Cute, eh?

Not if it grows up to be like many of the stray dogs roaming Baghdad, according to city officials who have launched a campaign to kill the homeless hounds. (The abandoned pooch that's pictured, however, was one adopted by U.S. troops.) Stray dogs, according to authorities, caused the deaths of more than a dozen people in one month alone.

The culling operation, which kicked off last Sunday, was deemed necessary after a spate of vicious attacks by stray animals roaming Iraq's streets. In August, 13 people died after being attacked by stray dogs, said Anam Hamid, head of the environment board on Baghdad's provincial council. His comments were carried in an Associated Press story announcing the dog-elimination campaign, which began in western Baghdad and will eventually move over the Tigris River to the eastern side of the capital.

"We have decided to take action after receiving complaints of rising attacks on people by packs of dogs and reports that some children are refusing to go to school because they're afraid of being bitten," Hamid said.

It is unclear how long the operation will go on. Under former leader Saddam Hussein, stray-dog culls were conducted annually, but they have not taken place amid the chaos of six years of war. In a city lacking animal shelters and experiencing massive displacement, violence and murders, the number of street dogs has soared. Many are strays or offspring of strays, but others have become homeless after being separated from their owners.

Some lucky ones, like the puppy pictured above, get taken in by sympathetic U.S. soldiers who raise them on their bases and often try to take them home when they redeploy to the United States. But those dogs are not immune from the diseases that Baghdad officials say make the city's street hounds so dangerous. In June, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that an Iraqi dog that had been adopted by U.S. forces and brought to the United States had rabies. The 11-month-old dog had lived the previous seven months on a U.S. base with the soldier but had not been vaccinated. Shortly after arriving in the U.S., it fell ill and had to be euthanized.

Military veterinarians and police are conducting the culling, luring the dogs with poisoned meat and then shooting them. U.S. troops were alerted to the plan to prevent friendly-fire clashes erupting between the dog teams and American soldiers unaware of their intent.

-- Tina Susman in Baghdad

Photo credits: Top photo by Tina Susman / Los Angeles Times; bottom photo of a stray dog that sought shade beneath a car in central Baghdad by Saad Khalaf

Thanksgiving dinner for U.S. troops deployed overseas begins with a push by the Philadelphia employees of the federal government's Defense Supply Center to make sure the traditional food makes it to far-flung locations.

This year that means 120,000 pounds of whole turkeys and more than 179,000 pies sent to troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Dubai and Djibouti.

Also 95,826 pounds of ham, 16,874 containers of stuffing mix, 56,104 cans of sweet potatoes, 131,359 pounds of shrimp and, of course, 10,994 cans of cranberry sauce, and lots more. Total tab: more than $6.5 million.

-- Tony Perry in San Diego

Photo: Turkey at the chow hall at Camp Ripper, Al Asad, Iraq. Credit: Marine Corps

Was he an Iranian arms smuggler or a restorer of religious sites? Was that cocaine he had with him, or salt? And who arrested him: Americans, Iraqis, or someone else? All of those questions surround the brief detention last week of an Iranian man accused by U.S. officials of being a senior officer of Iran's elite Quds Force paramilitary unit.

Read more about the strange case of Nader Qorbani here. His quick release could be a sign of Iran's ability to push buttons in Iraq when it wants something done. Or it could be that Qorbani was not quite the catch the United States initially thought he was, so he was let go. One thing became clear during two days of trying to find out more about the arrest and the release: nobody wanted to discuss the details except perhaps an Iranian newspaper that is considered the mouthpiece of Iran's supreme leader. The paper, Kayhan, boasted Monday that Iran had essentially sprung Qorbani through pressure from its embassy in Baghdad.

Qorbani's Nov. 18 detention might have gone unnoticed, except that it occurred against the backdrop of contentious parliamentary debate over the Status of Forces Agreement, which would let American troops remain in Iraq through 2011. U.S. officials have long accused Iran of fueling the violence in Iraq and say it is doing everything it can to derail the SOFA, which legislators are expected to vote on Wednesday. Iran denies the accusations but has made clear it thinks U.S. forces should leave Iraq now, not three years from now. Read more about debate over SOFA here.

On Tuesday, Iranian hard-line newspapers published editorials and stories describing the pact as a sellout to the United States and urging Iraq to reject it, according to the Associated Press. A popular uprising in Iraq will erupt if lawmakers vote for the plan, one newspaper warned, the AP reports. 

So when the U.S. military announced the capture of a man described as a senior officer in Iran's elite Quds Force, it seemed like a nab the Americans would not want to let drop from public view. After all, it could bolster the American allegation that Iran was actively meddling in affairs in Iraq at a particularly delicate time. Usually, arrests of suspected terrorists, be they from Al Qaeda in Iraq or from Shiite militias supposedly trained and equipped by Iran, are mentioned prominently in military news briefings after the initial detentions are announced.

This time, that didn't happen.

Iraqi lawmakers, who have become enraged with fellow parliament member Mithal Alusi for his visits to Israel, now have another reason to be angry with the fiery politician. Alusi hired Iraq's leading constitutional lawyer to fight the legislature's attempt to punish him for visiting the Jewish state, and today, he won.

That means Alusi, a secular Sunni Muslim who frequently criticizes Iraq's Shiite-led government, no longer faces prosecution for traveling outside Iraq or for having visited Israel, most recently in September when he attended a terrorism symposium at an academic institute. Upon his return from Israel -- his third trip there since 2004 -- Iraq's parliament erupted in angry debate over what to do about Alusi, who has accused many leading Iraqi politicians of being stooges of Iran.

The session ended with a vote to strip him of his parliamentary immunity and to pursue criminal charges. Alusi immediately threatened to fight the decision in court. His lawyer, Iraqi constitutional expert Tariq Harb, took up the case two days later. Reached by phone today, Harb said the trial lasted two months before the supreme federal Court and that he based his case on a provision of Iraq's Constitution, Article 44. It guarantees Iraqis freedom to travel where they want.

"Removing the immunity is violating the constitution and the Iraqi law," said Harb. This morning, the court found in favor of Alusi, who was reported to be traveling and unavailable for comment.

"I am happy for two reasons here," his lawyer said. "One is because I won the case. And the second is that this proves the Iraqi judiciary is independent, and there is no influence of the executive, legislative or government authorities on it. We have a courageous and daring judiciary," he said.

-- Saif Rasheed and Tina Susman in Baghdad

Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr's call to followers to hold a mass prayer and protest in central Baghdad to denounce the new Status of Forces Agreement reached between U.S. and Iraqi negotiators brought tens of thousands of people swarming into central Baghdad's Firdos Square on Friday. This is none other than the place where U.S. forces helped Iraqis joyously pull down a giant statue of Saddam Hussein back in April 2003.

This time, the crowd gathered at the square was just as frenzied, but there were no American forces in sight. And this time, the protesters dragged down something very different: an effigy of President Bush. Their anger is over the SOFA, which would keep U.S. forces in Iraq through December 2011. That's far too long, according to the anti-U.S. cleric Sadr, and according to those in the crowd Friday.

They included young men like 19-year-old Ali Mohammed, who said the pact won't serve Iraqi interests if it is passed by the parliament next week, when a vote is expected. "We want the occupiers to leave. We don't want to form agreements with them," he said as he and a friend entered the rally site. There were plenty of old people in the crowd as well, including a woman who called herself Um Hadhi, who had walked for hours by herself from Sadr City to attend the protest.

"We are against the Americans. We want them to get out. Let them just say goodbye and leave us in peace," she said, deep wrinkles creasing her face. She refused to give her age. "I'm still young!" she said with a laugh as she headed for home after the rally.

As with most Sadrist protests, this one ended with the burning of an American symbol. Usually that's a flag. This time, it was the effigy, which bore little resemblance to Bush except for the suit and tie. In fact, from a distant rooftop, it bore a striking resemblance to L. Paul Bremer III, the one-time U.S.-appointed administrator of Iraq whose decrees are now blamed for many of the problems plaguing Iraq.

Covering a rally of this size is always tricky. You don't want to be caught in the middle of a melee if things turn sour. You need to be close enough to see what's going on, but not so close that all you see are other faces in the crowd. And this being Baghdad, one is always aware of the possibility for sudden violence. Many huge Shiite gatherings have been targeted by suicide bombers.

This time, there were no such problems. Iraqi security forces rimmed the perimeter of the wide avenues where most marchers passed but stayed confined to their vehicles or perched on rooftops. Men were frisked and women's bags were checked. Weapons were not allowed past checkpoints. The crowd, clearly vehement in its desire to see the end of the United States presence here, roared anti-U.S. chants that floated up and down the avenue. When the prayer ended and it came time to burn the effigy, protesters swarmed into the square, tore it down from its perch, and began stomping on top of it. A cloud of brown smoke rose after someone lit it on fire. More stomping followed. Then, it was time to go home.

-- Tina Susman and Caesar Ahmed in Baghdad

Photo credits: Caesar Ahmed

Two young Marines will be posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for stopping a terrorist attack on a Marine and Iraqi police outpost in Ramadi and saving dozens of lives, the Marine Corps announced today.

Lance Cpl. Jordan Haerter, 19, of Sag Harbor, N.Y., and Cpl. Jonathan Yale, 21, of Burkeville, Va., were standing guard on April 22 when a truck filled with 2,000 pounds of explosives barreled toward the outpost's main gate.

Haerter and Yale, following Marine training, fired at the truck. As the truck rolled to a stop, it exploded, killing the pair, demolishing a nearby mosque and house, and leaving a crater 20 feet in diameter and 5  feet deep.

Security film showed that the two Marines never flinched as they continued to fire at the truck, according to an investigation by the Marine Corps. "Both Marines were killed still firing their weapons," said Maj. Gen. John Kelly, the top Marine in Iraq.

Three Marines, eight Iraqi officers and 24 civilians -- all more than 100 yards from the blast -- were injured.  An additional 50 Marines and dozens of Iraqi police officers, in a barracks farther from the gate, were unhurt. 

"I have a son back home, and I know if that truck would've made it to where it was going -- I wouldn't be here today," Lance Cpl. Lawrence Tillery said after the attack. "Because of Lance Cpl. Haerter and Cpl. Yale, I will be able to see my son again. They gave me that opportunity."

The Iraqi Parliament session could have been an episode of ultimate fighting or the Three Stooges.

Head-scarf-wearing female Parliament members banged binders; security guards and a lawmaker shoved one another. An angry MP threw flowers off a desk like a rock star in a music video. Iraqi soldiers pushed people away from the dais. One half-expected to hear someone cry out "food fight" or see Groucho Marx shuffling through.

The pandemonium from Wednesday’s Parliament session was broadcast on Iraqi state television Thursday as the Assembly Speaker Mahmoud Mashaadani and Deputy  Speaker Khalid Attiyah wanted to show the public who was to blame for a violent row over the pending U.S.-Iraq security pact.

If anything could ignite the Parliament, it was the U.S-.Iraqi security agreement that would extend the American presence in Iraq another three years.  So the session turned into a brawl, with the opposing sides blaming one another.

In exasperation, Parliament Speaker  Mashaadani, flanked by bodyguards, adjourned the Parliament until today. The footage painted the Sadrists as creating a combative atmosphere.

On Thursday, no fighting broke out and lawmakers approved a second reading of the law. It needs to go to a third reading before a vote.

-- Baghdad bureau

Photo: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki talks to the press about the U.S.-Iraqi pact that caused a ruckus in Parliament. Credit: HO / AFP / Getty Images

The Iraqi Parliament is battling over what to do about the last, final version of the Status of Forces Agreement that landed on lawmakers' desks Monday and is expected to be voted on early next week. It took U.S. and Iraqi negotiators eight months to reach this point, and both sides say the talks that began last March reached a dead end at least once, only to be revived by negotiators. Below is the product of those talks. 

Prime Minister Nouri Maliki went on national TV on Tuesday to appeal for support for SOFA and to explain why he thinks it's the best option for Iraq. He made a point of stressing the last-minute concessions Iraq won from the United States, which can be noted by comparing the newest version with an earlier draft we posted last month.

Here briefly are some important elements to note in the new SOFA. The full text follows.

Within official quarters in Washington, Baghdad and Tehran these days, lots of eyeballs are zeroing in on the process of hammering out a Status of Forces of Agreement that would legitimize the presence of United States troops in Iraq after a United Nations mandate expires Dec. 31.

Shiite Iran has enormous influence over Iraq, with deep ties to all the major Shiite and Kurdish political parties and even to the main Sunni groups. It has delivered mixed signals about how it views current deal hammered out with U.S. officials by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and approved by his Cabinet.

Iranian officials have been surprisingly tight-lipped about the proposed deal. Hassan Qashqavi, the spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry said on Sunday that Tehran was waiting for Iraqi lawmakers, who must still vote on the deal, to weigh in:

"The Iraqi nation is in its most historic and decisive moment. We should wait and see when the security draft reaches on the floor of the parliament."

He chided a reporter who pressed him on the matter:

"Do not be in a hurry. Let 's see what will be the reaction of the parliament."

Iranian newspapers, which pretty much all represent different factions within the country's ruling elite, have shown similar wishy-washiness.

Amid the drama over the Iraqi Cabinet's decision to approve a security pact giving American forces another three years on the ground here, it was easy to miss another milestone. The Cabinet has formally announced the date for provincial elections: Jan. 31, 2009.

The decision, announced Tuesday, is the first time a date has been declared. The provincial election law passed by Parliament in September only said that the vote should be held by Jan. 31 but left in the air exactly when it would happen. This gives the country's political groups time to get ready for the official two-month campaigning period, which will begin Dec. 1. With luck and organization, it will give election officials time to arrange what is sure to be a massive undertaking.

The term "provincial election" might not sound sexy to many people, but here in Iraq, the elections have been eagerly awaited and are seen as perhaps the best way to revamp the country's skewed political structures and some of the sectarianism that has bedeviled the country. Their outcome could determine the state of the nation that U.S. troops leave behind when President-elect Barack Obama is in office and his plan to draw down forces takes hold.

The last provincial elections were held in 2005, and Sunni Arab groups boycotted them. That left many provinces, even those with substantial Sunni populations, governed by councils dominated by Shiites and Kurds.

Despising America has long been a Middle East pastime, but then the country that brought war to Iraq and orange-suited prisoners to Guantanamo Bay elected a Facebook-friendly president who speaks in poems.

What’s a mullah to do?

With the speed of a Twitter missive, the cultural game has shifted. Barack Obama’s rise to the White House comes when the Arabs are intensely suspicious of U.S. intentions, and when Islam, through satellite TV and the Internet, is inundated with Western culture.

Eight years of President Bush gave conservative Muslims a buttress against America. But Obama, who plays as well in Hollywood as he does in the villages of Kenya, is changing Washington’s image from a cowboy with snarling sound bites to a conciliator with star appeal.

Check out the rest of the story in today's Los Angeles Times.

— Jeffrey Fleishman in Cairo

Photo: President-elect Obama. Credit: Stan Honda/AFP/Getty Images

After months of tense negotiations and countless amendments, Iraq's Cabinet today approved a Status of Forces Agreement that outlines the future of American troops in Iraq. Under the plan, which now goes to the Parliament, U.S. troops would pull out of Iraqi cities by the end of June 2009 and would leave the country by the end of 2011.

But some opponents say they want a total withdrawal sooner than 2011; others say, whatever the final plan, it should be approved not by politicians but by the public in a referendum.

If you look closely at the photograph above, taken during the Cabinet's vote, you'll notice one hand not raised. The minister with her hands folded in front of her represents the main Sunni bloc in Parliament, which says the public, not Parliament, should decide on such an important pact. Also opposing the pact are lawmakers from Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr's bloc. Sadr on Friday threatened to revive armed elements of his Mahdi Army militia and return to war with U.S. forces if such an agreement is allowed to go through.

Despite these differences, the Cabinet approval had been anticipated following Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's decision to accept what he concluded was the best deal Iraq was going to get from the Americans. That deal includes the firm withdrawal dates, which will not be based on conditions on the ground as the United States had initially wanted. As government spokesman Ali Dabbagh made clear after the Cabinet vote, those dates are "final and decided."

Whatever concessions the United States made to get the pact approved, a statement issued from a U.S. Embassy representative in Iraq said the Americans welcomed the Cabinet vote. "This is an important and positive step," the statement said.

Other major elements of the pact include a ban on U.S. forces searching and raiding homes without Iraqi approval, the right of Iraqis to search shipments of weapons and other packages coming into the country for U.S. recipients, and the right of Iraq's justice system to prosecute American troops for serious crimes under some circumstances.

The question now is what will happen when the pact goes before Parliament, presumably this week. Will the pact's detractors try to prevent its passage, perhaps by staging walkouts and denying Parliament a quorum? Will Sadr make good on his vow to send his personal brigade into battle against the pact? If it passes Parliament, will Sunni Vice President Tariq Hashimi, who has led the call for a referendum, use his power on the presidency countil to veto it?

As one lawmaker said of the potential hurdles facing the legislature, "This will be an adventure."

--Times staff writers

Photo: The Iraqi Cabinet votes on the Status of Forces Agreement. Courtesy: Government of Iraq parliament.

Iraq’s Vice President Tariq Hashimi and his Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party could very well prove to be the force that blocks a U.S.-Iraq security agreement from being signed this year. Hashimi insisted this month that the pact be put before a popular referendum. His party members concede such a referendum would not be possible until sometime next year.

Hashimi (right) indicated his stance at the same time Shiite lawmakers close to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki have made clear they are now supporting an agreement for U.S. forces to stay in the country for another three years.

Without Hashimi’s Iraqi Islamic Party,  Shiite lawmakers, close to Maliki, have said that it makes no sense to bring the pact to a vote in parliament  The ruling Shiite coalition said it wants the country’s main groups – the Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds -- to agree to the text.

The fact that Sunnis are not backing the agreement is a possible excuse for Maliki,  he could escape blame if the agreement is not approved before the end of December. Confidantes to the prime minister indicated only Friday that Maliki was now lobbying for the text, after months of ambiguity. The lawmakers said Maliki planned to back the agreement in a cabinet meeting, tentatively scheduled for Sunday, with hopes of swiftly sending it to parliament for a vote.

Last month, we wrote about the revival of Baghdad's National Theater and the resilience of the actors, actresses, directors and writers who had kept their artistry alive through the war and who finally were launching their first nighttime performances since the U.S. invasion of March 2003.

On Saturday, bombers struck outside the theater just before sunset. Police say an Oldsmobile blew up as people were heading to the theater in the capital's Karada district. Initial reports from police said five people were killed and 23 injured. A dozen cars along the busy street were badly damaged or destroyed.

In northern Iraq, at least 12 people were killed and 36 wounded when a bomb struck the city of Tall Afar outside Mosul. The city has been repeatedly hit by suspected Sunni insurgents who are believed to cross over from nearby Syria to fuel the violence brewing in that region between Sunni Arabs and Kurds vying for power.

Both attacks showcased the instability across Iraq, where violence has greatly decreased in the past year but where regular Iraqis' view of things often differs from the U.S. military's vision. The United States consistently points out the positives -- lower attack numbers, lower death and injury tolls each month, arrests of suspected insurgents. The people who live in the neighborhoods, go to work each day and contend with the unpredictable nature of things, look at life differently.

The international fairground in Baghdad used to look like this (below), a sad remnant of its former self.

But for the past few days, it has had a distinctly different look with the opening of the first International Fair to be held here since the U.S. invasion of March 2003.

About 150 companies converged  on the western side of the Tigris River for the fair, which opened Tuesday and closes Saturday.

There were the usual annoying fixtures of Baghdad life to contend with: the frisking of anyone who entered the fairgrounds; the road closures in the area that slowed traffic to a crawl. But once inside, the atmosphere was joyful as people sat inside the new cars on display, watched firefighters leap from cranes onto a giant air bag, and sipped coffee and tea.

"Why don't they let the women be searched by us?" cracked one male security guard frisking men as he eyed the female fair visitors, most of them dressed in fancy clothes for the event.

The fair's opening was a sign of the Iraqi government's determination to lure investment back to Iraq, whose security risks have made it a hard sell. Earlier this month, another investment effort was launched with the opening of a five-star hotel and business center at the Baghdad airport.

"It's a beginning," said Herbert Lange, who worked with the Iraqi Trade Ministry in organizing the fair. "This is the right time. We're going to get business back to Iraq."

As a member of the paramilitary force known as the Sons of Iraq, whose foot soldiers man checkpoints and work alongside U.S. and Iraqi troops across Iraq, Surmad Mahmoud Jundi earns $300 a month. As a full-fledged member of the Iraqi police or military, he would get at least twice that, along with extra money for hazardous duty.

It's no wonder, then, that Jundi is impatient to make the leap from being a Son of Iraq to being a cop of Iraq, and his frustrations were clear as he stood in line under a warm autumn sun to receive his monthly pay. Jundi was one of thousands of Sons of Iraq to be paid by Iraqi officials for the first time this week as the Iraqi government takes command of the force, which had been paid and managed by the U.S. military.

The Iraqi payout, which began Monday in Baghdad, seemed to go smoothly, but the impatience exhibited by Jundi and several other Sons of Iraq is a warning sign of what may lie ahead if the Iraqi government does not fulfill its vow to find jobs for these men.

"So far all we've gotten is promises that we'll get hired here or there, but nothing," said Jundi as other men in line around him joined in the complaints. "There's nothing tangible" to hold on to for the future, said Younis Abdullah Sukhairi. "We don't have any faith." They said they trusted the U.S. forces but not Iraq's government.

The mutual distrust between the mainly Shiite Muslim government and the mainly Sunni Arab Sons of Iraq is at the root of several problems that could derail the program, which is credited with helping bring down violence nationwide. A year ago, there were about 24 attacks per day on U.S. and Iraqi forces and Iraqi civilians in Baghdad, said U.S. Army Brig. Gen. William Grimsley. Now, there are about four attacks per day, said Grimsley, who called the Sons of Iraq "hugely important" in bringing down violence.

By Tina Susman in Baghdad

"What's it like there?"

It's the question we get asked most often by people who haven't been to Baghdad, followed closely by, "Do you live in the Green Zone?" The answer to that one: No. The answer to the first is more difficult.

Baghdad, like any huge city, is a porridge of ugliness, beauty, charm, humor, scowls, color and grayness, but with a twist: It is under military occupation, and there are signs of the U.S. and Iraqi army presence everywhere. There are armed men in uniform, concrete walls erected to control movement of cars and people and checkpoints that don't let down their guard for anyone -- not even a man rushing to get married, as we saw on a recent day on the streets.

Iraq’s newspapers speculated today on what President-elect Barack Obama means for Iraq’s future. Here is an article from Azzaman, an independent newspaper, and an editorial from Mutamar, the paper that belongs to Ahmed Chalabi, the secular politician who prodded America to invade Iraq.

Azzaman wrote:

When …  the new elected president arrives at the White House, he will be looking to Iraq and Afghanistan, which of Iraq's issues will attract the new president attention? Let's count some of them according to the experts’ and the devastated Iraqi people’s point of view:

George W. Bush has become a familiar name to Iraqis in the nearly six years since the U.S. invasion. Today, Iraqis  pondered life with Barack Obama, the first African American elected president, who will preside over what presumably will be the United States’ endgame in Iraq.

Iraqis wondered would Obama’s election presage an end to the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq or would nothing change.  On the streets of Iraq, from Baghdad to Kurdistan, people pondered the implications of Obama’s victory.

Jarjees Said, a 38-year-old worker at a printing plant in the northern city of  Mosul, said: “We hope that he will withdraw the forces from Iraq and save the people from the  occupation and the suffering caused by the occupation forces.”

Some accused Obama of being an agent for Israel, apparently unaware of how America’s ultra-right wing accused him of being a Muslim agent and anti-Israeli in the election campaign. “The new president is interested in the Zionist lobby and specifically Israel.  That was obvious during his campaign visit where he prayed at the Wailing Wall wearing a yarmulke. McCain didn’t do these things,” said Abdul Qadir Yunis, who runs a private company in Mosul.

Few Americans stand to be as directly affected by the presidential race as the military forces deployed to Iraq, and while the military generally frowns on troops discussing politics publicly, it was impossible to avoid the topic early today as troops in Baghdad awoke to the news that Barack Obama had won handily over John McCain.

The military is a traditionally conservative organization. A recent poll by the Military Times in the run-up to the vote indicated strong support for McCain over Obama, but more research by the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks campaign contributions of $200 and up, found that most of the money coming from men and women in uniform was going to Democrats, not Republicans.

Whom to believe? We decided to ask the troops themselves, who seemed more than happy to talk politics, both in e-mail exchanges and while eating breakfast early today at the War Eagle base in northeastern Baghdad shortly after Obama was declared the winner. Here are some of their thoughts:

The victory of Barak Obama has elicited cautious optimism in the Arab world, as comments posted by readers on the websites of major Arab news websites have shown.

On the Dubai-based Al-Arabiya website, Abu Khaled wrote:

“Whether it is Obama or McCain, the US foreign policy is formulated in advance. Their unjust policy vis-à-vis Arabs and Muslims and their bias to Israel and their greed will not change. What Bush did to Arabs and Muslims, although we thought he would be more moderate than his democratic contender back then, shook our confidence in everyone. Although we prefer Obama, we should not be very optimistic."

Bakri Mohamed wrote on the Qatar-based al-Jazeera website:

“We should not be relying on others to bring change; we should pursue change to the better by ourselves. As to Obama’s victory, I don’t think it will change much in terms of US foreign policy. Anyway, congratulations to Obama.”

Respondent Essam Zayed agreed with him, saying:

“The optimism about Obama’s victory sounds strange. The US policies are usually put by the Congress and not the president. In the US, the president just implements these policies. We just hope that Obama would be more moderate than the dustbin of history called Bush.”

At least 16 people were killed in bombings in eastern Baghdad today, a reminder of the complicated situation in Iraq as Americans headed to the polls to elect their next president.

A bomb hidden in a car at a bus stop claimed the lives of 11 people and wounded 21 others in Mashtal neighborhood, police and hospital officials said. A roadside bomb in eastern Baghdad’s Qahira district killed five civilians, police said. A police officer was fatally shot by gunmen in a car in the Talbiya neighborhood, police said.

The attacks in eastern Baghdad, once a stronghold of Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, suggested that some splinter factions from his militia were conducting operations despite a freeze on most of his fighters.

Baghdad - It's all in the wrist, Abu Ali Wazan said as he pondered who would, and should, become the next U.S. president.

His choice is John McCain, because the Republican wants to leave U.S. forces in Iraq, where Wazan is convinced they are needed to prevent a resurgence of sectarian war. Because Wazan has seen photographs that he says show McCain with a watch on his right wrist, he said it stands to reason that McCain will defeat Barack Obama. Never mind that what appears to be a watch is actually a bracelet bearing the name of an American soldier killed in Baghdad. Wazan, who runs a sporting goods store, is convinced.

"Olmert also has his watch on his right hand," Wazan added, a reference to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who is shown in photographs with his right wrist clearly adorned with a timepiece.

Obama, when he wears a watch, keeps it on his left wrist, not the sign of a winner, said Wazan, whose analysis of the situation is about as scientific as it gets here.

There are no public opinion polls in Iraq. Iraqis questioned about the U.S. election generally have a personal choice, but whatever that choice is, most dismiss the idea that the winner will bring change to their lives. Some say America's desire to dominate global events will forever leave Iraq under its occupation; others say Iraq's government holds the ultimate power when it comes to whether American forces stay or go; and others say the next president's four-year term simply won't be enough time  to undo the effects of years of war.

Whatever their opinions, Iraqis certainly are following the presidential race, and questions about the candidates tend to unleash pent-up fury over everything that has gone wrong in Iraq since the American invasion of March 2003. Perhaps that's why of 26 queried, 10 said they thought Obama, who opposed the war, was the best choice for the United States and for Iraq. Six favored McCain. Nine said they had no opinion and argued that neither Obama nor McCain would improve things.

One man opted jokingly for Kennedy as the best hope for America and for Iraq, although he did not say which Kennedy.

The Navy will name a Zumwalt-class destroyer after a SEAL who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for diving on a grenade to save three buddies during a firefight in Ramadi, Iraq.

"Michael Monsoor's name will now be linked with one of our nation's most visible examples of military power — a U.S. Navy warship," Navy Secretary Donald Winter said in announcing the decision Wednesday night.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Monsoor died in 2006 while smothering an insurgent grenade that had been hurled at SEALs who were providing rooftop overwatch for Army troops. He was 25.

American forces in Iraq launched a daring commando raid into Syrian territory on Sunday in order to strike against a suspected insurgent leader.

But in the end, the operation may wind up being more trouble than it was worth as repercussions continue to reverberate in the Middle East and throughout the world, with even Europeans condemning the attack.

Syria's cabinet today  condemned the assault on the village of Sukkairah as "brutal, vicious American aggression."

Syria's official news agency reported that the authorities have decided to shut down an unidentified Damascus-based "American school" and a cultural center. The report didn't identify the exact name of the school.

But the U.S. Department of State has since 1950 overseen the Damascus Community School, which serves the children of American diplomats and others posted to Syria. The embassy in Damascus also operates a culture center which showcases American arts, including jazz.

A spokesman for the Syrian Embassy in London called the U.S. attack within Syria on Sunday afternoon an "outrageous crime" and hinted at a reprisal.

"We expect a clarification, and of course Syria reserves the right to respond accordingly in the proper way," Jihad Makdissi told the BBC.

Reuters quoted the spokesman for the Iraqi government this morning as saying the raid was meant to target bad guys conducting operations against Iraqi forces. Ali Dabbagh said:

"The attacked area was the scene of activities of terrorist groups operating from Syria against Iraq. ... The latest of these groups ... killed 13 police recruits in an [Iraqi] border village. Iraq had asked Syria to hand over this group which uses Syria as a base for its terrorist activities."

U.S. forces on Sunday afternoon apparently crossed the Iraqi border to launch a commando raid in a Syrian town that left at least eight people dead.

It was a high-stakes move that could not only increase tensions between Washington and Damascus but could unnerve Iraqi officials contemplating the signing of a Status of Forces Agreement with the U.S. that would legitamize the presence of American troops in Iraq.

So why now at the end of the Bush administration, with Washington trying to play nice with Damascus and tensions easing throughout the region, would U.S. forces stage such a gambit?

The blog-o-sphere was all abuzz with theories and speculation. Bill Roggio, writing at the Long War Journal, said that the U.S. must have had a compelling military reason for the attack, especially given the uptick of insurgent attacks in and around the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, which is close to Syria and has became a haven for insurgents.

Iraqi forces in northern Iraq launched a series of raids Sunday that netted 13 suspected insurgents, an official in Mosul said.

"The US military must have detected a senior member of al Qaeda in Iraq in the region," he wrote. "Abu Ayyub al Masri, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, is reported to have left the country earlier this year after the terror group lost its sanctuaries in Diyala province."

But others saw political considerations...

Below is the latest draft of the U.S.-Iraq security agreement, which the Iraqi government today said needed changes and further negotiations with the Americans. The Times has the story here.

Time is running out for the sides to replace the current U.N. legal cover by the end of the year with a status of forces agreement. Failure to reach a deal would be viewed as a diplomatic setback for the Americans.

Internal Iraqi political rivalries, Iranian influence, Iraqi ambivalence toward the U.S. and American missteps have all been blamed for the current impasse. The draft was obtained from the Iraqi government side and translated from Arabic into English.  The two key sections on immunity for U.S. soldiers and the timeline for an American withdrawal, both of which Iraqi officials have expressed unhappiness about, are after the jump below, followed by the document in its entirety:

The flight out of Baghdad was crowded, full of happy people soaring above soldiers, sticky bombs and barbed wire. The treacherous landscape fell away, becoming a speck in the desert as the Iraqi Airways jet broke through clouds and found blue sky, heading west toward Cairo.

Iraqis were in the aisle before the seat belt sign was turned off.

Dozens of cameras appeared –- clunky video cameras from Saddam Hussein’s time rattled alongside slender, new cellphone cameras. The plane became a kinetic puzzle of miniature movie-sets. Fathers and uncles were directors, posing families and recording an adventure, perhaps only a brief respite, but an escape from the sounds of gunfire and explosions.

One of the pilots landed the role of leading man. Everyone wanted a picture with him. He was big and broad, but patient, allowing girls to hold his arms; grown men to scrunch beside him and smile; children to strum the insignias on his shoulder boards.

The coming few weeks could prove crucial to the fate of a long term Iraq-U.S. security agreement. The deal has stalled for months amid differences between the sides, including real reluctance and outright opposition by some Iraqi officials to the continued presence of American forces in Iraq.

Since missing a July deadline to complete the deal, the Iraqis and Americans have been deadlocked over Iraq’s insistence that U.S. soldiers should not be exempt from Iraqi law. Western officials and Iraqis have also faulted the American side for a poor start to the negotiation process last spring, when its negotiators made demands now deemed way too high, including insisting on the right to conduct operations without Iraqi approval.

The return of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani to the capital late last month could break the stalemate. Talabani, who left in August for the United States, where he had heart surgery, has met for the last two days with Prime Minister Nouri Maliki. Today, the presidency council announced in a statement that Talabani, Maliki, Kurdistan regional President Massoud Barzani and vice presidents Tariq Hashimi and Adel Abdel Mahdi planned to hold talks on the agreement.

New violence this week against Christians in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul has sparked an outcry from the country's religious minority. In the last week, officials said, Christian families have fled the city after coming under attack from Sunni militants.

Christians have been targeted in the city along with other sects and ethnic groups since 2003. An estimated 933 Christian families have fled Mosul in the last week, said Jawdat Ismail, director of the ministry of displacement and migration in Nineveh province.

Nineveh, whose capital is Mosul, has been a front line in the simmering conflict between Kurds and Arabs over northern Iraq’s future boundaries. The tensions have fueled violence that has targeted Christians, along with other ethnic and religious groups, including Kurds, Shabaks and Yazidis. Sunni Arabs have also been targeted.

Meeting with Christian politicians Sunday, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki promised the embattled community protection. Additional army and national police units were being stationed in Mosul, government spokesman Ali Dabagh said in a statement. At times, Christian leaders have blamed both Sunni Arabs and Kurds for the bloodshed.

In 2006, the only Iraq veteran elected to the U.S. Congress was Patrick Murphy, a Democrat, who served as an Army lawyer with the 82nd Airborne Division. He narrowly defeated a one-term incumbent in Pennsylvania.

None of the other Iraq veterans who ran that season were successful. Several more are trying again this year.

In one region, California's 52nd Congressional District in eastern San Diego County, it's virtually assured the winner will be a veteran of the war in Iraq.

The Republican candidate is Duncan D. Hunter, 31, a captain in the Marine reserves; the Democrat is Mike Lumpkin, 43, recently retired as a Navy SEAL commander. Both have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

-- Tony Perry, in San Diego

Photo: Capt. Patrick Murphy, now Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.)

The boy with the plastic AK-47 stood in the dust. He waited for others; they came, more boys with fake guns.

They scurried, ran around barbed wire and blast walls, shooting imaginary bullets, pretending to die. Their make-believe war was folded into a real one, and their laughter, echoing amid U.S. and Iraqi soldiers with real guns and metal bullets, was strange and paradoxical.

The streets are safer in Baghdad these days. That’s why the boys were out playing. But they were playing with guns, plastic, shiny guns in the sunlight.   

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A separatist Kurdish leader sounded defiant this week after Turkey's parliament authorized more attacks against his group in northern Iraq. "We are ready and our forces are ready. We are not afraid of them. If they want to attack Iraq's Kurdistan, then the Middle East will turn into a fire ball,” Bozan Takeen, a senior leader from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), warned on Thursday by phone from his hideout in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Takeen, who is based in Iraqi Kurdistan’s Qandil mountains, which border Turkey and Iran, was speaking after Turkey’s parliament on Wednesday extended for one more year Ankara’s right to carry out military raids against the PKK in Iraqi Kurdistan.

This is the story of a high-ranking Iraqi police officer who was recently shot seven times outside his home in the Hurriya neighborhood of Baghdad.

He was saved by American soldiers and doctors. Because of danger to his family, the officer asked to be identified only as Sajad. These are his words:

"My wife went to see who was knocking at the door. She does that as a precaution because there might be a bad guy there. Our neighborhood is not completely safe. There are  bad elements who might wish to hurt a senior police officer.

" 'Who’s there?' my wife asked.

" 'Me,' came the reply.

"It was a boy who answered her. She knew him from his voice, she had talked to him before, so she felt safe. She opened the door and she saw a 16-year-old boy standing there. He asked to talk to her husband, and she said, 'He is breaking his fast, come another time.'

"The boy insisted. I went to the door. My 6-year-old daughter was with me; she was following me. When I went outside the house, more than five young men came from two sides holding pistols.

Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq rarely agree on the exact sighting of the crescent moon that marks the beginning of Eid.

But this year even Shiites couldn’t agree among themselves on the start of the three-day holy feast that ends the fasting month of Ramadan.

In many Shiite families, some broke their fasts, others did not, making for strained and confused households.

For years, the Eid was set by Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and other religious leaders who preside over the shrine at Najaf.

But these days, the Shiites who follow the guidance of other religious leaders celebrated the feast a day earlier than Sistani. They marked it on Wednesday, and Sistani followers on Thursday.

Shiites have become quite stubborn about the question. At least one man chased his wife through the house, trying to make her break her fast. She refused for an hour, then relented. She was angry at him for the rest of the day.

By Saif Rasheed in Baghdad

As a tradition during the feast of Eid, my family used to visit the homes of relatives and relax amid the wide gardens at the social Hunting Club in Baghdad's Mansour district.

Then came the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, and many of my relatives fled the country.

These days, with fewer family members to visit, we find ourselves spending more time at the Hunting Club. It is protected from gunfire, serves alcohol and steers conversations away from sectarian politics. 

The Hunting Club is different from what it was just a year or two ago. Security is better in Iraq.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have created a kind of building boom as the Fisher House Foundation and its financial partners build facilities across the country to accommodate families of wounded military personnel who are undergoing medical treatment.

In 2006, the foundation opened a house (above) near the Veterans Affairs Polytrauma Rehabilitation Center in Palo Alto. In a few weeks a Fisher House will open in Dallas, and a few months later one will open adjacent to the VA hospital in West Los Angeles.

Projects for 2008, according to the foundation's website, www.fisherhouse.org, include houses in West Roxbury, Mass.; Fort Bragg, N.C.; Camp Lejeune, N.C.; Elgin Air Force Base, Fla.; and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. Begun in 1991, the foundation's goal is to provide free accommodations for family members as military personnel receive medical treatment.

On Friday, military personnel and foundation officials gathered at the Naval Medical Center San Diego for the grand opening of the 41st Fisher House, the second at the medical center. The Navy will provide maintenance and management of the 8,000-square-foot, 12-suite house.

Dust blew out of the desert and into Baghdad. It whirled around the sheep standing on a corner, eating grass, waiting to be sold. A man arrived in a small truck. He got out and waded into the sheep, pulling at their wool, feeling their sides, lifting their front legs and checking their bellies. It looked like he was dancing with them.

He chose one and hauled it away from the others. The sheep fought. The man pushed it aside, spotting a fatter one hiding in the herd. He carried it to the back of his truck, hooves clattering metal, the door slamming shut. The man paid for the sheep. He smiled. It was the eve of the Eid for Shiite Muslims in Iraq -- the end of 30 days' fasting.

It seemed normal. A man went to the market to buy his family's feast. He praised God. But he drove home through Army checkpoints, blast walls and barbed wire. And news that, although Iraq's casualties are dropping, some people would not live to break their fast -- a car bomb in the city of Balad 80 kilometers north of Baghdad exploded near a shrine, killing three and wounding 30.

Jeffrey Fleishman in Baghdad

An Iraqi boy with his sheep. Associated Press 

The weekly newspaper that calls itself Al Esbuyia, or Iraq Weekly, offers a regular diet of sports, culture, features and sarcasm to readers, and one of its key features is the cartoon that accompanies each new issue. Most of the cartoons poke fun at the hardships endured by regular Iraqis, but some Iraqi lawmakers found the one published Sept. 14 to be not very amusing.

It shows a Muslim woman clad in a burka holding a burning bomb fuse in her raised left hand, a la the Statue of Liberty, who stands beside her. The drawing reflects the growing number of female suicide bombers in Iraq, but members of Iraq's parliament denounced it as an insult to Iraqi Muslim women and voted Sunday to sue the newspaper for defamation.

It's too early to say where, if anywhere, the lawsuit will go. For months, Iraqi lawmakers haven't been able to pass pressing legislation to hold provincial elections or share the nation's oil wealth, so the chances of them getting organized enough to push through a lawsuit like this seem remote.

But the action itself is another sign of the Iraqi government's prickly relationship with the media, which were hobbled for decades under Saddam Hussein. His ouster ushered in press freedom, sort of. Iraqi journalists and media company employees get gunned down, kidnapped, threatened and roughed up with alarming frequency. They also get detained and held, sometimes for months, by U.S. forces.

"I was there when they took them away. It was in the afternoon, and I was praying at the time," says Sumaychiya Abid Ahmad as she recalls the day 15 months ago when her sons, Waleed and Tawfiq, were arrested. The Iraqi soldiers who led them from the family's home in Abu Ghraib, southwest of Baghdad, said it would be a few minutes -- just enough time to get their help with an electrical problem, since both young men are electricians.

But as the Los Angeles Times reported Monday, the two are among several thousand Iraqis being held in Iraqi detention centers who say they have never seen a lawyer or been brought before a judge after months or even years of detention. It's a problem that U.S. and Iraqi officials acknowledge exists, but fixing it is proving difficult as stepped-up security efforts pour more and more detainees into the Iraqi system.

Lt. Col. William G. Rogers, one of the U.S. military officers working with Iraqis to upgrade the country's law-and-order system, compared the situation to a bucket with a hole in the bottom. A free legal aid clinic established with U.S. funds and opened in May is designed "to widen the hole" and get detainees through the system more quickly. "We can't control what comes into this bucket," Rogers said, "but the length of time someone is in that bucket, we can control."

It is one of the ironies of improved security in Iraq that the bucket has been filled to brimming since early 2007, when the U.S. troop influx and stepped-up training of Iraqi security forces led to more detentions. The legal aid clinic is a novelty in Iraq, and Rogers hopes others will open up across the country. For now, only the Rusafa detention facility in eastern Baghdad has a clinic, which is paid for by American funds and staffed by 25 Iraq lawyers. Each day, they see about 80 detainees, who are brought into a cage-like holding facility until their turn comes.

Most say they don't know what crime they are accused of having committed. Many accuse Iraq's mainly Shiite security forces of arresting them as part of a sectarian cleansing campaign. Most of the detainees are Sunnis. They include Waleed and Tawfiq, who were arrested in June 2007. Tracked down in Abu Ghraib, their mother and father described a scenario eerily similar to that outlined by many of the detainees interviewed during a two-day visit to the Rusafa facility.

Coming soon: a romantic island getaway in the heart of Baghdad! That's the hope, at least, of Iraq's Tourism Board, which held a news conference Sunday to announce an ambitious project to lure investors to build up the capital's Jazirat Al A'ras, a s