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Eat, Nap, Vote: Inside The Vatican Conclave To Choose The Next Pope

What actually takes place when the cardinals are not casting their votes during the papal conclave? Sistine Chapel doors closed as Vatican conclave begins Cardinals are in the Sistine Chapel for the second day of the conclave to elect a new pope, following two votes so far that have ended with black smoke – a signal that no new pope has been elected. Thursday’s voting has been highly anticipated, as the previous two popes were both announced on the second day of the conclave. Here is what we know about what the cardinals do all day: Out of 252 cardinals, only those less than the age of 80 are eligible to participate in the papal conclave. Currently, 135 cardinals meet this criterion. However, two have chosen not to travel to Rome, citing health issues, and bringing the number of confirmed voting participants to 133. A two-thirds majority is needed to elect a new pope; that’s 89 votes out of the 133 eligible cardinals. If no candidate reaches that threshold, another vote is held. After each round, ballots are burned. If black smoke appears from the chimney on top of the Sistine Chapel, it means no pope has been chosen. White smoke signals the Catholic Church has a new pontiff. “In the past, fresh straw was used to produce white smoke, and water was added to produce black smoke,” Father Francis Lucas, a Catholic priest and executive director of the Catholic Media Network, told Al Jazeera. “However, this sometimes resulted in grey smoke, which led to confusion. Now, chemicals are added to ensure the smoke is distinctly black or white,” he added. Voting after the first day occurs a maximum of four times per day: Twice in the morning and twice in the afternoon Each cardinal receives a ballot marked “Eligo in Summum Pontificem” (“I elect as Supreme Pontiff”) and writes in their chosen candidate. They are not permitted to vote for themselves. They then fold the ballot, hold it up for visibility and carry it to the altar, where a chalice covered by a plate awaits. One by one, the cardinals approach the altar before Michelangelo’s Last Judgement, swear an oath and place their votes in the chalice. According to Vatican News, each cardinal says aloud, in Italian: Each cardinal places his ballot on a plate, uses it to drop the vote into the chalice, bows towards the altar and then returns to his seat. Cardinals who are present but unable to walk to the altar due to illness give their folded ballot to one of the scrutineers – a number of cardinals chosen to oversee the voting. The scrutineer brings it to the altar and deposits it in the same manner, without reciting the oath again. No one except the cardinals is permitted inside the chapel during the conclave. Outside the chapel, there are others involved in the process, such as personnel handling logistics and security, cleaners, medical support staff and other clerics in supporting roles. About 100 additional people have taken the oath of secrecy over and above the voting cardinals. Conclaves are inherently secretive, but experts say some information is available about what happens when the cardinals are not voting. “In the course of the days of the conclave, they will move by charter bus around St Peter’s to the Sistine Chapel, enter and have the morning vote,” Steven P Millies, professor of public theology at the Catholic Theological Union, a Catholic graduate school of theology in Chicago, Illinois, in the United States, told Al Jazeera. “They will return to the Domus Sanctae Marthae (Latin for Saint Martha’s House, the Vatican guesthouse) and have their midday meal, take their midday nap, and then return for the evening vote (to the Sistine Chapel). And then back again (to the Domus Sanctae Marthae) for a nighttime meal,” he added. “The Church emphasises that the conclave is a spiritual and sacred process, not a political one,” Father Francis Lucas said. Some experts argue that most of the social activities and reflections on the previous vote might take place during their time in Saint Martha’s House. “One imagines that it is in the cafeteria at the Domus Sanctae Marthae, where people do eat cafeteria style, they put food on their own trays and that sort of thing,” Millies said. “There is a lot of time over meals and informal conversations for the cardinals to decipher the meaning of what just happened in the last vote and to try to figure out where their support might go best. This is where coalitions and alliances are made,” he added. “That doesn’t exclude the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but there certainly is a certain amount of negotiation, alliance-making, shifting alliances, those kinds of things that will happen in those spaces too,” he explained. According to reports, food is not great during the Conclave. “The food is pretty ordinary, pasta, soup and fruit, which is how Francis wanted it,” a Vatican insider who has eaten there told the UK’s Times newspaper. While food during the papal conclave has traditionally been a plain affair, Francis, known for his focus on simplicity and humility, has been partly blamed for the further decline in quality, according to a report by The New York Times. Some cardinals have complained about bland vegetables and uninspired pasta dishes. “You don’t eat very well,” Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi of Italy, a supporter of Pope Francis, told The New York Times. After his election, Pope Francis broke with more than a century of Vatican tradition by declining to move into the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace. Instead, he chose to live in a simple suite at Santa Marta (Saint Martha’s), where the voting cardinals are currently lodging. “This room where we are now was a guest room,” Pope Francis said in an interview. “I chose to live here, in Room 201… The papal apartment in the Apostolic Palace is not luxurious. It is old, tastefully decorated and large, but not luxurious. But in the end, it is like an inverted funnel. It is big and spacious, but the entrance is really tight. People can come only in dribs and drabs, and I cannot live without people. I need to live my life with others,” he added. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Multiple Explosions And Sirens In Indian-administered Kashmirs Jammu City

Pakistan’s FM says it ‘deserves to respond’; his Indian counterpart says any response will be an ‘escalation’. Residents in Indian-administered Kashmir have said there are major and multiple explosions and sirens in the city of Jammu causing a complete blackout. Local news channels reported suspected drones flying overhead in the city on Thursday. Shesh Paul Vaid, the region’s former director-general of police and a resident of Jammu, said  on social media: “Bombing, shelling, or missile strikes suspected.” Indian and Pakistani authorities did not immediately comment. Pakistan’s military says it shot down 29 drones from India that entered its airspace, as hostilities between the nuclear-armed neighbours continue to spiral following Indian air raids on multiple locations within Pakistan’s territory. Pakistani Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, the military spokesperson, said on Thursday that Indian-made Israeli Harop drones had been deployed to targets including Karachi and Lahore. “Indian drones continue to be sent into Pakistan airspace … [India] will continue to pay dearly for this naked aggression,” Chaudhry said. The military said one civilian was killed and four Pakistani soldiers were wounded as a result of the drone incidents. Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar has said his country has so far “exercised strategic restraint” and limited its response strictly for self-defence in accordance with international law and the United Nations Charter. “Pakistan deserves to respond to India at a place, time and manner of its choosing,” he said. Earlier on Thursday, his Indian counterpart, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, said that any further military action by Pakistan will be considered an “escalation”, adding that Islamabad will be considered responsible for any attack on Indian infrastructure. India said that Pakistan had attempted to engage military targets with missiles and drones, but that the Indian military had thwarted the attacks. India’s army said it “neutralised” attempts by Pakistan to “engage” several military targets in its northern and western regions on Wednesday night and early Thursday. It targeted air defence systems in several locations in Pakistan, India’s Ministry of Defence said in a statement, adding that 16 people were reported killed as a result of Pakistani fire. Pakistan said India’s attacks killed at least 31 civilians on Wednesday. Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif told the Reuters news agency that no military sites or the air defence system in the country’s second-largest city of Lahore sustained any damage from Indian drones. India said its army struck and damaged air defence radars and systems at multiple locations in Pakistan. Thursday’s exchanges and back and forth came claims and counterclaims came a day after India said it launched precision strikes on what it called “terrorist infrastructure” inside Pakistan. Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh told an all-party meeting on Thursday that “100 terrorists” had been killed; the claim could not be independently verified. The crisis between India and Pakistan appears to be “at a crossroads,” Washington-based South Asia analyst Michael Kugelman has told Al Jazeera. “India has said it has no intention of further military action, unless it is attacked by Pakistan. For now, Pakistan has vowed retaliation for the initial Indian airstrikes but it has also said it wants de-escalation,” he said. New Delhi’s operation followed a deadly attack in Indian-administered Kashmir two weeks ago, which killed 26 people. India blamed Islamabad for the attack – a charge Pakistan strongly denies. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a high-level meeting on Thursday in which he reaffirmed his government’s commitment to “national security, operational preparedness, and citizen safety,” his office said. “Ministries are ready to deal with all kinds of emerging situations,” the statement said. Reporting from New Delhi, Al Jazeera’s Neha Poonia described the situation along the Line of Control (LoC) – the de facto border in Kashmir – as deteriorating rapidly. “There’s been a significant escalation in the manner in which the two armies are engaging,” she said. The Indian army said 13 civilians had been killed, 59 injured, and one soldier had also died in the exchanges. Villages near the LoC have emptied, with residents fleeing or sheltering in bunkers. “We haven’t seen this kind of civilian movement in years,” Poonia noted. Amid the security crisis, 20 airports across northern India have been closed until at least May 10, severely affecting travel and commercial activity. Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority said Karachi airport will be closed until 6pm (13:00 GMT), while the airports at Islamabad and Lahore were briefly shut “for operational reasons”. From Islamabad, Al Jazeera’s Kamal Hyder reported that the Pakistani military has accused India of endangering civilian and aviation safety with repeated airspace violations. Hyder also noted a new point of contention: India’s release of water into the Chenab river. Islamabad sees this as a breach of longstanding agreements, an “existential threat” and “an act of war”. “Pakistan’s parliament, with cross-party consensus, has now authorised a military response,” Hyder said, pointing to mounting fears of a wider war. After Wednesday’s strikes, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif promised to retaliate, raising fears that the two countries could be headed towards another all-out conflict. But in a sign that India and Pakistan may be looking to temper the escalation, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar told the Reuters news agency on Thursday that there has been contact between the offices of the national security advisers of Islamabad and New Delhi. At the same time, Saudi Arabia and Iran have sent their foreign ministers to New Delhi and Islamabad in a bid to mediate. As India and Pakistan both accuse each other of provocation, analysts suggest Pakistan is under pressure to deliver a strong response to India’s actions. “India’s limited objectives are met,” said Happymon Jacob, director of the Council for Strategic and Defence Research in New Delhi, speaking to Al Jazeera. “Pakistan has a limited objective of ensuring that it carries out a retaliatory strike to save face domestically and internationally. So, that is likely to happen.” Jacob predicted the exchange may evolve into a few rounds of cross-border missile or artillery fire, similar to past confrontations. Security analyst Hassan Khan told Al Jazeera that the Pakistani government and military are under pressure to respond decisively. “Pakistan will respond and the people expect that response to be harder than what the Indians have done,” he said from Islamabad. Khan predicted Pakistan could target multiple Indian installations using missiles while avoiding crossing the LoC. 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US-UK Trade Deal: How Are Trumps Global Tariff Talks Shaping Up?

UK and US leaders to hold separate media events outlining Donald Trump’s first trade deal since global tariffs move. United States President Donald Trump is expected to announce the framework of a trade deal between the US and the United Kingdom on Thursday, according to people familiar with the plan. On Wednesday, Trump said he was preparing to announce “a major trade deal with representatives of a big and highly respected country”. In a post on Truth Social, he promised it would be the “first of many”. Investors have been waiting for Trump to ease his global trade war amid fears that prolonged uncertainty over tariffs could inflict serious damage to the world’s biggest economies. An agreement with the UK would mark Trump’s first trade deal since he imposed tariffs on dozens of countries on April 2, a move he called “liberation day”. Separately, Trump has introduced bespoke tariffs on certain US imports, including cars and steel. Trump has long accused other countries of exploiting the US on trade, casting his tariffs as necessary to bring jobs back to the US. He also wants to use tariffs to finance future tax cuts. At the moment, most imports from the UK to the US face a blanket 10 percent tariff. The UK, like other countries, has also been hit with 25 percent tariffs on steel and aluminium exports to the US, as well as a 25 percent tariff on cars and car parts. The broad outline of a proposed deal has been clear for some time – significant reductions in US tariffs on steel and cars, with an expectation that Trump’s 10 percent general tariff will remain in place. The UK would then be expected to reduce its own 2 percent digital services tax on US tech firms and its 10 percent tariff on car imports, and varying duties on US agricultural goods. However, Jonathan Haskel, a former member of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee, told the BBC: “Deals are limited and short-term and partial, just covering a few items. Trade agreements are broad-based and long-term.” Today’s announcement, he suggested, is more likely to be a deal and may amount to little more than a carve-out – exemptions on certain trade barriers that Trump introduced last month. On Thursday morning, however, Trump said the agreement was “a full and comprehensive one that will cement the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom for many years to come”. While both governments will likely present any agreement announced today as a significant win, it is essentially about returning to the status quo – removing the newly imposed tariff barriers. It remains to be seen how much any agreement will contribute to both countries’ economic output. In 2023, the UK had an overall trade surplus with the US. The UK reported a surplus of 71.4 billion pounds ($95bn) in goods and services. Most of that headroom came from services, however. On the goods side, the UK exported 15.3 percent of its goods to the US in 2023 – amounting to roughly 60 billion pounds ($80bn). Machinery and transport equipment accounted for the largest share, at 27 billion pounds ($36bn), ahead of chemicals at 14 billion pounds ($19bn). On the flipside, the US exported $77.2bn of goods to the UK in 2023. Ten percent of all goods imported by Great Britain came from the US in that year, second only to Germany. Machinery and transport equipment accounted for the largest share, worth nearly 20 billion pounds ($27bn), followed by fuel – amounting to 18.7 billion pounds ($25bn). On the services side, the US exported $76bn in services – things like advertising and banking – to the UK in 2023, and imported $170bn in British services. These are unaffected by tariffs. Trump’s top negotiating officials have engaged in a flurry of meetings with trade partners since the president’s “liberation day” tariff announcement on April 2. Although Trump delayed implementing “reciprocal” tariffs for most countries by 90 days on April 9, he did raise them for China to 145 percent. Beijing, in turn, slapped a 125 percent tariff on US goods. The reciprocal tariffs, which varied from 10 percent to 39 percent, were designed to hit countries with which Washington has large trade deficits, or that impose heavy tariffs on US goods. Though Britain was not among the countries hit with these reciprocal tariffs, today’s announcement could set a precedent for other bilateral trade deals. On Tuesday, Trump said he would review potential trade agreements over the next two weeks to decide which ones to accept. Last week, he said that “we [already] have potential trade deals” with South Korea and Japan. Following his 90-day reprieve, steep reciprocal tariffs are due to be imposed on US trade partners in early July, leaving country representatives racing to avoid a full-blown trade spat with the world’s number one economy. According to data from the Office of the United States Trade Representative, the total goods trade between the US and China stood at an estimated $582.4bn in 2024. US exports of goods to China totalled $143.5bn while US imports from China totalled $438.9bn. The upshot is that America’s trade deficit with China was $295.4bn last year, 5.8 percent higher ($16.3bn) than in 2023. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will meet with China’s Vice Premier He Lifeng in Switzerland this weekend for talks, which may be the first step in resolving a trade war between the world’s two largest economies. Meetings will take place in Geneva, and are expected to address reductions on broad tariffs, duties on specific products, export controls and Trump’s decision to end “de minimis” exemptions on low-value imports. China’s commerce ministry said last week that it was “evaluating” an offer from Washington. The Geneva meeting will be the first between the two since the announcement of Trump’s trade tariffs in April. On Tuesday, Bessent told Fox News that “we [the US and China] have a shared interest that isn’t sustainable. And 145 percent and 125 percent is the equivalent of an embargo. We don’t want to decouple. What we want is fair trade.” Trump has accused China of manipulating its currency to make its exports cheaper. He has also slammed Beijing for adopting what he says are market-interfering practices, such as direct government support for Chinese companies, as well as tax breaks and preferential financing. In 2023, the EU exported 502 billion euros worth of goods to the US and imported 344 billion euros of goods from America, amounting to a goods trade surplus in the EU’s favour of 157 billion euros ($177bn). After Trump temporarily dropped his 20 percent reciprocal tariffs on the EU in April, the EU paused retaliatory duties on 21 billion euros ($24bn) of US goods until July 14, including on Harley-Davidson motorcycles, chicken and clothing. Since then, Brussels has said it wants to increase US goods imports by 50 billion euros ($57bn) to address the “problem” in their trade relationship. Maros Sefcovic, the EU’s top negotiator, recently told The Financial Times that the bloc is making “progress” towards striking a deal. But Sefcovic suggested that the EU would not accept an indefinite 10 percent tariff on its exports as a fair resolution to trade talks. He added that his “ambition” was still to strike a “balanced and fair” deal with the White House. He also said he wants his US counterparts to take into account US services which are exported to the EU. The EU experienced a services trade deficit of 109 billion euros ($123bn) with the US in 2023 in terms of services. Brussels exported 319 billion euros ($361bn) in services to the US that year, while importing 427 billion euros ($483bn). Taking this into account would bring the US overall trade deficit with the EU to about 50 billion euros ($57bn), he said. The new $57bn US deficit could be closed quickly, Sefcovic added, with deals to purchase more US gas and agricultural products. Talks are currently continuing. In the first three months of 2025, India exported $27.7bn of goods (mainly pharmaceutical and engineering products) to the US, while importing $10.5bn of goods (mainly aircraft and medical goods), meaning a US trade deficit of $17.2bn. On Tuesday, Trump revealed that India had agreed to drop all tariffs on US imports “to nothing”. New Delhi has not yet issued an official statement confirming Trump’s remarks. At a White House event alongside Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, Trump said, “India has one of the highest tariffs in the world. We are not going to put up with that. They have agreed to drop it to … nothing. They wouldn’t have done that for anybody else but me.” According to Bloomberg, India has reportedly proposed eliminating tariffs on select US imports – including steel, car parts and pharmaceuticals – as part of ongoing bilateral trade talks with Washington. India currently imposes tariffs on US imports ranging from 5 percent to 30 percent, depending on the product category. A zero-tariff offer would apply on a reciprocal basis and would be limited to a specific volume of goods. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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No Deterrent Value: Will Indias Strikes On Pakistan Stop Armed Attacks?

India has said its missiles were aimed at stopping new attacks on its territory. But analysts question that approach. New Delhi, India – As Indian military officials took the podium next to the country’s foreign secretary at a media briefing on Wednesday morning, after unprecedented missile strikes into Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir, a timeline of death played out on a video screen behind them. The 2001 attack on the Indian parliament in New Delhi in which nine people were killed. An assault on the Akshardham Temple in the western city of Ahmedabad in 2002, in which 33 people died. The 2008 Mumbai attacks in which more than 160 people were killed. Several other attacks. And finally, the killings in Pahalgam, Indian-administered Kashmir, in which gunmen shot down 26 people on April 22. The May 7 missile strikes on Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir were payback, New Delhi has said, for Islamabad’s refusal to crack down on armed groups that India insists have been financed, trained and sheltered by its neighbours over the past four decades. Islamabad denies that charge – though it acknowledges that some of these groups are based in Pakistan. But the missile strikes were about more than retribution, Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri suggested on Wednesday. The strikes, he said, were driven by “a compulsion both to deter and to pre-empt” attacks by armed groups launched on Indian territory. Misri accused Pakistan of failing to take “demonstrable steps” against “terrorist infrastructure on its territory or territory under its control”. Yet as tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours escalate hour by hour, with Pakistan accusing India of launching a wave of drones into its territory on Thursday, military and geopolitical analysts question whether India’s approach serves as a deterrent against armed groups eager to target it. They argue that New Delhi’s actions are more symbolic and aimed at addressing its domestic audience rather than tactical advancement in the so-called “fight against terror”. “This is all a domestic theatre,” said Ajai Sahni, executive director of South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), a platform that tracks and analyses armed attacks in South Asia. “The Indian strikes [in Pakistan] have no deterrent value. “The aim of the strike has nothing to do with military takeaway – the aim [for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi] was to speak with his own domestic audience,” Sahni told Al Jazeera. “And [Pakistan’s pledge] of retaliation is to speak with the audience of the other side. That is the genius of it – that both sides will claim victory from this.” The Indian army and Foreign Secretary Misri argued on Wednesday that the country’s security forces had been precise and careful in the selection of their targets. Among them was Muridke, next to Lahore, Pakistan’s second-most populous city, and what India described as the Markaz Taiba camp of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the group behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks. At the media briefing with Misri, Indian Army Colonel Sofiya Qureshi referred to the site as the place where key perpetrators of the Mumbai assault – including Ajmal Kasab, the sole gunman who was captured alive – were trained. More than 160 people died in the Mumbai attack. India also hit Bahawalpur, which New Delhi claims hosts the headquarters of the Jaish-e-Muhammad, an armed group behind the 2019 suicide bombing attack in Kashmir in which more than 40 Indian paramilitary soldiers were killed. “Justice is served,” the Indian army noted in a post on X as early reports of the missile strikes poured in on Wednesday, 15 days after the Pahalgam killings. The Indian missile strikes killed at least 31 people in Pakistan – all civilians, according to Islamabad – including two children. India has denied that it targeted civilians. But Pakistan has threatened to hit back, and after Thursday’s drone attacks, the South Asian nations are even closer to a full-blown military conflict. Any hits taken by armed groups from Indian missiles won’t fundamentally change their ability to target India, said Sahni. “All these strikes will result in are certain tactical and operational adaptations,” said Sahni. That – an adapted strategy on the part of armed groups – is precisely what was on display on April 22, when gunmen attacked tourists in Pahalgam, say experts. In February 2019, after the suicide attack on Indian troops, Indian warplanes pierced Pakistani airspace and bombed Balakot in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where New Delhi claimed it hit “terrorists’ camps”. As Pakistan scrambled jets in response, a dogfight ensued, and an Indian Air Force jet was shot down. Pakistan captured the Indian pilot before returning him 60 hours later. Both nations claimed victory – the Modi government in New Delhi said it had entered Pakistan and bombed “terrorists”, while Pakistan highlighted its downing of an Indian jet and the capture of a pilot as evidence that it came out on top. And so neither side, say experts, felt the need to really change. That’s why Sahni said he believes no matter how the current tit-for-tat threats and attacks play out, they won’t alter long-term calculations for any of the actors involved. Instead, “the tensions will resurface, perhaps in different forms.” A Kashmiri political analyst – who has seen India-Pakistan wars in 1965, 1971, and 1999, and three decades of Kashmiri armed rebellion against Indian rule – agreed. “If it was supposed to work, then Kashmir would not be standing where we are today,” they said, requesting anonymity, fearing reprisal from Indian forces. “One of the world’s most volatile flashpoints.” Six months after the Pulwama attack, New Delhi unilaterally revoked the disputed Kashmir region’s partial autonomy and broke down the erstwhile state into two federally governed territories in August 2019. China and Pakistan, India’s neighbours that both control parts of Kashmir, condemned the move. India then imposed a clampdown in Kashmir and arrested dozens of political leaders, journalists, and human rights activists, even as the Modi government claimed the region was returning to “normalcy”. Despite that – and the hundreds of armed rebels killed by Indian security forces over the years, “the armed movement continues,” Sahni pointed out. “The movement keeps on renewing itself [despite India’s countermeasures for three decades],” noted Sahni. “In the current attack, there has been a certain loss of material – buildings have been blown up – but if there is implicit support for these groups in Pakistan, they will always come back.” In the early hours of Wednesday, the Pakistani military claimed it had downed at least five Indian warplanes that had been involved in the missile strikes. Local Indian officials and security sources confirmed to Al Jazeera and other media outlets that at least two fighter jets had “crashed”, though Indian officials have not commented on the issue publicly. If the jets indeed belonged to the Indian fleet, “it will become difficult for India to make a decision in the future about sending in aircraft to impose punitive strikes on Pakistan,” said Ajai Shukla, a defence and strategic affairs commentator, who served in the Indian Army from 1976 to 2001. Shukla noted that while a planned and rehearsed strike would have deterrent value, “the realities eventually depend on how much loss has been inflicted, compared to losses incurred. “It’s a moment where India needs to pause and think,” added Shukla. “Even when both countries claim victory, at least one of them in their heart of hearts knows that this was not a victory. This was something that turned out to be a fiasco. “If there is going to be an attitude that we will not admit anything and we will declare victory, then probably that weakness will never be eradicated,” Shukla said. To Sahni, there’s a more imminent danger that has arisen from the strikes over the past two days. Previously, he said, both sides acted within unspoken but accepted “calibrated limits”. Not any more. “There are no clear lines on what is ‘escalation’ now,” he said. “And that’s the classic slippery slope, on the edge of a risky spiral.” Follow Al Jazeera English:...