News

“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 the air...

“Over 2,000 people were killed by Boko Haram fighters during the massacre [last week]... Hundreds of bodies - too many to count - remain strewn in the bush in Nigeria from an Islamic extremist attack that Amnesty International suggested Friday is the ‘deadliest massacre’ in the history of Boko Haram” (Sydney Morning Herald, January 13, 2015).

Last week’s terrorist shooting of 17 civilians in Paris shocked France and the world (FoxNews, January 11, 2015). Following this tragedy, 40 world leaders joined 3.7 million people in rallies in Paris and throughout France on Sunday in a show of solidarity against terrorism (CNN, January 11, 2015).

“Israel on Saturday froze NIS 500 million ($127 million) in Palestinian tax revenues collected on Ramallah’s behalf, in response to the Palestinian Authority [PA] filing a request to join the International Criminal Court earlier this week”—a move intended to allow the PA to prosecute Israel for war crimes (Times of Israel, January 3, 2015).

“A widening rift between Moscow and Washington over cruise missiles and increasingly daring patrols by nuclear-capable Russian submarines threatens to end an era of arms control and bring back a dangerous rivalry between the world’s two dominant nuclear arsenals. Tensions have been taken to a new level by US threats of retaliatory action for Russian development of a new cruise missile” (The Guardian, January 4, 2015). The U.S.