This is an opinion article does not necessarily represent khazen.org 

By Peter Wolfgang - catholicherald.co.uk -- Here Catholic pro-family activist Peter Wolfgang argues that, despite his failings, Donald Trump did much for the Church and for the causes she supports, and that we will miss him when Biden becomes president. In the companion article, theologian Holly Taylor Coolman argues that, whatever good he may have done, many of his actions were deeply opposed to Catholic teaching, and that alliance of many Catholics with him damaged the Church. Donald Trump’s presidency ended in disaster. He lost his bid for reelection. Democratic victory in the Georgia Senate runoffs will put the pro-life and religious liberty causes at an extreme disadvantage in Washington. Worst of all, the MAGA raid on the U.S. Capitol will be hung around the neck of these good causes for years to come. This is, by all the appearances, the hour of the Catholic Never-Trumper. But appearances can be deceiving. For all the ignominy of Trump’s bitter end, Catholics were right to vote for him. In fact, the Catholic Church will soon come to miss Donald Trump. Here are five reasons why.

by reuters -- President Joe Biden signed 15 executive actions shortly after being sworn on Wednesday, undoing policies put in place by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, and making his first moves on the pandemic and climate change. Signing several actions in front of reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday afternoon, Biden said there was "no time to waste" in issuing the executive orders, memorandums and directives. "Some of the executive actions I'm going to be signing today are going to help change the course of the COVID crisis, we're going to combat climate change in a way that we haven't done so far and advance racial equity and support other underserved communities" said Biden. “These are just all starting points”

Aides said the actions the Democratic president signed included a mask mandate on federal property and for federal employees, an order to establish a new White House office coordinating the response to the coronavirus, and halting the process of withdrawing from the World Health Organization. Biden signed a document to begin the process of re-entering the Paris climate accord and issued a sweeping order tackling climate change, including revoking the presidential permit granted to the contentious Keystone XL oil pipeline. Among a raft of orders addressing immigration, Biden revoked Trump's emergency declaration that helped fund the construction of a border wall and ended a travel ban on some hostile countries.

BEIJING (Reuters) - China said on Wednesday it wanted to cooperate with President Joe Biden’s new U.S. administration, while announcing sanctions against “lying and cheating” outgoing Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Alex Azar and 26 other top officials under Donald Trump. The move was a sign of China’s anger, especially at an accusation Pompeo made on his final full day in office that China had committed genocide against its Uighur Muslims, an assessment that Biden’s choice to succeed Pompeo, Anthony Blinken, said he shared. In a striking repudiation of its relationship with Washington under Trump, the Chinese foreign ministry announced the sanctions in a statement that appeared on its website around the time that Biden was taking the presidential oath.

Pompeo and the others had “planned, promoted and executed a series of crazy moves, gravely interfered in China’s internal affairs, undermined China’s interests, offended the Chinese people, and seriously disrupted China-U.S. relations,” it said. The other outgoing and former Trump officials sanctioned included trade chief Peter Navarro, National Security Advisers Robert O’Brien and John Bolton, Health Secretary Alex Azar, U.N. ambassador Kelly Craft and former top Trump aide Steve Bannon. The 28 ex-officials and immediate family members would be banned from entering mainland China, Hong Kong or Macao, and companies and institutions associated with them restricted from doing business with China. Pompeo and others sanctioned did not respond to requests for comment. The U.S. State Department also did not respond.

By BY ANCHAL VOHRA -- foreignpolicy.com --New information suggests that the thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate that exploded at the Port of Beirut on Aug. 4, killing more than 200 people and doing some $15 billion in property damage, may have been intended for the Syrian government. The Lebanese government’s official story until now has been that the cargo’s destination was Mozambique. But an investigation by a Lebanese filmmaker that was aired on the local network Al Jadeed has established a link between three Syrian businessmen who backed Bashar al-Assad in the Syrian war and what appears to be a shell company that bought the explosives. Attention now turns to whether Fadi Sawan, a former military judge charged with investigating the tragedy, can leverage these new facts to hold the perpetrators—both foreign and domestic—accountable. But Lebanon’s government elites are also ramping up their own attacks on his reputation and his work. Foreign Policy reported in August that the Rustavi Azot chemicals factory in Georgia that supplied the explosives had been paid for 2,750 tons of explosives, yet Fábrica de Explosivos Moçambique (FEM), the company that ostensibly had it shipped, never claimed it. Now, a copy of a document obtained by Foreign Policy shows that while Rustavi Azot was the seller, the buyer was not FEM directly but a firm registered in London called Savaro. The sale contract shows the date of the purchase as July 10, 2013, when the Syrian war was at its peak. MV Rhosus, the ship that carried the cargo, docked in Lebanon that November and was then impounded as unseaworthy.

The United Kingdom’s Companies House registrar reveals that Savaro’s addresses are shared by properties previously owned or operated by the Syrian businessman George Haswani and brothers Mudalal and Imad Khuri, all three of whom are dual Syrian-Russian nationals. The man believed to own the ship, Igor Grechushkin, is Russian, too. Haswani received a doctorate in 1979 in the then-Soviet Union and is among the more seasoned intermediaries between Russia and the Syrian regime. Widely known as Moscow’s man in Damascus, he has a history of brokering deals with jihadi outfits as well as regime-backed shabiha, or militias. A Syrian businessman from Yabroud, Haswani’s birthplace, spoke to FP on the condition of anonymity and said: “Haswani is known to resolve disputes between locals and shabiha. But he also knew ISIS and [the Nusra Front].” Haswani is known to have negotiated the release in 2014 of a group of Greek Orthodox nuns who had been seized by the Nusra Front, an al Qaeda affiliate that has since been folded into the active Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. In 2015, Haswani was sanctioned by the United States for allegedly buying oil for the regime from the Islamic State, which controlled oil-rich parts of Syria at the time. Haswani also co-owned the now liquidated Hesco Engineering and Construction Co., which was listed under the same address as Savaro. That address matches the one written on the sale contract seen by Foreign Policy.