Greece has once again become "ground zero" for Europe's migration crisis. More than 40,000 migrants arrived in Greece during the first nine months of 2019, and more than half of those arrived during just the past three months, according to new data compiled by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

The surge in migrant arrivals to Greece during the third quarter of 2019 — 5,903 arrivals in July; 9,341 in August; and 10,294 in September — has coincided with repeated threats by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and other members of his government to flood Europe with Muslim migrants.

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For more than 40 years, George Will has been producing erudite political commentary. Most often, I find myself agreeing with the arguments presented in his twice-weekly columns for The Washington Post. When I don't, I have to wrack my brains to figure out why, and how I might frame a cogent dissent.

He's recently published "The Conservative Sensibility" — no subtitle — a 538-page reflection on Western political philosophy and tradition, and the specifically American vision of the Founders.

"A sensibility," he writes, "is more than an attitude but less than an agenda." The American conservative sensibility, he adds, includes "an unsentimental, almost bleak realism," while applying "general principles to untidy realities."

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Suddenly, Iran's clerical regime doesn't seem quite so powerful. In recent weeks, Iran's increasingly aggressive regional behavior (including its involvement in the September 14th attack on Saudi oil facilities), and the tepid response to this activity from the United States and its allies, has conveyed the unmistakable impression that Tehran is on the march. But now, Iranian leaders are experiencing some unexpected problems closer to home, in neighboring Iraq. Over the past week, mass protests have spread throughout Iraq, with thousands of citizens taking to the streets in a widening – and increasingly bloody – grassroots revolt. The fury of the protestors is directed at a lot of things. It is a response to the notorious mismanagement and disfunction of the Iraqi government, which current Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi has failed to tackle resolutely. It is likewise about the country's endemic corruption and graft, which watchdog groups like Transparency International have ranked as among the worst in the world. But the protests are about something else as well: Iran's pervasive political interference on the territory of its western neighbor.

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The United States has done it again. After a telephone chat with President Recep Erdogan, Turkey's Islamist autocrat, President Trump has abruptly reversed U.S. military policy against the advice of the State Department and Pentagon and paved the way for a Turkish invasion of northeastern Syria.

His stunning decision has not only jeopardized a costly victory over the Islamic State, it has betrayed the Kurds, people who were pivotal in defeating the Islamist militants.

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The Israeli notion of mamlachtiyut does not translate well into English. Coming from the word mamlacha, or kingdom, the word suggests the quality of acting in sovereign-like fashion. It was the term David Ben-Gurion invoked when he spoke of Jews' ability to have military power while at the same time exercising caution with their political power. Read Israeli history, and you'll see this term conjured every time the nation faced a major juncture that required individuals and factions to transcend their partisan loyalties. Israelis are a cynical bunch, yet the fact that we have a specific term for putting one's own interests aside for the greater good speaks volumes and makes clear precisely what it is that we truly value.

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On Monday, four children of an American and his Israeli wife killed by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in 2015 filed suit against Turkey's Kuveyt Turk Bank in a New York court. They charge that the bank helps Hamas finance its terrorist attacks, allegations the firm is almost certain to deny.

The lawsuit against this Shariah-compliant bank, which counts the Turkish government as a shareholder, comes two weeks after the US Treasury sanctioned 11 Turkey-linked entities and individuals for supporting Hamas and other jihadist outfits. The evidence keeps mounting: Turkey has become a haven for regional baddies.

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MOST STATE license plates bear mottos that are uplifting ("The Spirit of America," "Live Free or Die,"), descriptive ("10,000 Lakes," "America's Dairyland"), or welcoming ("Aloha State," "Great Faces, Great Places"). Only the District of Columbia's is bad-tempered. The epigram on its license plate is a complaint: "Taxation Without Representation.")

Washington, D.C., is the nation's 20th largest city by population and the 122nd largest by area, but it's the only one that complains because it's not a state. The license-plate logo is meant to be a protest that D.C. residents pay federal taxes but don't elect voting representatives to Congress.

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The Trump administration last week announced steps that could lead to the importation of prescription drugs from Canada, where prices are lower. It is a goal supported by President Trump, but long opposed by many Republicans.

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Located along Italy's southern coastline in the region of Calabria, near the very tip of the boot-shaped Italian peninsula, the village of Bova Marina appears an unlikely place to witness Jewish history unfold.

The small town, home to just over 4,000 people, lies nestled between quiet beaches with stunning views of the Ionian Sea and rugged, untamed hills stretching out amid large tracts of agricultural farmland.

Quaint and rustic, like countless other diminutive Italian settlements in the area, there is little on the surface to suggest even the remotest connection with the people of Israel.

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