Fire breaks out on crude oil transportation line in Syria's Al-Furqlus

A feud between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates across the Horn of Africa is overshadowing this weekend’s African Union summit, though most of the continent’s leaders will try to avoid taking sides, nine diplomats and experts said.

The U.S. military is preparing for the possibility of sustained, weeks-long operations against Iran if President Donald Trump orders an attack, two U.S. officials told Reuters, in what could become a far more serious conflict than previously seen between the countries.

The opening of the 39th African Union summit in Addis Ababa was marked by a controversial statement from AU Commission Chair Mahamoud Ali Youssouf, who declared that the “extermination” of the Palestinian people “must stop.”