Ibrahim Fadl bought the bar from a merchant who has sold him real gold before. But he heard counterfeit gold bars were going around, so he drilled into several of his gold bars worth $100,000 and saw gray tungsten - not gold. What makes it so devious is a real gold bar is purchased with the serial numbers and papers, then it is hollowed out, the gold is sold, the tungsten is put in, then the bar is closed up.

That is a sophisticated operation. MTB, the Swiss manufacturer of the gold bars, said customers should only buy from a reputable merchant. The problem, he admits, is Ibrahim Fadl is a very reputable merchant. Raymond Nessim, CEO Manfra, Tordell & Brookes, said he has reported the situation to the FBI and Secret Service. The Secret Service, which deals with counterfeits, said it is investigating.

However, Western governments have not been as sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinian people as their citizens, emphasizing Hamas’ fault and Israel’s right to self-defense. US President Barack Obama has reiterated US support for Israel's right to defend itself on Friday during a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The EU has followed in US’ footsteps. European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton made a statement Friday saying that "Israel has the right to protect its population from these kinds of attacks. I urge Israel to ensure that its response is proportionate."

And Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel also announced Friday that she holds Hamas responsible for Gaza violence and that Israel has the right to defend itself. The UK took a similar position when Prime Minister David Cameron told Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu that Hamas "bears the principal responsibility" for the violence in southern Israel and Gaza.

Britain stands to lose around €1 billion a year in its contentious EU budget rebate under the latest proposals being circulated ahead of what is certain to be an extremely bruising summit devoted to the trillion-euro budget next week.

The chair of the summit, Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European council of national government leaders, has drafted new seven-year budget proposals, slashing the original figures from the European Commission by between €75 billion and €81 billion. His team is presenting the reduced budget as a figure that David Cameron could live with despite the prime minister's threat to veto a deal unless EU spending is frozen at 2011 levels plus inflation until 2020.

The Van Rompuy team also say that the British rebate, worth €3.6 billion last year, is being retained. But two changes to the way it is calculated would result in the rebate being cut by almost 28% or around €1 billion a year, according to senior UK officials who on Thursday lambasted both the rebate rejigging and the overall thrust of the Van Rompuy proposals.

The paper says: "We are convinced that the EU must set up, within a framework yet to-be-defined, true civilian-military structures to plan and conduct missions and operations." It adds: "We should show preparedness to hold available, train, deploy and sustain in theatre the necessary civilian and military means."

Polish foreign minister Radek Sikorski said: "If the EU wants to become a superpower, and Poland supports this, then we must have the capability to exert influence in our neighbourhood ... Sometimes we must use force to back our diplomacy." He called for an "ambitious" EU budget for 2014 to 2020 to help with defence co-ordination.

Wen’s Terceira walkabout, which followed a four-nation visit to South America, largely escaped notice at the time, but alarm bells should have immediately gone off in Washington and in European capitals. For one thing, Wen’s last official stop on the trip was Santiago, the capital of Chile. Flights from Chile to China normally cross the Pacific, not the Atlantic, so there was no reason for his plane to be near the Azores. Moreover, those who visit the Azores generally favor other islands in the out-of-the-way chain.

Terceira, however, has one big attraction for Beijing: Air Base No 4. Better known as Lajes Field, the facility where Premier Wen’s 747 landed in June is jointly operated by the US Air Force and its Portuguese counterpart. If China controlled the base, the Atlantic would no longer be secure. From the 10,865-foot runway on the northeast edge of the island, Chinese planes could patrol the northern and central portions of the Atlantic and thereby cut air and sea traffic between the US and Europe. Beijing would also be able to deny access to the nearby Mediterranean Sea.

And China could target the American homeland. Lajes is less than 2,300 miles from New York, shorter than the distance between Pearl Harbor and Los Angeles.

The crisis of capitalism has revealed the solutions to the crisis that both the bourgeois and social democratic parties have reserved for workers and the poorest sections of society. In the context of Spain today, the only alternative that the capitalists and their political representatives can offer is for us to pay the loan-shark debts of big business and the banks with the real wealth that we as workers create.

In Izquierda Unida (United Left) we as Lucha de Clases (Class Struggle) put forward the need to develop a programme that will meet the immediate interests of the working class and the poorest sections of society. Such a programme begins with the following points:

Get rid of the laws and counter-reforms being used against the working class – measures that have gone hand in hand with the cuts in social spending.

No closure of any company. Any company that closes shall be immediately nationalised under the democratic control of the workers.

The introduction of a minimum wage of €1,000 a month, the same as the minimum pension.

The same amount of €1,000 to be paid to every adult who is unemployed.

The whole of the banking and finance sector should be nationalised into one public bank, not to absorb losses and to be promptly privatised again, as the PSOE and PP hope to do with the Cajas (Savings Banks), but rather to take control of all their assets and use them in the interests of the majority.

The banks hold a large quantity of empty housing. These should be nationalised and used to create a stock of social housing and rented out for no more than 10% of household income.

The Public Debt should be written off with small investors only compensated in cases of proven need.

Decent public healthcare and education for everyone. Pensions and social rights for all residents of Spain.

Recognition of the democratic rights of the different nationalities of Spain, including the right to self-determination.

Another Europe is possible, a Europe that defends the overwhelming majority of the population. No to the Europe of the bankers and the rich! This is the mood that prevails in Greece, and is also what defeated Sarkozy in France. This idea can unite the immense majority of the current population of the EU. The only solution for Europe is the Socialist United States of Europe!

Here are our recommendations for pronouncing the names of the Standing Committee members. Unlike English names, Chinese names do not appear in the Western order, ie given name first. Chinese names, like Korean, Vietnamese and Hungarian names, appear family-name first in the original language. Stressed syllables are shown in upper case, -uh as 'a' in sofa.

Xi Jinping: SHEE jin PING (-sh as in ship, -j as in Jack, -i as in sit, -ng as in sing)

Li Keqiang: LEE kuh chee-AANG (-ee as in street, -aa as in father, -ch as in church, -ng as in sing)

Zhang Dejiang: JAANG duh jee-AANG (-j as in Jack, -aa as in father, -ng as in sing)

Zhang Gaoli: JAANG gow LEE (-j as in Jack, -aa as in father, -ng as in sing, -ow as in now)

Wang Qishan: WAANG chee SHAN (-aa as in father, -ng as in sing -ch as in church)

Liu Yunshan: LYOH yuen SHAN (-ly as in million, -oh as in no, -ue as in French vu)

Yu Zhengsheng: YUE jung SHUNG (-ue as in French vu, -j as in Jack, -u as in bun, -ng as in sing)

The Pronunciation Unit's advice is anglicised so that any word, name or phrase, in any language, is pronounceable by broadcasters and intelligible to audiences. Some of our previous blog posts have discussed why Mandarin Chinese presents challenges in the process of anglicisation. Not only does Mandarin Chinese have a number of vowels and consonants that do not exist in English and have no obvious equivalent but it is also a tone language. Mandarin Chinese has four tones - high level, high rising, fall-rise, falling (and a fifth null-tone) - which are vital, just like vowels and consonants, to differentiating meaning.

A draft of the proposal, formulated in secret and only recently posted on the ITU website for public perusal, reveal that if accepted, the changes would allow government restriction or blocking of information disseminated via the internet and create a global regime of monitoring internet communications - including the demand that those who send and receive information identify themselves. It would also allow governments to shut down the internet if there is the belief that it may interfere in the internal affairs of other states or that information of a sensitive nature might be shared.

Telecommunications ministers from 193 countries will meet behind closed doors in Dubai next month to discuss the proposal, with Australia's Senator Stephen Conroy among them. The move has sparked a ferocious, under-the-radar diplomatic war between a powerful bloc of nations, led by China and Russia, who want to exert greater controls on the net and western democracies determined to preserve the free-wheeling, open architecture of the World Wide Web.

The battle for control has also seen a cartel of telco corporations join forces to support amended pricing regulations changes which critics warn will pave the way for significant increases in the cost of day-to-day internet use, including email and social media.