AMMAN — Shaker Youssef Absi, the Palestinian who heads a shadowy militant group blamed for this week’s violence in Lebanon, is not a terrorist but a nationalist who seeks an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands, his family says.

DAMASCUS (AFP) — Syria’s President Bashar Assad is a would-be reformer who is now gearing up for a second seven-year term having refused to bow to international calls for reform. Assad, running in a no-contest referendum on Sunday, came to power in July 2000 with the reputation of a modernist, …

TRIPOLI  (AP) — Heavy exchanges of gunfire erupted late Thursday between Lebanese troops besieging a Palestinian refugee camp and Islamic militants holed up inside, breaking a two-day-old truce.