Author: Emily Feldmesser

The Issue: ISIL

Over the weekend, the Islamic State released a video showing the beheading of Peter Kassig, an American aid worker. He was the fifth Western hostage the group has killed and the third American, according to the Washington Post. The New York Times reported he was beheaded in retaliation for airstrikes carried out by the United States in Iraq and Syria. President Barack Obama and the United States government confirmed the identity of Kassig and the authenticity of the video. “Mr. Kassig was taken from us in an act of pure evil by a terrorist group,” Obama said in a statement.

Kassig was captured in eastern Syria in October 2013 while traveling in an ambulance, the Washington Post reported. During his captivity, Kassig converted to Islam while sharing a cell with a devout Syrian Muslim and changed his name to Abdul-Rahman. Kassig founded an aid group to help Syrians that were in the middle of the country’s civil war, according to the Associated Press.

The AP also reported Kassig served in the U.S. Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment and was deployed to Iraq in 2007. He was captured doing relief work with  Special Emergency Response and Assistance, a group he founded after his discharge from the Army.

Now, the BBC reported, “Western intelligence officials are trying to identify Islamic State militants seen in the video…using facial recognition software to identify those involved in the mass beheading, matching their real names and origins to their adopted battle names.” It’s reported one of the militants is French and another is British.

The Islamic State is currently holding two women, one a 26-year-old American, according to the Washington Post.

The Issue: Japan’s Economy

While the rest of the world is recovering from the devastating 2008 recession, it seems as though Japan has unexpectedly fallen back into one in the third financial quarter, the New York Times reported.

Japanese cabinet officials said the economy shrunk by 1.6 percent in the three months to the end of September, compared with a year earlier, the Washington Post reported, the second straight quarterly drop. “Economists had been expecting the statistics to show that the economy had grown by 2 percent in the quarter.”

There is a possibility of an economic stimulus package, according to Reuters, but Japan’s Economy Minister said it would “be heard to craft an exceptionally big package because of the need for financial discipline.”

Reuters also reported some economists are thinking growth could improve in the October-December quarter.

The Issue: Ottawa Terrorist Attack

A terrorist attack rocked Canada’s capital and catapulted more investigations of terrorism in Canada. On Oct. 22, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau opened fire at Canada’s National War Memorial and entered the nearby Parliament building.

Zehaf-Bibeau killed corporal Nathan Cirillo, who was guarding the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, before he was killed himself. Zehaf-Bibeau was killed by Canadian sergeant-at-arms Kevin Vickers. This was the second deadly assault on a uniformed member of Canada’s armed forces within three days, the New York Times reported. A few days before, there was a hit-and-run car crash that killed a soldier and wounded another in Quebec. Later, authorities named it an act of terror.

According to Reuters, a Canadian Parliament committee is set to hear from two top security officials about threats facing Canada. Reuters also said Zehaf-Bibeau made a video of himself “just before the attack that contained evidence that he was driven by ideological and political motives.” The BBC reports that Canadian authorities said “the gunman was radicalized but had no ties to Middle Eastern Islamist extremists.”  Zehaf-Bibeau had converted to Islam, is from suburban Montreal and has dealt with drug abuse and mental health problems, the New York Times reported. He also has a criminal history.

During the attack, Parliament was locked down, but public tours have since reopened.

The Issue: Leaving Afghanistan

Combat operations have ended in the Afghani province of Helmand. United States Marines and British troops have left, which ends a “decade-long struggle to keep a major Taliban stronghold and the region’s vast opium production in check,” the New York Times said. According to the Washington Post, the province is now “almost exclusively in the hands of Afghan security forces.”

The withdrawal and base closure is one of the largest operations in the winding down of the international combat mission in Afghanistan, according to Reuters. The Washington Post reported the withdrawal “marks another step in the wider disengagement of NATO-led forces in Afghanistan.” The Washington Post also said British forces were largely in control of Helmand in the early years of the war, but in 2008 President Obama sent tens of thousands of American Marines to the province. At the peak of U.S. deployment, about 20,000 Marines were stationed at Helmand.

About 400 British troops and more than 350 Marines have been killed in Helmand.

The Issue: Hong Kong Protests

The protests for democracy in Hong Kong are still alive and well. They started about three weeks ago with a student rally, and grew to mass protests for “great democracy” in Hong Kong, according to the Associated Press. Since the protests started, they have grown bigger, and dangerous, and there is no end in sight.

The protestors want fully democratic elections, and were angered that the Chinese government wanted to vet potential candidates for the 2017 polls, the BBC says. There are scheduled talks between the student protestors and the Chinese government in the coming week, but violent protests have erupted. Reuters is calling this the worst political crisis in Hong Kong “since Britain handed the free-wheeling city back to China in 1997(.)”

Now, the BBC reports there have been charges of “outside involvement” in the protests. Hong Kong’s leader, CY Leung, is accusing “external forces” of involvement, and called the protests “out of control, even for the organizers.” However, student organizers and protestors have “denied any outside involvement” in the protests. The BBC also posited that “China could be making allegations of interference to discourage foreign governments from supporting the protests.”

Authorities “have been inconsistent both in handling the students’ call for political reform and in tactics to clear the streets,” the AP reported. None of the sides are sure what will result from the protests, and there doesn’t seem to be any sort of consensus.

The Issue: Europe’s Economy

It’s been about five years since the Great Recession that decimated the financial markets, but there still hasn’t been a full recovery, particularly in Europe.

The leader of the financial sector in Europe is Germany, who was the pioneer of austerity, a policy model of reducing spending and the increase of frugality within a financial sector. Thanks to Germany, many countries in the European Union were bailed out and their economies saved.

Wolfgang Schaeuble, Germany’s finance minister, said the country must “increase its investment to improve competitiveness, but not at the expense of higher debt,” the BBC reports. Those comments came after a horrible market week, which signaled a possible weakening of the German economy.

The weakening of the German economy comes after the German government cut its economic growth forecast from 1.8 percent to 1.2 percent, the BBC said. Along with that news, a health check of Europe’s top banks by the European Central Bank (ECB) found that “in the seven months since it began, the ECB had to shoot down countless pleas from banks and national supervisors for special treatment,” Reuters reports. The health check will also say which of Europe’s 130 biggest banks have “valued their assets properly and which have not, as well as whether banks need more capital to withstand another economic crash,” Reuters said.

The Issue: Ebola

The first case of Ebola has been confirmed in the United States. A man from Liberia tested positive for the disease in Dallas, and the BBC reports that 50 people the man, Thomas Duncan, had been in contact with are being monitored for signs of the virus. The only other cases in the country were of medical professionals being flown here for treatment.

There have been other suspected cases of the disease besides Duncan. The New York Times said there was a suspected case in Washington, D.C., where a patient who had been in Nigeria was isolated at Howard University Hospital but was eventually determined to not have the virus. Another man who flew from Brussels to Newark Airport went to the hospital with Ebola-like symptoms.

With this influx of Ebola cases, the Obama administration “believe(s) that screening of passengers in the affected countries in Africa, by taking their temperature and requesting information about their activities, is the best way to prevent the virus from spreading to the United States,” the New York Times reported.

It has been rumored Duncan knew he had the disease and did not file the proper documentation while flying from Liberia. According to the BBC, Liberian officials said they would “prosecute Mr. Duncan for lying on an Ebola questionnaire form.”

The BBC reports the disease has killed an estimated 3,400 people in West Africa. There have been 7,178 confirmed cases, most in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.

The Issue: ISIL

On Friday, ISIL released yet another video of militants apparently beheading a hostage, this time a British man named Alan Henning. This is the fourth hostage the group has killed.

Henning was a former taxi driver in Britain who was “moved by the plight of the Syrian people,” the New York Times said. The BBC reports Henning was on his fourth aid mission to Syria in December, when he was kidnapped minutes after arriving in the county.

Along with the beheading, the militants threatened American hostage Peter Kassig, whom National Security Spokesperson Caitlin Hayden confirmed the militants were holding, the Associated Press reported.

Kassig, a former Army Ranger, was travelling through Syria working for the relief organization he founded, Special Emergency Response and Assistance, when he was captured in October of 2013, the AP reports. While in captivity, Kassig converted to Islam. He now goes by Abdul-Rahman.