JAPAN - After initial success, Japan is facing a reality check on the coronavirus. The country garnered global attention after containing the first wave of Covid-19 with what it referred to as the “Japan Model” - limited testing and no lockdown, nor any legal means to force businesses to close. The country’s finance minister even suggested a higher “cultural standard” helped contain the disease. But now the island nation is facing a formidable resurgence, with Covid-19 cases hitting records nationwide day after day. Infections first concentrated in the capital have spread to other urban areas, while regions without cases for months have become new hotspots. And the patient demographic - originally younger people less likely to fall seriously ill - is expanding to the elderly, a concern given that Japan is home to the world’s oldest population.

UK - A senior executive for pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca has confirmed that his company cannot face legal action for any potential side effects caused by its Covid vaccine. Those affected will have no legal recourse. AstraZeneca is one of 25 pharmaceutical companies worldwide already testing their Covid vaccines on humans, in preparation for injecting hundreds of millions of people. These are flush times for Britain’s largest pharmaceutical company, worth something in the order of £70 million. They have just reported bumper profits of $12.6 billion in the last six months alone. But despite its healthy balance sheet, AstraZeneca is unwilling to be held responsible for any potential side effects of its ‘hopeful’ vaccine candidate. In other words, the company is completely protected, or indemnified, against lawsuits from people who are injected with their vaccine and experience negative effects, regardless of how severe or long-lasting they are.

USA - A CDC report released Friday reveals that hundreds of campers at a north Georgia YMCA camp were infected with coronavirus in just days before the camp was shut down. According to the report, of the 597 residents who attended the camp, 344 were tested and 260 tested positive for the virus. The camp was only open for four days before being shut down because of the virus, and officials followed all recommended safety protocols. In total, the virus attacked 44% of the children, staff members and trainees who attended the camp.

With back-to-school fast approaching, it’s important to point out that this was an overnight camp. “Relatively large cohorts sleeping in the same cabin and engaging in regular singing and cheering likely contributed to transmission,” officials said. MacArthur said strict adherence to wearing a mask and social distancing is hard for kids, but the study makes it clear that those guidelines are important.

UK - Christians in Scotland have warned new hate speech legislation could enshrine “cancel culture” in law while rendering expression of biblical morality illegal. The Scottish Parliament is currently debating the “Hate Crime and Public Order” bill that would criminalize communicating “threatening, abusive or insulting material” that is “likely” to stir up hatred against a protected group, which Christians fear could easily include traditional Christian teaching on sexual morality, marriage, and human nature. “A new offence of possessing inflammatory material could even render material such as the Bible and the Catechism of the Catholic Church inflammatory,” Mr Horan said. “The Catholic Church’s understanding of the human person, including the belief that sex and gender are not fluid and changeable, could potentially fall foul of the new law.”

USA - Black Lives Matter protests erupted into violence across the country last night as 'explosive devices' were used against federal officers in Seattle and Portland, and a demonstrator was shot dead during a march in Austin. One protester was shot and killed when gunshots were fired during a protest in downtown Austin, Texas, Saturday night. Shocking footage showed people marching along the street holding banners demanding an end to police brutality and racism when loud shots rang out. This comes as protests gathered steam across several US cities Saturday, two months on from the Memorial Day 'murder' of George Floyd and in a show of solidarity for Portland where demonstrators and federal agents have clashed ever since Trump sent federal troops in. The president has so far deployed federal agents to Portland, Seattle and Chicago.

CHINA - Torrential rains in China continued this week, threatening even worse floods after almost 24 million people have been impacted by 433 overflowing rivers, with millions evacuated and at least 142 dead as of Tuesday. The largest of those rivers, the Yangtze, remains the focus of great concern. The third major flood of the year hit the massive Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze on Sunday, pouring 50,000 cubic meters of water per second into its containment systems. An even larger surge was expected by Tuesday evening.

USA - The numbers: An economy badly battered by the coronavirus shrank at a record 32.9% annual pace in the second quarter, underscoring just how big a hole the US finds itself in as it labors to recover from the deepest recession in American history. The tidal wave of damage from the first global pandemic in a century was almost as bad as Wall Street expected. Analysts polled by MarketWatch had forecast a 35% decline in gross domestic product at an annual pace, the official scorecard of the US economy. The economy began to recover in mid-May after a severe contraction at the beginning of the quarter, but the US faces a long road back, analysts say. Millions of Americans are still out of work, thousands of businesses have closed and many of those that remain open have had to scale back operations because of tepid demand or ongoing government restrictions. The recent surge in coronavirus cases in about half of US states, especially large ones such as Texas, Florida and California, has also dealt a blow to a fragile economic recovery.

USA - For a very long time we have been warned that a US economic collapse was inevitably coming, and now it is here. Fear of COVID-19 and unprecedented civil unrest in our major cities have combined to plunge us into a historic economic downturn, and nobody is exactly sure what is going to happen next. On Thursday, we learned that US GDP was down 32.9 percent on an annualized basis last quarter.

GERMANY - The German economy suffered a record-breaking economic contraction in the second quarter as measures intended to stymie the coronavirus pandemic shuttered businesses and required consumers to stay home. The economy shrank at an annualized rate of 34.7 percent in the second quarter, worse than the stunning 32.9 percent decline in the US. For the whole of 2020, the German government forecasts that GDP will contract 6.3 percent before expanding by 5.2 percent in 2021. The US economy is expected to decline less than 6 percent for the full year. The outperformance of the US compared with European nations conclusively undermines claims by critics in the Democrat Party and the media that the Trump administration’s handling of the pandemic has harmed the economy.

USA - President Trump on Thursday suggested delaying the November election as he continued to raise the false specter of widespread voting fraud. “With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???” he tweeted. There is no evidence to support Trump’s claims of voting fraud on a massive scale, and adjusting the date of the election would be difficult, if not impossible. However, the suggestion was an alarming indication that Trump is considering ways to prolong his stay in office as the country reels from a deadly pandemic and the resulting economic crisis.

USA - President Donald Trump said Thursday that he did not want to change the date of the election but again warned of the disaster that mail-in voting would cause. “No, do I want to see a date change? No,” Trump said. “But I don’t want to see a crooked election. This election will be the most rigged election in history, if that happens.” The president commented on the election during a press conference at the White House on Thursday evening. Earlier Thursday, he floated the idea of changing the date of the election, sending the corporate media into a frenzy over his comments. The president does not have the Constitutional power to change the date of the election, which is scheduled for November 3, 2020.

USA - Donald Trump is pulling thousands of US troops out of Germany and relocating America's European headquarters from Stuttgart to Belgium following a row with German Chancellor Angela Merkel over NATO funding. US Defence Minister Mark Esper announced plans to withdraw troops from Germany to Washington on Wednesday. Estimates suggest 12,000 troops will be leaving Germany, with half of them returning to America, and the other half heading to Italy. Mr Trump has accused Berlin of taking advantage of the US on trade and faulted the country for failing to meet NATO's defence spending targets. As well as the NATO funding, the US is not happy with Germany's trade surplus or Berlin's link up with Russia on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.

USA - The US government has made further attempts to force European firms to ditch the Russian-led Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, Welt am Sonntag reported, citing people familiar with talks on the issue. According to the newspaper, officials from US Department of State, the Treasury Department, as well as the Department of Energy approached European contractors to make sure they fully understand the consequences of staying in the project. Up to a dozen officials reportedly held at least two online conferences with representatives of the firms in recent days.

ISRAEL - Rabbi Benyahu Bruner, the Rosh Yeshiva of the Tzfat hesder yeshiva, Mitzpe Yericho Chief Rabbi Yehuda Kroizer, Rabbi Elisha Wolfson, and other leading religious Zionist rabbis issued a special call during the Nine Days and Tisha B'Av for the public to support organizations working on behalf of the Temple Mount. Rabbi Bruner said in a video which was filmed on the Temple Mount: "We are in the days between the fasts. The sages say that this mourning is ancient - it has gone on for too long. Our goal is for this mourning to end. This mourning can only be ended by us redeeming the place [of the Holy Temple]. Therefore, I would like to thank all those who will donate to the Temple Mount organizations generously so that they can continue their activities with more vigor and courage for the redemption of the Temple Mount."

GERMANY - Defense Secretary Mark Esper has outlined proposals that foresee bringing about 6,400 troops back to the US and relocating another 5,400 within Europe. That entails reducing the presence in Germany by roughly one third. US Defense Secretary Mark Esper confirmed on Wednesday that troops would be pulled and relocated from Germany. in Wednesday's announcement, the first time the US set out concrete proposals on its "European Strategic Force Posture Review," Esper tentatively put the number at 11,800. Under the plan, the US will send home some 6,400 forces and relocate 5,400 out of Germany and to other European countries in Europe, the US Defense Department said. Roughly 25,000 troops are set to remain in Germany. The reassignment envisages troops moving to Italy and Belgium, but some could also go to Poland and the Baltic states, if Warsaw agrees to an accord that the two sides have been working on, Esper said.