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Oliver Glasner, who has been heavily linked with a move to Manchester United, confirms he will leave Crystal Palace.

Oliver Glasner ‌will not extend his contract with Crystal ‍Palace ‍, which is due to expire at the end of the season, the Austrian manager has confirmed.

Glasner guided Palace to victory in ⁠the FA Cup last season, the first major ​trophy of their 164-year-old history, as well ‍as the Community Shield in August.

The 51-year-old’s success at Palace has made him a key target for other clubs, and he ⁠has been linked with the top job at Manchester United.

“A decision has already been taken, months ago. I had a meeting with Steve [Parish] in October, the international break,” Glasner told reporters on Friday.

“We had a very long talk, ​and I told him I ‌will not sign a new contract. We agreed at the time, it was the best to keep it between us. It’s ‌the best that we could do, and keep it confidential ‌for three months.

“But now it’s important ⁠to have clarity, and we had a very busy schedule, so that’s why we didn’t want to talk about it. ‌Steve and I want the best for Crystal Palace.”

Palace are 13th in the league standings with 28 ‍points from 21 matches and travel to Sunderland on Saturday.

Man City set to confirm Guehi capture from Crystal Palace

Manchester City are understood to agreed a deal in principle to sign Crystal Palace captain Marc Guehi as they battle a defensive crisis.

The England defender was close to joining Liverpool on transfer deadline day in September before the move collapsed.

Other clubs reportedly interested in Guehi, including Liverpool once again and Bayern Munich, were understood to be targeting a move at the end of the season, when Guehi was due to be a free agent.

Pep Guardiola, speaking on the eve of City’s match against Manchester United, was tight-lipped when asked about the club’s potential interest in Guehi, stressing he had “nothing to say”.

Palace travel to Sunderland on Saturday, where Glasner will not ‌be able to call upon defender Guehi.

The 25-year-old was linked with ⁠a move to Manchester City earlier on Friday, with British media reporting that a deal had been agreed in principle.

Asked about Guehi’s future, Glasner said, “I can’t confirm the club because it is not done, but is in the final stages, and the result ‌is Marc doesn’t play tomorrow for us.”

Guehi captained Palace to FA Cup success in May against City and has won 26 England caps.

City boss Guardiola, whose team are second in the Premier League, six points behind Arsenal, said the team were desperately short of defensive options.

“Without John [Stones], without Ruben [Dias], without Josko [Gvardiol], we are in a difficult situation for not one game but a long, long period,” he said.

“It’s a difficult situation. Ruben will be back soon. Josko, no. John, hopefully, we’ll see.”

President Trump’s administration said Tuesday it will end temporary protected status for immigrants from Somalia, the latest move in the president’s mass deportation agenda.

The move affects hundreds of people who are a small subset of immigrants with TPS protections in the United States. It comes during Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, where many native Somalis live and where street protests have intensified since a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent killed a U.S citizen who was demonstrating against federal presence in the city.

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that affected Somalis must leave the U.S. by March 17, when existing protections, last extended by former President Biden, will expire.

“Temporary means temporary,” said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, adding that the decision puts “Americans first.”

The Congressional Research Service last spring said the Somali TPS population was 705 out of nearly 1.3 million TPS immigrants. But Trump has rolled back protections across multiple countries in his second presidency.

Congress established the Temporary Protected Status program in 1990 to help foreign nationals attempting to leave unstable, threatening conditions in their home countries. It allows the executive branch to designate a country so that its citizens are eligible to enter the U.S. and receive status.

Somalia first received the designation under President George H.W. Bush amid a civil war in 1991. The status has been extended for decades, most recently by Biden in July 2024.

Noem insisted circumstances in Somalia “have improved to the point that it no longer meets the law’s requirement for Temporary Protected Status.”

Located in the horn of Africa, Somalia is one of the world’s poorest nations and has for decades been beset by chronic strife exacerbated by multiple natural disasters, including severe droughts.

The 2025 congressional report stated that Somalis had received more than two dozen extensions because of perpetual “insecurity and ongoing armed conflict that present serious threats to the safety of returnees.”

Trump has targeted Somali immigrants with racist rhetoric and accused those in Minneapolis of massively defrauding federal programs.

In December, Trump said he did not want Somalis in the U.S., saying they “come from hell” and “contribute nothing.” He made no distinction between citizens and non-citizens or offered any opinion on immigration status. He has had especially harsh words for Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat who emigrated from Somalia as a child. Trump has repeatedly suggested she should be deported, despite her being a U.S. citizen, and in his rant last fall he called her “garbage.”

Omar, who has been an outspoken critic of the ICE deployment in Minneapolis, has called Trump’s “obsession” with her and Somali-Americans “creepy and unhealthy.”

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

The UK’s Ministry of Defence says an underground facility likely storing ISIL weapons was the target of the attack, but the area was ‘devoid of any civilian habitation’.

The United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence has said its aircraft joined France in striking an underground facility in Syria that had likely been used by the ISIL (ISIS) group to store weapons, as the group appears to be resurgent after a period of relative dormancy in the region.

“Royal Air Force aircraft have completed successful strikes against Daesh in a joint operation with France,” the ministry said of the Saturday night attack in a statement, using the Arabic acronym for ISIL.

The statement said the area, north of the ancient site of Palmyra, was “devoid of any civilian habitation”.

The United States military in late December said it had killed or captured about 25 ISIL fighters in a wave of attacks over nine days in Syria.

The Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees the US military’s Middle East operations, issued a statement on Tuesday marking the conclusion of the operations last month.

The campaign followed the killing of two US soldiers and a civilian interpreter by an ISIL attacker in Syria on December 13, and widespread US strikes against the group six days later.

In the meantime, Turkiye’s government said on Wednesday it had detained more than 100 ISIL suspects in nationwide raids, as the group shows signs of intensified regional activity after a period of relative dormancy.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya announced the arrests, saying Turkish authorities rounded up 125 suspects across 25 provinces, including Ankara.

The operation was the third of its kind in less than a week during the holiday season, and follows a deadly shootout on Tuesday between Turkish police and suspected ISIL members in the northwestern city of Yalova.

That clash killed three Turkish police and six suspected ISIL members, all Turkish nationals. A day later, Turkish security forces arrested 357 suspected ISIL members in a coordinated crackdown.

In 2017, when the group still held large swaths of neighbouring Syria and Iraq before being vanquished on the battlefield, ISIL attacked an Istanbul nightclub during New Year’s celebrations, killing 39 people. Istanbul prosecutor’s office said Turkish police had received intelligence that operatives were “planning attacks in Turkiye against non-Muslims in particular” this holiday season.

On top of maintaining sleeper cells in Turkiye, ISIL is still active in Syria, with which Turkiye shares a 900km (560-mile) border, and has carried out a spate of attacks there since the ouster of former President Bashar al-Assad last year.

Syria has faced mounting security challenges after more than 13 years of ruinous civil war that ended late in 2024 with the fall of former President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

Israel on Friday announced it is officially recognising Somaliland, a first for the self-proclaimed republic since 1991.

The leader of Yemen’s Houthi rebels has warned any Israeli presence in Somaliland would be considered a “military target”, in the latest condemnation of Israel’s move to recognise the breakaway region.

“We consider any Israeli presence in Somaliland a military target for our armed forces, as it constitutes aggression against Somalia and Yemen, and a threat to the security of the region,” said the group’s chief, Abdel-Malik al-Houthi, according to a statement published by rebel media online.

Israel announced on Friday that it is officially recognising Somaliland, a first for the self-proclaimed republic that in 1991 declared it unilaterally separated from Somalia.

The Houthi chief warned that the move carried grave consequences, saying that recognition is “a hostile stance targeting Somalia and its African surroundings, as well as Yemen, the Red Sea, and the countries along both shores of the Red Sea”.

Somaliland, which has for decades pushed for international recognition, enjoys a strategic position on the Gulf of Aden and has its own money, passport and army.

Regional analysts say a rapprochement with Somaliland would provide Israel with better access to the Red Sea, enabling it to hit Houthi rebels in Yemen.

After launching its genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, Israel repeatedly struck targets in Yemen in response to Houthi attacks on Israel, which the Yemeni rebels said were in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.

The Houthis have halted their attacks since a fragile truce began in Gaza in October.

Somaliland has been diplomatically isolated since its unilateral declaration of independence, even if it has generally experienced greater stability than Somalia, where al-Shabab fighters periodically mount attacks in the capital, Mogadishu.

Israel’s recognition of Somaliland was criticised by the African Union, Egypt, Turkiye, the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, and the Saudi-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

The European Union insisted that Somalia’s sovereignty should be respected.