IRAQ

Militia Routed, but Fear Remains in Iraq - David Enders, Washington Times

As the sun came up on a recent morning in the district of Sadr City, Iraqi army troops searched as many as a thousand houses, arresting a dozen suspects and collecting nearly 50 unregistered weapons. Four months ago, these streets, some too narrow for Humvees, were controlled by the Jaish al-Mahdi, a Shi'ite militia whose name in Arabic means the Mahdi Army, which in 2006 poured out of Sadr City and took over large parts of Baghdad. "When you ask if the Mahdi Army could return as a military power, I don't think so," said Maj. Nadhim Khadim of the Iraqi army's 11th Division, the only one that operates entirely without US advisers. Even though the Iraqi army now has as many as 3,500 soldiers in the area, many residents still fear that the militia - most of whose leadership fled before the army entered - will return.

The Last Battle - Michael Gordon, New York Times

One morning this spring I climbed into a Polish helicopter with a major-general in the Iraqi Army named Othman Ali Farhood. He had just surveyed the situation in Kut, a small city 100 miles southeast of Baghdad where Iraqi forces were contending with a Shiite militia, and was returning to his division headquarters near the city of Diwaniya. Othman, who is a lanky man with a welcoming manner, commands the Eighth Division, rated by the US military as one of Iraq’s best units. In many ways, he also embodies the complexities of Iraq today - including its best hopes for a stable future. A career military man, he served under Saddam Hussein; a tribal sheik, he was at home in the ancestral culture of Iraq’s south; a member of Iraq’s Shiite majority, he and his family had been discriminated against under Saddam’s Sunni-dominated regime. Othman prides himself on his ability to rise above sectarianism, but he also conveys a belief in the historical inevitability of the Shiite ascension in Iraq. “Right now we are the leaders of Iraq,” he told me, “and we will not let it go to anybody else.” By the time I met up with him, Othman had proved himself one of the Americans’ most effective partners. Over the past year he worked with Team Phoenix, which was composed of three marines dispatched by Gen. David H. Petraeus to troubleshoot problems in the Shiite south. The tug of war among the religious parties and the Shiite tribes has emerged as one of the most-significant but also least-understood aspects of Iraq’s political scene. It pits leaders from the Shiite core of Maliki’s coalition against outsiders looking for a way in. It is a struggle between party officials who spent the Saddam years in exile, mostly in Iran, and tribal leaders who endured his rule at home - and, on another level, a contest between urbanized Shiites, who lean more toward the religious parties and Sadr’s movement, and agrarian Iraqis, whose loyalties lie more in tribal society. Significantly, it is also a rivalry between Shiites who favor a government based on religious parties and those who have a more secular vision.

AFGHANISTAN / PAKISTAN TRIBAL AREAS

Pakistan May Step Up Action Against Insurgents - Josh Meyer, Los Angeles Times

Anxious to avoid a US intervention or cutoff of funds, Pakistan's government is proposing military and intelligence changes that both countries say are needed to counter the growing threat from insurgents, officials say. Pakistan wants to deploy a specially trained unit of its Special Service Group into tribal areas along its western border. The region has become a haven for Al Qaeda and Taliban forces that increasingly are attacking Western soldiers in neighboring Afghanistan, officials say. The Pakistani commando division, trained by the United States, is an elite special operations force similar to the Army's Special Forces, or Green Berets. Pakistan has been criticized for sending conventional troops who do not have training in the kind of guerrilla warfare techniques that US officials say are needed to fight the militants in the tribal areas.

Rogue Pakistan Spies Aid Taliban - Christina Lamb, The Times

The United States has accused Pakistan’s main spy agency of deliberately undermining Nato efforts in Afghanistan by helping the Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants they are supposed to be fighting. President George W Bush confronted Yusuf Raza Gillani, Pakistan’s prime minister, in Washington last week with evidence of involvement by the ISI, its military intelligence, in a deadly attack on the Afghan capital and warned of retaliation if it continues. The move comes amid growing fears that Pakistan’s tribal areas are turning into a global launch pad for terrorists. Gillani, on his first official US visit since being elected in February, was left in no doubt that the Bush administration had lost patience with the ISI’s alleged double game.

Fighting Swells, Refugees Too - Carlotta Gall, New York Times

On a piece of barren land on the western edge of this capital, a refugee camp is steadily swelling as families displaced by the heavy bombardment in southern Afghanistan arrive in batches. The growing numbers reaching Kabul are a sign of the deepening of the conflict between NATO and American forces and the Taliban in the south and of the feeling among the population that there will be no end soon. Families who fled the fighting around their homes in Helmand Province one or two years ago and sought temporary shelter around two southern provincial capitals, Lashkar Gah and Kandahar, said they had moved to Kabul because of growing insecurity across the south.

RAF Sends Air Rescue Crews to Afghanistan - Michael Smith, The Times

The RAF is being forced to pull a fifth of its helicopter crews out of Britain’s search and rescue service and send them to Afghanistan in an attempt to stop soldiers being killed by roadside bombs. The move will drastically reduce the number of RAF Sea King helicopters available to rescue people in trouble at sea or caught in disasters such as last year’s floods. The RAF crews respond to an average of 1,000 emergency calls a year, varying from rescuing holidaymakers in difficulties to the 2004 floods that devastated the Cornish village of Boscastle. Cutting one of the five crews from each of the six RAF search and rescue stations around Britain will put at risk the current ability to respond to any emergency within an hour.

Taliban, Pakistan Reject Reports of al-Qaida Deputy's Death - Voice of America

A spokesman for the Taliban in Pakistan is quoted Saturday as denying a US media report that Osama bin Laden's chief deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has been killed or wounded. The spokesman called Friday's report by CBS News "baseless." Pakistani officials say they have not seen any evidence to support the claim that al-Qaida's second-in-command was hit in missile strike Monday in South Waziristan, near the Afghan border. CBS said it based its report on an intercepted letter from a Pakistani Taliban commander that said Zawahiri needed medical treatment after the military strike.

Missile Strike on al-Zawahri Disputed - Associated Press

A Taliban spokesman in Pakistan denied on Saturday a US media report that al Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri may have been killed or critically injured in a missile strike. CBS News reported Friday that it had obtained a copy of an intercepted letter dated July 29 from unnamed sources in Pakistan, which urgently requested a doctor to treat Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant. The letter was purportedly from Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud and said that al-Zawahri is in "severe pain" and that his "injuries are infected." "We deny it categorically," Mehsud spokesman Maulvi Umar told the Associated Press by telephone from an undisclosed location inside Pakistan. Pakistan army and intelligence officials said they had no information that al-Zawahri was hit Monday in a missile strike apparently launched by the US in South Waziristan, a volatile tribal region near the Afghan border.

IRAN

Iran's FM Shrugs Off Nuclear Deadline - Steve Herman, Voice of America

A top Iranian official, observing a South Asian regional leaders' summit, has dismissed a Saturday deadline to reply to an offer made by major powers concerning Tehran's nuclear program. Iran's foreign minister denies his country is facing any deadline to accept an incentives package in exchange for suspending uranium enrichment activities, or face additional sanctions. Manouchehr Mottaki, speaking to reporters Saturday evening in the Sri Lankan capital, says Iran is still awaiting a response from world powers to a package Tehran proposed last month. The Iranian foreign minister says once both packages have been reviewed then there will be proper grounds for further discussion. The United States, Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia on July 19th asked Iran to respond to their incentive package. The Russians have rejected the notion of a firm deadline and it is unclear whether any of the others will now insist Tehran give an immediate reply.

Ahmadinejad: Iran Aims to Reinforce Nuclear Rights - Associated Press

Iran will not give up "a single iota of its nuclear rights," the country's president said Saturday, rebuffing an informal deadline to stop expanding uranium enrichment or face more sanctions. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made the remarks during discussions with Syrian President Beshar Assad, who arrived in Tehran Saturday for a two-day visit, the Iranian president's official Web site said. Assad is in Tehran to discuss Iran's controversial uranium enrichment following a request from French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Iran Threatens Use of Force - Sydney Morning Herald

Iran has threatened to use force against its "enemies" to defend its nuclear drive. "For them, subjects like the nuclear issue are pretexts. The key reason for the hostility of the enemies in the past 30 years against Iran is that they want us to pull back so that they can say we have given in," President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on state television on Friday. "But the Iranian people will resist with force against the enemies." The comments came as the United States set a weekend deadline for Iran to respond to an international offer to freeze its nuclear drive. "We want and we expect a response this weekend," US State Department acting spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos said. But a European Union diplomat said in Brussels that the EU was in no rush for a response from Iran.

'Bomb Bomb Iran'? Not Likely. - David Ignatius, Washington Post opinion

Analysts speculate about the danger of a US or Israeli military attack on Iran before the Bush administration departs office next January. But if you read the tea leaves carefully, the evidence is actually pointing in the opposite direction. One sign that the diplomatic track is dominant for now is that the administration plans to announce late this month that it will open an interest section in Tehran, a senior official disclosed Thursday. This will be an important symbol, as it will be the first American diplomatic mission in Iran since the US Embassy there was seized in 1979. The official described it as an effort to "reach out to the Iranian people." The Iranian government has long had an interest section in Washington.

THE LONG WAR

Modest Gains Against Bioterrorism Threat - Spencer Hsu, Washington Post

In the past seven years, the federal government has spent more than $57 billion to shore up the nation's bioterrorism defenses, stockpiling drugs, ringing more than 30 American cities in a network of detectors and boosting preparedness at hospitals. The result: modest gains, at best, toward preventing another attack similar to the one in 2001, in which anthrax bacteria killed five people and sickened 17, experts and government officials agree. "The threat of bioterrorism has not subsided," while the challenge of predicting or preventing a major biological attack remains "daunting," Robert Hooks, the Homeland Security Department's deputy assistant secretary for weapons of mass destruction and biodefense, told a House panel two weeks ago.

Renewed Questions on Bioterror Effort - Lipton and Shane, New York Times

Until the anthrax attacks of 2001, Bruce E. Ivins was one of just a few dozen American bioterrorism researchers working with the most lethal biological pathogens, almost all at high-security military laboratories. Today, there are hundreds of such researchers in scores of laboratories at universities and other institutions around the United States, preparing for the next bioattack. But the revelation that FBI investigators believe that the anthrax attacks were carried out by Dr. Ivins, an Army biodefense scientist who committed suicide last week after he learned that he was about to be indicted for murder, has already re-ignited a debate: Has the unprecedented boom in biodefense research made the country less secure by multiplying the places and people with access to dangerous germs?

With No Suspect, Anthrax Case May Close - Associated Press

With the chief suspect in the anthrax attacks now dead, the Justice Department is expected to decide within days whether to close what had been one of its highest-profile unsolved cases. Five people died and 17 others were sickened when anthrax-laced letters began showing up at congressional offices, newsrooms and post offices soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. After wrongly investigating Army scientist Steven Hatfill, the FBI more than a year ago began looking at another suspect: Bruce E. Ivins, who worked at the same military lab. Mr. Ivins, an award-winning scientist who was working on an anthrax cure, killed himself Tuesday.

The Fog of War-Crimes Trials - Jonathan Mahler, New York Times

Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson opened the proceedings at Nuremberg not with a list of Nazi atrocities but with a tribute to the war-crimes court itself: “That four great nations, flushed with victory and stung with injury, stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily submit their captive enemies to the judgment of the law is one of the most significant tributes that power has ever paid to reason.” The ensuing trials, though not without their flaws, largely fulfilled this lofty promise, standing as a monument to the rule of law and the very idea of conducting public trials for war criminals. As civilized people, we have a natural desire to see criminals held responsible for their actions. The desire is that much stronger in the case of large-scale crimes like genocides or terrorist attacks, which seem to demand not just accountability but a reaffirmation of the moral order - a public enumeration of what is right and what is wrong - that can be delivered only in a courtroom. The hope once was that military tribunals at Guantánamo Bay would meet this need - if not provide closure on the Sept. 11 attacks, then at least enable a collective participation in the trials of their perpetrators.

Gitmo Dangles New Incentive for Detainees - Carol Williams, Los Angeles Times

In hopes of encouraging better behavior among terrorism suspects in a maximum-security facility here, parts of it will be gradually transformed to let some of the men eat, visit and exercise together. The planned easing of conditions in some cell blocks of Camp 6 is part of an effort to provide more "intellectual stimulation" for the prisoners, said Rear Adm. Dave Thomas, who two months ago took over command of the military prison and interrogation network. "The effect I hope to achieve is to get greater compliance," Thomas said Saturday as he showed journalists the construction work underway to reconfigure guard posts and access. Prisoners excluded from the initial communal-living group "would see that others got this, and that might be an incentive," he said.

COMPLEX OPERATIONS

Military's Social Science Grants Raise Alarm - Maria Glod, Washington Post

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is calling on "eggheads" to help the military unravel questions about the recruitment of terrorists, the resurgence of the Taliban and messages delivered in militant Muslim religious schools. Many eggheads are wary. The Pentagon's $50 million Minerva Research Initiative, named after the Roman goddess of wisdom and warriors, will fund social science research deemed crucial to national security. Initial proposals were due July 25, and the first grants are expected to be awarded by year's end. But the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, which includes professors from American and George Mason universities, said dependence on Pentagon funding could make universities an "instrument rather than a critic of war-making."

The Painful Images of War - Clark Hoyt, New York Times opinion

Two hundred twenty-one American soldiers and Marines have been killed in Iraq this year, but until eight days ago, The Times had not published a photo of one of their bodies. The picture The Times did publish on July 26, of a room full of death after a suicide bombing in June, with a marine in the foreground, his face covered and his uniform riddled with tiny shrapnel holes, accompanied a front-page article about how few such images there are. But before war photographs pass into history, they are news and records of events that are still raw for everyone involved - soldiers, families and journalists. The experiences of The Times in recent years with searing pictures of injury and, in one case, imminent death, suggest how emotional, complicated and unpredictable the issues can be.

US DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

US Sub May Have Leaked Radiation - Norimitsu Onishi, New York Times

An American nuclear-powered submarine may have leaked a small amount of radiation as it stopped by Japan in the spring and was then deployed throughout the Pacific Ocean, the Japanese government said Saturday. The Japanese government said that it was informed Friday by the United States Navy that the submarine, the Houston, might have discharged an amount of radiation that was too small to be considered harmful. The chief government spokesman, Nobutaka Machimura, said in a news conference that the radioactive amount - estimated at less than half a microcurie - was too insignificant to “affect the human body or the environment.” The submarine spent a week in March in Sasebo, in western Japan, before cruising to Guam and then Hawaii, where the leak was discovered during an inspection late last month, the Japanese government said.

AFRICA

Algeria Car Bomb Wounds 21, Ministry Says - Reuters

A car bomb exploded near a police station in a town east of Algiers on Sunday, wounding 21 people including six policemen, the Interior Ministry said. The blast happened at about 5 a.m. (12 a.m. EDT on Sunday) in Tizi Ouzou, the main town in the mountainous Berber-speaking Kabylie region of northern Algeria, a ministry statement carried by the official APS news agency said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Previous such attacks have been claimed by a group which calls itself al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and has its main base in Kabylie.

Darfur's Development Gap - David Phillips, Boston Globe opinion

By accusing President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan of genocide, the International Criminal Court has caused Khartoum to change its approach to Darfur, where 200,000 people have died and millions have been displaced since 2003. Hoping to defer the court's charges, Bashir is promising peace, development, and restitution to Darfurians. The United Nations Security Council should leverage efforts by Russia and China to defer charges against Bashir by securing an agreement with Khartoum to cooperate with the international community in a development plan for Darfur. The initiative would address a root cause of the conflict, which lies in Darfur's poverty and historic marginalization. The Darfur development initiative would run parallel to efforts aimed at addressing immediate security and humanitarian needs. Despite the activities of state-sponsored militias - the "janjaweed" - development activities are still possible in parts of Darfur less affected by conflict.

AMERICAS

Venezuela Drug Flights Up, US Says - Chris Kraul, Los Angeles Times

Suspected drug flights from Venezuela to the Caribbean island of Hispaniola rose 44% over the first three months of the year, US officials say, a surge in activity that some believe was behind Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's expressions of willingness to resume anti-drug cooperation with Washington. Despite the possible rapprochement with Chavez three years after the leftist leader suspended joint anti-drug efforts, US counter-narcotics officials in Venezuela and the Caribbean say they see no sign of cooperation or of reduced traffic. "Many people here want to cooperate, but this being an autocracy, no one is going to reach out until the big guy does something," said one US government source who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue. "We're not seeing anything on the narco side except words."

President of Argentina on Defensive - Vinod Sreeharsha, New York Times

After months of political turmoil and a plummeting approval rating, Argentina’s leader, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, gave the first news conference of her eight-month presidency on Saturday. She mounted a strong defense of her government, emphasized the importance of foreign investment in Argentina and denied that her husband, Néstor Kirchner, the former president, was in control. “We’re both political activists,” she said.

Why Did Raúl Revive Fidel's 1973 Speech? - Brian Latell, Miami Herald opinion

Cuba's July 26th anniversary has always been an occasion for the glorification of Fidel Castro and the revolutionary process he initiated in 1953 at Santiago's Moncada garrison. This year at Moncada, as last year in Camagüey, Raúl Castro spoke in his brother's place, hewing to many of the themes that for decades have been standard for the event. Wearing his four-star general's uniform, Raúl was dwarfed by a giant billboard-sized poster of Fidel that loomed above him on the speaker's platform. The image was of a much younger, khaki-clad Fidel in a militant stance. Raúl paid fawning reverence to his ailing brother, as he also did in a speech two weeks earlier before the national assembly. He broke no new policy ground, however, to the disappointment of many Cubans who expected the unveiling of new liberalizing reforms.

ASIA PACIFIC

Journalists: China Not Living Up To Pledge - Maureen Fan, Washington Post

Three state-of-the-art Olympic media centers in Beijing have been equipped with rows of brand-new computers. Thousands of English-speaking volunteers stand at the ready, trained to offer Internet access with a smile. Behind the scenes, their bosses on the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games are busy preparing daily news conferences and field trips to showcase all that China has to offer. There are lectures on how to protect the giant panda, briefings on the safety of Olympic Village food and opportunities to witness the gleaming urban development of Beijing. But much to the dismay of organizers, the thousands of credentialed journalists who have begun pouring into the capital are not impressed. Instead of writing about pandas or Olympic food, Western journalists are mostly covering stories that the Chinese government would rather they not - the city's chronic pollution, for instance - and complaining about a lack of access to Internet sites and the famed Tiananmen Square.

The Security Olympics - Washington Post editorial

When it was competing to host the 2008 Olympics, China told the world that it would do so as a modernizing power that would use the Games to expand freedom of expression and "benefit the further development of our human rights cause," as the mayor of Beijing put it. The China that is emerging before Friday's opening ceremonies is something entirely different: an unapologetic autocracy that censors the Internet, imprisons nonviolent domestic critics and bulldozes anything or anyone deemed to be in the way of a state-orchestrated showcase. No one doubts that China is a far freer country for most of its citizens today than during the dark days of Mao and the Cultural Revolution. Nor did anyone expect China to transform itself into a democracy in time for the Games, as South Korea did 20 years ago. But Beijing itself nourished hopes of a loosening of political controls and promised the International Olympic Committee that it would allow full media freedom. Instead, as a host of Western human rights groups and Chinese activists has documented, the regime has moved in the opposite direction.

N. Korea Threatens to Expel S. Koreans - Choe Sang-Hun, New York Times

North Korea threatened on Sunday to expel South Korean businesspeople from a joint tourist resort, escalating a standoff over the shooting death of a South Korean homemaker visiting a tourism zone. South Korean visits to the Kumgang Mountain resort, at the southeastern corner of North Korea, had already been suspended since July 11 when North Korean soldiers shot and killed a 53-year-old South Korean woman who strayed off the resort enclave and entered a restricted military zone. About 300 South Korean tourism officials and business people remain there, most of them affiliated with Hyundai-Asan, a Seoul-based company that operates the resort together with the North Korean government.

Burma's Prisons a Caldron of Protest Fury - Washington Post

The promise of Burma's future begins in its prisons. Inside, dissidents detained by the military junta tapped out messages on water pipes and listened to them echo from one cell to the next. They spelled words by knocking on walls, each series of sounds a letter of the alphabet. Sometimes they bribed guards with cigarettes to pass along coded messages in necklaces made of pebbles and strings of plastic bags. Former Burmese political detainees say they found countless ways to communicate, defying their isolation and a system that was designed to break their will. For many, life behind the walls instead became a rite of passage toward political maturity.

EUROPE

Release of Spanish Terrorist from Prison Draws Reaction - Voice of America

The release from prison of a Basque separatist convicted of murdering 25 people, has drawn reaction from Spain's prime minister and victims' advocates. Jose Ignacio de Juana Chaos, a member of the militant group ETA, left Aranjuez prison outside Madrid Saturday after serving 21 years of a 3,000-year sentence. Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said on Friday that feelings of contempt for the ETA member are understandable, but he said the law must be respected. Victims associations have expressed outrage, not only at Juana Chaos' release, but also at news that he plans to live in the Basque town of San Sebastian, where ETA killed a police officer 40 years ago. The separatist group has been blamed for more than 820 deaths in a campaign for an independent Basque state in northern Spain and southwestern France. Spain's penal code at the time of sentencing enabled Chaos to gain an early release from prison.

6 Die as Georgia Battles Rebel Group - Michael Schwirtz, New York Times

Troops from the former Soviet republic of Georgia battled separatist fighters in a rebel republic overnight, killing at least six people and wounding more than a dozen others, officials from both sides said Saturday. Violence between Georgia and the rebel republic, South Ossetia, has flared recently after months of relative calm. Each side accused the other of setting off the fighting, which began Friday evening and continued through Saturday morning, and involved mortars, grenade launchers and small-arms fire. Earlier on Friday, six Georgian policemen were wounded in the border area by a roadside bomb, the Georgian Interior Ministry said.

Democracy’s Close Call in Turkey - New York Times editorial

Turkey narrowly averted an incalculable disaster last week. The Constitutional Court turned back a state prosecutor’s request to dissolve the ruling Justice and Development Party and ban 71 of its leading figures from politics for five years, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul. The court ruling is a victory for Turkey, for democracy and for the politics of moderation in the volatile Near and Middle East. That makes it a victory for the United States as well. Had it gone the other way, Turkey’s chances of joining the European Union would have been demolished and the clearly expressed will of Turkish voters outrageously thwarted. Worst of all, an alarming message would have been sent to religious-minded voters throughout the Muslim world that scrupulous adherence to the ground rules of democratic politics was no guarantee of equal political rights and representation.

MIDDLE EAST

Syria Close to Peace Deal with Israel - Uzi Mahnaimi, The Times

The Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert is racing to conclude a peace deal with Syria before he steps down from office in a few months. Syria is close to agreeing to “normal relations” in the words of its president, Bashar al-Assad, and to disengage from Iran in return for an Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Golan Heights. The outline of a deal was reached in talks brokered by the Turks, according to reports in Israel. “We [Syria and Israel] desire to recognise each other and end the state of war. Let us make peace . . . let us end, once and for all, the state of war,” Imad Mustafa, Syria’s ambassador to the United States, told a Washington audience last week. Assad, who is due to visit Tehran this weekend, is expected to inform his Iranian partners that Damascus has opted to loosen its links with them and move closer to Israel. The meeting is likely to be a difficult one since Iran has been financing the rebuilding of Syria’s armed forces and a mutual defence pact has only recently been ratified.

Rival Palestinian Factions Fight Gun Battles in Gaza - Voice of America

Rival Palestinian factions have clashed in the Gaza Strip, which is ruled by the Islamic militant group Hamas. At least four people, including two Hamas policemen, have been killed and dozens wounded. Machine gun and mortar fire rang out in heavily-populated Gaza City as Hamas security forces stepped up the pressure on their Palestinian opponents. They attacked a stronghold of a clan aligned with the rival Fatah faction, and gunmen there returned fire. Hamas said it believed suspects in a bombing that killed five Hamas gunmen and a girl a week ago were hiding in the neighborhood. The raid is part of an intensifying Hamas crackdown on Fatah. Since the bombing, more than 200 Fatah activists have been arrested.

9 Dead in Hamas Raid on Pro-Fatah Clan - Ethan Bronner, New York Times

The worst intra-Palestinian violence in more than a year left nine people dead and scores injured in Gaza on Saturday as the ruling Hamas party cracked down on a clan loyal to its rival, Fatah. Israel stepped in to help Fatah by allowing 180 of its men into Israel and treating and hospitalizing two dozen of its wounded. A spokesman for the Hamas police in Gaza said that among the dead were two Hamas policemen and seven members of the clan, but other reports said another Hamas police officer had been killed as well. The Hamas spokesman put the number of wounded at 90, including at least a dozen children. Witnesses reported a day of fierce street fighting in the Shejaia neighborhood of Gaza City, although by nightfall quiet had been restored.

Infighting Escalates in Gaza Strip - Barzak and Nammari, Associated Press

Hamas forces battled Fatah-linked fighters with mortars and machine guns in a crowded Gaza neighborhood Saturday, leaving at least nine dead in the worst Palestinian infighting in nine months. About 88 people were injured, 12 of them children, hospital officials said. Loud explosions and gunfire could be heard throughout the day in the Gaza City neighborhood of Shijaiyeh, a stronghold of the Fatah-allied Hilles clan. Hamas has accused the clan of hiding suspects responsible for a car bombing last week that killed five activists of the radical Islamist group.

Hamas Arrests Fatah Men Forced Back to Gaza - Reuters

About 30 pro-Fatah Palestinians who fled to Israel after fierce clashes in the Gaza Strip were sent back to the Hamas-controlled enclave on Sunday and the Islamist group said they were immediately detained by its forces. They were among 180 supporters of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction granted refuge in Israel on Saturday after nine Palestinians were killed and 95 were wounded during a Hamas assault on their Gaza City neighborhood. The fighting was the bloodiest since Hamas routed Fatah and took over the coastal enclave a year ago. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said dozens of those who fled the fighting returned to the Gaza Strip and were detained.

Race for Profit Hastening Water Crisis - Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times

Across the countryside of this nation on the heel of the Arabian Peninsula, the pumps and drills roar. Wildcatters bore as much as 1,000 feet into the earth and draw out the valuable liquid. They pump it into tankers and haul it away to sell to the highest bidder. But soon the reservoirs will run dry. As Yemen's exploding population draws out more and more water from the parched land - mostly to help feed a voracious appetite for khat, a mildly narcotic plant - the bone-dry nation's very existence is threatened. The country faces its greatest water crisis, with underground levels dropping dramatically, scientists and government officials say.

SOUTH ASIA

S. Asian Leaders Want Joint Action to Fight Terrorism - Voice of America

Concerns about terrorism and accusations of responsibility for recent bomb blasts in Afghanistan and India are overshadowing the annual summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation. South Asian leaders are pledging, albeit in vague terms, to work together to fight terrorism. The SAARC summit convened a day after Pakistan refuted accusations its intelligence service had a role in last month's fatal bombing at India's embassy in Kabul. U.S. media reports Friday quoted American intelligence sources as saying electronic intercepts connected the bombers to Pakistani intelligence. Indian officials here say Pakistan's prime minister, during a "candid and open conversation" with his Indian counterpart, promised he will conduct "an independent investigation" of the bombing.

EVENTS OF INTEREST

11-15 August - Counterinsurgency Leaders Workshop (Official Event - Workshop). Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The US Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency (COIN) Center is hosting a five-day program for prospective counterinsurgency leaders, 11-15 August 2008, at the Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The program is focused on equipping leaders with an understanding of the insurgency and counterinsurgency environments, as well as close consideration of the kinds of persons and organizations that usually emerge from insurgencies in contrast to those of conventional conflicts. This event will be held at the Battle Command Training Center (BCTC) Training Facility on Fort Leavenworth. Seating is limited. However, registration is open to any person who serves in any official capacity with regard to dealing with insurgencies, with priority is given to those applying from invited organizations. Other applicants will be reviewed for eligibility on a space-available, case-by-case basis. The duty is uniform/business casual. Application must completed on-line at the link above. The deadline for application is 1 August 2008. For more information, contact the COIN Center at 913-684-5196.

11-12 September - DNI Open Source Conferece 2008 (Public Event - Conference). Washington, DC. Sponsored by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The Office of the DNI is pleased to announce the "DNI Open Source Conference 2008" to be held on Thursday, 11 September and Friday, 12 September, 2008 at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington DC. The conference is free; however, all who wish to attend must register online in advance (deadline 31 July). The two-day conference will explore a wide range of open source issues and open source best practices for the Intelligence Community and its partners. We invite participants from the broader open source community of interest including academia, think tanks, private industry, federal, state, local and tribal entities, international partners, and the media to attend. The conference will include speakers from across the broader open source community participating in panel discussions and focus group sessions. Information about the agenda and break-out sessions is now available. The DNI Open Source Conference 2007 was held 16-17 July 2007 at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center. More than 900 registered participants and speakers attended. Presentations made at the conference break-out sessions are available on the DNI Open Source Conference 2007 website.

16-18 September 2008 - The U.S. Army and the Interagency Process: A Historical Perspective (Public Event - Conference / Call for Papers). Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Sponsored by the U.S. Army Combat Studies Institute. The symposium will include a variety of guest speakers, panel sessions, and general discussions. This symposium will explore the partnership between the U.S. Army and government agencies in attaining national goals and objectives in peace and war within a historical context. Separate international topics may be presented. The symposium will also examine current issues, dilemmas, problems, trends, and practices associated with U.S. Army operations requiring close interagency cooperation.