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JERUSALEM — Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama toured Israel’s Holocaust memorial Wednesday, laying a wreath in memory of the 6 million Jews who died and saying, “Ultimately, this is a place of hope.”
Obama toured the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial on a Jerusalem hillside as he moved through a busy day of meetings with Israeli and Palestinian officials, including Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Now that Barack Obama has left Afghanistan and Iraq, where he was part of a congressional delegation, and is visiting the Middle East and Europe as a presidential candidate, most everything he does is being viewed through the prism of the race for the White House.

JERUSALEM — Barack Obama paid a predawn visit to the holiest place in Judaism on Thursday, bowing his head in prayer at the Western Wall.
Obama placed a small note inside a crevice in the ancient wall, a custom observed by many. He made his brief stop as he completed a trip to the Middle East in which he met with Israeli and Palestinian leaders as well as Jordan’s King Abdullah II.

Barack Obama’s campaign on Friday unveiled details of the presidential candidate’s upcoming trip overseas, outlining the series of meetings he plans to hold with foreign heads of state while denying charges that the trip is a global campaign swing.
Aides to the Illinois senator said Obama has no intention of making policy overseas or stepping into the role of president and that he only intends to discuss ways to enhance “cooperation” between the United States and its allies.

SDEROT, Israel — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says it’s in the interest of Israeli security to arrive at a lasting peace with the Palestinians, and called Iran the biggest common threat to U.S. and Israeli security.
Obama spoke at a press conference in Sderot, near the Gaza border. The city has been a frequent target of rocket attacks from Palestinian militants. Shards of rockets were in stacks behind Obama as a reminder of ongoing attacks.

JERUSALEM — A written prayer that Barack Obama left this week in the cracks of the Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest site, asks God to guide him and guard his family, an Israeli newspaper reported Friday.
“Lord — Protect my family and me,” reads the note published in the Maariv daily. “Forgive me my sins, and help me guard against pride and despair. Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just. And make me an instrument of your will.”

PERTH, Australia — If Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is worried that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is complicating the Bush administration’s foreign policy with freelance campaign diplomacy, she isn’t showing it.
In her first public comments about Obama’s overseas jaunt during which he has contrasted his international approach to that of President Bush in meetings with foreign officials, Rice said the trip was part of the election cycle and would not affect the administration.

WASHINGTON — A Republican group launched a new effort Wednesday to turn Jewish voters away from Barack Obama, an ad campaign that compares the Democratic presidential candidate to Pat Buchanan but offers scant evidence of their similarities.

AMMAN, Jordan — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Tuesday that security in Iraq has improved and that the United States urgently needs to turn its attention to Afghanistan.
“There is security progress, but now we need a political solution” in Iraq, Obama said in the first news conference of his highly publicized trip abroad. Afghanistan is now the “central front in the war against terrorism,” he added.