IRAQ: President Obama: 'These two young Marines stood their ground'

In his speech Friday outlining plans for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, President Obama also paid tribute to two Marines posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for thwarting a suicide bomber: Lance Cpl. Jordan Haerter and Cpl. Jonathan Yale.

"These young men enlisted in time of war, knowing they would face great danger. They came here, to Camp Lejeune, as they trained for their mission. And last April they were standing guard in Anbar.

"In an age when suicide is a weapon, they were suddenly faced with an oncoming truck filled with explosives. These two young Marines stood their ground. These two Marines opened fire. And these two Marines stopped that truck.

"When the thousands of pounds of explosives detonated, they had saved 50  Marines and Iraqi police  who would have been in the truck's path, but Cpl. Yale and Lance Cpl. Haerter lost their own lives."

After his speech, Obama met with members of the Yale and Haerter families.

--Tony Perry, San Diego

Photo: President Obama at Camp Lejeune, N.C. Credit: Associated Press.

AFGHANISTAN: Hearts, minds and do-rah.

Amid a chasm of cultural differences, the Americans and Afghans share a love of sports.

And so U.S. troops helped organize a do-rah tournament in Oruzgan province, one of the areas where the Taliban has been most prevalent. The contest pitted various village squads competing for bragging rights in Deh Rawood district.

The sport is a bit like wrestling, with teams inside concentric circles trying to throw or kick each other. Judges award points for hits and aggressiveness.

About 1,500 spectators were in attendance. Trophies were awarded. U.S. troops and Afghan forces provided security.

-- Tony Perry, San Diego.

Photo: Do-rah in progress. Credit: U.S. Army

U.S. to lift ban on pictures of flag-draped caskets; Marine-congressman objects

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Thursday that he is lifting the ban on photography of caskets arriving at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, pending the working out of details that will allow individual families to veto picture taking.

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine), a Marine who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, immediately expressed his opposition to the policy change. Hunter believes that the current ban, in place since 1991, has worked well and that there is no need to subject traumatized family members to requests from the news media for permission to take pictures.

"Allowing the media to photograph the flag-draped caskets of America's fallen heroes dishonors their service and sacrifice," Hunter said, "and is a disservice to all those who have ever served in our nation's military."

-- Tony Perry, San Diego

Photo: Caskets being unloaded at Dover Air Force Base. The picture was among 300 released by the Air Force after a Freedom of Information Act request made by the website www.thememoryhole.org.

ISRAEL: Screen artists strike

Many successful revolutions begin with a takeover of television or radio studios. This week in Israel, these weren't armed rebels interrupting a live TV broadcast, but local artists.

TV journalist Guy Zohar presents "The Day That Was", a nightly light news wrap-up program. In the country's news-heavy media, the show is refreshingly low key. The set is minimal and the lighting dim, almost intimate. Perched on a bar stool -- the only furniture on the set -- Zohar offers a slightly offbeat take on the news. 

The next item was 2008 crime stats and car thefts. "So, if you have a Subaru, you'd better chain it to a post," he was saying, when three young women barged onto the set in mid-item.

"Oh dear," said the startled host, usually understated.

The three women opened their jackets, revealing not what you think. Taped to their shirts were handwritten signs: "original productions -- or close."

EGYPT: Palestinian reconciliation talks kick off in Cairo

Reconciliation talks between Hamas, Fatah and smaller Palestinian factions began Thursday in Cairo amid hopes for an agreement on a national unity government after nearly two years of bloodshed and political impasse that have slowed progress in the wider Arab-Israeli conflict.

In negotiations leading to the talks, Fatah and Hamas agreed to stop media smear campaigns against each other and to release prisoners held by both sides. "A certain number of detainees will be freed right at the beginning of the dialogue," according to a joint statement by Azzam Ahmed, leader of the Fatah bloc in the Palestinian parliament, and Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas official.

IRAQ: Homeless in Baghdad

It's bad enough to be homeless. It's worse to be homeless in a war-torn city such as Baghdad. But to be homeless and without even a country to claim you as a citizen? That is the apparent plight of a family living outside a five-star hotel in the Iraqi capital. As we wrote in today's story, Allia Abbis Ali Kassem Tibiti and her parents claim to be from Tibet and moved into their spot because the Chinese Embassy is inside the hotel across the street. They're hoping their presence will force the Chinese to grant them citizenship documents and let them leave Iraq.

SYRIA: A "kangaroo court" infringing on human rights

A group of friends chatting in a cafe and criticizing politicians is a common scene in many parts of the world.

Not in Syria.

Muhamad al-Husseini, 67, landed in jail for criticizing corruption and “insulting the Syrian president” while sitting at a popular cafe in Damascus.

The supreme state security court sentenced Husseini to three years in jail in 2007 based on reports by security services officials who reportedly overheard him.

Husseini’s case -- and those of 200 more Syrian detainees tried or charged between January 2007 and June 2008 by this special "kangaroo court" that prosecutes individuals seen as a threat to the state -- was the subject of an extensive report issued today by the New-York based Human Rights Watch.

IRAQ: National Museum reopens, sort of

Perhaps no event generated as much rage among regular Iraqis toward the United States in the early days of the war as the ransacking of Baghdad's National Museum, where looters fled with ancient artifacts as well as modern air conditioners while security collapsed in the spring of 2003. Today, with security greatly improved and thousands of stolen items returned to the museum, the treasure trove is preparing to reopen.

This being Iraq, where protocol and ceremony must be observed, the museum's doors could not simply be flung open to the public. Instead, dignitaries led by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki were given a personal tour of the museum Monday as a run-up to the public opening. This being Iraq, the event also was not without controversy.

EGYPT: Cairo bomb witness recalls terrifying scene

About 33 feet separated Amr Hassan, a theater director, from death in Sunday’s bombing in old Cairo -- the capital's first deadly terrorist attack in three years.

“I had a rehearsal right behind al Hussein mosque," Hassan said in an interview today. "I was waiting for the executive director in front of the mosque so we could go together to rehearsal. I was standing [about 33 feet] away from the blast.

“The minute the bomb exploded, we heard a terrifying noise and a blue oracle covered the place. A minute earlier, I saw a beggar. ... The beggar was terribly injured and he had definitely died. I saw his body thrown [about 13 feet] into the air. Everybody rushed; tourists were terrified, they were running in all directions. Victims were lying on the ground with injuries to faces and legs. 

"The police were watching a football game on TV at coffee shops when the explosion happened. The timing must have been well calculated [by the perpetrators]; the police were very relaxed ahead of the bombing." 

The bombing that rocked the Khan el Khalili bazaar, one of Cairo’s most famous tourist sites, left one French woman killed and 24 injured, according to Egyptian health ministry officials. Three suspects have reportedly been arrested. No group has claimed responsibility.

There were conflicting reports on the reason behind the explosion. Some reports claimed that a bomb was thrown from the top of a building while others said that the explosion occurred when a bomb hidden beneath a stone bench was detonated. Hassan found the latter account more conceivable; however, he believed the death toll was higher.

“I don’t think the bomb was thrown from the top because we would have noticed it before it hit the ground," he said. "I don’t think there was only one killed. ... The beggar’s body was lying right next to the French woman who was killed. I saw the police telling the rescuers to remove the woman’s body first. We as Egyptians are always left behind; were not they both victims? Why would the police remove the body of one and wait on the other?" 

-- Noha El-Hennawy in Cairo

Photo: Egyptian security personnel use a metal detector to search the tourist area of Khan el Khalili in Cairo. Credit: Agence France-Presse

ISRAEL: Reading with the enemy

"Don't judge a book by its cover," every kid knows. But what about the publisher?

Not many know, but obtaining an Arabic copy of Harry Potter in Israel requires a special permit under the pre-state Trade with the Enemy Ordinance. It's published in Lebanon. The same applies to the work of Israeli novelist Amos Oz, as Syrian publishing houses are the only ones in the Arab world that publish Arabic translations of his and other Hebrew literature.

Saleh Abbasi founded his bookstore, Kull Shay (Kol Bo in Hebrew) in 1974. 35 years later, he's Israel's largest supplier of Arabic books for a wide range of needs, including textbooks, classic and children's literature, academic institutions and even the national library.

But about 80% of Arabic books sold here -- from Shakespeare to Pinocchio -- are published in Lebanon and Syria, with no diplomatic relations with Israel.  As Israel signed peace treaties -- first with Egypt, later with Jordan -- Abbasi began importing the books through the two Arab countries now at peace with Israel.

It's complicated.

First, he sends the list of books he wants to import to agents in Jordan and Egypt. When they inform him they can supply the books, he sends the list to the Israeli censorship. When the books arrive, he is informed by the customs authorities, goes to the border in question, pays the fees and releases the shipment after censorship clearance.

Last August, Abbasi received a letter from the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor informing him that his license to import the books was being withdrawn under the 1939 Trade with the Enemy Ordinance, one of several legal anachronisms inherited from the British Mandate in Palestine and still in use. The books, purchased in countries at peace with Israel, are published and produced in "enemy states." The ministry's previous legal position had been that books did not constitute trade with the enemy.

After a complaint, the permit was temporarily reinstated by special permission, but efforts to have it extended to 2009 were rejected. In January, Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, petitioned the Supreme Court demanding the ban be lifted to guarantee the cultural rights of Arabic readers, as well as overall academic freedom and Abbasi's freedom of occupation.

The issue was pressing, as the Cairo to Nazareth book fair was to take place parallel to the international book fair, held in Jerusalem last week. Most orders for Arabic books are placed around the International Cairo Book Fair, held late January. Without a permit, there would be no new books. The authorities relented and issued another temporary permit that may be extended at the end of the year.

But it was given under the Trade with the Enemy Ordinance, not unlike (unwritten) consent Israel gives in certain cases for actual trade and other interactions with enemy countries. Adalah is now pressing for the import be continued under regular trade agreements.

"All informational and cultural materials should be exempt from the Trade with the Enemy Ordinance entirely," says Haneen Naamnih, a legal intern at Adalah who assisted in the petition submitted by attorney Hassan Jabareen, Adalah's director general. The timing of the authorities' decision to enact the absurd and anachronistic ban was a puzzle.

The petition included letters from Israeli academic leaders, who stressed the importance of the books for academia, research and general education. Professional Arabic dictionaries used by Middle East and Arabic majors in Israeli universities, for example, are published in Lebanon.

In 1988, the U.S. passed the Berman Amendment to the 1917 TWEA ('trading with the enemy act'), exempting informational material from Castro's Cuba from the ban, including books, papers, music and art. A later amendment and court case finally freed American publishers from the need to secure permission from the governments of Cuba, Iran and Sudan for publishing the works of authors from those countries, a demand that had made it effectively impossible.

-- Batsheva Sobelman in Jerusalem.

Photo: Saleh Abbasi with his books. Credit: Adala website