Headlines:

• Zionist Entity Makes its Move
• Another Conference on Libya
• Global Fertility Rate Reaches Watershed Moment

Zionist Entity Makes its Move

The latest flare up in Gaza took place on Sunday 11 November when ‘Israeli Special Force’ attempted to infiltrate Gaza dressed in civilian vehicles. In the thick of the night, a dressed vehicle drove three kilometres into Eastern Khan Younis, Gaza, anticipating that a besieged community or resistance accustomed to summary executions, sniper fire and airstrikes would be slumbered. To its surprise, the vehicle, laden with military supplies reportedly akin to an ‘operations room’ was spotted by Gazan soldiers on patrol. A fire fight ensued in which Commander Nour Barakah and colleague Majed al-Qara were killed. In a rare public address, the Jewish entity’s military chief of Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Tal Rousso also denied the failed operation was an attempt to assassinate Barakeh. The Jewish entity’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cut short a visit to Paris to mark the World War One centenary of the Armistice. The current fighting comes in the context of years of sporadic conflict, but Iran’s expansion into Syria has worried Israel and it is in this context its carrying out risky offensive operations.

Another Conference on Libya

The Palermo international conference on Libya only attracted a small number of leaders, while Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter, a key power broker in the North African country, shunned the main conference’s meetings. No commitments were made and no binding agreement was concluded by the warring factions to a United Nations-led road map envisaging elections next year. Libya has been split into rival factions in the country’s east and west since Hifter emerged in Libya in 2014. Numerous conferences have taken place ever since between rival factions and the global powers, but little has been achieved. The future of Libya is similar to Syria where the future is no longer in the hands of the people but being determined in Western capitals.

Global Fertility Rate Reaches Watershed Moment

The world is reaching a “watershed” where nearly half of its countries are in the midst of a “baby bust” with birth rates below levels needed to maintain population size, a major international report has found. The annual Global Burden of Disease Study, published in The Lancet, shows that 91 of 195 countries now have fertility rates below replacement level – currently 2.05 births on average for every woman. “We’re now getting to that watershed moment where half the countries in the world are below replacement level for births,” Dr Murray told The Independent. “It’s very likely that will just continue for the foreseeable future, and the way high-income countries have been dealing with lower fertility is through migration. “That has its consequences, and societies in some cases have not been happy with large scale inward migration.” After decades of pushing individualism, the chickens have come home to roost now. Placing oneself, their career and life before all else has now created a scenario where half of the world, mainly the capitalist west will have declining populations.