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Summary: U.S./Top News Growing doubts among GOP lawmakers about the administration's strategy and the prospect of Democratic wins in next month's elections will soon force the Bush administration to abandon its open-ended commitment to the war in Iraq, the Washington Post reports.
The US military command in Iraq acknowledged Thursday its 12-week-old campaign to win back control of Baghdad from sectarian death squads and insurgents had failed to reduce violence across the city, the New York Times reports.
In a news analysis, the Times writes that acknowledgment by the US Army spokesman that the latest plan to secure Baghdad has faltered leaves Bush with some of the ugliest choices he has faced in the war. Whatever choices he makes they will be forced by a series of events that seems largely out of his control.
Representatives of a group of academics and writers rejected the Anti-Defamation League's invitation to discuss their charge that the ADL applied pressure to shut down a prominent critic of Israel's New York lecture, Jewish Week reports. In their letter, the critics wrote Foxman: "What does surprise and disturb us is that an organization dedicated to promoting civil rights and public education should threaten and exert pressure to cancel a public lecture by an important scholar."
An American military propaganda campaign that planted favorable news articles in the Iraqi news media did not violate laws or Pentagon regulations, but it was not properly supervised by military officials in Baghdad, an audit by the Pentagon Inspector General has concluded.
A federal judge ruled Thursday US courts did not have the authority to prohibit allied military forces in Iraq from transferring to the Iraqi government's custody an American citizen who has been sentenced to death.
The U.S. public has become increasingly anxious about world events and the role their country is playing in them, according to a new survey. The survey found a substantial rise in concern about how the U.S. is perceived in the world. Nearly 90% of respondents said they considered it a threat to U.S. national security when "the rest of the world sees the US" in a negative light. Nearly two-thirds of respondents said the world currently feels either "somewhat" or "very" negatively toward the country, while nearly four in five said they believe the country is seen as "arrogant".
Going into the November midterm elections, seven in ten Americans say they prefer Congressional candidates who will pursue a new approach to U.S. foreign policy, the Program on International Policy Attitudes reports.
Iran Britain said Thursday it expects a draft U.N. resolution on Iran to be introduced in the Security Council early next week and diplomats said it will seek sanctions on Tehran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment. France, Britain and Germany were still discussing the text with the US on Thursday, and had not yet shown it to Russia and China.
Iraq The Shiite militia run by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr seized total control of the southern Iraqi city of Amarah on Friday in one of the boldest acts of defiance yet by one of the country's powerful, unofficial armies, AP reports.
Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki's office has instructed the country's health ministry to stop providing mortality figures to the UN, jeopardizing a key source of information on the number of civilian war dead in Iraq, the Washington Post reports.
Israel Unauthorized settler outposts in the West Bank would get official government approval under a deal Israel's defense minister is working out, AP reports..
Lebanon The Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah fired cluster munitions during its 33-day war with Israel last summer, in strikes that caused one death and 12 injuries, according to a report released this week by Human Rights Watch.
North Korea China is prepared to step up pressure on North Korea in coming weeks by reducing oil shipments, among other measures, if the country refuses to return to negotiations or conducts more nuclear tests, the New York Times reports.
The government of South Korea told Secretary of State Rice Thursday it had no intention of pulling out of an industrial zone and a tourist resort in North Korea, the New York Times reports. "We are not deviating from the international community only because we differ with a certain country," a security adviser for President Roh said, referring to the United States.
Contents: http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/newsroom/blog/
-------- Robert Naiman Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org
Just Foreign Policy is a membership organization devoted to reforming U.S. foreign policy so that it reflects the values and interests of the majority of Americans.