ISRAEL - Among the many negative consequences of the Second Lebanon War in summer 2006 was the distraction it provided from Iran's nuclear program. So focused was the international community on 34 days of fighting, and so inarticulate was Israel in explaining that it was (indecisively) confronting the Iranian takeover of southern Lebanon, that Teheran slipped gratefully into the global shadows, there to quietly advance its progress toward the bomb.
GAZA - Israel has bombed supply tunnels in the southern Gaza Strip in a second day of intense air raids aimed at forcing Hamas militants to halt rocket fire.
UK - Looking back over my columns of the past 12 months, one of their major themes was neatly encapsulated by two recent items from The Daily Telegraph.
UK - The worsening economic slowdown is increasing fears that Britain's banks will have to raise still more capital next year in a market starved of investors.
WORLD - A sustainable global food system in the 21st Century needs to be built on a series of "new fundamentals", according to a leading food expert. Tim Lang warned that the current system, designed in the 1940s, was showing "structural failures", such as "astronomic" environmental costs.
GAZA - Israeli F-16 bombers have pounded key targets across the Gaza Strip, killing at least 225 people, local medics say.
LONDON - Japanese companies have started to move their European headquarters from London to Germany to escape Britain's high costs, poor transport infrastructure and rising crime rates.
NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD - India warned its citizens on Friday it was unsafe to travel to Pakistan after the prime minister met military chiefs, and Pakistan cancelled army leave and moved some troops from its western border.
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN - Pakistan began moving thousands of troops away from the Afghan border toward India on Friday amid tensions following the Mumbai attacks, intelligence officials said.
BETHLEHEM, WEST BANK - The Holy Land is in need of a lasting solution that doesn't involve war or high security walls, says the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem. That solution, he says, is peace.
VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI has called for peace in the Middle East and stability in Africa in his Christmas Day message. Speaking from the Vatican, the Pope prayed for the opponents of the "twisted logic of conflict and violence" to prevail in the Holy Land.
VATICAN CITY - Pope reassures that alarmist readings foretelling the end of the world are false.
USA - We no longer have a civilian-led government. It is hard for a lifelong Republican and son of a retired Air Force colonel to say this, but the most unnerving legacy of the Bush administration is the encroachment of the Department of Defense into a striking number of aspects of civilian government. Our Constitution is at risk.
SAUDI ARABIA - Saudi Arabia has sought Pakistan's help as part of its long-term plan to attain nuclear weapons for regional dominance, says a report.
USA - Are you afraid that the economic downturn could get out of hand? I mean, really out of hand? Well, don't worry. The US Army War College is on the case - ready to handle "unforeseen economic collapse" and the "rapid dissolution of public order in all or significant parts of the US." And you thought we were just dealing with a recession!