More drone strikes could be launched within weeks to kill terrorists in Syria plotting to wreak carnage in Britain, the county’s defence secretary indicated.

A history of the world in the first half of the 20th century is contained in 17 lots from a Skibbereen autograph collector to be sold at Whyte’s in Dublin on September 20.

Monique Walsh (Letters, Nov 5) illustrates the value of factual, rational debate, but only because her response is a series of omissions and gross misrepresentation.

Nurit Tinari-Modai of the Israeli embassy (Letters Sep 8) takes your correspondent Dan Buckley to task for suggesting that Israel’s 1967 attack on its Arab neighbours was a bid to grab land and resources.

Dan Buckley’s article ‘Lifeblood of the World is Running Dry’ (Sept 5) suggests that a leading motivating factor in Israel’s participation in the 1967 Six Day War against three Arab armies was its desire to conquer water sources in the West Bank and the Golan Heights.

Al Murray’s comic alter ego is an oafish and outspoken landlord of questionable opinions, says Richard Fitzpatrick

FOR four decades, the willful, mercurial figure of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has been a thorn in the side of the West.

SATURDAY

Mubarak lasted three decades as president but as the crowds in Tahrir Square chanted ‘Leave! Leave!’, he ended his tenure as a symbol of all that is wrong with Egypt, says Lee Keath

He survived assassination attempts and wave after wave of Mideast crises, a solid ally of the West whose stable image reassured many Egyptians.

Liverpool’s co-owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett have attempted to start an auction for the Anfield club.

Liverpool are reportedly in discussions with a wealthy Middle Eastern family over a possible £500m (€532m) takeover.

Iraqi sports authorities have welcomed the decision of the International Olympic Committee to re-admit their athletes for the forthcoming Olympic Games in Beijing.

US military interrogators assaulted Afghan detainees in 2003, using investigation methods they learned during self-defence training, according to Pentagon documents.

Car giant Ford will not make an announcement about the sale of its Jaguar and Land Rover subsidiaries until late this year or perhaps early 2008, the head of the company’s European operations said today.

A US soldier kidnapped last week in Baghdad was married to an Iraqi college student and was with his wife and her family when hooded gunmen took him, a woman claiming to be his mother-in-law said today.

IT’s all of half a century now since President John F Kennedy declared: “October 23, 1956, is a day that will live forever in the annals of free men and nations.

Extremists said Abu Musab al-Zarqawi died the death of a true Muslim hero, but other Arabs saw him as a killer who had devastated many families.

CHAD’S president has reversed earlier threats by officials to forcibly return Sudanese refugees to their country’s volatile Darfur region after allegations that Chadian rebels have recruited fighters from the camps, the UN refugee chief said yesterday.

Thousands rallied in Chad’s capital N’Djamena yesterday in support of the president following a defeated rebel attack, while the oil minister threatened to shut down the country’s oil pipeline unless the government is compensated for frozen oil revenues.

Thousands of people rallied today in Chad’s capital N’djamena in support of the president following a defeated rebel attack, while the oil minister threatened to shut down the country’s oil pipeline unless the World Bank releases frozen oil revenues.

The alleged ringleader of a terror group accused of attacking Americans and Kuwaiti security has died of heart failure while in prison, an Interior Ministry official said today.

Former England captain Nasser Hussain has announced his retirement from all forms of cricket with immediate effect.

Western oil industry workers who lost five colleagues in a Saudi Arabian shooting rampage finalised plans today to pack up and leave the kingdom.

THE Church of the Nativity is largely empty, a few ornaments hang forlornly on trees in a deserted Manger Square and few tourists or pilgrims are to be found in the town where Jesus was born, just days before Christmas.

A very public fit of presidential coughing and sneezing has energised debate among the Egyptian elite over democratisation and how power is wielded in the most populous Arab country, reform advocates said today.

A British man was shot and killed as he waited in his car at a traffic light in in the Saudi capital Riyadh today.

Palestinian Christians in Bethlehem are to restrict Christmas observances to religious ritual this year – the first time since 1994 that Jesus’ traditional birthplace is under Israeli occupation during the holiday.

Israeli and Palestinian officials were today meeting in a bid to end a standoff at Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity where 200 gunmen are besieged by Israeli forces, the town’s mayor said.

William Clay Ford Jr has replaced Jacques Nasser as chief executive officer of the Ford Motor Company.

William Clay Ford Jr will replace Jacques Nasser as chief executive officer of the Ford Motor Company, it was reported.

A suicide bomber blew himself up on the patio of a restaurant near the Israeli coastal town of Haifa today, wounding up to 20 people.

Israeli helicopter gunships unleashed a fatal pinpoint strike on a car carrying a Palestinian security agent as the man drove on the outskirts of a refugee camp today.