Middle Orient News

A TOP PLO body gave its approval Thursday to President Mahmoud Abbas to call new presidential and legislative elections, a high-stakes gamble meant to sideline Hamas, but also bound to set off new confrontations with the Islamists and cement the West Bank-Gaza divide.

A suicide car bomber has hit a paramilitary checkpoint, killing four people in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region, the latest attack in a wave of violence sweeping the country in recent weeks.

Israel released 255 Palestinian prisoners on Friday as part of a series of goodwill gestures designed to bolster Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in his standoff against Hamas.

More than 250 Palestinians released from Israeli prisons have received a rapturous welcome from relatives and friends in Ramallah, on the West Bank.

Iraq’s main Sunni Arab bloc has ended its boycott of the Shi’ite-dominated parliament, officials said on Thursday, in a positive sign for the country’s faltering attempts at national reconciliation.

KABUL (Reuters) – Iranian arms are entering Afghanistan and reaching Taliban insurgents in such quality and quantity that the Tehran government must know about it, the U.S. ambassador to Kabul said on Tuesday.

Seven of the most important Sunni-led insurgent organisations fighting the US occupation in Iraq have agreed to form a public political alliance with the aim of preparing for negotiations in advance of an American withdrawal, their leaders have told the Guardian.

Egypt opened shelters on Thursday to house hundreds of Palestinians stranded at the closed border with the Gaza Strip for fear that some could resort to sleeping on the streets, an Egyptian official said.

Chief of General Intelligence Omar Suleiman visited America this week to discuss a range of strategic issues with US administration officials, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and CIA Director Michael Hayden.

A Mideast peace conference called for by President Bush will take place in September on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly meeting in New York, an Egyptian envoy said Thursday.