PICTURED: Editor selections from the Middle East
Tensions soared in Jerusalem this week after a grisly attack on a synagogue, an Egyptian doctor was acquitted in the country's first female genital mutilation trial, and Lebanese demanded the release of family members captured by militants.
The attack in Jerusalem saw two Palestinians kill five people with guns and meat cleavers. It was the deadliest attack in the city since 2008 and the latest in a wave of violence linked to a dispute over a holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims.
In Egypt, a court acquitted a doctor in the death of a 13-year-old girl in the country's first female genital mutilation trial. Survivors of the practice came forward to tell their stories in a portrait series by Cairo-based photographer Nariman El-Mofty.
FILE - In this Friday, Nov. 21, 2014 file photo, a Palestinian protester using a sling shot throws a stone towards Israeli security forces during clashes following a protest against Israeli restrictions on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, at the Qalandia checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah.(AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed, File)
In Lebanon, families of soldiers captured by Islamic militants pressed the government to take action.
But amid all the turmoil there were moments of levity in Afghanistan and Iraq. Thousands of families have flocked to Kabul's first amusement park — a refuge in a country blighted by war and poverty. In Baghdad, the School of Music and Ballet has managed to survive decades of turmoil, a feat that speaks to the resilience of the city's residents.
And British driver Lewis Hamilton sealed his second Formula One title in style at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
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Associated Press photographers and photo editors on Twitter: http://apne.ws/15Oo6jo
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AP Middle East regional photo editor Maya Alleruzzo curated this gallery. Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/mayaalleruzzo
FILE - In this Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014 file photo, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish youth looks at a bullet hole at a synagogue a day after a shooting attack there in Jerusalem. The synagogue attack, which left five people dead, was the deadliest in Jerusalem since 2008 and came amid weeks of violence linked to a disputed holy site sacred to Jews and Muslims. Nearly a dozen people have been killed in attacks by Palestinians using guns, knives and vehicles. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner, File)
FILE - In this Thursday, Nov. 20, 2014 file photo, the Dome of the Rock Mosque in the Al Aqsa Mosque compound is seen in Jerusalem's old city. Tensions in the region have spiked in recent weeks, largely over the disputed holy site in Jerusalem sacred to both Muslims and Jews. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner, File)
FILE - In this Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014 file photo, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man prayers as Israeli rescue workers clean the scene of a shooting attack in a Synagogue in Jerusalem. Two Palestinians stormed a Jerusalem synagogue on Tuesday, attacking worshippers praying inside with knives, axes and guns, and killing four people before they were killed in a shootout with police, officials said. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit, File)
FILE - On this Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014 file photo, an Israeli forensic expert photographs the bodies of two Palestinians killed in a shootout with police at the scene of a shooting attack in a Synagogue in Jerusalem. Two Palestinians stormed a Jerusalem synagogue on Tuesday, attacking worshippers praying inside with knives, axes and guns, and killing four people before they were killed by police, officials said. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner, File)
FILE - In this Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014 file photo, ultra-Orthodox Jews attend the funeral of Mosheh Twersky, in Jerusalem. Two Palestinian cousins armed with meat cleavers and a gun stormed a Jerusalem synagogue during morning prayers Tuesday, killing Twersky and three others in the city's bloodiest attack in years. Police killed the attackers in a shootout. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File)
FILE - In this Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014 file photo, Palestinians hang national flag inside the demolished apartment of Abdel Rahman al-Shaludi in east Jerusalem. Israeli authorities demolished the apartment as a punitive measure after al-Shaludi's deadly attack with his car on a Jerusalem train station last month which left five people dead. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean, File)
FILE - In this Friday, Nov. 21, 2014 file photo, a Palestinian woman flinches as Israeli border policemen clash with protesters opposed to Israeli restrictions on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, at the Qalandia checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah.(AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed, File)
FILE - In this Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014 file photo, a group of female spectators leave as another group follows a debate of the Iranian parliament on a vote of confidence for nominee for the post of science minister Fakhroddin Ahamadi Danesh Ashtiani proposed by the President Hassan Rouhani, in Tehran, Iran. Iran's parliament rejected Rouhani's nominee for the post of science minister over his pro-reform tendencies. In October the parliament rejected Mahmoud Nili Ahmadabadi, another nominee for the same post; the same body dismissed former-Science Minister Reza Faraji Dana in August over similar allegations. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)
FILE - In this Monday, Nov. 17, 2014 file photo, Inaam Omar, 50, aunt of one Lebanese soldier Ziad Omar who was kidnapped by Islamic militants, holds his picture during a demonstration to demand action to secure the captives' release, in front of government heaquarters in downtown Beirut, Lebanon. The militants, including the al-Qaida linked Nusra Front and the extremist Islamic State group, are holding some 20 Lebanese soldiers and policemen hostages since August, when they briefly overran a Lebanese border town. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein, File)
FILE - In this Saturday, Nov. 15, 2014 file photo, Hamdeya Nazmy, 43, who was forcefully subjected to female genital mutilation as a 9-year-old child poses for a photograph with her 5-year-old daughter Demyana, in Sidfa, 340 kilometers (210 miles) south of Cairo, Egypt. Nazmy has seven daughters and only one was submitted to female genital cutting. Genital mutilation involves removing all or part of the clitoris and labia minora. It is practiced in 29 countries, most of them in East and West Africa, but also in Egypt and parts of Iraq and Yemen. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty, File)
FILE - In this Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2014 file photo, Reda el-Danbouki, Egyptian lawyer for 13-year-old Sohair el-Batea who died undergoing the procedure of female genital mutilation committed by Dr. Raslan Fadl, points at her grave in Dierb Biqtaris village, on the outskirts of Aga town in Dakahliya,120 kilometers (75 miles) northeast of Cairo, Egypt. It was not easy getting the landmark case to trial, and no cases had come before a court, years after FGM was banned. Sohair¿s family initially filed a police report saying she died as a result of FGM, but later changed their story after reconciling with the doctor, said el-Danbouki. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty, File)
FILE - In this Nov. 12, 2014 file photo, young students practice at a dancing studio in the Baghdad School of Music and Ballet in Monsur district in Baghdad, Iraq. The school has managed to survive decades of turmoil, a feat that speaks to the resilience of Baghdad's residents through war after war. (AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed, File)
FILE - In this Friday, Nov. 14, 2014 file photo, visitors enjoy a spinning chair ride at Afghanistan's first amusement park called City Park in Kabul. Excitement builds in the queue forming behind the barbed-wire security fence outside the park as children in bright clothes clutch their parents' hands and hop from foot to foot in anticipation of the pleasures waiting behind the high concrete blast walls. For the thousands of families who have visited there since it opened during a national religious holiday weekend in October, it is a rare escape from lives blighted by war, death and misery. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)
FILE - In this Thursday, Nov. 20, 2014 file photo, a Pakistani boy who is displaced with his family from tribal area of Bajur where security forces are fighting against militants, plays with his donkey in Islamabad's slums.(AP Photo/B.K. Bangash, File)
FILE - In this Sunday, Nov. 23, 2014 file photo, Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain takes the checkered flag to win Abu Dhab Formula one at the Yas Marina racetrack in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. (AP Photo/Kamran Jebreili, File)
FILE - In this Sunday, Nov. 23, 2014 file photo, Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain hugs his partner American singer Nicole Scherzinger after winning the Emirates Formula One Grand Prix to clinch the Formula One world championship at the Yas Marina racetrack in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. (AP Photo/Kamran Jebreili, File)
FILE - In this Thursday, Nov. 20, 2014 file photo,an Emirati man takes a selfie outside of the Ferrari pits at the Yas Marina racetrack in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. With double points on offer in the Formula One finale, there could yet be a bitter twist to the fascinating title duel between Mercedes teammates Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The Emirates Formula One Grand Prix will take place on Sunday. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar, File)
