By NBC News' Moufaq Khatib

AMMAN – As the Obama administration's Middle East envoy George Mitchell prepares to meet with Jordan's leader, King Abdullah II, he can expect to hear some strong words about the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

That's because Jordan, a small country that borders Israel and the West Bank, is directly affected by the state of relations between Israel and the Palestinians. Roughly 60 percent of the Jordanian population is Palestinian, with half of them living in the country's refugee camps.  

"There is a saying here: When the Palestinians sneeze under the Israeli occupation, then Jordanians come down with the flu," said Hisham Awad, a Palestinian refugee living in Jordan.

Since the first Palestinian conflict in 1948, Jordan has been the recipient of the many waves of refugees fleeing the region's war-torn territories.

Palestinians refugees fled to Jordan in 1948 and again in 1967, and many Lebanese also sought refuge there during their country's long civil war. Many Iraqis also fled to Jordan after the U.S. invasion nearly six years ago.

The constant flood of refugees is a major issue for the country of just six million.

"[W]e are very concerned about this because there are some Israeli and American voices who are promoting the idea of transferring  even more Palestinians from the West Bank to Jordan," Salh al-Qalab, a former Jordanian Information Minister who is now a columnist for a prominent newspaper.

It is a solution to the Mideast crisis that many Jordanians believe is untenable.

That's why Jordan is trying to make the Israeli-Palestinian peace process the region's key priority. While in Jordan on Saturday, Mitchell is scheduled to meet King Abdullah II, who has stressed the need for international engagement in the peace process and favors a two-state solution.

Many Jordanians are concerned about the appointment of Hillary Clinton as secretary of state, because they view her as overly friendly toward Israel.

"Hilary Clinton was biased toward the Israelis and promoted the right of the Israelis to defend themselves at the expense of the Palestinian people," said Fahd al-Fanek, a political analyst. "She continually voted against the legitimate right of the Palestinians to resist the Israeli occupier."      

But others take heart in the appointment of Mitchell as the special envoy to the region. Mitchell, whose Lebanese roots have been noted in the region, was able to help negotiate the thorny peace process in Northern Ireland.

Dr. Abdul Hamaid al Majali, a Jordanian journalist, is waiting to pass judgment.

"It is too early to tell," said al Majali. "We Arabs need to speak with one voice, we need to be united. This will help Obama and give him the opportunity to create peace in the region and not fall back on all the old negative feelings of the previous administration."

 MUMBAI, India –  Dr. Harish Ahire led us through a maze of crowded, narrow alleyways, navigating around excited groups of barefoot children and women washing pots in buckets of precious water, just inches away from open sewers.

"When it rains, the sewage runs into their homes," he told me.

A woman rose from her washing, gesturing with broad sweeps of her arm from the sewer to the door of her tiny room, home to eight members of her family, who were huddled around a small television watching a soap opera.

"The big problem is contagious diseases – from the water. There is no clean water, no proper sanitation, no ventilation," Ahire said. Almost on cue, a large bedraggled rat strolled nonchalantly across the alley. A woman took a half-hearted swing at it with a stick, more through wary familiarity than any sense of shock.

We continued to the edge of the slum, where piles of rubbish tumbled down the banks of a stagnant river, into which most of the slum's waste eventually found its way.

Impossibly crowded
Ahire looked a little out of place in his crisp, white shirt, but the 63-year-old doctor was brought up in Mumbai's slums, where he now works, his clinic a simple two-story building near the entrance of the Ghatkopar slum.

He's a fierce advocate of the rights of India's lower castes, and I'd first met him more than 10 years ago, in the wake of a riot, during which the police had shot dead 11 slum dwellers.  

The incident was soon forgotten; the often-brutal world of the slums isn't something India likes to dwell on, even though half of Mumbai's 17 million people live in what is quaintly referred to as "informal housing."

Ian Williams/ NBC News

Dr. Harish Ahire and his daughter at their clinic in Ghatkopar slum, Mumbai

It's a catchall description for everything from simple roadside shelters, often little more than a plastic sheet to sleep under, to cardboard huts, to more permanent and sturdier settlements of concrete and corrugated iron – all of which seem almost impossibly crowded.

Ahire's slum, or colony, as the residents refer to it, is home to around 100,000 people. Mumbai's biggest, Dharavi, is home to 1 million – by some estimates the biggest and most squalid slum in Asia. Some 18,000 people crowd in per single acre there. It is a city within a city, with its own informal economy of small businesses.

Mumbai may be India's financial and entertainment capital, but you can't miss Mumbai's slums from the moment you fly in, since they encroach right onto airport land. They sit cheek by jowl with apartment blocks renting units for thousands of dollars a month.  And each year they grow bigger, as Mumbai serves as a magnet for those seeking a better life in the city.

Mixed reaction to the 'Slumdog'
Ahire hadn't heard of the movie "Slumdog Millionaire" – few have in the slums – but he says the rags to riches tale is one that resonates there. It's what draws people to Mumbai, though few will ever escape the grinding poverty in which they live. Ahire was an exception; he managed to train as a doctor, as has his eldest daughter. His youngest daughter is studying law.

The slums are a fact of life here. Middle-class India goes about its life as if they hardly exist. It is the new India of computer services and call centers that usually attracts the attention of the world – even though this touches on only a minority of Indians.

Since the film was released in India, there have been some protests – slum dwellers objecting to the word "dog" in the title of the film tore down posters and ransacked a movie theater where the movie was playing in Patna, in the eastern state of Bihar. And in Mumbai, slum residents held a protest last week and held up banners reading "Poverty for Sale" and "I am not a dog." But despite reports criticizing the film's creators for not adequately compensating the child actors, their parents have come forward to defend the creators.

Ian Williams/ NBC News

A barber at work in the Ghatkopar slum in Mumbai.

For some, escape is still just a dream
Meantime, the slums encroach on the doorstep of one of Mumbai's most wealthy suburbs, Andheri, sometimes referred to as Mumbai's Beverly Hills. It is where Bollywood's top actors and producers live, and where we met Johnny Lever, one the country's most popular comedians, who has acted in more than 300 Bollywood movies.

Lever was born and raised in Dharavi, where as a child he scraped a living for his family by mimicking movie stars. He had no formal education and could not speak proper Hindi (he spoke the street slang of the slums), but his impersonations and song and dance routines eventually drew the attention of the real Bollywood.

"If you have talent, nothing can stop you," he told me. "You can get out of the slums."

Ahire isn't so sure. "I realized my dream," he told me. "I became a doctor." But for most of those living in Mumbai's teeming slums getting out of the slums remains just that – a dream.

Related links:
Newsweek: 'Slumdog Millionaire' Director Defends Film
Child star, parents defend 'Slumdog' creators

CAIRO – President Barack Obama's first week in office has been filled with words and deeds calculated to restore America's image in the Arab and Muslim world, gestures that some of this region's leading media figures believe are already changing the way people think about the United States. 

"You can't believe the change," said Gamal Abdel Gawad, a senior political analyst in Cairo. "People are beginning to entertain the idea of the U.S. as a force of good, not evil."

But other Arab and Muslim reporters and editors gathered in Cairo to hear from President Obama's Mideast envoy remain skeptical.

"Where is the policy? Is it just words?" asked Kareem Fathi, a correspondent for Kuwait TV. 

Amr Nabil / AP

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, right, meets with U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell in Cairo on Wednesday.  Â

Beginning with his inauguration promise to seek "a new way forward" with the Muslim world based on "mutual respect," Obama has made headlines across the region by announcing the closure of the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, making his first official telephone call as president to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, sending his Middle East envoy George Mitchell to the region (whose Irish-Lebanese parentage has been duly noted by many), and granting his first television interview to the Arab satellite network al-Arabiya.

"[Obama's] approach was extraordinary because of his choice," said Randa Abul Azam, Al- Arabiya's Cairo Bureau Chief.  "He corrected eight years of Bush during which Arabs and Muslims felt portrayed as terrorists. He is trying to mend that mistake. The distinction has been made and is felt and appreciated." 

'U.S. policy must change'
Obama's Mideast envoy Mitchell is on a tour of the region this week. He was in Cairo on Wednesday to meet with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, before continuing on to Israel, and I took advantage of the opportunity to ask some of the reporters and editors waiting for him about their expectations for the new administration. 

Most seem to agree with Azam and Gawad that President Obama already has helped thaw relations, but many doubt that his charm offensive, however sincere, will translate into new policies toward the Palestinian-Israeli problem and other vexing issues like Iraq.  

"The most important thing is there will be no change in U.S. policy, only a change in the image of the U.S.," said Arab News Network reporter Yasser Gawara. "George Mitchell succeeded in Northern Ireland, but before he does anything, the U.S. policy must change."

"It was a good thing [Obama] mentioned Muslims, but will words be enough without any acts?  He appointed George Mitchell, which is a good thing, but he also appointed Hillary Clinton as secretary of state, and we know she is in solidarity with Israel," Fathi, the Kuwait TV correspondent, said. 

Others contend that Obama's decision to hit the ground running in the Middle East indicates that he sees Palestinian-Israeli peace as essential to regional stability and U.S. interests.

"All those [actions] indicate that he is interested, really interested in doing something different in the Middle East, that the Middle East is high on the priorities of the U.S. President," concluded the political analyst Gawad.

"We have good, positive indications from his inaugural speech, his appointment of George Mitchell and his interview with Arabiya," said Abul Azam (who works for the network). "But the hurt is so much. Iraq is still occupied. Palestine and Gaza are as we see. People need to see real change on the ground."    

Suzy el Geneidy, a veteran political reporter for the Egyptian political magazine Al Ahram Al Arabi, is willing to give Obama a chance. 

"[Obama] does not think Muslims are bad or evil ...His statements give us more reason to be optimistic. He wants to reach out and have a dialogue," she said. "His policy might not change 100 percent, but maybe there is an ability to listen more, a possibility of minor changes."

"There is a serious tendency toward capitalism among the well-to-do peasants."

-  Mao Zedong, The Socialist Upsurge in China's Countryside, Volume 1 (1955)

YUEQI, Chongqing – Driving around the farming villages surrounding Chongqing municipality during China's Lunar New Year holiday this weekend, we noticed plenty of evidence to support Mao's thesis.  

The most popular was the abundance of Guangdong license plates. Guangdong province, a few hundred miles southeast of Chongqing, is considered ground zero for China's economic reform experiment, the heartland of the nation's export manufacturing economy.   

"These cars all belong to people who went south and made it big," explained Li Youfu, the village elder of Yueqi. In this rural hamlet of 5,000 people, half are migrant workers, and their remittances make-up about 80 percent of the town's income. "They became little bosses down there and bought cars to bring back here." 

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

Hopes for a better life run high for China's new generation of so-called peasantry.

Outside Li's home, where he also runs a small corner shop, young men pulled up on shiny motorcycles to play mah jong for money on a nifty automated table that shuffled their tiles for them. 

"[The table] cost only 2,000 renminbi ($290)," said Li Jingshan, the village elder's 22-year-old son. That's more than what used to be his monthly salary. The younger Li came back home early in December for the holiday – a little earlier than usual – after the Guangdong food product factory that employed him suspended its operations temporarily because of the slowdown. He's worked in the south for four years, where he earned 1,800 renminbi a month ($264), plus free meals and housing. 

But the global economic crisis has reverberated around China's once-thriving coastal areas in the south and east. The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security said up to 10 million out of an estimated 150 million migrants lost their jobs last year due to the crisis. Since business has slowed at Li's factory, it's unclear whether he will have a job to go back to once the weeks-long New Year holiday comes to an end. 

"We were finishing work at two, three o'clock in the afternoon," said Li when I asked him whether there had been enough orders at the factory to keep him fully employed. Then he grinned. "More time to play!" 

VIDEO: Millions of migrant workers are returning home after losing their jobs

'These young people can't farm'
Li doesn't appear to have inherited his carefree spirit from his father.  As the older Li led us behind his two-story house to the fields and paddies which he and his fellow villagers have been farming for decades, he expressed a concern that was echoed across the countryside. 

"These young people can't farm," he said, shaking his head at the thought of his son staying home to work the land if there was no job waiting for him back in Guangdong. "They just aren't used to it." 

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

Despite steadily rising incomes, parts of China's countryside still look as they did 50 years ago.

Nor is the father keen to have his son till the soil. "Peasant incomes are very low. If they can't find work, just to live off the farm is not enough. Even with government subsidies, it's not enough," said the older Li, who earns roughly 20,000 renminbi a year (about $3,000), but those earnings come all from his little corner shop. "What I farm here is just for me and my family to eat. You can't earn enough from that." 

"This is definitely a trend we're seeing," said Zhou Litai, a high-profile labor lawyer based in central Chongqing. "It's the balinghou generation of migrant workers," he said referring to those born after the 1980s. 

Most of these migrant workers left their homes years ago and have become urban dwellers.  

"I am more used to Guangdong than I am to this place now," said Mr. Zhang, a 30-year-old from Gaosun village. Zhang, who was too shy to give his full name, began working at a garment factory in Foshan, Guangdong, back in 1997. A few years later, he left to open his own restaurant. "After coming out to work after finishing school, for ten years, I have been away all this time. I know Guangdong really well. This place – not so much." 

Pondering the options 
Zhang is taking a wait-and-see approach for now.  "If there is a chance the economy [in the south] will improve, then I will definitely go back right away." But if the downturn persists, farming isn't an option for Zhang. 

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

NBC News' David Lom films an elderly farmer cleaning rice for the new year feast.

"It doesn't bring much income," he shook his head. "You still have to go away to work. You still have to rely on work in other areas. Maybe you don't have to go too far, but you have to get out to the big cities or more developed areas, do some construction or something menial to earn better money. But to expect that we can live off our pigs or ducks, there is no way you can prosper that way." 

Concerns about maintaining social stability have propelled local governments to act. In fact, everyone we met talked about government-funded training programs for unemployed returnees. 

Wen Chen-bing, 42, quit a manager's job at a toy factory in Dongguan, Guangdong. The factory, which had supplied big companies like Mattel, had reduced its workforce from 13,000 to 3,000 in 2008. 

Wen decided to leave when he heard about a local training program designed for managers at his level. "This will give me better opportunities in the future," he said. "And the skills will be very valuable." 

Uncertainty about the economy hasn't yet muted the villagers' holiday celebrations. Folks like Zhang said they're spending the same amount of money to ring in the New Year as they usually would.

But Zhang said he has found himself wondering a lot about the future. "What do I do? What should I do?"

Related links:  
World Blog: Earning a Chinese New Year's Feast
VIDEO: Global Year of the Ox celebrations
SLIDESHOW: Year of the Ox

Iraq is holding provincial elections on Saturday. The elections are expected to set the political landscape for the next several years and its expected to include the election of more women.

VIDEO: Women run for office in Iraq

Learn more about Iraq's upcoming elections from NBC's Richard Engel:
Q &A on Iraqi provincial elections

YUBAI QU, Chongqing Municipality – It was a Chinese stand-off. 

Wang Chen, our 30-something driver from Chongqing, was looking at me anxiously.

I was grappling with not just anxiety (his) but also a mixture of guilt and resentment (mine).

The problem came up when Wang teased us with the prospect of interviewing migrant workers from his wife's ancestral village about 40 miles outside of the center of Chongqing.   

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

Paying respects during the Lunar New Year.Â

We were working on a story about how the global economic meltdown is affecting Chinese migrant workers and their hopes for the New Year. For the past couple of days, we had been driving around one small town several hours' drive away, talking to workers who had returned from the economically blighted coastal areas for the weeks-long Lunar New Year holiday.

But a group of local officials turned up, and in spite of their friendly demeanor, their presence intimidated the villagers. Where earlier the workers had spoken frankly about the difficulties of trying to make ends meet in an economic downturn, they suddenly were limiting their comments to praise for the government. Needless to say, we weren't entirely satisfied with the quality of the interviews.

So the following day we were toying with the idea of driving half a day to Chengdu, where we could try again to get a solid lead. But Wang – who was fielding regular and somewhat irate phone calls from his wife urging him to join her at her parents' village – was trying to persuade us to stop by their village under the pretext of enjoying a meal with the family. 

We understood the significance of the meal – the Chinese New Year is the most important day of the calendar and is the one time all year when families are reunited across the country for days, if not weeks. 

But we were here to work, and we had a deadline to meet.

When I explained to Wang our problem, he offered to enlist his wife's help to find a migrant worker in her village. But when we arrived, he told me that there were no migrant workers. 

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

Men play mah jong, a favorite pastime during the Chinese New Year.Â

"They're all at lunch now," he said, a little too blithely. "So why don't we just go up to my wife's parents' home now and eat?"

I stared back at him and dug in my heels. "Our agreement was that we would come here for a meal once we had finished shooting." It seemed churlish to deny him a chance to see his in-laws, especially as we were only a few hundred yards away, but I suspected that he had engineered the situation so that we would be guilted into being with his family.

"We'll come back here to see your wife once we've checked out the next village," I said.

Thus motivated, Wang Chen sped onto the next town, where the main street was bustling with activity. Children shopped for fireworks. The elderly played mah jong, a favorite pastime during the Chinese New Year. And the young buzzed around on motorcycles bought with the income from their earnings as migrant workers in the big city.

And it was one of those young migrant workers that Wang found for us: Mr. Zhang, a 30-year- old who started working in Guangdong province back in 1997. After several years' working in a garment factory, he opened his own restaurant. Business was good the first few years, but then last year it dried up, so much so he had to shut down the restaurant and come back home.  Now he's trying to figure out the next step.

We filmed Zhang and then the town's main street.

"So do we still need to go to Chengdu?" asked Wang, the same anxious expression reappearing on his face. "No, that interview went really well, thank you, we're done," I said.  "Let's go meet your in-laws."

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

The Pang family treated the NBC News team to a lavish New Year meal in their modest peasant home.Â

The reward
A little later, in the warm glow of local hospitality, we were treated to a homemade feast consisting of produce grown on the farm and meat from a 220-pound pig raised by the family and slaughtered for the occasion. 

"Good thing we didn't come here before we got that interview in the other town," said our correspondent Ian Williams. Out of politeness, we were all knocking back countless cups of local beer that our hosts insisted on pouring for us.

So with each pour, we raised our paper cups to toast Wang Chen and his family and to wish them good health and great prosperity. 

And, hopefully, his wife's forgiven me.

Related links:  
VIDEO: Global Year of the Ox celebrations
SLIDESHOW: Year of the Ox

By NBC News' Carol Grisanti and Mushtaq Yusufzai

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – The message from Washington to Pakistan was clear: there is no change in U.S. policy when it comes to going after al-Qaida and Taliban targets in Pakistan's lawless border areas. After all, Barack Obama warned during his presidential campaign that America must go after terrorist targets if Pakistan did not act first.

It should not have been a surprise, then, to Pakistanis when on Friday night, five missiles from remotely piloted Predator drones struck targets in the lawless tribal areas of North and South Waziristan – but it was. 

The twin attacks killed 22 people, including some foreign militants, but also many civilians.

Athar Hussain / Reuters

Supporters of the Pakistani Islamist party Jamat-e-Islami protest U.S. drone attacks in Karachi on Sunday.Â

Who's in charge?
The Pakistan government quickly voiced its outrage. "These attacks can affect Pakistan's cooperation in the war on terror," Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari told U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson the following day.

The foreign ministry followed up with a terse statement expressing "the sincere hope that the United States will review its policy." And Pakistan's Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani – already on record promising the country there would be no more drone attacks once Obama became president – was embarrassed

Adding to the government's problems, many Pakistanis no longer believe their government is being honest when protesting the attacks. 

"The people know that there is a tacit understanding between the government and the U.S. regarding the drone attacks," argued author and political commentator Zahid Hussain.

"This is not only fuelling outrage among the people, but is isolating the Pakistani army from the tribes people in those areas. And that affects Pakistan's own authority to contain militancy," explained Hussain. 

The anger now threatens to undermine the authority of the fledgling civilian government in Islamabad, which after one year in office, is still struggling to take control of rising militancy in the country.

Civilian victims
Western security analysts argue that the attacks are necessary because the border areas are lawless and under the control of Taliban and al-Qaida militants – not the Pakistani government.

But many locals argue that innocent civilians are the main victims of the attacks. In North Waziristan, the drone strikes are leading to mental disorders, especially among women and children, according to Dr. Munir Ahmad, a 50-year-old psychiatrist in Miranshah, a city on the border with Afghanistan that is North Waziristan's main population center.

 "The situation among the people is alarming," he said. "The women and children are so frightened from hours of drones circling overhead and then the thunderous noise of the missile attacks that now even a door slamming frightens them to uncontrollable tears," he said.

Ahmad, who specializes in treating the effects of violence, told us that two years ago he used to treat about 10 patients a day for different mental disorders – he said he now sees around 160 patients a day suffering from uncontrollable fear and rage. "I am especially worried about long-term affects on the children," he said.

Mohammed Yaqoob, a grammar school teacher in Miranshah, blames the Pakistani government for failing to protect people from the drone attacks.

"The children are so afraid that they can't concentrate on their lessons," Yaqoob told us. "They just sit in the classroom and look towards the sky watching the three or four drones that continuously hover over the town," he said.  Yaqoob said that over 30 high schools have closed in North Waziristan because parents have pulled their kids out of school and sent them to live with relatives in safer cities.

Hasbunallah Khan / AP

Pakistani tribesmen indicate damages in a house hit by a suspected U.S. missile strike in Zharki village, near Miranshah, Pakistan.

There have been 38 drone attacks in Pakistan since August – mostly in North and South Waziristan – more than three times as many as during the previous year. The drones usually fly at low altitudes in the evenings and strike at night when people are asleep.

U.S. officials point to the success of such attacks in killing many senior al-Qaida leaders, including Khalid Habib, the group's deputy chief of operations, and Rashid Rauf, the alleged mastermind of a 2006 plot to blow up airliners. 

And last week, in a sign of the growing cooperation between the United States and the Pakistani government over the drone attacks, Pakistani security forces captured Zabi-ul Taifi, a Saudi militant with a $5 million bounty on his head, in a sting operation in the Khyber tribal area.

Pakistani intelligence sources said a pilotless drone circled over the house where Taifi was holed up, while CIA agents sat in a car parked outside and watched as Pakistanis agents stormed inside. Taifi is the first senior al-Qaida figure to be captured rather than killed in a long time.

"The tribespeople are sandwiched between the all-powerful militants and the U.S. drones," said Haji Niamatullah Dawar, a resident of Mirali, North Waziristan – a 45 minute drive from the capital of Miranshah. "We have no choice now but to leave our homes and shift closer to peaceful cities like Lahore and Islamabad," he said.

Spawning more militants
Mohammed Wali, a farmer in Mirali, said that the drone attacks are causing some to join the militants.

"My neighbor was so furious when a drone killed his mother, two sisters and his 7-year-old brother last September that he filled his car with explosives and rammed it into a Pakistani army convoy," he said. "He had to avenge the death of his loved ones," Wali added. Twelve people, including ten Pakistani soldiers were killed.

"After disappointment, the next stage is aggression and then violence," said Ahmad, who believes that 90 percent of the tribes people in North Waziristan are suffering from some kind of mental illness due to the violence in the region. "I don't have the capability to see so many patients who are mentally disturbed," he said. "And they can't afford to be without help as they wait and wait for me to finally see them."

As thousands attended the funerals for the people killed in Friday's drone attacks, tribal elders said that their great hopes that Obama would stop the attacks have been dashed.

"We are very disappointed now," said Malik Taj Mohammed, a chief in South Waziristan. "Why doesn't President Obama understand that the problems we face are poverty and lack of development in our lands and spend his money trying to help us rather than kill us," he said.

"TEL AVIV, Israel – Danny Mahlouf, a 70-year-old Israeli plasterer from Ashkelon, has a message for Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, and it's personal. "Tell Ismail Haniyeh to lose the beard, and stop making trouble!"

They go way back. In the late '80s, Haniyeh worked for five years as a plasterer in Ashkelon and Mahlouf was his boss. "We were close friends but we lost contact," Mahlouf said. "Then one day my son was watching TV and suddenly he shouted, Dad, come quickly, Ismail's on TV. He's prime minister!"

Hatem Moussa / AP file

Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh waves to supporters in Gaza City, Dec. 8.Â

Their story tells much about the ties between Jews and Arabs that have been lost in the violence. The relationships between Israelis and Palestinians weren't always full of the tension and hatred that often characterize them today, and that raises the possibility that one day, somehow, it could go back to the more peaceful days.

Old friends
I met Mahlouf in a café in Ashkelon, while waiting for Grad rockets to fall, fired by Haniyeh's men in Gaza. My new friends in the café, where I went every day during the recent three-week war, told me Mahlouf's story and said I must meet him. Then one day he came in, and we talked for an hour.

He's a tough old guy who still works a six-day week. He stood up, blew out his chest, patted his firm stomach and boomed, "Guess how old I am! Ismail would recognize me right away!"            

I won't get in the way of his words, for they tumbled out. But it's Mahlouf's explanation of why he believes Ismail Haniyeh changed from a humble worker to an Islamic militant, and what his old friend thinks about him:

"He was a good worker, he worked for me for five years on a salary. He went with my son to Netanya, all over, he came to my house and I went to his in Gaza.

"There was no border post then, we all just came and went. We went to him, I went to Jabaliya like going to my own home, we ate fish there, we lived together, no difference between Jews and Arabs. We ate together, they went to Tel Aviv in their cars, I went to his house, his old house, not the new one now! Gaza was like Tel Aviv for me.

"Weddings, funerals, we were friends. He came with his wife and two children to my daughter's wedding. But one day his brother was killed and from that very day he became a Hamasnik."

On May 20, 1990, an Israeli, Ami Popper, who had been dishonorably discharged from the army, lined up Arab workers in the road in Rishon-le-Zion, and killed seven. One of them was Haniyeh's brother. Popper was sentenced to seven life terms for murder, one for each of the seven Palestinians he killed, but he could be paroled by 2023. 

SLIDESHOW: Gaza's road to recovery

'I'll never come to Israel again'
"I went to Ismail's house for the funeral," Mahlouf continued. "There were four men in masks. I thought, walla! I'm finished. I'm a dead man. Then one took off his mask and it was Ismail. He said, 'I told you not to come. I'm finished. I'll never come to Israel again.' He came with me to the Erez border to make sure I was safe, and he never came back to work. I never saw him again.           

"He wasn't religious – only later when his brother died. Then I didn't see him again till [I saw him on] TV, and he's prime minister! But today, let him stay in the bunker.

"That day at the funeral, I told him, get better, you can't kill the Jews, we are one state, you are many, you won't beat us.

"What's to talk about? They ate with us, worked with us, lived like kings. What happened? They want to get rid of us, what? Tough, we have our state, that's it. Nothing they can do about it. There they kill each other, what did they get out of it?            

"That's it, if you see him, best wishes to Haniyeh. I say to him, Ismail, get better, stop making problems, it's over. That's my message to Ismail. And lose the beard. Tell him your boss, Danny the plasterer, Rachel's husband, sends his best wishes and stop making all those problems. We all want peace."

There was a special reason to celebrate in India on Thursday with 10 Oscar nominations for movie "Slumdog Millionaire" announced. But while there's local pride, there are also some criticism about the film's stark depiction of poverty in Mumbai. NBC's Ian Williams reports from Mumbai.

VIDEO: Mixed feelings at hometown premier of 'Slumdog'

A new museum is being built in Baghdad, which will feature torture devices and 26 million documents related to Saddam Hussein's regime's crimes. NBC's Steve Wende reports from Baghdad.

VIDEO: Iraq's 'Torture Museum' shows off Saddam's crimes

By Arata Yamamoto, NBC News Producer

TOKYO – "We got up at 4:30 to see this and it was really worth it," said Tim Roberston, after visiting Tokyo's famous Tsukiji Fish Market with two friends from Melbourne. "It was probably the best sushi I've ever had."

Sections of the Tsukiji Fish Market in central Tokyo reopened to tourists this week, lifting a month-long ban which according to market officials was put in place due to the busy year-end New Year's trade.   

Katsumi Kasahara / AP

Visitors watch frozen tunas on the floor during a morning auction at Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo on Jan. 19.Â

But the local Japanese media all characterized the shutout as the result of increasingly disruptive behavior, or as they call it "bad manners," mainly by foreign tourists.

Bad behavior prompted closure
The Tsukiji Market is a bustling nexus for fish and fresh produce traders, the largest of its kind in the world with mini-turret trucks scurrying through narrow alleys handling more than 2,000 tons of marine products every day.

It's considered the gateway to Tokyo's kitchens, providing the freshest of fish to wholesalers and restaurants, and its daily trade is estimated to be worth $20 million.

In recent years, with the help of the growing global popularity of sushi and appreciation for Japanese cuisine, Tsukiji has become one of Tokyo's main attractions for visitors from abroad.

But not everyone was pleased with the influx of visitors.

"We never promoted this place as a tourist destination," said Yoshiaki Takagi, an official from the Tsukiji Market. "It's not Disneyland. The facilities are 70 years old and dangerous. And besides, we're trying to provide food for the city."

Some of the complaints from traders include flashes from cameras which could be disruptive during the fiercely competitive bidding process, a ritual that requires careful attention to the auctioneer's subtle hand signals and price calls.

A slip – or a missed sign – could be very costly, especially if they're handling the much coveted Pacific blue fin tunas which can command prices of $10,000 a fish.

Other offenses that had wholesalers aghast have been people touching fish with their bare hands, in some instances riding them and smoking on the quality-controlled trading floor – damaging fish that could end up at a five-star sushi restaurant in Ginza.

And when video surfaced of a visitor licking a prized tuna before the morning auction – it was seemingly the last straw that prompted the ban. 

 
The market has reopened on a let's see-basis and with additional precautionary measures in place such as having two guards standing by during the 5 a.m. tuna bidding and distributing leaflets to visitors detailing the market's rules in five languages.

Yet some are more than happy to see the return of the foreign visitors.

At Oedo, a small counter-only restaurant tucked inside the market, an employee handed a red light pointer to a group of foreign customers so that they could select their choice of fresh tuna and salmon rice bowls from a wall covered with pictures of their specialties.

"Ninety percent of our customers this morning were foreigners," said Izumi Nishimoto, who works at the restaurant. "Last month we took a bit of a hit."

But despite all the effort, the opportunity to see Tsukiji may not be around for long.

The city of Tokyo is planning to move the market to Toyosu, a reclaimed strip of land on Tokyo Bay by the year 2014. The reason is that much of Tsukiji's equipment, even though its part of the charm, is desperately antiquated and the small maneuvering space has proven to be increasingly dangerous.

It's a plan that's not free of controversy, however. The main concern, and one that has drawn criticisms from some of the Tsujiki traders, is that recent tests conducted by the Tokyo metropolitan government showed high levels of pollutants such as benzene and cyanogen in the soil at the new location in Toyosu.

As a result, the city has devised a $650 million plan to replace all the polluted soil by setting up a special soil-cleansing plant, a painstaking procedure that is expected to take two years.

"At the new site, the city is planning to install proper facilities to accommodate visitors so that we can confidently welcome them," Takagi explained. But as for the Tsukiji market, he said that while they're not trying to completely shut out tourists, "if people still want to come and visit, there are risks involved and if they're willing to take personal responsibility, then ... "

Now a lone station for an automated monorail system stands at the vacant lot for the new Toyosu site. But the main action and the bustle is definitely across the bay at Tsukiji. If you come to visit, just be forewarned that you might be in for a harsh chiding from one of the Tsukiji fish mongers if you break the rules.

BAGHDAD – Inspirational words like "change" and "hope," in President Barack Obama's inaugural speech found a receptive audience in Iraq. Many hope that he will be faithful to his promises and that he will be able to fix the problems created by his predecessor, George W. Bush.

"I think Obama is going to be a better president than Bush. His foreign policy will depend on using dialogue and diplomacy to solve the world's major and sensitive issues,'' said Daood Hashim, a journalism professor in his mid-50s. "Obama said many times during his presidential campaign and inauguration speech that he is going to find a solution to the Iranian nuclear activities thru dialogue – and that is the ideal way to solve problems." 

Ahmad Al-rubaye / AFP - Getty Images

An Iraqi boy follows the Arabic tradition of giving sweets on a happy occasion as others watch the U.S. inauguration ceremony on live TV at a cafe in Baghdad's Sadr City on Jan. 20.Â

Likewise, S'adee Yassen said he appreciates Obama's ideas, as opposed to what he saw as Bush's bellicose way of dealing with things. "In my opinion, Obama is going to be a peacemaker, whereas Bush was like a Roman warrior occupied all the time with attacking and invading other nations," he said.

A 39-year-old government official, Yassen said he hopes that Obama will create change in Iraq by rebuilding the country. He also believes that the "responsible withdrawal of American forces" would stop giving armed groups excuses to continue their attacks.

Diana Obaidi, 24, was inspired by the inauguration. She said that she wishes that democracy will eventually prevail in Iraq after so many decades of dictatorships. "The thing I liked most in the inauguration is the civilized and peaceful power handover. I hope all the heads of Arab states take this as an example."

However, for some Iraqis, the United States' stalwart support of Israel, which has antagonized the Arab world, has skewed the opinions of others who believe that Obama will be no different.

Ehab Sameer, a 22-year-old college student, is convinced that Obama won't stray from the policies of his predecessors. "I don't think inaugurating Obama as the new U.S. president offers any change or hope for the Middle East people, because the American policy is the same no matter what." He saw just one good development: "The only change is that Obama is black and that's good."

Rasool Shibib, a 43-year-old cafeteria owner, is pessimistic concerning U.S.-Arab policies and shares Sameer's view. "There will be a change in Obama's strategy towards the world, but  his strategy towards Arabs and Muslims will be similar to that of Bush as long as there is the Jewish lobby in the American administration."

 MOSCOW – At Papa's Place Bar & Restaurant in Moscow, inauguration night was in full swing. Red, white and blue balloons hung from the ceiling, while a steady supply of hamburgers and pizza gave the mixed crowd of Russians and expatriates a little taste of America as they gathered to watch Barack Obama's historic inauguration.

"We decided we had to do something for our American friends…and for us Russians….It's not just great for America, it's great for the whole world," said Ekaterina Yezdina, director of the Executive Language Center, who hosted the event.

Max Avdeev / AFP - Getty Images

Russians and American expatriates watch the inauguration of U.S. President Barack Obama on big screens at an American-style diner in Moscow on Jan. 20.

Other partygoers agreed. "By looking at this now, I have…a feeling of hope that something might actually change. For the better," said Igor Budantsov, 33, a lawyer sporting an American flag in his lapel.

But for Moscow, this gathering was the exception rather than the rule. Unlike elsewhere in the world, there was no sense of urgency here to watch the inauguration or groups of people gathering to watch in homes and bars.  

VIDEO: World watches as Obama takes office

"I don't plan on watching it," said Alexander Moroz, an 18-year-old student, while on a cigarette break outside of the European Shopping Mall in central Moscow hours before the inauguration.

It shouldn't come as any surprise. The political instability during the 1990s here, followed by the stable but de facto one-party rule of the Putin era, has left many in Russia disillusioned and apathetic about politics, whether domestic or international. Pre-election polls showed that while Obama consistently topped McCain, both candidates were easily beat out by those saying they simply had no preference.

More concerned with the financial crisis
Igor Sinebok, a political science student whose class stayed up all election night, said they had no plans to gather for the inauguration. For his part, Moroz said he started becoming more interested in politics late last year, but "only domestic politics, and that was because of the financial crisis."

Russia has been hit hard by the crisis, with the stock market collapsing and ongoing devaluation of the ruble. For many people, this translates into salary cuts, wage deferments or losing their jobs at a time when jobs are becoming scarcer each week.

This doesn't mean that Russians are not interested in the new U.S. president. But with the economic crisis weighing heavily on people's minds, for many here the focus is less on the history of the moment and more on how it will affect the economy.

"I hope that Obama will improve the American economy, which will then improve ours as well," said Irina Dorofeyova, 43, a Moscow hairdresser.

And if the media is a reflection of the general public's interest, this morning's Kommersant newspaper, a leading Russian business daily, had the Obama inauguration on page eight while the cover story dealt with the fate of the ruble.

There were no street parties, no fireworks nor obvious celebrations on the streets of Pakistan to herald in Barack Obama as the new American president – but on every TV news channel, all night long, Barak Obama was the news.

The entire country tuned in to the events happening more than 7,000 miles away on the other side of the globe and watched as Obama called for "the re-making of America." Well into the wee hours of the night, TV pundits and anchors analyzed and debated every word of the new president's speech and the future of U.S.-Pakistani relations.

Faeza Tariq, an Islamabad housewife and mother of two, said she and her entire family stayed awake to watch the inauguration. "The best thing for all of us is that Bush is gone and a new humble man has replaced him. This is going to be a new beginning and I hope an end to the drone attacks on us."

Emlio Morenatti / AP

A Pakistani vendor waits for customers for his newspapers with front page pictures of President Barack Obama in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on Jan. 21.Â

On Wednesday morning, Pakistanis on the streets and in the markets of Islamabad, the capital, were weighing the pros and cons of regime change in America.

"Since Obama's message to America is all about change, well, then we should expect change too," said Mohammed Sarwar, a pharmacist in Islamabad. Sarwar was already debating an Obama presidency with two of his customers when we arrived.

"I like Obama," he added. "That's why I stayed up all night to watch his ceremony. I feel he will be good for Pakistan."

Hoping for 'A New Way Forward in the Muslim World'
Next door to the pharmacy, 25-year-old Mohammed Asif was selling samosas, a fried stuffed pastry common all over South Asia. In addition to serving snacks, Asif was dishing out his own views on just how Obama was going to change America and with it, the entire world. "He will be much better for us than Bush," he said. "His father was a Muslim, and we should expect much better results for the Muslims. I am sure he will be good for Pakistan," he said.

Mohammed Hanif, who was sitting on a park bench reading the newspapers, admitted he didn't watch any TV coverage of the inauguration. "Obama should focus on eliminating all the injustices to Muslims here in Pakistan and in the Middle East and Afghanistan," he said. "If he doesn't change things, he may have to exit just like Bush, with shoes thrown on him." He quickly added, "That's just my opinion, of course," with a huge grin.

"Obama Seeks A New Way Forward in the Muslim World" was the morning's banner headline in "Dawn," a leading English language daily and seemed to reflect the hopes of the nation. All of the country's newspapers devoted front- page coverage to the high expectations of an Obama presidency.

 

SLIDESHOW: Cheers for Obama inauguration across U.S. and the globe

Mahmoud Ali Durrani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the U.S., was less sanguine. "The expectations of him are very high and the challenges are enormous, but I don't see any dramatic changes in U.S. policy," he said. 

Durrani, who recently lost his job as National Security Advisor because of a disagreement with Pakistan's prime minister, warned that the continued U.S. policy of "hot pursuit" by unmanned drones targeting al-Qaida in Pakistan's border areas is counterproductive and will not be allowed. "Obama should abolish this policy," he said.

Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, chairman of the Pakistan Senate Foreign Relations Committee, thought President Obama made a very positive speech. "Now, I hope he will begin to heal the wounds of Muslims around the world," he said. "He needs to address Palestine and he needs to review the so called war on terror."

Tribal areas on alert
Anti-American sentiments run high here where an overwhelming majority of Pakistanis point to the growing extremism and violence in the country as payback for Pakistan's role in fighting what they believe is America's war on terror.

In the tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan where al-Qaida and the Taliban have their sanctuaries, Pakistani tribesmen are worried that Obama is planning to invade Pakistan.

"The Taliban have enslaved and hijacked the majority of the tribal population at gunpoint," said Rahmanullah, a tribesman from Bajaur – one of Pakistan's seven federally administered tribal areas. "And now we will have to pay the price for America sending troops to fight us and the Taliban," he said.

 "If President Obama wants the people to shun militancy and become a civilized part of society, then he should stop spending money on this useless war and spend it on the development of our neglected children and our neglected areas," said Haji Nadir Khan, another Bajauri tribesman.

"Let us wait and see whether Obama will change his policy on Pakistan," said Asif, a 20 year-old college student in Islamabad who goes by only one name. "Even if Obama is sincere in his intentions – the institutions of the U.S. will not let him prevail, they consider us a terrorist state," he said. 

Mohammed Azeem, a fellow student agreed. "No U.S. president will ever support us," he said. "America considers Pakistan their enemy."

Still, whether or not they believe there will be a change in U.S. policies, all Pakistanis are now watching and waiting and hoping that the signals coming from Obama as he seeks "a new way forward based on mutual respect" will include them as well.

LONDON – The morning after Barack Obama's election triumph, the front-page headline in Britain's Metro newspaper read: "The Day America Became a Little Bit Cool Again."

As Obama was sworn-in as president 3,600 miles away today, there were few signs of such widespread ardor waning in London.

Morning newspapers vied for the best coverage of an event that hadn't even occurred yet with The Independent devoting no fewer than 23 pages to the looming inauguration. Tuesday's Guardian came complete with a section featuring Obama's "finest" speeches.

Jason Cumming/ msnbc.com

Emma Betsy, 21, left, and Whitney Calvert, 24, right, celebrating Obama's inauguration at a London pub.

How Obama could – or couldn't – change the world was practically the only topic being discussed on Britain's talk-radio stations, while the BBC devoted much of the day to events in D.C.

But in a society where many people don't need an excuse to enjoy a pint, the sheer number of pubs showcasing a uniquely American piece of political theater was perhaps the best illustration of how Obama has captured the imagination of many Britons.

It was anything but business as usual at the Texas Embassy Cantina, near Trafalgar Square. The American-themed bar-restaurant was packed with hundreds of loud, passionate revelers, including many Britons who'd fled work early to witness history on big screens.

Victoria Scott, 29, may be a supporter of the U.K.'s right-leaning Conservative party but she wasn't unhappy at the thought of George W. Bush leaving the White House.

"I can't help but think of the phrase, 'Things can only get better,'" she said. "If Obama does half of what people think he's going to do it'll be fantastic.

"He's certainly going to be better than the last one. Apart from the wars and Guantanamo Bay, I could never get behind anyone who mangles the English language like Bush did."

Wende Guastamachio, 54, formerly a California-based lawyer, was dressed to the nines in preparation for an inaugural ball and vowed her night would involve "eight years of deferred partying."

"This is just a celebration of so much," she said. "Being in London, I finally get to feel good about being American. British people used to say to me, 'You're okay but your president is an idiot.'"

SLIDESHOW: Worldwide celebrations for Obama's inauguration

Whitney Calvert, 24, who is originally from Peoria, Ill., likened watching Obama's speech to key moments in U.S. history.

"Being abroad you see it's not just the U.S. excited about a change," she said. "It surprised me how much about the election was on television over here and all day long there's been stuff on the inauguration on the BBC.

"I'm not sure whether people would be as excited if they weren't so upset about the previous administration and the things that happened. A lot of Europeans hate Bush."

Dance studies student Emma Betsy, 21, from Northampton, admitted she never imagined the U.S. would elect an African-American president in her lifetime. But she added, "He's only one man, he can't change the world. Change is not going to happen overnight."

'Hope he can live up to expectations'
At the Sir Paul Pindar pub on the edge of London's City financial district, dozens of business-suit-clad workers gathered in reverential silence around screens usually reserved for soccer matches.

When the sound of a ringing cell phone broke their spell, dirty looks were shot at the Blackberry's suddenly sheepish owner. Applause rang out across the bar as Obama finished by simply stating "God bless the United States of America."

Carroll Carter, Jr., head of sales for a financial technology firm, was among those mesmerized by Obama's words. "If you argue there's only one superpower left, he's a man who's representing the world," he said. "Obama's set the bar high, now he's got to jump over it. We have to pull together as a world. The challenges are not just American challenges but global challenges."

Nigerian-born Viviennisi Adeboye, a 28-year-old IT professional, described Obama's speech as "a captivating and emotional moment." She added, "America believes so much in him and Obama believes in them. I hope he can live up to expectations."

Elsewhere, some normally free London venues were seeking $25 cover charges as they hosted inauguration parties targeting both British fans and the 250,000 expatriate Americans who reside in the U.K.

The Tricycle Theatre in the traditionally Irish Kilburn area of the capital promised "American beer, pretzels and cheerleaders" as it broadcast the inauguration on a full-sized cinema screen to a sell-out crowd.

Democrats Abroad U.K. was hosting a $150-per-head inaugural ball at the ritzy Royal Lancaster Hotel. The group was also holding a luau party – complete with limbo contest – about 50 miles away in Cambridge.

And Madame Tussauds' wax museum, which last week added an Obama figure to its collection which already boasts icons like Elvis Presley, Tom Cruise, David Beckham and Ronald Reagan, was allowing anyone with an American passport to dodge the usual $36 entry fee.

Even the bookmakers got in on the action, taking bets on what color Obama's tie would be as well as whether words and phrases including "John McCain," "Hillary Clinton," "credit crunch" and "Britain" would feature in his speech.

From Kenya to Kosovo, cheers for a new U.S. president. Click the slideshow link below.

SLIDESHOW: Worldwide celebrations

Â

In America, expectations may be high that, once President-elect Barack Obama is inaugurated, change will come. But in China hopes are for the status quo.

This month, China has been celebrating 30 years of restored diplomatic relations with the United States. Amidst a series of high-profile events featuring visiting American political luminaries such as Jimmy Carter, Henry Kissinger, and Zbigniew Brzezinski, the Chinese media have waxed rhapsodic about bilateral ties.

And the trot down memory lane has taken an extra tinge of nostalgia as the Chinese government watches Obama take over the American presidency.

With Israel and Egypt closely monitoring Gaza's borders, the conflict has been nearly impossible to cover from the inside. This week, after swearing, in writing, that he and his crew didn't hold Egypt personally responsible for their safety, NBC's Richard Engel was allowed to enter Gaza. As he describes it, "It felt like a cage had been opened."

Click below to see a poignant look at life in Gaza. Engel spends time in local hospitals, on rooftops and in safe houses talking to those bearing the brunt of the conflict. 

VIDEO: Picking up the pieces in Gaza

JERUSALEM – For 17 days I have been covering the Gaza conflict, working in several Israeli towns and cities – Sderot, Ashkelon, Beersheba – and also along the Israel-Gaza border.

For the first time I witnessed the effect that the al Qassam rockets fired from Gaza have on daily life in southern Israel. People would be on their way to work or school when all of a sudden, their morning would be interrupted by the wailing sirens warning everyone to rush to the shelter.

They displayed emotions ranging from annoyance to fright, but mostly life went on. Shops stayed open, people continued their errands in the street. Part of this is that, unfortunately, they have become accustomed to the barrages, but I thought how nerve-wracking it must be to wait for sirens, knowing that something like a missile could rain from the sky without warning.

Later, we went to the border, where sometimes we were joined by families, young and old, who came to see their army, the Israeli Defense Forces, at work.

As horrific as the Hamas rockets had been, the violence here was much worse. The F-16s, Apache helicopters and tanks were moving into Gaza – firing into the northernmost Gaza towns of Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun, and the refugee town of Jebalya. The explosions were terrifying and I'll never forget the "jellyfish" – those missiles which would explode in mid-air, dropping more of their kind over the area.

I was working with Tom Aspell, as his producer, and every day we would do our live TV reports on how the operation in Gaza was going. The Israelis strictly restricted journalists' access into the area, but every day I called people inside Gaza and spoke with local journalists there who would tell me how difficult it was to cover the story. 

After 17 days of round-the-clock live-reports, I decided to take a day off and went home to Jerusalem.

For the first time I turned on an Arab channel, al-Jazeera, to get an update on what was going on. And then I knew it was impossible to give any equivalency between the situation in the Israeli towns in the south with the tragedy that was unfolding in Gaza.

That night I felt sick, I couldn't sleep – I could only see images of children, and children, and more children. The ones who had been blinded, the ones who had lost their limbs, or just that picture of the small girl's head, her eyes wide open. It was only her head, nothing else.

It was now very difficult to comprehend what was really going on. What was the true goal –the mission – of the Israeli army? Are they really fighting Hamas, or are they targeting civilians?

The figures would seem to point to the latter. As of Friday, more than 1,100 Palestinians have been killed since the war began on Dec. 27, including 346 children, according to the U.N. and Gaza health officials. And countless houses have been demolished and infrastructure destroyed. Meanwhile, 13 Israelis have been killed, four by rocket fire, according to the military.

Already, new information has emerged about the bombing of the U.N. school where 45 civilians taking shelter were killed by a bomb blast. Israel has now retracted its initial claim that the school was being used by Hamas to fire rockets into Israel. The military is now admitting that instead it was a bomb that missed its target. The U.N., meanwhile, is drawing up a report on this to submit as possible evidence of a war crime. 

What peace will be won?
Who can rationalize more than 1,000 Palestinians being killed in less than three weeks, 5,000 more injured – and perhaps the hardest part to accept – the fact that more than 50 percent of the casualties were women and children?

Another disturbing aspect of this carnage is the apparent cynicism when it comes to talk of minimizing civilian casualties, including the massive dropping of leaflets asking people to leave their homes.

Leave their homes for where? Gaza is in essence an open prison. There are no borders to cross. Instead, people are running from house to house like mice. There is nowhere to hide; their next hiding place could be where they die.

If civilian casualties are part of Israel's strategy -- a way of teaching Hamas a very costly lesson – then I don't think there will be a victory to claim.

Instead, a new generation full of anger and hatred is being created on a daily basis.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan – It took us an hour to get past the heavily-armed guards and bomb-sniffing dogs and through the gate of the U.S. Embassy. A few days earlier, a suicide bomber had blown up himself and his car, killing at least two civilians, only 50 yards from the building.

But now we were inside the embassy and interviewing Loren Stoddard, a top official at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). It was a surreal time and place to be talking about pomegranates.

"You see this?" asked the sharp, jovial Stoddard, reaching for a ruby red fruit the size of a grapefruit. "You know the one main thing that's been lacking in Afghanistan is hope. Hope in a successful, productive, prosperous future. Well, this pomegranate represents hope to all Afghan farmers."

Stoddard explained how this traditional Afghan fruit – so popular these days in the U.S. and Europe for its elixir-like effects – was skyrocketing in price and capable of even replacing opium poppy as Afghanistan's chief cash crop.

Then he held up an even bigger, and ruddier, fruit. "And this is the 'Kandahari' from Kandahar, one of the best pomegranates in the world. At least in this part of the world, it's its own brand name.''

A light went off in my mind: A brand name? Just what Afghanistan needs.

Whirlwind tour
We had just spent two weeks with Gen. John Nicholson, the new U.S. commander in southern Afghanistan tasked to help turn around the 7-year-old war:

· We had fly-on-the-wall access to classified security briefs, and meetings with NATO commanders, Afghan leaders, Western diplomats and State Department officials.

· We embedded with over-stretched U.S. soldiers trying to protect a key highway known as "IED Alley."

VIDEO: Mr. Fix-it takes on 'the forgotten war'

· We visited Afghan schoolgirls who had acid sprayed in their faces by extremists on motorbikes because they insisted on getting an education.

· We met an Italian orthopedist in Kabul who spent every minute of his waking life giving life – and limbs – to others.

· We followed street kids through Kabul's back alleys, running to their mud houses to give their families the 40 cents or so they'd earned that day selling plastic shopping bags in the market.

·  I took notes as a young U.S. Army captain, who was about to fly home at the end of his 15-month tour, shared the collective frustration – and angst – of his 13-man unit, the only foreign troops near a Taliban safe haven along the border with Pakistan. 

· And then there was the USAID farmer from Minnesota who was so low-profile he even looked Afghan and was coping with bad roads, thieves, kidnappings, Taliban attacks and U.S. friendly fire. Yet he too saw a future in Afghan pomegranates – and loved the "Kandaharis." 

At the end of this whirlwind tour – through four provinces controlled largely by the Taliban – it now struck me that the story here was a lot about a brand name.

A "Kandhari" pomegranate had one. But does Afghanistan? What is "Afghanistan?"

VIDEO: Afghan schoolgirls defy Taliban

Different perceptions
To some, the "Afghanistan" brand evokes a safe haven for the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks – for al-Qaida and Taliban terrorists. It represents a kind of Middle Earth – always beyond the reach of civilization – so primitive and dangerous that even members of the same tribe kill each other.

For others it's the land of the remote and exotic, where hippies went during the 1960's on their way to India's ashrams, hitching rides through deep valleys and majestic passes.

For many Americans "Afghanistan" is just the "other" or "forgotten" war.

But, for some commanders on the ground, the brand represents a sea change in U.S. foreign policy this year. One, they believe, that will combine a "surge" of U.S. forces, with smart reconstruction, good governance and regional diplomacy. In a word: winning.

"A 'surge' suggests a limited presence," said Gen. Nicholson, Deputy Commander of Stabilization. "What we need now is an increased presence over a long enough period of time to adequately secure the population. Once we do that we'll be able to achieve the other effects, connect the government to the people, and enable this government and Afghan security forces to stand on their own."

It's an ambitious plan, and one that, unfortunately, runs right into a branding issue.

Here's the problem: While the U.S. and some NATO countries, like Britain, Canada, and the Netherlands, see "Afghanistan" as a country at war and themselves as peacemakers, most  NATO members signed onto their missions here as peaceKEEPERS. "Afghanistan" to them means a nation that needs law, not war. And that difference in perception has led to increasing headaches for U.S. commanders.

VIDEO: 'Angel of Mercy' gives hope to Afghan disabled

'Peacemakers' or 'peacekeepers?'
Take the war on drugs. In the South, Helmand Province remains the world's opium-producing capital. So NATO ministers recently agreed to beef up their rules of engagement to allow their soldiers to take on the drug labs, drug lords and smugglers who drive both the heroin trade and the insurgency.

Plans were drawn up for NATO-led operations against specific targets, those that showed a nexus between the poppy and the Taliban. But those plans are now largely stalled.

Why? Because some NATO countries, like Canada, balked at joining any military mission that might kill "non-combatants," even drug lords. Some NATO commanders even fear their soldiers might be charged with murder. 

Again – a "branding" issue: is Afghanistan a country at war...or not? Even the allies can't decide.

"Being part of a NATO [force] here lends great legitimacy to our mission," explained Nicholson. "But there's a price of admission. It's difficult when you work together with many different nations, each with their own national will, expressed through their governments. It impacts on the armies here, and there's gonna be some friction with that."

VIDEO: Hope for kids working the streets of Kabul

What is the mission?
There are currently five major reviews of U.S. policy in Afghanistan. All are freshly written and on the table, to be synthesized by CENTCOM Commander Gen. David Petraeus, and handed to President-elect Barack Obama sometime in February.

Obama is expected to formulate a plan "for success" in Afghanistan. We saw the outlines of that plan during our trip to southern Afghanistan. It entails an influx of U.S. troops – at least three, maybe four, combat brigades with air and intelligence assets, who'll deploy to the hottest of Afghanistan's hotspots.

They'll engage the Taliban in their mountainous safe havens – inside Afghanistan – while simultaneously funding district and provincial-level councils, the Afghan faces of new local government, and try to win over moderate Taliban fighters to their side.

NATO nations, even those unwilling to fight, will be pressured to provide more police mentors and Afghan army trainers. There will certainly be more heavy fighting – and more casualties on all sides. But by the end of 2009, enough spots with relative security should emerge across Afghanistan's volatile south and east to allow for good governance and stability to grow.

VIDEO: U.S. forces engage Taliban in 'lethal game'

That's the outline. But each step is fraught with mine fields and uncertainties. What if good governors don't emerge? Or are killed by suicide bombers? What if the Taliban scares off a generation of students and teachers? What if the Kabul government collapses, not by insurgents, but corruption? And what if the pomegranate doesn't turn out to be the silver bullet of counter-narcotics?

"All the nations of NATO – not just the U.S. – really need to look at what they have here," said Capt. Dan Leard, the officer at the airport about to fly home. "And really decide on just how important this mission is to the world."

In other words, before a plan for Afghanistan, Western officials still need to agree on their definition of "Afghanistan."

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With one of the fiercest day of fighting in Gaza on Thursday, a small group of foreign reporters were allowed to join an official military embed with the Israeli Defense Forces to get a first-hand look at the fighting. NBC News' Martin Fletcher was part of the group and reports from the scene.

VIDEO: Fighting, as well as talks of a ceasefire, intensify in Gaza Â

The New York Times' Ethan Bronner was also part of the IDF's military embed in Gaza Thursday and discusses the 'limited glimpse' of Gaza the reporters were afforded with NBC's Martin Fletcher.

 

"This is my fourth day crisscrossing deserts in my attempt to get into Gaza. I haven't gotten in, yet, but not from lack of effort.

I left on Sunday from the Israeli side of the Gaza border. The Israelis weren't allowing journalists in, but there were rumors going around that we could get in through Egypt. 

So I jumped in a car in Sderot and drove through southern Israel, through the Negev Desert, crossed into Egypt, crossed the Sinai Desert, and arrived in Rafah, which is right at the Gaza border. It was about a 12-hour drive.

Since then, we stayed near the Rafah border for the last three days – reporting and trying to get into Gaza. Each day we spent about eight hours at the border crossing, arguing with Egyptian officials.

VIDEO: Anger over war in Gaza intensifies

At one stage it got into a bit of a shouting match, as I was saying that we should be allowed in and the Egyptian intelligence officials thought I was being rude.  Eventually we had to make up.  We drank lots of tea.

The reason I got into the argument with the intelligence officials is because it's just been so frustrating to show up every day and plead our case with the border officials and listem to them tell us that we need a different piece of paperwork.

We've had different pieces of paper every day. We've tried letters from two U.S. congressman; we've tried a letter from our employer; we've tried personal letters saying that we accept responsibility and do not hold the Egyptian government responsible for what happens to us in Gaza, recognizing that there is a risk because it is a war zone.  

None of that has worked. Each day the answer was: Come back tomorrow with a different piece of paper.

Some journalists have gotten through from the Israeli side today, but only on an official military embed with the Israel Defense Forces and their video footage is subject to clearance by Israeli military censors.

European embassies have been more cooperative than the Americans. Some European embassies in Cairo have written letters saying things like, "We request that the Egyptian authorities allow this journalist access and please grant him all facilities." It helped and a few Europeans have gotten in from the Egyptian side. 

The Americans have not done that and will not do that. But this morning, after lots of back and forth, the U.S. Embassy in Cairo said that it would do something that the Egyptian officials have been asking for; give us a letter of accreditation. It's basically a stamped letter from the U.S. Embassy acknowledging that we are in fact journalists and American passport holders.   

When word about the embassy's gesture came, we were, of course, still on the Egyptian side of the border with Gaza in Rafah. So we got back in a car, crossed over the Sinai Desert again, over the Suez Canal and got back into Cairo – a four-hour journey.

The embassy agreed to have some staff stay late to help us. The only other people that were in the embassy when we arrived were two Egyptians who looked like they were having some sort of family emergency and needed to get back to the States urgently and several other journalists who were trying to do the exact same thing that we were trying to do. 

Eventually we did get the letter and now we are heading back through the Sinai Desert to the Egyptian-Gaza border on another four-hour journey. You need to time things well so that you get there during daylight hours because once you get to the crossing, you can go over once the sun goes down, but it gets significantly more dangerous.

So, it's been an evolving process, to say the least."

TEHRAN, Iran – During the past 30 years, the United States has pondered regime change, military action, and containment as policies toward Iran. None have proved effective.

Now President-elect Barack Obama is expected to try what he calls a "new approach" towards Iran – engagement.

Don't expect Obama to sip tea with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader who has the final say on all political and state matters, and come away with pledges from Tehran to stop aiding terrorists, abandon its nuclear weapons program or recognize Israel anytime soon.
 
But what we might see – if the political stars align – is the beginning of considerably lower-level diplomatic engagement, perhaps the establishment of a U.S. diplomatic post in Tehran and some people-to-people, cultural, and sporting exchanges.

"Now that Bush has gone, this is a great chance for us to make friends with America," said Maryam, a Tehran University student. "I think this is the first real chance in 30 years for the two sides to put aside their differences. It's in everyone's best interests."

But Farshad, a civil engineer, disagreed. "You know the Americans do not want peace with us. All this talk from Obama about engagement with Iran is an excuse. He wants to look like he has tried to make a deal with us, but really his end goal is to attack us."

If those two comments offer any indication, dealing with Iran is going to be very tricky.

Iran's theocrats are a crafty and skilled breed: they have mastered the art of cat and mouse games and defied sanctions and international pressure.

If one looks at the events that have occurred in the region since the attacks of 9/11, including the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, one would think that Iran would be weak and scared. But quite the opposite has occurred: Iran is confident and has established itself as a regional superpower.

Iran has a finger in every major trouble spot in the region. It counsels Syria, funds Hamas, founded Hezbollah, influences Iraq and threatens Israel; it could even, if it chose, be helpful to U.S. interests in Afghanistan.

"President Ahmadinejad does not want stability with the United States, he thrives on instability," said Sayed Laylaz, an economist and political analyst. "If relations between the two countries were normal, then he would not have a podium to rant and rave from."

On the anniversary of the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran last November, Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, said the problems between the United States and Iran were too deep to be resolved easily. The Iranian leader also indicated that he was not interested in partial resolution of the problems between the two sides.

With regard to its nuclear program, Iran has made it very clear that it is not willing to make any concessions, arguing that it has a right to develop nuclear power for it what it says are peaceful means.

Despite strong words from U.S. officials about its nuclear ambitions, Iran's leaders seem to feel confident that an attack is unlikely, because American forces are stuck in Iraq and Afghanistan, global markets are in turmoil and the world does not have the appetite for another war. And should U.S. forces attempt a more targeted strike on the country's nuclear facilities, Iran's leadership believes it can defend itself.

"In the event of the slightest aggression against Iran, every one of the U.S.'s 32 bases in the region is within range of Iranian missiles," Hojat-Ol-Eslam Mojtaba Zolnour, Khamenei's representative in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, told reporters recently.

"It is possible that some enemies are considering a plan for a brief attack on Iran and [its] strategic installations," he added. "Iran will not permit such a plan, and in such an event, the entire Iranian nation will defeat the enemies, with one voice and with unity."

Sen. Hillary Clinton, Obama's nominee to be secretary of state, addressed the issue of Iran during her Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday.

In her testimony, Clinton said the U.S. would seek to halt Iran's push for nuclear weapons by using diplomacy, sanctions and coalitions with other countries, which she considered a "new" approach. 

"We are not taking any option off the table at all, but we will pursue a new, perhaps different approach that will become a cornerstone of what the Obama administration believes is an attitude toward engagement that might bear fruit," she said.

But when pressed on the issue, Clinton acknowledged that the new administration couldn't predict what the results of attempted engagement with Iran would be.

"We have no illusions, Mr. Chairman, that even with a new administration looking to try to engage Iran in a way that might influence its behavior, that we can predict the results. But the president-elect is committed to that course and we will pursue it," she said.

HARBIN, Heilongjiang Province, China – The first thing most passengers do in China when they get off a plane is head for the bathroom or light up a cigarette.

In Harbin, they make for a row of booths labeled "Clothes Changing" and throw on long underwear.

Seven layers later, I was still shivering.

Adrienne Mong/NBC News

A cathedral reproduced entirely in ice.

"It says here that Harbin is below freezing more than six months of the year," said David Lom, our cameraman, as he scrolled through his Blackberry. "That's ridiculous."

David has made it his life's ambition to work only in warm climates.

I was beginning to think that wasn't such a bad goal.

We came to Harbin to film the annual Snow and Ice Festival. And I was looking forward to spending an extra day afterwards to explore this city of three million and its other major sights: the Siberian Tiger Reserve (home to the extremely rare Manchurian tiger); the Germ Warfare Base (where the Japanese conducted controversial experiments on war prisoners from 1939-45); and St. Sophia Cathedral, one of the few Eastern Orthodox churches in East Asia. 

But as soon as we set foot outdoors, I was having second thoughts.  The taxi driver told us it was 18 below Celsius, which sounded and felt much colder than its Fahrenheit equivalent: -4F.

 
The festival – apparently one of only four of its kind across the globe – is spread over several park sites on the edge of the Songhua River, spanning what would take up 75-odd football fields. 

We, however, were concentrating on just a couple of fields, both on Sun Island, which features what must be the world's largest snow Santa Claus and dozens of other snow sculptures, plus an ice park, where more than 30 structures were gleaming – but not melting – under the bright morning sun.

VIDEO: Vistors flock to China's Snow and Ice festival

The sculptures were made from artificial snow, trucked in at regular intervals, and looked from a distance like they were made from Styrofoam.  Up close, they were remarkable – especially the giant Santa, which measures 525 feet long and 79 feet tall. Families were sliding down from his beard on rubber tires.

"I do love the smoothness of the snow, it does make you want to touch it and feel it," enthused Lorelie Fox, a visitor from Leeds, England.  "And of course it's so very dense whereas the real snow is very powdery."

SLIDESHOW: An icy city of lights

But the most extraordinary sight had to be the ice sculptures – although "sculpture" doesn't quite do them justice. 

Before us, the spiky towers and spires of dozens of buildings rose up against the real skyline of Harbin. There were Chinese temples, several cathedrals and churches, a mosque, and – wonder of wonders – a pretty good 115-feet replica of the Neuschwanstein Castle ("Mad" King Ludwig's castle) in Germany.

Artists and almost 8,000 workers used 32 million gallons of water to make ice blocks to construct the sculptures. Chipping and hacking away 24 hours a day, the workers took nearly 14 days to make everything – right down to the last detail: steps, banister posts, rooftop figurines.

VIDEO: Americans in China marvel at the Snow and Ice festival

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We watched as kids sped down giant slides of ice from atop a hill. Dozens of people rode bicycles across a frozen pond as an ice sculpture of Milan's Cathedral loomed above them. Horse carriages drove by, their bells tinkling. Vendors sold fake fur hats, gloves, and whole roasted sweet potatoes. 

And as the sun set, the ice city took on an entirely different kind of glow. LED lights encased inside the ice blocks began to flicker in rainbow hues. 

We filmed for another hour until the sky was blue-black and the crowds around us grew. By that time, we had been outside for six hours; my fingers and toes were thoroughly frozen. 

And I had decided the tiger reserve, the germ warfare lab and the old Russian quarter would have to wait until summer or, at the very least, spring.

SALAH EL DIN, Egypt – Beneath Egypt's border with Gaza lay dozens of tunnels Israel says are used to smuggle weapons and ammunition to Hamas militants. In recent days, Israeli fighter jets and unmanned drone planes have bombed the southern Gaza border city Rafah in an effort to stop Hamas rocket attacks on Israel.

But for residents living along the Egyptian side of the Gaza-Egypt border, there is growing fear and anger over Israeli military operations that injured four Egyptians over the weekend, according to news reports.

"My grandchildren wake up in the middle of the night, crying as the bombs go off, shaking the very foundation of our house. They haven't really slept for five days," said Om Fayez, the short, feisty matriarch of a five-story family home in Salah el Din, a few hundred feet from the border. "Our windows have been shattered [by the bombings]. We are scared we'll be hurt."

NBC News

Rhasmeya el Nahal shows NBC News' Alphonso Van Marsh her families' orange groves leading to Egypt's border and the high-rise buildings of Gaza.Â

Fayez has reason to fear. Shrapnel hit and injured two Egyptian children and two Egyptian police officers on Sunday, according to a Reuters report, when an Israeli Air Force bomb exploded in Gaza. The injured were on the Egyptian side of the border at the time and were taken to a local hospital. The gravity of their injuries is unknown. Egyptian police sources told Reuters an Israeli bomb landed on Egyptian soil on Monday – but failed to explode.

"[Israel] says it is going after the tunnels," said Fayez's daughter Rhasmeya el Nahal, pointing toward an Israeli drone circling over Gaza. "But what about [those people] who have nothing to do with them?"

El Nahal said that most of the tunnels are used to smuggle goods to Palestinians because they are trapped due to Israel's land, air and sea blockade around Gaza. She wouldn't discuss weapons, but el Nahal insisted smugglers use the tunnels to make money. Some people are engineers, other run shops, the smugglers are doing a job just like any other, she told me. "They're simply digging for cash."

Egypt has been cracking down on tunnel use. Local Bedouins told us that Egyptian authorities recently instructed them not to take journalists to tunnel entrances. El Nahal said Egyptian authorities have held her husband without charge for three months after a neighbor accused him of having a tunnel on their property. From the rooftop overlooking orange groves, another el Nahal family member said he challenged Egyptian authorities to inspect the family property for what Egyptian authorities suspect lays beneath.

El Nahal said police have yet to visit, and her husband – a civilian administrator at local police headquarters – remains in detention. At the time of writing, NBC News could not independently verify her claims that the expansive family property was indeed tunnel free.

Alphonso Van Marsh/ NBC News

The Israeli military has distributed Arabic-language fliers like this one warning residents that "Hamas is feeling the wrath of the Israel Defense Forces" – and providing a number to phone in tunnel locations Israel says are used to smuggle weapons to Palestinians.

Meantime, trying to calm frayed nerves
In the meantime, Fayez and el Nahal said they are concentrating on putting the family's youngest – including four girls under age 10 – at ease, despite the bombardment. It is not easy, they said.

El Nahal handed me a paper flier the Israel Defense Forces dumped over Gaza that she says blew over the border. In Arabic, the flier warned that the Israeli military will continue military attacks until it reaches its objective. "Hamas started to feel the wrath of the Israel Defense Forces…for your safety, we beg you to leave your residential areas and go to city centers," it said. New fliers dumped Sunday offer a number for residents to call if they know the whereabouts of tunnel locations.

Last week, an Israeli spokeswoman said Israeli forces had destroyed 50 percent of the tunnels. Israel insists any proposal to end the conflict must include Egyptian efforts to shut down the complex tunnel system.

Egyptian Bedouins say the tunnels can be reconstructed or replaced in a matter of weeks. But Fayez and el Nahal say replacing the fear their girls are experiencing now with a normal child's carefree existence will take a whole lot longer.