Summary: Iraq’s parliament has voted to reject a draft law that allows troops from Britain, Australia, and several other countries to remain in Iraq beyond the end of 2008.

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Summary: The speaker of Iraq’s parliament, Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, announced his resignation after a parliamentary session descended into chaos as lawmakers argued about whether to free a journalist who threw his shoes at President George W. Bush. … In an interview with ABC News, Vice President Dick Cheney attempted to justify the decision to invade Iraq. … A double-bombing targeting traffic police in Baghdad killed at least 18 people and wounded 52. … Raed Fahmy, Iraq’s Minister of Science and Technology, escaped injury in a car bomb explosion that appeared to be an assassination attempt.

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Summary: Thousands of Iraqis took to the streets to demand the release of Muntadhar al-Zeidi, a reporter who threw his shoes at President George W. Bush, as Arabs across the Middle East hailed the journalist as a hero and praised his insult as a proper send-off to the U.S. president upon leaving office.

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Summary: Ali al-Dabbagh, spokesman for the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, says Iraq will need a U.S. troop presence for 10 years to help build up its military forces, well past the newly agreed three-year deadline for the withdrawal of American soldiers under the U.S.-Iraq status-of-forces agreement negotiated by the Bush administration.

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Summary: A rocket attack on a U.N. compound in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone has killed two foreigners and wounded 15. … A suicide bomber struck Shiite worshippers at a mosque run by followers of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, killing at least 12 people, a day after Iraqi lawmakers approved a status-of-forces agreement with the Bush administration. … The Iraqi parliament’s approval of a security pact with the U.S. has propelled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki into a position of strength unsurpassed among Iraqi political leaders since the fall of Saddam Hussein; however, it has also set the stage for a power struggle in the run-up to the 2010 Iraqi elections, which may weaken Maliki’s dominance.

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Summary: Al-Qaida’s second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, said in an Internet video the U.S. financial crisis was caused by Washington’s military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan and taxpayers were paying the price. … Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has emerged as a nationalist strongman after reaching a status-of-forces agreement with the Bush administration requiring U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq by the end of 2011.

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Summary: A suicide car bomber targeting an American convoy exploded about 200 yards outside the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, killing at least four Afghan bystanders. … Iraq’s parliament approved a security pact with the United States that lets American troops stay in the country for three more years.

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Summary: Followers of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr stomped on and burned an effigy of President George Bush in the same central Baghdad square where Iraqis beat a toppled statue of Saddam Hussein with their sandals five years earlier. Chanting and waving flags, thousands of Iraqis filled Firdous Square to protest a proposed U.S.-Iraqi security pact that would allow American troops to stay for three more years.

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Summary: Iran praised the Iraqi Cabinet for approving a U.S-Iraq status-of-forces agreement. … Michael Hanna, an analyst at the Century Foundation in New York, said a continuing but finite presence of U.S. troops in Iraq could benefit Iran because it provides “retaliatory options” as Tehran pursues a nuclear program opposed by the West.

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Summary: An Associated Press tally showed at least 26 deadly bombings in Baghdad in the first half of November 2008, compared with 28 for all of October and 22 in September. At least 102 people were killed in the Iraqi capital in the first half of November 2008, compared with 95 in October and 96 in September, according to the AP count.

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