Maxwell, 59, seeks the 2nd District congressional seat. The Concord resident opposes the incumbent, Charles Bass of Peterborough, and Berlin Mayor Bob Danderson in the Republican primary Sept. 12.

Maxwell would not specify if she holds the opinion that the government stood by while terrorists hijacked four domestic airliners and used them as weapons, or if it had a larger role by sanctioning and carrying out the attacks.

But she implicated the government by saying the Sept. 11 attacks were meant "to soften us up . . . to make us more willing to have more stringent laws here, which are totally against the Bill of Rights . . . to make us particularly focus on Arabs and Muslims . . . and those strange persons who spend all their time creating little bombs," giving Americans a reason "to hate them and fear them and, therefore, bomb them in Iraq for other reasons."

She said this strategy "would be normal" for governments, citing her belief that the British government - and not the Germany military - sank the Lusitania ocean liner in 1915. The deaths of Americans on the cruise liner helped galvanize U.S. support to enter World War I, and benefited England, she said.

In turn, the Sept. 11 attacks "made the ground fertile" for more stringent laws, such as the Patriot Act, and the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, Maxwell said.

Near the end of the interview, Maxwell pounded her fist on the table and asked editors of The Telegraph why they weren't publishing more stories about the government's role in the terrorist attacks or proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Maxwell has no political experience. She lived abroad for the past quarter-century with her husband, George, a pediatrician, and only recently returned to the U.S., she said.

In the hour-long interview, Maxwell spoke at length about Constitutional law, U.S. law, nuclear weapons proliferation, and other domestic and foreign policy issues.

Maxwell said the U.S. should withdraw from Iraq. She also questioned whether Congress authorized the war and said its members can't explain that 2002 vote. (Congress authorized the use of force to defend this country's security and enforce United Nations resolutions on Iraq.)

"Legally, we shouldn't have gone to Iraq if Congress can't explain why," she said.

Maxwell described herself as a strict Constitutionalist, a candidate who wants to bring the country "back to basics." The Constitution grants more power to the legislative branch than the other two branches, but Congress has allowed the executive and judicial branches to diminish its influence, she said.

She also said the U.S. shouldn't immerse itself in the international community by signing trade and security pacts. These agreements have weakened national sovereignty, she said.

A ranking Democrat "is publicly supporting a terrorist organization," Republicans barked back after Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) dithered on whether Congress should support Israel in the war.

Jewish leaders have spent years carefully cultivating the bromide that support for Israel is the one bipartisan issue; some tried hard not to wince.

"I do not see the point of constantly testing members of Congress on their Israel bona fides," said Steve Rabinowitz, a former Clinton aide and Democratic strategist who was unhappy with both sides for making the war political fodder. "Just for partisan purposes to routinely, constantly test how far you can push members of Congress, I think it's totally alienating."

Others said the process was healthy.

"I think it's a good thing to have members of Congress outdo their colleagues by showing that their pro-Israel credentials are stronger than the next guy's," said William Daroff, vice president of public policy at United Jewish Communities and a former Republican activist.

"When Israel is in the existential battle for survival that it now finds itself in, having people argue whether they are the best friend of Israel or the bester friend of Israel really shows the parameters of where the vast majority of public officials are in America today," he said.

At stake is a community that votes in disproportionately high numbers, that breaks ties in swing states like Florida and Ohio, and that has historically favored Democrats in votes and in campaign contributions.

The opening salvo came in the days after the war started on July 12. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the minority leader in the U.S. House of Representatives, refused to sponsor a resolution affirming the House's support for Israel in its war against Hezbollah.

Pelosi, who otherwise supported the resolution and instructed her caucus to vote for it, objected to the omission of language calling on both sides to safeguard civilian lives.

The wrangling went on behind closed doors, but Republicans sidestepped congressional niceties by leaking the dispute to Jewish reporters.

That infuriated Democrats, who noted that Sen. John Warner (R-Va.), the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, had voiced similar concerns. They were ready the next week when Maliki came to town.

The Iraqi prime minister was to have represented President Bush's promise of a democratic Iraq emerging from the ashes of civil war - but Jewish lawmakers seized control of the coverage, lambasting Maliki's refusal to join other Arab leaders in condemning Hezbollah for launching the war.

"His comments condemning Israel were wrong but predictable, but his refusal to condemn Hezbollah is painful," said Sen. Charles Schumer, the Jewish Democrat from New York.

Republicans fired next, when Dingell, the longest serving member in the House, explained his vote - one of just eight - against the resolution supporting Israel.

"I don't take sides for or against Hezbollah or for or against Israel," he said in a TV interview. His next sentence in what was a confused interview was: "I condemn Hezbollah as does everybody else, for the violence."

The second sentence was left out in Republican releases. The National Republican Congressional Committee accused Dingell of "support for a known terrorist organization."

Often the digs, which increased in frequency as the war continued, come down to headcounts: Democrats made hay of the fact that Republicans made up 10 of 12 U.S. senators who failed to sign a letter to the European Union urging it to classify Hezbollah as a terrorist group.

Just because the guns have fallen silent, doesn't mean the shouting has stopped.

The Republican Jewish Coalition is launching an ad campaign this week linking Democratic Sen. Joseph Lieberman's loss in the Connecticut primary last week to what it says is receding Democratic support for Israel.

"Joe Lieberman was a voice of support for Israel," the ad says. "That voice has been silenced by the Democratic Party. America and Israel are worse off for it."

The National Jewish Democratic Council is urging newspapers not to take the ad, calling the RJC "beyond hypocritical" because of its earlier broadsides against Lieberman, who was the first Jew to make a viable presidential ticket in 2000.

Democrats had no choice but to respond, said Ira Forman, the NJDC executive director.

"When they play this hypocritical gotcha game, we're stupid unless we respond," he said. "If you're going to play that gotcha game, you live by the sword you die by the sword."

The attacks make political sense for Republicans. A recent Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll, conducted between July 28 and Aug. 1, found a striking partisan gap in support for Israel: Democrats supported neutrality over alignment with the Jewish state, 54 percent to 39 percent, while Republicans supported alignment with the Jewish state over neutrality, 64 percent to 29 percent.

Forman attributed the results to the GOP's substantial evangelical base. "If you take evangelical Christians out of the equation, Democrats and Republicans look about the same on Israel," he said.

Republican Jews say the poll indicates the Democrats are no longer steadfast on Israel's security.

Noam Neusner, a former Jewish liaison for the current Bush administration, said that although the trend represents an opportunity for his party, it is disquieting for those who want support for Israel to remain bipartisan.

"What concerns me is that the Democratic Party's rank and file appears to be becoming hostile to Israel's security needs," Neusner said.

Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said that if anything, the bickering was a comfort to him. He had feared that the war would mean Israel would get sucked into the pre-election for-Bush/against-Bush polarization

"What we've seen is the reverse," Foxman said. "The Democrats who are opposed to the president on 99 percent of things are closing ranks on Israel."

One spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because officers at the highest levels of the Army are still making minor changes. The other described the initiative in memos obtained by The Associated Press.

Brig. Gen. Anthony A. Cucolo, who heads the Army's public affairs office, said the Army's move is not new but a continuing "rigorous and routine review of current casualty cases with outstanding issues."

The step follows high-profile mistakes in telling families the circumstances of soldiers' deaths.

The best-known is that of Cpl. Pat Tillman, the one-time NFL star from San Jose, Calif., who quit football to join the U.S. Army Rangers and was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan in April 2004.

Tillman's family was originally told he had been killed by enemy fire. Five weeks later, they learned he was shot dead by fellow Rangers after an ambush.

The military suspected it was a friendly fire death within hours, but failed to tell the Tillmans despite a regulation on the books directing it to do so, said the soldier's mother, Mary Tillman.

She called the move positive, but she said the Army must follow up and deliver any new information to surviving family members.

"People will be able to come to terms with the truth, but if you were lied to once, then you're always going to be distrustful," she said in a telephone interview.

Two months after Tillman died, Lt. Andre Tyson and Spc. Patrick McCaffrey, two California National Guardsmen, were killed by the Iraqi civil-defense soldiers they were training.

The Army initially told the families the two men were killed in a conventional ambush. It was two years before their survivors learned they were slain.

The Army is not reopening investigations into the deaths of all soldiers killed in action, but it is revisiting them to ensure family members were informed of the Army's most accurate and updated findings.

The review has been quietly under way for more than two months, but the directive has not yet been sent to units in the field.

It will order Army units down to the battalion level to dig up so-called 15-6 investigative reports routinely conducted after combat deaths. Battalions that have been or are in Iraq or Afghanistan are being directed to ship copies of the initial casualty reports to top Army officials.

The Army will compare the initial reports to the follow-up investigations, looking for discrepancies in conclusions, according to military officials.

If the Army finds such a discrepancy, it will reappoint a casualty notification team, prepare a new report for the surviving family members and revisit the family to make personal notifications, one official said.

Marine Corps spokesman Lt. Col. Scott Fazekas said he was not aware of any similar review by the Marines.

A soldier's death may result in multiple investigations for a number of reasons. Follow-up inquiries are often launched when a first layer of military investigators concludes they need to probe more deeply. For instance, sometimes a crime is suspected but investigators in the field do not have access to resources such as ballistics testing.

Follow-up inquiries are commonly conducted by the Army's Criminal Investigation Command, known as CID, and by the Combat Readiness Center.

One of the military officials said the review is approximately half complete.

The full scope of the effort was not clear Thursday. Officials who spoke said they did not know how many soldiers' deaths would be included, or the circumstances that would trigger review. But it will certainly include several hundred deaths, one official said. Another said the review will include all combat deaths in the two theaters.

That would mean the review would cover some 2,000 reports. Nearly 1,800 Army soldiers have died in Iraq since 2003. More than 230 have died in Afghanistan, according to an Associated Press tally.

Nadia McCaffrey, the mother of Patrick McCaffrey, welcomed the move but said she was cautious in her optimism because the Army has moved slowly to inform her in the past.

"So now again we have to see how long it takes for people to act on it," she said from her home in Tracy.

Police in Essex, Vermont, where the shooting occurred, said one person had been taken into custody but they gave no other details. New England Cable News reported the shooter was a 20-year-old man. There was no indication by police if the shooter was among those killed or wounded.

Farr said the ages of the shooter and the injured were unclear. Classes at the school were scheduled to begin next Wednesday.