Week in Review: The Iranian Empire Is Back, Europe’s Military, Censoring ‘Fake News,’ and Much More

• The Iranian empire is back. This is the conclusion of a Lebanese analyst who sees the Islamic Republic as the leader of an Islamist empire reaching across the Middle East from Afghanistan to North Africa.

• Fidel Castro’s death took place in the middle of a resurgence of European engagement with Cuba—something past American administrations never would have allowed. Also interesting is the Black Lives Matter movement publicly saying it needs to actively apply the lessons of Castro’s revolution.

• Mainstream news sources and news aggregators are criticizing the rise of what they are calling “fake news”—some are even censoring it. But who decides what gets that label?

• We’ll also talk about more progress being made in efforts to build a unified European military—the possible rise of a strongman in South Korea—how Libya is turning into something of a contested area between Europe and Russia—and how the president of the Philippines is threatening to KILL human rights activists.