MIDEAST: Pilgrims’ Progress Breaks Gaza Siege

More than 2,000 pilgrims have finally returned to the Gaza Strip via Egypt's Rafah crossing after being stuck on the border for five days. The repatriation followed their staunch refusal to return home via alternate, Israeli-controlled border crossings.

POLITICS-US: Christian Zionists Gain Israel’s Inner Sanctum

After raising more than two hundred million dollars for various projects in Israel, Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein and the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ), the organisation he founded and is president of, has hit pay-dirt.

MIDEAST: Border Politics Leaves Palestinians Stranded

Hundreds of Palestinians still remain stranded on the Egyptian side of the border following last summer's closure of the Rafah crossing between Egypt's Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip.

CHALLENGES 2007-2008: Two Territories, No Nation

The year begins after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas renewed peace talks with Israel that had been frozen for seven years and agreeing with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to make every effort to forge a peace deal by the end of 2008 that would ensure the Palestinians an independent state.

CHALLENGES 2007-2008: Bush’s Twilight Year Looks Grim

If the last days of 2007 are any indication, U.S. President George W. Bush’s last year in office is shaping up as grim and lonely.

CHALLENGES 2007-2008: Lebanon Confronts Its Seven Deadly Plagues

This year, Lebanon has witnessed a series of unfortunate events. With demonstrations, street confrontations, rising religious tensions, assassinations, an internal war, economic recession and a looming political crisis that has resulted in a power vacuum at the head of state, Lebanon has faced its own seven deadly plagues.

CHALLENGES 2007-2008: A Prime Minister Hangs On, Just About

At the start of 2007, it seemed that war would cost Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert his job. As he completed the year, still in office, the greatest threat to him staying there now seems to be the prospect of peace.

EGYPT: U.S. Congress Conditions Aid on Border Containment

Last week, both houses of U.S. Congress agreed to withhold 100 million dollars in financial assistance to Egypt following Israeli claims that Egyptian authorities were failing to prevent weapons smuggling to the Gaza Strip. Cairo, for its part, denounced the decision, while local political analysts saw the move as a heavy-handed pressure tactic on the part of Washington's pro-Israel lobby.

MIDEAST: They Do Not Exist, And That Is Official

In the maze of dirty streets that spreads from Beirut's revamped Sport City to the shabby Halabi quarters, 20,000 refugees are clustered in what is known as the Bourj al-Barajneh Palestinian camp. In a town plagued by poverty, many families live in complete destitution.

MIDEAST: In Gaza, Santa Is Insolvent

"Santa Claus is empty handed this year...insolvent," says Father Manuel Musallam, head of the Holy Family School in Gaza City.

RIGHTS: “USA vs. Al-Arian” Highlights Real Cost of Indefinite Detentions

Twelve-year-old Lama Al-Arian looked up into a camera with a broad smile two years ago and called her father a "political prisoner". But her eyes betray her playfully shy exuberance - they are wracked by uncertainty about the future of a man who has been in a United States prison for five years this February.

EGYPT: Israel Recognised by Govt, Not By People

Thirty years after late Egyptian president Anwar Sadat's historic trip to Israel, Egyptian diplomatic relations with the Hebrew state remain cordial. On a popular level, however, the relationship - buttressed by the 1979 Camp David peace agreement - still represents a major source of contention.

LEBANON: Palestinians Brave a Hazardous Profession

Kamel Mohammed was pruning lemon trees last winter when his red electric saw detonated an unexploded cluster bomb, blasting shrapnel all over his body. After an operation to remove the metal shards from his chest, Mohammed, a 44-year-old father from the nearby Palestinian refugee camp of Rashidieh in south Lebanon, went straight back to work cultivating fields and chopping wood for coal.

FINANCE: Donors Back Palestinian Economy, Urge Israeli Ease-Up

International donors pledged billions of dollars Monday to shore up peace prospects amid warnings no amount of money can help if Israel keeps the Palestinian economy in a stranglehold.

POLITICS-US: Assassination Jars Nascent Detente with Syria

When the George W. Bush administration asked Damascus to attend last month's Annapolis conference, Emad Moustapha, the Syrian ambassador to the United States, admits he was stunned.

POLITICS-US: Congress Debates Strings on Palestinian Aid

Members of the U.S. Congress expressed concern Wednesday that an aid package aimed at increasing support for the government of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas does not contain enough effective oversight measures to ensure the money doesn't end up in the wrong hands.

POLITICS: U.S. Jews Tilt Rightwards on Israel

U.S. Jews appear to have become more opposed both to Israel's making key concessions in renewed peace talks with Palestinians and to the U.S. carrying out a military attack against Iran's nuclear facilities, according to the latest in an annual series of surveys of Jewish opinion released here this week by the American Jewish Committee (AJC).

MIDEAST: Annapolis Outcome ‘Proves Arab Failure’

In the wake of last month's Annapolis conference, some quarters of Arab officialdom express optimism that the talks might yet lead to a settlement of the perennial Israel-Palestine conflict. Many independent analysts, however, saw the event as little more than an exercise in submission.

Q&A: “Where Is the Democracy in International Relations?”

It's about the oldest dispute around, which is good enough reason to hear more on it from those who can influence a possible resolution. So when Abdelwahab Derbal, head of the mission in Brussels of the League of Arab States speaks of his anger over the Palestine issue, these may be words to listen to, whichever side of the divide (if any) you are on.

EGYPT: Islamist Draft Manifesto Stirs Controversy

For the last several months, politicians of all stripes have awaited release of the Muslim Brotherhood movement's political party manifesto. According to spokesmen for the group, the document is intended to clarify the positions of the Muslim Brotherhood - Egypt's largest opposition force - on a range of issues.

LEBANON: Democracy Begins to Agree on a General

As the constitutional clock ticks away the last few hours of Emile Lahoud's presidential term, Lebanon faces its worst political deadlock since the end of the civil war.