We are told the mainspring of their resentment is the fact that millions of Russians died in order to defeat Hitler. True. But Stalin happily signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler when Britain stood alone, didn’t he? Cheers for that, Uncle Joe. We lost a lot of our own people too but that doesn’t stop us calling officious car park attendants or town-hall officials “little Hitlers”. And if they were to bleat in response: “How dare you call me that, my grandad died defeating fascism,” we’d think they were not only pompous twits but also slightly round the twist.

No, the reason for all this bluster and faux outrage is the usual one in such cases: what has just been said happens to be the awkward truth. Hitler dreamt of seizing his neighbours’ territory and so does Putin. The similarity of Germany’s land-grab of Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland, mostly full of pro-Germans whose first language was that of their big neighbour, and Putin’s annexing of the overwhelmingly pro-Russian Crimea, is so hideously obvious that it hardly needs pointing out.

Putin, like Hitler, is obsessed with race. Hitler wanted to integrate what he called the “Volksgenossen” – which literally translates as “racial comrades” – of German-speaking Europe into his Third Reich. Putin wants to absorb the “sootechestvennikie” (which translates into the more innocent sounding “compatriots”) into an expanded Russia. It’s the same thing. And of course there are more personal similarities between the two leaders. While unpredictable and dangerous both cut irredeemably comic figures. Vainglorious men never realise how funny they are.

Barclays said it "very much regrets the situation" that led to the fine. The FCA found the bank failed to "adequately manage conflicts of interest between itself and its customers", in relation to fixing the price of gold. "Barclays has undertaken a significant amount of work to enhance our systems and controls and is committed to the highest standards across all of our operations," said Antony Jenkins, group chief executive.

The FCA also fined the trader, Daniel James Plunkett, £96,500. "A firm's lack of controls and a trader's disregard for a customer's interests have allowed the financial services industry's reputation to be sullied again," said Tracey McDermott, the FCA's director of enforcement and financial crime. "Barclays' failure to identify and manage the risks in its business was extremely disappointing."

Mr Plunkett was a director on the precious metals desk. He was responsible for pricing and managing Barclays' risk on a contract that was specifically linked to the price of gold at 3:00pm on 28 June 2012. If the gold price was above $1,558.96 (£925.57) at that time then Barclays would be required to make a payment of $3.9 million to its customer. But if the price was below that benchmark Barclays would not have to make the payment.

Mr Plunkett created fake orders with the intent of pushing the price of gold below $1,588.96, which he succeeded in doing. The result was Barclays was not obligated to make the $3.9 million payment to its customer, and Mr Plunkett booked a profit of $1.75 million for the bank.

When asked what the pope particularly intends to talk about during the visit, Parolin revealed he would talk about "on the one hand, Israel's right to exist in peace and security within internationally recognized boundaries."

On the other side, the pope would talk about "the Palestinian people's right to have a homeland, sovereign and independent, the right to move around freely, the right to live in dignity," according to Parolin. In fact, the Vatican recognized the "State of Palestine" in 2012 amid the United Nations (UN) vote to confer "Palestine" non-member observer state status, a status until then only held by the Vatican.

Despite the pope's insistence that his visit is "religious not political," his decision to begin his trip from Jordan directly by helicopter with a stop in Palestinian Authority (PA) controlled Bethlehem has been greeted by Arab sources as a move to "recognize Palestine" and help "end the occupation."

Israel Hasson, Knesset member of the Kadima Party and former Shin Bet deputy director, said, “I don’t know what Bar and Regev were trying to do, and what they did stems from a lack of understanding of the issue, in my view. This is, of course, dangerous.” Hasson also told Al-Monitor, “The Temple Mount is the brain stem, by any definition. It is considered an all pan-Arab element, and even at Camp David in 2000 [former Egyptian President Hosni] Mubarak made clear to [former Prime Minister] Ehud Barak that [the late PLO leader] Yasser Arafat has no right to conduct negotiations over Jerusalem. A second and no less important thing is that the Temple Mount is part of our intimate relationship with Jordan. Those who run that place are the Jordanian Waqf, so such a law can bring about an unnecessary clash with Jordan.”

“Nonsense,” Regev told Al-Monitor. “Such talk doesn’t deter me.” Regev, formerly chief army spokeswoman, said she was also approached by the Shin Bet, but it did not succeed in persuading her to back off her involvement with the Temple Mount.

She is not bothered that Bar withdrew his support for the bill. Even before he did so, she said she would sign up other Knesset members from the right and move on with the legislative process. “This is a law that enacts justice,” she said. “They scare him with the Jordanians and the Shin Bet, but the fact is that in the Tomb of the Patriarchs it works well. I have no intention of stopping, despite the threats of a third intifada. Just as I make sure that Father Gabriel can enter the church in Nazareth, so I want every Jew to be able to pray on the Temple Mount.”

RT: A number of Western business people have boycotted the St Petersburg economic forum. Are they going to lose out?

Paul Craig Roberts: I think it is just a symbolic way of accommodating Washington. I don’t think it means anything, I do not think the firms in Germany, for example, want to harm the relationships with Russia, nor do they want it in France. So I do not think it means much. What is much more significant is that the number of Asian countries that are coming to this forum, and the energy deal signed by Russia and China, is an indication that the world will be moving away from American financial hegemony.

This large energy deal will be conducted outside the dollar system, so here is the beginning of the de-dollarization, the beginning of the de-Americanization. This is an indication that the two large countries, Russia and China, are forming a strategic alliance because they are tired of being harassed and cut out of the Western mechanisms, they are tired of the threats. So they are moving in a new direction, and they will take much of the world with them. I do not think the European countries that have strong economic relations with Russia will want to lose those.

This is a beginning of a turn from Russia toward the East. Previously Russia was focused on being accepted by the West, being accepted by the Americans. It waited for years to be allowed to join the WTO. I think this was a mistake on Russia’s part because the West is not the rising part of the world. The rising part of the world is the East.

The Pope will also meet with Israel's two chief rabbis, according to the report. PMW said that in 2012 the Mufti preached that it is Muslim destiny to exterminate Jews as part of a Muslim holy war. On another occasion, in the Al-Aqsa Mosque, he said that Jews were "enemies of Allah," and in another speech he said that the souls of suicide bombers "tell us to follow in their path," Algemeiner.com reported.

Mufti has also rejected Christian teachings, according to PMW, saying that Jesus was not a Judean, but a Palestinian who preached Islam. He also called Jesus "a Palestinian par excellence" and claimed that Jesus and his mother Mary were Palestinians, not Jews. In the past, Mufti's public comments about the Jews were condemned by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, the British Foreign Office, and the European Union, among others, Algemeiner.com reported.

The research showed that glyphosate residues, found in most processed foods in the Western diet courtesy of GE sugar beets, corn, and soy, "enhance the damaging effects of other food-borne chemical residues and toxins in the environment to disrupt normal body functions and induce disease." More recently, a Norwegian study published in Food Technology found that genetically engineered (GE) soy contains high levels of glyphosate, along with a poorer nutritional profile, leading the researchers to question its quality and safety.

Evidence also suggests glyphosate may be a key player in Argentina's growing health problems, where birth defects and cancer rates have skyrocketed among GE corn and soya farming communities. Making matters worse, while evidence is piling up showing the hazards of glyphosate on human health, farmers are ramping up their usage of the chemical due to the proliferation of resistant weeds, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently raised the allowable levels of glyphosate in food by significant amounts.

Chemical agriculture is an invention that has now been proven unsustainable, and we must make the appropriate changes if we want our descendants to survive on this planet—the situation is becoming that dire. Chemical technology companies have infiltrated and taken over agriculture, and it's an extremely profitable business. But it's quite literally making our food toxic; not to mention the fact that agricultural chemicals are also rendering water supplies undrinkable and unsuitable for marine life.