Today’s Headlines and Commentary

From the Department of Still More Surprises Here: Charlie Savage of the New York Times informs us that the NSA “is not just intercepting the communications of Americans who are in direct contact with foreigners targeted overseas, a practice that government officials have openly acknowledged. It is also casting a far wider net for people who cite information linked to those foreigners.” The Times also tells us that Washington’s foreign partners are none too pleased about the Obama administration’s decision to shutter so many of its embassies, arguing that the decision validates America’s enemies. Yes we did, no we didn’t: The Yemeni government, which yesterday claimed to have foiled AQAP plots, has “distanced itself” from said claims. This Wall Street Journal piece has more, and also describes the tumultuous U.S.-Yemeni counterterrorism relationship. CNN reports on the latest numbers of drone strikes casualties in Yemen: at least 31, including two civilians. There have been seven U.S. drone strikes in the last two weeks. Jeremy Herb of the Hill has more, and the Washington Post describes why the Obama administration authorized the strikes. Remember how President Obama wanted to repatriate the Yemeni detainees at Guantanamo Bay that had been cleared for release? Scott Wilson of the Post tells us why the latest terrorist threats from Yemen make that close to impossible. BBC correspondent Yalda Hakim reports on attitudes on drones from the ground in Yemen. Bruce Riedel of the Brookings Institution has an op-ed in the Daily Beast.  He writes about Al Qaeda 3.0, in the wake of the coup in Egypt, “the ill-starred Arab Awakening” and the unrest in Syria. U.S. District Court Judge Eric Vitaliano ruled on Tuesday that a City University of New York legal clinic could not gain access to “NSC records related to drone strikes and a reported ‘kill list’ of targeted terror suspects” through a FOIA request it filed. The invaluable Josh Gerstein at Politico has the details. Reuters reveals that the IRS has been omitting any references to tips it has received from the DEA’s Special Operations Division, a branch of the agency that “funnels information from overseas NSA intercepts, domestic wiretaps, informants and a large DEA database of telephone records to authorities nationwide to help them launch criminal investigations of Americans.” Check out this interactive feature from USA Today illustrating the differences between a Predator drone and a Reaper drone, how many deaths there have been from drone strikes, and how many drones each branch of the armed forces has. The feature uses data from Department of Defense, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism and International Institute for Strategic Studies. A British grandmother has been on a hunger strike in support of Shaker Aamer, a Guantanamo Bay detainee. The BBC has the story. Billy Kenber of the Post describes the proceedings at Maj. Nidal Hasan’s trial, during which his standby lawyers said that Hassan, in fact, seeks the death penalty. At least thirty people were killed by a suicide bombing at a funeral service for a policeman in Quetta, Pakistan, reports Salman Masood of the Times. The Indian defense minister has accused the Pakistani government of involvement in the deaths of five Indian soldiers who were killed in clashes at the Line of Control this week, according to BBC and the Times. Greaaaaaaat. And, Max Fisher of the Post tells us about the latest satirical story Chinese media were fooled by---this excellent piece by Andy Borowitz of the New Yorker about Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos recent purchase of the Washington Post. It’s Today’s Moment of Zen. For more interesting law and security-related articles, follow us on Twitter, visit the Georgetown Center on National Security and the Law’s Security Law Brief, Syracuse’s Institute for National Security & Counterterrorism’s newsroll and blog, and Fordham Law’s Center on National Security’s Morning Brief and Cyber Brief. Email Raffaela Wakeman and Ritika Singh noteworthy articles to include, visit the Lawfare Events Calendar for upcoming national security events, and check out relevant job openings at the Lawfare Job Board.