Republican Senator John McCain became the first prominent American official to visit Libya, on a one-day visit Friday to meet representatives of the rebel government and its military. – New York Times
The government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi suffered setbacks on multiple fronts on Thursday as rebels in the western mountains seized a Tunisian border crossing, fighters in the besieged city of Misurata said they were gaining ground and President Obama authorized the use of armed drones for close-in fighting against the Qaddafi forces. – New York Times
Defense Secretary Robert Gates, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon, offered the administration’s most comprehensive description to date of its battlefield aims in Libya. Gates said the United States hoped the ongoing airstrikes on Qaddafi’s forces would weaken the Libyan military enough that insurgents in broader swaths of the country would feel comfortable rising up against the Qaddafi regime. Washington and its allies want Qaddafi out of power, but only if he is removed by the Libyans themselves, Gates said. – National Journal
Countries in the NATO-led air campaign have enough precision munitions and aircraft to attack ground targets and keep military pressure on the Libyan government forces, a senior alliance official and national defense officials said. – Defense News
A top Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) leader was reported to have been killed in an ambush by Colonel Muammar Qaddafi's forces earlier this month. The LIFG leader, known as Urwah, was detained in Iran in 2004 but allowed to return to Libya to participate in the fighting against Qaddafi's regime earlier this year. - Long War Journal
British Prime Minister David Cameron insisted Thursday that NATO isn’t edging toward the deployment of ground troops in Libya despite the decision by several European nations to send military staff to assist rebel forces. – Associated Press
The top U.S. military officer said air strikes had hobbled Libyan forces, but admitted the conflict was moving into "stalemate" as Muammar Gaddafi's troops pressed on with their punishing siege of rebel Misrata. - Reuters
The Obama administration said Thursday that Col. Moammar Gadhafi’s government may be targeting Libyan civilians with cluster bombs, cautiously endorsing claims by rebels and human rights groups that the Libyan strongman’s troops are using the indiscriminate weapon on the western city of Misrata. – Associated Press
Libya urged rebels on Thursday to sit down to peace talks but said it was arming and training civilians to confront any possible ground attack by NATO forces. - Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: On April 15, the State Department notified Congress that it wanted to send $25 million of non-lethal military aid to the Libyan rebels, but as of today that money is being held up by the White House and no funds or goods have been disbursed. – The Cable
Michael Chertoff and Michael Hayden write: If disorder and disarray follow Gaddafi’s ouster, will humanitarians be prepared to stand by while the blood of retribution is spilled in the streets; or anarchy reigns; or society disintegrates; or a terrorist haven, famine and disease emerge? Whatever one’s view about the wisdom of embarking on our coalition effort in Libya, prudence suggests we begin serious planning about what happens when we win — including what effort and resources and time will be required. – Washington Post
Sarah Sewall and Anthony Zinni write: It’s time we recognize that the West conducts military action to prevent civilian slaughter — but refuses to plan systematically for that possibility. Military planners like to say that hope is not a strategy. Neither is denial. – Washington Post
Syria
Syria deployed police officers, soldiers and military vehicles in two of the country’s three largest cities on Thursday ahead of a call for nationwide protests that will test the popular reception of reforms decreed by President Bashar al-Assad as well as the momentum that organizers have sought to bring to a five-week uprising. – New York Times
Escalating anti-government demonstrations in Syria have put the Obama administration in a quandary as it tries to protect a range of wider U.S. interests while supporting what it has called the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people. – Washington Post
Unable to stem a growing popular uprising with promises of reform, ceaseless propaganda and restrictions on the news media, Syria's government still retains one powerful weapon: the solid support of a secretive web of security forces that so far show no signs of abandoning President Bashar Assad and his Baath Party. – Los Angeles Times
The son of the former commander of the Syrian Republican Guard, Mr Makhlouf controls as much as 60 per cent of the country’s economy through a complex web of holding companies. His business empire spans industries ranging from telecommunications, oil, gas and construction, to banking, airlines and retail. He even owns the country’s only duty free business as well as several private schools. This concentration of power, say bankers and economists, has made it almost impossible for outsiders to conduct business in Syria without his consent. - Financial Times
President Bashar al-Assad's violent crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Syria will eventually lead to his overthrow, former vice president Abdelhalim Khaddam said in remarks published on Thursday. - Reuters
President Bashar al-Assad ended Syria's state of emergency, in effect for nearly 50 years, on Thursday in an attempt to defuse mass protests against his authoritarian rule that have gripped Syria for over a month. - Reuters
Prominent Syrian opposition figure Haitham al-Maleh dismissed a decree lifting emergency law on Thursday and said the move was "useless" without an independent judiciary and accountability for security apparatus. – New York Times
Max Boot writes: There is no need for military action but there is much more we could do at this stage to encourage the peaceful overthrow of the dictator in Damascus. That Obama isn’t doing any of it is simply a head-scratcher. - Contentions
Yemen
The secretary general of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council traveled to the Yemeni capital, Sana, on Thursday to offer the embattled president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, a deal to solve Yemen’s current political crisis. A Yemeni government statement promised an official response within 24 hours. – New York Times
A Gulf Arab peace plan presented in Sanaa on Thursday calls for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to transfer power over three months, an official said, the latest effort to stop Yemen's descent into further violence and chaos. - Reuters
Bahrain
A government crackdown on the Shiite-dominated political opposition is reaching deep into Bahrain’s middle-class professions, according to local political leaders and human rights activists, potentially threatening the country’s long-term stability. – Washington Post
An American human rights group said on Friday that the number of physicians who have gone missing in Bahrain has risen to more than 30, the latest indication that the country’s health care system being drawn into Bahrain’s confrontation with pro-democracy campaigners. – New York Times
A prominent Bahraini human rights activist went on military trial on Thursday, his daughters said, after the Gulf Arab kingdom launched a crackdown on protesters. - Reuters
Egypt
As part of the general mood here to expunge everything reminiscent of former President Hosni Mubarak, an Egyptian court on Thursday ordered the removal of his name and likeness from all public institutions. – New York Times
Egypt's public prosecutor on Thursday ordered former energy minister Sameh Fahmy and five other senior energy officials detained for questioning into a natural gas deal with Israel the government is reviewing. - Reuters
Hundreds of supporters of a radical Muslim Egyptian cleric called on the United States to release him in a rare public demonstration by Islamists who have become more vocal since President Hosni Mubarak was ousted. - Reuters
Protesters in a southern Egyptian city insisted Thursday their new Christian governor resign, stepping up a week-long challenge to his appointment by the country's military rulers. - Reuters
Morocco
Colum Lynch reports: The United Nations and France have been among the most enthusiastic supporters of the popular uprisings spreading across Africa, resorting to, or at least backing, the use of military force in Ivory Coast and Libya to foster democratic change. But their fervor for bold political reform has not been felt in the North African territory of Western Sahara, Africa's last colony, where they have favored deference to the slow incremental path to change advocated by the territory's ruling power, Morocco. – Turtle Bay
Iraq
Senior U.S. and Iraqi military officials have been in negotiations about keeping some 10,000 American troops in Iraq beyond the scheduled withdrawal of all U.S. forces at year's end, according to officials familiar with the talks. But the discussions face political obstacles in both countries, and have faltered in recent weeks because of Iraqi worries that a continued U.S. military presence could fuel sectarian tension and lead to protests similar to those sweeping other Arab countries, U.S. officials say. – Wall Street Journal
The Iraqi army can maintain security, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said April 21 in talks with America's top military officer, the latest official to visit Baghdad ahead of an upcoming U.S. pullout. - AFP
A government ban on protests on the streets of the capital has led some Iraqis to question their leaders' commitment to democracy and the rule of law. - Reuters
Kuwait
Kuwait's foreign minister said an Iranian spy cell uncovered by the Gulf Arab state last year monitored the U.S. military presence and possessed explosives to bomb "strategic" facilities. "We are talking about a cell whose task was not only to monitor and record the (U.S.) military presence that is in their view hostile -- the American forces presence on Kuwait lands -- but it exceeded that," Sheikh Mohammad al-Salem al-Sabah told Dubai-based Al Arabiya television. - Reuters
Turkey
Turkey's High Election Board moved to partly reverse its decision barring Kurdish parliamentary candidates from June election ballots, following mounting political pressure and a third day of violent demonstrations in the southeastern part of the country. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Against the backdrop of the Arab Spring, Turkey’s ever restive Kurds have begun a fresh push to achieve what they have been fighting for since the founding of the Turkish republic in 1923: true freedom of representation and the right to be educated in their mother tongue. – New York Times
Israel
A declaration signed by dozens of prominent Israeli academics, writers and artists welcoming a Palestinian state on the basis of Israel’s 1967 borders was presented Thursday at the site of Israel’s 1948 proclamation of independence. – Washington Post
The United Nations called on Thursday for "bold and decisive steps" to relaunch the Israeli-Palestinian peace process as the region awaits a possible new initiative by U.S. President Barack Obama. - Reuters
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Thursday it would be "illogical" for the United States to block a Palestinian bid for statehood planned at the United Nations in September. - Reuters
Asia
Afghanistan
The U.S. military, using Google Earth and disposable parachutes, is escalating its airdrops to troops in isolated outposts, to avoid exposing ground convoys to ambushes and roadside bombs. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
A Pentagon agency has set up a team of experts to find ways to foil buried homemade explosives that increasingly are killing and maiming troops in Afghanistan. – Washington Times
The outpost, in the northeastern mountains of Paktika Province, has not been shelled since late last summer, due largely, soldiers here believe, to a shift in tactics that started when a new unit came in and began relentlessly patrolling the surrounding mountains, always on foot and usually at night. The incessant patrols took away the insurgents’ vantage points, and they have barely engaged since. Now the unit, Company E of the Second Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment — a part of the 101st Airborne Division — is trying to solidify those gains by pushing the Taliban out of several nearby villages that American commanders believe are among the last of their sanctuaries in the area before the warmer summer months, when insurgent activity is heaviest. – New York Times
The commander put the laser-pointer away and went to the maps on the wall, which he knows as well or better than many know the inside of their own houses…Amid all the details of the 90-minute interview, there was a critical point [Maj. Gen. John F.] Campbell kept returning to: The key to long-term success and an eventual acceptable end-state is partnership with the Afghan people on every level. – The Leaf-Chronicle
If hard-won security gains made against the Taliban over the past year can be sustained during the peak fighting season in Afghanistan this summer, the U.S. and its allies may find they have “turned a corner” by the end of this year, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday. – Associated Press
Pakistan
This week there was no smiling photo op, and the tone of statements made separately by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pakistan’s army chief was far from cordial. More than ever before, the lack of trust between the strategic partners and the gulf between their perceptions of regional threats was made palpably and publicly clear. – Washington Post
The Pakistani army on Thursday rejected what it called “negative propaganda” by the United States, hours after the top U.S. military officer accused the country’s spy agency of continued links to a powerful Afghan Taliban faction. – Associated Press
Two U.S. pilotless aircraft fired four missiles into a house in Pakistan's North Waziristan region on the Afghan border on Friday killing 25 militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said. - Reuters
At least 15 people were killed and several wounded when a bomb ripped through a club for card players in Pakistan's biggest city of Karachi Thursday, police said. - Reuters
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