Death Rays From Space: How Bad Are They?

Cosmic rays pour down on Earth like a constant rain. We don't much notice these high-energy particles, but they may have played a role in the evolution of life on our planet.

Some of the mass extinctions identified in the fossil record can be linked to an asteroid impact or increased volcanism, but many of the causes of those ancient die-offs are still open for debate.

"There may have been nearby astronomical goings-on that drastically increased the radiation on Earth," says Brian Fields from the University of Illinois.

A supernova going off 30 light-years away could cause such a jump in radiation on our planet that could directly, or indirectly, wipe out huge numbers of species. Currently researchers are looking for possible evidence for this sort of cosmic foul play.

"Just finding dead beasties is not proof of a nearby supernova," Fields says.

A hard rain is going to fall

Cosmic rays are mostly high-energy protons originating from supernova shock waves. We can't precisely trace where a cosmic ray came from because its trajectory is bent by magnetic fields. In fact, a typical cosmic ray will bounce inside the galaxy's magnetic field for millions of years before eventually colliding with something... like Earth.

"Every square centimeter on the top of the Earth's atmosphere is hit by several cosmic rays per second," Fields says. "This is forever going on."

None of these "primary" cosmic rays ever reach us on the ground. Instead, they collide with atoms in the upper atmosphere, creating a shower of lower energy "secondary" particles.

Secondary effects

At sea level, the majority of cosmic ray secondaries are highly penetrating muons. About 10,000 muons pass through our bodies every minute. Some of these muons will ionize molecules as they go through our flesh, occasionally leading to genetic mutations that may be harmful.

At present, the average human receives the equivalent of about 10 chest X-rays per year from cosmic rays. We shouldn't be alarmed by this, since it is just part of the natural background radiation under which humans and our ancestors have been exposed to for eons. Indeed, cosmic-ray-induced mutations may sometimes be beneficial.

"It is clear that in some way cosmic rays shaped evolution of organisms on Earth," says Franco Ferrari from the University of Szczecin in Poland.

In a recent issue of the journal Astrobiology, Ferrari and Ewa Szuszkiewicz from the same university reviewed what we know about cosmic rays, and they argue that the current biological relevance of these particles is not necessarily representative of the past.

"It is very likely that organisms of early Earth possessed DNA that was unstable and could easily mutate under external agents, more so, perhaps, than the DNA of present-day bacteria," the authors write.

Cosmic ray storm

Not only might biology have been more susceptible to mutation long ago, but the cosmic rays might have been more intense in the past, affecting both Earth's atmosphere and the life below.

One controversial theory suggests cosmic rays can increase cloud production. Cloudier skies bounce more sunlight off into space, cooling the planet and leading to widespread ecosystem changes. Another theory about increased cosmic radiation has nearly the opposite effect -- by stripping away our protective ozone layer, the Earth would have been blasted by more solar UV radiation. All that extra UV would have created hostile conditions for life.

Ozone depletion also could arise from a nearby gamma ray burst. However, the radiation flash would last only a second, and the ozone would recover after a few years. In contrast, cosmic rays from a nearby supernova would bombard Earth for at least 1,000 years, according to Fields.

"An organism might be able wait out a gamma ray burst, but cosmic rays are going to affect many generations," he says.

Near miss

One way to tell whether an extinction event was due to cosmic rays is to look for radioactive isotopes that would have formed in a nearby supernova and then were blown onto our planet by the associated blast wave.

In 1999, a group from the Technical University of Munich in Germany detected iron-60 in rock samples from the deep ocean. This extremely rare iron isotope is forged in the fires of supernovae. It is also radioactively unstable, with a half-life of 1.5 million years, so it must have come from a fairly recent supernova.

From the iron-60's location and concentration, the German group later calculated that the putative supernova went off 2.8 million years ago at a distance of about 100 light years away. Fields believes this was probably too far away to have caused an extinction-level event.

"I'd call it a near miss," he says.

The cosmic rays from this supernova may have had an effect on the climate, but to cause serious biological damage, a supernova would need to explode within about 30 light years of Earth.

Cosmic ray roulette

Although 30 light-years is small on a galactic scale, Fields thinks it likely that Earth has been caught in a supernova "kill radius" as many as a dozen times over our 4.5-billion-year history.

However, a nearby supernova is not the only way to increase the cosmic ray intensity. As our Sun orbits around the galactic center, it regularly passes through one of the galaxy's spiral arms where the cosmic ray radiation is higher than average, says Ferrari. Some researchers speculate that each passage through a spiral arm spawns an Ice Age on Earth through cosmic-ray-induced cloud formation.

In a similar vein, Melott and his colleagues found a possible link between the bobbing of our Sun up and down in the galactic plane and a 63-million-year cycle in fossil biodiversity. The hypothesis is that our solar system is exposed to more cosmic rays every time the solar system peaks out of one side of the galaxy.

However, Melott now thinks this bobbing may only play a small part, seeing as recent evidence points to a correlation between continental uplift and the observed biodiversity cycle.

More work is definitely needed to tie cosmic rays to extinction events. Melott says that the search continues for other radioactive isotope evidence of nearby supernovae, and his group is developing simulations of cosmic ray bombardment to see if there might be any recognizable pattern to the biological destruction.

"No one has calculated the full effects on the ground," he says.

Hamas Imposes Islamic Dress Code On Students

GAZA CITY [MENL] -- The Hamas regime has imposed an Islamic dress code on women students.

The Hamas regime said female students must wear Islamic dress in schools starting from the current academic semester. The dress code stipulated head covering and full-length robes and required that teachers instruct only those of the same sex.

Algeria Expects Imminent Surrender Of AQIM Agents

CAIRO [MENL] -- Algeria has been preparing for the imminent surrender of six senior Al Qaida operatives.

Security sources said six cell commanders of the Al Qaida Organization in the Islamic Maghreb were conducting negotiations for their surrender to Algerian authorities. The sources said the two sides were discussing the prospect of amnesty or reduction of any jail sentence for the insurgents.

France's Algerian shadow

As part of its series on Veterans Al Jazeera visited France where feelings over the country's brutal war in its former colony Algeria more than 40 years ago still run deep.

Born and raised in Algeria Rabah Gerrairia considers the African nation very much "his country" but it is with sadness and bitterness that he explains why he will never return there.

"I won't go back, I won't go," he says. "Of course my family's there, and I'd love to see them. But I'm scared. I'm really scared I'd be killed. It's my country, but I can never go back, never."

Gerrairia fears for his welfare in Algeria emanate from his part in France’s brutal and bloody conflict in its former colony between 1954 and 1962.

He was one of 150,000 Algerian Muslims who fought for the French during the war known as "harki", a term that more than four decades on is still a negative one for many of their countrymen.

Ahead of the declaration of independence by Algeria in 1962 they were forcibly disarmed by the French army – who stood by as thousands were tortured and killed by Algerian independence fighters who regarded them as traitors.

Unlike European settlers who had also fought for the French – and despite the clear danger to their lives – Algerians who had fought for France were forbidden from immigrating to the former colonial power.

Through the kindness of individual French commanders, however, several thousand were illegally smuggled to France where on arrival they were confined to primitive rural camps.

In the south of France, near Marseilles one group of veterans remain close friends, regularly meeting to relive their experience and share a cup of tea.

'Republican values'

Revisiting the site of one camp, that was only finally demolished in 1995, the men reveal their hostility at the French government for their treatment.

"In the camp we lived communally, without any relation to the outside world. We were Arabs and didn't know what racism was," says Slimane Djera, another veteran.

"It was only when I was in college that racism came along. We were treated differently – always put at the back of the class. And we have found it very difficult to find jobs."

"They [France] said we were there to defend "Republican values", and then they left us without arms, to our own destiny," says Saiid Merabti. "We want France to admit its responsibility for those of us who died in Algeria and for our abandonment in France"

The Algerian veterans’ anger is symptomatic of a conflict that has left deep psychological scars on the French psyche and whose legacy was left unaddressed and ignored for a long time by successive governments.

It was a conflict that France was reluctant to label a war from the very start even as a rebellion by the Algerian National Liberation Front escalated from early attacks on French military and civilian targets into full-scale conflict.

Algeria was colonized by the French in the 19th century and, unlike the neighboring protectorates of Tunisia or Morocco, Algeria was considered inalienable French territory, a mere extension of the mainland.

Independence drive

By the mid 20th century it was home to over a million European settlers who enjoyed the privileges of French citizenship, the overwhelming majority of the population – Arab and Berber Muslims – reaped few benefits from the French presence.

In 1954 the FLN, determined to end France's colonial rule and achieve independence, turned to violence.

As the war became more embittered, atrocities were reportedly carried out by all sides.

Many young soldiers sent to Algeria were deployed to villages in the countryside to root out FLN influence at any cost.

"Two or three other soldiers and I found ourselves face to face with two FLN fighters. Guns were fired on either side, and they were wounded," says Jean-Paul Vittori, one veteran who did his military service in Algeria.

"I stopped shooting to wait for reinforcements. Then other soldiers arrived, and one simply killed one of the FLN fighters. I'll never forget that – it remains an open wound. I’d never have imagined that someone could kill a defenseless soldier."

The French proved unable to crush the independence movement and at the end of 1956, the FLN hardened its stance, launching a campaign of urban attacks inaugurated a new chapter in the war known as "The Battle of Algiers".

Such bombings were often carried out by Algerian women dressed in Western clothes – a tactic which sent the European settler population into hysteria.

Severe measures

France reacted harshly, deploying its 10th Parachute Division – headed by General Jacques Massu – to Algiers in an attempt to prevent any further attacks, and stop a General Strike called by the FLN to garner international attention to the independence cause.

General Paul Aussaresses reported directly to General Massu and says his superior officer was under orders to prevent a strike organized by the FLN "at any price."

That price included degrading forms of torture, practiced by General Massu’s Parachute Division, as they swept the streets of Algiers' ancient Muslim quarter – the Kasbah - in an attempt to identify and break FLN cells.

Many people were appalled at the measures that France was undertaking within its own territory.

"Today the French authorities admit that a war took place. At the time they refused to. So these prisoners didn't fall under the Geneva Convention," says Jacques Verges, a human rights lawyer famous for his defense of criminals such as Carlos the Jackal.

"What's more, they weren't even entitled to the same rights as ordinary criminals. Basically they were "outside" the law. The result was that in Algiers at the time over fifty torture sites existed, mainly in private houses."

Verges began his career defending FLN suspects, an action undertaken, he claims, to raise attention in France itself to the systematic abuse of human rights being carried out in its name.

"Appalling crimes were committed in Algeria that no one knew about. Events were hushed up. Court-cases were the only way of denouncing these crimes publicly: the only way of denouncing torture."

Official silence

The French state was to draw a line under the war. An amnesty was put in place for all crimes committed during the war and for decades it was veiled in official silence.

That silence has not only angered Algerian veterans but also former French servicemen and former members of the "Organization of the Secret Army" (OAS) a breakaway group of hardliners which brought France itself to the verge of civil war in its attempt to keep Algeria French at all costs.

The activities of the OAS against both French and Algerian targets accentuated inter-communal tensions in Algeria and men and women from the group still gather for meetings of "The Association for the Defense of Former Prisoners and Exiles of French Algeria".

More than four decades on, they remain firm in their belief that France should never have given up Algeria.

"We'll forget once everyone has recognized de Gaulle's betrayal – but we'll never forgive him," says Joseph Hattab Pacha, a member of the group.

Few French have much sympathy for former OAS members and their claims of “betrayal” but increased calls for recognition of the conflict and its atrocities saw the National Assembly officially admit that a "war" had taken place and a small monument was erected on the banks of the River Seine.

Broken silence

The silence surrounding the war was well and truly shattered in 2000 when
General Paul Aussaresses published a book in which he admitted his part in the systematic torture that was practiced by the French during the "Battle of Algiers", including his assassination of the local FLN leader Larbi Ben M'hidi, covered up at the time as "suicide".

General Aussaresses insists that the coercive methods of interrogation – including torture - were sanctioned at the highest levels of the French State.

"General Aussaresses committed war crimes in Algeria, crimes against humanity. But his book shows that he committed these crimes under orders from members of the government," Jacques Verges says. "He carried out the orders - but the people above him were quite simply able to bury the past."

Aussaresses and his publishers were put on trial in order to suppress the book and convicted them of condoning war crimes, a move that many say made a scapegoat of the general by a nation still unable to face up to its own responsibility for the conduct of the war in Algeria.

The French values of liberty, equality and fraternity were badly compromised during the conflict and it continues to cast a shadow over France's relationship with its own Muslim community.

Aussaresses however remains unrepentant.

"In the middle of trial in Paris my lawyer called me and said 'listen Paul I have a message. If you say the word "regret" there will be no trial.' I said: listen, I cannot say that. I cannot say that.

"I feel there is a song of Edith Piaff: “Non, rein de rein, no je ne regret rein." That's my song. I don't regret. I did not like, but I don't regret."

Source: al-Jazeera.
Link: http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/general/2009/08/200982714730290967.html.

Delay further muddies confused Afghan poll picture

By Hamid Shalizi

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghan officials said on Thursday they had delayed releasing further results from the nation's disputed presidential poll, adding further confusion to a contest which appears headed for a second round.

Votes from about 17 percent of 27,000 polling stations have been counted so far, meaning results could swing wildly in the coming days. Preliminary final results are due on September 3, with the final tally about two weeks later.

Afghanistan has been in political limbo since the August 20 vote, with partial results released so far showing President Hamid Karzai leading his main rival, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, by about 43 percent to 34 percent.

Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission (IEC) said only votes from provincial council elections, held concurrently with the presidential poll a week ago, would be counted on Thursday.

Adding to an already chaotic picture, computer software failures meant counting was going slower than expected, said IEC deputy head Zekria Barakzai.

The election is a major test for Karzai after eight years in power and for U.S. President Barack Obama, who has poured in thousands of extra troops as part of his new regional strategy to defeat the Taliban and stabilize Afghanistan.

The picture will not become any clearer for at least two days, with no counting planned for Friday, a Muslim holiday.

"We will come up with new figures and information on Saturday," Barakzai told Reuters.

To avoid a potentially destabilizing second round run-off in October, a candidate must win more than 50 percent of the vote.

The most likely outcome that can be gleaned from the partial election results released so far is that a run-off is likely, election observers say.

FOREIGN TROOP DEATHS HIT 300

Security in Afghanistan has deteriorated rapidly this year, with attacks reaching their worst levels since the austere Islamist Taliban were ousted by U.S.-led Afghan forces in 2001.

Violence spiked further in the weeks leading up to the poll, which the Taliban vowed to disrupt, testing Obama's new strategy and softening support for the war in the United States, but the election went ahead with relatively few attacks.

However, at least 43 people were killed in a huge truck bomb blast on Tuesday in southern Kandahar city, the worst incident of its kind in more than a year. The Taliban denied responsibility for the blast.

With civilian and military casualties at record levels, 2009 has become the deadliest year of the war for foreign troops.

Three hundred have been killed so far this year compared with 294 in 2008, the previous worst year of the war.

Another five members of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) had been killed in separate incidents over the past three days, ISAF and the U.S. military said.

ISAF said in a statement 12 Taliban fighters had been killed during a raid, backed by attack helicopters, on a clinic in southeastern Paktika province on Wednesday during which a Taliban commander was detained.

The Taliban commander, known as Mullah Muslim, was being treated for wounds suffered in a gunbattle with Afghan forces on election day, it said. One ISAF soldier was killed during the raid, the statement said.

Two U.S. service members were killed on Wednesday, one in the east and the other in the violent south, home of the Taliban-led insurgency. One was killed by a roadside bomb, the deadliest weapon used by insurgents, and the other in a gunbattle, ISAF said in a separate statement.

Another U.S. soldier was killed during an firefight with insurgents after a patrol was hit by a roadside bomb in the south earlier on Thursday, ISAF said.

Another ISAF service member whose nationality was not released died on Tuesday of wounds suffered in a roadside bomb blast almost two weeks ago.

More than 30,000 extra U.S. troops have landed in Afghanistan this year, most part of a package of reinforcements ordered by Obama in May. More than 100,000 Western troops are now in the country, 63,000 of them Americans.

Young Afghan freed from Guantanamo to sue US gov't

By HEIDI VOGT, Associated Press Writer

KABUL – The family of one of the youngest prisoners ever held at Guantanamo plans to sue the U.S. government to compensate him for mistreatment and an adolescence lost to nearly seven years in a cell, his lawyers said Thursday.

Mohammed Jawad returned to Afghanistan this week after a military judge ruled that he was coerced into confessing that he threw a grenade at an unmarked vehicle in the capital in 2002. The attack wounded two American soldiers and their interpreter.

Afghan police delivered Jawad into U.S. custody and about a month later he was sent to the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Jawad and his family say he was 12 when he was arrested, and that he is now 19 years old. The Pentagon has said a bone scan showed he was about 17 when taken into custody. His defense lawyers decline to give an exact age for Jawad, who does not have a birth certificate, but say photos taken in Guantanamo showed that he had not gone through puberty.

"I was an innocent child when they put me in prison," Jawad told The Associated Press in an interview at the offices of an Afghan lawyer association. A round-cheeked man with a scraggly beard, Jawad spoke tentatively, glancing at his lawyer. He wore a white robe and a traditional beaded cap as he sat stiffly on an office couch.

Lawyers and family members say Jawad was submitted to various types of torture while imprisoned, including sleep deprivation and beatings.

The family plans to sue for compensation in U.S. courts, said Maj. Eric Montalvo, one of the military lawyers who was defending Jawad. Montalvo, who finishes his military service this month and has already joined a private firm, said he will aid in the process but will not necessarily file the suit.

"I will not allow him not to be assisted," Montalvo said, explaining that Jawad needs intensive psychological counseling and tutoring to make up for his lack of schooling. Jawad said he wants to become a doctor because he was impressed by the way doctors at Guantanamo helped people.

Justice Department officials have said the criminal investigation of Jawad is still open but his transfer back to Afghanistan makes prosecution unlikely. The judge who ordered him released said the government's case was an "outrage" and "full of holes."

Jawad flew Monday to the main U.S. base outside Kabul and then by helicopter to the Afghan Defense Ministry. President Hamid Karzai welcomed Jawad home in a private meeting at his palace. Jawad said Karzai expressed joy that he had been released, but that the conversation turned more sober as they talked about his mistreatment at Guantanamo.

"After I told him about the conditions, he seemed very sad," Jawad said. He said he didn't want to go into specifics about mistreatment, saying only: "Their behavior was not very good."

In a statement, the Afghan president also said he hoped that improvements to the justice system would soon mean the Afghan government can prosecute its own citizens accused of attacking U.S. forces.

"All cases of accused Afghans should be investigated by Afghans, inside the framework of Afghan rules and laws," he said.

Although the Obama administration says it's closing Guantanamo, hundreds of Afghans are still being held without charge at the U.S. military base at Bagram near the Kabul.

Relatives say they did not learn that Jawad had been arrested until nine months after he disappeared when he was sent by an uncle to fetch tea in 2002. Nine months later, the family received a letter from him through the Red Cross saying he was in Guantanamo.

Last October, a military judge at Guantanamo threw out Jawad's confession. The judge found that Jawad initially denied throwing the grenade but changed his story after Afghan authorities threatened to kill him and his family. U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle ordered him released nine months later.

On Monday night, Jawad was greeted by a crowd of family members at a friend's home in Kabul. Turbaned uncles and brothers and cousins hugged him tightly. But Jawad said when he was brought in to his mother, she didn't recognize him.

"She pulled off my cap and looked at the back of my head. There was a mark there that she recognized and then she knew it was me," Jawad said.

China denounces proposed Dalai Lama visit to Taiwan

By Ralph Jennings and Lucy Hornby

TAIPEI/BEIJING (Reuters) – China promptly denounced a proposed trip to Taiwan by the Dalai Lama on Thursday, saying any such visit by a man Beijing brands a separatist threatened to "sabotage" improving relations.

Taiwan, a self-ruled island claimed by Beijing, approved the visit by the Nobel Peace laureate to comfort victims of a deadly typhoon at a time of burgeoning trade and investment between the rivals.

"No matter under what form or identity Dalai uses to enter Taiwan, we resolutely oppose this," China's Taiwan Affairs Bureau said in a statement carried by Xinhua news agency.

"Some of the people in the Democratic Progressive Party use the disaster rescue excuse to invite Dalai to Taiwan to sabotage the hard-earned positive situation of cross-straits relations."

Beijing brands the India-based Tibetan luminary as a separatist and condemns his trips abroad.

An aide to the Dalai Lama in the Indian town of Dharamsala said the spiritual leader had been keen to visit Taiwan.

"As of now, we are planning a visit to Taiwan and the dates are still being worked out," Tenzin Taklha said. "We want to make it very clear that the Dalai Lama is visiting Taiwan to express condolences to victims and lead prayers."

China is considered unlikely to retaliate by choking off growing economic ties between the long-time political rivals.

By blaming the opposition DPP and not Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou or the ruling Nationalist Party (KMT), Beijing may have indicated it does not wish to escalate the issue.

"Beijing will be a little uncomfortable, but if they understand how severe the disaster is they will show some respect to Taiwan's people," KMT Secretary-General Wu Den-yih said.

About 650 people are feared dead after Typhoon Morakot, the island's worst typhoon in 50 years, soaked Taiwan from August 7-9.

China has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since 1949, when Mao Zedong's forces won the Chinese civil war and Chiang Kai-shek's KMT fled to the island. Beijing has vowed to bring Taiwan under its rule, by force if necessary.

But Beijing is also aware any strong moves against the Dalai Lama could play into the hands of Taiwanese opponents of President Ma, who has sought to ease tensions with Beijing.

RESTORING IMAGE

The Taiwan president's office, under fire for perceptions the response to Typhoon Morakot was too slow, and national security officials met for five hours late on Wednesday and decided to permit a visit, the Government Information Office said.

Admitting the Dalai Lama lets Ma give the impression that Ma is not driven solely concerned with ties with Beijing, said Hsu Yung-ming, a political science professor at Soochow University.

"He doesn't want people to think he cares only about China, that he also cares about Taiwan," Hsu said.

Taiwan, home to a large exiled Tibetan community and millions of Buddhists, allowed visits by the Dalai Lama in 1997 and 2001.

Ma last year quashed hopes for a new visit by the Tibetan spiritual leader, saying the timing was wrong. Taiwan Buddhist groups criticized that decision.

Since taking office in 2008, Ma's administration has avoided action that could anger Beijing as he pursues trade ties.

"We've ... decided to let the Dalai Lama visit as he is coming here to pray for the dead victims, as well as the survivors," Ma told reporters while visiting typhoon survivors.

The Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule over Tibet.

War in Sudan's Darfur 'is over'

The six-year war between forces loyal to Sudan's government and rebels in Darfur has effectively ended, the UN's military commander in the region says.

General Martin Agwai, who is leaving his post this week, said the vicious fighting of earlier years had subsided as rebel groups split into factions.

He says the region now suffers more from low-level disputes and banditry.

The UN says 300,000 people have died in Darfur, but the Sudanese government puts the figure at 10,000.

Almost three million people are said to have been displaced by the fighting.

Oppression claims

Gen Agwai, who commands thousands of troops from the UN and African Union, said the region now suffered more from "security issues" than full-blown conflict.

"Banditry, localized issues, people trying to resolve issues over water and land at a local level. But real war as such, I think we are over that," he said.

Similar comments from other officials have drawn derision from Western campaigners and some diplomats, who see them as an attempt to play down continuing violence in the region.

Gen Agwai said only one rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem), posed a real threat.

Jem signed a peace deal with Khartoum in February, which paved the way for peace talks held in Egypt last month.

The war broke out in the arid and impoverished region early in 2003 when rebel groups including Jem attacked government targets, accusing Khartoum of oppressing black Africans in favor of Arabs.

Pro-government militiamen hit back with brutal force, which the US says was a genocide.

Khartoum denies supporting the militias, but the international court in The Hague has issued an arrest warrant for President Omar al-Bashir accusing him of war crimes.

Source: British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8224424.stm.

Congressman Kucinich remembers Kennedy's hospital visit

CLEVELAND--Congressman Dennis Kucinich says "America has lost a great champion for health care, working people and education," with the passing of Senator Edward Kennedy.

Kucinich shared some personal remembrances.

He first met Senator Kennedy in the mid 1970's. Then Councilman Dennis Kucinich was a patient in St. Alexis Hospital. Kennedy and other senators were touring local hospitals and wound up spending time with him.

Kucinich has recently experienced the death of two brothers and a sister.

He remembers one of the first calls of condolence on the death of his brother Perry came from Senator Kennedy.

He offered his thoughts and tribute in remarks to Channel 3 News.

Iran's Ahmadinejad issues condolence message on Hakim's death

Tehran - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has issued a condolence message on the death of Abdulaziz al-Hakim, leader of one of Iraq's most powerful Shiite political groups, state media reported Thursday. In his message, carried by the IRNA news agency, Ahmadinejad said al-Hakim's death was a big loss for the Iraqi nation as he dedicated his life to promote Islam and justice in Iraq.

Al-Hakim died on Wednesday at a Tehran hospital after a battle with lung cancer.

A special mourning ceremony was held on Thursday in front of the Iraqi embassy in Tehran before his body was transferred to Najaf in southern Iraq.

Auschwitz blueprints given to Israeli PM

By DAVID RISING, Associated Press Writer



BERLIN – Architectural plans for the Auschwitz death camp that were discovered in Berlin last year were given to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday for display at his country's official Holocaust memorial.

The 29 sketches of the death camp that was built in Nazi-occupied Poland date back as far as 1941, and include detailed blueprints for living barracks, delousing facilities and crematoria, including gas chambers. The sketches are considered important to helping understand the genesis of the Nazi genocide.

They are initialed by the head of the SS, Heinrich Himmler, and Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Hoess.

They turned up in an apartment in Berlin in 2008; how they got there is not clear, but their authenticity has been verified by Germany's federal archive.

While they are not the only original Auschwitz blueprints that still exist — others were captured by the Soviet Red Army and brought back to Moscow — they will be the first for Israel's Yad Vashem memorial, its chairman told The Associated Press in an interview.

"This set is a very early one, which was found here in Berlin, from the autumn of '41," Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev said.

"It brings a better understanding of the whole process, and the intention of the planners of the complex, and from this perspective it is important."

The blueprints were purchased from the unidentified finder by Germany's Axel Springer Verlag, the publisher of top-selling Bild newspaper among others, and put on display in the company's Berlin headquarters.

The publisher is now giving them to Yad Vashem for its permanent collection.

Shalev said they will be put on display at Yad Vashem on Jan. 27, 2010, as part of a special exhibit opening to mark the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

The blueprints include general plans for the original Auschwitz camp, and also the expansion Auschwitz-Birkenau camp where most of the killings were carried out.

More than 1 million people, mostly Jews, died in the gas chambers or through forced labor, disease or starvation at the camp, which the Nazis built after occupying Poland.

Netanyahu is in Berlin for meetings with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, and other officials.

Later, the Israeli leader is scheduled to visit a house on Berlin's Wannsee lake that was the site of the Jan. 20, 1942, "Wannsee Conference" — a watershed in Nazi policy against Europe's Jews.

The building now houses a museum documenting the Holocaust and the notorious meeting, which was once thought to be the point at which the Nazis decided to stop deporting and randomly killing Jews and instead to industrialize their murder.

Though debate continues, most historians now agree that the decision was made some months earlier — by Adolf Hitler himself, even though no written order from him has ever been found.

Hundreds of thousands of Jews had already been murdered by the time the 15 civil servants, SS and party officials met at Wannsee. It is now believed by many that Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi Security Service and Security Police head, called the meeting to make sure everybody knew what Hitler wanted done and to establish SS oversight of the process.

Shalev said the blueprints showing that the construction of Auschwitz was already being planned in 1941 help to reinforce that argument.

"The Wannsee conference ... was a kind of coordination," Shalev said. "The process of the Final Solution started to be implemented a few months before it, so the plans that were found from late '41 are more evidence."

A large yellowed plan, dated April 30, 1942 and titled "general building plan concentration camp Auschwitz" provides a wider view, showing the barracks but also roads, other buildings, and the outlying area.

Another drawing dated Oct. 14, 1941, shows the plans for construction of a "Waffen SS prisoner of war camp" with rows of what appear to be barracks. A notation in the bottom right says it was drafted by a prisoner, "Nr. 471."

Clash kills 4 Pakistani soldiers, 9 militants

By MUNIR AHMAD, Associated Press Writer

ISLAMABAD – Militants ambushed troops on a dusty road in a volatile tribal region of Pakistan, triggering an intense firefight that killed at least nine attackers and four soldiers, two officials said Thursday.

The clash took place Wednesday in the stronghold of a senior Taliban commander, Waliur Rehman, in the South Waziristan tribal region near the Afghan border. Troops backed by helicopter gunships targeted militant hide-outs in the region, an intelligence official and an army officer said.

The officials, who spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media, provided no further details of the fighting, but said troops were still hunting for the attackers.

The incident came two days after two Taliban commanders acknowledged their chief, Baitullah Mehsud, died following an Aug. 5 U.S. missile strike in the North Waziristan tribal region.

Taliban members say they selected Hakimullah Mehsud as the group's new leader, while Rehman was appointed Taliban leader in South Waziristan, where most of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan's fighters — believed to number as many as 25,000 — are based.

Pakistan has deployed more than 100,000 troops to the regions near the Afghan border since the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

Wednesday's ambush was the first by militants since Rehman's appointment as the insurgent leader in South Waziristan, a region that has witnessed scores of military operations.

Troops and police imposed a curfew throughout Thursday and launched an operation in the northwestern city of Dera Ismail Khan to recover illegal weapons, said police chief Saeedullah Marwat.

The operation follows sporadic clashes over the past few months between majority Sunni and minority Shiite Muslims in the area, Marwat said. He did not have further details, beyond saying some weapons had been handed in voluntarily.

Separately, the army said security forces in the Swat Valley in northern Pakistan seized a vehicle that was being prepared for a suicide attack and arrested nine militants.

The military still clashes sporadically with Taliban fighters in Swat, where it fought a near three-month offensive to clear insurgents from the area. Search operations in various parts of Swat led to the arrest of another 22 suspected militants, while 14 turned themselves in to security forces, the army said in a statement Thursday.

Hariri: Hezbollah part of Lebanese cabinet

Premier-elect Saad Hariri rebuffs interventions in Lebanon's cabinet formation, stressing Hezbollah will be part of the new government even if Israel does not like it.

Speaking at an Iftar reception on Tuesday night, Hariri highlighted the significance of involving all Lebanese factions in the new cabinet as Lebanon's national interests required so.

"The national unity government will include the (ruling) March 14 alliance, and I also want to assure the Israeli enemy that Hezbollah will be in this government whether it (Israel) likes it," he said.

The comments come amid weeks-long delays in the formation of the new cabinet in the wake of internal divisions within the ruling party and Israeli threats against the inclusion of Hezbollah in the national unity government.

Earlier this month, Israeli Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that the Lebanese government as a whole would be responsible for any attack from its territory if the Islamic resistance group were part of the new government.

Hariri was elected prime minister on June 27, but stopped short of naming a cabinet after the Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) withdrew from the ruling alliance, causing the bloc to lose its parliamentary majority.

PSP leader Walid Jumblatt, however, later called for a consensus among the Lebanese parties, saying the delay in its establishment was due to a misunderstanding of his stand.

After weeks of negotiations on the arrangement of Lebanon's 30-seat cabinet, Hariri's ruling alliance will have 15 portfolios in the new government, with 10 ministries going to the Hezbollah-led opposition. President Michel Suleiman is to appoint the remaining five portfolios.

Key posts such as the ministers of foreign affairs, finance, interior and telecommunications are still in the center of ongoing dispute.

Taiwan's government approves visit by Dalai Lama

By ANNIE HUANG, Associated Press Writer

TAIPEI, Taiwan – Taiwan's president risked angering China with his surprise announcement Thursday that he has agreed to let the Dalai Lama visit the island to comfort survivors of a devastating typhoon.

President Ma Ying-jeou's move was unexpected because he has made a priority of seeking better relations with China, and just last December nixed plans for a visit by the Buddhist spiritual leader in what was deemed a move to placate Beijing.

But his government has come under fire over its slow response to Typhoon Morakot, which claimed 670 lives when it hit Aug. 8-9, and opposition politicians in the storm zone pointedly invited the Tibetan spiritual leader to the island to console survivors.

The invitation put Ma into a bind — either risk angering China, or give further ammunition to the opposition, which accuses him of hewing Beijing's line. On Thursday, Ma gave his answer while visiting a school in Nantou County that was destroyed in mudslides triggered by the storm.

"The Dalai Lama could come to Taiwan to help rest the souls of the dead and also pray for the well-being of the survivors," he said.

There was no immediate comment from either China's Taiwan Affairs Office or Foreign Ministry.

Beijing considers the Dalai Lama a "splittist" for promoting autonomy in the Chinese region of Tibet, and opposes visits to foreign countries that raise his profile. Allowing him to visit Taiwan could undermine the rapidly improving relations between Beijing and Taipei, longtime rivals which are developing close business ties after decades of enmity.

China claims self-governing Taiwan as part of its territory, though they split amid civil war in 1949.

On Wednesday, leaders of seven municipalities hit by Morakot issued a joint statement inviting the Dalai Lama to visit storm victims from Aug. 31 to Sept. 4. The invitation from the leaders — all from the opposition Democratic Progressive Party — came as Ma faced criticism that he botched the government's response to the island's deadliest storm in 50 years.

The Dalai Lama — who has made three visits to the island over the past 12 years — has accepted the invitation "in principle," his spokesman Tenzin Takhla said Wednesday from Dharmsala, India, home to the Tibetan government-in-exile.

Since becoming president 15 months ago, Ma has reversed many of his predecessor's anti-China policies, tightening economic links across the 100-mile (160-kilometer) -wide Taiwan Strait and even speaking of a peace treaty with Beijing.

Presidential spokesman Wang Yu-chi said the Dalai Lama's upcoming visit would be strictly religious, with no political overtones.

"We welcome the Dalai Lama to come to Taiwan to take part in mass prayers," Wang told reporters. He said the visit was approved "for humanitarian and religious considerations ... and we believe it will not harm cross-Strait relations."

Wang declined to say if Ma would meet the Dalai Lama during his stay in Taiwan.

Ma's policy of seeking better relations with China contrasts sharply with the opposition DPP's strong support for formal independence for the island of 23 million people.

That stance infuriates Beijing, which has repeatedly warned that any move to make the Taiwan-China split permanent would lead to war.

Taiwan and Tibet share similar histories. Both are territories that Beijing believes should be under its rule. Despite a failed 1959 uprising that sent the Dalai Lama into exile, China controls Tibet and has refused the Tibetan religious leader's request for greater autonomy.

August tied for deadliest month in Afghanistan

By AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Writer

KABUL – NATO says a U.S. service member has been killed in a militant attack involving a roadside bomb and gunfire.

The death brings to 44 the number of U.S. troops who have died in Afghanistan this month, tying August with July for the deadliest month of the eight-year war.

NATO says the American died in southern Afghanistan on Thursday when the troop's patrol responded to the gunfire attack.

With four days left in the month, August is likely to become the deadliest of the war. More than 60,000 U.S. troops are now in the country — a record number — to combat rising insurgent violence.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

KABUL (AP) — U.S. and Afghan forces attacked a clinic in eastern Afghanistan after a wounded Taliban commander sought treatment, and a U.S. helicopter gunship fired on the medical center after militants put up resistance, officials said Thursday.

Reports of the militant death toll from Wednesday's firefight varied widely. The spokesman for the governor of Paktika province said 12 militants died, while police said two were killed. The U.S. military did not report any deaths. It wasn't clear why the tolls differed.

The fighting began after a wounded Taliban commander sought treatment at a clinic in the Sar Hawza district of Paktika. As U.S. said Afghan forces moved toward the center, militants began firing from inside.

Hamidullah Zhwak, the governor's spokesman, said the Taliban commander was wounded Aug. 20, the day of the country's presidential election.

Militants brought him and three other wounded Taliban to the clinic at noon Wednesday. U.S. and Afghan forces were tipped off to their presence and soon arrived at the scene, he said.

Insurgent snipers fired from a tower near the clinic, and troops called in an airstrike, Zhwak said. Fighting between some 20 militants and Afghan and U.S. forces lasted about five hours, and 12 Taliban were killed in the clash, he said.

"After ensuring the clinic was cleared of civilians, an AH-64 Apache helicopter fired rounds at the building ending the direct threat and injuring the targeted insurgent in the building," a U.S. military statement said.

Seven insurgents — including the wounded commander — had been detained, the U.S. statement said.

Gen. Dawlat Khan, the provincial police chief, said two militants died in the encounter.

The Taliban have gained control of large segments of Afghanistan's south and east over the past few years, prompting the U.S. to send an additional 21,000 troops to the country this year.

The latest clash comes as the war-torn country awaits results from last week's election. The lengthy vote count, coupled with ongoing accusations of fraud, threatens to undermine hopes that Afghans can put together a united front against the insurgency.

Who will succeed Kennedy? Speculative list is long

By STEVE LeBLANC, Associated Press Writer

BOSTON – For the first time in nearly half a century, Massachusetts voters will be handed ballots for the U.S. Senate seat held by Sen. Edward Kennedy without his name on them.

The long list of potential candidates to replace him in the seat once held by President John F. Kennedy includes congressmen, former prosecutors and, perhaps, one of Edward Kennedy's nephews.

Kennedy's death leaves little mourning time for the dozen or more Senate hopefuls who face a five-month dash to election day.

State law requires a special election no sooner than 145 days and no later than 160 days after a vacancy occurs. The law bans an interim appointee. In this case, the election must be held either the last two weeks of January or the first week of February.

Primaries must be held six weeks before the special election, giving Democratic and Republican candidates little more than three months to campaign for their party's nomination.

"That is a very short period of time to be able to mount an attempt to garner one of these precious seats," said Paul Watanabe, a professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts-Boston. The tight window will favor candidates with name recognition and hefty campaign war chests, he added.

An open senate seat in Massachusetts is a rare political prize. Kennedy held his seat for 47 years. Fellow Democrat Sen. John Kerry was elected in 1984.

"No one will replace Ted Kennedy in their first year, but Democrats at least want someone who reflects his basic policy positions," said Julian Zelizer, professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University.

Despite speculation that Kennedy's wife, Vicki, could assume his Senate seat, family aides have said she is not interested in replacing her husband.

One of Kennedy's nephews, former Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy II, has also been suggested as a candidate. He heads Citizens Energy, a nonprofit that distributes discounted heating oil to the poor, and has been criticized in recent years for accepting oil from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

Other potential Democratic contenders include state Attorney General Martha Coakley, who would be the first woman elected to the Senate from Massachusetts. She has a high profile and statewide recognition, but would need to raise money quickly.

Several congressmen have also been mentioned, including Reps. Stephen Lynch, Michael Capuano, Edward Markey, James McGovern and William Delahunt.

While each has a federal campaign account, they are better known in their districts and differ in ideology. Lynch from the South Boston neighborhood of Boston, is more socially conservative compared to Capuano, a liberal from the blue collar city of Somerville.

One former Democratic member of Congress, Martin Meehan, has also been named as a potential candidate. Now chancellor of the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, Meehan still has nearly $5 million in his federal account.

Republicans face an even tougher climb in a state that leans heavily Democratic.

Potential candidates include Cape Cod businessman Jeff Beatty, former Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, former U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan, state Sen. Scott Brown, and Chris Egan, former U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Cooperation and Development.

In a recent letter to lawmakers, Kennedy said the special election law should be changed to allow the governor to appoint someone to serve in the Senate during the course of the election — provided that person pledges not to run for the seat.

"It is vital for this Commonwealth to have two voices speaking for the needs of its citizens and two votes in the Senate during the approximately five months between a vacancy and an election," Kennedy wrote.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Patrick called the proposal "a reasonable idea" and said he would sign the bill if it reached his desk.

"Right now, Massachusetts needs two voices in the U.S. Senate," Patrick said.

Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo, both Democrats, haven't said whether they back the change. DeLeo said there would likely be a public hearing on the issue within the next month.

Without the change, Senate Democrats could fall one vote short on any health care overhaul legislation this fall. Health care had been Kennedy's core issue for decades.

Before Kennedy's death, Democrats held a potentially filibuster-proof margin in the Senate, but some moderate Democrats have been wavering. Another Democrat, Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia, has been seriously ill and often absent.

The succession law was changed in 2004, when Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., became his party's presidential nominee and Republican Mitt Romney was the state's governor. Democratic lawmakers changed the law to block Romney from installing a Republican to serve until the next general election.

Suicidal planet seems on death spiral into star

By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

WASHINGTON – Astronomers have found what appears to be a gigantic suicidal planet.

The odd, fiery planet is so close to its star and so large that it is triggering tremendous plasma tides on the star. Those powerful tides are in turn warping the planet's zippy less-than-a-day orbit around its star.

The result: an ever-closer tango of death, with the planet eventually spiraling into the star.

It's a slow death. The planet WASP-18b has maybe a million years to live, said planet discoverer Coel Hellier, a professor of astrophysics at the Keele University in England. Hellier's report on the suicidal planet is in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

"It's causing its own destruction by creating these tides," Hellier said.

The star is called WASP-18 and the planet is WASP-18b because of the Wide Angle Search for Planets team that found them.

The planet circles a star that is in the constellation Phoenix and is about 325 light-years away from Earth, which means it is in our galactic neighborhood. A light-year is about 5.8 trillion miles.

The planet is 1.9 million miles from its star, 1/50th of the distance between Earth and the sun, our star. And because of that the temperature is about 3,800 degrees.

Its size — 10 times bigger than Jupiter — and its proximity to its star make it likely to die, Hellier said.

Think of how the distant moon pulls Earth's oceans to form twice-daily tides. The effect the odd planet has on its star is thousands of times stronger, Hellier said. The star's tidal bulge of plasma may extend hundreds of miles, he said.

Like most planets outside our solar system, this planet was not seen directly by a telescope. Astronomers found it by seeing dips in light from the star every time the planet came between the star and Earth.

So far astronomers have found more than 370 planets outside the solar system. This one is "yet another weird one in the exoplanet menagerie," said planet specialist Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

It's so unusual to find a suicidal planet that University of Maryland astronomer Douglas Hamilton questioned whether there was another explanation. While it is likely that this is a suicidal planet, Hamilton said it is also possible that some basic physics calculations that all astronomers rely on could be dead wrong.

The answer will become apparent in less than a decade if the planet seems to be further in a death spiral, he said.

Mubarak Sees Rival In Intel Chief

LONDON [MENL] -- President Hosni Mubarak has deemed his intelligence chief a rival in Egypt's succession struggle.

Arab diplomatic sources said Mubarak has been dismayed by the increasing popularity of his intelligence chief, Gen. Omar Suleiman. They said private polls taken in Egypt show Suleiman to be the leading candidate to succeed the 81-year-old Mubarak, said to be ailing and increasingly withdrawn.

Fatah Plans Separate Military

RAMALLAH [MENL] -- The ruling Fatah movement has decided to organize a military separate from that of the Palestinian Authority.

Fatah sources said the Fatah Central Committee voted to launch efforts to form a military wing. The sources said the military would comprise a modern force unlike that of Fatah's Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, formed in 2000 during the war with Israel.

Somalia: Islamists Ban Selling Explosive Things, Warn People Not Sell Cooked Food

Kismayu — The Islamic administration of Kismayu town 500 kilometers south of the Somali capital Mogadishu has banned selling the explosive things that the children play and warned to the people not to sell cooked food in the town for the sake of the holy Ramadan month, officials said on Wednesday.

Sheik Abu Hureira Osma'il, a deputy chairman of Kismayu administration warned to the businessmen in the town selling the explosive substances that the children play for the festival days and celebrations like the pistols and small arms saying that who ever is seen ignoring the order will be taken the right steps pointing out that those things are good things for the Muslims.

On the other hand Abu Hureira Isma'il also said that there are people who secretly cook food around the streets and neighborhoods of the town at the daytime as the people are fast warning them not to cook or sell food or will be punished.

However, the statement of the Islamic administration of Kismayu town comes as the people are fasting and in the holy Ramadan month which all Muslims in over the world abstain from the eating, smoking and drinking at the daylight.

Source: allAfrica.
Link: http://allafrica.com/stories/200908260826.html.

Analysis: Afghan summer brings reversals

By ROBERT H. REID, Associated Press Writer

KABUL – It's been a summer of setbacks in Afghanistan — with rising casualties, a divisive election and growing public doubts about the war in the United States and among key allies.

The year began with President Barack Obama promising a new beginning for an old war — long ignored and under-resourced by the Bush administration as the spotlight fell on the conflict in Iraq.

As part of a new emphasis, Obama ordered 21,000 troops to Afghanistan and replaced the top U.S. commander with Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who unveiled a strategy shifting the focus from killing insurgents to protecting Afghan civilians, a mindset that helped turn the tide of the Iraq conflict.

At the same time, the administration promised to build up the capabilities of the Afghan government, accelerate the training of Afghan soldiers and police and help the Afghan leadership combat corruption and the flourishing drug trade, which helps finance the insurgency.

Months later, the American effort appears to be faltering.

Hopes that the Afghan presidential election would produce a leader with a strong national mandate have been cast into doubt by allegations of widespread fraud in the Aug. 20 balloting.

Early returns point to a possible runoff between President Hamid Karzai and former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, probably in October. Final returns are not expected before the middle of next month, but figures released Wednesday show Karzai leading with 44.8 percent of ballots counted to 35.1 percent for Abdullah.

Karzai needs more than 50 percent to avoid a runoff. Many ballots from Karzai's southern strongholds have yet to be counted, and it is possible Karzai may yet surpass the 50 percent mark and claim a first round victory.

Even if he does, however, fraud allegations — not only from Abdullah but some of the other 34 candidates — have so poisoned the political atmosphere that it will be difficult to bring together social and political groups opposed to the Taliban. At the worst, the controversy may trigger street riots and splinter the country along ethnic lines.

The image of Afghan politicians squabbling in Kabul at a time when American and other international soldiers are dying on the battlefield is grimly reminiscent of the darkest days of the Iraq war, when political stagnation in Baghdad helped turn U.S. public opinion against the Bush administration's policy in the 2006 congressional election.

Nearly 300 international troops have been killed in Afghanistan this year, making this the deadliest year since the conflict began in 2001. Two U.S. service members were killed Wednesday in separate attacks in southern and eastern Afghanistan, raising the August death toll to 43 — one short of the July figure which was the highest monthly total of the war.

At the same time, the insurgents show no sign of shrinking from the fight. With U.S. and British troops focusing operations in Helmand province, the Taliban have quietly tightened their grip in neighboring Kandahar, where a vehicle bomb attack Tuesday killed at least 41 people in an assault that appeared directed at foreign interests in the city.

Taliban intimidation kept many Afghans from the polls in the south last week — despite major U.S. and British military operations aimed at making the vote secure.

U.S. officials have made little effort to gloss over the problems, perhaps mindful of the backlash that stung the Bush administration after years of false optimism in Iraq.

Last weekend, Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described the situation in Afghanistan as "serious and deteriorating" and told CNN that "I don't think that threat's going to go away."

All this comes as public support for the war both in the United States and Britain is wavering.

A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found that just over half the respondents said the war in Afghanistan was not worth fighting. A survey last month in Britain found that 58 percent of the respondents believe the war is unwinnable and 52 percent wanted British troops withdrawn immediately.

All these negatives are coming together as McChrystal is preparing to submit a report to the president next week that may include a recommendation for thousands more troops.

Republican Sen. John McCain has urged McChrystal to ask for more, citing the success of the troop surge in bringing down violence in Iraq. McCain has said that doubling the Marine force from three to six battalions would bring "significantly more success."

But sending more troops to an unpopular, meat-grinder war could be a hard sell among many of Obama's fellow Democrats.

Sen. Russ Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat who supported the U.S. move into Afghanistan following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, said the U.S. needs a timeline for its departure from the country. Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio expressed frustration with the Afghan government and said he is "concerned that this war not last a whole lot longer."

"We've got to begin seeing changes," Brown said. "We don't stay forever if they don't meet the goals they need to meet."

Netanyahu in Europe: Hopes for Renewed Peace Talks

By BRUCE CRUMLEY

It certainly doesn't qualify as a breakthrough, but after months of deadlock and mutual recrimination it appears the leaders of Israel and Palestine may be slowly getting closer to restarting peace talks. Word of creeping movement toward possible renewed negotiations arose from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Britain and Germany this week, sparking fragile hope - and guarded optimism.

After his meeting with British Premier Gordon Brown on Tuesday, Netanyahu spent Wednesday huddling with U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell in London. Central to both discussions were European and American efforts to get Netanyahu to agree to a freeze on the construction of West Bank settlements - one of the main conditions Palestine has set for resuming talks with Israel.

Though under severe pressure from hard-right partners in his coalition government to concede nothing, Netanyahu's comments in London suggested he might nevertheless be considering modifying his hostility to a building freeze. "We are making headway," Netanyahu said ahead of his meeting with Mitchell. "My government has taken steps in both words and deeds to move forward." Later that day, he left for Germany to meet Chancellor Angela Merkel on the last leg of his European jaunt. Though Merkel has always been careful to avoid pressuring Israel in public on the issue, German officials have said the Chancellor will remind Netanyahu during their meeting on Thursday of Berlin's position that all settlement activity in the West Bank be halted, and that a final peace agreement be based on a two-state solution.

Netanyahu has conformed to the latter half of that German request - sort of. Three months after winning Israel's general election in March, he altered his earlier rejection of an independent Palestine by endorsing the U.S.- and Europe-backed two-state proposal - though only under conditions the Palestinians considered non-starters, such as no Palestinian army or air space control and limitations on the return of exiles. He has also dismissed demands that Jerusalem be the seat of the Palestinian state, calling the city "Israel's undivided capital." But having ignored most other demands forwarded by Palestinian authorities in their peace proposal, Netanyahu now finds himself under pressure from Western nations to give in to almost universal calls outside Israel that settlement on the West Bank be halted.

But by making significant concessions on West Bank construction, Netanyahu risks infuriating his hard-right coalition partners, who could bring the government down by quitting in protest. So, he now seems to be shopping the idea of a compromise deal: a freeze on all new building, but the right to see through construction which is already under way. In exchange, Israel may be extended various goodwill measures from Arab states, like reopening trade offices, initiating cultural exchanges and opening airspace to Israeli commercial planes, to further encourage movement toward renewed talks - and conditions for stable peace in the region.

None of that is enough for the Palestinians, and may prove too much for Netanyahu's government partners - which is one reason why signs that the Israeli leader is considering giving up even a little ground in the middle are inspiring some hope. "Politics is often the art of finding ladders tall enough to provide leaders who've climbed trees too tall for them with a face-saving manner of climbing down," says Yossi Mekelberg, an associate fellow at British think tank Chatham House and Program Director of International Relations at Regents College in London. "That climb-down requires that small, careful steps be taken at a consistent pace. Today we're talking about settlement freezes, which is nothing compared to questions like Jerusalem, border placement, or the fate of refugees. But you have to start somewhere."

Were even imperfect movement to be made on the settlement issue, it would probably be enough to clear the way for Netanyahu to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the margins of next month's United Nations General Assembly. That resumption of direct contacts would be a major boost for Obama's stated foreign policy priority of laying the foundation of lasting peace in the Middle East. And it would also reverse the dramatically deteriorating Israeli-Palestinian relations that helped lift hard-line, mutually hostile governments to power on both sides of the divide.

Still, those small, careful steps may be too slow for a situation already favoring extremes. A survey released on Wednesday by Israel's Maagar Mohot polling company indicates that two-thirds of respondents say they share the hard-right's refusal of any freeze on West Bank settlement - even if Arab nations reward such a move. Meanwhile, the hardship and anger produced in Palestine - and in Gaza particularly - is so great that slow but sure peace progress may not be enough in the end.

"The risk is that the hopelessness and helplessness has become so great by the time you reach the final destination that people on both sides say 'All that, just for this? Forget it'," Mekelberg says. "On the other hand, really big breakthroughs clearly aren't in the cards right now, so small steps are really the only choice you have. When things are this tight, small movement is big compared to no movement."

Which is why American and European diplomats this week are sounding hopeful about Netanyahu swapping his reputation as "Mr. No" for a stint as "Mr. Maybe."

Kennedy to be buried at Arlington Cemetery

OAK BLUFFS, Massachusetts (Reuters) – Senator Edward Kennedy will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery on Saturday near his two brothers who were assassinated in the prime of their political careers.

Kennedy died late on Tuesday in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, at age 77 after battling brain cancer for more than a year. He will be buried at 5 p.m. (2100 GMT) on Saturday near his brothers, President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert Kennedy, in a private service at the cemetery outside Washington.

Only two U.S. presidents are buried at the site in Virginia: Kennedy and William Howard Taft who died in 1930.

Senator Edward Kennedy was eligible for burial at the cemetery because he both served in the U.S. military and was an elected official.

On Thursday, a motorcade from the Kennedy family compound in Hyannis Port will take the senator's body to his brother's presidential library in Boston.

The senator will lie in repose on Friday at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library that he had helped to develop over years into a forum for debating issues.

It will be open to the public from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. followed by a private "Celebration of Life Memorial Service" from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

A Roman Catholic, Kennedy's funeral Mass is planned for Saturday at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Basilica in Boston where he prayed daily while his daughter, Kara, was struggling with lung cancer.

President Barack Obama, who is on vacation at Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, was expected to attend.