Amir Oren, the veteran military analyst for Ha'aretz newspaper, took note of Israel's exchanging 1,027 Palestinian convicts for army Staff Sergeant Gilad Schalit, who had been captured by Hamas in 2006. Mr Oren wrote that the price paid by Mr Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak "can be interpreted only in a context that goes beyond that of the Gilad Schalit deal."

He noted that Israeli leaders in the past have shown a readiness to absorb "a small loss" in order to attain a greater success, generally involving "some sort of military adventure." Mr Oren also noted that, until recently, Mr Netanyahu had faced opposition to attacking Iran from Army Chief of Staff General Gabi Ashkenazi and Mossad intelligence chief Meir Dagan. Both retired earlier this year and have been replaced by men believed to hold a different view on Iran.

This week, Jerusalem Post military correspondent Yakov Katz wrote that, with the Schalit chapter behind it, "Israel can now move forward to deal with some of the other strategic problems it faces in the region, such as Iran's nuclear program." Had Israel first attacked Iran, Hamas' patron, it would have endangered the Schalit deal, Mr Katz said.

The European agreement, which involves a 50 percent write-down of Greek debt and boosting the euro zone's bailout fund to as much as 1 trillion euros, has averted a collapse in Europe and spurred a rush to risky currencies and assets once again at the expense of the dollar.

Add in to the mix: a suddenly revitalized US economy that a few weeks ago was teetering on the verge of recession and had fueled speculation about another round of quantitative easing.

Almost overnight it leaves a whole new global outlook that appears a little more encouraging. The dollar, with its near-zero interest rates guaranteed over the next two years, is the first to get sold off in times of global optimism, as investors use the greenback to fund the market's foray into risky trades.

"When economic conditions are not deteriorating, there is a general risk-loving mode and the dollar will remain the primary funding currency," said Alessio de Longis, portfolio manager for the Oppenheimer Currency Opportunities fund in New York. "There is a deployment of capital from the United States to the rest of the world. As the risk of collapse to economic growth diminishes, investors are slowly but surely putting capital back to work," said De Longis.

On Thursday, the greenback plunged to a seven-week low against the euro and plumbed multi-week troughs versus the Australian dollar and Swiss franc on the back of the European deal.

Data released by the European Central Bank show that real M1 deposits in Portugal have fallen at an annualised rate of 21 per cent over the past six months, buckling violently in September. "Portugal appears to have entered a Grecian vortex and monetary trends have deteriorated sharply in Spain, with a decline of 8.4 per cent," said Simon Ward, from Henderson Global Investors. Mr Ward said the ECB must cut interest rates "immediately" and launch a full-scale blitz of quantitative easing of up to 10 per cent of eurozone GDP.

The M1 data - cash and current accounts - is watched by experts as a leading indicator for the economy six months to a year ahead. It has been an accurate warning signal for each stage of the crisis since 2007. A mix of fiscal austerity and monetary tightening by the ECB earlier this year appear to have tipped the Iberian region into a downward slide. "The trends are less awful in Ireland and Italy, suggesting that both are rescuable if the ECB acts aggressively," said Mr Ward.

A shrinking money supply is dangerous for countries with a high debt stock. Portugal's public and private debt will reach 360 per cent of GDP by next year, far higher than in Greece.

Mr Soros, who achieved world wide fame when he bet against sterling remaining within the Exchange Rate Mechanism in the 1990s, said that the 50 per cent "haircut" on private bond holders would only reduce Greek debt by 20 per cent. He said that was insufficient to stop an economic decline in Greece which would lead to greater social unrest.

His words come as the eurozone appeared to be heading for further economic trouble as investors started to express scepticism about the rescue deal announced in the early hours of Thursday morning. This weekend Goldman Sachs said that the eurozone countries were heading for a "mild recession" as confidence waned.

"Given the magnitude of the crisis it is again too little too late," Mr Soros said of the Brussels deal at a dinner organised by Pi Capital investor network on Thursday. "It will bring relief partly because the markets were so obsessed by the lack of leadership. The mere fact that something was achieved was a major relief and it will be good for any time from one day to three months."

"Unfortunately it is not the last crisis because the fundamental issues have not been settled. It is clear that the amount of debt that Greece has accumulated and is accumulating is untenable and the country is effectively insolvent."

The technological advance of smartphone scanning breaks down one of the last barriers to easy bank switching. As the practice spreads, there may be no stopping upstarts from cutting into the deposits of major banks. The idea of switching out of big banks to smaller ones has morphed into its very own day: November 5 is Bank Transfer Day (see www.facebook.com/NovemberFifth). It was launched by Los Angeles art gallery owner Kristen Christian to encourage folks to pull their money from big banks in protest of their policies, from mortgage lending practices to the repayment of TARP funds to a constant array of new fees.

"Seriously, who likes going to branches? It's much more convenient to either mail checks or use cutting-edge mobile deposit technology," asks former Capital One executive Dan O'Malley, who is now CEO of PerkStreet Financial, one such small financial institution. Mailing checks for deposit to operations like PerkStreet, State Farm Bank, ING Direct or a distant credit union has long been an option, but the growth and acceptance of deposit by phone could be a game-changer for many consumers, O'Malley and others say. USAA Bank has been accepting scanned check deposits for years. It caters to mobile military families but also offers banking services to the general public.

"In addition to reducing costs associated with mailing checks, mobile-based remote deposit makes it infinitely more convenient for customers to get money into their online-only accounts at branchless banks," O'Malley says. In case you're concerned about the security of your online bank, check to see if your funds will be FDIC insured. State Farm, PerkStreet (through Bancorp Bank) and ING, for example, all are FDIC members. Being a revolutionary is one thing. But doing without that government deposit guarantee? That's revolting in a different way.

Assad has drawn repeated condemnation from the United Nations, Arab League and Western governments for the violent manner in which he has attempted to crush a seven-month uprising against his rule. Assad said in the interview that Western countries "are going to ratchet up the pressure, definitely," adding: "but Syria is different in every respect from Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen. The history is different. The politics is different."

"Syria is the hub now in this region. It is the fault line, and if you play with the ground you will cause an earthquake," he said. "Do you want to see another Afghanistan, or tens of Afghanistans? Any problem in Syria will burn the whole region. If the plan is to divide Syria, that is to divide the whole region," Assad added. The UN estimates that 3,000 people, including nearly 200 children, have been killed in the unrest. Since the start of protests in March, Syrian authorities have blamed the violence on gunmen they say have killed 1,100 soldiers and police.

Communities inland were getting hit hardest, with eastern Pennsylvania serving as the bull's-eye for the storm. West Milford, New Jersey, about 45 miles northwest of New York City, had received 15.5 inches of snow by Saturday night, while Plainfield, Massachusetts, had gotten 14.3 inches. New York City's Central Park set a record for both the date and the month of October with 1.3 inches of snow.

More than 2.3 million customers lost power from Maryland north through Massachusetts, and utilities were bringing in crews from other states to help restore it. More than half a million residents in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Connecticut were without power, including New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. By late Saturday, the storm had vacated most of Pennsylvania and was tracking northeast.

Throughout the region, officials had warned that the early storm would bring sticky snow on the heels of the week's warmer weather and could create dangerous conditions. New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts declared states of emergencies, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency for 13 counties. At least three deaths have been blamed on the storm.

But instead of firing a 'big bazooka' to slay the beast of Greek national debt as George Osborne demanded last month at an IMF meeting in Washington the leaders popped off a pathetic peashooter. True, stock markets around the world were up dramatically after the Brussels accord.

But this is likely to be a temporary respite leading business and City economists suggest the accord is not worth the paper it's written on. One economist, Stuart Thomson of Ignis Asset Management, went as far as to declare it 'a massive confidence trick'.

Led by President Sarkozy of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel, euroland's leaders have developed a habit of issuing pompous communiques giving the immediate impression that enough has been done to resolve the crisis and to restore confidence in the region's economy. But when you examine the fine-print, you find very little has changed. Each element of the rescue package looks fragile under scrutiny. Perhaps the biggest unanswered question of all is how the greater fiscal and budgetary integration promised in Brussels by the 17 euroland members can ever be achieved.

A quick comparison of tax rates in different eurozone nations gives an indication of the difficulties. Ireland, for instance, has almost managed to pull itself out of the debt crisis by sticking with a super-low 12.5 per cent corporation tax rate that has attracted big American companies to the country - Google recently moved its European headquarters to Dublin for this reason.

In contrast, Germany's is a high-tax economy where some personal tax rates exceed 50 per cent. Then again, in other countries such as Italy and Greece, countless citizens 'forget' to pay taxes and tax fraud is almost an industry in itself. Binding together these very different attitudes towards taxation will be all but impossible. The idea of unyielding German tax inspectors arriving to inspect a Greek taverna or Italian pasta emporium is not likely to be welcomed - yet that is what closer integration implies.

So, forget the rhetoric. In reality, all that came out of Brussels this week was another sticking plaster. And it won't be strong enough to fix the gaping wound that is the euro crisis. Meanwhile, throughout Europe, prospects for output and jobs are deteriorating sharply as consumer confidence plummets, industrial output diminishes and exports are falling like a stone.

Hours after an all-night summit of euro governments ended, flaws began to emerge in a package that was billed as a "grand and comprehensive" solution to the European debt crisis. The concerns were led by Germany's powerful central bank, which expressed fears that a plan to leverage a 440 billion euros eurozone rescue fund to amass a "fire power" of 1 trillion euros, or 880 billion pounds, resembled the risky finance methods that triggered the crisis in 2008.

EU leaders are expected to sanction the establishment of a so-called special purpose investment vehicle, or SPIV, to be set up in the coming weeks. It is aimed at attracting investment from countries such as China and Brazil. Jens Weidmann, the president of the Bundesbank and a member of the European Central Bank, sounded the alarm over the plan to "leverage" the fund by a factor of four to five times without putting any new money into the pot.

He warned that the scheme could be hit by market turbulence with taxpayers left holding the bill for risky investments in Italian and Spanish bonds.

Mr Osborne said he would not allow the International Monetary Fund, which is partly bankrolled by British taxpayers, to provide money for the new euro bail-out fund. The announcement was a fillip to Conservative backbenchers who have demanded that the Government acts to claw back powers from Brussels.

The Daily Telegraph has learnt that Tory MPs will meet next month to begin drawing up a detailed plan calling for the return of employment and social laws following the back-bench rebellion over a European referendum. Mr Osborne told MPs: "Britain will not be putting money into the bail-out fund either directly or through the IMF."

He ruled out IMF involvement amid indications that the international organisation may be asked to help bankroll the 1 trillion euros (880 million pounds) fund to lend money to beleaguered countries in the single currency. "The IMF exists to support countries, it does not exist to support currencies," Mr Osborne said. "The IMF contributing money to the eurozone bail-out fund, no; Britain contributing money to the eurozone bail-out fund, no. That is Britain's clear position."

Water use has been growing at more than twice the rate of population increase in the last century, said Kirsty Jenkinson of the World Resources Institute, a Washington think tank. Water use is predicted to increase by 50 percent between 2007 and 2025 in developing countries and 18 percent in developed ones, with much of the increased use in the poorest countries with more and more people moving from rural areas to cities, Jenkinson said in a telephone interview.

Factor in the expected impacts of climate change this century - more severe floods, droughts and shifts from past precipitation patterns - that are likely to hit the poorest people first and worst "and we have a significant challenge on our hands," Jenkinson said.

Will there be enough water for everyone, especially if population continues to rise, as predicted, to 9 billion by mid-century? "There's a lot of water on Earth, so we probably won't run out," said Rob Renner, executive director of the Colorado-based Water Research Foundation. "The problem is that 97.5 percent of it is salty and... of the 2.5 percent that's fresh, two-thirds of that is frozen. So there's not a lot of fresh water to deal with in the world."

"The worst case scenario has been taken off the table for now, but we still haven't painted the optimistic picture. The optimistic picture is really how we take out the highs in the S&P, but I think there needs to be a catalyst for that," said Burt White, chief investment officer at LPL Financial.

"I don't think the bears have thrown in the towel yet. I still think there's a lot of things that can go wrong here. You still have a lot of pessimisn around the [European] plan. You still have a lot of pessimism around consumers. You still have a lot of pessimism around Washington. That keeps the fear balloon big..."

The German leader forced French President Nicolas Sarkozy to bend to her will on using the European rescue fund only as a last resort, ruled out an automatic crisis-fighting role for the European Central Bank and dragged banks back to the table to take greater losses on Greek debt. She even wrung further budget concessions out of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

"Merkel got what she wanted," Shada Islam, an analyst at the Friends of Europe policy-advisory group in Brussels, said by phone yesterday after the summit ended. "This has confirmed Germany's role as the make-or-break player not only in the euro- zone crisis but in European Union affairs beyond Europe."

Two years after the debt crisis came to light in Greece, Merkel is finally translating her status as leader of Europe's biggest economy and biggest contributor to euro-area bailouts into international clout.

Private banks holding Greek debt will accept a write-off of 50% of their returns. The move is expected to cut the nation's debt load to 120% of its GDP in 2020. Under current conditions, it would have grown to 180%.

The firepower of the main euro bailout fund - known as the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) - is to be boosted from the 440 billion euros set up earlier this year to 1 trillion euros. There is about 250 billion euros left available in the EFSF, which the summit statement said could be leveraged 4-5 times.

European banks will be required to raise about 106 billion euros in new capital by June 2012. It is hoped that this would help shield them against losses resulting from any government defaults and protect larger economies - like Italy and Spain - from the market turmoil.

It is thought China may pay about 70 billion euros ($100 billion) into the fund, which is expected to be boosted to 1 trillion euros. Meanwhile French President Nicolas Sarkozy said debt-ridden Greece's entry to the eurozone was a mistake. Greece was "not ready" when it joined in 2001, he said, adding that it could be rescued thanks to a new deal on the debt crisis.

European leaders worked into the early hours of Thursday in Brussels to secure an agreement aimed at preventing the crisis from spreading to larger eurozone economies. The deal triggered a worldwide shares rally.

The President of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, has said he believes China will invest in Europe only if there are incentives for it to do so. "I don't think that China will just come in as a white knight to try to provide money just to bail out Europeans," he told the BBC.