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Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was surprised by a forthright expression of support for the Jewish state from Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting last month in Moscow, Israeli daily Ma’ariv reported on Friday. Netanyahu had flown to meet the Russian leader in a last minute effort to prevent an interim nuclear deal between Iran and world powers from being signed. During the meeting, Netanyahu asked Putin to withhold support for the convening of a Nuclear Non Proliferation Conference the stated purpose of which would be to rid the entire Middle East of nuclear weapons, according to the report....

An Egyptian court decided on Tuesday to ban all activities of Palestinian Hamas movement and confiscate its headquarters in Cairo, state-run Ahram website reported. A lawsuit was filed against the movement to ban its activities and designate it as a terrorist group, after the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi last July. Hamas is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and is well known for its support to the group, from which Morsi hails. More than 60 members of the group are facing trial on jailbreak charges, along with Morsi and top leaders of Brotherhood. They are accused of facilitating...

Susan ‘Medea’ Benjamin announced on Twitter Monday night she is being held in a jail cell at the Cairo, Egypt airport: “I’m being held in a jail at Cairo airport!!!” Benjamin is in Egypt to lead a delegation of activists to Hamas-led Gaza to mark International Women’s Day later this week. Code Pink has a history of working with the Muslim Brotherhood to overthrow the Egyptian government of former President Hosni Mubarak as well as other terrorist groups and state sponsors of terrorism. Medea Benjamin appeared at ease as she walked around Tahrir Square and handed out roses during the...

Palestinian civil servants called on the Gaza Strip’s Hamas government Monday to pay them full salaries, the clearest sign yet that Egypt’s blockade of the territory is making it increasingly difficult for the Islamic militants to govern. The civil servants are considered Hamas sympathizers and their public complaints about not getting paid in full over the past four months reflect growing discontent in Gaza. Still, there were no signs of open revolt against Hamas, which has kept a tight grip on Gaza and its 1.7 million people since the group overran the territory in 2007. …

The Egyptian government, sworn in on Saturday, takes office as a fresh wave of labour unrest sweeps the country, adding to the turmoil from a chaotic and violent political transition. In a televised address on Sunday, Prime Minister Ibrahim Mehleb said he called on the “patriotism” of Egyptians and that this was the moment for work, not strikes. A crippling stoppage by bus drivers last week has just ended but postal workers in many parts of the country remain on strike. Doctors, pharmacists, steel and textile workers have all carried out industrial actions in recent days. The strike by about...

Russia, flush with new-found wealth from oil exports, expands its military reach and political influence abroad. A war-weary America slashes defense spending and retreats from the world. The president embarks on a massive government-subsidized program to develop alternative energy to replace fossil fuels. Pundits cluck about America in retreat, and point to the rise of an Asian economic superpower. That’s the world circa 1976, but it sounds like quotes ripped from today’s headlines. History has a way of repeating itself, or to quote the great Yogi Bera, it’s déjà vu all over again. The Obama administration is looking a lot...

The Anti-Defamation League, one of the US's most powerful Jewish organizations known for its advocacy on behalf of Israel, criticized Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday for comments he made in Munich regarding the negative consequences that Israel can expect if efforts to achieve a two-state solution break down. In a letter to Kerry, ADL chief Abe Foxman said that while he appreciated Kerry's efforts to move the peace process forward, the remarks about Israel's likely ostracism in the event that no deal is reached will only spur the pro-boycott elements and the Palestinians to become further entrenched in...

Egypt's military has come out with a shocking "medical breakthrough." On Sunday, the army announced its new "Complete Cure Device," which it says can treat cancer and hepatitis C every time, and which doctors call a "scientific scandal." Maj. Gen. Ibrahim Abdel-Atti, head of the Cancer Treatment and Screening center, praised the new device, bragging "I defeated AIDS with the grace of my god at the rate of 100%. And I defeated hepatitis C." According to Abdel-Atti's research team's claims, the device draws blood, "breaks down" the disease, and returns the now cancer-free blood back to the patient, reports CNN....

Half as many Americans view Iran as the United States’ greatest enemy today as did two years ago. As a result, China now edges out Iran and North Korea atop the list. After the top three countries, 9% of Americans mention Russia, 7% name Iraq, 5% Afghanistan, and 3% Syria. Gallup first asked this open-ended question in 2001, and opinions have shifted over that time. In the 2001 survey—10 years after the Persian Gulf War but before the 2003 Iraq war began—Americans named Iraq as the greatest U.S. enemy by a large margin. …

In its annual survey of American Jewry published last October, the American Jewish Committee found that 75 percent of American Jews agree with the statement, “The goal of the Arabs is not a peaceful two-state agreement with Israel, but rather the destruction of Israel.” And yet, American Jews supported the establishment of a Palestinian state 50% to 47%. Next week over 10,000 predominantly Jewish American supporters of Israel will gather in Washington at AIPAC’s annual policy conference. Given their high commitment to Israel, probably most of those gathered belong to the 47% of American Jews who opposed Palestinian statehood. Yet...

Western sources: Israel Air Force hits SS-21 batteries, first attack in Syrian war on nuclear-capable missiles Western military and intelligence sources report that Israeli Air Force strikes in Lebanon and Syria overnight Monday, Feb. 24 came on the heels of the first use in the three-year Syrian war of a Russian-made nuclear-capable Tochka (Point) surface missile - NATO-coded SS-21 Scarab - which carries a 480-kilo warhead with a range of 70 km. These missiles were fired earlier Monday in the Syrian-Hizballah battle for Yabroud. There was no information about the effect of the Israeli strikes.

Two days ago, Egyptian media began big campaigns about a miraculous device (billed as ''Complete Cure'') invented by Egypt's armed forces for treating HIV/AIDS and the Hepatitis C virus. The news stories depicted the machine as a breakthrough, and a real miracle for completely curing patients of any of the two resistant diseases, giving hope for 18 million Egyptians with Hepatitis C and tens of thousands with HIV. (All this in no time at all -- only 16 hours for the cure and one minute for detecting the disease.) According to the Egyptian media, with the device there is no...

The first woman elected to head an Egyptian political party expressed doubt over the country’s transition to democracy on Monday, criticizing the interim authorities’ increasing intolerance of dissent. Hala Shukrallah, a 59-year-old Coptic Christian, condemned the security crackdown that has resulted in mass detentions and trials in the months since the military overthrew the Islamist president last July. […] Hundreds of Islamists have been killed and thousands detained. But by the end of last year and with the issuance of a draconian protest law, the appetite for dissent decreased and the clampdown widened to include some of the main figures...

Prosecutors Sunday accused deposed president Mohammed Morsi of leaking state secrets to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards as part of a plot to destabilize Egypt, at the second hearing of his trial for espionage. The trial, one of three that are under way against Morsi, is part of a relentless government crackdown targeting him and his Muslim Brotherhood movement since his ouster by the army in July. …

An Egyptian court acquitted six police officers Saturday on charges of killing 83 protesters during the country’s 2011 revolution, the latest in a string of trials that rights group say failed to hold the country’s security forces accountable for demonstrators’ deaths. The acquittals come as ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi, toppled in July by the military, faces a host of criminal charges. Morsi appeared Saturday in court and shouted from inside a soundproof defendants’ cell, urging his supporters to continue protests and vowing to try the country’s military chief and Republican Guards commander for killing his supporters. The police officers’...

US Senator Tim Kaine, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee, said he expects the coming presidential elections in Egypt to be impartial. During a meeting with a number of journalists at a Cairo hotel Thursday, Kaine denied that the US let down Egypt in its war against terrorism, highlighting that the relations between the two countries are strong and that Washington will support Egypt in the coming period. Responding to a question on the US stance regarding the candidature of Defense Minister Field Marshal Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi in the presidential polls, Kaine said that there is no problem at all...

Obama's New Asylum Decree Favors Muslims Over Christians Egyptian Coptic Christians protest a spate of recent attacks on Christians and churches in Cairo. AP View Enlarged Image Immigration: As President Obama offers asylum to "minor" terrorists providing "limited" material support to terrorism, he's slamming shut the door on thousands of Christians fleeing terrorism in Muslim lands like Egypt. In another end-run around Congress, President Obama has unilaterally eased immigration requirements for foreigners linked to terrorism. He ordered the State Department and Homeland Security to ignore a post-9/11 law barring entry to those giving political or charitable aid to Hamas and...

Iran’s President, Hassan Rouhani, on Wednesday said that Jerusalem should “be liberated from the yoke of Israel.” The comments were made during a meeting in Tehran between Rouhani and the Speaker or the Palestinian Authority (PA) parliament, Salim Zanoun, and were reported by the semi-official Fars news agency. During the meeting, according to Fars, Rouhani expressed the support of the Iranian government and nation “for the oppressed people of Palestine”, and called for the “liberation of the Holy Quds (Jerusalem) from the yoke of Israel.” …

Twenty journalists, including four foreigners, have gone on trial in the Egyptian capital, Cairo. They face charges including aiding a terrorist organisation - as the Muslim Brotherhood was designated in December - and endangering national security. Eight defendants are in custody, among them al-Jazeera's Egyptian-Canadian bureau chief Mohamed Adel Fahmy and Australian correspondent Peter Greste.

<p>TEL AVIV – The Palestinian Authority received a pledge from the U.S. that by the end of 2014, the Obama administration will issue an official written declaration presenting general highlights of a future Palestinian state, a senior Palestinian negotiator told WND.</p>