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Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in Washington today for a series of meetings at the White House. He'll hold one-on-one talks with US president Barack Obama before a "working lunch" with Obama, vice president Joseph Biden, and several other officials.

Obama's top priority during these talks will almost certainly be pushing for an extension to Israel's temporary West Bank settlement freeze, which is due to expire in September. The end of the freeze would forestall any possibility of direct talks between the Israelis ri the Palestinians.

"There has been a distinct improvement in the White House relationship with Israel since the last meeting" between Obama and Netanyahu on March 23, said Jonathan Spyer, a political scientist at Israel's Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. "Obama will be looking for a payback," perhaps in the form of an extension to the settlement freeze, Spyer said.

But from Netanyahu's perspective, the domestic politics of extending the freeze are... difficult, to say the least. His administration has nothing to show for the current freeze: Israeli-Palestinian "proximity talks" have yielded little concrete progress, save for a rumored land swap proposal offered by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas.

No blogging yesterday while I worked on a couple of reported projects -- so I'll spare you any day-after thoughts on President Obama's choice to replace Gen. Stanley McChrystal with Gen. David Petraeus. You've read enough of those already, I'm sure.

Instead, let's pivot back to what's actually happening in Afghanistan. As I said in my Al-Jazeera piece about McChrystal's departure, the change of command isn't likely to mean a major change in strategy: McChrystal was hardly the only counterinsurgency believer in the military, and many elements of his "new strategy" actually began under his predecessor, Gen. David McKiernan.

The Israeli security cabinet met earlier today and announced (some of) the details of its plan to ease the Gaza blockade.

Today's announcement from the cabinet was more detailed than last week's, which merely declared Israel's intent to loosen the blockade. But it still doesn't say exactly which goods will be barred from Gaza; whether businesses in Gaza will be allowed to resume exports; or whether the looser blockade will include looser rules on the movement of people.

It's a small step, but nonetheless it's objectively a good thing. After the jump: A statement from the White House, issued a few minutes after the Israeli decision.

Israel's decision to slightly ease the Gaza blockade drew a very caveated reaction from around the world. Britain's foreign office said "further work is needed"; Catherine Ashton, the European Union foreign policy chief, urged Israel to allow "many, many more goods... in to Gaza."

Pew released its latest global survey a few hours ago, and it shows a clear drop in public support in Muslim countries for US policies and for Barack Obama.

Not too surprising, right? Many of Obama's policies are proving deeply unpopular in the Muslim world. But what's striking to me is how his personal support is falling much faster than perceptions of official US policy.

I'm a little late in responding to Michael Cohen's cri de coeur about liberal silence on Obama's increasingly-on-the-wrong-track Afghan strategy. I agree with his basic premise -- the left, particularly the left-wing media, has been quiet about Afghanistan -- though I think he ignores some contradictory evidence.

Spencer Ackerman outlines most of the reasons for the left's quietude. I would add one other point: It's difficult to outline a good alternative, and it requires a certain degree of local knowledge to do so.

My personal take on the new package of Iran sanctions approved this week is that they won't accomplish anything -- anything good, at least.

The Iranian regime has already warned that the sanctions will preclude further negotiations over its nuclear program. Officials have also warned that the sanctions might scrap last month's so-called "Tehran declaration," the tripartite deal negotiated by Turkey and Brazil. (That might be a bluff -- it would sour relations with both countries, and Iran does need at least a few allies.)

One year ago today, Barack Obama went to Cairo University and delivered this optimistic speech. He vowed to "seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world." The speech was certainly received with some skepticism, but coverage in the Arabic press was generally positive and sympathetic.

Today, the top story on Al-Jazeera's Web site (عربي) is headlined "Obama: Israel's concerns are legitimate." Obama and vice president Joe Biden call the Gaza flotilla raid "tragic" -- but both  defend Israel's actions, actions which have been condemned by virtually every other world leader on the planet. (Even the New York Times editorial board, hardly a staunch critic of Israel, seems puzzled by Obama's "tepid response.")

I've been doing largely non-stop flotilla coverage at Al-Jazeera for the last three days (including live blogs on Monday and Tuesday), so you'll forgive me for not writing too much about the subject tonight; I need a break. (Issandr El Amrani has a good roundup of flotilla commentary, if you're looking for broad analysis.)

But I do want to quickly comment on the American reaction -- or, rather, the lack thereof -- to the flotilla attack. During the White House press briefing yesterday, press secretary Robert Gibbs was asked (repeatedly) about Obama's refusal to condemn Israel's actions -- something dozens of other world leaders had already done.

The Obama administration agreed to a compromise yesterday to salvage a month-long round of talks aimed at updating the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty -- and then promptly announced that it may not accept one of the conditions of the deal.

All 189 NPT signatories accepted the 28-page review document in a vote last night. It directs the United Nations secretary-general to convene a conference in 2012, aimed at creating a "WMD-free zone" in the Middle East. The final document also urges Israel to join the treaty (along with India and Pakistan, the other two countries to never sign the NPT).

Apologies for my non-existent blogging over the last few days! I've been swamped with work -- blogging/interviewing people at the Al-Jazeera forum here in Doha, and brainstorming on a new project we're launching in the next few weeks (details to come...).

Anyway. One of the people I interviewed was Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, the Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan (his new autobiography is a worthwhile read).

We were talking about the Kandahar offensive (sorry, process) after the interview, which elicited a laugh from Zaeef. He held out his right hand to signify the US troops pushing into Kandahar, then drew a semicircle in the air to symbolize the Taliban. "They will not find us in Kandahar. We will go around them and attack them from behind."

For basically as long as Lebanon has existed as a modern nation, foreign forces have found the country a useful proxy to assert their regional interests in the Middle East, so it's not exactly breaking from script for the Obama administration and the U.S. Congress to assert an extremely self-interested agenda during Prime Minister Saad Hariri's first visit to Washington since coming to power last summer. (Nor is it strange for America to be self-interested, but I digress.)

Hariri met with Obama on Monday; he spent Tuesday with Vice President Joe Biden and members of Congress, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Looking at the reporting that has emerged in the past two days, those meetings have been dominated by topics of American concern: the alleged transfer of Scud missiles from Syria to Hizballah, the disarming of Hizballah, and Lebanon's role in the U.S.-led effort to sanction Iran. Shelved, for the most part: Discussion of America's mired attempt to kick-start Israeli-Palestinian peace.

As U.S. policymakers debate whether to hand Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak a "stunningly deferential," nearly strings-free endowment to be used over the next five to ten years -- an endowment that Cairo has proposed should reach a whopping $4 billion -- it might be useful to remind ourselves about the reality of life in America's ahwa-sipping, shisha-smoking Arab best friend in the Middle East.

During Afghan President Hamid Karzai's first 48 hours in Washington, D.C. -- the first half of a four-day visit that comes at a momentous time in his country's history -- the recently re-elected leader chose a distinctly non-Afghan issue to emphasize: a visit he paid on Tuesday morning to injured American troops at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

During brief remarks after the trip, before his meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Karzai spoke only of the visit, calling it "an extremely painful moment." Later that day, at a reception in his honor, Karzai brought it up again. "That was a moment of immense thinking for me as a person," he said. On Wednesday, during a joint press conference after meeting with President Obama, the Walter Reed visit -- "a very difficult moment" -- was on the tip of Karzai's tongue, to the exclusion of more controversial issues, such as Karzai's April diatribe against alleged Western interference in the October presidential election that he won.

That Karzai was reportedly "visibly moved" by the sight of devastated American soldiers is understandable and even laudable, but Karzai's repeated public mentions of the visit seemed to deliver a political message as well: I understand your sacrifice, I am your friend, but I still need you to be there for me.

The White House held a conference call yesterday afternoon -- well, afternoon DC time; it was close to midnight here -- to discuss Afghan president Hamid Karzai's upcoming visit to Washington.

Karzai arrives in Washington on Monday; he will meet with military and diplomatic officials before a three-hour (!) Oval Office meeting with President Obama on Wednesday. He's also bringing a large delegation of ministers to meet with other U.S. officials.

It didn't come as much of a surprise yesterday when the White House announced it was renewing economic sanctions against Syria.

Syria's "continuing support for terrorist organisations and pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and missile programmes, continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States," President Obama wrote in a message to Congress.

Obama praised the Syrian government for its efforts to reduce the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq (efforts which, you might remember, the Washington Post editorial page recently insisted Syria hadn't undertaken). But Obama said Syria would have to take a number of other steps before Washington would lift its sanctions.

Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat, an outspoken advocate of home demolitions and illegal construction in East Jerusalem, visited Washington this week to condemn the Obama administration's modest efforts towards a full settlement freeze.

Barkat met with Jewish organizations and legislators on Capitol Hill, and did a few television interviews, but he was reportedly denied meetings with secretary of state Hillary Clinton and Middle East envoy George Mitchell. Even some Democratic members of Congress were less than thrilled about Barkat's visit.

President Obama's Summit on Entrepreneurship - featuring more than 250 delegates from more than 50 countries (and Chamillionaire!) kicked off on Monday. It's being billed as the fulfillment of a pledge he made during last year's Cairo speech to host such a summit in Washington, so while there are delegates from Europe and India and South America, most are from majority-Muslim countries, and they're who the administration is really targeting.

A few months ago, one of the hottest topics among Afghanistan watchers in Washington was a previously little-known Pashtun tribe called the Shinwari, which signed a pledge to fight the Taliban. Dexter Filkins reported excitedly on the pledge in November and January; David Rohde went further, calling tribal militias "America's new hope" in Afghanistan.

How's the initiative working out, several months later? McClatchy's Anand Gopal checks in with the Shinwari in the Achin district of Nangarhar province, and the results aren't encouraging (long excerpt, sorry, but it's important stuff).

The Obama administration is counting on a carefully-timed sequence of events to jump-start "proximity talks" between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority.

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas will present a formal proposal for indirect talks when the Arab League's peace process committee meets on May 1. The Arab League already endorsed the talks early last month, but withdrew its support just over a week later after Israel approved new construction in Ramot Shlomo.