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Congress Pushes Pakistan To Stamp Out Terrorism (Washington, DC) -- Congressional negotiators have agreed on legislation tying U.S. aid to Pakistan to significant progress in cracking down on terrorists. The agreement still has to be approved by the Senate and House comes after concerns about al-Qaeda becoming entrenched in Pakistan's tribal region near Afghanistan grows. Bush administration officials say Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has been an important ally in the war on terrorism, but believe he could do more. The agreement bars financial aid in the fiscal year beginning October 1st until President Bush finds Pakistan is making, quote, "demonstrated,...

The People's Hurricane Relief Fund and Oversight Committee held a press conference this morning in front of their New Orleans office to protest the alleged withholding of funds from Hurricane Katrina victims by the American Red Cross. PHRF charges that the humanitarian aid organization is concealing money available through the Means to Recovery program, which is part of its third-phase recovery efforts for people who suffered losses in Katrina, Rita and Wilma. The first phase was emergency response, sheltering and feeding, while the second phase was financial assistance. According to PHRF, the Means to Recovery program is supposed to allocate...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Aid to poor countries has little effect on economic growth, and policies that rely on such claims should be reexamined, two former International Monetary Fund economists wrote in a paper released this month. "We find little evidence of a robust positive correlation between aid and growth," wrote Raghuram Rajan, who stepped down as IMF chief economist at the end of 2006, and Arvind Subramanian, who left the IMF this year, said. "We find little evidence that aid works better in better policy or institutional environments, or that certain kinds of aid work better than others," they added....

Afghan Government Provides Aid to Flood Victims Hundreds of pounds of food and water help 250 villagers. By U.S. Army Capt. Ashley Dellavalle Task Force Rugged Public Affairs Office SHARANA, Afghanistan, July 9, 2007 — Flood victims of Janan Kala Village received humanitarian aid from the Paktika Rural Development minister and members of the Sharana Provincial Reconstruction Team, July 3. The team brought bags of rice, milk, beans and flour, as well as tarps and blankets to the beleaguered Janan Kala villagers living in the Mota Khan district of Paktika province. The area was devastated by large amounts of...

http://70.47.124.114/node/751 Editorial: Mahmoud Abbas the Moderate? July 3, 2007 - 11:43am Extras By Don Winter Yesterday, I had the unexpected pleasure of watching the great Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian people bemoaning the violence that has been planned against his person and the de-facto violence that has been committed against his own goons by Hamas. Yet, during the speech he didn’t miss an opportunity to blame Israel as the reason for the violence. If some Jews on this globe decide to view Abbas as a benevolent moderate, they must be the same ones who believed that the Nazis...

http://www.jewishexponent.com/article/13376/ What They Are Saying What They Are SayingJune 28, 2007 - Jonathan S. Tobin, Executive Editor Like a Ship That Sinks? Investing in Fatah Calls to Mind the 'Titanic'Historian and Shalem Center fellow Michael Oren writes in The Wall Street Journal (www.opinionjournal.com) on June 20 that backing Fatah isn't the answer: "America and its Middle Eastern allies have every reason to panic. The green flags of Hamas are furling over Gaza, and the Fatah forces trained and financed by the United States have ignominiously fled. Fears are rife that Iranian-backed and Syrian-hosted terror will next achieve dominance over the...

Quick Takes: News From Israel You May Have Missed http://www.jewishpress.com/page.do/21905/Quick_Takes%3A_%3Ci%3ENews_From_Israel_You_May_Have_Missed%3C%2Fi%3E.html By: Aaron Klein Wednesday, June 20, 2007 More Aid To Abbas Even after the Hamas takeover of U.S.-backed Palestinian security compounds in Gaza and seizure of large quantities of American weapons, the Bush administration is contemplating sending more weapons to the Palestinians and is asking Israel to make security concessions to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Israeli and Palestinian diplomatic sources said. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced the U.S. will resume "full assistance to the Palestinian government," lifting an economic and political embargo against the Palestinian government enacted after...

MORE than $600 million of Australia's foreign aid over the past two years never went overseas but was swallowed up in the coffers of a small Federal Government agency in Pitt Street, Sydney. This is just one example of a shift in policy under which the Government dresses up as overseas development assistance money that never leaves Australia or is used to prop up its immigration policies. Help for refugees in Australia, payments to support the "Pacific solution", and a legal bill at the AWB inquiry are other forms of aid which make the nation appear more generous than it...

TRIPOLI, Lebanon - Three U.S. transport planes carrying military aid to Lebanon's army arrived in Beirut Saturday, part of an international airlift to support troops fighting Islamic militants in a Palestinian refugee camp. At the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp on the outskirts of the northern city of Tripoli, a four-day-old truce mostly held up despite sporadic gunfire. A few dozen more Palestinians left the camp. Four ambulances entered the camp bearing medicine on Saturday, and trucks from the international Red Cross brought water, bread and candles. Souad Ali, 70, one of the people who left, said she had cancer and...

BERLIN - The world's biggest industrial countries are failing to keep up with financial promises they made to Africa, rocker-activist Bono said Tuesday, calling a new progress report "a cold shower" for the Group of Eight. G-8 members in 2004-2006 contributed less than half the amount needed to make good on promises to double Africa aid to $50 billion by 2010, according to a report released by DATA — Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa — an advocacy group founded by Bono, the 47-year-old frontman for Irish band U2. "The G-8 are sleepwalking into a crisis of credibility. I know the DATA...

Louis Michel, the European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, is assessing the humanitarian situation in the Middle East, in the context of a five day visit to the region. In a speech on the humanitarian dimension of the Middle East Peace Process, delivered today at a conference in Jerusalem, the Commissioner underlined the need for all parties involved to respect the core element of international humanitarian law, the protection of civilians. In particular, he recalled the need to ensure access to the victims of conflict, and urged all parties to respect the humanitarian space. "I am more and more...

A suspicious package that sparked a bomb scare and evacuation of a New Zealand mail centre was later identified as a harmless sex aid, according to a newspaper report. An airport x-ray machine alerted staff about suspicious wiring in the parcel from China on Tuesday and it was placed in an explosives safe overnight. Emergency services were only notified the next morning, when they decided to evacuate the mail centre near Auckland airport. The New Zealand Herald reports the parcel was later identified as a sex aid. The incident has prompted a Customs investigation into why emergency services were not...

<p>WASHINGTON — Nearly $60 million in U.S. aid to help the Palestinian security forces has cleared congressional hurdles and is now ready to spend, the State Department said Tuesday.</p> <p>The $59 million package, reduced from $86 million over concerns that some money might go to radical groups, met with no objections from lawmakers and will soon be on its way to security apparatus controlled by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, spokesman Sean McCormack said.</p>

Congress Agrees to Train and Equip Abbas' Security Forces By Julie Stahl CNSNews.com Jerusalem Bureau Chief April 11, 2007 Jerusalem (CNSNews.com) - The U.S. Congress has cleared the way for millions of American taxpayer dollars to be spent on security forces loyal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas -- despite Abbas' involvement in the new Fatah-Hamas unity government. The U.S. and Israel support Abbas and his Fatah faction as "moderates" in the region, and they were backing him in his power struggle against Hamas until he joined forces with the terrorist organization. Now the U.S. Congress has agreed to beef...

BAGHDAD — Humanitarian assistance packages were delivered to displaced families at the Al-Salaam Neighborhood Advisory Council by Multi-National Division—Baghdad Soldiers March 29. Through coordination with the Neighborhood Advisory Council, U.S. Army Capt. Benjamin Morales, commander of Company B, 1st Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, and his paratroopers delivered boxes of food, oils and sanitation supplies. The NAC senior leadership insisted the exchange be made after the meeting, so residents of Al-Salaam could see the progress made through cooperation with Iraqi and Coalition security forces. “It will be good for the community to see...

JALALABAD AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, April 3, 2007 — The Laghman provincial government, Afghan National Security Forces and Coalition partners provided vital humanitarian assistance to flood victims in northeastern Afghanistan, March 31-April 1. The relief efforts came in the wake of severe flooding to the south of the provincial capital of Mehtar Lam. The flooding, which filled some areas with waist-high water, stranded around 200 Afghan civilians and left many without food, dry clothing or shelter. "My soldiers felt very good about the opportunity to deliver food, blankets and clothing in such a time of need.” Army Lt. Col. Steven Gilbert, the...

An Iraqi smiles after receiving a care package from Company B, 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, attached to the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, and elements from the Iraqi police in the Khadra neighborhood of Baghdad. These packages were provided throughout February and March to help Iraqis who have been unable to provide for themselves. U.S. Army photo by 1st Lt. Jason Collins, Co. B, 1st Bn., 5th Cav. Reg. TALÂ’AFAR --Iraqi security forces and TalÂ’Afar civic leaders provided aid and humanitarian assistance to TalÂ’Afar citizens displaced by the terrorist bombing Wednesday.The Iraqi military coordinated and flew a...

New treatments for malaria were developed in response to a resurgence of the disease in the 1990s. Since then, funding for these treatments has increased significantly through bilateral and multilateral aid, corporate and private assistance, and national government programs in malarial countries. Yet problems in the drug purchase and delivery processes and threats to future treatments persist. These problems are relatively easy to solve, but the international community seems reluctant to tackle them, which means the funding is not being used as effectively as it should. In the mid-1960s, U.S. troops confined the peripatetic Vietcong (and many Vietnamese civilians) to...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The United States said on Sunday its ban on direct aid to the Palestinian government would remain in place but it broke ranks with Israel by authorising contacts with some members of the new unity administration. The U.S. consulate in Jerusalem said Washington would continue to shun Hamas ministers in the power-sharing Palestinian cabinet but permit contacts with non-Hamas members on a case-by-case basis. The decision to allow some contacts marked a shift in U.S. policy and a split with Israel, which said it would boycott the new government in its entirety, including non-Hamas ministers. Israeli Prime...

U.S. Army Maj. Gordon Crawford of Headquarters Company, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, gets his ear irrigated by Army Sgt. Heather M. Cusson of C Company, 710th, Brigade Support Battalion. U.S. Army photo by Army Pfc. Melissa M. Escobar New Aid Station Increases Quality Care Facility offers X-rays, dental care, physical therapy. By Army Pfc. Melissa M. Escobar 22nd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, March 15, 2007 -- With the expansion of Jalalabad Airfield under way to support the growing numbers of troops coming into the expanding northeastern battle space of Task Force Spartan, the...