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“Representatives from 22 European Union member states converged on the Silesian Sisters Convent on the edge of this West Bank town [Beit Jala], to protest Israel’s plan to extend the controversial barrier that Israel is building in and around the West Bank through this area” (Jerusalem Post, February 1, 2015). The Israeli “protective wall” is locally expected to...
“At least 100,000 people took to the streets of Madrid on Saturday (31 January) to show support for anti-establishment party Podemos, one week after Greek voters almost gave Syriza, a party with similar objectives, an absolute majority” (EU Observer, February 2, 2015). The Podemos party estimated the crowd to be three times this size, while the Spanish paper El...
“More than 25 years after the Berlin Wall’s fall, Russian lawmakers are mulling a proposal to condemn West Germany’s 1990 ‘annexation’ of East Germany as Moscow’s answer to Western denunciation of its seizure of Crimea” (The Local, January 28, 2015). Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, under whose leadership the Berlin Wall came down, “called the contention...
“Under the Bundesbank’s new gold storage plan in 2013, [Germany] decided to bring back 674 tonnes from abroad by 2020 and store half of its gold in its own vaults… Since the transfers began in 2013, the Bundesbank said it has relocated a total of 157 tonnes of gold to Frankfurt—67 tonnes from Paris and 90 tonnes from New York” (AFP, January 19, 2015).
“Just hours after bringing his far-left Syriza party to victory in the Greek elections, Alexis Tsipras has been appointed PM and shown that he is prepared to play hardball with eurozone fiscal hawks...” (EU Observer, January 26, 2015). Tsipras, age 40, “is the youngest Greek PM in modern times” and was elected to bring an end to austerity (ibid.). Greek debt is...
The “European Experiment” appears to be reaching its end, at least in its present form. With the fiscal turmoil in the south, the European Central Bank just issued its own quantitative easing program, excluding Greece because it is too great a risk for default (Stratfor, January 27, 2015).
“More than 170 people have been killed and 200,000 displaced by torrential rain and flooding in Malawi. Large areas in the south are underwater and homes, crops and livestock have been washed away” (BBC, January 19, 2015). Drinking water sources have been either submerged or contaminated and officials fear an outbreak of cholera (ibid.).
Last weekend Belgium sent troops to protect sites across the nation, including some Jewish sites. “It was the first time in 30 years that authorities used troops to reinforce police in Belgium’s cities” (Times of Israel, January 17, 2015).
After several years of the value of the Swiss franc being capped against the euro, “The euro lost nearly 20 percent of its value against the Swiss franc on Thursday [January 15] after the central bank abandoned the cap on the franc’s value against the single currency” (EU Observer, January 15, 2015). “The value of the Swiss franc increased by around 30 percent...
“An underwater volcano off Tonga was spewing ash high into the air on Tuesday, causing several carriers to suspend air travel to the South Pacific island nation and turning the surrounding ocean blood red, residents and officials said” (The Guardian, January 12, 2015). “The Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai underwater volcano… was sending volcanic ash up to 4,500m into...