Today's Headlines and Commentary

The intensity of the Russian and Syrian offensive is driving rebel groups to ally with extremist factions linked to al-Qaeda, the Wall Street Journal reports. The insurgents—including groups formerly backed by the United States—hope that partnering with the militant Islamist groups will improve their odds of survival and success in the ongoing conflict. This move poses a serious complication for the United States, which has been working to train and equip moderate rebels while also targeting rebels with extremist connections. Reuters notes that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will talk today about distinguishing between moderate and extremist groups.

Ground operations in the siege of Aleppo continue as government forces push into the center of the city, Reuters remarks. Rebel and government media sources have presented conflicting information regarding how far the government has penetrated into rebel-held territory. A force of 6,000 pro-government troops is massing outside of Aleppo, preparing to move on the rebel-held eastern part of the city, the Guardian reports. The force includes several hundred Syrian troops and roughly 5,000 Shia foreign fighters from Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, and Afghanistan.

The W.H.O. announced that Syrian and Russian airstrikes in Aleppo have killed 338 people this week, 100 of whom were children, the New York Times writes. The Syrian government and Russian forces are targeting civilian hospitals, water supplies, and food sources necessary to sustain the population. Reuters commented on the destruction of a water station in Aleppo just this morning, citing competing claims about which side was responsible. Rebels and human rights groups blame government airstrikes, while the government accuses the insurgents of destroying the water station in anticipation of losing the territory.

The Russian military has deployed more bombers to a Syrian air base and may send more ground attack aircraft, Reuters reports. Russia partially withdrew its forces from Syria in March, when Russian President Vladimir Putin declared Russia had secured its core objectives in Syria. Russian officials announced today, however, that they have no time frame for ending the country’s military intervention in Syria.

The Washington Post chronicles the Afghan National Security Forces’ struggle to cope with extremely high casualty rates. The Afghan government is grappling with a resurgent Taliban and its limited capacity to evacuate its wounded and dead, with recent data showing losses of up to 125 troops a week. Last week, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford expressed concerns over casualty rates rising as the war reaches a “stalemate.”

The United Nations alleges that a U.S. airstrike killed 15 civilians in eastern Afghanistan, writes the Times. Reports are conflicting: the United States maintains it targeted Islamic State militants, the United Nations claims that some Islamic State fighters were among the casualties but most were civilians, and the Afghan government’s investigation found that the airstrike killed 18 militants and five civilians. Regardless of the specifics, the allegations come amid increased scrutiny over American targeting practices following an inadvertent attack on Syrian government forces two weeks ago and numerous targeting failures in Afghanistan over the years.

India is pressuring Pakistan to free a soldier that the Pakistani military captured in Kashmir, the Guardian reports. It is unclear if the Indian soldier was part of last week’s cross-border raid on “terrorist launchpads,” which Pakistan denies ever happened. The raid was the culmination in a series of retaliatory measures after a Pakistani-sponsored terrorist organization attacked an Indian military base earlier this month.

The United States Congress voted this week to override a presidential veto of JASTA, legislation that would allow family members of 9/11 victims to sue the Saudi government. Congressional leaders, including Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who voted for JASTA and to override the veto now claim that there are problems with the legislation that must be fixed, writes the Hill. They also criticized Obama for not speaking out against the unintended consequences, despite the president’s veto and vocal public relations campaign about the potential that American officials and service members could be vulnerable to reciprocal lawsuits from other countries.

Now that the bill has become law, disputes over Saudi Arabia’s involvement in 9/11 will likely go to court in Manhattan, reports the Times. Exhaustive government investigations into the attack over the past 15 years have failed to produce evidence of Saudi involvement, and now lawyers will try to find new evidence implicating the kingdom.

JASTA’s passage is a blow to the already fraying U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia, the Times argues. After seeing the United States abandon Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during the Arab Spring, negotiate a nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia’s long-time rival Iran, and criticize the kingdom for its human rights record, the Saudi government is questioning its assumptions about the durability and strength of its partnership with the United States. The backlash to JASTA could include decreased cooperation between the two countries, ranging from arms sales to counterterrorism. The Wall Street Journal has more.

Saudi Arabia reached a compromise with the United Nations on an investigation of human rights abuses in its intervention in Yemen, writes the Guardian. After the United Nations threatened an independent investigation, the Saudis eventually agreed to attach U.N. investigators to a Yemeni inquiry. A Human Rights Watch official described the agreement as “a step in the right direction” but nonetheless “fell short” of ideal.

World leaders gathered in Jerusalem on Friday to attend the funeral of Shimon Peres in a ceremony that acted both as a eulogy for the departed Israeli leader and as a major diplomatic occasion. While both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas attended the event, the Times notes that peace in the region seems as elusive as ever.

The Wall Street Journal provides further reporting on the diplomacy surrounding the release of four American citizens detained by Iran in January, writing that the United States agreed to support the premature lifting of U.N. sanctions on Iranian state banks on the same day that the detainees were released. The U.S. commitment to lift sanctions was finalized along with an agreement to deliver money owed to Iran from a dispute over a pre-revolutionary arms deal and an agreement to drop charges against 21 Iranians, which also committed Iran to releasing the U.S. detainees.

In an audio clip that appears to date from a February fundraiser, Hillary Clinton can be heard indicating doubts over an Obama administration program for nuclear modernization, the Times writes. The Washington Free Beacon, the conservative news outlet that released the clip, indicated that the audio had been obtained through hacking but did not disclose who was responsible for the hack and leak.

The Daily Beast reports that, despite mounting evidence on the suspicious nature of the Trump campaign’s ties to the Kremlin, Republican senators are blocking Democratic efforts to investigate possible links between Putin and the Republican nominee for president. Democratic legislators have spearheaded efforts to investigate the campaign’s connections to the Kremlin on the basis of classified intelligence briefings, but have yet to shore up any Republican support for the measures.

Belgium is planning to expand the scope of an intensive security program from Molenbeek, the neighborhood that was home to the perpetrators of November’s attack in Paris, to target other Brussels neighborhoods as well. The country has struggled to effectively address the presence of militant Islamism among young immigrants and children of immigrants. The Wall Street Journal has more.

A Hungarian referendum on immigration policy is calling into question the future of an EU plan requiring member states to take in a given amount of migrants. The Journal writes that the referendum, which is set for October 2nd, will allow Hungarian voters to cast their ballots on whether their country should accept EU mandates on resettling refugees within Hungary. The country has been one of the most hostile to refugees and migrants, closing the border and refusing to allow refugees to pass through.

Three Chinese fishermen have died following a confrontation with the South Korean coast guard on Thursday, the AP reports. The coast guard vessel threw flashbang grenades onto the boat to prevent it from illegal fishing off the coast of South Korea, only to cause a fire that was likely responsible for the deaths of three of the men onboard. This incident is the latest in a series of violent confrontations between South Korean coast guard vessels and Chinese fishing boats venturing into South Korean waters.

South Korea plans to deploy a unit of the THAAD missile defense system on a golf course southeast of Seoul, Reuters writes. The unit had originally been planned to be deployed elsewhere in the region, but nearby residents became concerned that the area could become a target for North Korean forces in the event of war.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte raised eyebrows by comparing himself favorably to Hitler on Friday, saying that he would like to kill “three million” drug addicts like “Hitler massacred three million Jews.” Duterte’s shocking rhetoric is only the latest controversy that has surrounded his recent anti-drug campaign, which has been criticized for encouraging extrajudicial killings in alarming numbers. The Times has more.

Meanwhile, Reuters takes a look at Duterte’s pivot toward Beijing and away from Washington. The president’s planned visit to China next month may further strain the Philippines’ diplomatic relationships in an already tense region.

At the Miami Herald, Carol Rosenberg reports on recently released documents that cast many of the Guantanamo detainees previously believed to be “the worst of the worst” in a very different light. New intelligence reports prepared for status evaluations of Guantanamo Bay’s remaining detainees indicate that several individuals were guilty of either mistaken identity or much lesser crimes than previously believed. The reports raise serious questions about what appear to be major intelligence errors, though it remains unclear “who got it wrong, and when.”

ICYMI: Yesterday, on Lawfare

Rachel Bessette examined what Jordan’s recent parliamentary elections can tell us about the future of the kingdom.

Stephanie Leutert posted an interview with Enrique Roig, the former Central America Regional Security Initiative coordinator at USAID, on how U.S. funding to prevent violence in Central America is actually allocated.

Ingrid Wuerth took a closer look at what’s actually in JASTA.

Paul Rosenzweig flagged a suit filed to stop the ICANN and IANA transition.

Quinta Jurecic posted a report issued by the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Justice on the FBI’s use of Section 215 from 2012-2104.

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