKK (the Kurdistan Workers’ Party) and all affiliated groups must immediately cease all terrorist activity in regions where they are present, including in Syria, and lay down their weapons without condition”.The SDF is dominated by the People’s Protection Units (YPG), a Kurdish militant group seen by Ankara as an extension of the PKK, which earlier this year agreed to end its four-decade armed struggle against Turkey.”We will not allow any terrorist organisation — particularly the PKK, the PYD, the YPG, and the SDF — to establish a foothold in the region,” Guler added.A close ally of the new authorities, Turkey shares a 900-kilometre (550-mile) border with Syria and has launched successive offensives to push Kurdish forces from its frontier.Also on Tuesday, the SDF accused factions affiliated with Syria’s army of attacking Deir Hafer, around 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of Aleppo, and near the strategic Tishreen Dam to the city’s northeast.The Kurdish-led force affirmed its right to “respond legitimately to these attacks”.On Sunday, SDF chief Mazloum Abdi held further talks with officials in Damascus on integrating the Kurdish-led forces, but state media reported no tangible results.The Kurds are pushing for decentralised rule, an idea which Syria’s new Islamist authorities have rejected.Last month in Aleppo, clashes killed five people, while Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan urged the SDF not to be an obstacle to Syria’s stability.

One person was killed and three were injured during a protest in Jerusalem on Tuesday against a law to conscript ultra-Orthodox Jews into the Israeli armed forces, emergency crews said.A bus ran over and injured three pedestrians then drove on and struck an 18-year old who got trapped under the vehicle, rescuers said.the Magen David Adom emergency service said”Paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene,” the agency said.Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews had taken to the streets of to protest a law to conscript them to the army, as the military faces manpower shortages after two years of war on multiple fronts.Mass demonstrations against the law have been taking place on a regular basis in recent months. According to a police statement, Tuesday’s protest turned violent after “a small group of rioters began violently disturbing public order, including by blocking traffic routes, damaging buses, setting trash bins on fire, throwing objects and eggs at police officers and Border Police, shouting invective, and assaulting journalists working at the scene”.The police added that the bus “was blocked by rioters who were… obstructing the route”. The driver was arrested and under questioning alleged “that he was assaulted by rioters, after which the unfortunate incident occurred”.Israeli police sources quoted by local media ruled out concerns the event was a terror attack. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been under pressure from the opposition and some coalition partners to increase the number of military recruits, but ultra-Orthodox party leaders — traditionally Netanyahu allies — oppose the conscription of religious students, who form a large part of their constituency.Under a ruling established at the time of Israel’s creation in 1948, men who devote themselves full-time to studying Jewish texts are given a de facto pass from mandatory military service.But this exemption has come under mounting scrutiny from the rest of Israeli society — particularly when tens of thousands of conscripts and reservists are mobilised on several fronts, despite the fragile truce that has ended the war in Gaza.The ultra-Orthodox make up 14 percent of Israel’s Jewish population.Keeping ultra-Orthodox parties on board is key to the survival of Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition.In November, a new draft law was put forward in the parliament’s foreign affairs and defence committee, after a previous conscription bill was voted down in July. The ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party quit the government over that bill, and now Netanyahu’s coalition only holds 60 out of 120 seats in parliament.Ministers from the other main ultra-Orthodox party, Shas, resigned from the cabinet over the issue, though the party has not formally left the coalition.In late October, a teenage boy fell to his death from a high-rise during another mass protest against the conscription law in Jerusalem. Israeli media said his death was likely to be a suicide, as the boy had left a farewell message on his Instagram account.

Syria’s new government and Israel will set up a joint group under US supervision to share intelligence and seek military de-escalation on the ground, they announced Tuesday after talks.The Syrian foreign minister traveled to Paris in his country’s first known meeting in months with Israel, which has pounded its historic adversary despite US unease over the pressure on the fragile government.A joint statement issued by the US State Department after the talks in the French capital said that Syria and Israel were committed to “achieving lasting security and stability arrangements for both countries.””Both sides have decided to establish a joint fusion mechanism — a dedicated communication cell — to facilitate immediate and ongoing coordination on their intelligence sharing, military de-escalation, diplomatic engagement and commercial opportunities under the supervision of the United States,” the statement said.”This mechanism will serve as a platform to address any disputes promptly and work to prevent misunderstandings.”The statement did not say Israel would refrain from further strikes or restore an agreement that was previously in place.- Israeli strikes -Israel has no diplomatic relations with Syria, which during the half-century of rule by the Assad family publicly championed the Palestinian cause and was the Arab world’s key ally of Iran’s clerical state, Israel’s arch-enemy.Bashar al-Assad was ousted in a lightning offensive in December 2024 by Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former jihadist, after more than a decade of brutal civil war.President Donald Trump has met and praised Sharaa, now the interim president and an ally of Saudi Arabia and Turkey, brushing aside Israeli skepticism.The talks in Paris were mediated by Tom Barrack, a Trump business friend who is ambassador to Turkey and an outspoken advocate of supporting Sharaa.The United States recently fully removed remaining sanctions on Syria, hoping to give the country a chance to integrate into the global economy.Since Assad’s fall, Israel sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone that had separated Israeli and Syrian forces on the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.Israel, saying there was a power vacuum, also unilaterally declared void a 1974 disengagement agreement with Syria that had kept in effect a ceasefire.Sharaa has sought to restore the agreement and avoid wider conflict with Israel, but he has also opposed Israel’s insistence on maintaining a demilitarized zone in southern Syria.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office called for economic cooperation with Syria and “regional stability and security.””It was agreed to continue the dialogue to advance shared objectives and safeguard the security of the Druze minority in Syria,” it said.Israel has cited violence against the Druze, who also have a presence inside Israel, as a reason to intervene in Syria.Israel in July launched massive air strikes, including hitting the defense ministry in Damascus, leading some analysts to believe it was hoping to degrade military capacities of Syria while it was at a weak point.

Iranian security forces fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators at the Tehran bazaar on Tuesday, as an NGO said more than two dozen people had been killed in a crackdown on the most significant protests to hit the Islamic republic in three years.The protests were triggered by anger over the rising cost of living, with the Iranian rial losing value again on Tuesday to reach another record low against foreign currencies.Security forces have now killed at least 27 protesters, including five minors under the age of 18, the Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR) said. Iranian authorities say members of security forces have also been killed, including a policeman who was shot dead on Tuesday.The protest wave began on December 28 with a shutdown by merchants in the Tehran bazaar, a national economic hub. They have since spread to other areas, especially the west, which is home to Kurdish and Lor minority groups.It is the most serious protest movement in Islamic republic since the 2022-2023 nationwide rallies sparked by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, who had been arrested for allegedly violating the strict dress code for women.Iran’s Fars news agency said “sporadic gatherings” took place around the bazaar during an afternoon shutdown, with police dispersing the protest and demonstrators scattering into the alleyways nearby. In social media footage verified by AFP, protesters at the scene could also be heard shouting slogans including “Pahlavi will return” and “Seyyed Ali will be overthrown” — references to the monarchy ousted by the 1979 Islamic revolution and to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.Dozens of people are seen shouting “freedom” and “shameless” in footage posted by IHR and the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRNA). Security forces then fire tear gas at the protesters, who rush to disperse as acrid smoke rises from the ground. The official IRNA news agency said “some” people were arrested, without giving numbers.With protests continuing in other areas for a tenth day, HRNA posted footage of large crowds of people marching in protests through Abdanan in western Iran shouting slogans including “this is the last message, the entire regime is the target”.- ‘Crush dissent’ -The demonstrations have yet to reach the scale of the 2022-2023 movement, let alone that of the mass 2009 street protests that followed disputed elections.But against the background of an economic crisis and on the heels of the 12-day war against Israel in June, they present a new challenge for the leadership under 86-year-old Khamenei, in power since 1989.The government of President Masoud Pezeshkian has announced modest monthly payments for people to alleviate the economic pain, but the head of the judiciary warned Monday that there would be no leniency for “rioters”.According to official announcements in Iranian media, at least 13 people have been killed since the protests began, including members of the security forces. But IHR said: “At least 27 protesters have been killed by gunfire or other forms of violence carried out by security forces in eight provinces. Five of those killed have been verified to have been children.”It added that more than 1,000 people had been arrested nationwide.IHR said security forces killed at least six people in a single incident alone on Saturday when they opened fire on protesters in the Malekshahi district of the western Ilam province.It also accused authorities of raiding the main hospital in Ilam the day after to detain injured protesters.Amnesty International said on Tuesday that the “attack” on the hospital “exposes yet again how far the Iranian authorities are willing to go to crush dissent”.Pezeshkian has ordered his interior minister to investigate “thoroughly, comprehensively and expertly” what happened in Ilam province, according to the presidential website.With tensions continuing in the area, a policeman was shot dead Tuesday after being “directly hit by rioters’ bullet” in Malekshahi, the Fars news agency said.IHR said Iranian authorities also raided a hospital in the Hasanabad district of Tehran Tuesday, firing tear gas.The Iranian currency meanwhile fell in value to approximately 1.47 million rials to the dollar, according to the informal black market rate and several currency monitoring websites. On December 28, a previous low in the rial — then at 1.43 million to the dollar — had driven traders into the streets and sparked the protest movement.

The Israeli foreign minister arrived in Somaliland on Tuesday in a high-profile visit, condemned by Somalia as an “unauthorised incursion”, after Israel recognised the breakaway region in the Horn of Africa.Israel announced last month it was officially recognising Somaliland, a first for the self-proclaimed republic since it declared independence from Somalia in 1991.Somaliland enjoys a strategic position on the Gulf of Aden and has its own currency, passport and army, but has struggled to win international recognition, amid fears of provoking Somalia and encouraging other separatist movements in Africa.Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, whose delegation was welcomed at the airport by senior government officials, said recognising Somaliland had been “the moral thing to do”.Somaliland President Abdirahman Abdullahi Mohamed praised Israel’s “courageous” decision, and said it would open up economic and development opportunities.”It promotes the strategic interest partnership of the two countries,” he said in a joint press conference.Somalia reacted furiously to news of the visit, labelling it an “illegal” and “unauthorised incursion”.In a statement, Somalia’s foreign ministry said it “reserves the right to take all appropriate diplomatic and legal measures… to safeguard its sovereignty, national unity, and territorial integrity”.A special meeting of the African Union Peace and Security Council on Tuesday condemned “in the strongest terms” the recognition by Israel and called for its “immediate revocation”.The Arab League said in a statement that “any official or quasi-official dealings” with officials in Somaliland treated as separate from Somalia was a “flagrant violation of Somalia’s unity and sovereignty”.The move would “undermine regional peace and security and exacerbate political tensions in Somalia, the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the Horn of Africa”, the League added.Following Israel’s recognition, Islamist militant group Al-Shabaab, which has fought the Somali government for around two decades, said they would fight any attempt by Israel to use Somaliland as a base.- ‘Threat’ to stability -Analysts say the deal with Somaliland could provide Israel with better access to the Red Sea, enabling it to hit Houthi rebels in Yemen.Somaliland’s location alongside one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes has made it a key partner for foreign countries.Israel’s recognition was supported by the United States, but criticised by Egypt, Turkey, the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council and the Saudi-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. The European Union insisted Somalia’s sovereignty should be respected.Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud called the Israeli decision a “threat” to stability in the already volatile Horn of Africa.In an interview with Al Jazeera, he said Somaliland had accepted three conditions from Israel: the resettlement of Palestinians, the establishment of a military base on the Gulf of Aden, and joining the Abraham Accords to normalise ties with Israel.Somaliland’s foreign ministry denied the first two conditions.The region has experienced greater stability than the rest of insurgency-hit Somalia.It was briefly a recognised state in June 1960 when it gained independence from Britain, but voluntarily united with Italian-administered Somalia days later.Somaliland’s leaders say that union was never formally ratified and became void when the Somali state effectively collapsed in 1991.