President Trump's Jan. 28 executive order barring nationals of seven Middle East countries from entering the US was immediately followed by the burning of a mosque in the south Texas town of Victoria. Two days after that, six were killed and eight others injured when at least two gunmen opened fire at a mosque in Quebec City. The attack came as worshippers were gathered for evening prayers at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Québec. (Montreal Gazete) Now, amazingly, the White House is exploiting the Quebec attack to justify the very policy that may have inspired it. "We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms," press secretary Sean Spicer said at his daily briefing Jan. 30. "It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive, rather than reactive, when it comes to our nation's safety and security." (Toronto Star)

President Trump on Jan. 29 reorganized the National Security Council, elevating his chief strategist Steve Bannon and demoting the Director of National Intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "Alt-right" mouthpiece Bannon will join the NSC's inner-core "principals committee." Access to the NSC for a White House strategist is unprecedented. Bannon will serve under National Security Advisor Mike Flynn, a recently retired general who is the Trump administration's most extreme Islamophobe. (NYT, NPR, BBC News)

A federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay Jan. 28, temporarily halting the removal of individuals detained after President Trump issued an executive order the previous day that bars entry into the US of nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries. The stay came as scores of refugees, immigrants and others were stranded at airports across the country. While the ruling blocked the deportation of some arrivals ensnared by the executive order, it stopped short of allowing them into the country, and did not actually weigh in on the constitutionality of the president's order. Large crowds of protesters turned out at several airports, including New York's JFK, to protest Trump's order.

President Trump said Jan. 25 that he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for those displaced by violence, and a leaked draft of his impending executive order apparently directs the State Department and Pentagon to present a plan to him within 90 days. But this was presented in explicitly xenophobic terms—not humanitarian. In making the announcement, he dissed Europe's leaders for taking in Syrian refugees. Trump said that Germany and other European countries made a "tremendous mistake by allowing these millions of people... I don't want that to happen here." (LAT, Reuters)

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on Jan. 26 moved the minute hand of its symbolic Doomsday Clock from three minutes to two-and-a-half minutes to midnight. On this year that marks the 70th anniversary of the Doomsday Clock, the Bulletin notes (full text at PDF; links added by CountrerVortex): "The United States and Russia—which together possess more than 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons—remained at odds in a variety of theaters, from Syria to Ukraine to the borders of NATO; both countries continued wide-ranging modernizations of their nuclear forces, and serious arms control negotiations were nowhere to be seen. North Korea conducted its fourth and fifth underground nuclear tests and gave every indication it would continue to develop nuclear weapons delivery capabilities. Threats of nuclear warfare hung in the background as Pakistan and India faced each other warily across the Line of Control in Kashmir after militants attacked two Indian army bases."

President Donald Trump on Jan. 25 signed two executive orders on immigration, marking the beginning of Trump's efforts to fulfill his controversial immigration policy. The first order, titled "Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States," calls for, among other things, withholding federal funding to cities that provide safe haven to immigrants who have illegally entered the US. The second order, titled "Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements," directs the construction of a wall along the Mexican border and an increase in the number of enforcement officials to remove undocumented immigrants. Although the order calls for "immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border," it does not address construction costs, which Trump has continually said would fall to the Mexican government. Trump intimated that Mexico would be willing to pay for the wall because it would lessen the number of people who travel through Mexico from more southern countries to reach the US.

President Trump on Jan. 24 signed orders giving the go-ahead for construction of the controversial Keystone XL and Dakota Access oil pipelines, which had been halted by the Obama administration. Obama's State Department rejected a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline, and the Army Corps of Engineers had ordered work halted on the Dakota pipeline after weeks of protests by Native American groups and their activist allies. In a signing statement, Trump said the Keystone XL project will mean "a lot of jobs, 28,000 construction jobs, great construction jobs." In its own statement, TransCanada, the company seeking to build Keystone XL, said it "appreciate[s] the President of the United States inviting us to re-apply for KXL. We are currently preparing the application and intend to do so."

The Russian Defense Ministry announced Jan. 23 that its warplanes have flown their first joint combat mission in Syria with US-led aircraft, according to the Associated Press. The ministry said that two jets from the US-led coalition "participated in an anti-ISIS air-strike alongside Russian aircraft." The Pentagon, however, denied such a mission took place. "The Department of Defense is not coordinating air-strikes with the Russian military in Syria," said Pentagon spokesman Eric Pahon. US Air Force Col. John Dorrian, a coalition spokesman, said the Russian announcement is "propaganda." However, the new administration of Donald Trump has signalled that it is open to cooperating with Russia in Syria. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said that President Trump "would work with any country that shares our interest in defeating ISIS." (ARA News, FoxtrotAlpha, Jan. 24)