Welcome to the World Economic Forum on the Middle East! Wait, hold on a sec, let me beat and arrest some protesters first, and uphold Ayman Nour's jail sentence real quick. OK, thanks, ready to go.
Does Condi have a visit to Cairo coming anytime soon? I'd say cancel it, but it obviously didn't work last time.
Iraq
"The main thing now is to just get out of Iraq." No, that's not MoveOn.org speaking. Just a middle class Iraqi who can't handle it anymore. Some melancholy photos to supplement that sentiment.
Talabani is trying to get rival Shiite factions in Basra to settle down.
Iran
Click on it, it's good for you: Ignatius on what to say to Iran. The NYT gets into the Iran intel problem:
[T]he world is losing much of its ability to answer pressing questions about Iran's nuclear ambitions: how fast Tehran could make an atom bomb, and whether it harbors a program to do so. Diplomats and nuclear experts say the diminished view increases the risks of miscalculation, and possibly armed confrontation, just as the atomic impasse with the West is reaching a volatile new stage.
In the piece, David Kay echoes Michael Scheuer who told us earlier this week that the lack of good intel is going to lead Washington to rely on dubious opposition and dissident sources.
The Iranian uranium last month may have been derived from an old 1991 Chinese import.
Elsewhere
In Darfur, another problem: the anti-Khartoum rebels are now fighting each other and the civilians they were supposedly protecting are suffering.
The UN says Gitmo should be shut down, basically ensuring that the Bush administration won't do it. Defending Venezuela in the LAT. Ian Buruma on Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Life at an Army hospital in Iraq.
Hayden coverage: NYT, WaPo, LAT.
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