A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – Three years ago, hardly anyone knew his name.  But in a once-unimaginable scenario, Emmanuel Macron — at 39, the boy wonder of an aging political establishment — won the French presidency Sunday with a tidal wave of popular support. He will soon be France’s youngest head of state since ­Napoleon Bonaparte as well as its first modern president who does not belong to either of the center-left or center-right parties that have run this country for 60 years.

After the Brexit campaign’s success in Britain and Donald Trump’s upset victory in the U.S. presidential election, ­Macron’s triumph was billed as having slowed the global tide of anti-establishment populism. In the vote’s second and final round, he defeated Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Front, an anti-immigrant party tainted by the perception that it is tolerant of anti-Semitism and Nazi nostalgia.

Macron, who has never held elected office, has now been elected to one of the most powerful executive positions in the Western world and will be the leader of Europe’s second-largest economy. He did it, analysts say, through a combination of luck and a campaign message attuned to a new political moment. [ Source ]

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Prodigy Macron charts unlikely path from obscurity to Palais Elysee – Times of Israel

(Worthy News) – US President Donald Trump has succeeded in persuading Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas to make the kind of concessions that will enable the diplomatic process to move forward, World Jewish Congress President Ron Lauder told Israeli politicians at The Jerusalem Post Annual Conference in New York.

Lauder is the Jewish leader closest to Trump: their families have been friends for decades; he has free access to the president; and he has advised him on how to advance diplomatic initiatives in the Middle East. He also has built up ties with Arab leaders for decades and was Netanyahu’s unofficial envoy to Syria in the latter’s first term as prime minister.

Behind the scenes at the conference, Lauder briefed ministers Naftali Bennett, Ayelet Shaked and Ofir Akunis, as well as opposition leader Isaac Herzog on his impressions from talking to Trump about how to solve the Israeli- Palestinian conflict. [ Source ]

(Worthy News) – Congress will investigate whether the Obama administration undermined its own counterproliferation efforts in order to secure implementation of the nuclear deal with Iran, Politico reported.

The House oversight committee said Friday it had launched an investigation into Politico’s April 24 report that the administration had dropped prosecutions against several Iranian fugitives accused of posing threats to national security, while publicly downplaying the danger posed by Iranians freed in a January 2016 prisoner exchange.

Republican committee leaders Jason Chaffetz and Ron DeSantis said they had asked the State and Justice Departments to provide documents on the various cases referenced in the report by May 19, as well as make officials available for briefings by May 25. [ Source ]