Haaretz (Israel)
ANALYSIS/ U.S. takes page from Israel’s book in Syria strike
 

The left-leaning Israeli daily has reacted to yesterday’s US air strike inside Syria.

Israel, remember, conducted a covert operation inside Syria last September, bombing a suspected nuclear facility. For Haaretz, America has decided to take a leaf out of Israel’s book. The common denominator in this strike last September and the US strike yesterday is that nobody takes the Syrians seriously any more – their sovereignty is repeatedly being breached.

The Israeli daily says it’s clear now that the US will not hesitate to attack terrorist targets in the country.

The paper does however remind readers that Syria made efforts to negotiate with Israel and improve their relations over the past year but that the US did not try to encourage the Syrians to make progress in these negotiations… insisting on viewing it as a member of the “axis of evil”.

The Times (UK)
A warning Syria’s President Assad must heed
 

The Times of London also examines the US strike and says it marks the culmination of years of US frustration with Damascus over alliances with Iran and Hezbollah and over Islamic extremists entering Iraq from Syrian territory.

The paper says the strike was a warning - an attempt to turn Bashar Assad’s regime away from ally Iran and into peace talks – a stick instead of the so-called carrot…

The Independent (UK)
Yasmin Alibhali-Brown: Could Britain elect a black premier? Not any time soon
 

While Obama is hugely popular in Britain and indeed in Europe as a whole, would he be elected here?

In the UK, racism against immigrants is still a problem, as Yasmin Alibhali-Brown reminds us, and black or Asian MPs would probably not win without the votes of black or Asian constituents.The article cites the Washington Post which said recently it would be hard to imagine Obama emerging in Europe anytime soon.

She goes on to say the British often prefer to see their society as tolerant and therefore ignore some of the problems with race that still exist.

But, she says, minority groups themselves must take some of the blame for there being no ‘British Obama’. Groups compete too much with each other instead of seeing their common interests. Obama’s achievement on the other hand has been to rise above identity politics.

So Britain - and indeed Europe - is playing catch up with America on this issue.

Aujourd’hui en France (France)
Three years afterwards, Clichy is still waiting for real change.
 

This is an article about the Paris suburb Clichy-sous-Bois where the infamous riots started off in 2005.

The spark that ignited that drama was the death of two teenagers who were being pursued by the police and took refuge in a power station where they were electrocuted.

It happened exactly three years ago today. This single event became a catalyst really for the anger of immigrant communities with heavy-handed police tactics and French society in general.

The court case surrounding the deaths of those two teenagers is still ongoing. So despite urban renewal programs and other attempts to improve life in Clichy, there is a sense that this chapter has not yet been closed.

The mayor herself has said that Clichy has become a laboratory of sorts for what went wrong but also for how to put it right.

Officials from Sweden, Russia, Lebanon, Israel, the US, Denmark and Indonesia visited Clichy-sous-Bois in the month of October alone. Chinese officials are expected in November. People want to understand why the riots started here, explains Ali Zahi, who is a local representative.

The Vancouver Sun (US)
Is Halloween a paedophile's favourite holiday?
 

Halloween is coming up this Friday. The Vancouver Sun reports that many American states require convicted sex offenders to observe a curfew on Halloween. The Vancouver Sun asks is Halloween really a pedophile’s favourite holiday?

US authorities certainly fear so – California has imposed a curfew on sex offenders and has forbidden them to turn their outside lights on on Halloween night.

In Maryland they must display a bright orange pumkin displaying the message, ‘No candy at this residence’.

Many of these so-called sex offenders have regular contact with even their own children and a case is pending in Missouri taken by a civil liberties group which says this amounts to applying the law retroactively and is nothing more than fear-mongering.