The movement’s electoral victory sheds new light on Moscow’s ideological reach and sets back the Russian Orthodox Church’s efforts outside Russia.

The victory of the students’ list in Serbia’s recent parliamentary elections is particularly remarkable: receiving 52% of the vote and winning 140 seats (out of 250), with voter turnout approaching 70% of those eligible to vote, the representatives chosen by the students will be able to reverse the autocratic tendencies of the country’s leader, the pro-Russian Aleksandar Vučić. Vučić’s party, by contrast, failed to receive 40% of the vote.

This success is the culmination of an unprecedented democratic process that began following the deaths of 16 people when a canopy collapsed at Novi Sad railway station (1 November 2024). The student protests that emerged as a consequence of that event spread from universities to schools across the country, drawing in professionals and farmers, professors and workers. (SettimanaNews)

Using the tools of assembly-based and direct democracy, without leaders and without a detailed political program, the students filled public squares, marched through cities, won the.

Tehran is on the ropes, and conditions are unlikely to change. Its weakening shifts the regional game. Jerusalem should open to Arab parties to fully capitalize on the opportunities.

On the eve of a possible massive attack on Iran, the recent inconclusive Israeli elections might yet open new geopolitical opportunities for the country and the region. In the vote, neither of the two main candidates, Benjamin Netanyahu or Gadi Eisenkot, won a clear majority, and the country is searching for a new direction before even forming a new government.

Two trends, one internal and the other external, may push Israel on a different track.

Iran’s fall?

One is about Iran. It is on the ropes. The morality police, the system’s keystone for 50 years, have vanished or thinned out on the streets.

Tehran may partially control Hormuz, but it does so at the cost of destroying the nation. The US chokehold on Iranian oil exports is stifling the country.

Consumer prices are up 88.7% year over year; job losses.