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Secret Centrifuges

Laptop of death perhaps not a laptop

Laura Rozen over at Politico (sorry, POLITICO) catches a detail I missed in the excerpts of the IAEA "secret annex."

You'll recall from yesterday's post that the information in this annex comes from a laptop reportedly delivered to the IAEA by U.S. intelligence. That story is full of holes, though; there are serious questions about the laptop's provenance, including reports that it came from the Mujahideen e-Khalq.

But now it appears that U.S. intelligence is changing its story.

Secret Centrifuges

Questionable intelligence

David Sanger and Bill Broad have a front-page story in today's New York Times that is attracting a lot of attention. Their story claims that the IAEA believes Iran has "sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable" nuclear weapon.

The story is based on an internal IAEA report, the so-called "classified annex" we've been hearing about for months. The Institute for Science and International Security obtained the relevant excerpts from the IAEA report and posted them online (pdf).

B'Tselem: Settlements occupy 42 percent of West Bank

Ben-Eliezer makes "secret trip" to Turkey: Israeli TV

CENTCOM talking sense on Hamas and Hizballah

Al-Akhbar: Our weekly brief

Peace Processing

Talking about direct talks: Netanyahu returns to the White House

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivering a statement in Jerusalem on July 1, 2010. (Photo: AFP)
US president Barack Obama will use a White House meeting with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push for an extended West Bank settlement freeze. If Netanyahu doesn't offer one - and the domestic politics are quite difficult for him - it's hard to see any possibility of direct talks with the Palestinian Authority later this year.

The Afghan Surge

Obama's southern strategy

Gen. David Petraeus testifying on Capitol Hill. (Photo: Reuters)
The president's decision to nominate Gen. David Petraeus as the commander of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan won't mean a major change in strategy. But there are mounting reasons for pessimism about current policy, particularly the relentless focus on southern Afghanistan. The deployment of tens of thousands of additional troops to Kandahar and Helmand serves few NATO objectives.

Freedom Flotilla Killings

Anticlimax: How much did the flotilla raid really change regional politics?

A demonstration in London against the Israeli attack on the Gaza-bound flotilla. (Photo: AFP)
It has accelerated Israel's isolation from several of its neighbors and allies; it has sharpened divisions within Turkish domestic politics; it has deepened perceptions that the Obama administration as too close to Israel. And it seems to have had a remarkably minor impact on Palestinian domestic politics.