Middle East Minute for January 15, 2021 - Al-Monitor: The Middle Eastʼs leading independent news source since 2012

Catch up on some of this week’s biggest headlines from around the Middle East. Lebanon begins a 24-hour curfew rule that’s in effect for 11 days, Turkey may have to brace for the return of nearly 1,500 migrants, and the US designates Yemen’s Houthis as a terrorist group.

A Syrian refugee carries two children moments after arriving on a dinghy on the Greek island of Lesbos, September 8, 2015. Greece asked the European Union for aid to prevent it being overwhelmed by refugees, as a minister said arrivals on Lesbos had swollen to three times as many as the island could handle. REUTERS/Dimitris Michalakis - RTX1RPL9

US unlikely to take more Syrian refugees

Barbara Slavin

USS Eisenhower

US Navy shoots down Iran-made drone fired from Yemen

Jared Szuba

In Washington, DC, reporting on defense, national security, military

Police and civil aviation personnel wearing protective face masks work at the Kuwait Airport as the repatriation process of Kuwait citizens continues, following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Kuwait City, Kuwait April 21, 2020. REUTERS/Stephanie McGehee - RC229G938E9I

Kuwait reduces its lockdown to 12 hours as virus cases continue to climb

Al-Monitor Staff

Al-Monitor Staff

Those displaced by conflict receive food aid in the Tuhayta district of Yemen's war-ravaged Hodeidah province, on June 30, 2021.

Aid agencies sound alarm as US considers relisting Houthis as terror group

Elizabeth Hagedorn

Elizabeth Hagedorn

In Washington, DC, reporting on diplomacy, regional politics, human rights