Both sides of the aisle want to avoid a shutdown, and will most likely pass a stopgap bill through March, but the negotiations over the details are still ongoing.

Congress has just 10 days until government funding is set to run out, and lawmakers don’t have a deal to keep the lights on during the holidays.

The fall of the Assad government in Syria took almost everybody by surprise and has created uncertainty for competing foreign interests that had established lines of control most assumed were frozen in the region.

With the mood in Damascus still celebratory, Assad's prime minister, Mohammed Jalali, on Monday agreed to hand power to the rebel-led Salvation Government, an administration based in rebel-held territory in northwest Syria.

Video shows Syrian rebel fighters destroying tomb of the late president Hafez al-Assad, the father of the ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. The tomb also houses the graves of Hafez al-Assad's wife and eldest son.