ISRAEL - Israel’s Army Radio reported Sunday that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had seized the peak of Mount Hermon, the highest mountain in the region, as a precaution against the advance of Syrian rebels as the Assad regime collapsed. The mountain, covered in snow during the winter months, is the highest in the region, and a key strategic point. Israel has a military base on the mountainside, but Syria has long had a military base on the peak of the mountain itself. The move marks the first time Israeli troops have been on the peak of the mountain since the Yom Kippur War in 1973. Israel has cautiously welcomed the demise of the Assad regime, a fierce enemy for more than five decades. However, Israel stressed the danger of both sides in the Syrian fight, noting that the rebels include Al Qaeda and ISIS terrorists.

USA - The US has confirmed that more than 75 ISIS targets were hit as part of efforts to "disrupt, degrade, and defeat" the terror group. ISIS targets in Syria have been hit with a barrage of US airstrikes in an attempt to wipe the terror group from the earth. US Central Command (CENTCOM) posted on X this evening that "over 75 targets" were struck in the centre of the country "using multiple US Air Force assets, including B-52s, F-15s, and A-10s". CENTCOM explained that "the strikes against the ISIS leaders, operatives, and camps were conducted as part of the ongoing mission to disrupt, degrade, and defeat ISIS, to prevent the terrorist group from conducting external operations and to ensure that ISIS does not seek to take advantage of the current situation to reconstitute in central Syria".

SYRIA - In the end there was no final stand or fearsome battle to salvage the regime — instead, the dictator’s soldiers left their weapons and fled. Just about the time Bashar al-Assad was packing his bags and preparing to flee Damascus, Syrian state television was playing Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake on loop. The president’s office said he was busy with “constitutional tasks”.

SYRIA - President-elect Donald Trump said Saturday that the US military should stay out of the fast-escalating conflict in Syria, where a dramatic rebel offensive reached the capital and threatened the rule of Syria’s Russian- and Iranian-allied president. “THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT,” Trump declared on social media. As world leaders watched the stunning rebel advance, with its potential to alter the balance of power in the Middle East, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser separately stressed that the Biden administration had no intention of intervening. “The United States is not going to ... militarily dive into the middle of a Syrian civil war,” Jake Sullivan told an audience in California.

TURKEY - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has voiced support for the jihadist insurgency in Syria, urging the Islamists to continue their march to Damascus, various media outlets reported on Friday. Militant forces in Syria led by the group Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham, formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, last week launched a surprise assault from their base in Idlib, targeting the province of Aleppo. Over the past week, the militants have driven back government forces and captured significant chunks of territory in Aleppo and Idlib, and on Thursday surrounded the key city of Hama.

MIDDLE EAST - Iran is abandoning its Syrian ally following rapid gains made by Islamist rebel forces, who are now closing in on the capital Damascus. “Iran is starting to evacuate its forces and military personnel because we cannot fight as an advisory and support force if Syria’s army itself does not want to fight,” a prominent advisor to the Iranian regime, Mehdi Rahmati, told the New York Times. “The bottom line,” he said, “is that Iran has realized that it cannot manage the situation in Syria right now with any military operation and this option is off the table.” The unspoken reason Iran is leaving Syria is that Israel smashed Iran's proxy Hezbollah, fatally weakening its ability to carry out operations outside of Lebanon. Abandoned by Iran, and with Russia unable to help, Assad's own poorly led and disorganized army won't be able to stem the tide. The Syrian army abandoned the second-largest city, Aleppo, while barely firing a shot. Now the Islamist army is rolling south, headed for Damascus.

SYRIA - As armed rebels have advanced at lightning speed in recent days from the north of Syria toward the capital, Damascus, footage online showed statues of the Assad dynasty — which has kept the country in its authoritarian grip for over 50 years — crashing to the ground. “Syria is the barometer for how power dynamics in the region are changing,” said Mona Yacoubian, head of the Middle East and North Africa Center at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington. “It is in for a period of chaos in a region that is already on fire.” The main regional players — Israel, Iran and Turkey — all have a stake in the outcome, which means that the ripples will affect not just the Middle East, but also global powers like the United States and Russia.

SYRIA - This surprising rebel victory in Syria is being led by the most powerful Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a political and paramilitary force. It emerged from the Syrian uprising of 2011 as an affiliate of Al-Qaeda but formally broke ties with it in 2016. For years, its leader Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani has been trying to change his group's image abroad while enforcing strict Islamist rule in the northwest corner of Syria under his control. Rebel forces in Damascus declare the city "free" from long-time ruler Bashar al-Assad as government forces withdraw. Rebels say public institutions will stay under the supervision of the former prime minister until they're officially handed over. Reports say that Assad has left Damascus by plane for an unknown destination.

MIDDLE EAST - Occasionally in history, one individual tilts the course of events through a single incident: think of Gavrilo Princip’s assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914 or George Washington firing the first shots of the Seven Years’ War with his ambush on French forces in the Ohio Valley in 1754. The atrocity ordered and masterminded by Sinwar, the late leader of Hamas, on October 7 last year has proved similarly momentous, its consequences reverberating well beyond the slaughter grounds of the kibbutzim on Gaza’s borders. Each wave has weakened Iran, hurting its regional ambitions of dominance, diminishing its stature and prising loose its network of proxies and clients across the Middle East.

SYRIA - Can Assad hang on? He can count on support from Russia and Iran, but Turkey has hardened its view against the regime. Since the start of the Syrian rebels’ lightning offensive a week ago, Turkey’s role and attitude have been unclear. But President Erdogan was unequivocal on Friday that he wanted them to topple the Assad regime. “The advances of the opposition are continuing,” he said. “Our hope is that this advance in Syria continues without any issues.” He explained that, like so many others, he had tried to reason with President Assad. “I told him, ‘Come, let’s meet to discuss the future of Syria together,’” Erdogan said. “But I never had a positive response.”

USA - Mr Hegseth, the Floridian Republican, also has a conservative military history. “There was no greater honor than knowing I was wearing the cloth of my country when I served in the military, but our nation’s once-proud fighting force has been infected and paralysed by a political agenda,” he said in July 2023. “It is time to rip the woke out of the military and return it to its core mission. We must restore a sense of confidence, conviction, and patriotic duty to our institutions — and that begins with our military.” He announced intentions to oust “woke” generals, end war crimes investigations against American soldiers and remove women from combat roles. The 44-year-old suggested stories about his potential downfall were triggered by Left-wing opposition to his anti-woke agenda.

ISRAEL - Israel warns of a widening of the war against the entire Lebanese state if there are further violations of the ceasefire by Hezbollah. Israel has issued a stark warning that it is preparing to renew and expand its war against the entire Lebanese state if its truce with Hezbollah completely collapses. "If until now we separated the state of Lebanon from Hezbollah... it will no longer be [like this]," he said during a visit to the northern border area.

EUROPE - Michel Barnier’s "political Waterloo" may trigger a "chain reaction" across the financial markets which could send the euro into a downward spiral and pose a threat to the monetary union itself, financial experts have warned.

UK - Strong winds of 80mph and heavy rain will hit the UK this weekend as the fourth named storm of the season arrives. Storm Darragh is expected to last from Friday evening into Sunday, with up to 60mm of rain forecast in some places. It comes as communities are still recovering from the impact of Storm Bert.

EUROPE - Officials in Brussels fear that the curse of the eurozone is about to strike again — and this time it is France on the receiving end. The European Union’s spending limits, “austerity” to many voters, are hardwired into Europe’s single currency and have played a big part in France’s current political crisis as well as the growth of anti-establishment populist movements across the continent. Brussels is closely monitoring the situation in France and, above all, the reactions of the financial markets, which in the past have triggered a sovereign debt crisis by reducing the value of bonds and increasing the cost of borrowing for all eurozone governments. Both France’s situation and political instability in Germany, which also has looming fiscal deficits and insurgent populists, come at a dangerous time for the EU with an incoming Donald Trump presidency, a stalling economy and threats from Russia.