The Levant Files

Tunisia is facing mounting domestic and international pressure as its political and economic crises deepen. The latest flashpoint is the deteriorating health of 85-year-old Rached Ghannouchi, the imprisoned leader of the Ennahda movement. According to reports from Anadolu Agency and the Middle East Monitor, Ghannouchi recently launched a hunger and medication strike from his hospital bed. His plight underscores the severe democratic backsliding and human rights abuses characterizing President Kais Saied's increasingly authoritarian rule. The legal persecution of Ghannouchi has reached unprecedented levels this year. As reported by Al Jazeera, a Tunisian court formally sentenced the Ennahda leader to life in prison on June 3, 2026. This latest verdict adds to a staggering cumulative sentence; according to the Middle East Eye, the opposition figurehead is already serving over 150 years in prison on a multitude of charges that his supporters widely dismiss as politically motivated. Hi...

Israel threatened a second strike on “Site 99” and suspected Turkish assistance to Damascus before Washington handed the file to the UN watchdog The United States has brokered an arrangement under which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will remove nuclear material left over from Syria’s dismantled weapons programme, defusing a stand-off that had drawn in Israel and raised suspicions in Jerusalem about Turkey. The arrangement, first reported by Axios on 10 August, centres on a clandestine facility Israeli and American officials call “Site 99.” Two Israeli officials cited in the report said the Assad regime stored there material connected to the Al-Kibar reactor project, including yellowcake — a uranium ore concentrate that can be further processed and eventually enriched — plus other residue from the destroyed reactor. The material cannot produce a nuclear detonation. The concern was narrower: that radioactive substances could be combined with conventional explosives in a s...

Turkish pro-government broadcaster CNN Türk on 11 August ran a segment asking whether Greece and Turkey are heading toward a "second Kardak crisis" — a direct reference to the January 1996 Imia/Kardak standoff, when the two NATO allies came to the brink of armed conflict over an uninhabited islet in the Aegean. The choice of language is not incidental. It is the sharpest data point yet in a pattern The Levant Files documented in a special investigation published two days earlier, on 9 August, tracking five weeks of escalating anti-Greek rhetoric across Turkey's pro-government press. The immediate trigger for the CNN Türk piece was mundane on its face: a ceremony on 8 August marking the handover of two newly built military guesthouses to Greek armed forces personnel on Ro (Kastellorizo group; Karaada in Turkish), an islet roughly two kilometres from the Turkish coastal town of Kaş. But the broadcaster's Athens correspondent, Duygu Leloğlu, framed the event as a calcula...

Six senior appointments fill posts left vacant by wartime losses as Mojtaba Khamenei consolidates control Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei issued decrees on Monday appointing six senior commanders to key posts across the Armed Forces General Staff, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and the Basij Resistance Force, in what marks his first major military reshuffle since assuming the position of Supreme Leader and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. The appointments come as Iran remains locked in an ongoing conflict with the United States and Israel that began on February 28, and follow the deaths of several senior commanders in US-Israeli strikes during the war — including Mojtaba Khamenei's father and predecessor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. According to the appointments: - Major General Ali Abdollahi, an IRGC pilot, was named Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces. - Brigadier General Kioumars Heydari was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff of...

Iran fired several missiles and drones at locations in the Alana Valley, about 90 kilometers northeast of Erbil, targeting positions of the Kurdish opposition groups Komala and the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI), a Peshmerga commander told Rudaw English on Wednesday. A security official told Rudaw that two drones struck the area, causing no casualties. The attacks targeted the headquarters and camps of Iranian Kurdish opposition groups based in the Kurdistan Region, a day after Iranian missiles struck the same area, injuring at least two Komala Peshmerga fighters. Andam Jabar, Rudaw's reporter in the area, said four drones struck locations across Soran, Khalifan, and Harir districts at around 6:00 am local time. Two drones crashed in Khalifan, while another struck a civilian home in Soran and one crashed in Harir, where it caused a fire in the brushwood and grasslands of Mount Bani Harir. Jabar reported no casualties at any of the three locations. The attack comes amid s...

A court in Damascus has sentenced Syria’s former president Bashar al-Assad, his brother Maher al-Assad and several senior figures from the ousted government to death, in one of the most significant judicial rulings since the fall of the Assad administration in December 2024. The verdict was issued on Tuesday, August 11, by a criminal court in Damascus following proceedings centred on killings, torture and abuses committed during the government’s response to the uprising that began in southern Syria in 2011. According to Syria’s official SANA news agency, the court convicted Bashar al-Assad of crimes against humanity, premeditated murder and other offences, citing his position at the top of the former state hierarchy and his responsibility for directing institutions implicated in serious violations. SANA reported that the ruling was delivered by a panel headed by Judge Fakhr al-Din al-Aryan, with representatives of Syria’s National Commission for Transitional Justice, international lega...

Tensions along the Syria-Iraq border have increased in recent days after Syria reportedly raised the readiness of its armed forces and deployed additional units near the frontier, amid concerns over movements by Iran-aligned Iraqi militias and cross-border weapons transfers. However, there is no confirmed evidence of direct fighting between Syrian and Iraqi forces. Iraqi authorities have rejected reports of an impending confrontation, describing the situation along the border as normal and coordinated. Syrian military units were reportedly placed on heightened alert on 4 August, with personnel recalled to their bases and forces deployed near the eastern border, particularly around Al-Bukamal in Deir ez-Zor province. Some reports said reconnaissance units observed concentrations of Popular Mobilization Forces fighters on the Iraqi side of the border. The developments reportedly followed Syrian warnings to Baghdad about movements by armed groups linked to Iran. Syrian officials alleg...

Yemen is experiencing its most serious military escalation in years, with Houthi missile and drone attacks targeting government-held areas and government forces responding with artillery and strikes on Houthi positions across several fronts. The Houthis launched ballistic missiles and drones early Tuesday against residential areas in Marib, according to Yemen’s government military media centre. Further attacks targeted the western port city of Mocha and its harbour in Taiz province, where air defences reportedly intercepted several drones. The renewed attacks followed a major Houthi assault on Mocha over the weekend. Yemeni military sources said the attack killed at least seven people, including civilians and soldiers, and wounded about 30 others. Local reports have cited differing preliminary casualty figures, while damage was reported at the port and other civilian and economic facilities. Residents were urged to remain indoors and stay away from windows and exposed areas. The go...

Turkey’s Grand National Assembly has approved a landmark 12-article framework law intended to provide the legal basis for the disarmament and dissolution process involving the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), marking the most significant parliamentary step yet in the government’s “Terror-Free Turkey” initiative. The bill, formally titled the Law on Strengthening National Solidarity and Social Integration, was adopted after nearly 12 hours of debate. According to the final detailed voting breakdown reported by Turkish sources, it received 467 votes in favour, 87 against and seven abstentions. Thirty-one deputies did not participate. The governing Justice and Development Party (AK Party) voted unanimously in favour, with 268 votes. The Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) also supported the legislation with 44 votes. The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) gave 55 votes in favour. The main opposition Yeni Parti supported the bill with 35 votes but cast 54 votes a...