(TEHRAN, Iran) — The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group vowed Sunday to end the U.S. military’s presence in the Middle East, saying U.S. bases, warships and soldiers were all fair targets following the recent U.S. killing of an Iranian general.

Hassan Nasrallah said the U.S. military “will pay the price” for the U.S. drone strike that killed Gen Qasem Soleimani in Iraq Friday. His comments further heightened tensions in a region already on high alert and bracing for Iranian retaliation.

President Donald Trump has threatened to bomb 52 sites in Iran if it retaliates by attacking Americans. Iran vowed to take an even-greater step away from its unraveling nuclear deal with world powers as a response to Soleimani’s slaying.

“The suicide attackers who forced the Americans to leave from our region in the past are still here and their numbers have increased,” Nasrallah said.

It was not clear which suicide bombings Nasrallah was referring to. A 1983 attack on a U.S. Marine barracks in Bei..

(NAIROBI, Kenya) — Al-Shabab extremists overran a key military base used by U.S. counterterror forces in Kenya before dawn Sunday, destroying U.S. aircraft and vehicles, Kenyan authorities said. It was the al-Qaida-linked group’s first attack against U.S. forces in the East African country, and the military called the security situation “fluid” several hours after the assault.

Five attackers were killed and the assault has been contained, said Kenyan military spokesman Paul Njuguna.

It was not yet clear whether any U.S. or Kenyan forces were killed. A U.S. Africa Command statement, issued after al-Shabab released photos of blazing aircraft, said “an accountability of personnel assessment is underway” and the Manda Bay airfield was “still in the process of being fully secured.” Kenya’s military said four attackers were dead.

Al-Shabab, based in neighboring Somalia, claimed responsibility and asserted that “intense” combat with U.S. forces continued. The U.S. statement called the al-S..

(MINSK, Belarus) — Belarus has reached an agreement with Russia for limited oil supplies after Moscow earlier this week stopped supplying crude amid stalled talks on strengthening economic ties between the neighboring countries.

Belarusian state-run oil company Belneftekhim said Saturday that the country’s refineries started receiving the first batch of crude oil, sufficient to ensure “non-stop operation of the country’s refineries in January 2020.”

Russian pipeline operator Transneft confirmed earlier on Saturday it would transfer 133,000 tons of oil to Belarus.

According to a statement from Belneftekhim, the oil would come at a discounted price while negotiations for resuming regular imports continue.

Russia stopped supplying oil to its post-Soviet neighbor after Dec. 31, as the two countries failed to renegotiate oil prices for this year amid stalled talks on further strengthening economic ties.

The suspension did not affect oil transit to Europe or the supply of natural gas bu..

(FORT BRAGG, N.C.) — Hundreds of U.S. soldiers deployed Saturday from Fort Bragg, North Carolina, to Kuwait to serve as reinforcements in the Middle East amid rising tensions following the U.S. killing of a top Iranian general.

Lt. Col. Mike Burns, a spokesman for the 82nd Airborne Division, told The Associated Press 3,500 members of the division’s quick-deployment brigade, known officially as its Immediate Response Force, will have deployed within a few days. The most recent group of service members to deploy will join about 700 who left earlier in the week, Burns said.

A loading ramp at Fort Bragg was filled Saturday morning with combat gear and restless soldiers. Some tried to grab a last-minute nap on wooden benches. Reporters saw others filing onto buses.

The additional troop deployments reflect concerns about potential Iranian retaliatory action in the volatile aftermath of Friday’s drone strike that killed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds Force who has been..

(JAKARTA, Indonesia) — Landslides and floods triggered by torrential downpours have left at least 53 people dead in and around Indonesia’s capital, as rescuers struggled to search for people apparently buried under tons of mud, officials said Saturday.

Monsoon rains and rising rivers submerged a dozen districts in the greater Jakarta area and caused landslides that buried at least a dozen people.

National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Agus Wibowo said the fatalities included those who had drowned or been electrocuted since rivers broke their banks early Wednesday after extreme torrential rains hit on New Year’s Eve. Three elderly people died of hypothermia.

It’s the worst flooding in the area since 2007, when 80 people were killed over 10 days.

Rescuers recovered more bodies as flash floods and mudslides destroyed Sukamulia village in Bogor district. They were searching for a villager who was missing in a landslide in Lebak, a district in neighboring Banten province, Wibowo ..

(CHICAGO) — The U.S. men’s soccer team has canceled its plan to train in Doha, Qatar, from Jan. 5-25 “due to the developing situation in the region.”

The U.S. Soccer Federation announced the decision Friday, a day after a U.S. military air strike killed a top Iranian military commander.

The Americans will move training to a site in the United States that has not yet been determined. They will be use a roster of players mostly from Major League Soccer ahead of an exhibition against Costa Rica on Feb. 1 in Carson, California.

The USSF said it hopes to train in the future at Qatar, host of the 2022 World Cup.

American musician P!nk has pledged to donate $500,000 to local fires services fighting Australia’s devastating wildfires, and other celebrities have announced plans to donate as well.

For months, Australia has been fighting the worst wildfires it’s experienced in decades, which scientists say have been intensified by climate change. At least 19 people have died, dozens are missing, hundreds of homes have been destroyed and, according to Bloomberg, nearly half a billion animals may have been killed. As TIME’s Amy Gunia reports, “The fire season in Australia is far from over, and already it is shaping up to be one of the most intense in the country’s history.”

On Saturday, P!nk posted on Twitter and Instagram: “I am totally devastated watching what is happening in Australia right now with the horrific bushfires.” She pledged to donate $500,000 to local fire services battling the bushfires, and asked others to consider donating as well.

I am totally devastated watching what is happenin..

(NASHVILLE, Tenn. ) — United Methodist Church leaders from around the world are proposing a new conservative denomination that would split from the rest of the church in an attempt to resolve a yearslong dispute over gay marriage and gay clergy.

Members of the 13-million-person denomination have been at odds for years over the issue. Some members, especially in the United States, have been demanding full inclusion for LGBTQ people.

A specially called meeting last year failed to resolve the differences. The new proposal envisions an amicable separation in which conservative churches forming a new denomination would retain their assets. The new denomination also would receive $25 million.

With just weeks before voting begins in Iowa, the killing of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in a U.S. airstrike ordered by President Donald Trump has posed a new challenge to his Democratic opponents: how should the Democratic candidates react to the assassination of a terrorist whose death could draw the U.S. into another costly confrontation in the Middle East? In a race that has rarely zeroed in on foreign policy, the question has the potential to reveal fissures between Democratic rivals and possibly upend the wide-open 2020 nominating contest.

On the campaign trail, the Democratic candidates acknowledged Soleimani was responsible for bloodshed across the Middle East, including the deaths of Americans, while highlighting the potential consequences of Iranian retaliation and giving the contenders an opportunity to highlight what several said was a rushed move on the President’s part.

“[Soleimani] supported terror and sowed chaos. None of that negates the fact that this is a h..

(BOSTON) — Iran’s retaliation for the United States’ targeted killing of its top general is likely to include cyberattacks, security experts warned Friday. Iran’s state-backed hackers are already among the world’s most aggressive and could inject malware that triggers major disruptions to the U.S. public and private sector.

Potential targets include manufacturing facilities, oil and gas plants and transit systems. A top U.S. cybersecurity official is warning businesses and government agencies to be extra vigilant.

Iranian state-backed hackers carried out a series of disruptive denial-of-service attacks that knocked the websites of major U.S. banks and the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ offline in 2012-13, a response to U.S. sanctions. Two years later, they wiped servers at the Sands Casino in Las Vegas, crippling hotel and gambling operations.

The destructive attacks on U.S. targets ebbed when Tehran reached a nuclear deal with the Obama administration in 2015. The killing early..

(BAGHDAD) — Iran has vowed “harsh retaliation” for a U.S. airstrike near Baghdad’s airport that killed Tehran’s top general and the architect of its interventions across the Middle East, as tensions soared in the wake of the targeted killing.

The killing of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds Force, marks a major escalation in the standoff between Washington and Iran, which has careened from one crisis to another since President Donald Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal and imposed crippling sanctions.

The United States urged its U.S. citizens to leave Iraq “immediately.” The State Department said the embassy in Baghdad, which was attacked by Iran-backed militiamen and other protesters earlier this week, is closed and all consular services have been suspended.

Read more: Why the U.S. Assassination of Iranian Quds Force Leader Qasem Soleimani Has the U.S. Bracing for Retaliation

Around 5,200 American troops are based in Iraq, where they mainly train Iraqi forc..

(LONDON) — British workers who practice “ethical veganism” to protect animals secured a big win in an employment tribunal when a judge ruled Friday that they are entitled to legal protection from job discrimination.

The judge said that because ethical veganism is a philosophical belief, its adherents are covered by the U.K.’s anti-discrimination law, the 2010 Equality Act.

The ruling came in a claim brought by a man who said he was fired after raising questions about pension fund investments in companies that test products on animals.

Jordi Casamitjana, 55, alleged his dismissal from the League Against Cruel Sports, a British charity that works against animals being abused or killed for sport, resulted from his strong beliefs. The charity did not contest at the hearing whether ethical vegans deserved workplace protections.

Ethical vegans go beyond eating a plant-based diet to try to exclude any form of what they believe is animal exploitation, including not wearing wool or leather ..

(WASHINGTON) — The United States is sending nearly 3,000 more Army troops to the Mideast as reinforcements in the volatile aftermath of the killing of an Iranian general in a strike ordered by President Donald Trump, defense officials said Friday.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a decision not yet announced by the Pentagon, said the troops are from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. They are in addition to about 700 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne who deployed to Kuwait earlier this week after the storming of the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad by Iran-backed militiamen and their supporters.

The dispatching of extra troops reflects concern about potential Iranian retaliatory action for the killing Thursday of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s Quds Force. But it also runs counter to Trump’s repeated push to extract the United States from Mideast conflicts. Prior to this week’s troop deployments, the administration had sent..

(WASHINGTON) — Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden said Thursday that President Donald Trump has “tossed a stick of dynamite into a tinderbox” with the targeted killing of Iran’s top general in an airstrike at Baghdad’s international airport.

The former vice president joined other Democratic White House hopefuls in criticizing Trump’s order, saying it could leave the U.S. “on the brink of a major conflict across the Middle East.”

My statement on the killing of Qassem Soleimani. pic.twitter.com/4Q9tlLAYFB

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) January 3, 2020

The Pentagon said the U.S. military killed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds Force, in Baghdad Friday at the direction of Trump. The attack is expected to draw severe Iranian retaliation against Israel and American interests. The Defense Department said Soleimani “was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region.”

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders released a ..

(JAKARTA, Indonesia) — The death toll from floods in Indonesia’s capital rose to 43 of Friday as rescuers found more bodies amid receding floodwaters, disaster officials said.

Monsoon rains and rising rivers submerged at least 182 neighborhoods in greater Jakarta and caused landslides in the Bogor and Depok districts on the city’s outskirts, which buried a dozen people.

National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Agus Wibowo said the fatalities also included those who had drowned or been electrocuted since rivers broke their banks Wednesday after extreme torrential rains throughout New Year’s Eve. Three elderly people died of hypothermia.

It was the worst flooding since 2013, when 57 people were killed after Jakarta was inundated by monsoon rains.

Floodwaters started receded in some parts of the city on Thursday evening, enabling residents to return to their homes.

Wibowo said about 397,000 people sought refuge in shelters across the greater metropolitan area.

Those returning t..

The State Department is urging American citizens to leave Iraq immediately, citing danger in the aftermath of a U.S. airstrike which killed Qasem Soleimani, one of Iran’s most senior military commanders.

President Donald Trump authorized the strike that killed Soleimani, who led the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, at Baghdad’s international airport early Friday morning.

American citizens were specifically warned to avoid the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, which had been besieged by Iranian-backed militias Thursday.

“Due to heightened tensions in Iraq and the region, the U.S. Embassy urges American citizens to heed the January 2020 Travel Advisory and depart Iraq immediately,” the State Department said in a statement released Friday. “Due to Iranian-backed militia attacks at the U.S. Embassy compound, all public consular operations are suspended until further notice. U.S. citizens should not approach the Embassy.”

Soleimani had approved the attacks on the U.S.’s B..