Coming Up This Week

• Today is April Fool's Day: trust no one. Unfortunately, you can't actually buy some of the oddball new products brands announced today - like Pringles Sour Cream & Onion soda or Rosetta Stoned for translating English to stoner English. More here.
• No joke: many European markets are closed for Easter Monday.
• NATO celebrates its 75th anniversary on Thursday. SecGen Stoltenberg will commemorate the occasion with a press conference in Brussels.
• Kuwait votes in a general election on Thursday, and Slovakia votes in the second round of its presidential election on Saturday.

Commodity Prices

• Aluminum: $2,337/ton
• Antimony (ingot min. 99.65% fob China): $13,450/ton
• Cobalt: $28,550/ton
• Copper: $8,867/ton
• Gold: $2,233/toz
• Lead: $2,055/ton
• Natural Gas (Nymex): $1.76/MMbtu
• WTI Crude Oil (Nymex): $83.17/barrel
• Zinc: $2,439/ton

Gaza and Israel

• Israel and Hamas resumed ceasefire talks in Cairo yesterday.
• Then Israel announced an end to its two-week operation in and around al-Shifa hospital, which Israel says Hamas has been using as an operating base.
• Israel carried out airstrikes on another militant group, Islamic Jihad, in the courtyard of another hospital, Al Aqsa in Deir al Balah. Those strikes reportedly injured seven journalists but killed four members of Islamic Jihad, according to the BBC.
• Tens of thousands of Israelis took part in protests against PM Netanyahu in Jerusalem yesterday. They want Netanyahu to resign over his handling of the war and hold fresh elections. The demonstrations are set to continue through Wednesday.
• Meanwhile, The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an Iran-backed Iraqi militia, targeted a naval base in the southern Israeli city of Eilat with what it called "appropriate weapons" that penetrated Israel's air defenses and triggered alarms but caused no casualties. Eilat is the southernmost large city in Israel, which is why Israel's enemies to the south (e.g. this militia and the Houthis in Yemen) often target it.

Russia

• Insider - a Riga-based and Russia-focused investigative journalist outfit - ended a year-long investigation with the conclusion that Russia's military intelligence unit known as 29155 may have been responsible for the mysterious "Havana syndrome" attacks that affected U.S. diplomats and personnel in multiple locations around the globe: Insider found evidence placing 29155 members on the scene of several of the attacks. The Kremlin dismissed the report as "nothing more than baseless, unfounded accusations by the media."
• Donald Tusk, Poland's PM and a former European Commission President, said Europe is entering a "pre-war era" and encouraged European countries to boost their defense spending in preparation for a possible future war against Russia. The Economist hinted that he was responding to an intensified Russian assault on Ukraine's energy structure.
• Pouria Zeraati, a UK-based Iranian journalist known for criticizing Iran's regime, was wounded in a stabbing attack in southwest London Friday. UK terror police are investigating whether he was targeted because of his work.

Turkey

• Turkey's main opposition party, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), stunned Pres. Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development (AK) party by winning local elections.
• Analysts say the vote signaled a rebuke of Erdogan's plans to introduce a new constitution and consolidate power.
• Ekrem Imamoglu, Istanbul's CHP mayor, won his bid for re-election against Erdogan's chosen candidate, which led to speculation that Imamoglu could challenge Erdogan for the presidency in the future.

Afghanistan

• A landmine apparently left behind during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s exploded in Ghazni this week, killing at least nine children - and drawing attention to the problem of unexploded ordnance scattered across the country from prior wars. Many minefields have been cleared, but some haven't yet.

Libya

• Assailants attacked Tripoli PM Dbeibah's residence with rocket-propelled grenades yesterday, causing alarm but no casualties. It's not clear who was responsible, but it could have been one of the militias that supports the rival government in Benghazi.

China

• Syngenta, a Swiss pesticides firm owned by China's state-owned ChemChina, cancelled a long-delayed $9 billion IPO (at a valuation of $60 billion) on the Shanghai Stock Exchange amidst extended turbulence in Chinese markets.
• Separately, former Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeou arrived in China for an 11-day visit, during which he's expected to meet Pres. Xi. Ma's Kuomintang party favors closer relations with China, and this is his second trip there: his first - last year - was the first by a former leader of Taiwan.

Other News

• Romania and Bulgaria kinda-sorta joined the Schengen free-travel zone yesterday: their sea and air ports of entry will no longer check travel documents for entrants from other Schengen countries. However, their land borders will still block undocumented travelers because of concerns other Schengen countries have with illegal immigration through the southeastern borders of the bloc.