The United States and India are in the middle of a diplomatic spat. It began when India's deputy consul general in New York, Devyani Khobragade, was arrested last week for allegedly submitting a fraudulent visa application for her housekeeper.

Tags: united states, india, conflict, gay rights, visa, diplomatic immunity, new york, devyani khobragade

Japan's approval of new national defense guidelines and its first-ever national security strategy are raising questions whether, after a year of focusing on the economy, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is finally baring his nationalist teeth. The announcement this week of a significant increase in military spending over the next five years to counter China’s growing military influence in the region was not unexpected.

Tags: china, government pd, japan, hard power, military diplomacy, conflict, nationalism, defense, senkaku islands, east china sea

More than five years after flights by Israeli airlines to Turkey stopped, Israel signed an agreement with Ankara to renew service. Civil Aviation Authority director Giora Romm his Turkish counterpart, Bilal Eksi, struck the deal after talks that took place in Turkey, Haaretz has learned. The sides agreed to address Israel's security concerns which were cited as the reason flights were ceased.

Tags: middle east, israel, turkey, tourism, security, travel, airlines

Wittingly — or perhaps unwittingly, because of the rapid acceleration of events — Hezbollah’s opponents have not shed much light on the latest major positions expressed by Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah in his Dec. 3 interview on Lebanon's OTV. Lebanese cultural and intellectual circles, however, are preoccupied with two issues raised by unprecedented assertions by Nasrallah. One issue is external, involving Hezbollah and Iran’s vision of the United States, while the other concerns the Shiite organization’s vision of Lebanon as a nation and a state.

Tags: united states, iran, non-state actors, islam, non-state pd, syria, lebanon, hezbollah, hassan nasrallah, shi'ite muslim

Patterns of global migration and remittances have shifted in recent decades, even as both the number of immigrants and the amount of money they send home have grown, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of data from the United Nations and the World Bank. A rising share of international migrants now lives in today’s high-income countries such as the United States and Germany, while a growing share was born in today’s middle-income nations such as India and Mexico, the analysis finds.

Tags: united states, india, united nations, mexico, germany, diaspora, world bank, migration, remittances

Turki al-Hamad paid a heavy price for a tweet. Last year the novelist told his followers that Islam as practiced in Saudi Arabia was not the "message of love" preached by the Prophet Muhammad. The outcome was six months in prison without trial. Conditions were immeasurably better than when he was detained in the 1970s, but the hazards of speaking out in the digital age were still painfully clear.

Tags: social media, islam, twitter, facebook, saudi arabia, censorship, youtube

Western nations have indicated to the Syrian opposition that peace talks next month may not lead to the removal of President Bashar al-Assad and that his Alawite minority will remain key in any transitional administration, opposition sources said.

Tags: non-state actors, syria, conflict, bashar al-assad, civil war, free syrian army, transnational advocacy networks, friends of syria, syrian national coalition

It's tempting in wartime to dehumanize your enemy, especially when that enemy is a militant who may have killed innocent women and children. But al-Qaeda militants have families, too. The BBC's Shaimaa Khalil just returned from Yemen, where she had access to a family that has produced three al-Qaeda militants, all brothers.

Tags: Cultural Diplomacy, terrorism, al qaeda, yemen