Dubai / Bloomberg First Gulf Bank (FGB) PJSC reported a better-than- expected six percent rise in full-year profit as the United Arab Emirates’ third-biggest bank was helped by non-operating income. Net income advanced to 6.01 billion dirhams ($1.64 billion) from 5.66 billion a year earlier, the Abu Dhabi-based lender said in an e-mailed statement on Sunday. The mean estimate of ...

Tel Aviv / Bloomberg Israel’s natural gas companies and Noble Energy Inc. have signed the first contract to supply natural gas from the Leviathan site offshore Israel. Partners in Leviathan, Israel’s largest field, will supply 6 billion cubic meters of gas over 18 years to two power stations owned by local electricity producer Edeltech Group. Leviathan will be developed by ...

Qamishli / AFP A delegation including senior US diplomat Brett McGurk met with members of a Kurd-Arab alliance fighting the IS extremist group inside Syria on Saturday, Kurdish sources said on Sunday. The visit appeared to be the first by a senior US government official inside Syrian territory. McGurk, who is US President Barack Obama’s envoy to an international coalition ...