“President Obama was considering clemency, but I told him, ‘Over my dead body are we going to let him out before his time.’ If it were up to me, he would stay in jail for life,” U.S. Vice President Joe Biden was quoted as saying during a meeting with rabbis in Florida in a New York Times article published on Saturday.

The Times article reported that U.S. President Barack Obama has turned to Biden to shore up support amongst U.S. Jews.

Read more http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/report-obama-weighed-clemency-for-pollard-but-biden-vehemently-opposed-move-1.387562

	U.S. Vice President Joe Biden
	Photo by: AP

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Barack Obama with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Neither of the leaders support calls for a Palestinian state. Photograph: Jason Reed/Reuters

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Popular satirist and host of The Daily Show implies that the Palestinian UN bid is legitimate because ongoing negotiations with Israel have not borne fruit.

The host of a popular satirical news show in the United States weighed in on the Palestinian bid for United Nations membership on Thursday night, deriding U.S. President Obama’s suggestion that Palestinian statehood could only come as a result of negotiations with Israel.

	Cover of book ‘A Visitor’s Guide to the Human Race’ by Jon Stewart.
	Photo by: AP

Read More http://www.haaretz.com/culture/jon-stewart-lampoons-obama-s-stance-on-palestinian-statehood-1.386237

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Sooner or later, it’s going to happen. Most likely, the moment will come just before his first head-of-state meeting in New York. Or perhaps it will happen just before his first side-bar meeting with Binyamin Netanyahu. Or then again, it may come as the cumulative reaction to a series of embarrassing encounters with fellow world leaders. But the moment will come.

At some point this coming week, during his visit to the this year’s opening of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, US President Barack Obama is going to have a nearly irresistible urge. He is going to want to stand up to his hovering political handlers and the smothering bureaucracy which tries to dictate his every move, summon his personal dignity, and say “Enough”.

In April of 1995, President Clinton played host to then-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan. US-Pakistan relations were in sharp decline. A few years before, the US had begun to implement sanctions mandated by the so-called Pressler Amendment, under which Pakistan was to be punished with a complete cutoff of aid and of military sales if it were found to be pursuing a nuclear-weapons capability. The first President Bush had made such a finding, and now the ties between the two countries were being progressively cut.

At the heart of the growing ill-feeling between the two nations was the US cancellation of a previously-agreed sale of 28 F-16 fighter aircraft. The Pakistanis had realised when they signed the purchase deal that it might be cancelled if the Pressler Amendment were invoked. Now, given the law and the previous assertion of Pakistani culpability from President Bush, there was no longer any question of delivering the aircraft. But there was another wrinkle.

Read more  http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/09/2011919102245537768.html

Secreatry of State Hillary Clinton arrives at the Elysee palace for a meeting with french President Nicolas Sarkozy prior to a conference on Libya‘s post-Moamer Kadhafi future on September 1, 2011 in Paris. Photographer: Lionel Bonaventure/AFP/Getty Images

The most popular national political figure in America today is one who was rejected by her own party three years ago: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans hold a favorable view of her and one-third are suffering a form of buyer’s remorse, saying the U.S. would be better off now if she had become president in 2008 instead of Barack Obama.

The finding in the latest Bloomberg National Poll shows a higher level of wishful thinking about a Hillary Clinton presidency than when a similar question was asked in July 2010. Then, a quarter of Americans held such a view.

“Looking back, I wonder if she would have been a stronger leader, knowing the games and the politics and all that goes on,” said Susan Dunlop, 50, a homemaker in New Port Richey, Florida. “I don’t think she would have bent as much.”

Clinton, 63, a former first lady and U.S. senator from New York, fought with Obama for the Democratic nomination until June 2008, in what was often a combative primary that included her questioning his presidential readiness.

While 34 percent say things would be better under a Clinton administration, almost half — 47 percent — say things would be about the same and 13 percent say worse.

“Some of her appeal is that she is not Barack Obama,” said J. Ann Selzer, president of Des Moines, Iowa-based Selzer & Co., which conducted the Sept. 9-12 poll.

Read More  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-16/clinton-popularity-prompts-some-remorse-poll.html

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National September 11 Memorial site in New York

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has “specific, credible but unconfirmed threat information” as the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks nears, agency spokesman Matt Chandler said in a statement.

The threat concerns a possible al-Qaeda-sponsored attack targeting New York or Washington on or near the anniversary of the attack, said a different U.S. official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly. The official said the intelligence concerns a possible vehicle-borne attack, perhaps on a transportation hub or bottleneck, and cautioned that the options may be broader than a car or truck bombing.

Another intelligence official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said the information hasn’t been fully vetted.

President Barack Obama was briefed on the threat today and received updates throughout the day, according to a statement from a White House official who asked not to be identified.

Obama directed counter-terrorism officials to redouble their efforts, which had already been increased in advance of the anniversary of the 2001 attacks on New York City’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., the White House official said.

New York police will increase security after receiving information of the possible targeting of New York for an attack keyed to the Sept. 11 anniversary, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.

Read More  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-08/u-s-homeland-security-reports-9-11-terror-threat.html

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Update 3:04 p.m. ET: All national monuments and parks in Washington are “stable but closed” following Tuesday’s earthquake, a United States Park Police spokesman said.

Part of the central tower of the National Cathedral, the highest point in Washington, D.C., was damaged, according to spokesman Richard Weinberg. “It looks like three of the pinnacles have broken off the central tower,” Weinberg told CNN.

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Image via Wikipedia

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will give an interview to Syrian television today to address recent events in the nation and the government’s reforms, the state-run news agency reported as Assad’s security forces continued a violent crackdown on protesters.

Faced with the most serious threat to his family’s 40-year rule, Assad has deployed tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and helicopters to crush the uprising that began in mid-March after revolts ousted the leaders of Tunisia and Egypt and sparked a conflict in Libya.

Security forces fired on protesters yesterday in the Homs governorate and Daraa, Mahmoud Merhi, head of the Arab Organization for Human Rights, said in a phone interview from Damascus, the capital. At least six people died in clashes in Homs, Ammar Qurabi of the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria said yesterday by phone.

U.S. President Barack Obama, in a coordinated move with U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, issued a statement on Aug. 18 saying Assad should step down and allow Syrians to chart their own political future.

The European Union reached an agreement to broaden sanctions against the regime, including preparing for an embargo on the import of Syrian crude oil into the bloc, according to an e-mailed statement on Aug. 19.

At least 40 people were killed on Aug. 19 in Damascus, Homs and Daraa, the area where the revolt against Syria’s president began, according to the website of the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria.

Obama’s declaration was his first explicit call for Assad to give up power since the uprising started. He also signed an executive order freezing any Syrian government assets in the U.S. and banning import to the U.S. of petroleum products of Syrian origin. The order prohibits people in the U.S. from doing business with Syria.

To contact the reporter on this story: Glen Carey in Riyadh at gcarey8@bloomberg.net.

Source http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-20/assad-plans-to-appear-on-syrian-television-as-violent-crackdown-escalates.html

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In an interview with two US newspapers published Friday, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the Iraqis appeared to have made up their mind to extend the presence of American troops beyond the year-end withdrawal deadline. “My view is that they finally did say, ‘Yes,’” Panetta told Stars and Stripes and the Military Times… Read More

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Syrian security forces have fired on anti-government protesters after Friday prayers, killing at least 40 people across the country, activists say. Read More  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14586004

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The leaders of the US, France, Germany, Britain and the EU call for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down over his crackdown on protesters.

Click to play  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14577333

 Hillary Clinton: “The transition to democracy in Syria has begun, and it is time for Assad to get out of the way”

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Syrian warships have joined a military assault on protesters in the northern port city of Latakia, activists say.

At least 19 people have been killed in the operation, according to activists and human rights groups.

Read More  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14520830

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Activists say 17 people have died as government attempts to put down demonstrations from Damascus to Deir ez-Zor.

Watch the Video http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/08/2011812125517309603.html

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PEACE ON EARTH

Unilateral declaration considered if peace talks with Israel remain in limbo, though previous pronouncements have been received coolly.

By Reuters

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has told Arab leaders he may seek U.S. recognition for a Palestinian state, which would include all of the West Bank, should peace talks with Israel break down, an aide said on Saturday.

The idea, raised during Arab League deliberations in Libya on Friday, would place new pressure on Israel to extend a recently expired freeze on construction of settlements in the West Bank – a Palestinian condition for continuing recently relaunched direct peace negotiations.

	Photo by: AP

Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said “alternatives” to the face-to-face talks launched five weeks ago had been discussed,

Read More http://www.haaretz.com/news/

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A combination of undated video stills shows Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Reuters

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2017444,00.html#ixzz11MWvSPfm

Nine years after the 9/11 attacks, al-Qaeda’s shadow still looms large in America’s national conversation. President Barack Obama on Thursday warned that a grotesque Koran-burning prank planned by the pastor of a tiny Florida church would be a “recruitment bonanza for al-Qaeda.” The putative threat of Osama bin Laden’s little band of terrorists, believed to number no more than a couple of hundred, is also the prime reason offered in Washington for keeping close to 100,000 troops in Afghanistan at a huge cost in blood and treasure. “No challenge is more essential to our security than our fight against al-Qaeda,” Obama said last week. “And because of our drawdown in Iraq, we are now able to apply the resources necessary to go on offense.”

GOP heavyweight Newt Gingrich disagrees, warning that the Administration lacks a “serious strategy in fighting terrorism” and is blind to its danger — echoing Senator John McCain’s effort, in the final weeks of his doomed 2008 presidential campaign, to rally support by asking whether Barack Obama “is a man who has what it takes to protect America from Osama bin Laden.” (See a bin Laden family photo album.)

In U.S. politics, you downplay the “al-Qaeda threat” at your peril, as Senator John Kerry discovered in 2004, when he suggested during his ill-fated presidential campaign that terrorism could not be eliminated, but could be reduced to a “nuisance” level where it wasn’t dominating Americans’ lives. Al-Qaeda, he said, was essentially a diabolical criminal enterprise that should not be given the status of a geopolitical challenger on the order of Hitler or Stalin.

Kerry’s view did not convince voters, but it may well have been vindicated by events. Systematic police work and intelligence-driven military strikes have reduced the operational core of bin Laden’s movement to a handful of desperate men hiding from U.S. drones in the wilds of Pashtunistan. They’ve failed to launch another attack on the U.S. mainland, and even the handful of devastating strikes in far off places — Bali, Madrid, London, Istanbul — that followed 9/11 have given way to the occasional, amateurish attempt by one or two people recruited via the Internet. More important, al-Qaeda’s attacks failed miserably to achieve their main objective: to inspire a global bin Laden-led rebellion against U.S.-aligned regimes throughout the Muslim world. (See a special report on the accued 9/11 plotters.)

Bin Laden’s problem from the very beginning was that while (polls show) a majority of Muslims around the world might have agreed with his charge of U.S. malfeasance in its dealings in the Middle East, only a tiny minority identified with terrorism as a response. Despite the virulently anti-American attitudes revealed in opinion surveys in parts of the Muslim world after 9/11, very few people were prepared to condone attacks on innocent civilians. That’s why so many people in Egypt and Pakistan bought into conspiracy theories about the CIA or Israel’s Mossad being behind the attacks.

The ubiquity of bin Laden’s image in the wake of the attacks suggested that he might become a kind of jihadist Che Guevara, destined to live on long after his death on an endless stream of T-shirts and tchotchkes. (Of course, he’d first have to be killed to test that theory.) But there’s another connection: Like the Saudi jihadist, the Argentinian revolutionary had mistakenly assumed that simply demonstrating through violence that a hated enemy was not invulnerable would automatically rouse the masses to rebellion.

While the 9/11 attacks made bin Laden the focus of American fear and rage, his “global jihad” failed to either eclipse or enlist its more localized Islamist rivals. Hamas confined itself to striking Israeli targets, and to competing with Fatah for local political power at the ballot box and on the streets; Hizballah continued to lock horns with Israel on its northern border and to engage in the complexities of Lebanese politics; Iran actually helped the initial U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan, although it soon resumed its struggle with Washington and its allies for influence throughout the Middle East. Al-Qaeda may still figure in U.S. debate, but it no longer garners any attention in the Arab political conversation — prompting it to issue increasingly hysterical denunciations of Hamas, Hizballah and Iran. (See pictures of the battle against the Taliban.)

The only al-Qaeda “chapter” to gain any traction was the one that came into existence in Iraq in response to the U.S. invasion, and thrived while its presence was tolerated as a force multiplier by mainstream Sunni insurgents. But the group’s ideology and propensity for vicious sectarian murder of Shi’ites turned the insurgents against them, and eventually the bulk of the insurgency turned on al-Qaeda, with many Sunni insurgents going onto the U.S. payroll under the rubric of the “Awakening” movement. (The uptick of al-Qaeda attacks in Iraq in recent months has coincided with the growing alienation of Sunnis, particularly in the “Awakening” movement, from the Shi’ite-led government. And a political solution to Iraq’s political conflict will no doubt once again shut it out.)

A similar fate almost certainly awaits the movement in Afghanistan, where its erstwhile Taliban ally is fighting a nationalist campaign against foreign armies, which will inevitably end in a power-sharing political settlement. And even Taliban leaders have indicated they won’t allow their territory to be used as a base to export terrorism.

If anything, hostility towards the U.S. in the Muslim world has actually escalated over the past nine years, because of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and Israel’s conflicts with its neighbors. But al-Qaeda, ironically, remains on the margins. It’s not inconceivable that bin Laden’s men will get lucky again at some point in the future, but not even another major terror strike would change the basic calculus of al-Qaeda’s demise.See pictures of President Bush in the Middle East.

See TIME’s Pictures of the Week

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Netanyahu refused to hold a serious discussion on any of the core issues apart from security, Abbas reportedly told diplomats.

By Barak Ravid

The three meetings held so far between Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the current round of peace talks have addressed nothing of substance, diplomatic sources say.

	Mahmoud Abbas, Hosni Mubarak and Benjamin Netanyahu with Barack Obama in the White House/
	Photo by: White House

American mediators are still trying to save the talks from collapsing in the crisis following the resumption of construction in settlements.

Netanyahu refused to hold a serious discussion on any of the core issues apart from security, Abbas reportedly told diplomats he met at the UN General Assembly. Israeli and foreign sources say the main problem is that Netanyahu refuses to present fundamental positions or discuss the borders of the Palestinian state.

“I heard nothing from Netanyahu but niceties,” Abbas reportedly told foreign diplomats.

U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell presented the talks as very successful, saying they were moving more rapidly than those in Northern Ireland, where he also served as mediator. He said Abbas and Netanyahu were dealing with all the tough issues and not leaving them to the end of the discussions.

But both Israeli and Palestinian sources said Mitchell’s statement was “inaccurate” at best. A European diplomat who met the Palestinian negotiating team in New York about a week ago told Haaretz the Palestinians were furious with Mitchell. “He gave a false presentation of progress,” the diplomat said a Palestinian official had told him.

Five Israeli and foreign diplomats, who were briefed about the Netanyahu-Abbas meetings by one of the parties or by senior American officials, said prospects for progress in the talks remained gloomy, even if the construction crisis were solved.

The two first meetings, held during the talks’ launch in Washington on September 2 and at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit on September 14, mainly dealt with technical matters like the order of the topics to be discussed and the future of the construction freeze in the settlements.

The first meeting dealt with setting a date for the next meeting and with formulating a “conduct code” for the talks, mainly to prevent leaks. They also discussed the construction freeze and what to discuss first – security or borders.

After the second meeting, Mitchell said the parties had discussed seriously and in detail core issues of the final status arrangement. But officials briefed about that meeting said it dealt with an attempt to define the “core issues” rather than presenting positions on them.

The sources said this discussion was strange as at least two Israeli governments had reached an agreement with the Palestinians on this issue.

The sources said the sterile discussion about whether to discuss borders or security first, or both issues simultaneously, continued.

Mitchell described the third meeting, held on September 15 in Jerusalem, as very positive and said it made considerable progress. Here too officials familiar with the talks said the opposite is true.

Abbas presented Netanyahu with all the details of his talks with former prime minister Ehud Olmert and the current Palestinian stands on borders, security, the refugees, Jerusalem and the settlements. Netanyahu refused to comment on the Palestinian positions, especially on the borders, and would only present his position on the security arrangements.

Abbas was “alarmed” to hear at that meeting that Netanyahu was interested in reaching a framework agreement within a year, but in implementing it over a period of at least 20 years, a European diplomat said.

The American brokers were reportedly extremely frustrated after the meeting in Jerusalem and some of them wondered if the talks hadn’t in fact gone backward.

A source close to the prime minister confirmed that Netanyahu refused to go into core issues such as the borders in detail. As long as the construction crisis was not over and the talks’ continuation was not assured, Netanyahu did not want to present a position that could endanger him politically, the source explained.

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A researcher with ties to Dennis Ross published an article on Wednesday saying that Obama sent a letter to Netanyahu offering U.S. guarantees in exchange for a two month settlement freeze extension.

The White House denied on Thursday that U.S. President Barack Obama sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposing a set of U.S. guarantees to Israel in exchange for Israel extending a freeze on settlement construction in the West Bank for another two months.

“No letter was sent to the Prime Minister. We are not going to comment on sensitive diplomatic matters,” said Benjamin Chang, the deputy spokesman for the White House National Security Council.

It is not clear, however, whether Obama could have made the offer via means other than a letter.

Earlier on Thursday, Palestinian negotiator Nabil Shaath said that U.S. special envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell denied that Obama made such an offer to Netanyahu.

In an interview on Nazareth’s A-Shams radio station, Shaath said that Mitchell made the denial during a meeting on Thursday with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah.

Shaath added that the Palestinians would not return to the negotiating table unless Israel extends a freeze on settlement construction in the West Bank and that the Arab League would support that position at its meeting next week.

An article published on Wednesday on the website for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy by David Makovsky, a researcher with ties to Dennis Ross, Barack Obama’s chief advisor on the Middle East, reported that Obama had written a letter Netanyahu in which Obama offered to support the presence of Israel Defense Forces soldiers in the Jordan Valley even after the establishment of a Palestinian state, if Israel would agree to a two month settlement building freeze.

Netanyahu was reportedly inclined to reject the offer.

	U.S. President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
	Photo by: AP

Obama’s letter was said to include a long list of American favors in exchange for an extension of the settlement building freeze, which ended this week. Most of these favors are critical to Israel’s strategic security needs that Netanyahu has been demanding for years.

Other commitments that Obama reportedly offered Netanyahu in the letter include an agreement not to ask for any more building freeze extensions, an agreement to veto any anti-Israel UN Security Council resolution in the next year, and an agreement that the future fate of the settlements be dealt with only as part of a final status agreement with the Palestinians.

Obama’s letter was said to include additional commitments, including a series of guarantees to prevent the smuggling of weapons and missiles into a Palestinian state, a lengthy period of interim security arrangements in the Jordan Valley and a comprehensive regional defense pact for protection from Iran to follow the establishment of the Palestinian state.

The American President also reportedly vowed to upgrade Israel’s security capabilities and increase the three billion dollar security aid package that Israel receives annually. The letter included commitments to advanced weapons and early warning systems, including satellites.

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Based on US President Barack Obama’s 31 August pronouncement and the uncritical TV news coverage of it, it might be reasonable to believe that the Iraq war is over. The frustrating truth, however, is that for the Iraqi people, for American soldiers…

The US is revamping foreign aid to focus on development, not dependence, President Barack Obama tells the UN.