A few years ago Damascus was a place of calm in a violent region.

Previous experience has been positive and benefits would outweigh the costs.

It is an image that challenges me emotionally every time I look at it, and the more I look, the more it challenges me.

Ralph Baydoun is a 23-year-old Lebanese videographer based in World Vision's Beirut office and last month we travelled together to some of the more challenging areas of the Middle East - the Kurdistan region of Iraq, and the Lebanon-Syrian border.

"As I write to you, I feel so much sadness because you stayed behind in Syria on your own. You are far away and the war in Syria has grown distance between us."

Sometimes Fatma's granddaughters want to talk about their old life in Syria. They lived in a nice house in Aleppo and went to school every day.

I first met Reverend Harold Good eight years ago in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Spare a thought for our Prime Minister. The price of "club" membership is to take New Zealand into a war not of our making, training troops who were once our enemy.

He looks downwards and shakes his head in response to my question, "What do you hope for?"

The school bus lurches to a halt outside a Bekaa Valley primary school in the east of Lebanon.

Canada's mysterious and small operation has become a lot bigger and more costly since it began, writes Dita De Boni. Which could be our fate, too.

The Syrian conflict is one of several emergencies World Vision is responding to.

An auction of Kiwi artists' work has raised $22,000 for a project that uses art to help Syrian kids cope with the trauma of civil war.

The Independent investigates how Isis jihadis govern every aspect of life within the territories they control.

There was no dignity in childbirth for Sabrine. She lay on a bed, exhausted, lurching in and out of consciousness.

'The scenes terrified me': Meet the former jihadi who deserted Isis rather than take part in executions, beheadings and rape.

The memories and the sound of war can never be forgotten but help when working with refugees, writes Rachel Smalley.

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.

For refugees, possessions are few and far between but there is still plenty that they treasure. Photographer Jo Currie captured these precious fragments.

An Australian extremist has been killed fighting in Syria, rebels have claimed.

World Vision's Dominica Leonard travelled with Rachel Smalley to the Middle East to meet Iraqi and Syrian refugees for our Forgotten Millions campaign. Here she tells the story of three young children who stole her heart in the midst of a refugee camp in

One of the lesser-noted points in Prime Minister John Key's speech last year on the New Zealand response to the crisis caused by Isis was that "we will be looking at further assistance to meet....

Zeinab is in the throes of puberty. She is 14 years old, Syrian, and a wife.

Broadcaster Rachel Smalley finds she has a lot in common with struggling mothers who are caring for children in a conflict zone.

The Nigerian militant group Boko Haram has announced it is joining Isis by apparently releasing an audio statement swearing allegiance.

Broadcaster Rachel Smalley meets a refugee of the Syrian conflict whose 5-year-old daughter was taken when an Isis convoy arrived in her village.

The Herald and World Vision are running a major campaign to raise funds and help the 5.6 million children left homeless by war in Syria.

Young Muslims lured to Syria by extremist groups should not automatically be labelled terrorists but dealt with like victims of trafficking, the head of Europol has said.

Today the Herald and World Vision begin a campaign to help the 5.6 million children left homeless by war in Syria. Broadcaster Rachel Smalley tells some of their stories.

New Zealand troops are preparing for a two-year tour in Iraq to help the fight against Islamic State. This is what they are up against.