International Politics of the Middle East

Some inside the White House have cited Hezbollah, the armed Lebanese political movement, as an example of what the Taliban could become. Hezbollah is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. government, but the group has political support within Lebanon and participates, sometimes through intimidation, in the political process. Some White House advisers have noted that although Hezbollah is a source of regional instability, it is not a threat to the United States. The senior administration official said the Hezbollah example has not been cited specifically to President Obama and has been raised only informally outside the Situation Room meetings.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Thursday that "there is clearly a difference between" the Taliban and "an entity that, through a global, transnational jihadist network, would seek to strike the U.S. homeland." "I think the Taliban are, obviously, exceedingly bad people that have done awful things," Gibbs said. "Their capability is somewhat different, though, on that continuum of transnational threats."

"The police are now saying that up to 100 kilos [of explosives] - perhaps more than that - may have been used in this particular attack."

"What is surprising everyone is that immediately after the attack, the provincial information minister came out and said that he knew where the attack came from, and started saying that people should be united against the Taliban, even though the Taliban have not claimed responsibility," he said.

No responsibility claim

Washington has denied any involvement

Amiri, who is said to be a researcher at Tehran's Malek Ashtar University, disappeared after he went on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia in June.

His family in Tehran said he was closely questioned by Saudi police at the airport and later called his wife from Medina, in Saudi Arabia, before apparently vanishing.

If current demographic trends continue, moreover, the world could level off at about 9 billion persons in 2050, and nearly 1/3 of those could well be Muslim. The really big Muslim populations are not in the Middle East, which is largely arid and wouldn't support such populations. It is in relatively well-watered places such as Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and Indonesia in Asia where the bulk of Muslims live.

One of the implications is that the US is a little unlikely to thrive as a superpower in the 21st century if its more venal and bloodthirsty politicians go on barking about "Islamo-fascism" (they never said Christo-Fascism even though Gen. Franco in Spain was a good candidate for the label) and denigrating Islam and Muslims and seeking to militarily occupy their countries and siphon off their resources. That kind of behavior may have worked in the 19th century before Muslims were mobilized, but it does not work now.

Syria and Saudi Arabia have jointly called for a national unity government to be formed in Lebanon to end the continuing political stalemate there.

The Saudis back the pro-Western parliament majority in Lebanon and the Syrians the Hezbollah-led opposition.

Syria's official news agency said the two sides "affirmed the importance of reaching consensus in Lebanon and finding points of agreement through the formation of a national unity government as basis for the stability".

Israel's foreign minister has said there is no chance of an early solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and told people to "learn to live with it".

In a radio interview, Mr Lieberman said people who thought Israel and the Palestinians could reach a deal "do not understand reality and are sowing illusions".

"We have to be realistic - we will not be able to reach agreement on core and emotional subjects like Jerusalem and the right of return (of Palestinian refugees0," he said.

Turkey and Armenia will sign landmark deals this weekend to normalise ties, in a major step towards ending nearly a century of hostility over their bloody history, Russian and US officials said Thursday.

two protocols, agreed under Swiss mediation, to establish diplomatic ties for the first time and open their border which has been sealed for more than a decade.

on Saturday in Zurich

while we must strive to reinforce the common principles that we share, we must also accept the reality of differences in our values and in our outlook. Islam and the West have distinct value systems. Respect for our differences is a foundation for coexistence, and never for conflict.

While some of the divide between Islam and the West lies in the realm of ideas, it lies mostly in the realm of politics. The violence and the aggression to which many Muslim countries have been subjected are the main sources of a deep and legitimate sense of grievance, and they must be addressed.

Tensions have run high in Jerusalem since Sunday after authorites closed the al-Aqsa mosque compound in the Old City, claiming people were inciting violence. Clashes broke out, with seven Palestinian  protesters injured and three arrested.

On Tuesday, some 2,000 police officers deployed in strength across Jerusalem as an annual Jewish march took place. But no incidents have been reported.

Silvan Shalom, the Israeli deputy prime minister, told public radio that "the battle is under way for sovereignty over Jerusalem and particularly over the Temple Mount".

The Egyptian government said today that its antiquities department had severed ties with the Louvre in Paris because it had refused to return "stolen" artefacts. The Louvre has said it is open to returning the four reliefs from the tomb of the noble Tetaki, though it is awaiting a decision from a committee of experts and final approval from the culture ministry. The ruling means that no archaeological expeditions connected to the Louvre will be allowed to work in Egypt. Among the Supreme Council of Antiquities' other targets is the Rosetta Stone, pictured, which is in the British Museum.

Many Palestinians have expressed anger at PA President Mahmoud Abbas for seeming to let Israelis off the hook following Goldstone's trenchant criticism of Israel's blockade of Gaza and attacks on its citizens.

Academics and rights workers held a street protest on Monday.

Hamas, which controls Gaza, has lashed out at the decision as "shameful and irresponsible", and posters saying "to the trash heap of history, you traitor, Mahmoud Abbas" have appeared in the Strip.

The White House said prior to Tuesday's meeting that Obama considered it "tremendously important" to listen to congress about the war, but would not base his decision on the mood on Capitol Hill or waning public support for the war.

Afghanistan's ambassador to the United States has said that more US troops are needed in his country to help promote stability and train the domestic security forces.

"We are very grateful for what the United States has done for Afghanistan; we respect the decision of the [US] president," he told Al Jazeera on Wednesday.

A Saudi court on Wednesday sentenced a man who caused uproar by bragging about his sex life on television to five years in prison and 1,000 lashes

He made the comments on Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation, which aired the interview a few months ago. Saudi authorities shut down LBC offices in Jeddah and Riyadh after airing the interview on an episode of its popular show "A Thick Red Line." Abdul Jawad was arrested shortly after the program aired and charged with violating Saudi Arabia's crime of publicizing vice.

The segment in question has been posted on the video-sharing site YouTube since its initial broadcast last month, and has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

Every year thousands of women arrive in the Gulf to take up jobs as domestic workers.

The majority of them leave behind their families on a huge financial gamble to try to earn enough in remittances.

Two and a half years ago, Mary left her family in East Africa to work as a maid in a private house in the Middle East.

Perhaps what Iran wants is the ability to produce a nuclear weapon fast, rather than have a standing arsenal

I think a single hypothesis can account for all the known facts. These are: Iran is making a drive to close the fuel cycle and to be capable of independently enriching uranium to at least the 5 percent or so needed for energy reactors and also to the 20 percent needed for its medical reactor. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei gave a fatwa in 2005 that no Islamic state may possess or use atomic weapons because they willy nilly kill masses of innocent civilians when used, which is contrary to the Islamic law of war (which forbids killing innocent non-combatants). Iranian officials have repeatedly denied that they are working on a nuclear bomb or that they aspire to have one. US intelligence agencies are convinced that Iran has done no weapons-related experiments since 2003, and that it currently has no nuclear weapons program. Israel forcefully maintains that Iran's nuclear program is for weapons and has repeatedly threatened to bomb the Natanz enrichment facilities. Iran recently announced a new nuclear enrichment facility near Qom.

Those who agree with the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency, as well as with the International Atomic Energy Agency, that there is no evidence for Iran having a nuclear weapons program have to explain Iran's insistence on closing the fuel cycle and being able to enrich uranium itself.

A Saudi Arabian man who boasted about his sex life on a TV talk show has been jailed for five years

also sentenced to 1,000 lashes by a Saudi court on charges relating to immoral behaviour.

Extra-marital sex is illegal in Saudi Arabia, one of the most conservative societies in the Arab world.

The United Nations' refugee agency is planning to include the Holocaust in a new human-rights curriculum for pupils in its Gaza secondary schools despite strident opposition to the idea from within Hamas. John Ging, the UN Relief and Works Agency's (UNRWA) director of operations in Gaza, told The Independent that he was "confident and determined" that the Holocaust would feature for the first time in a wide-ranging curriculum that is being drafted.

Although the UNRWA director strongly emphasised that the de facto Hamas government had not sought to interfere with the agency – which is responsible for the welfare of some 1 million Gaza refugees – other figures in the movement have angrily condemned the idea of including the Holocaust in any part of the curriculum. Yunis al Astal, a religious leader and a Hamas member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, said last month that it would be "marketing a lie" and a "war crime" to do so.

"This is also part of the frustration here. There are so many global tragedies and travesties that are learned worldwide. Who learns about the Nakba? Again [that is] a very reasonable and legitimate demand but it's not 'either/or'; it's both."

Angelina Jolie met with Iraqi refugees in Syria on Friday and urged the world not to forget the plight of those among them who cannot return home because of the trauma they suffered and the country's instability.