Iraqi authorities forced an Iranian cargo plane heading to Syria to land for inspection in Baghdad to ensure it was not carrying weapons, an Iraqi official said Sunday.

Four rockets fired from Gaza crashed into southern Israel on Sunday without harming anyone, Israeli police said, hours after an air strike killed a Hamas fighter.

Millions of pilgrims arrived this week in Mecca for Islam’s annual Hajj (pilgrimage), which officially starts on Wednesday. Around four million pilgrims were heading to Mina, where they will spend their night before heading to the Mount of Arafat in the early hours of Thursday.

A Jordanian soldier was killed in clashes with armed militants trying to cross the border into Syria on Monday and sectarian clashes overnight in Lebanon left eight dead as Syria’s civil war spilled into neighboring countries.

Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, the emir of Qatar, is set to arrive in the Gaza Strip to inaugurate a $254-million Qatari investment project to rebuild the impoverished and overcrowded coastal enclave.

Lebanese troops and gunmen exchanged fire in Beirut’s southern suburbs on Monday, wounding five people, deepening a political crisis following the assassination of a senior intelligence official, security and medical sources said

Back-to-back bomb blasts in a crowded Baghdad market near a revered Shia Muslim shrine and several shootings targeting government officials have killed at least 17 people.

The annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca will not be affected by events in Syria and elsewhere across the region, Saudi Arabia’s interior minister has said.

India has opened its first glass mosque and the biggest in the northeast Meghalaya state that is expected to draw hundreds of tourists to the marvelous worshipping house.

Chabahar, Iran- Two members of the Basij militia have been killed in a suspected suicide attack in the south east of Iran on Friday, 19th Oct. 2012.