The eastern Mediterranean and Middle East are in the grips of one of their worst droughts in decades, which is drying rivers and lakes, shriveling crops and even leading to water cutoffs in major cities.

During Syria’s civil war, protecting the revered Sayyida Zeinab shrine was a rallying cry for some Shiite fighters and groups from beyond the country’s borders backing then-President Bashar Assad.

Intelligence officials in Syria’s new de facto government say they have thwarted a plan by the Islamic State group to set off a bomb at a Shiite shrine in the Damascus suburb of Sayyida Zeinab.