Air Strikes

WASHINGTON -- Five days after a stark U.S.-backed warning, Serbian forces besieging Sarajevo are starting to talk their way out of the threat of air strikes next week.With six days left before the deadline passes for NATO to begin air strikes, negotiations between United Nations commanders and Bosnian Serb gunners have assumed center stage. Meanwhile, some U.N. spokesmen's comments suggest that they might be willing both to let the deadline slip and to accept certain Serbian conditions for surrendering their guns.

The Clinton administration was wrong to bomb Sudan and Afghanistan.These bombings showed a disregard for international law and a disrespect for our constitutional system of government. They won't solve the problem of terrorism; they may exacerbate it. And they reduce us to the tactics of the terrorists themselves.And the timing of the attacks raises the question of presidential selfishness and recklessness. Less than three days after Clinton's lowest day in office, just as calls for his resignation were beginning to mount, he launches these attacks, knowing full well that he was bound to receive a boost in popularity.

For a few hours last night, rap fell silent on Baltimore's V-103 and gospel was stilled on Heaven-600. Country-and-western took a break on WPTX down in Lexington Park and the symphonies paused on WSCL in Salisbury.Gov. William Donald Schaefer and a SWAT team of state officials took to the airwaves on 11 Maryland radio stations and Maryland Public Television to answer listeners' questions on crime.From the moment the phones started ringing at the second Governor's Radio Summit on Violent Street Crime, it appeared that the evening would tap plenty of frustration but generate little consensus and uncover few new ideas.

JERUSALEM -- Eight Lebanese civilians were killed yesterday when Israel conducted its first strike against the militant Islamic group Hezbollah since the government accused it of attacking Jewish and Israeli institutions abroad, south Lebanese security sources said.An Israeli Army spokeswoman apologized for what she said was the mistaken bombing of a home in the village of Deir Zaharani.The spokeswoman said that "innocent civilians are not a target," and that the army "expresses sorrow for the casualties."

WASHINGTON - When Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, accompanied by Ambassador David Ivry, recently visited the Oval Office, President Bush remarked that Israel certainly has the right ambassador for the moment. He said this because Mr. Ivry has shown that he understands how preventive action is pertinent to the problem of weapons of mass destruction in dangerous hands. Mr. Bush's remark, pregnant with implications, revealed that the president as well as the vice president remember and admire a bold Israeli action for which Israel was roundly condemned 20 years ago. On the afternoon of June 7, 1981, Jordan's King Hussein, yachting in the Gulf of Aqaba, saw eight low-flying Israeli F-16s roar eastward.

"What is our purpose?'' Senate Minority Leader Robert Dole asked of the latest U.S. commitment of troops to Somalia. ''What is the cost? How long will they stay?''U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali addresses these questions in his most recent report to the Security Council on Somalia. But his answers would not please Mr. Dole or a growing number of senators and representatives concerned about the increasing U.S. commitment to the U.N. operation in Somalia.Mr. Boutros-Ghali explains that what began as an effort to prevent mass starvation has become a campaign ''to reconstruct [Somalia's]

JERUSALEM // Israel launched a series of air strikes on the Gaza Strip yesterday in response to renewed rocket attacks by Palestinian militants on nearby Israeli communities. The moves by both sides cast doubt on attempts to get the Middle East road map for peace back on track. Israel's defense minister vowed to deliver a "crushing" blow to militants. At least two Palestinians were killed in the attacks, the first that Israel has staged since officially ending its 38-year military rule of the Gaza Strip this month when it pulled its settlers and soldiers out of the densely populated region.

WASHINGTON -- With a single call to NATO headquarters, United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali can set into motion an air assault against Bosnian Serb targets by the largest collection of allied military power in Europe since World War II.About 65 North Atlantic Treaty Organization warplanes, more than 30 from the United States alone, were poised yesterday to launch air strikes of varying intensity in and around Sarajevo if Mr. Boutros-Ghali decides...

WASHINGTON -- The United States and Britain ended a four-day campaign of cruise missile and bomb attacks against Iraq last night, with President Clinton declaring that he was "confident we have achieved our mission" and the Pentagon reporting no casualties among attacking forces.In a brief televised speech from the White House less than five hours after he had been impeached, Clinton said that an early assessment of the 70-hour air campaign showed Iraq's ability to develop weapons of mass destruction had suffered "significant damage."

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton's foreign policy team is preparing twin diplomatic campaigns in the coming weeks to line up support for possible military action against Iraq and to try to renew stalled Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and others plan trips to Europe and the Mideast in pursuit of the initiatives.But the administration faces a tough selling job on both fronts.Important members of the United Nations Security Council -- France, Russia and China -- oppose the use of air strikes against Iraq to force Saddam Hussein to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors.