The Federal Reserve, saying ‘the coronavirus outbreak has harmed communities and disrupted economic activity in many countries, including the United States,’ cut interest rates to essentially zero on Sunday and launched a massive $700 billion quantitative easing program to shelter the economy from the effects of the virus.
A church in China formerly part of the government-recognized Three-self branch of churches was shut down, propelling around 200 believers to begin to meet in secret.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday announced that Israel would begin using advanced digital monitoring tools to track carriers of the coronavirus, raising major privacy concerns and prompting accusations of mass surveillance.
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin will task Blue and White leader Benny Gantz with forming the next government, after the leftist former IDF chief gained a majority of seats in the Knesset with unexpected support.
A Finnish Member of Parliament is under investigation for expressing the biblical view of sexuality in a series of television interviews, police charging her with “hate speech” in a case that civil liberties groups are seeing as a harbinger of ill-fortune for free speech.
A Nigerian civil society grouped has traced the genocidal activities of Muslim groups in that country and found that earlier estimates of the numbers of Christians killed over the last few years were far too modest.
Vladimir Putin has formally signed off on constitutional amendments that would allow the Russian leader to run again for president in 2024, the Interfax news agency reported on March 14.
Islamic religious authorities have closed the Al-Aqsa mosque and the Dome of the Rock as a precautionary measure against the spread of the coronavirus. However, outdoor prayers will still be permitted outside the two shrines housed in Jerusalem.
The U.S. House early Saturday passed bipartisan legislation in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
At the close of business Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1,985 points to 23,186, nearly recouping Thursday’s more than 2,300-point loss. The S&P 500 gained 228 to 2,709 and the Nasdaq Composite was up by 672 points to 7,874.
The 16 Dead Seas scroll fragments housed at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC, are forgeries, museum officials said Friday.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Israel climbed to 164 on Saturday, up 21 from Friday, with nearly 40,000 currently in home quarantines according to the Israeli Health Ministry. Of those with the virus, two are still in serious condition, 10 are in moderate condition, and four have recovered.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a meeting at his office in Jerusalem late on Saturday afternoon to discuss further, more stringent measures Israel may take to halt the coronavirus pandemic.
President Donald Trump declared Sunday, March 15, as a National Day of Prayer.
Mexico could consider measures at its northern border to slow the spread of the coronavirus into its relatively unaffected territory, health officials said on Friday, with an eye to containing a US outbreak that has infected more than 2,000 people.
The World Health Organization says Europe has replaced China as the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic.
U.S. President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency, clearing the way for more federal aid to stream to states and cities to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
Iran said Saturday the coronavirus outbreak has killed another 97 people, pushing the death toll in the country to 611, as war-ravaged Syria announced a number of strict measures despite the government saying it has no confirmed cases.
The regime in Tehran is in lots of trouble these days. As U.S. sanctions tighten, at least a quarter of Iran’s oil rigs are now out of action, ‘dealing a potentially long-term blow to its oil industry.’ The coronavirus ‘has now spread to every province in the country and people are fearful that the true scale of the outbreak is even worse than is being disclosed.’
The Trump administration will extend a 30-day ban on travel from European countries to the United Kingdom and Ireland.