Breaking ranks with the indefensible

1. What do you think was the most noteworthy thing that happened this week?

Another week, yet more episodes of terror, turmoil and bloodshed across the world. The Islamic State has claimed credit for the latest terror attacks in Europe, this time along a coastal stretch in Spain. In all, at least 13 people died and about 100 were injured in a van rampage down a tourist boulevard in Barcelona, at the height of the summer travel season. It's the tenth such attack in Europe, since Nice in July 2016, involving vehicles ploughing into pedestrians.

US President Donald Trump was among world leaders who came out strongly soon after to condemn the perpetrators. But he had been far less quick to do so in a similar vehicle-ramming incident on US soil in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the weekend, that killed a local woman. Reaction to Mr Trump's refusal to denounce unequivocally the far-right's role and responsibility in the deadly violence at Charlottesville dominated the news earlier this week. The responses to his utterly fl…