Russia, one of the few remaining friends of Bashar al-Assad's regime, just sent the Syrian government some advanced antiship missiles.
After more than two years of civil war, tens of thousands of deaths, a refugee crisis, ethnic cleansing, religious strife, terrorism, chemical warfare, and an international conflict that has engulfed all of its neighbors, Syria is still in the hands of Bashar al-Assad. Just the way he planned it. Here's how we got to the current state of play after the Israel attacks, and what's next.
A powerful seismic event occurred near the Iran-Pakistan border on Tuesday, and some are expecting it may cause hundreds of deaths.
There is a sad reality to the otherwise hilarious non-time machine "time machine" story that came out of Iran this week: It's making the otherwise legitimate Iranian scientific community look bad, even though it knows — just like you — that the inventor is a total quack.
After mastering the art of drones (by way of Photoshop) and the science of sending a monkey (that was not real) into space, the latest breakthrough out of Iran is a "time machine." The only thing stopping production, apparently, is the fear that China will make millions of crappy versions of it.
The nuclear negotiations between Iran and the western power brokers appeared to be achieving something. But when the parties emerged from the final meeting of two days worth of talks, nothing had changed and everything had fallen apart.
Secretary of State John Kerry made a surprise trip to Iraq on Sunday to urge Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to at the very least do something about the continued Iranian flights to Syria that go right through Iraq's airspace. Right now they're not doing very much.
He is no stranger to assassination attempts — both real and potentially imaginary — but according to a piece in the new issue of The Atlantic the Iranian leader's closest brush with death was entirely accidental.
President Obama faced a simple question: Did the dueling accusations about chemical weapons in Syria cross his supposed line to engage or not? Well, in a press conference with Benjamin Netanyahu, he said the line is still there, and chemical weapons are a "game changer" — he's just not sure who crossed it yet. But he's "deeply skeptical" the opposition did.
As part of a mini press-tour to set up his first presidential trip to Israel next week, Barack Obama told an Israeli television station that Iran is at least a year away from developing a nuclear weapon.
While Europe and the U.S. hem-and-haw about finding ways to support Syria's rebel army — and get threatened for even considering it — Iran appears to have no reservations about funneling money to their enemies.
Iranian media — propaganda versions and otherwise — is abuzz with reports that Iran's government, by way of Carlos the Jackal's French lawyer, is preparing to sue Hollywood over the "unrealistic portrayal" of Iranians in the Oscar-winning film.
On Thursday morning, we learned that that the United States had successfully captured Osama bin Laden's son-in-law, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, who's also al Qaeda's spokesman. You'll never guess where he's been hiding the past ten years.
The death of Hugo Chavez may have created an opening for Venezuela to alter is relationship with the rest of the world, but will the country be able to change without its leader? Will it want to?
Barring any international intervention or rebel advancement, Bashar al-Assad will be the President for another year, at least, if Iran is to be believed. Their friendship will live on.
American and Iranian diplomats took a controversial nuclear-proliferation summit as an opportunity to bond the Olympic committee's decision to pull greco-roman and freestyle wrestling from future Olympic Games. Yeah, the nuclear talks ended pretty quickly.
Joanne Bamberger on Silicon Valley's working moms, Jonathan Cohn on the inevitable sequester, Jeffrey Toobin on Pistorius' likely plea bargain, Hussein Banai on Iran's refusal to talk, and Arthur Levitt on an SEC failure.
It looks like Ben Affleck will not be receiving any congratulatory phone calls from Iran today, after the media there dismissed his film's triumph at the Academy Awards as "Hollywood insiders sacrificing quality and artistic cinema to political slogans and distortions."
A week after being sent home from Tehran empty-handed, U.N. nuclear inspectors have revealed that Iran has being installing new centrifuges at their main nuclear plant, a clear act of defiance ahead of an upcoming round of talks.
In today's tour of state-sponsored propaganda: the link between video games and Korea's propaganda factory, how the end of Olympic wrestling brought Iran and the U.S. together, and China cracks down on food — not hackers.
Leading negotiators for the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency left Tehran this morning after another round of talks with Iranian nuclear inspections accomplished absolutely nothing.
The only technological miracle in this alleged flight of the Qahar 313 fighter over Mount Damavand is that someone at the Iranian defense ministry appears to have upgraded to Photoshop CS6 since the last copy-and-paste job went viral.
A summary of the best reads found behind the paywall of The New York Times.
Iran is jumping on the drone news bandwagon today, with expertly timed released of it claims is decrypted surveillance footage taken from a downed American drone.
The United States leveled sanctions on Wednesday against the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, a gigantic umbrella group that controls Press TV, which has given the world some truly absurd versions of news stories in the past year.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to Egypt has not gone so well, as he was lectured by a Sunni Cleric, mobbed by aggressive glad-handers, and had someone else throw a shoe at him.
Bulgarian officials announced that the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah was behind a bus bombing that killed five Israeli tourists last summer, a ruling that could force Europe to officially sanction the group.
It's a made-in-Iran, "super advanced," radar "evading" military jet, prepared to unleash hell upon the regime's many enemies. Only there's now one major problem: Aviation experts say this plane can't even fly.
What monkey? Unfazed by questions about whether his country's space monkey mission was staged, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is pretty gung ho about being his country's first man sent to space.
In a roomful of world leaders at a security conference in Munich, Iran's foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, said on Sunday that his country is prepared to resume nuclear negotiations in Kazakhstan.
The U.S. is open to direct talks with Iran over this whole nuclear weapon fiasco, but only if Iran is serious about coming to the table, Joe Biden said at a Munich security conference Saturday.
Iran made a pretty big deal about their supposedly successful attempt at launching a monkey into orbit and returning him safely to Earth. But looking closely at evidence from the mission, experts have easily called Iran's bluff.
Jonathan Tobin on how Hagel blew it, Chris Cillizza on why Hagel will still get confirmed, Flynt and Hillary Leverett on the need to accept Iranian power, Paul Krugman on the search for austerity successes, and Ron Fournier on covering Hillary.
Both Iran and Syria are ramping up the rhetoric this morning, not-so-subtly threatening Israel over its attack within Syria's borders on Wednesday.
There are two countries in this world that we'd rather not see tinker with nuclear energy: Iran and North Korea. And it just so happens one of those is now prepping for a nuclear test, while the other is bragging about how it's putting its own program into overdrive.
Iran claims that it sent a living organism into space for the first time ever, without help from any other countries, and brought it back alive.
An official with the Library of Congress says a widely cited but poorly sourced report his office did on Iran's intelligence ministry has been pulled from circulation.
A summary of the best reads found behind the paywall of The New York Times.
A prisoner swap between the Syrian government and rebels forces reveals what Bashar al-Assad's thinks the life of one of his own citizens is worth: About 2 percent of an Iranian's.
After years of suggesting that his kidnapping was a terrorist plot, U.S. officials now believe that individuals working with the government of Iran delivered pictures of Robert Levinson to his family.
On Sunday, an advisor to Iran's health minister made a grizzly announcement on state television. In the last year alone, air pollution in Tehran left 4,460 dead, and the problem's getting worse.
Iran's top nuclear negotiator announced Friday that his nation will sit down for talks with the world's six major nuclear powers this month, rekindling a small bit of hope for a deal to end the country's bid for nuclear weapons.
Shashank Joshi on talking to Iran, Molly Redden on a female Pentagon chief, Mark Bittman on obesity, Susan Crawford on Comcast's power, and Ruth Marcus on inflation inside the fiscal cliff.
The United Nations and Iran ended their latest negotiations over the country's nuclear program with an agreement to hold more negotiations, which is what amounts to a breakthrough in this ongoing stalemate.
Max Fisher on Chuck Hagel, Roger Cohen on oil, Simon Jenkins on North Korea, Jeffrey Goldberg on Australia, and Palav Babaria on Obamacare.
The Swedish ambassador crossed his legs during a meeting with the Iranian president, and Ahmadinejad was so offended that he crossed his own in retaliation. Huh?
Iran's state news agency reported this morning that they have "hunted" and captured an unarmed surveillance vehicle, but the United States Navy says it hasn't lost any drones.
Earlier this month, Iran's news agency provided visual evidence that its government had figured out to make a fancy new drone that could take off and land vertically. What they didn't tell us is that they used Photoshop.
American military officials revealed yesterday that two Iranian fighter jets intercepted a Predator surveillance drone over international water, and even tried to shoot it down
Just in case you needed any more evidence that Israel is really super serious about wanting to take out Iran's nuclear operations, a new report claims that Benjamin Netanyahu initiated a plan to attack Iran back as early as 2010.
The eye of Hurricane Sandy hasn't hit land yet but state-run news outlets in countries at odds with the U.S. are brimming with apocalyptic coverage of the swirling weather system.
Have a story we missed? A link we have to click? A sharp opinion about the news? Instead of waiting for us to post it, tell us on the Open Wire.
Submit your news and ideas | See all reader postsThe Atlantic Wire is your authoritative guide to the news and ideas that matter most right now. Our team tracks newsmakers and opinions across the entire media spectrum: newspapers, web sites, television, radio and magazines.
But we do more than just collect information. By synthesizing, analyzing and summarizing what’s out there, and adding new information when we can, we are a news engine that gives you a quick and valuable account of the issues of the day.
Have a hot tip? A story we missed? Tell us on the Open Wire
How to send us editorial or technical feedback
Get Five Best Columns in your inbox each morning (preview)
