Middle Orient

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad-Ali Hosseini said on Saturday that Iran is studying U.S. proposals for talks on Iraq.

Hamas gave Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh its list of nominees for ministerial posts in a national unity cabinet on Saturday, but a source in the Islamist movement declined to reveal the names.

 A large portrait of Mike Mansfield, dogged Democratic foe of the Vietnam war, hangs near the U.S. Senate chamber where a new generation of Democrats is trying to stop another unpopular conflict — in Iraq.

Iraq’s Air Force should have 50 to 60 helicopters by the end of the year, including 28 new Russian aircraft, Iraq’s defence minister said on Saturday as he inspected two refitted Vietnam-era Huey helicopters in Baghdad.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Saudi Arabia’s king personally welcomed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad upon his arrival Saturday, a rapprochement many hope will help calm sectarian tensions threatening the Middle East.

Researchers at Yale have identified multiple pathogenic “alien islands” in the genome of the A. baumannii, bacteria that has been responsible for new and highly drug-resistant infections in combat troops in the Middle East, according to a report in the March 1 issue of Genes and Development.

As troubles for the United States mount in Iraq, the Bush administration escalates its complaints against Iran: Iran won’t recognize Israel. Worse, it says Israel ought to be wiped off the map. It won’t abandon its nuclear program. It continues to support the Hezbollah insurgents in Lebanon. It is intervening …

A Marine was arraigned a second time Thursday on charges of kidnapping and murdering an Iraqi civilian after he withdrew a guilty plea last month that had been part of a pretrial agreement.

It was a choice that perhaps owed more to the public mood than to any cute lyrical hook or novel musical riff. Asked to pick a song for this year’s Eurovision song contest, Israelis paid little heed to the eternal Eurovision themes of peace, love and harmony and settled instead …

Iranian students involved in an angry protest against the president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have been expelled and earmarked for compulsory military service in an apparent act of official retribution.