Syria Feature: The Conflict --- and Truce --- Between Insurgents and Kurds in Ras al-Ain

Fighters in Ras al-Ain (Photo: Reuters)

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Kurdish and Arab militias waged a bitter battle for three months in the northern city of Ras Al Ayn, in Hassakeh province. Now, they’ve reached a truce that has managed to last into a third week, marking an early success for a nascent group of peacekeepers led by famed Christian dissident Michel Kilo....

The months of fighting in Ras Al Ain killed nearly 300 people. It took a diverse group of men and women, Kurds and Arabs, Alawites, Sunnis, Christians, tribal leaders and urbanites to broker Feb. 17’s tenuous peace.

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Syria Live Coverage: A "Humanitarian Tragedy"

2120 GMT: Jet Shot Down in Damascus? All day we've been tracking reports of a jet shot down in Damascus. The only problem is that it's unclear a jet ever crashed. However, a reader, Amir, finds this video. Much of it is a collection of videos from today that we have seen. The clip we had not seen is at about the 2:30 mark, when an explosion on the horizon, followed my a smoke cloud, reportedly shows the moment the jet crashed.

We're still not 100% sure what happened, though there are plenty of rumors that the pilot, a Russian, has been captured. We'd treat this as straight rumor until a video is released.

2105 GMT: Battle for Ashrafiyeh District of Aleppo. The rebels have set their sights on another district in norther-central in Aleppo, the Ashrafiyeh District. A microblogger finds several videos, including the one below which appear to show rebels firing mortars at Assad positions from the nearby railway (map):

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Syria (and Beyond) Coverage: UN --- Death Toll Passes 60,000

People run from a regime airstrike on the Damascus suburb of Douma --- activists report that there were 20 deaths

See also Libya Satire: A Beginner's Guide to Democacy...and Slapstick
Wednesday's Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Aleppo Airport Is Briefly Closed

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2044 GMT: Syria. An airstrike on the Jobar section of Homs today:

1726 GMT: Syria. Insurgents drive a captured regime in the Jabal al-Zawiya area:

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Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: UN Envoy Annan Returns to Damascus

1818 GMT: Syria. Earlier we saw many reports of shells falling on the small town of Busrah al Harir, in Daraa province (map). Now, the LCC shares this video reportedly showing shells falling on the town:

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Syria, Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Clampdown

1910 GMT: Ali Tarhouni, the Minister of Finance of the Libyan opposition's National Transitional Council, says he is meeting with Obama Administration officials to establish a line of credit.

Tarhouni was a University of Washington lecturer until March, when he returned to opposition- held Libya.

1832 GMT: The Bahraini regime has expelled the Reuters correspondent, Frederik Richter, who had been based in the capital Manama since 2008.

Officials said Reuters had lacked balance in its reporting but could name another correspondent for accreditation by the Ministry of Information.

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Egypt (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Settling In for the Long Game

0132 GMT: We end tonight's liveblog with this report from Al Jazeera: 

 0036 GMT: There are reports of gunfire in Cairo. We cannot confirm where exactly it is coming from or who's shooting. 

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