BAGHDAD (AFP) — Ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein will be hanged within 30 days, an appeal court judge said Tuesday, after confirming the former strongman’s sentence for crimes against humanity.

A STRING OF car bombs and other blasts killed at least 54 Iraqis on Tuesday, including 17 outside Baghdad’s most venerated Sunni mosque, while US troops battled Shiite gunmen in Baghdad.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israelis are puzzling over the prospect of peace with Syria after their two foreign intelligence agencies gave dramatically different assessments of recent diplomatic overtures from Damascus.