Saudi Arabia threateningly accused Qatar of “declaring war” on the Kingdom for supposedly calling for the Holy Mosques in Mecca and Medina to be placed under international control. Qatar denies that it ever issued such a statement, but that didn’t prevent the Saudis from reacting in a very harsh way by framing the idea as…
The water crisis caused by ongoing power outages of more than 20 hours a day has pushed Gaza Strip residents to dig unlicensed wells, disregarding the ensuing serious threats to the already scarce aquifer water stock. At the request of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Israel reduced its power supply to Gaza on June 19 from…
A popular thesis since the 1930s is that a natural progression exists from currency wars to trade wars to shooting wars. Both history and analysis support this thesis. Currency wars do not exist all the time; they arise under certain conditions and persist until there is either systemic reform or systemic collapse. The conditions that…
-Will he sign, or won’t he? – Moscow’s John Bull pub customers tried to second-guess the US President. The pub on the Nikitsky Boulevard in the centre of Moscow is a good watering hole that is frequented by the Foreign Office minor officials and sundry intelligentsia. – He won’t sign his own surrender, fervently said…
Twenty years ago, a run on the Thai currency triggered a financial crisis that quickly devastated the economy of the entire region, sinking the currencies of Thailand, Indonesia, and South Korea and ultimately spreading as far as Russia and Brazil. Far from ‘lessons being learned’, history looks worryingly set to repeat itself. On July 22,…
More U.S. troops entered Yemen this week escalating ground operations against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). And according to the Pentagon, additional troops are likely to follow. Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis has not ruled out sending additional troops to Yemen shortly, possibly even in a matter of weeks. U.S. and U.A.E. Troops Push AQAP Out…
