Mena Today

Yemen's Saudi-backed government said it launched an operation on Friday against UAE-backed southern separatists, marking a major escalation in a rift between the two Gulf heavyweights. 

Air traffic at Yemen's Aden international airport was halted on Thursday as tensions persisted between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two Gulf powers whose rivalry is reshaping war-torn Yemen.

The Israel Defense Forces carried out a new incursion into Lebanese territory during the night from Wednesday to Thursday, advancing roughly 600 meters beyond the border. 

The latest unrest in Iran, which reportedly left several people dead on Thursday, is not an isolated episode. It is the latest expression of a deep and persistent crisis between a population pushed to the brink and a ruling system that has lost its social legitimacy.

EU member Bulgaria marked its entry into the euro zone on Thursday with a display of euro coins on the facade of the central bank in Sofia and fireworks to celebrate a long-awaited milestone.

A group of at least 100 Haredi donors and lay leaders in the United States has pledged to withdraw financial support from Israeli yeshivot and other religious institutions that publicly denigrate the Israel Defense Forces.

Several people were killed during unrest in Iran on Thursday, an Iranian news agency and a rights group reported, as the biggest protests to hit the country for three years over soaring inflation sparked violence in several provinces.

Ras Al Khaimah welcomed 2026 with an impressive 15-minute New Year’s Eve show combining drones and fireworks, earning a new Guinness World Records title for the largest aerial phoenix formed by multirotor drones.

Around 40 people have been killed and 100 injured, most of them seriously, after an explosion tore through a crowded bar during a New Year's Eve party in the upscale ski resort of Crans-Montana, Swiss officials said on Thursday.

A suicide bomber suspected of having links to Islamic State tried to target a church in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on New Year's Eve before detonating his explosive belt near a security patrol, killing one member and wounding two others, the interior ministry said on Wednesday.

Iranian protesters tried to break into a local government building in the southern Fars Province on Wednesday, state media said, on a fourth day of demonstrations over the cost of living that have prompted an unusual government offer of dialogue.