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20070715
• Saudi Arabia - Iraq - US - Syria - Iran - Lebanon - Afghan - Foreign - Military - Intelligence - Politics - Religious - Terrorism - History - Osama bin Laden - "Saudis' role in Iraq insurgency outlined: Sunni extremists from Saudi Arabia make up half the foreign fighters in Iraq, many suicide bombers, a U.S. official says." ... "Although [Republican President] Bush administration officials have frequently lashed out at Syria and Iran, accusing it of helping insurgents and militias here, the largest number of foreign fighters and suicide bombers in Iraq come from a third neighbor, Saudi Arabia, according to a senior U.S. military officer and Iraqi lawmakers." ... "About 45% of all foreign militants targeting U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians and security forces are from Saudi Arabia; 15% are from Syria and Lebanon; and 10% are from North Africa, according to official U.S. military figures made available to The Times by the senior officer. Nearly half of the 135 foreigners in U.S. detention facilities in Iraq are Saudis, he said." ... "Fighters from Saudi Arabia are thought to have carried out more suicide bombings than those of any other nationality, said the senior U.S. officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the subject's sensitivity. It is apparently the first time a U.S. official has given such a breakdown on the role played by Saudi nationals in Iraq's Sunni Arab insurgency." ... "He said 50% of all Saudi fighters in Iraq come here as suicide bombers. In the last six months, such bombings have killed or injured 4,000 Iraqis." ... "The situation has left the U.S. military in the awkward position of battling an enemy whose top source of foreign fighters is a key ally that at best has not been able to prevent its citizens from undertaking bloody attacks in Iraq, and at worst shares complicity in sending extremists to commit attacks against U.S. forces, Iraqi civilians and the Shiite-led government in Baghdad [Iraq's capital]." ... "In the 1980s, the Saudi intelligence service sponsored Sunni Muslim fighters for the U.S.-backed Afghan mujahedin battling Soviet troops in Afghanistan. At the time, Saudi intelligence cultivated another man helping the Afghan fighters, Osama bin Laden, the future leader of Al Qaeda who would one day turn against the Saudi royal family and mastermind the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon. Indeed, Saudi Arabia has long been a source of a good portion of the money and manpower for Al Qaeda: 15 of the 19 hijackers in the Sept. 11 attacks were Saudi." (1, 2) -By Ned Parker with contributions by Paul Richter and Greg Miller -LAtimes

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20060819
• Israel - Lebanon - France - UN - Iran - Syria - "Israel mounts fresh Lebanon raid: Israel carried out an overnight raid inside Lebanon aimed at disrupting an arms transfer, the Israeli army says." ... "One soldier died and two were injured in the Bekaa Valley operation, it said. Lebanese sources earlier told Reuters agency that three militants also died." ... "The incident came hours after UN chief Kofi Annan warned of a "fragile" situation on the ground." ... "Meanwhile, 50 French troops arrived in the Lebanese port of Naqoura, the first soldiers to bolster the UN force." ... "They are among 200 extra troops promised by France, as the UN struggles to build its force." ... "The UN wants 3,500 troops on the ground speedily, to be expanded later to 15,000. It says it is disappointed with the French contribution and wants other European nations to offer more help too." ... "Israel's fresh operation inside Lebanon came five days after a UN-brokered ceasefire ended the month-long conflict." ... "Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said the Israeli raid was a naked violation of the ceasefire." ... "The Israeli army said the raid was to prevent arms being delivered to Hezbollah by Iran and Syria." -BBC /News 

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20060816
• Israel - Lebanon - Terrorism - Politics - "Many Israelis see a strategic defeat: In Israel, critics condemn strategy behind war." ... "Scathing indictments of the way the Israeli government and its military have conducted the longest war in the nation's history filled the country's newspapers and airwaves yesterday, as Israelis began to feel safe enough to return to their national pastime of blistering political debate." ... "Israeli analysts across the political spectrum branded the war against Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon ``an embarrassing defeat" for a ``semi-rookie government" that should have known the goals it set for itself were ``impossible to achieve."" ... "On the second day since July 12 without Hezbollah rocket attacks, many Israelis looked around and declared themselves sorely disappointed with a war that forced a million people to flee their homes in northern Israel and killed 150 Israelis and more than 800 Lebanese. The war inflamed anger across the Muslim world -- without dealing a decisive blow to Hezbollah or bringing home the two Israeli soldiers whose kidnapping by the Lebanese militant group triggered the fighting." ... "The outrage came from the left and the right." -By Anne Barnard and Matthew Kalman -Boston/Globe 

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20060801
• Israel - Lebanon - Iran - United States - Britain - Syria - "Israel strikes deep into Lebanon: Peres estimates end of fighting in a matter of weeks." ... "Israeli troops landed Tuesday near the eastern Lebanese town of Baalbeck, Lebanese security sources said, and the Israeli military also engaged in fierce fighting with Hezbollah forces just across the border with Lebanon." ... "Israeli aircraft flew support missions as troops hit the ground about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) north of Baalbeck in the Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border, the sources said." ... "Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad held the United States and Britain responsible for the bloodshed in Lebanon, The Associated Press reported." ... "The United States and Israel accuse Syria and Iran of supporting Hezbollah, and the Bekaa Valley has long been considered a haven for Hezbollah, with supply routes from Syria." -Contributed to by Nada Husseini, John Roberts, John King, Elise Labott, Richard Roth and Ben Wedeman -CNN 

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20060731
• US - Israel - Lebanon - Iran - Syria - Religion - Military - Chuck Hagel - Nebraska - "Key Republican breaks with Bush on Mideast: Nebraska's Sen. Hagel calls for immediate cease-fire." ... "Urging President Bush to turn all U.S. efforts toward "ending this madness," a leading Republican senator Monday broke with the Bush administration and called for an immediate cease-fire in the Mideast." ... ""The sickening slaughter on both sides must end and it must end now," Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel said. "President Bush must call for an immediate cease-fire. This madness must stop."" ... "The Bush administration has refused to call for Israel to halt its attacks on southern Lebanon, joining Israel in insisting that Hezbollah fighters must be pushed back from the Israeli-Lebanese border." ... "President Bush Monday in a speech in Miami Beach, Florida, reiterated his call for a cease-fire in the Mideast only if it brought a "long-lasting peace" that addressed Iran and Syria's support for Hezbollah, the Islamic militia that Israel is targeting. (Full story)" ... "Hagel said that refusal threatens to isolate the United States and Israel and harm chances of achieving a long-term peace in the region." -CNN 

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20060730
• Lebanon - Israel - UN - History - "Dozens killed in Lebanon air raid: More than 54 civilians, at least 34 of them children, have been killed in a town in south Lebanon in the deadliest Israeli strike of the conflict so far." ... "Displaced families had been sheltering in the basement of a house in Qana, which was crushed after a direct hit." ... "Lebanon's prime minister denounced "Israeli war criminals" and cancelled talks with the US secretary of state." ... "Israel said it regretted the incident - but added that civilians had been warned to flee the village." ... "Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel would "continue to act with no hesitation against Hezbollah" which has been firing rockets into Israel from southern Lebanon." ... "Qana was the site of an Israeli bombing of a UN base in 1996 that killed more than 100 people sheltering there during Israel's "Grapes of Wrath" offensive, which was also aimed at destroying Hezbollah." -BBC /News 

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20060726
• Israel - Lebanon - UN - Austria - Canada - China - "Annan: Israel bombed UN base for hours." ... "The UN general secretary, Kofi Annan, today accused the Israeli military of carrying out a sustained bombing of the UN base on the Lebanon-Israel border that culminated in the killing of four unarmed monitors." ... ""I spoke to Mr Olmert [Israel's prime minister] and he definitely believes it was a mistake and has expressed his deep sorrow," Mr Annan told a press conference in Rome." ... ""But the shelling started in the morning and went on until after 7pm. You cannot imagine the anguish of the unarmed men and women peacekeepers who were there."" ... "According to a detailed timeline of the incident provided by an unidentified UN officer and reported by CNN, the first bomb exploded around 200 metres from the post at 1.20pm (11.20am BST) yesterday." ... "Unifil observers then telephoned their designated contact with the Israeli military, who assured them the attacks would stop. In the following hours, nine more bombs fell close to the post, each one followed by a call to the Israeli military, the UN officer said." ... "The main Unifil base in the town of Naqoura lost contact with the post at 7.40pm, seemingly the time when the post received a direct hit." ... "The four monitors came from Austria, Canada, China and Finland." -Guardian.co.uk 

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20060725
• Israel - Lebanon - "Israel Hits Hezbollah District in Beirut." ... "Beirut was pounded by new airstrikes Tuesday as the two-week-old crisis showed no signs of letting up, despite frantic diplomatic efforts. At least four heavy blasts were heard, the first Israeli strikes in the capital in nearly two days." ... "Outlining the scope of the Israeli campaign for the first time, a senior army commander said Israel would only encircle Lebanese towns and villages near the border and did not plan a deeper push into the country." ... "With the diplomatic threads for a solution still tangled, the violence looked likely to drag on with a new element after 14 days of bombardment: tough ground fighting as Israeli forces try to move village to village near the border, facing well-armed, determined Islamic militant guerrillas who have been digging in for years." ... "Israel's death toll in the conflict stands at 42, including 24 soldiers and 18 civilians, most killed by hundreds of rockets that have been fired by Hezbollah." ... "At least 391 people have been killed and 1,596 wounded in Lebanon, according to Lebanese security officials. Among them are 20 Lebanese soldiers and at least 11 Hezbollah guerrillas." -By Hamza Hendawi -AP via -SFGate.com 

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20060724
• Lebanon - Israel - US - Politics - "Fierce Fighting Rages Deeper Into Lebanon: Israel Pushes Deeper Into Lebanon As Aid Convoys Head for the South; Rice Concludes Beirut Visit." ... "Israeli ground forces pushed deeper into Lebanon on Monday in heavy fighting and captured two Hezbollah guerrillas, while two aid convoys carrying food, generators and other badly needed supplies left Beirut for two southern cities." ... "Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a surprise visit to Beirut to launch diplomatic efforts aimed at ending 13 days of warfare. Prime Minister Fuad Saniora told her his government is hoping to "put an end to the war being inflicted on Lebanon." He told Rice that Israel's bombardment was taking his country "backward 50 years."" ... "An official close to parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a close Hezbollah ally, said his talks with Rice failed to "reach an agreement because Rice insisted on one full package to end the fighting." The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were private." ... "Israel has not bombed Beirut since Sunday afternoon and appeared to have stopped all airstrikes on the city in deference to Rice's visit. Rice later flew to Jerusalem." ... "Sunday was one of the heaviest days of Israeli bombardment, with 270 targets, compared with 120 the day before, according to the military." (1, 2, 3,) -By Kathy Gannon with contributions by Katherine Shrader, Benjamin Harvey, Jill Lawless, Brian Murphy, Joseph Panossian, and Lauren Frayer -AP via -ABCNEWS.com 

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20060722
• US - Israel - Lebanon - Business - Politics - "U.S. Speeds Up Bomb Delivery for the Israelis." ... "The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, American officials said Friday." ... "The decision to quickly ship the weapons to Israel was made with relatively little debate within the Bush administration, the officials said. Its disclosure threatens to anger Arab governments and others because of the appearance that the United States is actively aiding the Israeli bombing campaign in a way that could be compared to Iran’s efforts to arm and resupply Hezbollah." ... "The munitions that the United States is sending to Israel are part of a multimillion-dollar arms sale package approved last year that Israel is able to draw on as needed, the officials said. But Israel’s request for expedited delivery of the satellite and laser-guided bombs was described as unusual by some military officers, and as an indication that Israel still had a long list of targets in Lebanon to strike." ... "Pentagon and military officials declined to describe in detail the size and contents of the shipment to Israel, and they would not say whether the munitions were being shipped by cargo aircraft or some other means. But an arms-sale package approved last year provides authority for Israel to purchase from the United States as many as 100 GBU-28’s, which are 5,000-pound laser-guided bombs intended to destroy concrete bunkers. The package also provides for selling satellite-guided munitions." (1, 2) -By David S. Cloud and Helene Cooper with contributions by Thom Shanker -NYTimes 

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20060721
• Israel - Lebanon - US - "Israel set war plan more than a year ago: Strategy was put in motion as Hezbollah began gaining military strength in Lebanon." ... "Israel's military response by air, land and sea to what it considered a provocation last week by Hezbollah militants is unfolding according to a plan finalized more than a year ago." ... "In the six years since Israel ended its military occupation of southern Lebanon, it watched warily as Hezbollah built up its military presence in the region. When Hezbollah militants kidnapped two Israeli soldiers last week, the Israeli military was ready to react almost instantly." ... "More than a year ago, a senior Israeli army officer began giving PowerPoint presentations, on an off-the-record basis, to U.S. and other diplomats, journalists and think tanks, setting out the plan for the current operation in revealing detail. Under the ground rules of the briefings, the officer could not be identified." ... "In his talks, the officer described a three-week campaign: The first week concentrated on destroying Hezbollah's heavier long-range missiles, bombing its command-and-control centers, and disrupting transportation and communication arteries. In the second week, the focus shifted to attacks on individual sites of rocket launchers or weapons stores. In the third week, ground forces in large numbers would be introduced, but only in order to knock out targets discovered during reconnaissance missions as the campaign unfolded. There was no plan, according to this scenario, to reoccupy southern Lebanon on a long-term basis." -By Matthew Kalman -SFGate.com 

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20060720
• Lebanon - Israel - UN - "Fighting inside Lebanese border: Israeli soldiers are fighting Hezbollah militants inside the Lebanese border, Israeli military officials say." ... "The clashes come as Israel keeps up its bombing of Lebanon, carrying out 80 air strikes early on Thursday." ... "Lebanon's president has called for an immediate ceasefire, calling Israel's offensive - which has killed 300 people and displaced 500,000 - a "massacre"." ... "Bombed roads are hampering aid efforts, with the UN warning the humanitarian crisis is worsening by the hour." ... "The nine days of fighting - triggered by the capture of two Israeli soldiers by the militant Hezbollah group in a cross-border raid - have left 29 Israelis dead, including 15 civilians killed by rockets fired by Hezbollah into Israel." ... "The United Nations' emergency relief co-ordinator, Jan Egeland, said that without a truce allowing aid agencies to begin the relief effort there would be a "catastrophe"." ... "Mr Egeland said that neither Hezbollah nor the Israelis seemed to care about civilian suffering, adding that nearly a third of the dead or wounded were children and the wounded could not be helped because roads and bridges had been cut by Israeli air strikes." -BBC /News 

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• US - Lebanon - Israel - Terrorism - History - "U.S. Marines land in Lebanon to aid evacuations: Return for first time since 1984." ... "U.S. Marines touched Lebanese soil for the first time in more than 22 years Thursday and began evacuating American citizens from the war-torn country." ... "The 40 Marines were using landing craft to ferry the evacuees to the USS Nashville just off the Lebanese coast." ... "The ship, once loaded, will return to Cyprus late Thursday." ... "Other Western countries also are rushing to evacuate their citizens from the fighting that is raging between Israel and Hezbollah militants. (Full story)" ... "That fighting entered a ninth day Thursday. (Full story)" ... "U.S. officials said the Marines are in Beirut only to help Americans and to engage in a humanitarian mission. They will leave as soon as the evacuees are on board." ... "Hezbollah, currently locked in battle with Israel, is a Lebanon-based group linked to the 1983 bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241 servicemen. Hezbollah is designated a terrorist organization by the United States." ... "The Marines pulled out of Lebanon in February 1984, just months after the bombing." -CNN 

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20060719
• US - Israel - Lebanon - Iran - Syria - Intelligence - "Arming of Hezbollah Reveals U.S. and Israeli Blind Spots." ... "The power and sophistication of the missile and rocket arsenal that Hezbollah has used in recent days has caught the United States and Israel off guard, and officials in both countries are just now learning the extent to which the militant group has succeeded in getting weapons from Iran and Syria." ... "While the Bush administration has stated that cracking down on weapons proliferation is one of its top priorities, the arming of Hezbollah shows the blind spots of American and other Western intelligence services in assessing the threat, officials from across those governments said." ... "American and Israeli officials said the successful attack last Friday on an Israeli naval vessel was the strongest evidence to date of direct support by Iran to Hezbollah. The attack was carried out with a sophisticated antiship cruise missile, the C-802, an Iranian-made variant of the Chinese Silkworm, an American intelligence official said." ... "At the same time, American and Israeli officials cautioned that they had found no evidence that Iranian operatives working in Lebanon launched the antiship missile themselves." -By Mark Mazzetti and Thom Shanker -NYTimes 

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20060716
• Lebanon - Israel - Military - Terrorism - Politics - US - "Desperate choices inside Lebanon: Many are trapped amid Israeli siege." ... "After days of bombardment and blockade by Israel, many Lebanese and visitors faced a tough choice: to leave through the last remaining exit routes or hunker down with extra candles, water, and powdered milk." ... "Tens of thousands have fled this tiny country since Thursday, after Israel began bombing targets in southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut in retaliation for the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah. But most of Lebanon's 4 million residents remain, unfazed by the familiar sounds of war around them." ... "Israeli officials said they feared that Hezbollah, a popular political party here that is considered a terrorist group in the United States, would transport the soldiers out of the country, so they laid siege to Lebanon, closing its ports and bombing the only airport and major highways to the outside world." ... "The blockade trapped many of the estimated 25,000 visiting Americans, among them Melani Cammett , a Harvard-affiliated professor living in the Back Bay, her husband, and their two children, ages 3 and 5." -By Farah Stockman and Andrew Lee Butters with contribution by Rana Fil -Boston/Globe 

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20060715
• Israel - Iran - Lebanon - Tech - Military - Terrorism - History - "Israel: Iran Aided Hezbollah Ship Attack: Israeli intelligence says Iranian troops helped Hezbollah attack warship; Iran denies charge." ... "Elite Iranian troops helped Hezbollah fire a sophisticated radar-guided missile at an Israeli warship, Israeli officials said Saturday, describing an apparent surprise blow by militants who had been using only low-tech weapons." ... "Iran denied that it had any troops in Lebanon." ... "Israel initially believed that an aerial drone armed with explosives hit the warship, but it became clear that Hezbollah had used an Iranian-made C-802 missile to strike the vessel late Friday, an Israeli intelligence official said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the information." ... "Hezbollah is widely believed to have been trained, funded and guided by the Revolutionary Guard since the militant group was founded during Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. The Islamic republic's elite corps of more than 200,000 fighters is independent of the regular armed forces and directly controlled by Iran's supreme leader." -By Ramit Plushnick-Masti -AP via -CBSNews 

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20060714
• Lebanon - Israel - "South Lebanon feels brunt of Israeli attacks: Airstrikes Thursday destroyed roads and bridges and killed at least 52 civilians." ... "Mohammed Akkash's voice cracked as he listed the names of his 10 grandchildren who were killed just hours earlier in an Israeli air raid on his son's home." ... ""The youngest one, Safat, was just 6 months old. Is a 6-month-old baby a resistance fighter? What happened is a crime," he says, as other mourners sitting on plastic seats outside his home nodded quietly in agreement." ... "Throughout the dusty hill villages and deep valleys of south Lebanon, similar displays of grief and anger were evident Thursday as the district reeled beneath the most intensive series of Israeli airstrikes mounted in 10 years. Roads and bridges here were systematically blown up, part of Israel's strategy of targeting the militant group Hizbullah's infrastructure that has effectively cut off south Lebanon from the rest of the country." ... "Sayyed Adil Akkash, a Shiite Muslim cleric allegedly connected to Lebanon's Hizbullah party, was killed along with his wife and 10 children in a predawn air raid in which up to 40 missiles struck his three-story home on a stony hillside outside this village. The missiles leveled the building, leaving a pile of rubble and coating a field of green tobacco plants in a thick layer of dark gray dust." -By Nicholas Blanford -CSMonitor

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20060530
• Noteworthy - Opinion - US - Military - Terrorism - Countries - Intelligence - Libya - Egypt - Lebanon - China - North Korea - Iran - "Neo-cons question Bush’s democratisation strategy." ... "President George W. Bush has likened the “war on terrorism” to the cold war against communism." ... "Addressing military cadets graduating from West Point, Mr Bush reaffirmed at the weekend that the US “will not rest until the promise of liberty reaches every people in every nation”." ... "But as the US struggles to assert itself on the international stage, the president’s most radical supporters now dismiss this as mere rhetoric, and traditional conservatives are questioning the wisdom of a democratisation strategy that has brought unpleasant consequences in the Middle East." ... "Neo-conservative commentators at the American Enterprise Institute wrote last week what amounted to an obituary of the Bush freedom doctrine." ... "“Bush killed his own doctrine,” they said, describing the final blow as the resumption of diplomatic relations with Libya. This betrayal of Libyan democracy activists, they said, came after the US watched Egypt abrogate elections, ignored the collapse of the “Cedar Revolution” in Lebanon, abandoned imprisoned Chinese dissidents and started considering a peace treaty with Stalinist North Korea." ... "The neo-conservatives offered no explanation for desertion of the doctrine, other than a desire to make quick but transitory short-term gains. “The president continues to believe his own preaching, but his administration has become incapable of making the hard choices those beliefs require,” they wrote." -By Guy Dinmore -FT.com 

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20051215
• Lebanon - Syria - Political - Intelligence - Terrorism - "UN extends Lebanon murder probe, chastises Syria." ... "The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously on Thursday to extend for six months the international probe into the murder of a Lebanese leader and told Syria it was not co-operating fully with investigators." ... "The resolution also authorises the U.N. commission to provide technical assistance to the Beirut government investigating a string of other politically motivated murders or attempted killings in the last year." ... "Detlev Mehlis, the German prosecutor who headed the U.N. inquiry, on Monday released a 25-page report saying new evidence had reinforced his earlier judgement that Syrian intelligence officials and their Lebanese allies, were involved in the killing." -By Evelyn Leopold -Reuters

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