Weekend News Brief: Mass Panic, Paris, Beirut, Facebook Safety Check, Ricky Martin

MIDDLE EAST: Beirut feels forgotten after Paris attacks: “When my people died, no country bothered to light up its landmarks in the colors of their flag,” Elie Fares, a Lebanese doctor, wrote on his blog. “When my people died, they did not send the world into mourning. Their death was but an irrelevant fleck along the international news cycle, something that happens in THOSE parts of the world.”

ON EDGE: False alarm at Paris’ Place de la République on Sunday sends hundreds running for their lives. French officials later said the noise they were running from was fireworks:

Video of the moment of massive panic at a Paris memorial https://t.co/ceRO8oIsMc https://t.co/zkoe3OWHVe

— The Situation Room (@CNNSitRoom) November 15, 2015

SOCIAL MEDIA: Mark Zuckerberg says Facebook will implement its Safety Check feature for more human disasters going forward: “Many people have rightfully asked why we turned on Safety Check for Paris but not for bombings in Beirut and other places. Until yesterday, our policy was only to activate Safety Check for natural disasters. We just changed this and now plan to activate Safety Check for more human disasters going forward as well. Here’s more detail on Safety Check and our policy for deploying it from the Facebook Safety page:https://www.facebook.com/fbsafety/posts/930229667014872 Thank you to everyone who has reached out with questions and concerns about this. You are right that there are many other important conflicts in the world. We care about all people equally, and we will work hard to help people suffering in as many of these situations as we can.”

2016 ELECTION: Democratic candidates address Paris terrorist attacks at debate:

PARIS: Video shows moment when terrorists began shooting at Bataclan theatre (warning: violent).

VIRAL: The creator of the instantly iconic ‘Peace for Paris’ symbol is 32-year-old French graphic artist, Jean Jullien, who lives in London: “My first reaction was to draw something and share it. It was spontaneous. I wanted to do something that could be useful for people. Given the scale of the violence, the peace-and-love symbol was essential. It was then quite an easy thing to combine it with the Eiffel Tower, the symbol of Paris. The two symbols fit together.”

https://twitter.com/jean_jullien/status/665305363500011521

UKRAINE: Gay rights bill passes: “Ukrainian lawmakers have approved a bill that bans discrimination against gay people at work – key legislation intended to help pave the way for visa-free travel between the country and the European Union. The 450-seat parliament on Thursday approved the bill with 234 votes. The Ukrainian president, Petro Poroshenko, hailed parliament’s action as a “historic” move that brought the nation close to its longtime goal of winning the visa-free regime.”

FILM: Spectre and The Peanuts Movie top the box office.

SOUTH AFRICA: Two Presbyterian clergymen were charged for officiating at same-sex marriages: “In their heads of argument, the two men argued that the church’s current rules contravene South African law that allows for same sex marriages. The church’s provincial and national bodies declined to comment to the newspaper as the outcome of the hearings has not been finalised.”

SUPERHEROES: The first image of Chris Pine as Steve Trevor in Wonder Woman:

https://twitter.com/comiczeroes/status/665531072843751424/photo/1

ROYAL MEETING: Ricky Martin and Prince Harry came together at Royal Albert Hall. It was for the Royal Variety Performance.