Global military spending has begun rising in real terms for the first time since the U.S. began its withdrawal of troops from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the SIPRI. Defense budgets rose 1 percent to $1.68 trillion in 2015, making up about 2.3 percent of the world’s GDP. Source: Bloomberg
Israeli security officials met recently with the U.S. counterparts to discuss the recent escalation between Washington and Tehran and shared sensitive intelligence on Iran, a report on the news site Independent Arabia claimed on Sunday. According to the report, the Israeli delegation told the American officials that in the case of a full-fledged confrontation between Iran and the United States, Jerusalem would not play an active role and would only join the fighting if it was attacked by Iran or its proxies. Source: Israelhayom
Sen. Lindsey Graham said Monday that he believes Iran is behind recent attacks on pipelines and ships around the Middle East, and warned that Tehran should expect “an overwhelming military response” if it harms “American personnel and interests” in the region. Source: Politico
Several key suppliers are reportedly cutting off Huawei after the Trump administration added the Chinese telecom equipment and smartphone giant to a trade blacklist last week. According to Bloomberg, semiconductor companies Intel, Qualcomm, Xilinx and Broadcom will no longer supply Huawei until further notice. This follows another report earlier today that Google has suspended some trade with Huawei, leaving it with access only to the open-source version of Android. Source: Techcrunch
