Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has turned the heat up on his Arab neighbors after last month’s double bombings at the foreign and finance ministries, which killed about 100 people. Maliki and his government have repeatedly accused Syria of providing shelter to those behind the blasts. Syria has denied the charge, and some Iraqi politicians have raised serious questions about whether Syria or the Baath Party was involved.

Today, Maliki once more slammed his neighbors. “We will continue looking [for a way] to close all the gaps and the doors from which the killers can breathe again. We censure the others from our brothers, friends and the neighborly countries,” Maliki said on a visit to the southern city of Karbala. “They used to say that they are with us and they did stand with us in certain situations, but how can we describe the practice of embracing the killers. To where will they be exported [next] time, to Iraq again or to a different country? Can the evil be contained to one specific country?” 

Maliki has asked the U.N. Security Council to establish a formal investigation into the bombings. He has also accused Syrian intelligence agents of sitting in on a meeting in July of Baath Party officials and Islamic militants. The government sees it as the latest episode in which Syria has allegedly been complicit in the activities of anti-Iraq militants. Iraqi security officials confirmed today that they had sent additional security forces to reinforce the vast Syria-Iraq border. 

Since the bombings, the government has revived the practice of showing taped confessions from alleged militants. Two confessions have been shown on state television and a third was aired at a news conference. The first confession was of an Iraqi arrested for the Aug. 19 attack, who blamed Baath Party leaders in Syria for planning the attack. The other confessions have shown foreign fighters recounting their alleged travels through Syria. There is no way to verify whether the taped remarks were genuine or staged.  But they mark a concerted effort to blame Syria in part for recent security breaches.

On Wednesday and Thursday, the state channel broadcast the purported confessions of an alleged fighter from Yemen named Mohammed Oud.

The following are excerpts from the broadcast:

Seven years after being abducted from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, by the CIA and shipped to the U.S. air base in Bagram, Afghanistan, Haji Pacha Wazir was hoping he would finally be free. 

The Afghan government had cleared him for release, and a recent court ruling allowed him to petition his case in a U.S. federal court.

But Wazir's petition was dismissed based on "lack of jurisdiction," despite the fact that Wazir, an Afghan national, has been in the sole custody of the U.S. government since his arrest, according to the nonprofit organization representing him.

Yemen kept up its military offensive today  against Shiite rebels in the northwest as troops, artillery and aircraft attacked a militant stronghold near the border with Saudi Arabia.

The mountainous Saada province shook with gunfire and explosions for a second day. The Sunni-led government, which claims the rebels have killed more than 330 people over the last year, said that militants had taken over schools and seized teachers. The Associated Press quoted a health official as saying that 12 people had been killed in the fighting.

The assault against the rebels comes as this poor nation has grown unstable with dangers on other fronts: a separatist insurgency in the south and an infusion of Al Qaeda fighters planning attacks across the Middle East. Such a scenario is an increasing concern for neighboring Saudi Arabia and its oilfields. 

Ten men allegedly linked to Al Qaeda have been arrested and accused of using a billboard advertising agency as cover to spy on United Nations peacekeeping troops and the Lebanese army in preparation for an attack, Lebanese media reported today.

A statement released Tuesday by the Lebanese army said the men came from a number of Arab countries, while an unnamed security source told Reuters that the ringleader was a Syrian national who was discovered with six fake passports.

The men are also accused of providing assistance in the form of fake documents and transportation to members of Fatah al Islam, the Islamist insurgent group that battled the Lebanese army in and around the Nahr al Bared Palestinian refugee camp for three months in 2007, resulting in casualties on both sides and the death and displacement of hundreds of Palestinian civilians.

Amnesty International has charged that Saudi Arabia “has launched a sustained assault on human rights under the facade of countering terrorism.”

In a new report, the human-rights group claims the kingdom’s campaign to crush Al Qaeda and other terrorist elements has led to severe abuses in civil liberties. Statistics released by the Saudi Ministry of Justice show that 330 suspects have been tried for terror-related offenses, receiving penalties ranging from fines to death.

 Amnesty states that Saudi authorities are holding 3,100 people in detention and that “neither the names of those tried nor the details of the charges against them were disclosed, maintaining the extreme secrecy of the trial process.”

When asked about the Amnesty report, a Saudi Interior Ministry official, Abdulrahman Alhadlaq, told the Associated Press: "These are claims that have to be proven."

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Why do young Saudi men keep popping up to do bad things in dangerous places?

Saudi militants are instigating terror and death from Yemen to Europe and from Iraq to Pakistan. The Saudi government has been attempting to calm jihadist passions by enrolling extremists in reform schools and silencing radical preachers. There has been progress, but the kingdom’s ultra-conservative brand of Wahhabi Islam keeps churning out those with masked faces and crisscrossed bandoliers.

Tariq Alhomayed, editor of the English-language daily Asharq Al-Awsat, explored the problem Saudi Arabia and the Arab world face in an opinion piece headlined: "Saudi Youth and Terrorism: When Will It End?"

“The ideological war in Saudi Arabia [against extremism] continues to be fought but below the expected level, even though the Saudi media is fiercely in opposition to extremism and the extremists, and there is a social aversion to Al Qaeda, the takfiris, and those who support them,” writes Alhomayed. “But despite this we continue to witness the destruction of our youth.”

He adds: “We should blame ourselves.”

Read the rest of the story here.

-- Jeffrey Fleishman in Cairo

Photo: The aftermath of a suicide bombing in Baghdad. Credit: Reuters

Alleged spy Roxana Saberi has been released from an Iranian prison, but intrigue continues to plague the region with Syria confirming the arrest of two British citizens on terrorism charges and Lebanon reeling from the discovery of an Israeli spy network.

The 36-year old mother of four, Maryam Kallis, and 28-year-old Yasser Ahmed were arrested eight weeks ago by Syrian plainclothes intelligence officers, according to their families. On Sunday, the Syrian embassy in London confirmed the arrests (in Arabic), accusing the two Britons of working with a terrorist group connected to Al Qaeda.

“The Syrian Authorities arrested Mrs. Kallis and Mr. Ahmed in Damascus on the 17 March 2009, and the interrogations indicated that both Ms. Kallis and Mr. Ahmed are working for a terrorist network related to the Al Qaeda organization and other members of the network were also arrested by the Syrian Authorities,” read a statement released by the embassy.

An Al Qaeda-linked group was allegedly responsible for a violent attack on a Christian choir group in the Jordanian capital of Amman last July, authorities revealed Tuesday.

The incident took place in a downtown Amman neighborhood. A gunman opened fire on a bus full of tourists, wounding six, including four Lebanese musicians from a university choir.

After months of investigation, a group of 12 Jordanians of Palestinian origin were put on trial Tuesday on charges that included July's shooting.

Their indictment alleged that the group's mastermind, Shaker Khatib, was trained by a Lebanese offshoot of Osama bin Laden's organization.

Egyptian movie star Adel Imam has sparked a fuss by criticizing Hamas and holding it partially responsible for the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip. His criticism of the Palestinian militant group has spurred radical Islamist leaders to issue a fatwa calling for Imam's execution.

Earlier this month, Imam told the independent daily al-Masry al-Youm:

“The Egyptian leadership warned the Palestinian leaders against Israeli attacks; however, they did not pay attention and fought a disproportionate war. It is better that Hamas stops what it is doing because Israel will not respond with flowers.”

Imam also criticized pro-Hamas demonstrations that erupted around the Arab world blaming Egypt for the blockade suffered by Hamas.