British politics has the fortune of a peaceful summer month to give followers of current affairs a welcome break from the turbulent world that we live in. In such unforgiving environments elsewhere, a similar break would be a minor miracle. But despite the perpetual gloom, some positive moments have occured in the Middle East. As the season ended, the US significantly handed over the restive province of Anbar in west Iraq. Once the epicentre of the insurgency - a destructive nexus of Al-Qaida in Iraq, Sunni nationalists and Ba'thists - it has experienced a dramatic improvement in the last year. An important moment for the country.
The success here linked, not to a large degree but in part, to a ruthless campaign in Baghdad by the coalition. A good summer story to boost sales and provide some gung-ho sweat to a predictably cold summer was the disclosure by General Petraeus that SAS had played a vital role in securing the capital. Undercover SAS hit teams conducted a secret war had taken out 3,500 terrorists in a year and a half. Pure but probably true propaganda. The story was only picked up by the right wing newspapers, and was probably good sunbed reading.
More machoism this week, as an Israeli cabinet minister suggests that Mossad could kidnap Iranian president Ahmadinejad. Forgetting the logistical difficulties, Israel would be walking into a legal minefield. A country that has by many accounts broken numerous international laws tries to prosecute a leader who has threatened to break another law, in a figurative sense. It would dominate the syllabus of international law students for years.
Some wilder moments have arisen in the summer's required reading that has been published in Washington. First the revelation that American intelligence spied on Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki.
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