plot

Hezbollah denies the Syrian accusations, reiterating that it does not have any presence on Syrian territory.

Syrian security forces have said they foiled a plot to target the Homs oil refinery in central Syria, arresting a cell affiliated with Lebanon’s Hezbollah armed group.

Syria’s General Intelligence Service (GIS) said on X that “the preemptive security operation” was carried out in cooperation with the country’s Internal Security Forces.

It identified two arrested individuals with their initials – M S and B Sh – but did not elaborate on the time or the location of the operation, “which resulted in the seizure of explosive devices in their possession that had been prepared to execute the plot”.

Hezbollah denied the Syrian accusations in a statement, reiterating that it does not have any presence on Syrian territory and is not ⁠involved in “any activity that undermines the ⁠security and stability of Syria”.

Hezbollah ⁠fought alongside former President Bashar al-Assad’s forces during Syria’s nearly 14-year civil war, but relations with Damascus have deteriorated sharply since his overthrow in 2024.

Syrian authorities have accused ⁠Hezbollah of involvement in a series of alleged plots, including planned assassinations, ⁠rocket attacks and arms smuggling.

The Homs refinery is one of Syria’s two oil refineries, along with the Baniyas refinery, and plays a key role in securing petroleum products.

ISIL cell

In a similar operation, the GIS said on Sunday that they arrested two members of a suspected ISIL (ISIS) cell in the governorate of Deir Az Zor.

Sunday’s statement added that investigations “showed the detainees’ involvement in carrying out a series of assassinations in the province, the latest of which targeted defence ministry member Ibrahim al-Jassem with a gunshot near the al-Rashid mosque in the city of Mayadin”.

The operation led to the seizure of weapons and ammunition found in the cell’s hideout, the security forces said, adding that authorities were continuing investigations of “the terrorists to uncover their links in preparation for bringing them to justice”.

On September 27, the security forces said they had arrested four members of an ISIL cell involved in planning and carrying out several attacks in different parts of the country.

On September 30, the Syrian Electricity Company said the Deir Ali, Nasiriya and Tishreen power stations had gone out of service after an explosion on a gas line at the Tishreen station in the Damascus countryside, which cut off the gas supply needed to run them.

On October 15, the Syrian Petroleum Company said the pipeline carrying petroleum products from Baniyas to Homs was damaged near the village of Hadida in western Homs countryside, causing a fuel leak, state media reported, in the latest in a series of attacks on Syria’s energy infrastructure.

Last month, Syria’s security forces foiled a plot to target a police patrol in Damascus countryside, saying that an ISIL cell was preparing to carry out the attack, Syrian state television reported. They said the group was responsible for explosions and assassinations in Raqqa, Aleppo, Idlib and Homs.

Damascus joined the US-led international coalition against ISIL last November, which was formed in 2014 and has carried out operations against the group in Syria and Iraq.

Two British nationals have appeared in court in connection to an alleged Iran-linked plot at RAF Fairford last month.

Mohmed Abdulkarim, 24, from Westminster, London, has been charged with assisting a foreign intelligence service, which police earlier said they believed to be Iran.

Nouman Essghir, also 24 and from Westminster, has been charged with entering a prohibited place for a purpose prejudicial to the UK on 22 August – weeks before he was arrested near the airbase in Gloucestershire alongside four other men.

The pair appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday.

A major incident was declared after three suspicious vans were seen near the US-operated airbase on 27 September.

Dozens of residents were evacuated and a large cordon was put up in the area around the base. No explosive materials were found in the vans by police but a quantity of petrol was seized.

The court heard vans bearing the logo “Fuel2You” were spotted close to the base.

In the early hours, the vans came across a Ministry of Defence Police cordon and re-routed to another location.

Police arrived and arrested five men. They later revealed that one had called 999 and reported what was going on.

During the hearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court, Essghir stood in the dock wearing a grey sweatshirt and confirmed his name and address.

Abdulkarim is charged with helping with the plot.

He appeared in court in a wheelchair wearing a checked shirt, jeans and a baseball cap. He confirmed his name and address.

Both men are charged under the 2023 National Security Act.

Essghir has been remanded in custody, while Abdulkarim has been granted bail with conditions including the surrender of his passport.

The case will be next heard at the Old Bailey on 20 November.

As Coronation Street villain Idris Nazir takes cruel action against Underworld owner Carla Connor-Swain, actress Alison King has revealed ‘devastation and disaster’ ahead

Carla Connor-Swain will be cruelly targeted by a Coronation Street villain very soon.

Now, actress Alison King, who has played Carla for 20 years, has teased “devastation and disaster” ahead. While Carla’s wife Lisa Connor-Swain will be there to support her, Carla faces rough times.

With her business, Underworld, facing ruin, villain Idris Nazir goes out of his way to steal it from her, including by sabotaging her plans. Soon, Carla has a fight on her hands with her livelihood at risk.

Ali shared: “She’s trying her absolute best to keep a lid on how stressed she is so she doesn’t panic everyone. But with inflation, everything is tight.

“The orders haven’t been coming in, and they haven’t been winning the contracts they wanted. She’s keeping it under her hat, but they are really struggling.

“She’s been trying to be strong and deal with it on her own, but she’s had a lot coming at her. I think she’s taken her eye off the game a bit and hasn’t been as invested.

“We also haven’t had the full team together, Sarah’s been awaiting her trial. There’s been a lot of turmoil for everyone.” Lisa’s there for Carla, but it leads to tension between them, with Ali adding: “Lisa is very literal, so she says things coming from a place of love, but it really rubs Carla the wrong way.

“Carla is learning to deal with that and understand what Lisa actually means, but she hated the thought of that. The factory is a huge part of Carla’s identity, it’s everything to her. It’s that or nothing.

“She lives very much in the present, and that fight-or-flight mode keeps her going.” Of course Idris is doing his best to get to Carla, with him after Underworld. Ali said: “Idris instantly rubbed her up the wrong way.

“Just the fact that he chimed in as if he knew anything about her, the way he speaks to her, and how he carries himself, everything about him annoys her right from the off. It was very abrupt, and there was almost literal hatred there from the start.

“She doesn’t know she’s underestimated him yet because she doesn’t realise he was behind [what happens]. Carla fights fire with fire and isn’t frightened of someone like him, but she underestimates just how nasty and manipulative he can be.

“Her instincts about bad people are usually spot on, but at the moment, he doesn’t scare her because she doesn’t know what lengths he will go to.” Carla hopes to salvage things before they are lost though.

Ali said: “Everything is on track if she can get this massive order out. That would tide them over into the next contract, and they’d be fine. This new client is someone she’s been wanting to work with for ages, and she knows anyone in the industry would vouch for Underworld’s track record. She’s really looking forward to working with him.”

But things change as devastation strikes, while fans will have to wait and see what happens. Ali went on: “She loves her workforce, they mean everything to her. They’re like her children, especially after giving her the most beautiful wedding.

“So having to let them down, especially financially right before Christmas, is absolutely devastating for her. She’s completely gutted. She’s devastated. She keeps it to herself for as long as she can before having to confess that the insurance won’t cover it.

“She simply overlooked it because her head was full with everything else, Sarah, Betsy, and keeping things running. Given past trauma like the roof collapse, it’s a massive trigger for her. At this point, she genuinely thinks it was just a terrible, tragic accident.”

Carla will not go down without a fight though. Ali said: “Running it with someone else wouldn’t be her first choice, but if it’s her only option to keep everyone above water, she’d do it. What’s driving her to save it is the panic of having no plan B, not wanting to play second fiddle to Lisa, and feeling a massive responsibility toward her staff and being a role model for Betsy.

“But she does not want Idris involved at any cost.” Ali has enjoyed playing Carla’s “vulnerable” side in the scenes too. She said: “Bringing vulnerable Carla out of the box reminds everyone of who she really is.

“Every time she goes through a crisis like this, she comes back a bit more understanding and empathetic toward others, even if she still loses her temper along the way!” On her future if Underworld does close, she added: “Her default seems to be helping Roy in the cafe, I would love that, she could live the dream running a cafe.

“But she likes the day to day cut and thrust of running the factory so it might not keep her satisfied for too long. She isn’t ready to slow down.”

Coronation Street airs weeknights at 8:30pm on ITV1 and ITV X. * Follow Mirror Celebs and TV on TikTok , Snapchat , Instagram , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and Threads .

Tehran summons envoy in tit-for-tat move after Berlin summoned ambassador to Iran.

Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has summoned Germany’s ambassador after a court in Hamburg found two men guilty of plotting to kill two leaders of Jewish organisations at Tehran’s behest, accusing Berlin of leveling “baseless political allegations”.

The decision to summon envoy Axel Dittmann came after Germany summoned the Iranian ambassador, Majid Nili Ahmadabadi, on Monday over allegations that Tehran was behind the plot to assassinate the two pro-Israel public figures.

“Levelling security-related accusations against Iran has long been a tactic employed by the Zionist regime and certain Western nations,” Iran’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement broadcast by official news agency IRNA.

“Attempting to provide a judicial face to baseless political claims not only fails to lend any credibility to such allegations but also undermines the standing of the German judiciary itself,” the statement added.

Hamburg conviction

Berlin’s allegations stem from a court case involving two men, a Danish national and an Afghan national, who were convicted in a Hamburg court on Thursday for planning to target the president of Germany’s main group representing the Jewish community and the head of the German-Israeli society.

The German Foreign Ministry said on X that the Iranian ambassador had been summoned, adding Tehran would not be allowed to “threaten our free society”.

“The malicious assassination attempts against Josef Schuster and Volker Beck will have legal consequences,” it added.

“We do not tolerate attacks on Jewish life and on those who defend it anywhere, and certainly not in Germany.”

The Dane, partially identified as Ali Hassan S, was jailed for eight-and-a-half years. The Afghan, who was recruited as his accomplice, was sentenced to four-and-a-half years.

Iran’s intelligence service steered the two men, the court said. The pair were arrested in Denmark last year and extradited.

In sentencing the men, the judge said they were guilty of “terrorist activities orchestrated by Iran”.

At the time they were charged, the Iranian embassy in Berlin released a statement rejecting what it called “unfounded allegations made at the behest of Iran’s enemies”.

A teenager who travelled from Norway to the UK to carry out a “hit” for an organised crime group has been sentenced to 20 years’ detention.

Johannes Natland, 19, was arrested in a hotel room in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, with two working guns and 19 rounds of live ammunition in March 2025, the Old Bailey previously heard.

During his retrial, a jury heard the teen was “recruited” by the Foxtrot Network, which was described as a Swedish organised crime group backed by the Iranian regime.

Natland, who had admitted to possession of the firearms and ammunition, was unanimously found guilty of conspiracy to murder and sentenced at Woolwich Crown Court on Friday.

The Foxtrot Network has been sanctioned by both the UK and the US for its close links to the Iranian government, with Natland’s target remaining unclear.

Commander Helen Flanagan, head of Counter Terrorism Policing London, said: “We haven’t been able to establish exactly who the intended victim was.”

The Foxtrot Network is known for pioneering a relatively new phenomenon of hiring teenage killers that Europol has called “violence-as-a-service” (VaaS).

At the sentencing hearing, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb told Natland: “The Foxtrot Network is an organised crime group which has developed an arm’s-length method of recruiting young people to carry out violent crimes.

“You were recruited to travel to England to kill an unidentified target.”

Natland flew into Manchester Airport on an emergency passport on 17 March 2025, shortly after his 18th birthday.

He was guided by videos on the messaging app Signal to Huddersfield, where the guns, a stolen car and a stash of cash were hidden.

He was prevented from carrying out the hit after Norwegian police arrested the teenager who had recruited him for the Foxtrot Network and found messages about the UK plot on his phone.

There was then a race against time to find Natland before he located his unknown target in England.

Addressing Natland, the judge said: “At the heart of this case is a stark fact. You agreed to assassinate another human being, a stranger to you, in a foreign country.

“You knew nothing of that person’s life or circumstances. You were just 18 years old when you placed yourself in readiness to murder for money.”

Coworker alerted police after receiving disturbing messages from 19-year-old suspect.

A ‌teenager arrested in a Chicago suburb had shared a document expressing ⁠white supremacist ⁠views and outlined an alleged plan to carry out a mass shooting, potentially targeting a Hindu place of worship, police in the US state of Illinois have said.

Alexandros Paporakis, 19, of Palatine, was arrested on Sunday after an individual reported receiving concerning electronic communications from him, Palatine police said on Wednesday. It was not ⁠immediately clear whether he had legal representation.

Detectives searched Paporakis’s home and recovered a rifle, multiple loaded rifle magazines and hundreds of additional rounds of rifle ammunition.

“Among the recovered items was a tactical vest containing body armor and a patch displaying imagery associated with white supremacist extremism,” a police statement said.

Paporakis’s coworker reportedly told police that he openly identified himself as a white supremacist at work and said he “couldn’t wait” to kill Indian people, according to prosecutors from the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office.

Detectives recovered a document called “Why I fought: A.K.A.: (Aurora Shooter’s Manifesto)” which had sentiments expressing white supremacist and extremist ideologies, referencing violence towards South Asians, specifically Indians.

Authorities believed Paporakis was planning to carry out his attack on Sunday, possibly targeting a Hindu temple in Aurora, 40 miles (65km) southwest of Palatine.

“However, the specific intended location has not been confirmed and remains under ⁠investigation,” the police said, adding the FBI was assisting in the probe.

Police said Paporakis is facing felony charges of “making a terrorist threat” and possessing an unlawful weapon.

The suspect appeared for a detention hearing on Wednesday and his next court appearance is scheduled for the end of October.

Human rights advocates said hate against South Asians has surged in the United States in recent years due to rising anti-immigration policies and a rise in white supremacist ideology.