Our prayers are with the family of the victims of this terrorist attacks! 

By Hassan Ammar and Andrea Rosa | AP - TRIPOLI, Lebanon — Military police and forensics in white overalls deployed in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli on Tuesday after a lone gunman went on an overnight shooting spree, killing four security personnel before blowing himself up in an apartment in a residential building. The rare shooting, in which the gunman used a motorcycle to move around, opening fire on police and army vehicles, shook the predominantly Sunni Muslim coastal city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan. Interior Minister Raya El Hassan told reporters that the gunman, identified as Abdul-Rahman Mabsout, is a former member of the Islamic State group and now a “lone wolf.” She said the situation was under control. The shooting began late Monday with Mabsout first firing at a branch of the Lebanese Central Bank, then driving around, shooting at police and later at an army vehicle, killing four.

With police in hot pursuit, opening fire and using tear gas, Mabsout then drove to a residential building, where he shot his way up the stairs and into an empty apartment on the fourth floor and barricaded himself inside. An hours-long standoff ensued, culminating with security forces storming the apartment. Cornered, Mabsout detonated his explosives vest, killing himself instantly. On Tuesday, there were multiple signs of battle. At least four civilian cars and one police car were heavily damaged, their windshields smashed and pocked by bullet holes. Military police and forensics removed bullets from the street. Tear gas canisters were still on the ground. The nine-floor apartment building where Mabsout died was shell pocked and the apartment itself partially destroyed. Mabsout left a message, apparently for the apartment’s owner, on a mirror. “Forgive me my Muslim brother. ... God willing. I love you in God, I didn’t mean it.”

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel expects to launch U.S.-mediated talks within weeks with Lebanon on setting their maritime border, a senior Israeli official …

Starting at around 3:30 EST on Sunday, a problem with Google’s cloud services triggered a massive disruption that rippled across the internet. According to the company’s own G Suite Status Dashboard, the Sunday outage at one point disrupted nearly every service Google offers in the US and Europe ranging from Gmail to Google Docs. “The network congestion issue in eastern USA, affecting Google Cloud, G Suite, and YouTube has been resolved for all affected users as of 4:00pm US/Pacific,” Google said in a statement.

The cloud outages impacted more than just Google services. Any services that leaned on Google’s cloud lost functionality, including Shopify, Snapchat, Discord, and even Rocket League game servers. Many Apple cloud-based services were also hampered by the outage, including iCloud Mail, iCloud Drive, and iMessage. Sunday’s issues once again highlighted how fragile the modern internet really is, and how reliant we are on Amazon (AWS), Microsoft (Azure), and Google (Google Cloud), who collectively dominate the $70 billion cloud computing market. The outage also again showcased that however carefully engineers may plan, having a centralized point of failure will inevitably cause headaches—especially when you’ve trusted your entire backend computing power or storage to just one company.

BEIRUT (AP) — The lawyer for Nizar Zacca held in Iran since 2015 said Monday that his client will be released in the "next few days." Majed Dimashkiyeh told The Associated Press that Nizar Zakka's expected release comes after mediations by top Lebanese officials, including President Michel Aoun and Prime Minister Saad Hariri.  Some Iranian media outlets reported earlier Monday that Zakka would be released soon without giving further details. The expected release of Nizar Zakka, 52, comes at a time of rising tension in the Middle East between the United States and Iran. Zakka, who has permanent U.S. residency, went missing in 2015, during his fifth trip to Iran. Two weeks later, Iranian state TV reported that he was in custody and suspected of having "deep links" to U.S. intelligence services. Zakka was sentenced to 10 years in prison in September 2016 and handed a $4.2 million fine after a security court convicted him of espionage. Zakka's family denies the allegations. Members of the U.S. House of Representatives issued a resolution two years ago calling for Zakka's release.