White House eagerly highlights the departure of U.S. combat troops from Iraq

WASHINGTON As the White House eagerly highlights the departure of U.S. combat troops from Iraq, the small army of American diplomats left behind is embarking on a long and perilous path to keeping the volatile country from slipping back to the brink of civil war.Among the challenges are helping Iraq’s deeply divided politicians form a new government; refereeing long-simmering Arab-Kurd territorial disputes; advising on attracting foreign investment; pushing for improved government services; and fleshing out a blueprint for future U.S.-Iraqi relations.

President Barack Obama also is banking on the diplomats – about 300, protected by as many as 7,000 private security contractors – to assume the duties of the U.S. military. That includes protecting U.S. personnel from attack and managing the training of Iraqi police, starting in October 2011.The Iraq insurgency, which began shortly after U.S. troops toppled Baghdad in April 2003, is why the U.S. only now is entering the post-combat phase of stabilizing Iraq. Originally, the U.S. thought Iraq would be peaceful within months of the invasion, allowing for a short-lived occupation and the relatively quick emergence of a viable government.Although the insurgency has been reduced to what one analyst terms a “lethal nuisance,” it will complicate the State Department’s mission and test Iraq’s security forces.Much is at stake as the department negotiates with the Pentagon over acquiring enough Black Hawk helicopters, bomb-resistant vehicles and other heavy gear to outfit its own protection force in Iraq.

“Regardless of the reasons for going to war, everything now depends on a successful transition to an effective and unified Iraqi government and Iraqi security forces that can bring both security and stability to the average Iraqi,” says Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. In his view that transition will take five years to 10 years.

The question is whether progress will be interrupted or reversed once American combat power is gone.The U.S. will have 50,000 troops in Iraq when the combat mission officially ends Aug. 31; they are scheduled to draw down to zero by Dec. 31, 2011. Until then, they will advise and train Iraqi security forces, and provide security and transport for the diplomats.

Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said in an interview to be broadcast Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that he believes Iraq’s security forces have matured to the point where they will be ready to shoulder enough of the burden to permit the remaining 50,000 U.S. soldiers to go home at the end of next year.”My assessment today is they – they will be,” Odierno said, according to an excerpt of the interview released Saturday by CNN.”We continue to see development in planning, in their ability to conduct operations,” he added. “We continue to see political development, economic development and all of these combined together will start to create an atmosphere that creates better security.”

Once the U.S. troops are gone, the State Department will be responsible for the security of its personnel.Obama administration officials say the diplomats are well prepared for what the State Department expects to be a three to five-year transition to a “normal” U.S.-Iraqi relationship.”We are fully prepared to assume our responsibilities as we move through this transition from a military-led effort to a civilian-led effort,” department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

Iraq watchers have their doubts.Kenneth M. Pollack, a frequent visitor to Iraq as director of Middle East policy at the Brookings Institution, says the administration is in danger of underestimating the difficulty it faces.”One of the biggest mistakes that most Americans are making is assuming that Iraq can’t slide back into civil war. It can,” Pollack said. “This thing can go bad very easily.”Pollack, who does not consider himself a pessimist on Iraq, said the historical record on civil wars around the globe shows that about half repeat themselves.

“So it is a huge mistake to assume it can’t” happen in Iraq, whose civil strife in 2005-07 was so violent that many Americans assumed the war was lost and believed U.S. troops should give up and go home.Pollack considers the State Department ill-suited for its new tasks – starting with the police training mission and including the complex developmental problems such as improving Iraq’s water system.”What the State Department is being asked to do isn’t in their DNA,” Pollack said.The department has been strongly criticized for its past work in Iraqi police training. An October 2007 report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, Stuart W. Bowen Jr., said the State Department had so badly managed a February 2004 contract for Iraqi police training that the department could not tell what it got for the $1.2 billion it spent.

In May 2004 President George W. Bush put the Pentagon in charge of all security force development.The newly departed U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, Christopher Hill, says he sees brighter days ahead for Iraq, but he also laments “woefully low” supplies of electricity and deeply ingrained tensions among the three main competitors for political power: Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds.”There is a mountain of mistrust,” Hill said.The diplomats’ postwar task would have been much easier if, as the administration once hoped, Iraq had formed a new government by now, nearly six months after its March 7 national elections.Instead, the political stalemate   with no end in sight – has created another hurdle to the central U.S. goal in Iraq: translating hard-fought security gains into stability.Still, there is optimism in some quarters.

“While there are no guarantees, the prospects for Iraq’s security and stability beyond 2011 look as good or better than they have at any time in the recent past,” John Negroponte, who was U.S. ambassador to Iraq in 2004-05, wrote Thursday in a ForeignPolicy.com blog.Another complication is the shake up of key U.S. players in Baghdad.Odierno leaves Baghdad on Sept. 1 for a new assignment in the U.S., and Gen. David Petraeus, who was Odierno’s boss as head of Central Command, switched last month to take command in Afghanistan. Hill was replaced in Baghdad this past week by James Jeffrey, who was the U.S. ambassador to Turkey.(AP)

Hillary Rodham Clinton that the Obama administration will sue the state over its new immigration law

PHOENIX Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said Thursday she’s angry over comments by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton that the Obama administration will sue the state over its new immigration law.In a June 8 media interview in Ecuador that began circulating Thursday in the U.S., Clinton said President Barack Obama thinks the federal government should determine immigration policy and that the Justice Department “will be bringing a lawsuit against the act.”Justice spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler on Thursday declined to say whether the department would sue and that “the department continues to review the law.”

The department has been looking at the law for weeks for possible civil rights violations, with an eye toward a possible court challenge.It’s unclear why Clinton made the comment since it’s not her area. She couldn’t be reached Thursday for comment.State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Obama and Clinton have both made it clear that the administration opposes the law.

“I will defer to the Justice Department on the legal steps that are available and where they stand on the review of the law,” Crowley said. “The secretary believes that comprehensive immigration reform is a better course of action.”Brewer, a Republican, said in a statement that “this is no way to treat the people of Arizona.”

“To learn of this lawsuit through an Ecuadorean interview with the secretary of state is just outrageous,” she said. “If our own government intends to sue our state to prevent illegal immigration enforcement, the least it can do is inform us before it informs the citizens of another nation.”Brewer spokesman Paul Senseman said the governor was “outraged” and that Clinton’s comments make it appear that the Justice Department has decided to file suit.

“But she’s confident that in the end, the state of Arizona, the citizens, will prevail,” he said.On April 23, Brewer signed what is considered the toughest legislation in the nation targeting illegal immigrants. It is set to go into effect July 29 pending multiple legal challenges and the Justice Department’s review.

The law requires police investigating another incident or crime to ask people about their immigration status if there’s a “reasonable suspicion” they’re in the country illegally. It also makes being in Arizona illegally a misdemeanor, and it prohibits seeking day-labor work along the state’s streets.The law’s stated intention is to drive illegal immigrants out of Arizona and discourage them from coming in the first place. It has outraged civil rights groups, drawn criticism from Obama and led to marches and protests organized by people on both sides of the issue.

The law’s backers say Congress isn’t doing anything meaningful about illegal immigration, so it’s the state’s duty to address the issue. Critics say it will lead to racial profiling and discrimination against Hispanics, and damage ties between police and minority communities.Brewer met with Obama in the Oval Office about the law on June 3, telling him: “We want our border secured.” Obama reiterated his objections to the law. Neither side appeared to give ground although both talked about seeking a bipartisan solution.

Other Arizona politicians, political candidates and activist groups were quick to weigh in on Clinton’s remarks. U.S. Senate candidate J.D. Hayworth, who is challenging Sen. John McCain, called them appalling; attorney general candidates Tom Horne and Andrew Thomas also denounced them.Joanne Lin, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, urged the administration to take swift action against the law.(AP)

Dozens of Palestinian stone-throwers clashed with Israeli police in East Jerusalem on Tuesday on a "day of rage" Hamas Islamists declared in protest at Israel's consecration of an ancient synagogue in the city

Dozens of Palestinian stone-throwers clashed with Israeli police in East Jerusalem on Tuesday on a “day of rage” Hamas Islamists declared in protest at Israel’s consecration of an ancient synagogue in the city.The violence presented another challenge to U.S. efforts to revive Middle East peace talks after Israel angered Palestinians and touched off a dispute with Washington by announcing plans last week to build 1,600 homes for Jews near East Jerusalem.Palestinians hurled stones at police and burned tires and trash bins in several areas of East Jerusalem, which Israel captured along with the West Bank in a 1967 war.

Police responded with tear gas and fired rubber bullets, witnesses said. Some 40 Palestinians were treated at East Jerusalem hospitals for minor injuries, medical officials said.A police spokesman said some 3,000 officers were put on high alert after Hamas, an Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip and wields influence in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, called for anti-Israeli protests.”We call on the Palestinian people to regard Tuesday as a day of rage against the occupation’s (Israel’s) procedures in Jerusalem against al-Aqsa mosque,” Hamas said in a statement.

Hamas and Palestinian officials affiliated with its rival Fatah movement have said the restoration work at the ancient Hurva synagogue in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem’s walled Old City endangered al-Aqsa, situated some 400 meters (yards) away.Israel has denied the allegation.An inauguration ceremony was held Monday at the synagogue, which was blown up by Jordanian forces when they overran the Jewish Quarter in the 1948 Middle East war. Israel captured the area 19 years later.

Sporadic violence has erupted in recent weeks in Jerusalem after Israel decided to include West Bank religious sites in a Jewish national heritage plan stoked Palestinian anger.Citing biblical and historical links, Israel sees all of Jerusalem as its capital, a claim not recognized internationally. The Palestinians want East Jerusalem to be the capital of a future state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In Washington Monday, a State Department spokesman voiced concern about the tensions over the rededication of the synagogue and appealed for calm.”We’re deeply disturbed by statements made by several Palestinian officials mischaracterizing the event in question, which can only serve to heighten the tensions that we see,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

A crisis in U.S.-Israeli relations over the settlement housing project, opposed by Washington, deepened Monday after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s said he would not curb construction of homes for Jews in and around Jerusalem.After Netanyahu’s defiant comments, U.S. officials said U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who had planned to leave Washington Monday for discussions with Israeli and Palestinian leaders on getting indirect negotiations under way, had put off his departure.Announcement of the housing plan during a visit last week by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden embarrassed the White House and Palestinians, who had just agreed to begin indirect talks with Israel, demanded the project be scrapped first.U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in unusually blunt remarks, called Israel’s actions an insult.Clinton telephoned Netanyahu Friday to convey unspecified demands about the housing project as well as about demonstrating commitment to the U.S.-mediated peace talks, the State Department said, without elaborating.U.S. officials said they were still waiting for Israel’s formal response. Israeli media reports said Clinton had asked for the settlement plan to be scrapped and for Israel to agree to discuss core statehood issues with the Palestinians.(Reuters)