Reuters World News - Pakistan church violence, Israel-Lebanon border tensions and a divided Fed

Episode Date: August 17, 2023

Increasing tensions along the Israel-Lebanon border have elevated the risk of outright conflict. A standoff in Pakistan as troops guard a church from mob violence over claims a Koran was desecrated. Fed minutes show division on further rate increases as the battle against inflation continues. Officials defend not using the siren alert system in Maui -- and Europe’s environmental ambitions face a ‘greenlash’.  Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt-out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, tensions along the Israel-Lebanon border elevate the risk of outright conflict, a standoff in Pakistan as troops guard churches from mob violence. The Fed divided over interest rates, and Europe faces a populist backlash on climate. It's Thursday, August 17th. This is Reuters World News with everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes. Every weekday. I'm Kim Vinal in London. We start with the headlines making news around the world.

A US appeals court has upheld the legality of the abortion pill Mithopristone, but imposed restrictions on its access. The court ordered a ban on telemedicine prescriptions and mail shipments of the drug. It stopped short, however, of pulling it off the market as a lower court had done, setting up a Supreme Court showdown. Hawaiian officials have defended not U.S. using a siren warning system during last week's deadly wildfires. Maui's emergency chief, Hermann Andeya, came under questioning by journalists at a press conference.

Do you regret not sounding the silence? I do not. And the reason why... So many people said they could have been saved if they had time to escape. In fact, on the website of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, the firing guideline is provided. If you are in a low-lying area near the coastline, evacuate to... high grounds. Had we sounded the siren that night, we're afraid that people would have gone

malca. And if that was the case, then they would have gone into the fire. The head coach of the US women's soccer team has resigned, according to several media reports. Vladko Andanovsky's reported exit follows the four times champions crashing out early from the Women's World Cup after a shock loss to Sweden. Burger King has scrapped tomato. from its wraps and burgers in many Indian outlets due to inflation. Even tomatoes need a vacation. We are unable to add tomatoes to our food. Red notices pasted at some India outlets.

The chain has cited quality issues in explaining the shorefall. In Pakistan, angry mobs have attacked four churches in the east of the country. Rioters are demanding that two men, they accuse of desecrating the Quran be handed over. Troops have been deployed to cordon off the Christian settlement. And residents have fled to a nearby village. Asif Shahzad is a reporter in Pakistan. So Asif, what's the latest is the standoff ongoing?

So the latest is that the standoff is still going on. The tensions are still running high. And this Christian settlement that was attacked by a mob of like 6,000 to 7,000 people yesterday. it has been cordoned off by paramilitary troops and police, and nobody is being allowed to get in or get out of that settlement. And the protesters who attacked this settlement yesterday, they have given a deadline today that if the two people who were blamed for blasphemy, if they are not arrested by afternoon,

then they will come out again and block the main highway, and they will start their protest again. What sparked this? Tell us about Pakistan's blasphemy laws. Pakistani blasphemy laws calls for death penalty for anyone who blaspheme anything against Islam or its Prophet Muhammad. There haven't been any serious attempts ever to reform these laws. These are really very harsh and strict laws. I mean, what sparked these latest wireless protests is that there was some allegation yesterday

that someone found a couple of pages of Holy Book Quran and there was something written in red on them. Some local guy approached it to a local cleric and showed him to them that someone has desecrated Holy Book Cros. That sparked this one as yesterday. Minutes from the Federal Reserve's July meeting are out and they show divisions between the bank officials over which way to go on future interest rate hikes.

Our Fedwatcher Howard Schneider has poured over the details and is here to break it down. You saw two members, although there was a consent, of vote to raise interest rates in July, two non-voting members, probably non-voting members, did say they would leave rates, prefer to leave rates where they were. And then you saw things like some or a number of start to talk about other risks out there, the risks of going too far, the risk that there could be an item, jump in unemployment because of all this, the risk that there's still impact from prior rate hikes coming through the economy, and all of that needed to be

considered. So all at all, I think you see opinions starting to diverge a little bit more as this debate really nears its endpoint. That's probably going to lead to a pause, a hold in September, with some optionality left on the table in their statement and their language to go again if they need to. Interestingly, in the minister, there was a reference to Dady in, quote, coming months helping resolve this question. That indicated to me that they're going to be a little bit patient about this next decision. It's been 17 years since the last major war between Israel and the Shiite Islamist group Hezbollah on the Lebanese border. Even as a deadly conflict between them has played out in Syria, they've avoided major blows. But several incidents at the frontier

recently raised concerns about a possible escalation, one fueled by tensions over Iran's nuclear program and escalating violence between Israel and the Palestinians. Maya Jabali is the Bureau achieve for Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. Maya, are Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah being drawn into a new conflict with one another? And why is it happening now? We've definitely seen a series of incidents in the past couple of months that have ratcheted up tensions along the southern border between Lebanon and Israel. That border is one that every once in a while will see some kind of incident pop up. There might be a protest. There might be somebody throwing a Molotov cocktail, something like that across the border. But the series of incidents that we've seen over the course of spring to summer now

have indicated that there are some tensions that are boiling. One analyst you spoke to said, Hezbollah wants to change the unwritten rules of engagement with Israel. What does that mean? So we spoke to Mohannat Hajaliyah Ali from the Carnegie Middle East Center and he gave us a way of thinking about what might be changing about those rules of engagement between Hasbullah and Israel, which have been in place basically since the very bloody month-long war in 2006 between Hasbela and Israel. Since then, the rules of engagement have kept kind of a cold war along that border. But what might be changing is other factors being drawn into that dynamic. So he pointed out that there's a kind of new dynamic that's playing out where if there's an escalation in the Palestinian territories between Israel and armed factions there, that Lebanon's southern borders could also light up.

And that is what we saw this summer when there were escalations along the Lebanese border with Israel, with rockets flying over, and Israel actually responding. And we're worried that that could again prove to be a new reality where Lebanese territories being drawn into the tensions that are playing out more broadly across the region. The European Union has burnished its role as a leader on climate change. But looming elections put future climate measures at risk, especially as pernished. populist backlash against green initiatives gains steam. Sarah Marsh is covering the story. Sarah, why is there a backlash to these policies now? So I think it's a combination of factors. On the one hand, you have a cost of living crisis, you have some of the highest rates of inflation

that we've seen in decades, and so people just feel they can't afford now the green transition on top of that. And then you have the issue that we're going now from pledges, to cut emissions to concrete policies and policies in areas that really affects citizens, such as building efficiency, transport, so people are having to get used to the idea of not only using combustion vehicles of having to spend money on renovating their homes. How are European leaders responding to or using this populist angst? So some politicians were starting to really tap into these worries and in the apparent hope that they're going to bring them electoral success,

especially in countries that are facing national elections. So, for example, in the UK, Britain used to be seen as a real leader in fighting climate change. And we've seen a real shift in rhetoric under Rishi Sunak, who has said that we need to be careful of treating more costs for people that they just simply can't afford. Is there a sense that Europe has ceded the mantle to the US at the moment? I think a lot depends on the upcoming election.

Analysts in general say that, yes, the US is doing a lot at the moment. They're spending hundreds of billions of dollars on fostering green technology. And certainly, Europe, there's a fear that all the green tech is going to move to the US. But on the other hand, typically the US really seesaws on green policy. And the next election could completely change the direction that it's going in. and bathe records of rentas with the form

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that's it for today's episode of Reuters World News. We'll be back with our daily headline show Friday. To make sure you know what's going on in the world, listen in for 10 minutes every weekday. And don't forget to subscribe on your favourite podcast player or download the Reuters app.