President Obama on Wednesday unveiled a policy directive that defines the pursuit of global development as a “core pillar of American power.” Under the directive, development and foreign assistance are for the first time elevated to the level of key factors in US national security and economic policy.

European approval remains high at 78 percent, but that’s down from 83 percent last year — a reflection, the report suggests, of discontent with Washington’s resolve to continue the fight in Afghanistan...

The ninth anniversary of September 11 is being overshadowed by the news of Pastor Terry Jones and his now-suspended plan to burn copies of the Koran at the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida. Even if the bonfire does not take place, the news of it is tragic for a number of reasons.

Anniversaries of tragedies offer an occasion to reflect as well as to mourn, and the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks should lead us to think on our triumphs and shortfalls in the struggle against al Qaeda during this period.

Muslims are dangerous. That's the bipartisan message of the day. That Muslims around the world can be provoked into violent range by the burning of the Koran is a belief unquestioned by both liberals and conservatives.

We have entered a new period of US policy toward Israel. Basically, Barack Obama needs Israel, requires its cooperation, and is eager to get along with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. How long this will last is unclear but it should characterize, barring unforeseen events, the next year at least.

After five years of waiting, Omar Khadr was finally slated to go on trial in Guantánamo Bay this summer -- and then suddenly, the gears ground to a halt. The problem was not that Khadr was just 15 years old when, according to the charges, he threw a grenade in a 2002 firefight in Afghanistan and killed a U.S. soldier.

The Middle East peace process has always been a fantasyland – a garden of illusions sustained by politicians and myths that by and large the American media have been too timid, too uninformed or too biased to question.