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U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is calling on Israel to exercise restraint in its ongoing military offensive to free kidnapped Israeli soldiers. She says Syria and Iran must stop backing terrorists. Condoleezza Rice - AFP Photo Secretary Rice would not comment specifically on the Israeli bombing of Beirut's airport, repeating the Bush Administration stance that Israel has the right to defend itself against missile strikes launched from Lebanese territory. But as Israel exercises that right of self defense, Rice says it is important that Israeli leaders exercise restraint and avoid civilian casualties. Click here to see map of conflict...

MADNESS begat more madness in the Middle East on Wednesday. With tensions already running high from the June 25 capture of a 19-year-old Israeli corporal by Palestinian militants, Hezbollah militants crossed into Israel on Wednesday to seize two Israeli soldiers. In an instant, Israel was unleashing its military fury on two fronts in an effort to force the militants holding its soldiers to relent. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called the Hezbollah move "an act of war" -- and vowed to hold the Lebanese government accountable for the safety of the two soldiers. He also promised the Israeli response would...

Bush says Israel has right to defend itself but urges restraint By Haaretz Service and News Agencies U.S. President George W. Bush said on Thursday that Israel had a right to defend itself against terrorist acts but it should not weaken the Beirut government. "Israel has the right to defend herself," Bush told a news conference after a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. "Secondly, whatever Israel does should not weaken the...government in Lebanon." Advertisement The president's comment came in response to the escalating violence between Israel and Lebanon, on Thursday after IAF warplanes carried out strikes in Lebanon in...

(IsraelNN.com) United States Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice joined the G8 industrialized nations group in calling for restraint by IDF forces that entered Gaza to rescue a soldier who was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists on Sunday. Rice added that diplomatic officials continue to work toward obtaining the release of 19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was taken hostage during the raid on an IDF outpost near the Kerem Shalom border crossing. Two soldiers were killed and four others wounded in the attack. Shalit’s whereabouts are unknown and his captors refuse to return him.

UN SECRETARY-General Kofi Annan has called for restraint as Israeli troops massed on the Gaza border for a possible offensive after the kidnapping of a soldier. Annan urged all parties to "exercise restraint at this grave moment, and to take all possible steps to avoid further escalation and bloodshed," his spokesman said. According to the spokesman, the secretary general was "alarmed" at the recent events triggered by a Palestinian militant raid early Sunday on an Israeli army post on the Gaza Strip border. Two Israeli servicemen and two Palestinian fighters were killed and a 20-year-old Israeli corporal, who also holds...

Sderot: Qassams land during president's visit Two rockets land in Sderot area as Katsav, Peretz visit Qassam-battered town. 'I have no intention of making restraint part of my work plan; restraint has run its course,' defense minister says. President: PA leadership directly responsible for rocket attacks. Leaders set to meet with hunger strikers in show of sympathy for residents' distress. Meanwhile, residents agree to end hunger strike at president's request Shmulik Hadad Hunger strikers in Sderot complied Monday with President Moshe Katsav's request and agreed to end their strike, nine days after it was first declared. However, residents said they...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 23, 2006 – President Bush today condemned yesterday's bombing of one of the holiest Shiite mosques, in Samarra, Iraq, and vowed U.S. support in rebuilding it. The top U.S. general in Iraq and the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad joined him in urging Iraqis not to allow the incident to divide them. Bush called the bombing an evil, political act intended to incite sectarian strife. During a Cabinet meeting today, he said he's pleased that "voices of reason" recognize this and have spoken out against retaliatory violence. "We will continue to work with those voices of reason to enable...

As an appeals court judge, Samuel Alito has compiled a massive record that includes more than 240 opinions. Of these, the most illuminating may well be his 41 dissents -- opinions that he has written by himself, rejecting the views of his colleagues. When they touch on issues that split people along political lines, Alito's dissents show a remarkable pattern: They are almost uniformly conservative. In the overwhelming majority of cases, he has urged a more conservative position than that of his colleagues. In his dissents, at least, he has been a conservative's conservative -- not always in his reasoning,...

A Supreme Property Rights Disaster In The Making More Kelo on the SCOTUS horizon?... [James S. Burling] 8/15/05 After a term marked by the Supreme Court’s utter contempt for property rights, those of us who happen to think there is something special about allowing old widows to keep their homes were not prepared for an even more bitter defeat. Yet, that is what President Bush handed us with the nomination of John Roberts. The battle over property rights is not a conservative versus liberal thing. It’s more a struggle between those who believe in the power of the state to...

Douglas W. Kmiec is a professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine University.Almost anyone on President Bush's short list of Supreme Court nominees will rouse Senate Democrats to filibuster. No one seriously believes that this will happen because his picks will lack proper training, integrity or temperament. Rather, what riles Democrats is Bush's repeated assertion that he will not appoint someone who "legislate[s] from the bench." They and their allies believe that Bush's opposition to judicial activism cloaks his real desire to fill the court with like-minded conservatives. They are wrong. The president's view on activist judges is a defensible, neutral...

"The great object of my fear is the Federal Judiciary. That body, like gravity, ever acting with noiseless foot and unalarming advance, gaining ground step by step and holding what it gains, is engulfing insidiously the special governments into the jaws of that which feeds them." – Thomas Jefferson to Spencer Roane, 1821. Interview with North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Paul Newby NCC: Justice Newby, thank you for taking the time to acquaint our readers with your judicial philosophy. I just have a few questions for you this evening. You ran on a platform emphasizing judicial restraint, could you elaborate...

If the Oklahoma City bombers refused to participate in a U.S. election, would the final results be considered “illegitimate?” What if the Nation of Islam, the Black Panthers, the Communist Party USA, or the Southern Indiana Regional Militia refused to vote in American elections? Would it matter and, really, who gives a damn? The Left-Wing, e.g. the New York Times, has been trying to hold the Iraqi elections to this type of ridiculous standard regarding Sunni participation. Granted: Sunnis make up 32-37% of Iraq’s population. While their representation is important, the majority of terrorist attacks aimed at destabilizing Iraq have...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and the Security Council urged Rwanda on Thursday to refrain from any military action in Congo after reports as many as eight battalions of Rwandan troops may be in Congo. The head of U.N. peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno warned the council at a closed-door briefing of the danger of increased tensions, saying there is a lot of stake for the Congo as well as the region, according to a diplomat at the session, speaking on condition of anonymity. Algeria's U.N. Ambassador Abdallah Baali, the current council president, said Guehenno told members that according...

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Sixty prominent Palestinian officials and intellectuals on Thursday urged the public to refrain from retaliation for Israel's assassination of Hamas' founder, saying it would ignite a new round of bloodshed that would only hurt Palestinian aspirations for independence. The half-page advertisement in the PLO's Al-Ayyam newspaper called on Palestinians to lay down their arms and turn to peaceful means of protest to end Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The ad reflected growing sentiment among many Palestinian leaders and intellectuals that military struggle is not helping the Palestinian cause. Thousands of Palestinians have...

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon convened the security-political cabinet Wednesday to discuss the situation along the northern border and Hezbollah's military build up in South Lebanon. Sharon said that Israel has no interest in opening a second front in the north even though it has reasons to act. Senior IDF officers expressed a similar line at the meeting. "However", the prime minister warned, "the situation could change." Sharon said that nobody should think that Israel was incapable of taking action. Rather, he said, it had decided to exercise restraint even though Syria and Hezbollah had tried to draw Israel into confrontation....