Many Syrians in refugee camps across the border in Lebanon were lawyers, teachers, dentists, accountants. As the conflict enters its fifth year they have become the forgotten millions.

Political unrest. Conflict. The collapse of the country's social infrastructure. And then a daily struggle just to stay alive. An artists has imagined what it would look like in NZ.

New images have emerged of three men accused of homosexuality and blasphemy being publicly beheaded at a traffic roundabout in northern Iraq.

Soldiers may be excused from going to train Iraqi forces in fight against Isis, for personal reasons. The Defence Force says it is part of being a "good employer".

Asim Qureshi has caused outrage by saying the murderer Jihadi John was 'beautiful' adding that he 'wouldn't hurt a fly'.

The Isis executioner known as 'Jihadi John' was today named as a graduate from London who was able to flee to Syria despite being on a terror watch list.

Prime Minister John Key has defended his angry counter-attack in Parliament after Opposition parties' criticised the decision to send troops to the Middle East.

NZ soldiers training Iraqi troops near Baghdad will not be taking a "them-and-us" view of the Iraqis but a partnership approach.

Lieutenant General Tim Keating, says New Zealand troops deployed to Iraq will have force protection for self defence and and all forces will be armed.

Sending troops to Iraq not unethical but duplicity, anger and hatred in Middle East may crush New Zealand's efforts, writes law professor Alexander Gillespie.

Prime Minister John Key says New Zealand is not considering an Iraq deployment to “wave its flag” or please its American allies, but to play an important role in forcing back the “reprehensible” Islamic State.

A video has emerged online claiming one of the two hostages being held by Isis has been killed and showing the other hostage outlining new terms for his release.

Hostages are a "military consultant" who headed to war zones after his wife died of cancer and a journalist dedicated to revealing horrors of war.

Intelligence agencies believe a teenager and her 20-year-old friend have become the first Australian women to join terrorists in Syria and offer themselves as jihadi brides.

Parliament has just passed legislation aimed at stopping would-be foreign fighters from leaving New Zealand to join Islamic State in Iraq.

The father of a teenager from Cardiff is thought to be the first Briton to have rescued his son from the jihadist group Islamic State.

Three NZ Defence Force personnel have already left for the Middle East to scope out a role for New Zealand forces to help train Iraqi forces fight ISIS.

The Prime Minister's landmark speech on national security has two messages for New Zealanders, but they are somewhat discordant.

John Key says any NZ commitment to the campaign against Isis in the Middle East would be for a long time, pointing to the 10-year deployment of troops to Bamiyan.

Isis is a nasty, brutish group that uses terror in parts of the globe, but it doesn't threaten the entire world. So Kiwis don't need to fight, says David Shearer.

New Zealand's contribution to the fight against Isis is set to be discussed at Cabinet today.

The second of three brothers who travelled to Syria to join forces seeking the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad has been killed in fighting, his father has confirmed.

John Key says he believes Isis is full of 'very bad people' and a military response is morally justified - but hasn't yet made a decision on whether NZ will fight them.

A teenage jihadist who ran away from his family in Australia to join the Islamic State terror group in Syria, has reportedly appeared in a new video.

In the weeks and months before he was brutally murdered on camera by militants from Isis, James Foley was beaten, starved, subjected to mock executions and even waterboarded by his captors.

Ginger jihadist Abdullah Elmir could face 25 years in jail if he ever sets foot on Australian soil again.

Abdullah Elmi, an Australian jihadist, has been lambasted by his Australian relatives as an idiot for his chilling video message.

French journalist Nicholas Henin reveals describes his "brutal and gruesome" life as an Islamic State hostage.