Newsweek International 10/26/2018 - 11/02/2018

1975  With the release of his career-making album Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen became the first rocker on the covers of Newsweek and Time simultaneously. “The first day I can remember lookin’ in the mirror and standin’ what I was seein’ was the day I had a guitar in my hand,” the 26-year-old told reporter Maureen Orth, who described his two-hour-plus concerts ending with “four foot-stomping encores” and a fan base possessing “a kind of cult hysteria.” Forty-three years later, that stamina and popularity remain. 1936 In March, Adolf Hitler sent German troops to reoccupy the Rhineland, in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. By October, his jingoistic rhetoric and threats to Moscow (“a national hymn of hate”) had Newsweek wondering if Europe was “building up mighty war machines.” Indeed:…

Members of the Colla Joves Xiquets de Valls team dazzle a massive crowd at the 27th Concurs de Castells, or Human Towers, competition on October 7. Starting some two centuries ago near this port town, castells have drawn a huge following across Catalonia. At local festivals, teams construct the highest, most complex displays possible, usually with the stoutest participants at the base and a small boy at the top. In 2010, UNESCO anointed the castells as Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.…

IT’S NOT EASY TO GET IN TO SEE DIANE Ellis-Marseglia, one of three commissioners who run Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Security is tight at the Government Administration Building on 55 East Court Street in Doylestown, a three-story brick structure with no windows, where she has an office. It also happens to be where officials retreat on election night to tally the votes recorded on the county’s 900 or so voting machines. Guards at the door X-ray bags and scan each visitor with a wand. Unfortunately, Russian hackers won’t need to come calling on Election Day. Cyberexperts warn that they could use more sophisticated means of changing the outcomes of close races or sowing confusion in an effort to throw the U.S. elections into disrepute. The 2018 midterms offer a compelling target:…

ON SEPTEMBER 18, A DAY AFTER Russia and Turkey agreed to create a “demilitarized” buffer zone between Syrian government troops and rebel forces in Syria’s Idlib province, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif hailed the initiative and described it as part of “intensive responsible diplomacy” to avert conflict. At the end of his Twitter post, however, he stressed all parties’ commitment “to fight extremist terror,” thus leaving the door open to further military action in the area in the future. Around the same time, in a phone conversation, the Iranian armed forces’ chief of staff told Syria’s defense minister that the Syrian army should fight the extremists “with full force.” If anything, this was an indication that, at least from Iran’s perspective—and arguably the Syrian government’sthe Turkish-Russian arrangement was only…

IN MAY 2017, WHEN SEBASTIAN KURZ TOOK control of the center-right Austrian People’s Party (OVP), he remade it in his image. Lest the world underestimate the significance of this, the 32-year-old rebranded the OVP as the Sebastian Kurz List–New People’s Party. Seven months later the conservative populist became Austria’s youngest-ever chancellor, in addition to the world’s first millennial head of state and, according to some analysts, the future of Europe. Like other right-wing populists ascending to power in the European Union, the ambitious Kurz has pushed a hard-line immigration agenda in response to economic stagnation and the Syrian refugee crisis. But his youthful persona and political happenstance have elevated his status and his ideas far beyond Austria’s borders. His rise coincided with the transition of the EU presidency to Austria,…

WHEN HURRICANE FLORENCE STRUCK THE U.S. last month, rain and wind weren’t the only causes of damage. Rising seas contributed to storm surges that reached nearly 20 feet in some estuaries. In the past 20 years, sea levels have risen about 3 millimeters per year, which has had an effect on coastal flooding. How much more will the seas rise in coming decades? The North and South poles are a good place to look for an answer. Melting ice in Greenland and Antarctica is a big cause of rising seas; Greenland has enough ice to raise sea levels by 21 feet. Loss of ice at the North Pole could shut down the Gulf Stream, plunging Northern Europe and Scandinavia into a deep freeze—a scenario depicted in the 2004 sci-fi movie…