The government says the country, which serves as the base for the United States Fifth Fleet, and was to have held a Formula One motor race which had to be postponed in March when the protests were at their peak, is back to business as usual.Shi'ite residents say that if this is the new normal, tense days lie ahead.

Most accounts from rights activists as well as journalists on the scene and sociologists analyzing the situation clearly show that Facebook had an enormous influence on the start and spread of the uprisings, as well as their apparent domino effect. It served a primary means of communication.

Even if the State of Israel had no external image problem, Israel-Diaspora relations would be a priority for the Israeli government, said Yuli Edelstein, the Jewish state’s minister of Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs...One of the obstacles to that responsibility is the fact that the average Israeli is uninterested about Jewish life in the Diaspora, he said.

A blogger whose frank and witty thoughts on Syria's uprising, politics and being a lesbian in the country shot her to prominence was last night seized by armed men in Damascus. Several Facebook pages had been set up on Monday evening calling for her release...and activists were tweeting using the hashtag FreeAmina.

Africa – once considered the lab for Chinese companies’ reach outside - is being relegated into a destination with too many risk factors. Safer political destinations and countries closer to home are likely to benefit from the shift. The readjustment has been in the works for some time but the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya have made those subtle shifts more pronounced.

The significance of the bipartisan rebuke of Obama and the broad consensus of the international community is evident in Netanyahu’s specific lines that received the most enthusiastic applause - when he defied Obama's suggestion that the 1967 borders be the basis of negotiations.

Jones, who first toured the Middle East and North Africa in 1953 with the jazz musician Lionel Hampton, said: "I have long been a vocal proponent of music and the arts being a great asset in building bridges between people and cultures."

As Arab uprisings sweep the Middle East, few images will likely unsettle Iran's leadership more than that of their flag being burned by Syrian protesters angry with the Islamic Republic's deep ties with Syria's dynastic regime.