Israel and the Palestine Authority (PA) open direct peace talks today (9/2) in Washington, DC. These are the first face-to-face meetings in nearly two years.

While Israeli and PA leaders are back at the negotiating table, some of their followers are doing everything they can to keep the violence going. On the Israeli side, settlers announced new construction in the West Bank. And on the Palestine side, Hamas has promised more attacks on Israel.

The U.S. announced a few legal actions against the Pakistani Taliban, aka Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), on Wednesday (9/1).

First, the U.S. Justice Department charged Hakimullah Mehsud, the self-proclaimed emir of the Pakistani Taliban, for his alleged involvement in the murder of seven CIA agents on Dec. 30, 2009 at a U.S. military base in Afghanistan.

Second, through the Rewards for Justice program, a $5 million reward is being offered for information leading to Mehsud's capture, and another $5 million is offered for the apprehension of Wali Ur Rehman, another Taliban leader.

Lastly, the State Department designated TTP as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO).

A Dutch judge ordered the release from custody of the two Yemeni men who were under investigation in Amsterdam after U.S. authorities became suspicious of their behavior and the contents of their airline luggage earlier this week.

The two were not charged with any crime. It isn't clear if U.S. authorities plan to conduct any further investigation of the incident.

At least three coordinated bombs exploded during a Shiite religious procession in Lahore, Pakistan today (9/1).

It isn't clear exactly how many people were killed by the suspected suicide blasts. Pakistan's Dawn reports authorities say 6 are dead and at least 80 more wounded, but CNN's report puts the death toll much hire at 22, with nearly 200 wounded.

First India forced Research in Motion (RIM) to open up BlackBerry messaging data to government monitoring and now it appears it is Google's and Skype's turns.

It is being reported that the Indian government plans to send the search giant and the VoIP provider letters insisting they set up servers in India and give access to their data.

Today, September 1st, is the sixth anniversary of the beginning of the Beslan school hostage crisis in Russia's North Ossetia-Alania Republic.

The mass hostage-taking incident ended with more than 300 people killed by both the Chechen separatist hostage-takers, and the Russian security forces who stormed the school.

The UK's Telegraph reports that last week the website for Britain's Belvoir Castle, the family seat of the 11th Duke of Rutland, was hijacked by a group of Algerian hackers who changed the home page to "a black page displaying the Algerian flag and a tirade against the Jewish state in Arabic."

You might ask why someone might do this? Well turns out the "hapless Middle-Eastern 'cyber-pirates', as the Telegraph describes them, mistook Belvoir Castle's website for that of the one belonging to Belvoir Fortress in Israel.

The Chinese navy began a series of war games in the Yellow Sea on Wednesday, days ahead of joint U.S/South Korea exercises in the same waters.