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Report: Hezbollah Leader Offers Assad Refuge, Soldiers JULY 25, 2012 9:54 AM Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s Secretary General, has offered refuge in Lebanon and elite military units to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, as the latter continues his fight to remain in power. In a recent conversation between the two leaders, Nasrallah told Assad that “Hezbollah’s elite units will stand at the front and fight the rebels,” according to a report in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Gomhoriih. While Syrian diplomats continue to defect – including reports on Wednesday that officials in Cyprus and the United Arab Emirates have left their posts – and...

Britain will help the Iraqi government dispose of what's left of deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons, still stored in two bunkers in north of Baghdad, the British embassy in Baghdad announced Monday. The British Defense Ministry will start training Iraqi technical and medical workers this year, an embassy statement said. The teams will work to safely destroy remnants of munitions and chemical warfare agents left over from Saddam's regime. He was overthrown in 2003 following an American-led invasion. …

U.S. Army Sgt. Vincent Hancock won a gold medal today in skeet-shooting at the 2012 London Olympics. The 23-year-old, who is based at Fort Benning in Georgia, also set an Olympic record in his event, according to USA Today

'The new James Bond 'Skyfall' trailer has landed online showcasing a host of new footage and a shock twist. The action-packed promo gives us the first proper look at Javier Bardem's curiously coiffured villain, Silva. The menacing star gets up to a number of dastardly deeds in the video; blowing up buildings, capturing Bond and causing havoc in MI6. The trailer opens up a number of questions about the history of the character, his relationship with Daniel Craig's James Bond and, crucially, Judi Dench's M.'

When Michelle Obama jetted off to Britain to instruct the US Olympic Team on what they need to do to come home with the gold, it became apparent that America's first lady had found a way to party hearty, regardless of the pledge to forgo her annual Martha's Vineyard vacation. Call me cynical, but just because Michelle Obama has well-cut biceps from doing 15-lb curls in the White House gym, trounced Ellen DeGeneres in a push-up contest, and kicked Jimmy Fallon's butt in a potato-sack race, that doesn't exactly qualify her to dole out pointers to seasoned Olympic athletes. But,...

WARSAW, POLAND — Fresh from a warm embrace from iconic Polish leader Lech Walesa, Mitt Romney will wrap up a three-country trip overseas Tuesday with a major speech that he hopes will send a message that he's tough and more willing to take a harder line with rogue nations than President Barack Obama is. Romney arrived in Warsaw late Monday after a day in Gdansk, where he enjoyed the most enthusiastic reception of his six-day trip, which was marred by controversies at the first two stops, in London and Jerusalem. He was greeted in Gdansk by crowds that swarmed in...

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) defended a German official who has been accused of performing the 'Nazi salute' during the opening ceremony of the London Games. Honorary IOC member Walther Troger was filmed extending his left arm back and forth repeatedly as the German team marched around London's Olympic stadium on July 27, The Telegraph reported. IOC spokesman Mark Adams vehemently denied allegations that Troger’s hand motion was a Nazi salute. "I can't think of anyone who is less anti-Semitic than him," he said adding that he is “devastated that it was interpreted in this way." According to The Telegraph,...

“As London prepares to throw the world a $14 billion party, it seems fair to ask the question: What does it get out of the bargain?” asks the Christian Science Monitor in a recent story on the 2012 Summer Olympics. “Salt Lake got to show that its Mormon community was open to the world,” observes journalist Mark Sappenfield. “Turin got to show that it was not the Detroit of Europe. China got to give the world a glimpse of the superpower-to-be. And Vancouver got to show the world that Canadians are not, in fact, Americans.” And what is London showing...

It looks different, sounds different and feels different - the Olympic tennis event is taking place at Wimbledon, just not as we know it. One of Britain's great sporting institutions, steeped in proud tradition and strict protocol, is almost unrecognisable from its usual self. Mauve hoardings, coloured kits, raucous crowds, pop songs and a beverage formerly known as Pimm's; London 2012 has taken over the All England Club. "It's definitely weird," explained five-times Wimbledon singles champion Serena Williams. "I love playing Wimbledon but this atmosphere I didn't expect. It's bananas, and I love it." Saturday's doubles tie involving Andy and...

The International Olympic Committee decided not to include in the opening ceremony a moment of silence to honor the eleven Israeli athletes killed by Palestinian gunmen during the 1972 games in Munich. That move drew the ire of NBC’s Bob Costas. During Friday’s ceremony, he commented that, although a private moment of silence was held before a mere 100 people this week at the Athlete’s Village, “for many, tonight, with the world watching, is the true time and place to remember those who were lost and how and why they died.” Instead, the Olympic ceremony featured a weird, politically correct...

Actually, London, your opening ceremony was atrocious. It was horrific. It was a deeply troubling insight into a once-great nation. I recognize that, in the grand scheme of things, the opening ceremony of the summer Olympics doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. Probably, the summer Olympics themselves don’t have any true significance. After all, it’s just sports, and most of them are obscure sports. But they are entertaining nonetheless, and we look forward to them each four years, and we enjoy the spectacle as much as we enjoy the competition. Which is why on Friday night we lined our...

'More Olympic tickets will go on sale after the row over empty seats, organisers Locog have said. It said an initial 3,000 tickets - including 600 gymnastics tickets - were "put back into the pot" and sold on the London 2012 website on Sunday night. More tickets returned by sports federations would be released the night before events, Locog added. Transport chiefs say London's morning rush hour went well on the first full working-day of the Games. Prime Minister David Cameron, meanwhile, said the empty seats were "disappointing" but not "a unique episode" with other previous Games facing similar problems....

The UK government is trapped between eurosceptics and anti-Europeans and is in danger of being ignored, dismissed and then forgotten by other member states, former Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson has told EurActiv in an exclusive interview. “The government in the UK is doing two things. It is operating in the short-term, not the long-term interest; and secondly, it is responding to political pressures within the Conservative party, not the national interest,” Mandelson told EurActiv. … He said Britain was “cutting off its nose to spite its face”, and added that its alliance with the euroskeptic Czech Republic was “a relationship...

Along with the creepy tableaux of fictional villains terrifying sick children, the ode to Britain's socialized health care was by far the most irritating part of Friday night's Olympic opening ceremony -- produced by lefty film maker Danny Boyle.As Boyle fulsomely praised socialized health care as it's practiced in Britain, one just has to wonder what his response would be to the following headlines, featuring that self-same NHS: Doris, 95, was left on a hospital trolley for 28 hours -- and when her son asked where she was, doctors didn't have a clue (UK Daily Mail, 4/29/12) Surgery bans elderly patient...

As Telegraph readers will recall, one of the earliest actions of the Obama presidency when it came to office in 2009 was to return a bust of Sir Winston Churchill to the British Embassy, an extraordinary move considering the huge admiration for the wartime leader on both sides of the Atlantic. Tim Shipman, The Sunday Telegraph’s Washington correspondent at the time (now Deputy Political Editor at The Daily Mail), was the first to break the story: A bust of the former prime minister once voted the greatest Briton in history, which was loaned to George W Bush from the Government's...

What better way to celebrate a dominant opening to group play at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London than with a hug from the first lady of the United States? After the final buzzer of their 98-71 win over France on Sunday, members of the U.S. men's national basketball team shook hands with their vanquished opposition, gathered at center court for a brief cheer, then walked off the court to a rousing ovation from the fans at the Basketball Arena in London. Before they headed back to the locker room, though, they took a quick left and headed straight for...

White House admits it did return Winston Churchill bust to Britain Barack Obama's White House has been forced to admit that it did return a bust of Sir Winston Churchill to British diplomats, after describing such claims as "100 per cent false". By Jon Swaine, Washington 7:53PM BST 29 Jul 2012 Aides to Mr Obama were furious after The Daily Telegraph disclosed last week that Mitt Romney planned to restore the Jacob Epstein sculpture to its home under George W Bush from 2001 to 2009. "I'm looking forward to the bust of Winston Churchill being in the Oval Office again,"...

LONDON - Britain was forced to bring in military personnel at short notice to provide security for the London Olympics -- and has now done the same to help fill thousands of empty seats at several venues despite the massive public demand for tickets. Many ordinary people who applied for tickets -- in what was essentially a lottery – missed out and there were numerous complaints about the allocation process. But the first day saw rows of empty seats at events including swimming, dressage, tennis, gymnastics and volleyball -- according to reports in The Guardian and Telegraph newspapers -- to...

Oxford University has rewritten the laws governing its strict academic dress code following concerns that they were unfair towards transgender students. Under the new regulations, students taking exams or attending formal occasions will no longer have to wear ceremonial clothing that is specific to their gender. It will mean men will be able to sit tests in skirts and stockings and women will have the option of wearing suits and bow ties. The new laws, which will come into force next week, comes after a motion put forward the university's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Queer society (LGBTQ Soc) was...

The choreographer of a somber segment in the London Olympics opening ceremony said Saturday he's disappointed that NBC decided not to show it to an American audience. Spectators were asked to display photos of loved ones who could not be there during the segment. The music, a hymn called "Abide With Me," was described in the ceremony's program as an "honest expression of the fear of approaching death." NBC producers did not air it, instead showing American viewers Ryan Seacrest's interview with swimmer Michael Phelps. "I am disappointed," said Londoner Akram Khan, who choreographed and danced in the segment. "I...