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Investigative journalist Allan Nairn reveals Admiral Dennis Blair played a critical role in backing the Indonesian occupation of East Timor during the 1990s. At the height of a wave of ruthless attacks on Timorese that killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands, Blair personally informed top Indonesian general Wiranto of unwavering U.S. support. He continued to support the Indonesian military until international outcry forced the Clinton administration to withdraw its military and diplomatic backing.

An Austin-based activist named Brandon Darby has revealed he worked as an FBI informant in the eighteen months leading up to the Republican National Convention. Darby has admitted to wearing recording devices at planning meetings and wearing a transmitter embedded in his belt during the convention. He is expected to testify on behalf of the government later this month in the trial of two Texas activists who were arrested at the RNC on charges of making and possessing Molotov cocktails.

    With multiple diplomatic efforts to stop the violence in Gaza urgently under way, Hamas could greatly speed and aid those efforts by ceasing the rocket attacks on Israeli towns. The international community has long sought reform of Israeli military and social policy towards Palestinian lands. While it is true that some Israelis are resistant to any reform that would empower Palestinian residents, such reform would become inexorable absent deliberate provocation of Israel's military wrath.

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    Washington - In filling four senior Justice Department positions Monday, President-elect Barack Obama signaled that he intends to roll back Bush administration counterterrorism policies authorizing harsh interrogation techniques, warrantless spying and indefinite detentions of terrorism suspects.

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    New Delhi - India's Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee said Monday that his government has delivered a dossier to Pakistan containing evidence of the involvement of Pakistanis in the Mumbai massacre - an act that strategic experts say amounts to an ultimatum to bring the perpetrators to Indian justice.

    Signalling that India is not prepared to accept further vacillation by Pakistan on its demand to extradite the terrorist masterminds responsible for the terrorist strike, Mukherjee said: "We have today handed

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The UN says around a quarter of the dead are civilians, but that figure only counts women and children, excluding adult males. Today, we will look at one of those men killed. I am joined by Fares Akram. He is the Gaza correspondent for The Independent of London. His father was killed in an Israeli F16 attack on Saturday. His wife is nine months pregnant. We also speak with UNRWA’s Christopher Gunness on the Israeli bombing of an UN school that killed three people.

    Acknowledging the legal wrangling isn't over, Democrat Al Franken said today he was humbled and proud to be "the next senator from Minnesota."

    In a five-minute statement given to two dozen reporters outside his Minneapolis home, Franken said: "I'm ready to go to Washington and get to work just as soon as possible."

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    Detroit - Huge rebates and zero-percent loans couldn't overcome economic uncertainty as U.S. auto sales plunged 36 percent in December, capping a dismal year that saw sales free-fall by 2.9 million vehicles from 2007.

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    U.S. lawmakers, critical of the Securities and Exchange Commission's failure to uncover Bernard Madoff's alleged $50 billion fraud, demanded the agency speed up an internal investigation of its missteps to help in their overhaul of market regulations.

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• Israeli Attack Intensifies; Tanks Enter Khan Yunis
• Israel Bombs UN School, Three Killed
• Doctor: Most Palestinian Casualties Are Civilians
• Red Cross: Gaza Is a “Full-Blown" Humanitarian Crisis
• Bush Refuses to Call for Ceasefire
• Poll: Americans Divided Over Israeli Attack
• Obama Defers to Bush on Gaza Crisis
• Obama Taps Leon Panetta to Head CIA
• Bush Critic Picked to Head Office of Legal Counsel
• Obama: Future Will Be “Dramatically Worse” If Stimulus Plan Is Not Approved
• Canvassing Board: Al Franken Won Minn. Recount; Coleman to Sue
• US Opens Massive New Embassy in Iraq
• Bush to Create World's Largest Marine Protection Area
• JetBlue & TSA Officials Pay Raed Jarrar $240,000 Settlement
• Video: Police Shoot Dead Unarmed Black Man on Oakland Train Platform

Former Clinton chief of staff Leon Panetta has been nominated to serve as director of CIA under Obama. (Photo: The New York Observer)

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    Chicago - Illinois U.S. Senate appointee Roland Burris is leaving for Washington Monday afternoon for a high-stakes showdown on Capitol Hill about whether he'll succeed President-elect Barack Obama in Congress.

    Burris, appointed by embattled Gov. Rod Blagojevich, was leaving a day after dozens of black leaders and ministers organized by U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush gave him a rousing send-off at New Covenant Church on Chicago's South Side.

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    Reporting from Gaza City and Jerusalem - Israel continued to tighten its grip on the Gaza Strip today, as world leaders pushed for an end to the fighting that entered its 10th day.

    After effectively bisecting the Gaza Strip over the weekend, the Israeli military announced that it had seized high-rise buildings and attacked tunnels at the edge of Gaza City. Further advances by the Israeli military would bring it into the heart of the Gaza's major city.

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    Federal Reserve officials, after taking the historic step of cutting the benchmark interest rate to as low as zero, are calling for greater government spending to help revive the U.S. economy.

    San Francisco Fed President Janet Yellen said yesterday at an economics conference in San Francisco that "it's worth pulling out all the stops" with an economic recovery package.

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    Can a remedy serve for both global warming and poverty?

    A few months ago, Van Jones, the founder and president of a group called Green for All, went to visit New Bedford, Massachusetts. His first stop of the day was the public library, where someone had assembled an audience of about thirty high-school dropouts. They leaned back in their chairs, hands in the pockets of their oversized sweatshirts.

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    The steady, strong winds over the Atlantic off New England have attracted another developer interested in harnessing them for power generation.

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Sameh Habeeb is a Palestinian journalist in Gaza City. He joins us on the phone. We also speak with Samer Badawi, the executive director of United Palestinian Appeal, a Washington-based charity established in 1978 to assist needy Palestinians. [includes rush transcript]

Earlier this morning, three Qassam rockets exploded in open areas in the western Negev in Israel. We go to the region to speak with Neve Gordon, chair of the Department of Politics and Government, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel, and the author of Israel’s Occupation. [includes rush transcript]

On the diplomatic front, the Security Council is meeting again today to discuss the crisis, after Sunday’s emergency session did not produce a ceasefire resolution. On Saturday, the United States blocked a UN Security Council statement calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Egypt, meanwhile, is hosting meetings for a European-backed ceasefire today. [includes rush transcript]

Damage to a home caused by a Hamas rocket in the Israeli border town of Sderot. Israel says it will continue the current military operation in Gaza until the rocket attacks on Israel stop. (Photo: Rina Castelnuovo / The New York Times)

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