One good effect of high gasoline prices? Some in Washington are finally talking sense about what to do about them.

The president has endorsed long-overdue congressional efforts to open up American waters to oil exploration and drilling. In a June 18 speech, President Bush announced that "we should expand American oil production by increasing access to the Outer Continental Shelf."

Currently, 85 percent of American-controlled waters — the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and parts of offshore Alaska — are off limits to energy production. John McCain has also endorsed opening these areas, thereby injecting the issue into the presidential debate.

Several pro-drilling bills have been introduced in Congress. Perhaps the most promising approach is found in the Deep Ocean Energy Resources Act, which would allow each coastal state to decide if it wants to allow drilling off its shores.

The DOER Act and similar bills, however, are Republican-sponsored measures with little or no support from the Democratic majority, which will decide if they even come to a vote.

That’s too bad, since these offshore restrictions are a relic of the past. They were put in place in the 1980s and 1990s when gasoline was little above $1 a gallon and the need for additional domestic oil was low.

At the time, the political path of least resistance was to give in to environmentalists and coastal developers and put vast areas out of reach. Even with the quadrupling of energy prices since then, the law has yet to be seriously challenged.

How much oil is out there? According to the Department of the Interior, these restricted deepwater areas contain 19 billion barrels of oil, about 30 years' worth of imports from Saudi Arabia. And these initial energy estimates have a track record for being low.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President George W. Bush prodded Congress on Friday to allow oil drilling in offshore waters and in the Alaskan wildlife refuge, citing "tough economic times" for the American people.

Bush met with his senior economic advisers at the Energy Department to discuss soaring prices for gasoline and crude oil. Bush said one answer is to increase supply in this country by tapping "the vast potential" of crude oil reserves on offshore lands and in Alaska as well as in oil shale in the western part of the United States.

With gasoline prices above $4 a gallon, Bush and his Republican allies think American's reluctance to drill in pristine waters and lands is diminishing and that there is an opportunity for oil companies to move into areas that have been off limits.

"And yet the Democratic leaders of Congress have consistently blocked opening up these lands for exploration," the president said. He said that technology has changed dramatically and that oil can be recovered in a way that protects the environment.

"The members of Congress, particularly the Democratic leadership, must address this issue before they go home" in August, Bush said. "They have a responsibility to explain to their constituents why we should not be drilling for more oil here in America to take the pressure off of gasoline prices."

"Crude oil prices are up and one reason crude oil prices are up is because demand is outstripping supply," the president said. "And therefore what can we do about it? That ought to be the question the United States Congress asks."

Iran test-fired more long-range ballistic missiles in the Gulf Thursday, July 10, the day after its launch of 10 missiles including the Shehab-3, which is capable of delivering a one-ton payload over Tel Aviv. The second round was announced by Tehran state TV on Day Three of the Great Prophet war games.

DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the 20 missiles of assorted ranges tested so far (including the Fajar and Zelzal series) were put on show to convince the United States and Israel that Iran has enough missiles and launchers to keep on firing on consecutive days.

This was more posture than reality. In fact, only one 2,000-km range Shehab-3 was actually test-fired. However, accentuating the Gulf as the location of the second day’s tests, instead of an inland desert location like the first, raises the threat level. It was Tehran’s answer to the bland comments delivered Wednesday by US Assistant Secretary of State William Burns that Washington is not nearing a military confrontation with Iran and that Tehran’s response to the latest six-power incentives package makes it possible to keep diplomacy going.

Iran clearly prefers to continue talking from a position of strength and flexed military muscles.

White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Wednesday. "The Iranians should stop the development of ballistic missiles, which could be used as a delivery vehicle for a potential nuclear weapon, immediately."

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pledged the US will defend its interests and its allies. The US has enhanced its security presence in the Gulf and “we take our obligations to help our allies defend themselves very seriously and no one should be confused about that.”

Democratic presidential nominee Senator Barack Obama said the missile tests showed the US needs to pursue direct and aggressive diplomacy backed by “tougher sanctions.” His rival Senator John McCain said the missile firings mean “Iran continues to threaten the security of their neighbors.” But he was sure that European allies are ready to impose financial and trade sanctions that “can be effective in modifying Iranian behavior.”

(CNN) — As the dog days of summer set in and Americans take a break from the daily political band-and-forth, a new CNN analysis of several recent national opinion surveys show Barack Obama with a sizeable lead over John McCain.

In the latest CNN Poll of polls, the Illinois senator holds an 8-point lead among registered voters nationwide, 49 percent to 41 percent, with 10 percent still undecided.

The 8-point spread is up 2 points from a CNN poll of polls released one week ago. It is double the margin it was one month ago, days after the prolonged Democratic race ended.

“Obama's lead has grown a bit over the course of the past month. It is still relatively slim, but it is certainly solid," CNN Senior Political Researcher Alan Silverleib said. "The burden is on McCain to find a way to shake things up as we enter the traditional summer doldrums.”

The poll of polls consists of three recent surveys from Gallup, CNN/Opinion Research Corp. and LA Times/Bloomberg. It does not carry a margin of error.

Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas was in Damascus this week. It had nothing to do with the Turkish-mediated Israeli-Syrian “peace talks” that Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert has been trying to spin into a raison d’être for his miserably corrupt, incompetent governance.

Instead Abbas met with an anti-American dictator, Bashar Assad, and with leaders of three anti-Israeli, anti-American, anti-Western terrorist organizations—Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine—to discuss achieving unity between two other terrorist organizations, Hamas and his own Fatah.

If this sounds rather important, it got little coverage. After all, there’s nothing sexy here for the international media, nothing you can spin into “Palestinians seek peace, but Israel keeps building settlements” or “Moderate Palestinians and Israelis seek peace, but both need to curb their extremists.”

Now why would the “secular moderate” Abbas be meeting in Damascus with the likes of Ramadan Abdullah Shallah—find him here on the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists list—whose Islamic Jihad outfit is defined as a terrorist organization by the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, Japan, Canada, Australia, and Israel, is responsible for this list of suicide attacks and much other terror, and exists to destroy Israel and replace it with a Sharia state?

And if the media don’t see anything here that suits their take on reality, what must President Bush and Secretary of State Rice be making of it? After all, since convening the Annapolis Conference last fall they’ve been pushing Abbas and his Fatah as the moderates who are going to finally sew up the conflict with Israel.

Anger and bitterness is the prevailing feeling among bystanders on Jerusalem’s busy Jaffa Road in the minutes after the deadly terror attack on July 2.

A Jewish man in his early twenties holds an unlit cigarette in one hand, while the other thumps out text messages on a cellphone, informing friends and family he is unhurt.

“If he was here I’d kill him. I’d rip him to pieces,” the youth mutters, as shocked eyewitnesses around him give graphic accounts of the attacker’s killing spree.

A correspondent of the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera channel is mingling with the irate bystanders, and assessing from afar the damage inflicted by the frenzied assailant.

His flagged microphone with the famous Al-Jazeera logo is tucked away and out of sight.

The reporter, an Israeli Arab, listens attentively to the heated cries of Jerusalem’s residents and remains silent. When the people are in pain, even a hint of an Arab accent could be enough to spark an explosion of verbal abuse.

Once word gets out that the assailant was not a Palestinian from the West Bank but a resident of eastern Jerusalem, one of the onlookers lifts his hands in the air in despair.

The middle-aged man, Yossi, has lived in the city his whole life and traces his family history in Jerusalem as far as eight generations back.

When a terrorist from eastern Jerusalem hit the Mercaz Harav Talmudic seminary in March, no one demolished his house, Yossi says.

“And now we are suffering the consequences.”

“So this one is also from east Jerusalem, and the third one will also be from east Jerusalem and it’ll become a trend,” he says. “In east Jerusalem they’re giving out candy and baklavas. That’s what they do when a Jew dies.”

The recent terror attack has rekindled the debate about how to deal with Israel’s Arab minority, and Jerusalem’s Arab residents in particular.

[Amman] – In stark contrast to regional player Iran, there was no international outcry when Jordan announced, then started the first stage of its nuclear plans.

Any problems that might arise will be purely internal and have to do with the Jordanian official apparatus' perceived inefficiency. Some say that the agencies in charge of implementation might render the peaceful nuclear program – which is supposed to be the answer to the kingdom's most serious problem – just another initiative that fades away before it bears any fruit.

According to Yassar Qatarneh, director of the Amman-based Regional Center on Conflict Prevention (RCCP), Jordan picked the right time to ride two waves: the hubbub caused by Iran's suspected nuclear program and the soaring prices of energy.

Qatarneh says those world powers that shoulder the burden of standing up to Tehran's nuclear ambitions need to prove to the rest of the world that they have no problem extending a helping hand to "benign" countries in the region such as Jordan, the Gulf states, Morocco, Egypt, Turkey, and others that have declared plans to build their own reactors.

"The other factor is the rising oil prices. Jordan has no choice but to tap into its potential and no one can blame such a resource-strapped country for looking for alternatives to conventional fuel," he adds.

Under the national energy strategy, Jordan plans to have its first nuclear reactor up and running by 2015, with more plants to follow in the years leading up to 2030. The kingdom hopes that by that time, 30 percent of its electricity needs will be met by nuclear power stations, with prospects of exporting the vital commodity.

The program, according to MP Atef Tarawneh, who heads the Energy and Natural Resources Committee in Jordan’s lower house, is two-fold: the nuclear reactor planned to be installed in Aqaba, 360 km from the capital Amman on the Red Sea, and the utilization of the vast uranium deposits, standing at 80,000 tons of proven reserves, in addition to 100,000 tons contained in phosphate deposits, according to an official estimate.

Asked why, unlike with Iran, no fuss has been made about Jordan's nuclear ambitions, MP Tarawneh said Jordan had, from the very beginning, made it clear it sought a peaceful program and embarked immediately on contacts with international players, particularly the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

During an April 2007 visit to Amman to listen to Jordanian officials about the plan, IAEA director-general Muhammad Al-Barade'i gave his blessings to Jordan's nuclear aspirations.

"Jordan, which adopts a moderate policy, will provide an example in the region for the exploitation of nuclear know-how for peaceful uses," Tarawneh says.

Apparently, says Qatarneh from the RCCP, these early disclosures and the transparency Amman showed satisfied its former foe and suspicious neighbor, Israel.

"The conventional wisdom in the West is that nuclear energy is only risky when in the hands of rogue countries such as Iran and Syria. They understand that for Jordan it is merely a matter of business. Besides, the many partners that will be helping Jordan implement the program will ensure the scheme is under tight control. There is no risk whatsoever that it would ever be developed into a weapons-building program," he says.

Jordan has already signed memoranda of understanding with the U.S., Canada, France and the UK. Officials say contacts are underway with other countries to carry out the two-track strategy.

"We are currently talking with the big five nuclear countries, and keeping all our options open to get the best technical, economic, safe, secure, sustainable reactor deal," says Ned Xoubi, Nuclear Fuel Cycle commissioner at the Jordan Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC), the agency set up last year to handle the nuclear program.

A former leader of a radical Islamic organization told Congress extreme Muslims are motivated by an ideology similar to Marxism and that Islamism has much in common with the former Soviet Union. 

Maajid Nawaz, a native of England and once prominent figure in the London-based extremist group Hizb ut-Tharir, testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that the root cause of Islamic terrorism was its fanatical ideology, not poverty or discrimination.

“There is a common misconception on the left in the UK that only grievances can lead to Islamism,” he said.

Nawaz drew parallels between socialist Marxism and Islamism, contending that both movements see everything as a global ideological power struggle. He said Islamists wished for the world to be ruled under a single caliphate state, “like the Soviet bloc.”

“There will always be a conflict between Islamism and capitalism, just as there was once conflict between communism and capitalism,” he said.

This runs counter to the opinion held by many liberals that Islamic extremism is a theocratic product of the far-right.

A problem with the West’s approach to terrorism, according to Nawaz, was that many viewed Muslim terrorism as a problem with the religion of Islam rather than a result of the political ideology of Islamism.

Nawaz had been involved with Hizb ut-Tharir since he was 16 when he was arrested in Egypt in 2002 for his membership in the organization. Amnesty International offered to assist him legally, which led him to revise his conceptions of the West. Upon returning to London, he renounced his former extremism and is now a director at the Quilliam Foundation, a British think tank dedicated to countering Islamism.

Dr. Michael Leiter, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, echoed Nawaz, saying that Islamism had far more to do with politics than religion.

“The ideology that motivates these terrorists today has very little to do with the religion of Islam. It’s the difference between a religion and a radical ideology,” he said.

There are over 1 billion Muslims in the world, although only a small percentage is believed to be Islamist. These extremists have been moving west, however, with recent Muslim immigrations into Europe.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Notwithstanding months of partisan wrangling in Congress over the Iraq war, the Senate Thursday handily confirmed Gen. David Petraeus as the top commander in the Middle East and Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno to replace Petraeus as the chief military officer in Iraq.

The Senate voted 95-2 in favor of Petraeus with Democratic Sens. Robert Byrd and Tom Harkin opposing. Harkin, D-Iowa, cast the lone vote opposing Odierno, who was confirmed 96-1.

The Senate action will keep the nation on its present course in Iraq for the remainder of the year. It also will hand the next administration a pair of combat-tested commanders who have relentlessly defended the need to keep troops in Iraq in large numbers, rather than wind down combat operations.

Despite their firm backing of the politically unpopular war, Petraeus and Odierno drew little criticism from congressional Democrats who typically reserve their sharpest critiques for Bush and his political appointees.

DEBKAfile’s counter-terror sources report that Hamas media Wednesday night broadcast a call to all Palestinian organizations to enlist for an all-out terrorist offensive against Israeli military and civilian targets on the West Bank. 

The immediate response was a bombing attack on an IDF vehicle on Route 60 south of the West Bank town of Hebron. No one was hurt.

Our sources add that Hamas is not threatening to end the Gaza truce.

Its West Bank terror offensive was announced to counter the IDF’s crackdown for the past week on its burgeoning presence on the West Bank by shutting down its institutions and sources of funding. The last straw for the Islamist Palestinian group was Israel’s military raid Tuesday of the Beit al Mal business mall in Nablus. The soldiers shut the center down for business, along with Hamas-owned bakeries and other profitable concerns.

DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources report that in Cairo, the talks Egyptian intelligence minister Gen. Omar Suleiman has been holding with Hamas leaders from Damascus and Gaza have reached an impasse over scaled up Hamas demands of Egypt and Israel:

1. Egypt must pledge the immediate reopening of the Rafah border terminal twice or three times a week without waiting for Israel to concur as required by international accords.

2. Israel must allow twenty times the present tonnage of goods to transit the Sufa and Nahal Oz crossings into Gaza

3. Israel must transfer to Hamas in Gaza the share of customs duties due to the Gaza Strip (proportionate to its population), which are deducted on incoming Palestinian commodities, instead of handing the entire sum to the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

Their leaders do not threaten outright to end the informal truce in Gaza, but they are avoiding discussing the fate of the Israeli soldier Hamas kidnapped more than two years ago.

Everyone in Washington, Republican and Democrat alike, should be extremely concerned with the fact that the American people have never been as repulsed by our own government as we are now.

Yet, there seems to be no shame at all on the Hill, no embarrassment or worry about the fact that the American people consider them complete and utter failures. There is no talk of resignation and slinking away. Instead, these same self-obsessed, do-nothing politicians go about their business, bemused by the disgust the great, unwashed, Not-Of-Their-Class masses feel for them.

According to the latest Rasmussen Reports survey, Congress has actually finally accomplished something–they’ve achieved the lowest approval rating in the history of the poll. Just 9 percent of the American people approve of the job Congress is doing. — That same 9 percent are also still waiting for the nurse to bring them their medication in their lovely padded rooms.

Once Congress hits the single-digits, they really must accept the fact that just as 5.5 percent unemployment is considered “full-employment,” a 9 percent approval rating is complete disapproval. With a number so shockingly low, one might think Pelosi and Reid would resign in disgrace, ashamed at the fact that the one thing they can claim to have done is lose the confidence of virtually everyone in the country.

Last Friday, on the Fourth of July, the great American patriot Jesse Helms passed away. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson also went to their great reward on Independence Day, so this is further proof of God.

Helms is now the second great American patriot I've always wanted to meet and never will, at least in this lifetime. The only other one is the magnificent Reagan aide Lyn Nofziger. (Wikipedia quote: "I sometimes lie awake at night trying to think of something funny that Richard Nixon said.")

After a week of hundreds of Helms obituaries -- one or two of which were not completely dishonest -- I will mention just a few items that were not addressed or given sufficient attention.

The two most obsessively discussed topics among Senate staffers are: (1) Who is the stupidest senator? (Sen. Barbara Boxer pulled into the lead when Sen. Lincoln Chafee retired), and (2) which senators are beastly and which are wonderful to their staff?

When I worked in the Senate in the '90s, the two senators famous for being absolute princes to work for were Sen. Helms and -- it pains me to tell you this, so you know it has to be true -- Sen. Teddy Kennedy. (He was so nice to his staffers, he frequently offered them rides home in his car after parties.)

South Carolina's Republican Party chairman announced support Wednesday for a campaign to allow oil exploration off the coast of South Carolina and other states, an idea that concerns environmental and tourism interests and is opposed by many Democratic leaders and candidates.

According to the state GOP, party Chairman Katon Dawson is the first Republican Party chairman in the country to endorse the "Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less." campaign launched by American Solutions, an organization chaired by former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

"If we take the bold step to cultivate energy resources here at home, we will not only break our dependence on foreign oil, we will also bring meaningful relief to hardworking families who are experiencing unprecedented pain at the pump as gas prices continue to skyrocket," Dawson said.

Federal rules allow gas and oil exploration in the Gulf of Mexico, but there has been a moratorium on drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts for 26 years. Oil companies, with some GOP support, have long sought to lift the moratorium.

Last year in Charleston Shell Oil Corp. sponsored a roundtable discussion on the subject. At that event, supporters of coastal oil and gas exploration said that even if the practice were allowed off South Carolina today, it could take at least 10 years to produce any new supplies.

Opponents made the same point.

"It would offer no immediate relief from the tremendous burden posed by rising gas and oil prices," said Democratic National Committee member Waring Howe Jr., of Charleston. "Putting my Democratic hat aside for a moment, I, as a life-long South Carolinian, fear that we could pay a tremendous environmental price."

Dawson said it's true that offshore drilling would provide no instant relief from high gas prices.

"It's about releasing the grip that oil dictators have on our economy," he said. "It's not just drilling offshore. It's solar power and wind power."

American and Iraqi forces are driving Al-Qaeda in Iraq out of its last redoubt in the north of the country in the culmination of one of the most spectacular victories of the war on terror.

After being forced from its strongholds in the west and centre of Iraq in the past two years, Al-Qaeda’s dwindling band of fighters has made a defiant “last stand” in the northern city of Mosul.

A huge operation to crush the 1,200 fighters who remained from a terrorist force once estimated at more than 12,000 began on May 10.

Operation Lion’s Roar, in which the Iraqi army combined forces with the Americans’ 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment, has already resulted in the death of Abu Khalaf, the Al-Qaeda leader, and the capture of more than 1,000 suspects. 

The group has been reduced to hit-and-run attacks, including one that killed two off-duty policemen yesterday, and sporadic bombings aimed at killing large numbers of officials and civilians.

Last Friday I joined the 2nd Iraqi Division as it supported local police in a house-to-house search for one such bomb after intelligence pointed to a large explosion today.

Even in the district of Zanjali, previously a hotbed of the insurgency, it was possible to accompany an Iraqi colonel on foot through streets of breeze-block houses studded with bullet holes. Hundreds of houses were searched without resistance but no bomb was found, only 60kg of explosives.

American and Iraqi leaders believe that while it would be premature to write off Al-Qaeda in Iraq, the Sunni group has lost control of its last urban base in Mosul and its remnants have been largely driven into the countryside to the south.

Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq’s prime minister, who has also led a crackdown on the Shi’ite Mahdi Army in Basra and Baghdad in recent months, claimed yesterday that his government had “defeated” terrorism.

“They were intending to besiege Baghdad and control it,” Maliki said. “But thanks to the will of the tribes, security forces, army and all Iraqis, we defeated them.”

The number of foreign fighters coming over the border from Syria to bolster Al-Qaeda’s numbers is thought to have declined to as few as 20 a month, compared with 120 a month at its peak.

Brigadier General Abdullah Abdul, a senior Iraqi commander, said: “We’ve limited their movements with check-points. They are doing small attacks and trying big ones, but they’re mostly not succeeding.”

Major-General Mark Hertling, American commander in the north, said: “I think we’re at the irreversible point.”

(July 10 — Atlanta, GA) - Two American children were escorted by the American consulate officers in Karachi, Pakistan Tuesday night Pakistan time and boarded a flight to Dubai, UAE and then boarded a direct flight to NYC, Noor Elahi Khan and Mahboob Elahi Khan are expected to arrive in Atlanta on a Delta flight this afternoon at 4:30 PM.

The two brothers have been in a Pakistani madrassa for four years and are the focus of a newly released documentary entitled “The Karachi Kids”.

[...]

Children in the documentary film “The Karachi Kids” describe beatings and human rights violations for those who reject the radical teachings of their Taliban masters. Children from California and Georgia are interviewed in the film from inside the madrassa and discuss coming back to the United States to spread extremism within our borders.

[...]

 

The headmaster of the Binoria madrassa personally recruits American children to his institution during Ramadan, and says on camera that: “We work on altering the mindset of the students we are training, so when they return to their home countries, their mindset is such that they will work on altering the minds of others. That is why I’m appealing to you that at least 1000 to 2000 boys come to us so we can train them and they will go back to their home countries and do the work and make people understand.” The headmaster of the Binoria madrassa also states that he has already graduated 100 American children from his madrassa.