Politics

Last week we were surprised to learn that demand for hotel rooms at the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, where the world's billionaires, CEOs, politicians, celebrities and oligarchs mingle every year (while regaled by their public relations teams known as the "media", for whom getting an invite to the DJ event du jour is more important than rocking the boat by asking unpleasant questions) was so great, not only are hotel rooms running out, but local employees may be put up in shipping containers in car parks to free up much needed accommodations.

As the Obama administration shunned Israel last week, we warned that police were calling on Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit to allow them to open a full criminal investigation against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Today, as Channel 2 reports, Israeli police entered Bibi's home for questioning. The prime minister was quick to react, blasting "don't celebrate too soon over corruption probe."

Over the weekend, Trump made waves among policy and media circles when during a brief, informal exchange with reporters on New Year's Eve at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, the president-elect questioned the official version of "Russians hacking the election", saying it was possible "somebody else" compromised the Democratic campaign’s servers, and adding that he will reveal some previously undisclosed facts in the coming days by hinting that "I also know things that other people don’t know, we they cannot be sure of the situation."

Having drawn the ire of the mainstream press for his extensive use of Twitter in announcing major developments and policy shifts, President-elect Donald Trump will not end the "onslaught" of posts on Twitter that fed his unconventional campaign, even after taking on the formalized duties of the Oval Office later this month, as Bloomberg notes following an announcement by incoming White House press secretary Sean Spicer who said he expects Trump "will boldly use" Twitter to make major policy announcements.

One week after a video emerged of the Berlin Christmas market truck killer, Anis Amri, pledging allegiance to ISIS, on Monday the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the deadly New Year’s Day terrorist attack in Istanbul that killed at least 39 people and wounded dozens more, claiming the operation had targeted Turkey in revenge for Turkish military operations against the organization in Syria, a similar justification used by the Turkish offduty policemen to assassinate the Russian ambassador in Turkey in December.