Obama convened his National Security Council on Tuesday to discuss the recent string of attacks by the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS), which claims it has created a caliphate taking in huge swathes of Iraq and Syria.

Washington and Paris have stepped up their fight against IS, with France launching its first strikes from a newly deployed aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean and the United States calling for more international cooperation against the group. Underlining heightened global fears of attacks after violent extremists killed scores in Mali, Lebanon, Nigeria and Turkey in recent weeks, the US government issued a worldwide travel alert warning American citizens of 'increased terrorist threats.'

But Obama 'was briefed that there is currently no specific, credible threat to the homeland from ISIL,' the White House said in a statement.

A total of €1 trillion of loans are non-performing, hampering efforts to get banks to make new loans to households and businesses that want to spend more or invest. That amounts to 5.6 percent of all loans and advances, down from 6 percent a year ago, the EBA said.

On average, European banks have twice the level of non-performing loans as their US counterparts, which took more action in the wake of the financial crisis to recapitalise and improve their balance sheets. The problem is worst for loans to non-financial services firms, where 10 percent of all loans in Europe have gone bad.

The study looked at 105 banks across the EU and Norway with assets totalling more than €30 trillion, and identified loans as non-performing if payments are more than 90 days late, or if the bank has decided that the capital will not be repaid without use of collateral.

One recording purports to show a uniformed security guard speaking of getting “swastikas in my eyes”. “In two years, there will be a revolution here and there will be no more of all this s***. We’ll clean it all out,” the guard, who has not been named, appears to say. “We have plenty of summer camps, and I swear to you they can be used again. On the gate: work makes you free,” he says. The German phrase he uses, Arbeit macht frei, was infamously written above the entrances to Auschwitz and other Nazi extermination camps.

In a second video, the same guard is heard apparently discussing now abandoned government proposals to hold asylum-seekers in transit zones at the border while their applications are processed. “We call them transit zones. That’s a beautiful word. In the Third Reich, they called them prison camps,” he says.

It is not the first time security guards at the site have been involved in controversy. Some weeks ago, another guard was caught on camera kicking and beating asylum-seekers who were protesting at the long delays processing their applications.

This year, Obama is promising to bring in an extra 10,000 low-skill, potentially difficult-to-integrate Syrian migrants into the United States. Sessions and other critics fear he’ll use his many powers — and Congress’ autopilot funding for refugee programs — to bring in far more than 10,000 migrants.

In fact, from 2010 to 2015, Obama has allowed more than 200,000 low-skill migrants from Central America to enter the United States, and then disappear into the nation’s growing population of at least 11 million illegal immigrants.

Obama says the new refugees will be vetted. But top security officials say the Syrians can’t be vetted because the US doesn’t know what they were doing in Syria before they applied for refugee status.

“The reckless and criminal actions of the Turkish authorities… have caused a dangerous escalation of relations between Russia and NATO, which cannot be justified by any interest, including protection of state borders,” Medvedev said. According to Medvedev, Russia is considering canceling several important projects with Turkey and barring Turkish companies from the Russian market.

Turkey shot down a Russian bomber over Syria on Tuesday, claiming it had violated Turkish airspace. Russia says no violation took place and considers the hostile act as 'a stab in the back' and direct assistance to terrorist forces in Syria.

In fighting IS, it should not be forgotten that in the primarily military and police-led post-9/11 "war on terror," the "number of violence-prone Islamists, who have joined terrorist groups" has not diminished but rather "multiplied dangerously," warns a renowned Middle East expert.

Referring to the fact that the majority of the Paris attackers were citizens of France or Belgium, Hamburg's Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy (IFSH) asks, "what is the purpose of war rhetoric, when a large portion of the problem is homemade?" This "talk about 'defending our values'," will only "steady the stirrups" for a police/military buildup, according to a longtime expert of German/European think tanks.

There is a "sorely felt discrepancy between the values we proclaim and reality," which is a "breeding ground for IS." "We are certainly the rich, but since quite some time, no longer the 'good guys,' in the eyes of many. And some even view us as the barbarians."

It’s the second tipping for Hamtramck (pronounced Ham-tram-ik), which in 2013 earned the distinction of becoming what appears to be the first majority-Muslim city in the United States following the arrival of thousands of immigrants from Yemen, Bangladesh and Bosnia over a decade.

In many ways, Hamtramck is a microcosm of the fears gripping parts of the country since the Islamic State’s attacks on Paris: The influx of Muslims here has profoundly unsettled some residents of the town long known for its love of dancing, beer, paczki pastries and the pope.

Business owners within 500 feet of one of Hamtramck’s four mosques can’t obtain a liquor license, she complained, a notable development in a place that flouted Prohibition-era laws by openly operating bars. The restrictions could thwart efforts to create an entertainment hub downtown, said the pro-commerce mayor.

And while Majewski advocated to allow mosques to issue calls to prayer, she understands why some longtime residents are struggling to adjust to the sound that echos through the city’s streets five times each day. “The Polish people think we were invading them,” said Masud Khan, one of the mosque’s leaders, recalling that time in an interview earlier this month. “We were a big threat to their religion and culture. Now their days are gone.”

The disease is spread by the Asian citrus psyllid, a tiny winged insect, and there’s currently no known cure. Greening already caused industry-wide losses of $7.8 billion and more than 7,500 jobs between 2006 to 2014, the University of Florida estimates.

The outlook is “precarious” for Florida’s citrus industry, which “risks losing relevance and economic impact” in the long run if crop yields continue to fall and trees keep dying, the citrus department said in its October 21 report.

The £21 million “commercial” facility will edge the controversial science “closer to mainstream acceptance”, Chinese media said, following the development of a technique which began when Dolly the sheep became the first cloned mammal when she was born in Scotland in 1996. The centre may cause alarm in Europe, where the cloning of animals for farming was banned in September due to animal welfare considerations.

But Xu Xiaochun, chairman of Chinese biotechnology company BoyaLife that is backing the facility, dismissed such concerns. “Let me ask one question. Was this ban based on scientific rationale or ethical rationale or political agenda?” Mr Xu told The Telegraph. “Legislation is always behind science. But in the area of cloning, I think we are going the wrong way and starting to kill the technology.”

The European Parliament’s environment committee co-rapporteur, Renate Sommer, has criticised the technique of cloning as not being “fully mature” as members voted on the ban in September. “In fact, no further progress has been made with it,” Ms Sommer said at the time. “The mortality rate remains equally high. Many of the animals which are born alive die in the first few weeks, and they die painfully. Should we allow that?"

The two-pilot Sukhoi Su-24 jet was shot down by F-16 fighter planes just after 9am this morning, after it violated Turkish airspace and ignored nearly a dozen warnings by the military, Ankara officials said.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin has refuted that the jet ever left Syrian airspace, and instead accused Turkey of funding ISIS, and using its military to protect the terrorist organisation.

Footage reportedly filmed by rebels in Syria's Turkomen Mountains, an area which has been the cause of recent tensions between Turkey and Russia, emerged showing local fighters cheering as they discovered the body of one of the Russian pilots. 'The loss we suffered today came from a stab in the back delivered by accomplices of the terrorists,' President Putin said, speaking at a meeting with King Abdullah II of Jordan in Sochi, Russia, on Thursday afternoon. 'We will never tolerate such atrocities as happened today and we hope that the international community will find the strength to join forces and fight this evil,' Putin said.

The president warned that 'today's tragic event will have serious consequences for Russian-Turkish relations', shortly before Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov cancelled tomorrow's visit to Turkey, where the two nations were due to discuss Syria. Putin boldly claimed that Turkey has been buying oil from ISIS, funding the terrorist group, and accused Ankara of protecting the jihadists with the country's military, Moscow-funded RT.com reports.

The Russian president's accusations came as Syrian insurgents reportedly shot down a rescue helicopter as it was searching for the pilots from the downed warplane using US-supplied arms.

According to a recent Rasmussen Reports survey, 92 percent of Americans consider Islamic terrorism to be a serious threat to the United States, and a Washington Post-ABC News survey found that 83 percent of registered voters believe that a terror attack that causes a large amount of casualties inside the United States is likely in the near future.

The American people clearly want ISIS to be dealt with, so why isn’t the Obama administration doing anything to go after the state sponsors of such terror? At this point, most Americans have absolutely no idea what is taking place in Iraq and Syria, and the mainstream media is certainly not being straight with us.

Could it be possible that Obama never intended to win the war against ISIS? Could it be possible that Obama simply wanted to try to “contain” them and use them as a tool to help overthrow the Assad regime in Syria? Could it be possible that he is purposely turning a blind eye to the assistance that the Turks, the Saudis and other Arab governments in the region are giving to ISIS?

If the answer to any of those questions is “yes”, then the entire war against ISIS is a complete and total fraud, and Obama should be immediately impeached. Things are not as they seem, and the American people are not being told the truth.

Since last Friday’s attacks, checkpoints have been established on major routes between France and Belgium with drivers and passengers subject to passport checks. Passengers have been searched on some cross-border trains, with armed guards patrolling the carriages.

It came as the European Commission bowed to French fury and agreed to rewrite the Schengen code to ensure the systematic security screening of every EU traveller before they can enter the continent – a further erosion of the principle of free movement but something Mr Cazeneuve said was “crucial” to defend against terrorism.

All migrants flooding into Europe will be subject to a full SIS and criminal records check, and extra border guards will be deployed to screen them. At present, they are only logged on an asylum database that has no security function. At least three of the eight gunmen are known to have fought in Syria, and at least two plus Abaaoud, the mastermind, sneaked into Europe along the Greek migrant trail.