JERUSALEM — Five days after President Obama’s landmark speech in Cairo, his Middle East envoy, George J. Mitchell, met Israeli officials Tuesday to stress America’s friendship and urge the “prompt resumption and early conclusion” of peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.

Menahem Kahana/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

George J. Mitchell, right, President Obama’s Middle East envoy, met with the Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman in Jerusalem on Tuesday.

His discussions coincided with growing strains between Israel and the Obama administration, which wants Israel to freeze settlement construction in the West Bank and to explicitly endorse the notion of establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists that construction should continue within existing settlements and has balked at publicly backing the two-state proposal for peace enshrined in earlier negotiations.

After talks with President Shimon Peres and other officials on Tuesday, Mr. Mitchell stressed that Washington’s “commitment to the security of Israel remains unshakeable.”

But, days before Mr. Netanyahu plans to deliver a much-heralded speech on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Mr. Mitchell repeated that the United States sought the creation of a “Palestinian state side by side in peace and security with the Jewish state of Israel.”

He stressed that Mr. Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had said that Israel and the Palestinians “have a responsibility to meet their obligations under the road map” — a reference to earlier peace terms in 2003 that call for a freeze on settlement construction while enjoining the Palestinian Authority to curb militant violence.

“It’s not just their responsibility,” Mr. Mitchell said. “We believe it’s in their security interest as well. But it’s also in the interest of all others to seek to promote peace — Americans, Europeans, Arabs and others — to support this effort to tangible steps. And we all share an obligation to create the conditions for the prompt resumption and early conclusion of negotiations.”

He added: “Let me be clear. These are not disagreements among adversaries. The United States and Israel are and will remain close allies and friends.”

Mr. Mitchell planned to meet Mr. Netanyahu later Tuesday and to hold talks on Wednesday with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.

Mr. Mitchell’s visit is the first diplomatic move since President Obama’s speech last Thursday on America’s relations with the Muslim world in which he said the “unbreakable” bond between the United States and Israel was ”based upon cultural and historical ties, and the recognition that the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied.”

”On the other hand,” Mr. Obama said in Cairo, ”it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people — Muslims and Christians — have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than 60 years, they’ve endured the pain of dislocation.” He said Americans ”will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity and a state of their own.”

Visiting Germany a day after the Cairo speech, Mr. Obama also put Israelis and Palestinians on notice that it was up to them to make “difficult compromises.”

Isabel Kershner reported from Jerusalem, and Alan Cowell from Paris.

The eldest son of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, in a rare television interview Tuesday, shed some light on who might eventually take over leadership of the country.

Kim Jong Il is widely reported to have suffered a stroke in August.

Kim Jong Nam told TV Asahi in Macau that he does not care about politics or succeeding his father.

“Personally, I am not interested in this issue (succession),” he said in an interview with the Japanese television network. “Sorry, I am not interested in the politics.”

The rules governing transfer of power in the secretive communist nation are unclear.

Kim Jong Il is widely reported to have suffered a stroke in August and has been absent from many public functions in recent months.

In April, he named his son, Kim Jong Un, and brother-in-law, Jang Song Thaek, to the country’s powerful National Defense Commission, suggesting his third son may be his heir.

“I hear that news in the media,” Kim Jong Nam said. “I think it’s true … however, it is my father’s decision. So once he decides, we have to support him.”

There has been speculation that Kim Jong Nam would defect from North Korea and that a purge of his supporters was under way. He told Asahi he saw no reason for leaving his homeland.

The great director Alfred Hitchcock used to describe the distinction between surprise and suspense in terms of a bomb placed underneath a table.

A bomb specialist (Jeremy Renner) finds more than he bargained for in “The Hurt Locker.”

If two people sit at the table and the bomb suddenly goes off, Hitchcock explained, that’s surprise. But if an audience watches the bomb get placed under the table, and the people at the table have an innocuous conversation, and the bomb is set to go off in a few minutes, and time ticks away while the audience fidgets — that, said Hitchcock, is suspense.

“The Hurt Locker” director Kathryn Bigelow had plenty of both to work with.

“The Hurt Locker,” which opens in limited release Friday and wider on June 26, concerns a Baghdad-based American bomb disposal unit in the Iraq war. It’s the job of the unit, and particularly Staff Sgt. William James (Jeremy Renner), to find and defuse the bombs set around the city, a constant battle during the film’s 2003-04 time frame.

The IEDs (improvised explosive devices, planted by insurgents) the unit must deal with are a constant presence — and cunningly planted. One is in an abandoned vehicle outside a government building. Another is implanted in the chest cavity of a murdered youth. Others are left in trash heaps, buried in the ground and attached to an unwilling suicide bomber.

Bigelow, who directed from journalist Mark Boal’s script, gives the film a documentary style, shooting from the perspective of bomb-finding robots, the windows of nearby apartments and even the inside of James’ heavy-duty high-tech protective suit, which resembles nothing so much as a real-life military version of the spacesuits worn by the astronauts in “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

The cast and crew primarily shot in Amman, Jordan, as well as near the Iraqi border, heightening the realism. The bombs aren’t in some remote desert; they are placed on city streets, among people and soldiers trying to go about their business.

“I wanted to create a real you-are-there, boots-on-the-ground feeling,” Bigelow (”Point Break,” “K-19: The Widowmaker”) said in a joint phone interview with Boal. “But I wanted to humanize the film, ground it in geography using the canvas of the city.”

“The Hurt Locker” — the expression refers to the pain of explosions — is based on Boal’s reporting for Playboy. The journalist and screenwriter, who also wrote the story on which “In the Valley of Elah” was based, was embedded with a bomb squad for several weeks.

He observed that although the units have the latest technology — along with the suits and robots, the men communicate through helmet microphones and protect one another with various guns and ordnance — bomb disposal still comes down to experience and wire cutters.

“The technology is only useful up to a point,” he said. “It doesn’t cure everything. You only have to open up the newspaper to see how much damage [bombs] can do.”

In the film, James is an adrenaline-fueled expert who joins an Explosive Ordnance Disposal squad after its previous leader, played by Guy Pearce, is killed in action. James has to win over a by-the-book sergeant (Anthony Mackie) and a despairing specialist (Brian Geraghty) while trying to get through the five-plus weeks until the company’s tour is over.

The movie doesn’t gloss over the challenges of the duty — Geraghty’s specialist regularly meets with a therapist, while Renner and Mackie’s characters lock horns over the safety of James’ methods — but also showcases the heroism of men doing a thankless job in a war zone. Indeed, the film barely scratches the surface in showing the sheer volume of IEDs: A bomb disposal unit could face a dozen a day, Boal said.

“The Hurt Locker” also proved a showcase for its performers, some of whom ended up in the film almost by accident. Along with its film stars — there are cameos from Ralph Fiennes, David Morse and Evangeline Lilly — the movie gave screen time to actors forced out of Baghdad during the war.

“A great surprise was, of the hundreds of thousands of refugees living in Amman, many were actors. There was a fairly big theatrical community in Baghdad,” Bigelow said. “They were really grateful for the opportunity to act again.”

“The Hurt Locker” has its own challenges. It’s being released during summer movie season, a time when people welcome the fake explosions of action films but may find the tense struggles of real bomb disposal experts too much to take.

But the film also has much in its favor (including, for studio bean counters, a low budget). It’s won a number of prestigious awards (including four honors at the Venice Film Festival), and it’s received glowing reviews.

” ‘The Hurt Locker’ is a near-perfect movie about men in war, men at work,” wrote Time’s Richard Corliss. “[It's] one of the rare war movies that’s strong but not shrill, and sympathetic to guys doing an impossible job.”

Bigelow, who says the film fits comfortably in the war-movie adventure genre, said she was drawn to the “opportunity to look at the heroism of these men,” what that bravery costs and what it saves. She hopes she’s succeeded.

“The film,” she said, “doesn’t let you forget.”

Those behind the technology say it could help save lives

British scientists have developed a portable microwave scanner to help police identify individuals carrying concealed guns and knives.

It is small enough to be used covertly, at some distance from the subject.

The device is based around microwave radar technology and is designed to pick up the “reflections” of weapons concealed beneath clothing.

Some officials believe technology like this could help increase the effectiveness of stop-and-search.

The existing prototype is suitable for the detection of guns, but researchers say subsequent versions of the technology will be able to identify concealed knives as well.

The new device employs low-power microwaves to identify weapons, using similar wavelengths as the body scanners currently in use at a number of airports.

This device could save lives and free up valuable policing time Catherine Coates, EPSRC

However, Professor Nick Bowring from Manchester Metropolitan University, who led the development of the new device, said it worked on a different principle.

Unlike airport scanners, the portable machine does not produce an image of the subject, it only analyses signals.

“It is designed to work out on the streets and is not (restricted) to a closed, controlled environment,” Professor Bowring told BBC News.

A human operator will transport the device, using it to direct microwave emission at a person of interest.

Return signals - microwaves reflected back towards the device - are picked up, sensed and analysed.

Weapon signature

“[The scanner] does a lot of computing and processing of the signals it acquires. It puts them all together, analyses them over a short period and makes a decision,” said Professor Bowring.

“It works on the principle that the radar returns from people, when they are carrying a gun or a knife, look different. And we pick up on those small differences.”

We welcome scientific innovation in the fight against crime but this kind of technology needs public scrutiny and foundation in law Anita Coles, Liberty

So-called neural network technology is employed to identify signals from concealed weapons and to ignore those from everyday items. Similar technology is used in the automatic recognition of car number plates.

Professor Bowring said he and his team had found ways to reduce the numbers of “false positive” readings to a “very low level”.

Because of sensitivities surrounding its use, he could not say what distance the device worked over, but explained it was a “useful stand-off range”. Researchers are reluctant to release pictures of the experimental set-up for similar reasons.

Tests are currently being carried out by the Metropolitan Police’s operational technology department to see how the scanner could work in practice.

If those trials are successful, a device could become available to police forces within two years.

Catherine Coates, head of innovation at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), said: “This device could save lives and free up valuable policing time currently taken up with gun and knife detection.”

‘Public scrutiny’

Anita Coles, policy officer for Liberty, told BBC News: “We welcome scientific innovation in the fight against crime but this kind of technology needs public scrutiny and foundation in law.

“The causes of violence also need attention. You will never eliminate all the guns, knives, bottles and glasses so it’s important to consider other conditions that foster conflict.”

In a statement, Stuart Ibbotson, head of engineering for the Metropolitan Police, said: “We are still at early stages and a way off deploying operational capability yet, but so far, results are very encouraging.

“This kind of device would be of great service to officers, helping them to catch people carrying guns and knives without putting themselves in increased danger. It could also help to target stop and search to further increase its effectiveness.”

The number of firearms operations rose by almost a fifth last year in police forces in England and Wales.

Officers fired weapons seven times - up from three incidents the year before, but still fewer times than in 2001.

The Home Office figures showed a drop in firearms operations in some police areas commonly believed to have significant gun crime problems.

Professor Bowring said the scanner had been developed relatively cheaply, at a cost of only a few hundred thousand pounds.

The project involved researchers from MMU, Manchester University, Newcastle University and Queen Mary University of London.

It was funded by the EPSRC, supported by the Metropolitan Police and the Home Office Scientific Development Branch.

Stocks cut losses Monday, ending mixed, as investors scooped up bank and consumer shares and kept an eye on Treasury bond yields, the dollar and commodity prices.

After the close, the Supreme Court granted a stay in the sale of Chrysler’s assets to Italian automaker Fiat, at the behest of a group of shareholders. The move delays Chrysler’s exit from bankruptcy, which had been expected to occur as soon as Monday.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) ended just above unchanged and the S&P 500 (SPX) index ended just below unchanged. The Nasdaq composite (COMP) lost 7 points or 0.4%.

All three major indexes had slumped through the session, before turning higher near the close and ultimately ending mixed.

The late-session turnaround was positive, but deceptive, in that the market breadth numbers remained negative, said Donald Selkin, chief market strategist at National Securities. He was referring to the fact that more shares fell than gained, on both the Nasdaq and New York Stock Exchange.

He said that going forward, it’s going to be difficult for the major indexes to push much higher.

“We saw some resiliency today, but I think the market is going to be laboring under the perception that the Federal Reserve is going to be forced to raise rates,” Selkin said.

That’s partly because Treasury yields have been rising, with the 2-year note yield now more than a full percentage point above the fed funds rate, which has been near zero since December.

Meanwhile, the 10-year note is edging closer to 4%, a level not seen since October. The spike has raised worries about the recovery hitting roadblocks before it’s barely begun.

Some optimism about the bank sector Monday helped to counter worries about inflation, the dollar and the spike in Treasury bond yields, said Dave Rovelli, managing director of U.S. equity trading at Canaccord Adams.

“The banks are up because the rumor is that there are going to be nine banks that they allow to pay back TARP funds,” Rovelli said.

The government will let the banks know this week, perhaps as soon as Tuesday morning, which ones they deem to be sufficiently capitalized to pay back the TARP funds received last fall.

Monday is the deadline for plans to be submitted by banks that need to raise additional cash as a result of the government’s stress tests.

Stalling after the rally: Stocks were weaker through most of Monday’s session as investors showed caution after a rally that has propelled the Dow off of 12-year lows hit in early March. The Dow has risen in 11 of the last 13 weeks, climbing 32.2% as of Friday’s close. That’s the blue-chip average’s best 13-week run in 26 years.

The other major indexes have also rocketed since March 9. Since hitting a more than 12-year low, the S&P has gained 39% as of Friday’s close. The Nasdaq has rallied 45.8% as of Friday’s close, since bouncing off of a 6-year low.

Pacing a typical post-rally retreat is the start of a shift in investor perception, said Jeffrey Kleintop, chief market strategist at LPL Financial.

He said the spate of not-as-bad economic news, punctuated by last Friday’s milder than expected job-loss report, has raised questions about whether the economy is healing faster than expected. If so, how will all the stimulus spending impact growth, and how will the government respond?

“The focus has switched to ‘yes, things are turning around, but maybe more rapidly than expected, and what does that mean for inflation?’” he said.

Financials: Banks were in focus Monday. The 10 banks that were required to raise a collective $75 billion as a result of the government “stress tests” have to submit detailed plans by Monday.

Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500), Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500) and PNC Financial Services (PNC, Fortune 500) are among the companies that have already met or exceeded requirements.

In addition, the government is expected to announce which banks can pay back the TARP funds.

Most major bank stocks were higher, boosting the KBW Bank sector index by 1.3%.

Apple: On Monday afternoon, the tech behemoth introduced a faster version of its iPhone, lowered the price on its existing phone and offered details on its revamped operating system. Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) shares ended modestly lower.

Company news: Fidelity and private-equity firm KKR are teaming up to give customers of the mutual fund company access to initial public offerings of KKR companies.

The global airline industry is likely to lose $9 billion this year due to weaker demand and the impact of the recession, according to trade group the International Air Transport Association.

Among stock movers, consumer shares advanced, including Dow components’ Home Depot (HD, Fortune 500) and Walt Disney (DIS, Fortune 500).

McDonald’s shares dipped after the company reported May sales at stores open a year or more rose 5.1%, versus a rise of 6.9% in April.

Market breadth was negative. On the New York Stock Exchange, losers beat winners three to two on volume of 1.08 billion shares. On the Nasdaq, decliners topped winners eight to five on volume of just under 2 billion shares.