Middle Orient

GAZA CITY (AP) — Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas on Thursday accused the United States of undermining efforts to form a new coalition government and called on Europe to take the lead in lifting international sanctions against the Palestinians.

BAGHDAD (AP) — The US military on Thursday said sectarian killings had spiked in areas of Baghdad not included in a security sweep, with police reporting more than a dozen killings in the capital — including four American soldiers — and 20 new bodies dumped on the streets.

BAGHDAD (AP) — The chief judge in Saddam Hussein’s genocide trial said Thursday that he did not believe the former Iraqi leader was a dictator, sparking demands from Kurds that he be removed from the case.

Pope Benedict XVI did not intend to offend Muslim sensibilities with remarks about holy war, the Vatican said Thursday night, scrambling to defend the pontiff as anger built in the Islamic world over some of his remarks during his pilgrimage in Germany.

UNITED NATIONS — UN chief Kofi Annan said most Middle East leaders he recently conferred with considered the Iraq war “a real disaster,” but felt the United States should not pullout just yet.

BEIRUT — A month after a UN resolution halted fighting between Israel and Hizbollah, the ceasefire appeared strong Thursday with Israeli troops continuing to withdraw from south Lebanon and UN peacekeepers fanning out across the war-ravaged region.

RAMALLAH — No mobile phones, no international calls, no fuel coupons and no “excessive” hospitality for senior employees. Hamas is tightening the purse strings.

WASHINGTON — If there ever was a question that the Bush administration and the Israeli government are of one mind on Mideast peacemaking and Iran’s nuclear programmes it is fading during talks Israel’s foreign minister is holding here.

ANKARA — The decision by northern Iraq’s Kurdish leaders to ban the national flag and hoist their own has increased disquiet in Turkey about the prospect of a de facto Kurdish statelet on its doorstep, diplomats and analysts here say.

Iraqi Mujahideen shot down Tuesday evening (Sept. 12) a US helicopter in the al-Bu ‘Ubayd area of ar-Ramadi, about 110km west of Baghdad. The Mujahideen fired a surface-to-air rocket at the American aircraft, bringing it crashing to the ground where it was completely wrecked.