AFRICA - German Chancellor Olaf Scholz this weekend makes his third visit to sub-Saharan Africa in two years, as conflicts elsewhere highlight the growing importance of an energy-rich region in which Berlin has traditionally had little involvement. He will visit major energy producer Nigeria, as well as Ghana, with migration flows and instability in West Africa also on his agenda. Much of the impetus for the trip has come from the realization that Germany - and Europe - need Africa more than it thought, said Greens legislator Anton Hofreiter. "People realized we needed allies against Russia's invasion of Ukraine," he said. "And suddenly we noticed they weren't necessarily on our side... That was a rude awakening." The war between Israel and Hamas has leant new urgency in particular to the energy aspect of the trip.

USA - Newly-minted House Speaker Mike Johnson (Republican for Louisiana) told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Thursday that the entirety of his worldview could be found if one would simply “go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it.” Johnson, who received unanimous Republican support after three weeks of chaos — and three other nominees for the position — was elected on Wednesday to replace ousted House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (Republican for California) and spoke with Hannity about getting back to business in the House of Representatives. “I said, ‘Well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it – that’s my worldview.’ That’s what I believe and so I make no apologies for it,” he said. Johnson took his Bible with him to deliver his first speech as House Speaker — where he told every other member of Congress that he believed they were all called by God to use their gifts to the best of their ability to serve the American people.

USA - Some big Wall Street banks are expecting next week’s refunding announcement by the Treasury to reflect the government’s large and ongoing borrowing needs. JPMorgan Chase and Deutsche Bank, estimate that Treasury will need to borrow roughly $1.5 trillion during the current fourth quarter and first quarter of 2024 — on top of the $1 trillion estimated borrowing that took place in the third quarter. Meanwhile, JPMorgan anticipates that Treasury will announce $800 billion in net marketable borrowing for the October-December period, and $698 billion for January-March of 2024, according to strategist Jay Barry and others.

ISRAEL - Israel’s military conducted a preliminary incursion into Gaza on Thursday with tanks, the largest raid since declaring war on the Hamas terrorist organization that invaded Israel on October 7, The Wall Street Journal reported. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) conducted a “limited raid” into Gaza on Thursday, Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said, amid intense domestic pressure to proceed with the pledged ground invasion aimed at eliminating Hamas entirely and rescuing hostages in Hamas captivity, according to the WSJ. IDF tanks and personnel destroyed obstacles in preparation for “the next stages of fighting,” Hagari said. No Israeli soldiers were injured during the raid, Hagari said, according to the WSJ.

SWITZERLAND - "What do we need so many humans for?" Leading advisor to the WEF, Yuval Noah Harari, "predicts" that rapid advances in computing technology will "make humans redundant", creating a "massive class of useless people" who will need to be kept "happy" with "drugs and computer games". "Now, we see the creation of a new massive class of useless people. As computers become better and better in more and more fields, there is a distinct possibility that computers will outperform us in most tasks, and will make humans redundant. And then the big political and economic question of the 21st century will be, what do we need humans for? Or at least, what do we need so many humans for?"

AUSTRALIA - "The plan of the Great Reset is that you will die with nothing." Australian senator, Malcolm Roberts, dropping serious truth bombs about Klaus Schwab's World Economic Forum — and its dystopian Great Reset agenda — in the Australian parliament. "Klaus Schwab's 'life by subscription' is really serfdom. It's slavery. Billionaire, globalist corporations will own everything — homes, factories, farms, cars, furniture — and everyday citizens will rent what they need, if their social credit score allows."

USA - This girl socially transitioned at 13, got puberty blockers at 14, testosterone at 15, and would have had a double mastectomy at 16 if Covid hadn't hit. She detransitioned at 17. Now she lives with this permanent damage. “I have to live the rest of my life with a man's voice, acne scars, joint pain, severe cramps, hot flashes, sore ribs, and shave my face once a week, because when I was fifteen I would have rather died than be a woman. I may never be able to have a baby because of a stupid mistake I made when I was fifteen. I don't know how to ever trust a therapist or doctor again. This is my life forever.”

USA - We are approaching a reckoning. We have seen this convergence before in Hitler’s Germany, in Stalin’s Russia, in Mussolini’s Italy, and in Mao’s China: the rise of strongmen and demagogues, the ascendency of profit-driven politics over deep-seated principles, the warring nationalism that seeks to divide and conquer, the callous disregard for basic human rights and dignity, and the silence of people who should know better. Yet no matter how many times the world has been down this road before, we can’t seem to avoid repeating the deadly mistakes of the past.

USA - Electric cars are currently being propped up with government incentives and subsidies due to the Democrats’ mad dash towards a green future. A new report reveals that if you take away those government programs, these cars are far more expensive than people realize. This is, of course, all part of their plan. They want to make it too expensive for most people to even own a car in the future. Cars are for elites. It’s public transportation for the rest of us.

JAPAN - 'People are finally seeing reality' about electric vehicle demand, according to Toyota's CEO, whose company sat out the frantic EV investment of its competitors in the past few years. While GM, Ford, and many other legacy automakers were pouring billions in EV development and battery factory joint ventures in the last few years, trying to catch up to Tesla, Toyota has been taking it slow. Its CEOs have argued that not only are the public and infrastructure still not ready for a rapid transition to entirely electric mobility, but automakers will have a hard time turning a profit making electric cars after early adopters in developed countries are done buying.

ISRAEL - Is it possible that the war in the Middle East could eventually go nuclear? If the fighting could have been limited to just Israel and Hamas, I think that there would have been a zero percent chance of Israel using nuclear weapons. But now it appears that Hezbollah, Syria, Iran and potentially other parties are likely to get involved too, and that means that Israel will literally be fighting a war of national survival. If it gets to a point where the Israelis think that they could potentially be overrun by their enemies, they aren’t going to leave their most powerful weapons on the shelf. For Israel’s enemies, this is the opportunity that they have been anticipating for so long. They think that they will finally have a shot at wiping Israel off the map.

LEBANON - Iran-backed terror group that could join war in the region is ten times stronger than Hamas, with 200,000 missiles, rockets and mortars. Since Hamas launched its ruthless attacks on Israeli towns and cities on October 7, Israel's Defence Forces have conducted a non-stop bombardment of the Gaza Strip designed to grind down the terrorist cells ahead of a planned ground assault. But while tens of thousands of Israeli troops, battalions of tanks and heavy artillery begin to mass along the border with Gaza, many fear that the real threat is found 125 miles to the north.

ISRAEL - Israel stopped issuing visas to UN officials Wednesday, a day after UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appeared to say Hamas’s murderous October 7 assault on southern Israel was brought on by Israeli occupation. The development came as Israeli officials continued to rail against the UN chief and demand his apology or resignation, with a senior lawmaker branding his words “truly insane” and adding that they were fanning the flames of antisemitism. The chairman of Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum accused Guterres of having “failed the test” of the refrain “Never again.”

IRAN - Iran’s president on Tuesday expressed regret at a “lack of unity” among Muslim countries in response to the war between its arch-foe Israel and Gaza’s rulers Hamas. Ebrahim Raisi said greater coordination across the Muslim world could have stopped Israel’s ongoing bombing of the Gaza Strip, which followed Hamas terrorists’ brutal attacks that killed some 1,400 people in Israeli territory, most of them civilians.

USA - The Pentagon is deploying two carrier strike groups, eleven Burke-class destroyers, a number of Ticonderoga-class cruisers, amphibious assault ships, THAAD and Patriot missile defense systems, multiple squadrons of fighter jets, strategic bombers, and undisclosed assets to the Middle East. The Pentagon expects Iranian proxies to continue to target US troops in the region and has already stated that they will respond "decisively." What's the probability that this escalates into a war between the United States and Iran?