(December 15, 2025)
“Currently, we have no force posture changes to announce,” a War Department official told Antiwar.com when asked if the Trump administration was planning to withdraw from Syria.
The US withdrew a few hundred soldiers from Syria earlier this year, but the comment signals a full withdrawal isn’t on the table. There are currently around 1,000 US troops in the country, a Pentagon official told The New York Times.
Ein bewaffneter Angriff auf ein Mitglied der NATONorth Atlantic Treaty Organization gilt als Angriff auf alle NATONorth Atlantic Treaty Organization-Mitglieder. Das besagt Artikel 5 des Nordatlantikvertrages, der die gegenseitige Beistandspflicht der Bündnispartner im Verteidigungsfall festhält. Dass der gegenseitige Beistand kein Lippenbekenntnis ist, zeigen die multinationalen NATONorth Atlantic Treaty Organization-Verbände an der Ostflanke der Allianz.
In a statement, the leaders of the UK, France, Germany and eight other European countries said troops from a “coalition of the willing” with US support could “assist in the regeneration of Ukraine’s forces, in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, including through operating inside Ukraine”.
Caribbean CSL (Aruba-Curacao, The Netherlands Antilles)
The CSL is at two locations: Curaçao`s Hato International Airport and Aruba`s Reina Beatrix International Airport. The formal 10-year access agreement with the Kingdom of the Netherlands was signed in March 2000 and the Netherlands` parliament ratified the agreement in October 2001. Both CSL locations required minor construction improvements to include aircraft parking ramps, maintenance, and operations buildings. Counter-drug flights were made from these locations even as improvements were being made. To date, the Aruba CSL has seen limited improvement and use while the Curacao CSL has received all required improvements to include ramp space for two large, two medium, and six small aircraft, a fresh water rise facility, a maintenance hangar, and an operations building.
Aruba-Curacao provides effective, rapid response operations in the northern source zone, which includes the Guajira Peninsula of Colombia and the Venezuelan border region, as well as a large part of the transit zone. The U.S. Air Force handles day-to-day operations at the CSL.
To maintain a safe level of separation, the JetBlue aircraft halted its climb and leveled its altitude before eventually climbing again to cruising altitude. During communications between the aircraft and ATC, Curaçao‘s control center confirmed that the military tanker was not visible on their screens either.
With its transponder not switched on, the aircraft would also not have been visible to JetBlue‘s Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS), which relies on transponder signals from nearby aircraft to warn of potential collisions. While this near-miss occurred during daylight hours, the situation could have been a lot worse if it happened at night during minimal visibility.
A JetBlue flight from the small Caribbean nation of Curaçao halted its ascent to avoid colliding with a US Air Force refueling tanker on Friday, and the pilot blamed the military plane for crossing his path.
“We almost had a midair collision up here,” the JetBlue pilot said, according to a recording of his conversation with air traffic control. “They passed directly in our flight path. … They don’t have their transponder turned on, it’s outrageous.”
The incident involved JetBlue Flight 1112 from Curaçao, which is just off the coast of Venezuela, en route to New York City’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Santo Domingo – The government of the Dominican Republic has authorised several United States military aircraft to land in the country in the coming days as part of an operational support deployment in the Caribbean.
The aircraft will have temporary permits to operate from restricted areas at San Isidro Air Base and Las Américas International Airport.
(December 13, 2025)
The C-130, in service since 1954, is one of the most successful military transport aircraft in history. Designed for rugged operations during the Cold War, it has been used in conflicts such as Vietnam and Desert Storm, as well as major humanitarian missions in Haiti, during Hurricane Katrina, and in global disaster zones.
The KC-130, introduced in the 1960s, serves as a tanker and logistics aircraft, enabling aerial refueling for fighter jets, helicopters, and drones.
It has supported operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya, as well as nighttime special operations and personnel transport.
(December 9, 2025)
A year after Israeli forces entered southern Syria, crossing into a UN buffer zone and in some cases beyond, its occupation remains and the frequency of the Israeli military raids on towns is increasing. An Israeli incursion in the town of Beit Jinn at the end of November left at least 13 Syrians dead, including two children.
Residents say they have traded the tyranny of Assad for a military occupation. Checkpoints are now operated by Israelis, not Assad officers. Night-time raids and phone searches continue.
(June 24, 2025)
The U.S. and the SDF stayed clear of Syria’s civil war, which led to the overthrow of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who fled to Russia.
The country’s new president is Ahmed al-Sharaa, who led the Islamist rebel group Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) that swept to power last December and has vowed to establish a tolerant, multi-ethnic state.
After months of deliberation, the U.S. has thrown its support behind the new Syrian leader. President Trump announced last month that he would lift sanctions on the country, a decision he made with encouragement from Saudi Arabia while Trump was in the Middle East.
(April 23, 2025)
US President Donald Trump’s Middle East chief at the National Security Council, Eric Trager, rebuffed Israeli and northeast Syrian officials in the last several weeks, saying that the US is transitioning from a “military to political role” in northeast Syria and that the drawdown of US troops would continue, the sources told MEE, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive discussions.
“Israel is opposed to the US withdrawing from northeast Syria,” one former US official told MEE. “They want to see the US extract concessions from Turkey on demilitarisation before any American boots leave Syrian soil.”
(April 16, 2025)
Israel has been kept in the loop about plan that could see US troop presence shrunk from 2,000 to 1,000; Jerusalem fears it will increase Turkey’s ‘appetite’ to control Syria.
(…)
Trump announced a full withdrawal of US troops from Syria during his first term but never followed through completely. Then too, Israel opposed the move, expressing concern that an American withdrawal would create a power vacuum in the region, allowing Tehran to expand its military entrenchment near the Israeli border.
(April 16, 2025)
The U.S. military has about 2,000 U.S. troops in Syria across a number of bases, mostly in the northeast. The troops are working with local forces to prevent a resurgence of Islamic State, which in 2014 seized large swathes of Iraq and Syria but was later pushed back.
One of the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that consolidation could reduce the number of troops in Syria to about 1,000.
The U.S. Supreme Court could ultimately decide the issue.
Israel is party to the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the UN. The Convention makes UN premises inviolable – in other words, immune from search and/or seizure – and makes UN property and assets immune from legal process.
The International Court of Justice has also underscored that Israel is obliged to cooperate with UNRWA and other UN agencies.
There can be no exceptions. To allow this represents a new challenge to international law, one that creates a dangerous precedent anywhere else the UN is present across the world.
Israeli authorities entered the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency‘s East Jerusalem offices on Monday and raised Israel‘s flag, in a raid they said was ordered over unpaid taxes but was condemned by the agency as a challenge to international law.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which has been accused of bias by Israel, has not used the building since the start of this year after Israel ordered it to vacate all its premises and cease its operations.
JERUSALEM, December 8, 2025 (WAFA) – Israeli occupation forces on Monday evening stormed Silwan neighborhood in the occupied city of Jerusalem, according to Jerusalem Governorate.
It said that the occupying forces barged their way into the Aby Tayeh neighborhood, a part of Silwan, and occupied the rooftops of several civilians’ houses, turning them into military posts.
The gun-toting soldiers opened indiscriminate fire, but there were no casualties.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan warns that the Gaza ceasefire remains fragile due to “daily violations” by Israeli forces and stresses the need for US intervention, specifically by President Donald Trump, to ensure the plan’s success.
Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani told an international conference in the Qatari capital that international mediators, led by the U.S., are working „to force the way forward“ to the second phase to cement the deal.
„What we have just done is a pause,“ he told the Doha Forum. „We cannot consider it yet a ceasefire.“
Speaking at the Doha Forum in Qatar, he said the international stabilization force needed to function as a peacekeeping force.
(November 29, 2025)
“Sometimes we wonder whether the Americans stationed at the headquarters are the Americans who make the decisions,” the diplomats said. “Everyone tells us we need to speak with whoever decides and whoever speaks with the Oval Office at the White House, not with Gen. Patrick Frank, who heads the American headquarters.”
It is now clear that most of the Arab countries, as well as Turkey, want to see the international stabilization force deployed to Gaza. They want to see this happen as part of the new phase. They appear to believe that Israel is stalling and dragging out the ceasefire without enabling new initiatives to take shape. However, although all countries want to see the new phase begin, they don’t seem ready to send their own personnel to the international force.
“We do not want it here.”
That was the message from PNM Tobago political leader Ancil Dennis in a video posted to social media as he rejected the US military radar now spinning at the ANR Robinson International Airport.
Dennis told Tobagonians the device was brought in without proper explanation and said the Government must “carry it back to Trinidad.”
He accused the Prime Minister, Chief Secretary Farley Augustine and Tobago East MP David Thomas of misleading the public by giving different descriptions of the radar.
Yet another US Marine aircraft was detected overnight heading into Tobago, the fourth of its kind over the course of the past week, as imagery on the island appeared to depict a powerful air defence US radar system at the ANR Robinson international Airport.
The sightings come after Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar yesterday confirmed the US military presence on the sister isle, backtracking on previous claims that previous military aircraft sighted on the island were only there to help the country with a “roadway.”
On Wednesday, when a C-17 Globemaster with the words Air Force emblazoned on its side was spotted at Tobago’s airport, a picture of the aeroplane was circulated widely on social media, with several citizens questioning its purpose.
Later that day, outside the Red House, the Prime Minister explained that the aircraft had brought in US marines to assist in constructing a roadway. At the time, she said that, to her knowledge, there were no longer any marines in the country. However, US marines were later seen at a popular hotel in Tobago. The day after, the Prime Minister clarified that following further inquiries, she had been informed that marines were still in Tobago and were assisting with work on the runway, roadway, and radar system at Tobago’s airport.
At least five Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) were executed by Russian soldiers amid a chaotic withdrawal near Huliaipole, Zaporizhzhia Oblast, it was reported on Nov. 27.
According to analytical organisation DeepState, Ukrainian soldiers were taken captive and shot dead on Nov. 26 near Zelenyi Hai village, in the Huliaipole sector.
„The enemy captured the soldiers in the forest, lined them up, and shot them after interrogation,“ DeepState said on Telegram.
Speaking to Interfax-Ukraine on Nov. 27, Spokesperson of the Southern Defense Forces Vladyslav Voloshyn acknowledged that Ukrainian forces had withdrawn from positions in the area, but one unit „withdrew from the occupied positions in an uncoordinated manner.“
„Thus, it exposed one of the flanks of our operational structure in this area and the personnel of the adjacent unit found themselves without cover,“ he said.
At the time, the CIA would have done its own vetting of him through a variety of databases, including the National Counterterrorism Center database, to see if he had any known ties to terrorist groups. The CIA did its own vetting before he started working with them and kept the identities of those they worked with secret, the official said.
NCTC would have vetted him again during Operation Allies Welcome in 2021 for any ties to terrorism before he was allowed into the US. He was clean then as well and did not show any ties to terror organizations, per the senior US official.
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, declined to provide a motive for Wednesday afternoon’s brazen act of violence which occurred just blocks from the White House. The presence of troops in the nation’s capital and other cities around the country has become a political flashpoint.
Rahmanullah Lakanwal, the Afghan man who allegedly shot two National Guard members in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, previously served in one of Afghanistan‘s elite counterterrorism units, according to AfghanEvac, a nonprofit run by U.S. veterans and others who served in Afghanistan.
The unit was operated by the CIA with direct U.S. intelligence and military support, according to AfghanEvac.
Washingtons Bürgermeisterin und auch die örtliche Polizei haben sich immer wieder gegen den Einsatz der Nationalgarde in ihrer Stadt ausgesprochen. Der Bundesdistrikt Washington D.C. hatte sogar eine Klage gegen die Trump-Regierung eingereicht – und recht bekommen. Eine Bundesrichterin entschied vor etwa einer Woche, dass der immer wieder verlängerte Einsatz der Nationalgarde in der Stadt illegal sei.
Von dieser Entscheidung zeigt sich der US-Präsident aber unbeeindruckt. Nach den Schüssen auf die beiden Nationalgardisten fühlt er sich im Recht. Seinen Pentagon-Chef hat er jetzt sogar angewiesen, noch weitere 500 Nationalgardisten in die Hauptstadt zu schicken.