MIDEAST: Lessons from the Karine A -Déjà Vu All Over Again
Analysis by Marsha B. Cohen
WASHINGTON - As Israeli Defence Forces munitions experts sorted through 300 tonnes of weapons found on a German-owned, Cypriot-operated cargo ship flying the Antiguan flag, Israeli politicians were sifting through the various talking points that could be offloaded from the vessel.
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MIDEAST: Abbas Produces a Dubious Twist
Analysis by Mel Frykberg
RAMALLAH - U.S. and Israeli failure to take either Palestinian rights or Israeli settlement expansion seriously has placed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority (PA) in an untenable situation, which could seriously damage peace prospects.
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POLITICS: U.N. Affirms Israeli-Hamas War Crimes Report
By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS - A 575-page blistering report by Justice Richard Goldstone detailing war crimes in Gaza last December is refusing to die despite an aggressive Israeli smear campaign to kill it.
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US-SYRIA: Diplomatic Thaw Just Penetrating the Surface
Analysis by Ellen Massey
WASHINGTON - Four months ago, the Barack Obama administration announced that it would appoint an ambassador to Syria, ending a four-year freeze on diplomatic relations between the two countries.
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RIGHTS: Palestinian Women Suffer as Israel Violates CEDAW
By Mel Frykberg
RAMALLAH - Palestinian women continue to suffer abuse and denial of basic human rights at the hands of Israeli settlers and soldiers in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
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MIDEAST: Peace Plan May Yet Survive New Twists
Analysis by Jerrold Kessel and Pierre Klochendler
JERUSALEM - U.S. President Obama's Middle East engagement policy reverses the unsuccessful policy of his predecessor, but the U.S. is again committing faux pas aplenty.
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U.S.: Congress Out of Step with Public on Intl Law?
By Eli Clifton
WASHINGTON - The U.S. House of Representatives passed a non-binding resolution Tuesday condemning the Goldstone Report on Israeli and Hamas actions taking during the Gaza War as "irredeemably biased" against Israel and calling on U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to oppose any consideration of the report in multilateral fora, such as the United Nations.
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Q&A: 'This Calm Will Not Last'
By Jon Elmer interviews Palestinian icon LEILA KHALED
AMMAN - Leila Khaled became an instant icon of the Palestinian struggle in 1969, when at 24 she was an operative in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacking of a Boeing 707, the first in a series of high-profile actions intended to put the Palestinians on the political map.
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RIGHTS-US: Another Legal Setback for Arar Torture Case
By William Fisher
NEW YORK - A federal appeals court on Monday dismissed a lawsuit brought against a former U.S. attorney general by a Canadian citizen who sought damages for being unlawfully detained by U.S. authorities in New York and then secretly shipped to Syria, where he was imprisoned for a year and claims he was tortured.
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U.S.: Obama's Outreach to Muslim World Teetering
Analysis by Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON - U.S. President Barack Obama's extraordinary efforts since his first days in office to reassure Muslims in the Greater Middle East about U.S. intentions in the region have suffered a series of setbacks that threaten to reverse whatever gains he has made over the past 10 months in restoring Washington's badly battered image and influence there.
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