American Airlines, when using miles Middle East - USA, it does nto matter how many stops you make, providing you are in the same direction, is, I once flew, DXB-LHR-ORD-SJC Although I stopped in ORD, my destination was SJC, unlike CO it seems! So their post on Skywards, about all the states, including Alaska is Bull as no one flies Alaska - Europe! It should say Europe, to IAH, IAD, EWR for 105'000 miles. I was raging with the Skywards Gold guy yesterday who did not see my point at all! To make it worse, CO do have a flight to MIA but it is a codeshare with VS so you cannot use EK points on that route.