President Obama is halfway through his first 100 days in office and, although he has focused primarily on domestic policy, he also has made a number of foreign policy moves. NEW YORK (CNN) -- President Obama is halfway through his first 100 days in office and, although he has focused primarily on domestic policy, he also has made a number of foreign policy moves. Obama selected Hillary Clinton as secretary of state and she has made several overseas ...

After a group of Israeli farmers sought last year to expand their property in the hills near Jerusalem, they discovered an archeological gem beneath the dirt. A team led by Daniel Ein Mor barely had to scratch the surface before finding the remains of a Byzantine monastery, he told CNN on Wednesday. "The excavation at Nes-Harim supplements our knowledge about the nature of the Christian-Byzantine settlement in the rural areas between the main cities in this part of the country ...

Prominent scholars and experts are urging President Obama to adopt strong policies backing democracy in the Middle East. More than 140 people signed an open letter to the president. Its message will be the topic of a news conference Tuesday at the National Press Club in Washington. "We urge you to elevate democratic reform and respect for human rights as key considerations in your engagement with both Arab regimes and Arab publics," the letter said. "We are writing ...

President Obama plans to visit Turkey in about a month, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Saturday. Clinton was holding talks in Ankara with officials "to emphasize the work the United States and Turkey must do together on behalf of peace, prosperity and progress," she said. Obama had said he was going to deliver a speech in a Muslim capital within the first hundred days of his presidency. Clinton did not say that Obama would be making such a speech ...

Before he was Pope, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger would hold an annual summer retreat for his former theology students, focused each year on a single theme of acute concern. Three months after his rise to the papacy, Benedict XVI continued the tradition with a closed-door encounter in the Vatican's breezy summer residence, Castel Gondolfo. The topic chosen that first year as Pope was Islam, and the keynote speaker was Father Samir Khalil Samir, a soft-spoken, Cairo-born Jesuit and an expert ...

A right-wing Dutch politician arrived in the U.S. Thursday to show his controversial film attacking Islam. Geert Wilders says he fears the Islamization of Europe but his short film on the subject has provoked death threats, Muslim protests and led the UK to refuse him entry. In the U.S., Wilders is touring with the film "Fitna" and meeting with lawmakers in Washington. The 16-minute documentary juxtaposes passages of the Quran with the mass murder of 9/11 and other acts by ...

Islamist fighters in Somalia have made significant gains in the country, according to the latest statement purportedly from al Qaeda's second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri. The 25-minute audio recording, titled "From Kabul to Mogadishu," focuses primarily on the "important developments" in Somalia, which al-Zawahiri called "a step on the path of victory of Islam." CNN cannot authenticate the message, which was released on Sunday and was interspersed with television news reports and statements from various al Qaeda-linked commanders. CNN analysts who listened ...

The Taliban and the government of North West Frontier Province in Pakistan have agreed to a permanent cease-fire in the nation's volatile Swat Valley, an official said. Syed Mohammad Javed, commissioner for the Malakand region, which includes Swat Valley, told reporters in Mingora that the two parties had agreed to make permanent a 10-day cease-fire declared earlier this week. Javed said the agreement meant boys schools will reopen on Monday and camps will be set up for Swat residents who ...

A U.S. congressional delegation visited Gaza Thursday, marking the first time that American lawmakers have entered the Hamas-controlled Palestinian territory in eight years, according to the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem. The delegation included Reps. Brian Baird, D-Washington, and Keith Ellison, D-Minnesota, who is the first Muslim to serve in the U.S. Congress. Sen. John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, also visited Gaza separately from the two congressmen, according to an official who was traveling with the senator. None of the ...

The Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at then-President George W. Bush told a judge Thursday that he was protesting against the U.S. "occupation" of Iraq. Muntadhar al-Zaidi's hour-long appearance at the Central Criminal Court of Iraq was his first public appearance since his arrest two months ago. Al-Zaidi told the judge that he had intended to humiliate Bush in the past. As Bush listed the gains made in Iraq during the mid-December news conference, al-Zaidi said, he was thinking ...