Iran
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta stressed Wednesday that if economic sanctions do not compel Iran to end its nuclear program, the United States would have to consider military options to destroy it. – Washington Post
[A]fter a flurry of high-level visits, including one by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta to Israel on Wednesday, a number of administration officials say they remain hopeful that Israel has no imminent plans to attack and may be willing to let the United States take the lead in any future military strike, which they say would not occur until next year at the earliest. – New York Times
Israeli leaders dismissed the chances that a U.S.-led sanctions campaign will convince Iran to give up its nuclear program, in a direct challenge to the Obama administration’s strategy, which has focused on diplomacy and sanctions rather than the threat of military action. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Both houses of Congress approved legislation on Wednesday that would significantly tighten sanctions against Iran’s energy, shipping and insurance sectors. – The Hill’s Floor Action Blog
While it appears unlikely that Iran is ready to risk an almost certain military backlash by trying to close Hormuz, which is jointly controlled with Oman, the latest flurry from Tehran shows that Iranian authorities see the strait as perhaps their most valuable asset in brinksmanship over tightening sanctions and efforts to resume talks with world powers over its suspected nuclear-weapons program. – Associated Press
Syria
The battle for the Syrian city of Aleppo intensified on Wednesday as United Nations observers there reported that Syrian jets had fired rockets into contested neighborhoods and that rebels had commandeered tanks and other heavy weapons. – New York Times
The Syrian government and opposition fighters alike have conducted summary executions, witnesses said Wednesday, as continuing fighting in Aleppo compounded the humanitarian crisis in Syria’s most-populous city. – Wall Street Journal
Failed efforts to curtail escalating violence in Syria led policy experts to unanimously call for direct U.S. assistance to rebel forces during a hearing at the Capitol on Wednesday, pushing for a new intelligence operation to identify legitimate opposition leaders and supply them with military support. – Washington Times
Some Syrian Kurds have in recent weeks taken dramatic steps towards autonomous rule, fueling Ankara’s existential fear: that its No. 1 enemy, the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, could boost its influence there and even use the region as a base to attack Turkey. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s warning to his army to continue the fight against rebels in Syria’s largest city are signs of desperation as his regime is losing support among the city’s elite who’ve defected to the opposition, U.S. officials, Syrian activists and analysts say. – Washington Examiner
This fight has been defined in Syria by endless images shot by mobile phone and volunteer videographers who know the importance of winning the media war. – Christian Science Monitor
If President Bashar al-Assad’s regime is defeated in Syria’s war, where will it go? One possibility is to the mountains — to create a ministate of its own. RFE/RL correspondent Charles Recknagel reports. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Syrian rebels turned a captured tank against government forces on Thursday and bombarded a military airbase, a welcome boost to their firepower in the week-long battle for the country’s commercial capital Aleppo. – Reuters
France said as it took over the month-long rotating chair of the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday it will shortly outline its plans for a new push by the body to solve a diplomatic impasse over the worsening conflict. – Reuters
Black belt Russian President Vladimir Putin will lock horns with British leader David Cameron over Syria and human rights during a day of judo diplomacy at the Olympics on Thursday at a time when relations between their two nations are strained. – Reuters
Turkey’s army staged tank exercises near the Syrian border on Wednesday, Turkish officials said, in a move highlighting Ankara’s unease about security on the frontier. – Reuters
The presence of U.N. observers in Syria, who have drastically curtailed their monitoring activities due to the escalating violence, continues to have a positive impact on humanitarian aid delivery, the EU crisis chief said on Wednesday. – Reuters
President Barack Obama has signed a secret order authorizing U.S. support for rebels seeking to depose Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his government, sources familiar with the matter said. – Reuters
The United States has set aside $25 million for aid to Syrian rebels, although the assistance remains limited to non-lethal supplies such as communications gear, the State Department said on Wednesday. – Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: The Obama administration very publicly signaled a shift in its approach to dealing with the Syria crisis after negotiations broke down at the United Nations in mid-July. But the actual details of that shift are still being debated internally and the administration’s rhetoric has gotten out ahead of its policy, according to officials, experts, and lawmakers. – The Cable
Editorial: How much of this Administration’s foreign policy calculations are a matter of strategy, and how much of election-year convenience, remains an open question. How Mr. Obama acts over Aleppo will provide an answer. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Egypt
Egyptian state media on Wednesday disclosed the broad outlines of the country’s new cabinet, selections that suggested President Mohamed Morsi was either unwilling or unable to assemble the kind of dynamic, politically diverse governing team many voters had hoped for. – Washington Post
Egyptian former appeal court judge Ahmed Mekky said he has accepted the post of justice minister in the government of newly elected President Mohamed Mursi, and is to be sworn in with other cabinet officers on Thursday. – Reuters
[T]he new [Egyptian] administration’s unclear powers and the scale of the challenges it must face dispel any optimism that Thursday’s cabinet unveiling will begin a new era of stability. – Reuters
Rebecca Friedman writes: Although critics everywhere are fond of pointing out the many unappealing facets of U.S. democracy, the repeated and peaceful transfer of power between political rivals is among the most admirable events in American politics. This strong tradition offers invaluable lessons to the new democracies born of the “Arab Spring.” – Los Angeles Times
Libya
A strong explosion rocked the Libyan military intelligence offices in the eastern city of Benghazi on Wednesday but caused no casualties, the latest of several violent incidents to shock the birthplace of last year’s revolt. – Reuters
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates has detained nine Islamists in the past two days, local activists said on Wednesday, and human rights groups have urged condemnation of the Gulf Arab country’s “draconian” treatment of the opposition. – Reuters
Iraq
The U.S. made its mark on Iraq with a military intervention. Iran has reshaped the country through shared religious beliefs. Now, as American influence wanes here, Turkey, a neighbor to the north, is wielding economic clout to become a major player in Iraq. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
The Obama administration is worried about a threat from the Iraqi government to forcibly shut down a camp for Iranian dissidents north of Baghdad. – Washington Times
Militants killed 325 Iraqis in July making it the bloodiest month in two years, Health Ministry figures showed, as the country battles insurgents after the U.S. withdrawal. – Reuters
Israel
The Hamas Islamist group in charge of the Gaza Strip on Wednesday denounced a Palestinian official’s visit to the site of a Nazi death camp in Poland, and called the Holocaust in which 6 million European Jews perished an “alleged tragedy.” – Reuters
Afghanistan
Afghanistan’s powerful finance minister came under scrutiny on Wednesday when an Afghan television network broadcast copies of two of his bank account statements that showed sizable payments from businesses and individuals and transfers of money from those accounts to bank accounts in Canada. – New York Times
A dispute over the drug trade lies at the heart of a security crisis that has gripped this Central Asian nation, as Afghanistan’s opium industry sows instability across the region. – Wall Street Journal
A bipartisan group of senators is looking to ensure that U.S.-Afghan relations do not fall by the wayside once thousands of U.S. troops begin to rotate out of the country over the next two years. – DEFCON Hill
Afghanistan’s intelligence agency arrested a prominent Afghan journalist and opposition political adviser this weekend, raising questions about media and political freedom in the country ahead of expected elections and the NATO draw down in 2014. – Christian Science Monitor
Afghanistan’s top anti-corruption chief said on Thursday the finance minister’s business affairs will be investigated after accusations aired on Afghan television that he stashed away more than $1 million in overseas banks. – Reuters
Afghan security forces killed at least eight insurgents during an early morning raid in Kabul on Thursday, with authorities saying they had thwarted a Taliban mass attack on the capital after a seven-hour gun battle. – Reuters
NATO forces should stay in Afghanistan until they have finished their job to ensure stability, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday, criticizing the planned withdrawal of most combat troops by 2014. – Reuters
Pakistan
Jirgas are a cornerstone of tribal societies in Pakistan, from the badlands in the country’s northwest to the plains of Punjab and Sindh provinces. They decide issues such as property disputes and squabbles over debt, and in regions where conventional courts are not trusted, locals embrace them as a swift means of obtaining justice. – Los Angeles Times
China
The Chinese dissident who sparked a diplomatic crisis with China this spring urged Congress on Wednesday to continue holding the communist leadership’s feet to the fire on human rights. – The Hill’s Global Affairs
In the end, a typhoon achieved what diplomacy couldn’t: it allowed exiled Tiananmen Square dissident Wang Dan to visit China for the first time in well over a decade. – WSJ’s China Real Time Report
The Chinese Communist party has banned students and officials in Xinjiang from religious activities during Ramadan, in an illustration of the policies that continue to stir resentment among the restive north-western region’s indigenous population. – Financial Times
Courts in China’s restive far western region of Xinjiang have jailed 20 people for up to 15 years on charges of terrorism and separatism, state media said on Thursday, as the heavily Muslim area marks the fasting month of Ramadan. – Reuters
China has blasted a U.S. State Department report that criticized its controls on religion, saying on Thursday that the document was prejudiced and an attempt to meddle in domestic affairs. – Reuters
Miles Yu reports: Wang Pengfei, the right-hand man of Wang Lijun, the former Chongqing police chief whose attempted defection to the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu in February triggered China’s biggest political storm in several decades, was officially charged recently with dereliction of duty and corruption. – Washington Times’ Inside China
Zhang Weiying writes: There’s no good reason for Beijing’s paucity of bold ideas. In the first two decades of China’s transition, such ideas trumped vested interests, which is why reform overcame interest groups’ opposition. However, in the past decade, it is the vested interests that have dominated the ideas. Various anti-reform policies have been implemented for protecting and strengthening interest groups. China’s future will depend upon whether free-market ideas again win out. – Wall Street Journal Asia (subscription required)
East Asia
Taiwan’s top opposition leader pledged to reassess his party’s traditionally combative stance toward Beijing, but said he hopes mainland officials will make changes, suggesting the party will continue to grapple with how to treat the island’s growing economic ties with China. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
“How can any man possibly lift 168 kilograms? I believe the great Kim Jong Il looked over me,” North Korean Olympian Om Yun Chol told the Olympic News Service on July 29 after lifting three times his weight in the men’s 56-kilogram class competition at the London Olympics. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Southeast Asia
The World Bank said it was making plans to resume aid to Myanmar after cutting off new lending to the country some 25 years ago, marking the latest major milestone in Myanmar’s rapprochement with the Western world. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
In the 1990s, Prabowo Subianto was a feared military commander, the son-in-law of Indonesian strongman Suharto and the alleged force behind the ruler’s heavy handed crackdowns against democracy activists. Today, he is the front-runner to become Indonesia’s next president. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Analysis: First came the diplomatic offensive, then the flexing of military muscle. Now, China is opening a third front to assert its claims in the South China Sea – moving ahead with its first major tender of oil and gas blocks in disputed parts of its waters. – Reuters
Russia
Amid signs of a broadening campaign to prosecute opposition politicians and activists in Russia this summer, the country’s Supreme Court issued a rare ruling in favor of the most prominent political prisoner, the jailed oil tycoon Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky. – New York Times
Defense lawyers accused Russian authorities on Wednesday of depriving three members of a women’s punk band of sleep and food during a trial that critics say is part of a campaign to discredit President Vladimir Putin’s opponents. – Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: The House will not take up a trade bill with Russia or a bill to sanction Russian human rights offenders before leaving for August recess and probably not until after the November elections, key lawmakers say. – The Cable
Editorial: The United States cannot by itself change Russia, but [the Magnitsky Act] would show that corruption and authoritarianism have consequences beyond Russia’s borders. As for Mr. Navalny, a leader more concerned with his nation’s welfare than his cronies’ wealth should award him a medal, not a prison sentence. – Washington Post
Europe
Bulgarian authorities released a computer-generated image of a man they said was the suicide bomber who killed five Israeli tourists and a local bus driver in the Balkan nation and said that two weeks after the blast they are still unsure of his identity. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Comedic touches aside, the security breach has become a major embarrassment for President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, who has channeled his country’s meager resources into maintaining a calcified police state. – New York Times
United States of America
[Dan] Senor has become one of the key people shaping Mr. Romney’s increasingly hawkish views on the Middle East. – New York Times
F.B.I. agents on a hunt for leakers have interviewed current and former high-level government officials from multiple agencies in recent weeks, casting a distinct chill over press coverage of national security issues as agencies decline routine interview requests and refuse to provide background briefings. – New York Times
Republican Sens. John McCain (Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) blasted the Justice Department on Wednesday, accusing it of not properly investigating national security leaks they say originated in the White House. – The Hill’s Floor Action Blog
Elliott Abrams writes: In fact what [Romney] said was clear enough, and ought not to have been controversial. His purported “gaffe” actually demonstrates two things. The first is that he has actually read and thought about these issues: What causes development, why are some nations more advanced than others, and what explains prosperity?…The second thing that was demonstrated is the ignorance and irresponsibility of the press, which immediately called Romney’s discussion a “gaffe.” – National Review Online
Peter Feaver writes: The negative spin from the trip is mostly artificially media-driven, and the press will quickly move on to some other controversy, faux or genuine. However, some voters care very deeply about Israel and Poland, and Romney’s trip likely resonated with them more positively than the Obama campaign would like to admit. They may be the only ones who remember details from the trip and, if so, the details they remember may reinforce their inclination to cast a ballot for Romney. – Shadow Government
Latin America
[T]he speeches President Juan Manuel Santos has been giving in several cities to mark his two years in office are also an exercise in damage control, analysts say, to restore his plummeting popularity and counter sniping by his still-popular predecessor, ex-President Alvaro Uribe. – Los Angeles Times
The top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is suggesting trade preferences to Ecuador should not be renewed, prompting strong push-back from the Ecuadorian embassy. – The Hill’s Global Affairs
Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles said on Wednesday he would scrap preferential oil deals with foreign allies if he defeats socialist President Hugo Chavez in an October election to lead the South American OPEC member – Reuters
West Africa
Delivering an implied warning about the dark side of China’s global search for energy and resources, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton urged African nations Wednesday to be careful about making foreign business deals that take advantage of the continent’s vast natural resources but offer little besides money in return. – Washington Post
East Africa
The United States wants to improve ties with Sudan after more than a decade of strained relations, if the African nation ruled by an autocratic president under indictment for war crimes adopts democracy and respects human rights, a senior Obama administration official said on Wednesday. – Washington Times
Somali leaders voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to adopt a new constitution that contains more individual rights and sets the country on a course for a more powerful and representative government. – Associated Press
Sudanese police used tear gas and batons on Wednesday to stop protests in Darfur’s biggest city Nyala against the government and its austerity program, a day after eight protesters were killed in the worst violence since June, witnesses said. – Reuters
Southern Africa
The seeming double standard of a life of luxury for the king, along with fat paychecks for his top officials, while the middle class and the poor make do with less, has unleashed a torrent of rage – New York Times
Angola’s ruling MPLA is using state media to its own advantage and restricting freedom of expression in the campaign for a general election on August 31, the main opposition party and a global rights group said on Wednesday. – Reuters
