by cnbc.com — Making good on a pledge to sever ties with Saudi Arabia after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Endeavor …

by dw.com -- Germany will not declare Lebanon's Hezbollah movement a terrorist organization, a top official said Friday. Minister of State Niels Annen told news magazine Der Spiegel that the Iran-backed Shiite Islamist movement is a relevant factor in Lebanese society and part of the complex political landscape in the country. Read more: Iran's military power: What you need to know The comments come after Britain last month banned Hezbollah's political wing, accusing the movement of destabilizing the Middle East. "The British move is a national decision that has no direct impact on the position of the German government or the EU," said Annen, a top Foreign Ministry official.

The European Union had already added Hezbollah's military wing to a list of banned terrorists groups in 2013. Hezbollah is represented in the Lebanese parliament and holds three of 30 ministries in the government led by Western-backed Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri. The movement's armed wing has expanded its influence in recent years in Lebanon and Syria, where alongside Iran and Russia it backs the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad. In Lebanon, it is considered to be more powerful than the Lebanese army. Hezbollah, or Party of God, was conceived by Muslim clerics in the 1980s in response to the Israeli invasion of South Lebanon in 1982. The Shiite group has a political and military wing.

As the once-powerful Islamic State (ISIS) crumbles, and its desperate fighters make a last stand in its final enclave surrounded by U.S.-backed coalition forces, its ideological leader is nowhere to be found. ISIS militants who have surrendered to coalition forces believe that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has abandoned the struggle when his leadership is needed most. His absence is causing deep fissures within the crumbling terrorist organization, which, though eroded, still boasts between 28,000 and 32,000 soldiers. “He’s hiding somewhere, people were angry,” Mohammed Ali, an ISIS fighter from Canada who was captured by the U.S.-backed Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces, told The Sunday Times. The ideological appeal of ISIS and Islamic extremism remains, but Baghdadi’s leadership vacuum and the receding territorial losses of what’s left of ISIS holdings in Syria diminish the influence of the once-powerful organization.

“Iraqi intelligence is following Baghdadi and we believe he never stays in one place for more than one day,” Abu Ali al-Basri, director general of Iraq’s intelligence office at the Ministry of Interior, told Fox News. “We have information he still moved from towns in Syria and entered the Iraq border through Anbar (province) with movement to bordering Salahuddin (province). Although Baghdadi remains far from the battlefield, he has continued to urge his loyal and ardent followers to carry on the fight. His most recent call to arms was in a series of audio clips released in August 2018.

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon on Thursday warned its Mediterranean neighbors that a planned EastMed gas pipeline from Israel to the European Union must not be allowed to violate its maritime borders. Beirut has an unresolved maritime border dispute with Israel - which it regards as an enemy country - over a sea area of about 860 sq km (330 square miles) extending along the edge of three of Lebanon’s southern energy blocks. Israel is hoping to enlist several European countries in the construction of a 2,000 km (1,243 mile) pipeline linking vast eastern Mediterranean gas resources to Europe through Cyprus, Greece and Italy at a cost of $7 billion.