Residents of the city in Syria's north-eastern province of Hasakah were preparing to celebrate the New Year when the attackers struck at three restaurants.
German society and the economy stand to benefit from the influx of hundreds of thousands of refugees, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Thursday, repeating her optimistic mantra "we can do this".
A UN plan to suspend Syria's nearly five-year-old civil war calls for listing which militant groups may be fought despite an eventual ceasefire, one of the toughest issues vexing diplomats trying to end the conflict.
A 2,000-year-old arch from the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra is set to be replicated in London and New York as a "call to action" against Islamic State, which has overrun the city.
A top Syrian rebel leader and head of the most powerful insurgent group in the eastern suburbs of Damascus was killed in an aerial raid that targeted the group's headquarters, rebel sources and the Syrian army said on Friday.
Syrian Islamist fighters are to be evacuated from rebel-held areas in a UN-brokered deal which marks a significant victory of President Bashar al-Assad.