Middle Orient

BAGHDAD (Agencies) — Sunni tribal leaders who have vowed to drive Al Qaeda out of Iraq’s most restive province met the Shiite premier on Wednesday, marking what Washington hopes will be a breakthrough alliance against the group. Sattar Buzayi, a Sunni sheikh from Anbar province who has emerged in recent …

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AFP) — Disputes over how the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers will deal with Hizbollah fighters is holding up the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon, Israel’s military chief of staff said Wednesday. “Yesterday we met with UNIFIL and the Lebanese army,” a government official quoted Lieutenant General …

DUBAI (AP) — Saudi Arabia is pushing ahead with plans to build a fence along its entire 900-kilometre border with Iraq to prevent armed groups from entering the kingdom from the chaotic northern neighbour. The barrier, which will likely take five to six years to complete, is part of a …

JABALIYA REFUGEE CAMP — Khalil Madhouni, a balding, middle-aged baker in this particularly squalid patch of the Gaza Strip, goes from fighter to peacemaker in the time it takes him to scratch his round belly with flour-caked fingernails. “War forever,” the angry-eyed bread maker growls when asked if the ruling …

SANAA — Unprecedented political debate during recent Yemeni polls also broke taboos over the issue of succession, putting reelected President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s plans for his son to take over on hold, analysts say.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Some 800,000 foreigners are working in Iran illegally. An Iran Daily report on Monday said that

RAMALLAH —  In a deepening of the political tension between Fateh and Hamas, a senior aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday said Abbas would not travel to Gaza Tuesday for a planned resumption of negotiations to form a Palestinian unity government.

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (AP) — Seeking to end anger in the Islamic world caused by his remarks on holy war, Pope Benedict XVI told Muslim ambassadors Monday that the two faiths must overcome any historic enmities and together reject violence — saying the future of humanity is at stake.

KISMAYO, Somalia (AFP) — Muslim gunmen opened fire Monday on crowds protesting the overnight Islamist takeover of Somalia’s key port of Kismayo, with conflicting reports of casualties.

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) — The African Union will add 4,000 troops to its extended Darfur peacekeeping mission, bringing the number of police and soldiers in western Sudan to 11,000, a spokesman for the AU said on Monday.