WORLD ROUNDUPGaza After Hamas | A Nordic “Trump-Mitigation” Strategy | Will It Be Ukraine Today, Taiwan Tomorrow?, and more

Climate Aid Projects Fighting Extremism and Unrest Are Closing Down  (Somini Sengupta, New York Times)
Heat, drought and floods are growing security risks, Western defense officials say, feeding instability and violence that could prove costly in the long term.

Cascading Effects: Will China’s New Dam Create a Himalayan Rift? (Jagannath Panda and Mrittika Guha Sarkar, National Interest)
Chinese hydroelectric power plans in Tibet threaten to destabilize the Himalayan region’s ecology and politics.

Gaza After Hamas  (Delaney Soliday, National Interest)
Without a reformed Palestinian Authority presence in Gaza, Hamas will continue to rule the Strip.

A Nordic “Trump-Mitigation” Strategy Amid a Return of Power Politics  (Erlingur Erlingsson, Just Security)
The region’s economic power and resilience combines with significant defense industries and forces and a fiscal position that is world-leading, and all that is compounded by  a culture of innovation, strong social support systems, and free-market thinking. It would make eminent strategic sense for the United States to remain on their good side, to the extent possible, as they have all collectively been among the most steadfast U.S. allies. It is hard to see the upside of alienating the NB8, which certainly would be more likely with loose and irresponsible talk that raises harrowing memories of Nazi Germany’s 1938 annexation of Austria — a kind of Greenland-Anschluss that should continue to be unthinkable.

Trump’s Gaza Plan is Absurd and an Affront to International Law (Eliav Lieblich, Just Security)
The odds of this “plan” materializing are admittedly low – if only because of the opposition from Arab States, and the sheer impracticability of many of its aspects. In Trump’s transactional world, it could also be a negotiating tactic. However, the damage inflicted on the most basic tenets of the international order by the casual normalization of the unthinkable is here to stay. Eventually, it would not only embolden the extreme right in Israel that seeks to continue the war in Gaza for the purpose of Jewish settlement, but will harm U.S. interests. It would both embolden its adversaries to advance their own extreme policies of annexation and deportation and destroy U.S. credibility in objecting to such policies.

Europe’s Leaders, Dazed by an Ally Acting Like an Adversary, Recalculate  (Mark Landler, New York Times)
Faced with undisguised hostility from the Trump administration, Europeans are preparing for what is shaping up to be a go-it-alone era.

Will It Be Ukraine Today, Taiwan Tomorrow?  (Economist)
How Donald Trump’s about-turn in Europe will affect Asia.

China’s Artificial Islands Are Teeming with Fighter Jets  (Brandon J. Weichert, National Interest)
China is stationing J-16 fighters in the South China Sea in an obvious attempt to assert greater control over the area.

Tehran’s Trump Trap  (Behnam Ben Taleblu, National Interest)
Iran is seeking to gain leverage while hoping that Washington will misread its own weakness and fear as goodwill and restraint.