Middle Orient

BAGHDAD (AP) — Suicide bombers killed 22 people in the Baghdad area Sunday, as insurgents stepped up a relentless campaign that claimed more than 90 lives a night before in a horrific bombing south of the capital. The government filed its first criminal case against Saddam Hussein for a 1982 …

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AP) — A rocket fired from Gaza killed a young Israeli woman Thursday, hours after Israeli forces raided the home of a 67-year-old British citizen in West Bank and killed a fighter — incidents that further shook a five-month truce already threatened this week by a suicide bombing.

NAIROBI (AFP) — Transitional Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed has appealed to the UN Security Council to modify a 13-year-old arms embargo on his country to allow a proposed regional peacekeeping force to be deployed to the lawless Horn of Africa nation. On the eve of the council’s planned debate …

BAGHDAD — In mosques, conferences and on the street, some Sunni Arab leaders are rallying members of their once dominant community to join forces and strongly contest upcoming balloting in a bid to find their place in the new Iraq. Despite recent efforts to unite ranks, however, the Sunni community …

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States told Iran Wednesday not to resume enriching uranium, which could feed a nuclear weapon, and also cautioned Tehran to keep its hands out of Iraq’s internal affairs. The latest US warnings followed an almost daily barrage of charge and countercharge between the two rivals, …

RAMALLAH — It’s been a hot summer on the Palestinian arts scene: Gunmen broke up the concert of a popular West Bank singer after he refused to limit his repertoire to political songs, and a Hamas-run town banned a music festival to prevent mingling of the sexes. Now, Palestinian national …

BAGHDAD (AP) — Suicide bombers struck twice near the entrance to the fortified Green Zone on Thursday, a day after a devastating attack on Iraqi children that provoked outrage and even brought a denial of responsibility from Al Qaeda in Iraq. Iraqi and US forces announced some rare successes in …

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US officials are stepping up pressure on the Palestinian leadership to crack down on violence that threatens a truce barely a month ahead of Israel’s planned withdrawal from Gaza. Officials said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas heard a stern message Wednesday in a phone call from US Secretary …

Israeli troops on Wednesday sealed off a cluster of Gaza Strip settlements marked for evacuation to stop the influx of hardline pullout opponents, in the government’s most sweeping measure yet to prepare for next month’s pullout from 25 settlements. Settlers responded defiantly, threatening to block roads throughout Israel and to …

NAIROBI (AFP) — A leading international policy group on Tuesday warned of fresh anarchy in Somalia if the United Nations Security Council lifts a 13-year-old arms embargo on the shattered country in order to enable the deployment of a regional peacekeeping force.