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Summary: U.S./Top News Iran's president pledged Monday that Iran would do all it could to stop the growing violence in Iraq, the New York Times reports. Analysts say the Iraqi president is urging Iran to hold direct talks with the US to help stop the bloodshed in Iraq. Iran has close ties with Shiite leaders in Iraq, and it might be able to call on them to exert restraint. Iraq's president said Iraq needed Iran's help to bring peace. An Iranian News Agency account of the Iranian president's remarks suggests that Iran's help might be contingent on the US setting a timetable for the withdrawal of its forces from Iraq - a demand supported by a majority of Americans and Iraqis.
Writing on Common Dreams, Jeff Cohen calls for holding CNN to account for providing a platform for Iran-bashing warmonger Glenn Beck.
A growing number of Middle East analysts say Iraq's conflict has spun out of Washington's control, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports, suggesting it doesn't matter if the Baker commission recommends talking with Iran and Syria, because it won't do any good. [Those who oppose talking to Iran and Syria on the grounds that they are responsible for all the violence in Iraq should get together with those who oppose talking with Iran and Syria on the grounds that they don't have any influence in Iraq to try to hammer out a consistent message.]
The Iraq Study Group met yesterday at an undisclosed location to discuss its first draft report that calls for increased diplomatic engagement in the region, the Washington Times reports. Baker is said to be pushing a recommendation for the Bush administration to engage in direct talks with Syria and Iran. Defense sources said it will be difficult for the group to reach a unanimous report if it recommends a significant shift away from Bush's policy of no specific timetable for removing U.S. troops.
NBC's "Today Show" host Matt Lauer yesterday told millions of American television viewers the network would buck the White House and from now on describe the Iraq war as a "civil war." Some media analysts compared the shift to Walter Cronkite's declaration in 1968 that the US was losing the Vietnam War, the Boston Globe reports, noting that the Los Angeles Times, the Christian Science Monitor, and McClatchy Newspapers have made the same shift, while CBS and the New York Times will permit "where appropriate" the use of the term "civil war."
Robert Gates is likely to assume the post of defense secretary before year's end if he is confirmed by the Senate as expected, AP reports. The Pentagon press secretary said Gates will have his confirmation hearing early next week, with a vote expected by the Senate by Dec. 13.
Iran Iran said Tuesday it would let the IAEA take further environmental samples of materials related to an academic center, Reuters reports. Iran is not required to allow the IAEA into sites where there is no clear sign of nuclear activities. But it says that by permitting such inspections, it wants to show its nuclear plans are peaceful.
Iraq A senior American intelligence official says Hezbollah has trained members of the Mahdi Army, Michael Gordon & Dexter Filkins write in the New York Times. Iran has facilitated the link between Hezbollah and the Shiite militias in Iraq, the official said, although no evidence is presented for this claim. In his piece on Common Dreams, Jeff Cohen cited Michael Gordon as a reporter who cannot hold officials to account for their claims about Iran because of his role in hyping claims about Iraq in the run-up to the US invasion.
The U.S. military cannot defeat the insurgency in western Iraq or counter al-Qaeda's rising popularity there, according to a classified Marine Corps intelligence report, writes the Washington Post, which obtained a copy of the report.
A debate over whether to set a timetable for a phased withdrawal of US forces from Iraq is being preempted by key US allies who have announced plans to scale back their own forces over the next year, AFP reports.
Lebanon A satricial ad campaign in Lebanon mocks the country's sectarian social and political structure, the Washington Post reports.
Afghanistan U.S. and European efforts to end heroin production in Afghanistan have done little to hamper the drug industry and have hurt the country's poorest people, according to a new report by the UN and the World Bank.
NATO's fragile unity over Afghanistan has begun to crack with a public call to discuss an exit strategy, the Independent reports. André Flahaut, the Belgian Defense Minister, brought anxieties about the Afghan mission into the open when he suggested that, at the Riga summit, "we finally reflect on an exit strategy". In an interview, Flahaut argued: "The situation is deteriorating and, over time, NATO forces risk appearing like an army of occupation."
NATO forces should be able to hand over responsibility to Afghanistan's security forces gradually in 2008, the alliance's secretary-general said on Tuesday. But Jaap De Hoop Scheffer said that at present any talk of withdrawals in Afghanistan was premature, Reuters reports.
Ecuador In a confused New York Times article about Ecuador's new president, Simon Romero tries to contrast Rafael Correa with other leftist Latin American presidents, noting Correa's statement that "Foreign investment that generates wealth and jobs and pays taxes will always be welcome." Similar statements have been made by the presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela, where foreign corporations continue to make handsome profits. Romero says it would be premature to make a judgment on Correa, but apparently the headline writer didn't get the memo. Ironically, Romero makes much of Correa's admiration of the late American economist John Kenneth Galbraith, which he contrasts to Correa's Bush and IMF-bashing (it's not clear why Romero sees this as contradictory.) It was President Chavez' statement that he regretted not having met Galbraith before his death that the New York Times mistranslated as a statement that he regretted not having met Noam Chomsky.
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- Robert Naiman Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org