For nearly six months after U.S.-led forces accidentally killed two dozen Pakistani troops at the Afghanistan border, officials at the highest reaches of the Obama administration have been locked in a heated debate over what might appear to be a small step—apologizing for the loss. The U.S. had expressed “regret” for the Nov. 26 deaths. [...]

Reuters – A private door opens from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office in central Jerusalem directly into a long, modestly furnished, half-paneled room decorated with modern paintings by Israeli artists and a copy of Israel’s 1948 declaration of independence. It contains little more than a long wooden table, brown leather chairs and a single [...]

When asked by reporters if U.S. troops would be sent to Yemen, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta responded, “There’s no consideration of that. Our operations now are directed with the Yemenese going after al-Qaida.” “No consideration” is exactly the type of vague and undefined phrase the American people have come to expect from representatives of [...]

WASHINGTON: The United States is helping bring more and better weapons to Syria’s rebels, including anti-tank weaponry, for their fight against President Bashar al-Assad regime, The Washington Post said today. President Barack Obama’s administration insisted it was not directly supplying the weapons or providing funding, with Gulf states paying for the new arms, the Post [...]

WASHINGTON — Leaders of the NATO nations will meet in Chicago on Sunday to set in motion the massive machinery necessary to wind down the war in Afghanistan. But even as American officials prepare a list of benchmarks they can cite as achieved in the war effort — expect to hear much about strategic partnership [...]

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called African asylum-seekers “infiltrators” who are a “concrete threat to the Jewish and democratic character of the country”. Speaking to IRIN, Ministry of Interior spokeswoman Sabine Hadad said most of the country’s “infiltrators” are work migrants who do not meet the definition of a refugee. The country’s laws define [...]

Israel’s Tireless Efforts to Conceal the Historical Events Leading to Its Creation by NEVE GORDON Be’er-Sheva, Israel. I first heard about the Nakba in the late 1980s, while I was an undergraduate student of philosophy at Hebrew University. This, I believe, is a revealing fact, particularly since, as a teenager, I was a member of [...]

The Executive Order declares a “national emergency” by John Glaser President Obama signed an Executive Order on Wednesday threatening to exert economic sanctions against any person or group in either Yemen or the United States who the administration decides is “obstructing” implementation of the U.S.-backed political transition in Yemen. After about a year of mass [...]

By Karen DeYoung and Liz Sly Syrian rebels battling the regime of President Bashar al-Assad have begun receiving significantly more and better weapons in recent weeks, an effort paid for by Persian Gulf nations and coordinated in part by the United States, according to opposition activists and U.S. and foreign officials. For more on this [...]

For the second day in a row, the European Union issued a document that had some harsh words for Israel, saying a spate of “potentially discriminatory or even anti-democratic bills” were tabled in the Knesset, and blasting Jerusalem for not prosecuting those responsible for settler violence. For more on this story, visit: EU issues second [...]