IRAN: No one-way tickets in Tehran

Inflation rather than the American warships moored in the Persian Gulf may be the biggest threat to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The country's inflation rate itself is a matter of heated dispute between officials and experts. The Central Bank pegged the rate at 16.2% in a report published this year. Reformist critics say it's closer to 25%.

However, consumers have their own assessment of inflation. Stores regularly say they’ve raised prices 30% to 35% over the last year for basic staples such as rice, bread and meat.

IRAQ: At long last, a victim is laid to rest

Salam Suwaidan died more than a year ago, but he finally got a proper burial Thursday after his family tracked his body to a cemetery for unidentified corpses and brought it back to his hometown west of Baghdad. Hundreds of people turned out for the funeral, the result of painstaking efforts by relatives whose experience illustrates the tragedy facing so many Iraqis.

Not only do they lose loved ones to violence on a daily basis, often they never find out what happened to them. This was nearly the case with Suwaidan, who headed the scholarship department at the Ministry of Higher Education in Baghdad.

IRAQ: Al Qaeda marks Thanksgiving with bloodshed

Al Qaeda in Iraq appears to remain as defiant as ever, despite indications that multinational forces in the country are making significant inroads into defeating the insurgents.

On Thursday, they brazenly attacked Iraqi Army troops in south Baghdad, captured a couple of Army vehicles, and then used them to attack armed civilians, known as Concerned Citizens, who at one time were Al Qaeda allies.

EGYPT: Who to believe?

Two days after an announcement that the government finalized a plan to build a new capital,  President Hosni Mubarak dealt a blow  to his cabinet by ridiculing the project and declaring that his treasury could not afford such a project, a statement that embarrassed the cabinet, which is a presidential appointee.

SAUDI ARABIA: A beguiling case of rape

Even in a Saudi Arabia, where evildoers are beheaded and the hands of pick-pockets are amputated, the case of the young woman from Qatif was viewed by many as a startling injustice and disturbing reminder of how little rights women have in the kingdom.

JORDAN: Islamists lose elections

Preliminary results from Jordan's elections Tuesday showed Islamists losing more than half of their parliamentary seats and those aligned with King Abdullah II winning big, according to Reuters.

The results were no big surprise for most observers, who saw the election as rigged to give the king's secular and Islamic opponents, like the Islamic Action Front, little chance at mounting a credible opposition. The Front's total dropped from the 17 seats it won in 2003 to seven.

The big loss for the Islamic Action Front comes as the party split between hard-liners who wanted to boycott the election altogether and moderates who wanted to give it a chance. The results may boost the hardline position.

IRAQ: News agency to address Baghdad security concerns

Iraq's government is so confident that the security gains being felt in the capital are here to stay that it plans to launch a new news agency to trumpet the good news. Ali Hadi Mohammed, head of the government's National Media Center, announced the plan Monday to a handful of foreign journalists invited to his office for a get-to-know-you session.

Presidential deadlock in Lebanon

Deadlocked Lebanese lawmakers yet again today delayed a parliamentary session to choose a new president to replace the departing Emile Lahoud, whose term expires at the stroke of midnight Friday.

They were supposed to meet Wednesday. But news agencies reported today that the meeting has been pushed back until Friday, just hours before the hours the deadline.

Blogger Jeha, writing at Pajamas Media, thinks there will likely be another delay.

The smart money is not betting on anything happening any time soon. Nor is anyone expecting much for the time being. The fact remains that the current crop of leaders, many of whom are “born again” Lebanese, have been accustomed to getting marching orders from elsewhere.

Indeed many Lebanese feel utter contempt toward their political class, who dress well but can't seem to govern, as shown in this animated video featuring Lebanon's political cast of characters, from Michel Auon to Walid Jumblatt.

Still many fear the political bickering could quickly descend into the kind of violence that plagued Lebanon during the 1975-1990 civil war.

IRAQ: Car bombings are all too common in Baghdad

Better security was the topic of a news conference held by U.S. government and military officials inside the well-protected Green Zone on Sunday. Unfortunately, security concerns prevented some journalists from hearing the news first-hand.

IRAN: Bureaucratic realism in Tehran

Iranian authorities have banned a Persian-language translation of Gabriel Garcia-Marquez's novel, "Memories of My Melancholy Whores," but pirated copies continue to sell briskly in Tehran. In fact, sales appear to have increased since the ban went into effect.

On the sidewalks outside Tehran University, vendors sold copies of the book, which is titled "Memories of my Melancholy Sweethearts," in the Persian version. On Sunday, the booksellers busily bound copies of the Colombian novelist's book to sell for about $3 each. At least one website put the whole book online, and without mistranslating the title.