that exists today is tearing our societies apart and causing ethnic violence around the world. rosalind jordan found this update from washington dc. the return to service for customers. really just, it's just random. some people are getting their instagram back. some people are getting their what's up back, and i think we have to look back at the chief technology officers of statement on twitter that teams are trying to reconnect network connections. and so there's no rhyme or reason as to whoa, when people are going to get their access back to their accounts. but it does appear, at least at this point, that as far as facebook is concerned, they're nothing nefarious has happened. now that doesn't mean that something nefarious hasn't happened, but simply that facebook is blaming this simply on the fact that something technological wasn't working. this comes down to whether or not facebook has been taking advantage or abusing. as critics would say, it's power because it is perhaps the most prolific social media company in the world of the there's been a this link to was the, to the press about h

let's see, the light is from rosalind jordan who is live for us at the state department in washington dc. hello there, rosalind. the biden administration is moving toward re establishing that consulate to secretary blinking offer any more information about the timing of the reopening move, which will anger israel. ah, he did not give any more details about when a separate council, a ton to engage with the palestinian leadership in the west bank would be reopened. but as you noted, the israeli government has already come out very strongly against the establishment of a separate facility after the trumpet ministration. i told the p l o that that it had to close its mission here in washington 3 years ago. there hasn't been any real love place where you at some palestinian officials could actually engage once the a u. s. moved its embassy from tel aviv to jerusalem. it established palestinian affairs unit inside the embassy. but because of the all of that, the palestinian authority has chosen not to engage with the us through that fora. and essentially that's up put a real strain on you a

for more on this story, less bringing a rosalind jordan live for us in washington day say, hello there, rosalind, we've just heard they've come back on line. what more do we know about this outage? well, we don't know much more about this other than what the chief dunk technology officer said in the last couple of hours, which is that there was some sort of problem with network connections and that engineers working for facebook were trying to fix those network connections. now as you said, it is a very slow coming back online. i still don't have a messenger or instagram, but other services that are owned by facebook, including its namesake platform, as well as the what's app of messaging service have come back online. when you consider that to more than 2000000000 people are accessing at least one of facebook's platforms, it's understandable why it's going to take a while for things to come back on. there had been speculation perhaps that child there were, this was a mass of hat, a hacker attack, or perhaps this was a, some sort of nefarious, a tank down of the social media giant. but

as rosalind jordan miracles, this lake is really papers on steroids, world leaders, politicians, and billionaires with hidden vaults of wealth, a new chapter in a never ending story. the pandora papers is a leak of almost $12000000.00 documents that alleges, concealed assets, tax avoidance, and in some cases, money laundering by some of the world's richest and most powerful, more than $600.00 journalists, and 117 countries have been sifting through files for months as part of the largest ever global financial investigation among its findings, king abdullah, the 2nd of jordan, who used shall companies to build a real estate or polio worth more than $100000000.00 with properties spanning malibu, washington and london has no indication of suggestion in our reporting, but this is indeed a legal, but i think we have certainly asked the king, why were these purchases made through show companies? why has none of this been disclosed? publicly, representatives of the king insist no wrong dealing is involved. they told the consortium that he used his own money, not jordanian government funds t

from washington. rosalind jordan ah, residence in a small colombian town, st influx of mostly haitian migrants is pushing them out of housing, migraines to try to catch boats on their way north to the us. but for a few of people, a day can leave and arise, that they will then stop to a week long once an adult wheatland johnny through the jungle to panama. government says that at east $46000.00 migrants have crossed the lawless jungle known as that daren gap. this year. as under and beauty is a nicole cli explains why hundreds of migrants struggling to cross the gulf of a robber. panama has put a maximum of 500 people that they are accepting every day that can enter their country. and so both companies here in columbia are only selling or letting go of $500.00 people per day that has created a bottleneck where we are. and there are now 22000 migrants here trying to continue their journey. while mostly asians are able to go many have to stay here for well over a month to be able to that to then leave either migrants like for example, cubans and venezuelans are telling us that they simpl

what rosalind jordan is live from the state department in washington, d. c. a rosalyn. good to see. you've just been at a state department briefing and just ended. what did they say about the efforts to find the missionaries? well, there is an inter agency effort to try to find the 17 people, 16 us citizens, one canadian citizen and of the 17. in this group 5 are children. they were leaving an orphanage as part of their work in haiti on saturday when they were abducted. they haven't been seen and the group that allegedly has kidnapped them has not made any public demands. but u. s. officials both here at the state department and at the white house saying that they are working with their haitian counterparts to try to run down the clues to try to find this group and to try to rescue them as quickly as possible. now certainly this is coming against the backdrop of vas, burgeoning violence across haiti, where armed gangs are said to be really in control of big chunks of the country. they don't respect the authority of law enforcement. some have suggested that they may be working on beh

of course, to support the country on its path calls, domestic peace and political transition. rosalind jordan has more on the u. s. reaction to monday school. the biden administration is taking every opportunity to say that it condemns the coup attempt in cartoon on monday. not only has the by debt ministration decided to suspend all $700000000.00 and economic assistance to the transitional government. it also says it is watching very closely how members of the holder are behaving as the process carries out. this is what bad price had to say about the prospect of sanctions against members of the military. rather than it is very early hours. this happened overnight. we're evaluating the situation on the ground, we're watching very closely. we're communicating and coordinating very closely with our allies and with our partners around the world. so i don't want to get ahead of, of where we are. but suffice to say that we are willing to resort to any and all appropriate measures to hold accountable. those who me be attempting to derail the will, the aspirations of the sudanese people and those wh

threatening his ambitious economic plans, mo, from rosalind jordan in washington. it comes down to whether members of congress in the president's party can agree on terms on both the social spending flash environmental bill, as well as on the infrastructure spending bill. if they can work out their differences on one, the actual price tag for the 1st bill, because there are some in the senate who say that bill's just simply too expensive at $3.00 trillion dollars. as well as work out the idea that there's going to be a guarantee that that bill is going to be passed. if more liberal members above the house representatives actually decide to vote for the infrastructure bill. so there's a lot of horse trading that goes on here. the former president of georgia, macau sank has really has been detained just hours after arriving back in the country for the 1st time in years here he'd said he wanted to support the opposition in saturday's election despite the risk of his arrest. california has become the 1st us state to make it compulsory for school children to be vaccinat

offline for several hours. millions of uses worldwide have been hit by the social media outage. rosalind jordan has this update from washington dc. the i returned to service for customers, really just it's just random. some people are getting their instagram back. some people are getting their what's out back. and i think we have to look back at the chief technology officers of statement on twitter that teams are trying to reconnect network connections. and so there is no rhyme or reason as to whoa when people are going to get their access back to their accounts. but it does appear, at least at this point. ah, that as far as facebook is concerned, there's nothing nefarious has happened. a, the oak is prime minister abbey homage has been sworn in for a 2nd term. he bound to protect the country from foreign interference and made global criticism of the conflict in the ticker i region. you and investigation says all sides in levy is conflict, have committed violations that may include wall crimes, a days how's accounts of murder, torture, enslavement and bright may be his pain in conflict since th

public's trust now face another hurdle hog and testifies before congress about facebook on tuesday, rosalind jordan, l g 0, washington. you the over his prime minister abbey ahmed has been sworn in for a 2nd term. is described the poll, which was held in june as ethiopia is 1st attempt at a free and fair vote. for the poles were overshadowed by the contracting to glide, or hundreds of thousands of facing possible famine. the world's largest association of airlines. it says it's aiming for the aviation industry to reach 0 carbon emissions by 2050. the international air transport association is counting heavily on carbon offsets, as well as the use of sustainable fuels and new plane technologies or oil as hit the california coast and what's being called an environmental catastrophe. investigators are looking into whether a ship anchor striking a pipeline could have triggered the leak over 570000 liters of oil a spilled out. environmental essay. many pipelines have been allowed to age into an unsafe state. the pfizer vaccine reportedly gets 50 percent less effective in preventing covered 19 infections

biden's economic agenda in a rare presidential move, biden met his party members on capitol hill. rosalind jordan has more from washington. it comes down to whether members of congress in the president's party can agree on terms on both the social spending flash environmental bill, as well as on the infrastructure spending bill if they can work out their differences on one, the actual price tag for the 1st bill because there are some in the senate who say that bill's just simply too expensive at $3.00 trillion dollars as well as work out the idea that there's going to be a guarantee that that bill is going to be passed. if more liberal members above the house of representatives actually decide to vote for the infrastructure bill. so there's a lot of horse trading that goes on here. people are voting in castles, 1st legislative elections that choosing 30 of the 45 members. sure accounts. so which was previously fully appointed by cats as a mia body can now propose law as a pre budgets and recall ministers. though the amir will retain veto power residence in a small colombian town, say an influx of

let's go straight now to rosalind jordan, who is at the state department at rosalind, the u. s. it clearly is put a lot of time and money into supporting handbooks, civilian leg government wants that message from the administration. while the 1st message from the biden administration is one of condemnation. the u. s. has invested, as you said, a lot of time, a lot of money into trying to help this transitional government get to of very and fair elections in the u. s. is view and establish and a definitive end to a years of dictatorship under the former leader. omar alba, sheer, but that was not the case. and in fact, to show its deep displeasure with the situation in cartoon, the u. s. has suspended all $700000000.00 that it was giving to the transitional government to carry out its work. none of that money had been dispersed and until things change, none of the money will be dispersed. certainly the u. s. is also concerned about other things, such as the safety of the prime minister, abdulla hum doc and his wife and other civilian leaders. this is more of what ned price the dep

of kidnappings which have risen dramatically since the president assassination in july life to rosalind jordan, who's at the state department for us in washington. so, rasa the state department expected to make a briefing this hour, but the white house anderson has already made comments to the press. secretary, that's right to the white house press secretary jen. saki said that you as president joe biden, has been kept up to date on the investigation into the kidnapping of the 17 person . 16 americans, one canadian til 5 of them are children. this happened on saturday after they left a on an orphanage outside porter prints. and they were abducted on their way back. there hasn't been any a word from the group that it allegedly has kidnapped them. but according to gen saki, the president is very much aware that the f b i is investigating this because this is a criminal matter. it's working i in, in tandem with this state department, which has a hosted job release unit as it were working with officials in the portal for us to try to secure the safe and quick release of the 17 people. but so far w

agenda in a rare move. biden has met with his party members on capitol hill out of there was rosalind jordan as more now from washington, dc. if it comes down to whether members of congress in the president's party can agree on terms on both the social spending flash environmental bill, as well as on the infrastructure spending bill, if they can work out their differences on one, the actual price tag for the 1st bill because there are some in the senate who say that bills just simply too expensive at $3.00 trillion dollars. as well as work out the idea that there's going to be a guarantee that that bill is going to be passed. if more liberal members above the house of representatives actually decide to vote for the infrastructure bill. so there's a lot of horse trading that goes on here. the united nations has told ethiopia as prime minister, it doesn't accept the country's decision to expel 7 of its senior personnel. ethiopia says the officials are being told to lead because their middle than the internal affairs of the country residents. no small colombian town say an influx of mostly hait

it's get more not from rosalind jordan who is live or for us in washington d. c. so he's mentioned network issues. do we have any more detail a rosalind as to what actually caused the sausage? we don't have any more ra confirmed information from facebook, but industry experts who studied the tech industry and who was in particular look at the guts of how high tech operates around the world. saying that apparently facebook was making some changes in the way that people are able to access a it's a products and services, but that it's system also happens to include internal corporate to functions. and so this is affected, not just people who use one of the social media platforms, but it's also affected the people who work at facebook's headquarters in california . this outage happened just before 9 am local time in california, which is when most people would be heading to work. and some people reported that they were unable to even use their building passes to get into their office. because this is all connected to the same, a computer infrastructure that you and i wo

public's trust now face another hurdle hog and testifies before congress about facebook on tuesday. rosalind jordan else's era washington. well, facebook share price, a job by him were $5.00 per cents when markets closed on monday. robin bright, joining us from hong kong were trainings just resumed. will the markets looking like they are now? well, there has been this big sell off a own wall street overnight contributed to caused by a tech stocks heading downwards. and that's how the spillover effect into asia is trading has started, especially given the heavy weighting of technical stocks on the asian markets. but it's also been contributed to by fears of over inflation, and that's been stoked by the rising oil price and the decision by and opec oil producing countries to increase output, but not by as much as people had wanted. so there are real concerns about a rising oil price economies kicking back into gear after the pandemic. and then with this rising o price leading possibly to inflation. so we've seen market such as the nick a in japan, a down by a 3 and a half percent at one point, althou

any laws, whether those laws should be changed is a matter for public debate. rosalind jordan al jazeera washington, so says north korea and south korea have restored a stoled communication channel showing on cut the hotline in august and protest against military drills so conducted with united states. but since then, young said it may consider a summit with its southern neighbour, while mcbride has moved from hong kong. what this means for both sides. these hot lines are a very important they are in the lines of communication across the dmc, between the north and the south. it prevents any accidental misunderstandings. it's very important that they are kept open, given the fragility of relations and the, the amount of armaments along the d, m. z. now, they tend to be caught and restored depending on how relations are at any given point in time. and of course, with the dipping relations that we saw in the last year or 2 with the ab, with the ending alpha negotiations over at north korea's nuclear austell, los st. all those talks became stalled. the north reacted very badly to that, and i

his party members on capitol hill. divisions among democrats threatened his ambitious plans. rosalind jordan has the latest from washington even though you as president joe biden's trip from the white house to capitol hill was televised on friday afternoon. the democratic leader didn't get what he wanted. members of his party agreeing to vote on 2 key pieces of legislation. a $1.00 trillion dollar infrastructure bill, as well as a $3.00 trillion dollar social services and environmental package. that's because progressives and conservatives in the democratic party are split on just how much money to spend, even though they all say they want the same things. now the members of the progressive wing, the more liberal wing, have been holding things up in the house of representatives. they say they're members were sent because their voters want to see more spending on things such as health care, education, child care, and a clean environment. and they intend to deliver, they say without a guarantee that that $3.00 trillion dollar bill is going to be passed. they're not going to vote for the $1.00

the stories broke any laws, whether those laws should be changed is a matter for public debate. rosalind jordan al jazeera washington on to other news on sol, says north korea and south korea have restored a stoled communication channel. chung, cut the hotline in august, in protest against military drills, which so conducted with the united states last month, telling us that it may consider a summit with its southern neighbour, rob mcbride's in hong kong to cover this one for us today. hi, rob festival, for people who don't know, can you tell us about this hotline and how it will, how it did work? these hot lines are very important. they are the lines of communication across the dmc between the north and the south. it prevents any accidental misunderstandings. it's very important that they are kept open, given the fragility of relations and the, the amount of arguments along the d, m. z. now, they tend to be cotton restored depending on how relations are at any given point in time. at a cost with the dipping relations that we saw in the last year or $2.00 with the ab, with the ending alpha nego

yeah, we'll see what happens when the system goes back online. rosalind jordan with the latest and now for motion receive roseland. thank you. will rosalyn was just explaining a lot of the issues that are going on with facebook, obviously beyond the current, the outage will the bite and administration says it will continue to push for reforms of social media networks in our view, this is just the latest in a series of revelations about social media platforms. are they make clear that self regulation is not working? that's long. been the presence of human the view of this administration. they validate the significant concern that the president lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed about how social media giants operate and the power they've mast several major u. s. pharmacy chains have gone on trial over their role in the nation's opioid crisis. nearly half a 1000000 people died of opiate overdoses in the u. s. and the 20 years leading up to 2019, the pharmacies are accused of misrepresenting the risks of long term opioid use, and failing to properly monitor suspicious orde

more on this one with rosalind jordan in washington. it comes down to whether members of congress in the president's party can agree on terms on both the social spending slash environmental bill, as well as on the infrastructure spending bill. if they can work out their differences on one, the actual price tag for the 1st bill, because there are some in the senate who say that bills just simply too expensive at $3.00 trillion dollars. as well as work out the idea that there's going to be a guarantee that that bill is going to be passed if more liberal members of the house of representatives actually decide to vote for the infrastructure bill. so there's a lot of horse trading that goes on here. they're supposedly going to be at least one more vote on friday evening in the house of representatives. but we don't know what time that votes going to happen, and exactly what they're going to be voting on. they have usually isn't just, all right, we're going to vote on a bill and let's go. there are a lot of procedural steps that have to be vo

great. context there with rosalind jordan in washington, d. c. thank you. now the former president of georgia, macau soccer really has been detained just hours after arriving back in the country for the 1st time in years earlier, he'd posted a video on facebook saying he wanted to support the opposition in saturday's election despite the risk of arrest. soc is really less georgia back in 2013 when his 2nd term as president ended years later, he was sentenced in absent here to 6 years in prison for an abuse of power, a charge he called politically motivated from foresee walker with more now from tbilisi. i understand that he was actually detained here in italy. see, having somehow escaped or the authorities since posting that video early this morning from by to me, which is on the coastal, which is on the coast. he on, on the black sea, he made it to the police, and he then said that he said he faced likely arrest. we then had a statement from the prime minister saying that that arrest operation had been carried out. and we've now seen a smiling recall sacri

thank you very much indeed. rosalind jordan re challenge has more now on the european leaders mentioned in the papers. the pandora papers are essentially reinforcing what we already knew, which is that london property is a very convenient, buoyant way for some of the world's most rich and wealthy and powerful people to park. what can often be dodgy, cash, one kind of example, not necessarily of all of us, but of some of it is tony and charee blair, tony blabbing, the full british prime minister. what they did, it seems, is to use a, an offshore company in the british virgin islands, to help them by a multi 1000000 pound prophecy in london. and avoid paying thousands of dollars worth hundreds of thousands of dollars worth in property tax. now, is this a legal? no, it's not because it's tax avoidance, which is perhaps morally questionable, but legally it's ok. and many, many other european figures are going to be coming out of these documents in the days and weeks to come to who already left to the for one of whom is president zelinski of ukraine. who in his campaign to become president,

public's trust now face another hurdle hog and testifies before congress about facebook on tuesday. rosalind jordan else's era washington, lina fried is the chief, technologically a technology correspondent at axia. and she says the outage shows the scale of facebook monopoly. and why there are growing coals to regulating take john? these types of outages are rare. they do usually happen, some sort of update is made and it knocks out a whole bunch of servers. typically though it doesn't take down all of facebook services or all of microsoft or all of google's and certainly not globally. so this was unusual. obviously the timing is particularly unique. i think it isn't necessarily. busy a sign of a conspiracy theory or a massive hack, but certainly it comes at a precarious time. and it's been interesting to watch both critics and supporters of facebook and facebook itself. say, see, this is how important we are. and the critic saying this is why no one company should be in charge of this much of the internet, and it sort of goes against the idea of the decentralized internet. whereas facebook is say

the stories broke any laws, whether those laws should be changed is a matter for public debate. rosalind jordan al jazeera washington as well, lebanon, which is dealing with a severe economic crisis, has had some of its top political leaders featured in those pandora papers. they include the current and former prime ministers, as well as the governor of lebanon central bank. oh, let's not speak as anna couldn't. she is in the capital favorite for us. then it has already been so much angleton, imagining this hasn't come as any great surprise to people that well, the pandora paper is what they revealed really is this tiny nation, lebanon has the highest number of offshore companies, more than 300 higher than the u. k. higher than france, and like you mentioned, people are not shocked. that is yet another scandal. but if you ask any lebanese today, and they say, well, we know we know our leaders are corrupt. we took to the streets 2 years ago to demand a new leadership. we could no longer put up with a political class that has been governing this country for decades of political class, responsible

so lots happening here. rosalind jordan is in washington keeping an eye on it. oh, let's start with king abdullah. then rosa. how damaging do you think these revelations are likely to be to him? well, it depends on whether the king is having a, any current political problems in his home country of jordan. and that's because, even though there have been criticisms leveled against his leadership in recent years saying that child the king has not been as much of a democratize or as other people in jordan would like that he has not made it possible for more people to improve their economic standing or to improve their access to capital market so so that they can expand on their business ambitions for example, or that he has not opened enough political space. so that more members of jordanian society can be engaged and actually have influence in the political process. if they're all of these new revelations, a tap into some of that underlying a discomfort or distaste for roger king of dallas. busy a leadership then certainly that could pose a political problem for hi

public's trust now face another hurdle. hogan testifies before congress about facebook on tuesday. rosalind jordan, l g 0 washington. i saw his claim responsibility for sunday's blast outside of mosque in the afghan capital was killed, 13 people. the taliban says it destroyed and i still sell in the north of trouble owls off to the explosion, which was the launch is attack since u. s. troop withdrawal. iceland africanist on previously claim responsibility for a suicide attack at cobbles. airport in august was killed both us soldiers in about a 170 afghan civilians. 70 deca hesitates is not from cold. i think the taliban did expect it to be ice. okay. because immediately on sunday evening they launched a campaign in the northern areas of cobble focusing on members of ice. okay. that statement i have in common last night, claiming it was a suicide bomber that managed to detonate himself. at one of the checkpoints, security has been tightened in the capital and reaction to that. certainly when it comes to the taliban security, as one of the main, the only, i think hailing force that they've always sa

visit capitol hill preferring instead to summon lawmakers to the white house for discussions. rosalind jordan james's live now from washington. and what did biden achieve? is he going to be able to write this deadlock? well, essentially the president had a packed room according to one of the house of representatives. members who was in that meeting. they have a slim majority in the house of representatives. and so it is important to have unity if they want to get both of these multi trillion dollar bills passed. however, as you noted the progressive wing, which number's nearly 100 members of the house of representatives, has a been able to was say, they don't want to vote for the infrastructure bill, which is a key part of jo biden's agenda unless they know that they're going to be able to get passage of this much larger rabbit, a bill that spends money not just on the environment, but on social programs, including education, child care, and other efforts to improve the numbers of the middle class in this country. now there isn't going to be a vote on the infrastructure bill, which is about $

the stories broke any laws, whether those laws should be changed is a matter for public debate. rosalind jordan al jazeera washington. well, the papers also reportedly show her as a bi jones president, that it's close circular been involved in property deals in the united kingdom. worth more than half a $1000000000.00. the elliots, who have been accused of corruption used offshore companies to buy u. k. property. it includes a $45000000.00 office block for the president's 11 year old son, shy adult as a political analyst and as a by john, he says report to baseless not the rail fact is that this information has no real wages. completely black p r against the as a bridge on government because these type of information is circulated in a number of this, the media from time to time. and later it turns out that this is completely false in this way, some circular power spatial. it wired, the international organizations are trying to get some political influence on the beach and the state and come to the 1st person specially present the home all the up. and the purpose is clear to discredit the repub

divisions among the democrats, which democrats, which threatened his ambitious plans or from rosalind jordan in washington. it comes down to whether members of congress in the president's party can agree on terms on both the social spending flash environmental bill, as well as on the infrastructure spending bill if they can work out their differences on one, the actual price tag for the 1st bill because there are some in the senate who said that bills just simply too expensive at $3.00 trillion dollars. as well as work out the idea that there's going to be a guarantee that that bill is going to be passed. if more liberal members of the house of representatives actually decide to vote for the infrastructure bill, so there's a lot of horse trading that goes on here. a lawyer known for his decades long battle against the u. s. oil giant chevron has been jailed for criminal contempt. steven jones again has been sentenced to 6 months in prison by a new court. the case stems from his fight on behalf of ecuadorian villages. to prove chevron polluted the amazon rain forest and the 1990 s. and the u.

thank you very much for that. rosalind jordan lined for a santa state department in washington. russia is closing nato's permanent mission in moscow. the move is in response to the expulsion of half of russia's mission to the western military alliance nearly 2 weeks ago. it's also closing all other nato related missions. nato is accused to 8 members of being undeclared russian spies, rush us, foreign minister, announced a retaliatory move in a media briefing earlier. while blaming natal for the worst thing relations almost for a future. we don't have proper conditions for basic diplomatic activities as a result of natal steps in response to natives actions. we suspend the work of our permanent mission to nato, including the work of the chief military representative starting from november 1st . nadine baba, falling the story for us from london joined, says, now live on the news hour and a deem what practical difference as russia closing its mission to nato. make willfully, if you listen to the german farm is hika mosse, who spoken in the last few hours. it's a very worrying development.

along with a few other nations began normalizing ties with israel last year, rosalind jordan has moved from washington while they're going to be a couple of our bilateral meetings as the secretary of state, antony blinkin will meet with his as really counterpart mr. lockheed. and then he will also have a separate meeting with thought his i am radi counterpart, then they'll have a trilateral meeting, all 3 men in the same room. they're going to be discussing of the raft of issues confronting middle eastern countries. everything from the political and economic instability in lebanon to the ongoing, a civil war inside yemen. the ongoing situation with libya, the ongoing, a civil war in syria, as well as looking at the ongoing efforts to broker peace between the israelis and the palestinians. but a senior state department official did indicate and a background briefing worth reporters on tuesday afternoon, that the bind administration is interested in seeing whether more countries in the middle east would be willing to open diplomatic ties with israel. certainly from a regional security st