Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fateh faction ruled out talks with Hamas on Thursday as Israel warned any such dialogue with the Islamists could “torpedo” a peace deal with the Jewish state.

Syrian President Bashar Assad all but ruled out his country’s participation in a US-sponsored international peace conference on the Middle East, suggesting in an interview published Thursday that the meeting has no chance for success.

Ferryman Hisham freely acknowledges that the poor and dangerous conditions of Baghdad’s roads that drive residents of the capital to despair are, for him at least, a godsend.