The Navy Times has published an essay which succinctly lays out the US position as it is apparently sending naval vessels within the 12-mile limit of reefs that China claims are islands within the South China Sea. Xinhua has published an editorial which attempts to refute the US position. The Xinhua essay mentions the Cuban Missile Crisis as an analogy to the current situation. While the Cuban missile crisis may be a good example of US arrogance, it is not really a relevant analog since the US was never claiming that Cuba was within US territorial waters.
There is a movement in Germany called the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident (Pegida) which has been quiescent for the last few months but which has been revived by the movement of refugees into the country. The movement is virulently anti-Islam and has been implicated in many acts of arson against refugee camps. It is also mobilizing political sentiment against Chancellor Merkel which is making handling the refugee issue more difficult. A candidate for mayor of Cologne was stabbed in the neck by an anti-refugee individual.
Egypt has begun the process of electing a new Parliament which will likely conclude in December. Both Houses of the Parliament have been suspended by the former General Abdel Fattah el-Sissi who overthrew the elected President Mohammed Morsi in 2013. The political process is carefully controlled and the political repression in Egypt is as great as it was under the rule of the former dictator Mubarak who was overthrown in the Arab Spring protests of 2011. The prospects for the return of democracy do not seem to be great.
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