FOREIGN AFFAIRS - page 18

The State Department confirmed Tuesday that Secretary of State John Kerry and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke after US diplomats objected to a multilateral deal that would have called for imminent discussions on working toward a nuclear weapons-free Middle East. Department press office director Jeff Rathke said that the conversation took place after Associated Press reporter Matt Lee asked him to verify that Netanyahu called Kerry “to express Israel’s thanks for sticking to the US commitment” on the stalled Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review deal.… Keep Reading

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, discussing the Holocaust from the Senate floor, said that there “are still glimpses of that same hate” in a secular and peaceful movement protesting Israel’s occupation of Palestine at academic institutions throughout the US and around the world. Reid said Wednesday morning that “in the midst of campus debates about boycotts of Israel, Jewish students have felt increasingly intimidated,” citing a controversial New York Times report published Sunday. He brought up the genocide against Jews in Europe in a speech… Keep Reading

The Obama administration said it opposes a Canadian judge’s decision to allow the conditional release of an ex-Guantanamo prisoner captured in Afghanistan as a teenager by American troops. State Department Spokesperson Jeff Rathke said that the US supports the Canadian government’s move to contest the ruling that saw Omar Khadr, now 28 years-old, conditionally freed from prison while waiting to challenge his prior conviction and guilty plea in an American appeals court. “The United States supports Canada in its efforts to combat terrorism,” Rathke initially… Keep Reading

In an exchange with reporters on Thursday, Defense Secretary Ash Carter conceded that the US government’s plans in Syria open the door to more US military involvement in the country’s long ongoing civil war. “Of course we would have some responsibility to protect forces,” the defense chief said, referring to rebel militants backed by Washington that should be deployed to Syria in “a few months.” Carter also noted that while the Pentagon expects the vetted-rebels to primarily engage with Islamic State forces in Syria, he… Keep Reading

Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter warned that a plan for humanitarian intervention four senators want the president to consider would amount to a “major combat mission.” Carter told Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) on Wednesday at a senate appropriations subcommittee hearing that the creation of safe zones within Syria is something that would be “contested” by both the Syrian government and fundamentalist insurgent groups like the Islamic State (ISIL). “We would need to fight to create such a space and then fight to keep such a… Keep Reading

The State Department on Monday acknowledged it is aware of reports that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton may have failed to fully abide by the terms of an ethics agreement she made before joining the Obama administration, but declined to characterize the infringement as a “problem.” Acting deputy spokesperson Jeff Rathke, when asked by reporters at a daily press briefing, said that the department was content to endorse Clinton’s self-regulatory approach to the revelations. “We welcome the new commitments from the Clinton Foundation to… Keep Reading

The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction was told it must reduce its staff in Kabul by 40%–an order that came directly from the State Department, the subject of numerous critical reports published by SIGAR. Appearing on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal on Monday morning, the public investigatory body’s chief, John Sopko, said the staffing order threatens his office’s ability to conduct independent oversight. “For the State Department, who we investigate, to tell me how many people we should have in Afghanistan is in direct contradiction to… Keep Reading