World events 20 in a concentrated form, understandable
World events 20.
Biden urged Israel and Hamas to “pause” fighting in order to allow time to free hostages held in the Gaza Strip, while stopping short of supporting a full ceasefire.
To see important ads, turn off your ad blocker! Article continued below:Progressive groups, as well as Muslim and Arab Americans, have criticized the US president over his support for Israel’s campaign against Hamas that has resulted in thousands of civilian deaths in the Palestinian territory.
World events 20, Macron.
President Emmanuel Macron plans to strengthen France’s arsenal of strategic tools to protect vulnerable firms against foreign buyers with deep pockets, particularly from the US and China. The finance ministry said the government will lower the threshold for triggering a review and extend the number of protected areas to include critical raw materials, as well as French units of foreign companies.
Discussions.
The US and China are set to hold rare nuclear arms control talks next week amid growing concerns over Beijing’s accelerated push to build up its arsenal of atomic weapons, a US administration official says.
The discussions will take place ahead of Biden’s planned meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco in less than two weeks.
World events 20, rhetoric.
The rhetoric coming out of Washington and Beijing contains a lot of “either you’re with us or against us” kind of talk, but not everyone is picking sides. A deep dive into trade and investment data highlights five nations straddling the new geopolitical fault lines: Vietnam, Poland, Mexico, Morocco and Indonesia.
Europe.
Europe’s worst construction crisis in decades has families seeing their dream of building their own home collapse. Residential building has tumbled as costs soar, while sluggish bureaucracies and increasingly stringent energy-efficiency regulations add to the headwinds. With housing already tight, the situation threatens to weigh on economic growth and further stoke political tensions.
World events 20, risk.
Latin America’s leftist leaders are reevaluating their relations with Israel over its offensive in the Gaza Strip, highlighting the diplomatic risks posed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bid to eradicate Hamas.
US House.
Fellow New York Republicans failed yesterday to expel Representative George Santos, who has been indicted on fraud charges, from the US House.
Uganda.
Ugandan activists demonstrating against a $4 billion oil pipeline have been threatened and detained as President Yoweri Museveni’s administration scrutinizes non-governmental organizations, Human Rights Watch said.
World events 20, Volodymyr Zelenskiy can barely disguise his frustration.
The weather is turning, the political mood is souring and the grinding counter-offensive may stall in spite of Ukraine’s insistence it will fight through the winter.
The Israel-Hamas conflict has diverted the world’s attention, and with the hard-right Republicans in charge of the House of Representatives, Ukraine can no longer assume the American military aid it relies on will keep coming, even with President Joe Biden’s assurances to the contrary. He’s got a reelection to fight, and supporting Ukraine is not the top concern for US voters.
In an interview with TIME magazine, Zelenskiy acknowledged: “Of course we lose out from the events in the Middle East.” Meanwhile, in one of his nightly addresses he complained how “the modern world quickly gets accustomed to success.”
A year ago, Ukraine’s spirited counterattack had won praise. Criticism of its current efforts as underwhelming clearly sting.
The US war machine is starting to be spread thin on two fronts. Ukraine is falling behind on artillery shells, the Europeans are unlikely to be able to step up while Russia is reportedly getting ammunition supplies from North Korea.
In public, leaders will keep saying how they stand by Ukraine, but the pledges are starting to ring hollow. A pair of notorious Russian pranksters tricked Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni into a phone call where she said Western allies are tired of the conflict.
“I see that there is a lot of fatigue, I have to say the truth, from all the sides,” she said in an audio recording from mid-September that was released online. “We’re nearing the moment in which everybody understands that we need a way out.”
All The Best!