U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken discussed the possibility of Indonesia normalizing diplomatic relations with Israel in meetings with officials in Jakarta last week, Israeli officials say. The Israeli officials stressed that no such step is imminent.
Why it matters: Indonesia is the most populous Muslim-majority country in the world and a major market for Israeli companies, but it has no official diplomatic relations with Israel.
Four senior Israeli officials who attended meetings in Jerusalem with national security adviser Jake Sullivan tell Axios they came away reassured that the U.S. is ready to take a harder line on Iran if necessary and to take Israel’s views into account.
The big picture: Sullivan sketched out three possible near-term scenarios on Iran’s nuclear program in the meetings, two officials say:
National security adviser Jake Sullivan's visit to Ramallah on Wednesday to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas comes amid growing Palestinian frustration with the Biden administration.
Why it matters: President Biden vowed to restore the U.S.-Palestinian relationship after it was severed almost entirely during the Trump administration. But Palestinian leaders are disappointed that he still hasn't implemented his promise to reopen the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem, Palestinian officials tell Axios.
A short excerpt from my interviews with Donald Trump has created a heated debate in the U.S. in recent days, particularly in the Jewish community.
What Trump said: "People in this country that are Jewish no longer love Israel. … I’ll tell you, the evangelical Christians love Israel more than the Jews in this country," Trump said in April during an interview for my book, "Trump’s Peace: The Abraham Accords and the Reshaping of the Middle East."
The Biden administration is loosening restrictions to make it easier for humanitarian groups to provide aid to a devastated Afghanistan, senior administration officials told reporters Tuesday night.
Why it matters: The steps do not address the urgent calls from the Taliban, Afghan protesters, international aid groups and U.S. lawmakers for the U.S. to lift its freeze on Afghan foreign reserves. With most aid stopped and overseas assets frozen, Afghanistan's cash crunch has rendered the economy hardly functional.
The NHL announced Wednesday that the league's players will not participate in the 2022 Beijing Olympics.
Why it matters: The move comes amid a surge in coronavirus infections, largely driven by the newly discovered Omicron variant, and after the league announced that it would briefly postpone all NHL games through Christmas.
World Health Organization Europe regional director Hans Kluge said at a briefing Tuesday that governments should prepare for "a significant surge" in COVID-19 cases, driven by the rapidly spreading Omicron variant.
Threat level: "We can see another storm coming — Omicron is becoming, or already has become, dominant in several countries — including in Denmark, Portugal and the United Kingdom, where its numbers are doubling" and "generating previously unseen transmission rates," Kluge said.
Harvard University professor Charles Lieber was convicted Tuesday in connection with lying to U.S. federal authorities about his ties to China.
Driving the news: A federal jury in Boston found the 62-year-old former chair of Harvard University's chemistry and chemical biology department guilty of two counts of making false statements to federal authorities about a Chinese government recruitment program, per a Department of Justice statement.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett announced Tuesday he's ordered the rollout of a fourth dose of the COVID-19 vaccine in response to the threat of the rapidly spreading Omicron variant.
Why it matters: Israel is believed to be the first country to offer a fourth coronavirus dose to citizens.
As President Biden's point person for Afghan refugee resettlement steps aside, advocacy groups are pressing the Biden administration to accelerate its efforts to help the tens of thousands of people still stuck in limbo.
Why it matters: Former Delaware Gov. Jack Markell (D) is leaving the envoy role after being confirmed as the U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The transition comes amid criticism that there hasn't been enough high-level, sustained engagement to ease thebacklog of applications nearly four months after the U.S. military and diplomatic withdrawal from Kabul.
April’s presidential election in France was supposed to pit Emmanuel Macron against the far-right, with the fairly unpopular incumbent facing his 2021 challenger Marine Le Pen or Éric Zemmour, the insurgent TV pundit whose rhetoric is even more radical.
State of play: With Le Pen and Zemmour splitting the far-right vote, a much trickier scenario looms for Macron, with Valérie Pécresse of the center-right Republicans now the favorite to break through to the second-round runoff.
The Chinese governmentis demanding that multinational firms cut ties with Lithuania or else lose access to China's markets, after the Baltic state allowed Taiwan to open an unofficial representative's office there.
Why it matters: Beijing is beginning to implement a de facto sanctions regime to enforce its geopolitical interests around the globe.
Elections in Hong Kong on Sunday saw the lowest turnout in the city's history, with just 30.2% of the electorate casting a vote, after an election boycott that Hong Kong authorities attempted to squelch both in the city and abroad.
Why it matters: The Hong Kong government is turning laws intended to protect democratic institutions into tools to strengthen authoritarianism in the once-autonomous city.
The Chinese government increasingly is using its economic weight to reshape global behavior and strengthen its own authoritarianism. And democratic governments have left companies to fend for themselves.
Why it matters: Global businesses and nonprofits learned the hard way this year that taking a stand for democratic values can cause massive revenue losses in the Chinese market.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan will meet Wednesday with Israeli officials including Naftali Bennett, with Iran "very high on the agenda," a senior Biden administration official told reporters on Monday evening.
Why it matters: The senior official said "time is running out" for the Iran nuclear talks in Vienna, and "we will talk with the Israelis on what is going to happen in the coming weeks." Sullivan is also expected to travel to Ramallah and meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Until recently, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson's popularity within his party and with the public made his position appear almost invulnerable. Now 6 in 10 Brits think he'll be out of a job by the end of next year.
By the numbers: Johnson's approval ratings have plummeted to a record-low 30%, his Brexit negotiator just abandoned ship, and his image as an electoral juggernaut has been tainted.
