Hezbollah choice at center of Lebanon vote

Lebanon goes to the polls on Sunday with the main choices a Hezbollah-backed alliance or the U.S-backed coalition to lead their government. U.S. President Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo, Egypt, on Wednesday came at a critical time for Lebanon as it sits amid a power struggle between a weakened pro-Western government and a stronger pro-Syrian Hezbollah political bloc that has gained political momentum in recent years.

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Middle East Muslims Like Obama’s Words but Want to See Action

There was plenty of enthusiasm across the Muslim world for President Barack Obama’s Cairo speech Thursday, although much of it was tempered by a withholding of judgment until talk of change is translated into action. And there were mixed feelings about whether policy changes would be forthcoming and on Arab and Muslim responsibility to help bring it about

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Hezbollah denies link to Hariri murder

The militia group Hezbollah has dismissed a German magazine report that it was behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, calling the accusations "fabrications." The report in Germany’s Der Spiegel is intended to “influence” the outcome of the upcoming elections in Lebanon, Hezbollah said Sunday in a message posted on the Web site of its television station Al-Manar. A Hezbollah-led alliance is running against a U.S.-backed parliamentary majority in elections scheduled for June 7. “It is nothing more than police fabrications made by the same black room that has kept on fabricating such stories for over four years,” Hezbollah said.

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Abu Ghraib photos provoked shock, then anger, for Arabs

There is hardly anything in U.S.-Arab relations that screams scandal louder than the torture pictures of Abu Ghraib: Naked hooded male bodies in the fetal position, piled up on top of each other in a pyramid shape, next to them U.S. soldiers in uniform smiling and giving two thumbs up

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Commentary: Why Obama should release photos

Justifying his dramatic reversal of the decision to release photos showing abuse of detainees by U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Obama argued publication would "further inflame anti-American opinion and put our troops in greater danger." (CNN) — Justifying his dramatic reversal of the decision to release photos showing abuse of detainees by U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Obama argued publication would “further inflame anti-American opinion and put our troops in greater danger.” In fact, world opinion, particularly that of Muslims, would likely view the release of these horror images as representing a rupture for the better in American politics and foreign policy.

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Taliban attack NATO trucks in Pakistan

Taliban militants attacked NATO supply terminals Wednesday morning, torching at least 10 supply trucks in northern Pakistan, local officials said. It was on August 11, 2006, just 13 days short of his twelfth birthday. “I went with my dad to take food for some people who were stuck in Smaiya,” he explains

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Why Mideast Christians Are Wary of Pope Benedict’s Visit

Ever since the year 1204 A.D., when the soldiers of the Fourth Crusade sacked the Christian city of Constantinople instead of “liberating” Jerusalem from Muslim rule, Christians in the Middle East have been understandably wary of emissaries of Rome. Today, as Christians in the Middle East welcome Pope Benedict XVI on his first trip to the Holy Land, many are worried that the unpredictable Pontiff might stir up passions at a time of religious strife and political cold war.

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