Keeping Up With The Chaos
Welcome to today’s global news roundup! In this edition, we bring you the latest updates from around the world. From the Middle East, where a hard-fought ceasefire has brought an end to the 11-day conflict between Israel and Gaza, to Australia, where the “Fridays for future” movement has reemerged with powerful climate protests. In Europe, EU countries and the EU Parliament have agreed on a Europe-wide certificate for Corona vaccinations, facilitating travel within the region. Meanwhile, Poland’s judicial control and disregard for EU guidelines are under scrutiny, and in the US, there is growing concern over the increasing number of attacks on people of Asian descent. Stay informed and engaged with today’s top news stories that impact our world.
MIDDLE EAST
Since Friday, a ceasefire ended 11 days of fighting between Israel and Gaza. More than 240 people were killed in the clashes that started on May 10th, nearly all of them in Gaza, which also suffered hundreds of millions of dollars of physical damage.
The situation is still very tensioned, and the peace fragile and superficial. While thousands of Palestinian had gathered, celebrating, the Israeli police stormed the Al Aqsa Mosque andwounded around 20 people with teargas and stun grenades, only hours after theceasefire went into effect. The recent clash is the fourth big one between Israel and Hamas since the first one back in 2008 and after every violent escalation, including the most recent one, the fronts remained extremely tensioned. And as long as the status quo does not change favourably, there will not be an end in sight of this long conflict.
AUSTRALIA
The young movement “Fridays for future” has revived in several dozen cities all over the Country. Last Friday marked the first major protest since the corona pandemic started back in spring 2020. On Twitter, the activists reported about 50,000 participants. The motto of the protests was “Fund our Future Not Gas”. Context to this is the decision of the government to support the country’s natural gas industry with 58.6 million Australian dollars. Among other things, the money is going to go into the construction of a new liquefied gas terminal for imported gas. The protests in Australia give many young people around the world hope that the movement will revive in their countries too, as soon as the lockdown is lifted, and large protests are possible once again.
EUROPE
EU countries and the EU Parliament agreed on a Europe-wide certificate for the detection of Corona vaccinations. The digital document will include information on vaccinations, corona test results and corona infections, thus facilitating travel. EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakidis declared the decision of an “important step to restore freedom of movement in the EU as safely as possible”. The critic: Not everyone has the opportunity to get vaccinated or afford frequent testing since the demand for free tests was cut down to the vague term “affordable” testing and will be decided countrywide .
POLAND
In recent years, Poland has repeatedly taken steps to control its judiciary and its citizens more than the EU guidelines actually allow. Most recently, it surfaced, the Minister of Justice was given the opportunity to promote judges without any of the legally stipulated reasons having to be present. In addition, the office of a “disciplinary officer” was introduced in several courts of law, aiming to strongly influence the judges, since the Minister of Justice can not only appoint the judges but also dismiss them. The ECJ (European court of justice) is now negotiating. But however it will decide, it remains questionable whether Poland will take steps to reverse the reforms or, as before, simply ignore the judgment.
USA
In the US, there has been an increasing number of attacks on people of Asian descent since the beginning of the Corona pandemic. Many attribute this mainly to former US President Donald Trump’s attacks on China. Trump had repeatedly referred to the coronavirus as a “China virus” because it was first detected in Wuhan, China. Between March 2020 and March 2021, more than 6,600 cases of violence or discrimination against U.S. citizens of Asian descent. Last week, the government unveiled a bill that opposes it and more closely tracks hate speech and acts. It is criticised for not dealing with the causes and problems that lead to an increase in hate crimes in the first place, and for not providing financial resources for information.
