MUST-READS

• Municipal Elections
  Uber to offer Saudi voters free rides during municipal elections

  Saudi citizens casting votes in the municipal council elections on Dec. 12 will enjoy a free ride as part of a charitable initiative launched by Al-Nahda Philanthropic Society for Women in collaboration with the famous car service app Uber.

• Saudi Oil Policy
  Saudi Arabia shipping more Nov-Dec crude to Asia to meet robust demand

  Saudi Arabia is shipping more crude oil to Asia over the last two months of the year as strong refining margins boost demand, trade sources said, helping the top oil exporter defend its market share amid fierce competition.

  • Barron's Asia - China, Saudi Arabia Tighten Global Liquidity As Growth Slows, Oil Dips
  • Bloomberg - The Impact of Lower Oil Prices on Saudi Arabia
• Refugees: EU
  Germany is taking in more refugees in 2015 than the US has in the past 10 years

  Germany is on pace to take in one million asylum-seekers this year. In the last 11 months, the country has taken in 964,574 new migrants, including more than 200,000 just in November. According to Die Welt (link in German), more than half of the potential refugees—about 484,000 migrants—came from Syria.

• Petrochemicals
  Saudi’s Sadara starts operations at Jubail polyethylene plant

  The plant is designed to produce 375,000 metric tons per year of products used in specialty applications, such as the manufacture of food-grade plastics, industrial and consumer packaging and health and hygiene films, it said in a bourse statement.

• Qatar
  In Qatar’s Education City, U.S. colleges are building an academic oasis

  A foundation the ruling family created has spent billions of dollars over 15 years — the six U.S. branches receive a total outlay of more than $320 million each year — to import elite higher education in specialties from medicine to foreign service, engineering to fine arts, enabling Qataris to obtain coveted U.S. degrees without leaving the Persian Gulf.

• Anti-ISIS Campaign
  Poll: Most say send ground troops to fight ISIS

  For the first time in CNN/ORC polling, a majority of Americans (53%) say the U.S. should send ground troops to Iraq or Syria to fight ISIS.

• Libya
  Libya’s Rival Governments Shun UN, Sign Separate Peace Deal

  Lawmakers from Libya's rival parliaments have reached a power-sharing agreement in Tunisia, shunning a U.N.-brokered deal to avoid the "foreign intervention" tainting it, an internationally recognized government representative said Sunday.

• Anti-ISIS Campaign
  Record Bombing of Islamic State Targets Tallied by U.S. Army

  The U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State last month dropped the most bombs in its 16-month campaign in Iraq and Syria, according to new Air Force data.

  • Washington Post - Islamic State's moneymaking streams take a hit as it loses territory
  • Reuters - Turkey to stop sending soldiers to Iraq after Baghdad protests
• Israel
  Sweden-Israel rift deepens over comments on Palestinian deaths

  Relations between the two countries have nose-dived since Sweden's Social Democrat-led government recognized a Palestinian state last year.

• Egypt
  Egypt Destroys 20 Newly Found Tunnels Along Border With Gaza

  Israel and Egypt have maintained a blockade of the Palestinian coastal territory since the Islamic militant group Hamas seized Gaza in 2007. For years, Egypt tolerated a smuggling industry that allowed hundreds of tunnels to bring in goods like cigarettes and spare parts, as well as weapons, into the strip.

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