EGYPT

A suicide bomber in the Syrian capital is responsible for an explosion that tore through a busy intersection, hitting a police bus and killing 25 people, and injuring dozens more in the second Damascus attack in two weeks.

Representatives of the rival factions Fatah and Hamas are pursuing contrasting approaches to building support for the Palestinian cause, with Fatah engaged in apparently fruitless peace talks with Israel while Hamas' leader pays visits to newly empowered Islamist governments across the region. While the two developments are not directly related, they nevertheless offer a glimpse of how the Palestinian peace process might play out in a region reshaped by popular uprisings.

Assad’s regime has thus far spent about $40-million on militias to brutalize the opposition.

Death by hanging for ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has been demanded by the prosecutor in his trial, who said the former leader was complicit in the killing of protestors during last year's uprising against his regime.

Militias clashed with government security troops in Tripoli, Libya on Tuesday, casting a blow to the country's attempt at forming a new government.

The chief prosecutor in the trial against Hosni Mubarak lambasted the former Egyptian president during an hour-long argument that The Associated Press called the harshest assessment of Mubarak's rule ever heard in an Egyptian courtroom.

Crude prices started their jolly ride to the top in February last year when simmering discontent in the Middle East erupted into several violent anti-government protests.

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will meet this week after more than a year of deadlock in peacemaking, officials said Sunday, but both sides played down prospects of any imminent resumption of talks.

Bahraini police fired tear gas and sound grenades after hundreds of Shi'ite youths demonstrated on Sunday against the death of a 15-year-old protester a day earlier in the Sunni-ruled Gulf island kingdom, residents and activists said.

The H5N1 strain of the flu is extremely dangerous, killing up to 60 percent of people who contract it.

For John Salemme, the mention of Egypt brings to my mind one thing: a lonely, tearful train ride on New Year’s Eve.

Egyptian prosecutors and police raided offices of 17 pro-democracy and human rights groups Thursday - including several funded by the United States - in what rights defenders described as a campaign against them by the military rulers.

The best Twitter feeds to follow in the new year.

A small group of committed programmers has taken it upon themselves to build a central network for Occupy groups and protesters around the world, Wired reported on its Threat Level blog. It's partly a function of not wanting Facebook to have access to private activist messages, but it's also an attempt to simplify communications among the many groups.

Ex-Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak appeared in court on Wednesday.

The Muslim Brotherhood's party, leading in a parliamentary election, wants to boost tourist numbers to Egypt and will not take steps that would harm the industry, a party official told a rally in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Oh Baby! A very pregnant Beyonce is reportedly getting ready to check in to a New York Hospital to give birth any minute now, according to multiple reports. Beyonce confirmed in September that she was six months pregnant, so she would be due around this time.

Who will be the five people to shape 2012? It could be anyone on list, or it could be none of them. Such is the state of geopolitics at this important moment in history.

From stories of Scott Olsen at Occupy Oakland and the riots in Tahrir Square, to a hilarious cache of old photos and LOTR's Eye of Sauron in a glass door's reflection, reddit has broken some of the biggest stories of the year, and given us plenty of hilarity in between. Here, see the top scoring links of 2011 as voted by reddit users.

Controversial Egyptian blogger, Aliaa Magda Elmahdy, whose nude photographs shocked her country, has asked those of her countrywomen who wish to remove their veils to send her photographs of their faces, to be published online.

The Egyptian economy, battered after months of uncertainty and violence that has followed the political upheaval in that country, is hovering dangerously close to crisis status.