Hizbullah’s triumph is blow for Israeli policy
NEW YORK (IPS) — Since the 34-day Israel-Lebanon two years ago, and particularly after the Doha accord in May which restored Hizbullah to the Lebanese government and essentially gave it the veto power it demanded, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah has been the most popular figure anywhere in the Arab world. "For decades, the Shi'a...
U.S., Iraq have draft to pull U.S. troops out
August 22nd, 20080 BAGHDAD — Iraq and the U.S. have reached a preliminary agreement to withdraw American forces from Iraqi cities by next June, six years into the increasingly unpopular war, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Thursday after meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. The negotiations over a withdrawal timetable follow...Israel clears soldiers in killing of Palestinian journalist, youths
The Israeli government has announced it won't prosecute soldiers involved in the death of Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana and eight Palestinian youths. The twenty-four-year-old Palestinian died on April 16 in Gaza when an Israeli tank shelled his vehicle clearly marked "press." Shana's final piece of footage shows the tank firing a...Little hope of peace after Olmert
CAIRO (IPS) — With Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's recent resignation announcement, the self-proclaimed Jewish state is headed for new leadership. Egyptian commentators, though, entertain few hopes that Olmert's successor — whoever he or she may be — will temper Israel's hard-line approach to the peace process. "Israeli...Gaza and West Bank in muddied separation
RAMALLAH (IPS) — Over a hundred Fatah fighters loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement fled to the West Bank from Gaza last week, fearing for their lives at the hands of Hamas, the Islamic movement which took over the Gaza Strip in June 2007 after it routed Fatah forces. The Fatah men barely managed to escape...One-fifth of Iraq funding paid to contractors
NEW YORK (IPS) — As a new report forecasts that the 190,000 private contractors in Iraq and neighboring countries will cost U.S. taxpayers more than 100 billion dollars by the end of 2008, an under-the-radar Florida court case suggests that U.S. President George W. Bush — a staunch contractor supporter — is preparing to throw...U.S. officials admit worry over a “difficult” al-Maliki
WASHINGTON (IPS) — U.S. officials privately admit being concerned that Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al- Maliki has become "overconfident" about his government's ability to manage without U.S. combat troops, according to an Iraq analyst who just returned from a trip to Iraq arranged by U.S. commander General David Petraeus. Colin...U.S. shifts ‘hearts and minds’ fight
Washington — Nearly seven years after the 9/11 attacks spawned the question, "Why do they hate us?" and made the repair of America's poor international image a top foreign-policy pursuit, the Bush administration is taking a new tack in the "war of ideas." Out, or at least de-emphasized, is the effort to explain America and its...Palestinian Authority rejects Israeli proposal
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas rejected an Israeli peace proposal because it did not provide for a contiguous Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, Abbas' office said Tuesday. Nabil Abu Rdainah, Abbas' spokesman, told the official Palestinian WAFA news agency Israeli Premier Ehud Olmert's plan showed a "lack of...
Palestinians bury poet Darwish in West Bank
August 15th, 20080 Palestinians bade an emotional farewell on Wednesday to their national poet Mahmoud Darwish, who was laid to rest on a hilltop overlooking the West Bank city of Ramallah. Darwish died Saturday in Houston at age 67 after complications from open-heart surgery. He was the first Palestinian to receive a state funeral since Yasser...
Bomb blast rocks north Lebanon
August 15th, 20080 A bomb explosion in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli has killed at least 18 people, including nine soldiers. The blast, which also left 45 others injured, hit a military bus in central Nour Square early on Wednesday, officials said. The explosion happened near a bus pick-up point in the busy commercial district as people...U.S. Army hopes to keep native Arabic speakers
Washington — The Army may begin paying a retention bonus of as much as $150,000 to Arabic speaking soldiers in reflection of how critical it has become for the U.S. military to retain native language and cultural know-how in its ranks. Only one other job in the Army, Special Forces, rates such a super-sized retention bonus. Now,...Hizbullah influence likely to hold
BEIRUT — Lebanon's politicians squabbled this week over whether or not to enshrine Hizbullah's resistance to Israel in a ministerial statement to be adopted by the fledgling national unity government. But with the balance of power in favor of the Shi'a movement laid bare since the May strife, analysts said there was little doubt the...Egypt sentences opposition activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim
Washington — Leading pro-democracy activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim was on Saturday sentenced in absentia by an Egyptian court to two years in prison on charges of "tarnishing Egypt's reputation." The Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED) condemns what has been an extended campaign to silence and demonize Ibrahim for exercising his...Medical care contingent on spying
Israel's secret police are pressuring Palestinians in Gaza to spy on their community in exchange for urgent medical treatment, according to a report released this week by an Israeli human rights organization. Physicians for Human Rights says the Shin Bet began interrogating Palestinian patients seeking permission to travel from......
New operation gets surprise support
BAQUBA (IPS) — A massive military operation in Diyala province has underscored the military and political gains by the Sahwa militia, despite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's earlier attempts to thwart them. Maliki has now apparently come around to involving the Sahwa rather than opposing them. The Sahwa are the "Awakening Forces"...Israel attacks charities, orphanages
If you still think there are red lines that Israel has not crossed with regard to its treatment of Palestinians, don't be too sure. In recent days and weeks, the Israeli army has been vandalizing, ransacking and confiscating Palestinian civilian institutions in the West Bank's largest towns and cities, including Ramallah, the seat of...What does al-Maliki really want?
The July deadline for Iraq and the United States to sign a security agreement for the long-term status of U.S. troops in Iraq is stumbling to a close. Officials of both the Bush administration and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki's government are now admitting that meeting a deadline that would allow Iraq to restore full...Iraq is poised to explode
While everyone's looking at Iraq's effect on American politics — and whether or not John McCain and Barack Obama are converging on a policy that combines a flexible timetable with a vague, and long-lasting, residual force — let's take a look instead at Iraqi politics. The picture isn't pretty. Despite the optimism of the neocons,......
Bodies swap is uneasy triumph
BEIRUT (IPS) — The image of 199 coffins covered with Lebanese, Palestinian and Hizbullah flags neatly aligned in a southern Beirut compound was broadcast last week on all national Lebanese TV stations. On Tuesday this week, 144 of these remains were transferred to Syria, their final place of rest. Such images have stirred varying...
Bush, U.S. military pressure Iraqis on withdrawal
July 26th, 20080 WASHINGTON (IPS) — Instead of moving toward accommodating the demand of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for a timetable for U.S. military withdrawal, the George W. Bush administration and the U.S. military leadership are continuing to pressure their erstwhile client regime to bow to the U.S. demand for a long-term military......
Roadblocks cripple West Bank economy
July 26th, 20080 HEBRON (IPS) — The Israeli military has erected three additional roadblocks, further blocking vehicular access on the road between the south Hebron village of At-Tuwani and the commercial hub of Yatta in the southern West Bank. The West Bank is the Palestinian area west of the Jordan river, much of it under Israeli control....Cancer on the rise in Lebanon
BEIRUT (IPS) — Reports of a rising incidence of cancer now worry many families across Lebanon. Over the past 40 years, reported cases of cancer have risen from 3,000 to about 8,000 a year. "Cancer has certainly increased in terms of real figures. Statistics in the 1960s show 100 incidents per 100,000 individuals. The most recent......
