Thursday, June 18, 2009

06/18/09

* Sheikh Salah: Netanyahu wants to rebuild Temple Sheikh Raed Salah, leader of the Islamic Movement's northern branch, spoke Wednesday afternoon in front of Muslim students at Haifa University.

* World Bank raises China forecast The World Bank has raised its forecast for growth in China this year from 6.5% to 7.2% amid signs that the economy is doing better than expected.

* Israel says ElBaradei biased on Syria Israel accused the head of the UN atomic agency of political bias in its probe of Syria Thursday, provoking a bitter response by the agency chief.

* Irish to be offered Lisbon pledge EU leaders meeting in Brussels are once more grappling with the Lisbon Treaty, hoping to agree on ways to help it pass a second Irish referendum.

* Dutch anti-Islam MP: 'Israel is West's first line of defense' Israel will be a major part of Geert Wilders' next film on Islam, the rightist Dutch legislator said last week.

* Iran investigates 646 poll complaints Iran's top legislative body says it is investigating 646 complaints from the three defeated presidential candidates over last week's election.

* Hamas rejects Carter plea to recognize Israel A senior Hamas official praised former President Jimmy Carter on Wednesday, a day after he met with the group, but said he failed to persuade the Islamic rulers of Gaza to accept international demands.

* Lieberman to Clinton: No settlement freeze Sharp differences remained between the US and Israeli positions on key issues Wednesday.

* Hu wraps up 'breakthrough' visit to Russia Chinese President Hu Jintao on Thursday wrapped up a visit to Russia that has seen the powers vow to beat the economic crisis.

* North Korea may fire a missile toward Hawaii North Korea may fire a long-range ballistic missile toward Hawaii in early July, a Japanese news report said.