The United Arab Emirates is dismantling parts of a military base it runs in the East African nation of Eritrea after it pulled back from the grinding war in nearby Yemen, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

The UAE built a port and expanded an airstrip in Assab beginning in September 2015, using the facility as a base to ferry heavy weaponry and Sudanese troops into Yemen as it fought alongside a Saudi-led coalition against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels there.

Snow blanketed parts of Lebanon on Wednesday, blocking roads and disrupting traffic.

Storm Joyce hit late Tuesday in Lebanon with gale force winds registering between 85 km/h (52 miles/h) and 100 km/h (62 miles/h). The storm is expected to get stronger Thursday.

Suspected Israeli settlers vandalized several vehicles belonging to Palestinian workers in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday in broad daylight in an incident caught by security cameras.

It appeared to be the latest in a series of so-called "price tag" attacks, in which hard-line Israeli nationalists attack Palestinians and vandalize their property in response to Palestinian militant attacks or perceived efforts by Israeli authorities to limit settlement activity.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed on Tuesday to expand cross-border operations against Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, following the killing of 13 Turkish soldiers, police and civilians who had been abducted by Kurdish insurgents.

In a speech to his ruling party's supporters, Erdogan also said that the killings have strengthened Turkey's will to form a secure zone along its border in northern Iraq to protect Turkey's frontiers from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.

Coronavirus case numbers are stabilizing in parts of the Middle East but the situation remains critical, with more than a dozen countries reporting cases of new variants, the World Health Organization said Monday.

Ahmed al-Mandhari, director of WHO's eastern Mediterranean region, which comprises most of the Middle East, said in a press briefing from Cairo that at least one of the three new coronavirus variants was reported in the 13 countries in the region. He did not name the countries.

Since Lebanon launched its inoculation campaign against Covid-19 virus on Sunday, around “535,000 individuals” have registered to get the vaccine, said Ali Romani, IT Project Manager at the Ministry of Health and programmer of the vaccination platform.

After 20 years of military engagement and billions of dollars spent, NATO and the United States still grapple with the same, seemingly intractable conundrum — how to withdraw troops from Afghanistan without abandoning the country to even more mayhem.

An accelerated U.S. drawdown over the past few months, led by the previous U.S. administration, has signaled what may be in store for long-suffering Afghans.

A massive fire that erupted when a fuel tanker exploded over the weekend at a major crossing in Afghanistan's western Herat province on the Iranian border was brought under control on Monday, after three days of efforts by firefighters from both countries, Afghan officials said.

At least 20 people were injured when the explosion that set off a huge fire that engulfed many of the hundreds of trucks lined up at the Islam Qala crossing carrying natural gas and fuel on Saturday. The crossing, around 120 kilometers (75 miles) west of the city of Herat, the provincial capital, is a major transit route between Afghanistan and Iran.

Donald Trump took in the win at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by friends and family. His lawyers celebrated with hugs and smiles. One joked, "We're going to Disney World!"

Now acquitted in his second Senate impeachment trial, Trump is preparing for the next phase of his post-presidency life. Feeling emboldened by the trial's outcome, he is expected to reemerge from a self-imposed hibernation at his club in Palm Beach, Florida, and is eyeing ways to reassert his power.

As the coronavirus spread across the globe, so too did speculation about its origins. Perhaps the virus escaped from a lab. Maybe it was engineered as a bioweapon.

Legitimate questions about the virus created perfect conditions for conspiracy theories. In the absence of knowledge, guesswork and propaganda flourished.