US & Canada

In a social media post ahead of Israel’s October 27 election, Trump calls Netanyahu a ‘Strong, Brave, and Brilliant’ leader.

United States President Donald Trump has issued an endorsement of Israel’s incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing a close race in parliamentary elections scheduled for October 27.

In a post on Truth Social on Sunday, Trump praised the Israeli leader for being an ally of the US in its war on Iran. He added that he was giving his “Complete and Total Endorsement” to Netanyahu.

“BIBI NETANYAHU WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!” Trump wrote.

The US president’s backing comes nine days before the Israeli election — and after speculation that it might not come at all.

Trump had refused to endorse Netanyahu earlier this month, when asked repeatedly about the Israeli leader’s job performance in an interview with Time magazine.

Instead, when pressed by his interviewer, Trump avoided the subject, shifting the focus instead to his own popularity or security in the Middle East.

The two leaders have met more than a half dozen times since January 2025, but there have been reports of disagreements, including over the war against Iran and other conflicts.

In June, Trump acknowledged calling Netanyahu “f***ing crazy” in a phone conversation where he expressed frustration about Israel’s attacks on Lebanon.

Trump had reportedly asked Netanyahu not to take further action in Lebanon, in an apparent attempt to preserve a short-lived April ceasefire with Iran.

The two leaders had jointly launched a war against Iran on February 28, but the conflict has cost Trump domestic support.

The war has upended the global oil and gas supply, with no clear end in sight.

A Pew Research Center poll found this month that roughly two-thirds of US voters disapprove of Trump’s handling of the war, which has driven up consumer fuel prices and raised concerns about draining military stockpiles.

Trump’s Republican Party is facing a critical midterm election on November 3 that will decide whether it maintains control of the US Congress, as well as other key state and local offices.

Experts have speculated that Trump’s prior reticence to endorse Netanyahu may have come from public perception that Israel may have coaxed the US into the war.

Netanyahu’s Likud Party and its far-right coalition are also facing the prospect of losing the October contest to an opposition bloc led by Yashar party head Gadi Eisenkot.

In his endorsement on Sunday, Trump said it was only a matter of time before Iran would have attacked both the US and Israel.

The war, Trump argued, had already left Iran “systematically destroyed, both Militarily and Financially, and unless they change their ways, rapidly, we will soon finish the job”.

“If Israel has the wrong Leader, which would be anyone other than Bibi, America will have to do this work ourselves, and I am not inclined to do so,” Trump wrote.

“Bibi Netanyahu has been Strong, Brave, and Brilliant in the face of tremendous opposition, including that coming from even Israel, itself.”

Remember the FIFA Peace Prize awarded to United States President Donald Trump six months before the World Cup? Well, it is now close to being scrapped, which would make the US president its first and only winner.

Less than a year after FIFA President Gianni Infantino extolled Trump in the US capital while presenting the award at the World Cup 2026 draw, several members of the FIFA Council are questioning its merit and have demanded changes, including scrapping the award.

The calls for scrutiny come at a time when Infantino faces ongoing criticism for his World Cup sell-off plan, which also led to calls for his removal from office.

So what was the prize about, and why might it be scrapped? Here’s a look:

What is the FIFA Peace Prize?

On November 5, football’s global governing body announced a new annual award called the “FIFA Peace Prize – Football Unites the World”.

FIFA said the award was created to “reward individuals who have taken exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace”.

Why did Trump receive the FIFA Peace Prize?

A month later, Trump became the first recipient of the award.

The US leader had been heavily favoured to win the inaugural prize after failing to win the Nobel Peace Prize despite an aggressive campaign involving endorsements from other world leaders.

Trump thanked FIFA and called the award “one of the great honours of my life”.

He and Infantino are close allies, and the FIFA chief had made it clear that he thought Trump should have won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to broker a ceasefire in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.

“This is your prize. This is your peace prize,” Infantino said at the glitzy, celebrity-studded ceremony at Washington, DC’s Kennedy Center.

Infantino has repeatedly spoken about football as a unifier for the world, but the prize is a departure from the federation’s traditional focus on sport.

Critics pointed out that the recognition came less than 24 hours after the Trump administration carried out a deadly air strike in the Caribbean.

Two months later, the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, assassinating Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in Tehran and hitting nuclear and military sites around the country.

The US-Israel war on Iran has gone on for months with Trump saying this week that he will not attack Iran again before the November 3 midterm elections in the US.

Why might FIFA scrap the award?

Several FIFA member nations demanded the discontinuation of the award during Thursday’s FIFA Council meeting in Zurich, Switzerland, according to reports in British media.

Others called for the prize to no longer be handed out to politicians.

As a result, FIFA’s 22-member Football Social Responsibility Committee was tasked with assessing the merits of the award. It is expected to make a recommendation before the next council meeting in Doha, Qatar, on December 16.

Debbie Hewitt, a FIFA vice president and president of the English Football Association, told the media at the council briefing that the committee “will consider, first of all, how the peace prize came about, whether it should have come about, whether it should have been awarded in the way that it was, who made that decision and whether or not it should be taken out or whether it should be reformed”.

What has FIFA said?

Al Jazeera has reached out to FIFA for comment and was referred to Infantino’s statement on it: “For the FIFA Peace Prize, it was decided that the Football Social Responsibility Committee will be tasked to analyse it, provide a proposal, and also, there, a decision will be taken at the next FIFA Council meeting.”

Has the FIFA Peace Prize faced opposition?

Yes.

In October, the Norwegian Football Association (NFF) made parallel filings with ⁠⁠FIFA committees in relation to three recent issues, one of which was related to the awarding of the FIFA Peace Prize.

“The purpose is ⁠⁠to raise these issues formally with the appropriate bodies, to have them examined, relevant evidence obtained and accountability for the conclusions reached,” the NFF said in a statement.

The NFF has repeatedly raised questions about the award, and in April, its president, Lise Klaveness, said FIFA should scrap its peace prize to avoid getting drawn into ⁠⁠politics.

“We want to see it abolished. We don’t think it’s part of FIFA’s mandate to give such a prize. We think we have a Nobel institute that does that job independently already,” Klaveness said.

Earlier, human rights group FairSquare filed a complaint with the FIFA Ethics Committee, accusing Infantino of breaching his duty of neutrality by supporting Trump.

‘Mockery’ of FIFA human rights policy

The criticism of the award isn’t limited to football associations.

In late April, Australia midfielder Jackson Irvine said football’s credibility as a force for good ⁠⁠has been undermined by FIFA, and he accused FIFA of making a mockery of its human rights policy.

“As an organisation, you would have to say decisions like the one that we saw awarding ⁠⁠this peace prize makes a mockery of what they’re trying to do with the human rights charter and trying to use football as a global driving force for good and positive change in the world,” Irvine told the Reuters news agency in an interview.

“Decisions like that feel like they just set us back in the perceived market of what football currently is, especially at the top level, where it’s becoming so disconnected from society and the grassroots of what the game actually is and means in our communities and in the world.”

Craig Mokhiber, a former United Nations official who has campaigned to suspend Israel from world football over its genocidal war in Gaza, called the award to Trump a “truly shameful development”.

Infantino has refused to take action against Israel, arguing that football “cannot solve geopolitical” issues.

“Not satisfied with two years of FIFA complicity in genocide in Palestine, Infantino and his cronies have now invented a new ‘peace prize’ in order to curry favour with Donald Trump,” Mokhiber told Al Jazeera.

He added that the award also aims to “obscure” Trump’s “disgraceful record” of support for Israel, his deadly strikes on vessels in the Caribbean Sea and “gross violations of human rights” inside the US.

Growing pressure on Infantino

The scrutiny around the FIFA Peace Prize follows the recent backlash Infantino has faced.

Infantino has been under fire since his announcement in late July that he wanted to open FIFA’s premium competitions, such as the World Cup, to private investors.

That plan was ultimately abandoned in the face of widespread criticism with a rebellion led by the European governing body UEFA, the Asian Football Confederation and CONCACAF, which runs the sport in North and Central America and the Caribbean.

Infantino has headed FIFA since 2016 and is running for re-election in March despite calls for him to stand down in the wake of the $4.2bn plan to sell a 20 per cent commercial stake in the World Cup.

US secretary of state says Ukraine has requested access to military-grade version of Starlink for strikes deep inside Russia.

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said Starshield, the military-grade version of the Starlink satellite service, is currently unavailable to Ukraine, but a request from Kyiv to access the system for attacks deep inside Russia is “under discussion”.

Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Rubio stressed Starshield’s distinction with Starlink, the internet service provided by Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

“Starlink is a commercial product, okay? And so it’s regulated and handled as a commercial product. Starshield is a defence product, a military product,” said Rubio, in comments released by the Department of State.

“They’ve asked for access to it in order to conduct deep strikes inside of Russia. They do not have access to it at this moment,” he added. “That’s under conversation.”

Launched in 2022 and provided to the US government, Starshield is designed for military use as it allows for deeper encryption to process sensitive information. SpaceX says it is primarily used by US defence agencies and other “government partners”.

Last week, Ukrainian officials said restrictions on Starlink terminals had slowed some drones on the battlefield, as Ukraine tries to hold back Russian forces in their nearly five-year war.

In his comments at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, Rubio also rejected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s suggestion that the reported disruption to Starlink services in Ukraine on Wednesday was deliberate.

“Well, I don’t know what Zelenskyy said. I’m not sure Zelenskyy knows what he’s talking about, but it wasn’t deliberate. We have nothing to do with that,” Rubio said.

Zelenskyy said on Saturday that the satellites are not tracking antennas on flying objects travelling faster than 161 kilometres per hour (100 miles per hour). This is affecting Ukrainian drones in their defence against Russian jet-powered drones and in their own medium-range attacks, he added.

Rubio said the US had not ordered Starlink speeds to be reduced and that the service had reportedly been restored to its previous level.

“No one at the White House ordered anyone to slow down internet or slow down speed so that certain drones couldn’t use it,” he said, calling the reports “categorically false”.

The remarks came as US President Donald Trump drew criticism from Democrats and Republicans after waiving sanctions on Russia and countries that buy its oil and gas, days before the restrictions were due to take effect under a law he signed last month.

Zelenskyy also criticised the sanctions waiver on Saturday, saying easing pressure on Russia would encourage further attacks.

“Financial rewards for [President Vladimir] Putin – all of this only encourages him to keep attacking,” Zelenskyy posted on social media, urging the US to maintain pressure on Moscow.

Williams scored 26 points as the Golden State Valkyries came back to take the lead at home against the Atlanta Dream.

Gabby Williams scored a game-high 26 points, including four key free throws in the final 78 seconds as the Golden State Valkyries held off the Atlanta Dream 68-64 in game one of the WNBA Finals.

Williams, runner-up to Atlanta’s Angel Reese in Defensive Player of the Year voting, has emerged as an offensive force for the Valkyries in the playoffs and carried the scoring load on a tough shooting night for the hosts, who did not have another player score in double figures on Saturday.

The French star took some time to warm up, going scoreless in the first quarter as the Valkyries got off to a tentative start in front of a raucous crowd at Chase Center.

“Once we all started having fun and the excitement got out, we started to kind of find our way,” Williams, who erupted for 16 points in the second quarter, said in an on-court interview.

“There was a lid on that basket tonight, but that’s why we rely on our defence,” she said.

Golden State trailed by one with 1 minute and 18 seconds remaining when Williams seized the rebound off a miss by Atlanta’s Allisha Gray and was fouled by Reese.

Williams made both free throws to put the Valkyries up 65-64 and added another pair of free throws to seal the win with 4.1 seconds left.

“It came down to getting stops and that’s been our bread-and-butter all ‌year,” noted Williams, whose team has allowed 335 fewer points than any other in the WNBA this season. “That’s why we harp on it so much, because we’ve built such great defensive habits.”

Gray, the Dream’s leading scorer, returned after missing two games with a hand injury and scored 19 points, but she was scoreless in the fourth quarter, when Atlanta made just two of their 19 attempts from the floor.

Reese added 14 points and 12 rebounds, and Rhyne Howard scored 12 for Atlanta.

Atlanta scored just two in an overall eight-point fourth quarter, where Gray was scoreless over the final 10 minutes and Reese scored all of her 14 points in the first half.

“I don’t think they really did anything,” Reese said. “Maybe that was just on me; I wasn’t aggressive enough with the ball and trying to get the ball and get to my spot. I’m definitely going to do a better job of that next game.”

The Valkyries will host game two of the best-of-seven series on Monday.

Both teams are chasing a first WNBA title. The Dream have come up empty in three prior trips to the Finals, most recently in 2013.

The Valkyries, who last year became the first WNBA expansion franchise to reach the playoffs in their inaugural season, are now contending for the title in their second.

Since the start of the war, there have been several negotiation initiatives between the United States and Iran. Only one – the memorandum of understanding signed in Islamabad on June 18 – was concluded, but it collapsed within days.

While prevailing analyses tend to explain this failure through the details of the provisions, this article proceeds from a different premise: that the diplomatic stalemate between the two sides is shaped by a syndrome that has governed US-Iranian relations for years.

In international relations, psychological syndromes can arise as a result of deep crises that leave their mark on political consciousness and memory, potentially obstructing efforts at rapprochement and negotiation between countries.

In the case of Iran and the US, the syndrome is comprised of two complexes: the complex Washington developed as a result of the 1979 siege of the US embassy in Tehran and the complex Tehran developed as a result of historical US hostility and its withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018.

The roots of the rupture between the two countries go as far back as August 1953 when US and British intelligence agencies helped overthrow the nationalist government of Mohammad Mosaddegh after it nationalised the oil industry in 1951. Since then, a perception has become entrenched in Iranian consciousness: that Washington does not accept an independent government in Tehran and it is prepared to sabotage it if it goes against its interests.

From this perspective, Washington’s decision to host Shah Reza Pahlavi, who had just been overthrown by his people, for medical treatment in October 1979 was read in revolutionary Tehran as a prelude to a second coup.

Iranian students stormed the US embassy on November 4 that year and held 52 Americans for 444 days. Diplomatic relations between the two countries were severed and have not been restored to this day.

While the incident is portrayed in the Iranian narrative as a defence of the revolution, in American consciousness, it established the image of Iran as a state that does not respect international norms, whose word cannot be relied upon and whose behaviour should not be rewarded.

That is the embassy siege complex. It is not about the incident itself so much as the informal rule it produced in US decision-making: that Iran must concede first and its concession must be verified before it receives anything in return.

The Iranian complex was shaped by this history as well, but it reached its peak in May 2018 when US President Donald Trump withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) despite the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) confirmation that Tehran was complying with it.

Just two weeks later, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced 12 demands for a new deal, only four of which were related to the nuclear file. Seven of them were related to Iran’s regional behaviour in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Afghanistan and the Gulf. In other words, Washington did not merely revoke an existing agreement; it also raised the ceiling of its conditions for any future agreement.

The knot then deepened in June 2025 when the US took part in the Twelve-Day War and struck the nuclear facilities at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan at a time when a new round of indirect negotiations was scheduled in Muscat. It then reached its furthest point with Washington’s participation alongside Israel in the current war.

Accordingly, a conviction became entrenched in the Iranian consciousness that an American signature guarantees nothing, that any agreement can be overturned with a change of administration and indeed that negotiation itself may be a cover for war rather than an alternative to it.

The informal rule this has produced in Iranian decision-making is that there will be no step taken before binding guarantees and no concession before pressure is lifted.

Thus, the two complexes stand at opposite ends: The first requires Iranian action before an American quid pro quo while the second requires an American guarantee before Iranian action.

A reading of the recent negotiation initiatives shows that every US initiative bears the imprint of the embassy siege complex. The 15-point plan put forward in March demanded the dismantling of the Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow facilities; an end to uranium enrichment; the suspension of Iran’s missile programme; and the abandonment of its allies in exchange for promises to lift sanctions later.

The May draft by White House envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner linked the release of Iran’s frozen funds to the suspension of enrichment first. The American response in September also stipulated the freezing of enrichment and the entry of inspectors throughout the negotiation period.

What remains constant in the American initiatives is that Iranian action precedes the quid pro quo and verification precedes trust.

The imprint of the JCPOA withdrawal complex in the Iranian initiatives is also a constant. The five-point response in late March demanded guarantees that war would not be repeated. The 10 points put forward in April demanded a binding UN Security Council resolution shielding any agreement from being overturned. And the 14 points in May demanded a nonaggression pledge that includes Israel.

Meanwhile, the seven-day plan proposed by Tehran last month stipulated the lifting of sanctions and the US naval blockade on Iran before the opening of the Strait of Hormuz on the sixth day and the start of nuclear negotiations on the seventh. What remains constant in the Iranian initiatives is that guarantees precede action and the lifting of pressure precedes Iranian concessions.

All these initiatives were dialogue between two complexes with each side drafting its text to protect itself from a repetition of its historical experience with the other, rather than to meet the other halfway. This may explain why the gap in substance has narrowed, but the gap in trust has not.

The Islamabad memorandum represents the exception that proves the rule as it was the closest moment to a settlement because it was formulated to reassure both sides over their core concerns. To reassure Washington, it stipulated the dilution of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium and made the lifting of sanctions and unfreezing of funds conditional on Iranian implementation.

To reassure Tehran, it provided for an end to hostilities, respect for mutual sovereignty, a mechanism to monitor implementation and UN Security Council approval of the final agreement. Ballistic missiles were also entirely absent from the text.

But this agreement did not hold. Tehran suspended its participation in the Geneva round of talks because of the absence of a ceasefire in Lebanon, which had been a consistent demand in every Iranian initiative since March. In the Iranian reading, Washington’s inability to rein in Israel confirmed that an American signature was not enough. The JCPOA withdrawal complex immediately kicked in, and the two sides returned to square one.

By late September, the dispute appeared to have shifted definitively from substance to sequencing. Informed sources indicated that it now revolves around the order of steps rather than their content and the stated goal has become a return to an enhanced version of the June memorandum.

Here the two complexes appear in their clearest form: Washington wants the Strait of Hormuz opened and enrichment frozen first because it does not trust Iran while Tehran wants the naval blockade lifted first because it does not trust the US.

A comparison between Pompeo’s 2018 conditions and the June 2026 memorandum shows that US demands have retreated from redefining Iran’s regional role to focusing on the nuclear file and the Strait of Hormuz while Iranian demands have shifted from compensation to be paid by Washington to a conditional investment fund financed by other parties.

In other words, the substantive gap between the two sides has narrowed considerably – something that would have been unimaginable eight years ago.

However, the two complexes have not diminished; indeed, they may have deepened because of the war. Each complex feeds the other until together they have become a single syndrome, and diplomatic deadlock has turned from a passing condition into a stable structure.

Accordingly, any new formula for sequencing the steps, however precise, will remain unable to break this deadlock unless it addresses both complexes at once – something that requires a third party capable of guaranteeing both the action and the reciprocal action simultaneously.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio is to visit India in the coming week, but he will not set foot in the capital, New Delhi.

Instead, on Monday, Rubio will hold talks with Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar in Mumbai, India’s financial hub, and then visit an oil refinery in Jamnagar in the western state of Gujarat, according to a statement from the US Department of State.

His itinerary sparked a political storm after the US ambassador to India said Washington expected Jaishankar to travel to meet Rubio, prompting opposition leaders to accuse the government of allowing India’s top diplomat to be “summoned” on home soil.

The spat comes as relations between the two countries are strained over trade, tariffs and India’s purchases of Russian oil.

So why is Rubio avoiding New Delhi, and why has it caused such upset? Here’s what you need to know:

What is Rubio doing in India?

He plans to discuss trade, energy and investment.

Rubio is arriving on Sunday from Samarkand, Uzbekistan, where he has been meeting with five Central Asian states at the C5+1 summit.

In India, he is due to meet senior officials to discuss the US-India strategic partnership and energy cooperation and hold talks with business leaders, the State Department said.

Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal appeared to confirm the agenda, stating on Friday that the Mumbai talks would cover energy, trade and investment, defence, and critical and emerging technologies.

In Jamnagar, Rubio is to visit the world’s largest single-site refinery, operated by billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, and attend a reception hosted by the Ambani family, according to The Hindu newspaper.

Why isn’t Rubio going to New Delhi?

No official reason has been given.

Rubio was in the Indian capital in May for a meeting of foreign ministers of countries in the Quad, a group consisting of the US, India, Japan and Australia.

The State Department has framed his upcoming trip around energy and investment, and the second stop on Rubio’s India visit, Jamnagar, is one of the world’s most important energy hubs.

The visit also comes as fuel prices bite in the US before next month’s midterm elections.

Reliance, an energy, retail and telecommunications conglomerate, also sits at the centre of Washington’s wider oil diplomacy.

Business Standard, an Indian financial daily, said the Jamnagar stop was significant because Reliance is the biggest buyer of Venezuelan crude oil besides the US at a time when Washington has been urging India to buy more.

Since US forces seized Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in January and took essential control of the country’s oil industry, the US government has marketed Venezuelan oil to buyers abroad.

Reliance is also investing in a new refinery in Texas, the first to be built in the US in 50 years, which Trump hailed as a $300bn deal when he announced it in March, Business Standard reported.

What did the US ambassador say, and why has it caused upset?

Speaking at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in New Delhi on Thursday, US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor said Rubio would meet Indian government officials in Mumbai, and Washington “expected” Jaishankar and others from New Delhi to travel there to see him.

Earlier in the week, however, Jaiswal had not confirmed the trip or explained why Rubio was skipping New Delhi, telling reporters the Indian government would announce it “at the appropriate time”, The Hindu newspaper reported.

Jairam Ramesh, a general secretary of the opposition Indian National Congress party, wrote on X that the ambassador’s statement was “quite extraordinary”.

Rahul Gandhi, leader of the opposition in parliament’s lower house, also took to X to comment, writing on Friday that Rubio had “summoned his employee to Mumbai”.

Congress MP Pawan Khera went further.

“A foreign government summoning India’s External Affairs Minister on Indian soil is a new low, even by the Modi Government’s standards,” he wrote on X, referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Why are US-India relations strained?

Mainly because of Trump’s tariffs and Russian oil.

In August last year after a round of trade talks broke down, the US hit most Indian goods with a 50 percent tariff. Under a framework the two sides agreed in February, that rate fell to 18 percent, however.

Since then, negotiations have stalled.

This month, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the talks had “plateaued”, according to The Hindu.

On Thursday, Trade Minister Piyush Goyal said the “first tranche” of a deal was in its final stages but India would not sign until its exporters had an edge over rivals such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia, according to the Reuters news agency.

Other points of friction have emerged.

Last week, US Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling announced that his department was suspending eight companies – including the Indian IT giants Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro and HCL – from a labour certification scheme that is a key step for employers seeking green cards for their foreign staff.

Sameer Lalwani, a senior fellow in the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote this week that Indian public opinion of the US has hit a record low, citing US engagement with Pakistan and the US-Israel war on Iran, which he said had pushed India back towards Russian oil.

Despite that, he argued, defence and technology cooperation has quietly deepened, and bilateral trade grew by almost 12 percent in 2025 to nearly $240bn.

In his view, “perceptions of the political relationship have deteriorated faster than its strategic foundations.”

A sanctions law had threatened to make matters worse.

Last month, Trump signed the Lindsey O Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, which could impose tariffs of up to 100 percent on goods from the five largest importers of Russian oil or gas.

India, one of the world’s biggest buyers of Russian oil, had warned Washington that new tariffs could hurt bilateral ties. Trump signed an executive order seeking to waive the sanctions on Friday as he tries to ease high oil prices before the November 3 US elections.

The Trump administration has asked Israel to stop settler attacks in the occupied West Bank, according to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. This comes amid outrage over a savage settler attack on Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine on Friday.

Some of 16 survivors treated for suspected shark bites, US coastguard says.

The search continues for 11 people still missing after a boat capsized off Mexico’s Baja California coast on Friday, as multiple survivors have been treated for suspected shark bites, according to the US coastguard.

“Several of the individuals rescued were suffering from severe injuries consistent with shark bites, and the Coast Guard provided life-saving first aid while en route [to] San Diego,” the coastguard said in a statement on Saturday.

Sixteen Mexican nationals were rescued on Friday. Survivors told officials there were 27 people on board.

The coastguard and US Navy used multiple aircraft and boats, along with assistance from the Mexican Navy, to search the area for the remaining passengers. An additional helicopter will be deployed later on Saturday, according to the coastguard.

A Mayday call was transmitted from someone on the boat at about 1am on Friday, coastguard Lieutenant Santiago Tamburini said on the day.

A rescue helicopter reached the site about two hours later. It took about 90 minutes for the crew, which included a rescue swimmer, to pull the 16 people from the water, he added.

The boat went down about 225km (140 miles) west of Ensenada, Mexico, an area popular with fishing and leisure boats, but that is also frequented by smugglers.

Although the incident did not happen in US waters, coastguard official Charlie Valor said on Saturday they “were able to help, and that’s why we launched our assets”.

Fatal attempts to transport refugees and migrants from Mexico to the US have occurred in the past.

In May 2025, at least three people died when a boat flipped off the coast about 56km (35 miles) north of the US-Mexico border.

In 2023, eight people were killed in one of the deadliest maritime smuggling accidents off the US coast, when two boats approached a San Diego beach in heavy fog, and one capsized in the surf.

Fires reported on three tankers in Strait of Hormuz and Sea of Oman, as masked settlers attack European politicians in occupied West Bank.

Rallies organised by the No Kings network opposed to United States President Donald Trump were held Saturday in cities and communities across the US, with an aim of getting people out to vote early in the midterm elections.

No Kings has more than 3,000 events planned across the US. The planned events, this time dubbed “No Kings: Vote Early”, were billed as nonpartisan, though they sought to build on nearly two years’ worth of No Kings marches and demonstrations by people upset with Trump’s presidency.

“It’s a day of nonpartisan voter participation: we are bringing our community together to make a plan to vote early and ensuring every eligible voter understands their options for how to vote and has the opportunity to make their voice heard,” organisers said in a statement.

By advocating for voting early, the “No Kings” organisers hope to cut off the potential for any malfeasance once election day rolls around.

A band entertained what appeared to be a few hundred people in caps and coats at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Despite the chilly weather, many in the crowd danced to the tunes. “VOTE EARLY” and “HANDS OFF MY VOTE!” were among the many signs held aloft.

At an Atlanta rally, City Councilman Michael Julian Bond told the crowd to urge others to vote ahead of the November 3 general election.

“The Constitution gives you one power, right? That is the power to vote. Are you gonna use that power?” he said.

“You don’t see Superman giving up his power,” Bond continued. “You don’t see Black Panther giving up his power. You don’t see Wonder Woman giving up her magic lasso. So why would you give up your right, your power, your obligation to vote? Be a superhero, use your power. Go to the polls and vote.”

Trump has long been suspicious of mail voting and has claimed without evidence that voting fraud cost him the 2020 presidential election.

His administration sued California election officials Thursday, asking a judge to bar the state from counting mail-in ballots for the midterm elections from people whom the federal government has identified as “likely” noncitizens until their immigration status can be confirmed.

On Friday, the Department of Justice warned that local officials who process and tabulate ballots submitted by suspected noncitizen voters are putting themselves at risk of criminal investigation and potential prosecution.

Earlier that day, Democratic Senators Alex Padilla of California, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Dick Durbin of Illinois wrote to Attorney General Todd Blanche, demanding that the Justice Department commit to not seizing ballots or other election materials before the midterm elections are certified.

United States President Donald Trump has signed an executive order waiving newly-passed Russia sanctions, claiming the move is in the US’s “national interest”.

Earlier this month, Trump also announced a deal to bring stocks of Russian diesel into global markets, in a bid to drive down energy prices that have spiked during the US-Israel war on Iran. The US Treasury waived sanctions on Russian diesel sales until April 2027.

Trump’s embrace of Russian energy has angered Ukraine, European partners and many US officials, who say the move rewards Moscow while it continues its four-and-a-half-year war against its neighbour.

Ukraine’s President Volodmyr Zelenskyy slammed Trump’s diesel deal as “a gift” to Russia’s President Vladimir Putin that will help fund his war effort.

While European countries have also criticised Trump’s embrace of Russian energy, the US president has accused them of “hypocrisy”, as figures show that European Union countries continue to import Russian gas.

Here’s what we know:

Which sanctions has Trump waived?

In his executive order on Friday, Trump called off numerous planned Russia-related sanctions days before they were due to take effect, including duties on Russian goods and penalties for buying the country’s oil and gas.

The now-blocked measures were part of legislation passed in Congress with bipartisan support last month, named after the late US Senator Lindsay Graham, an outspoken critic of Russia.

They would have included up to 100 percent tariffs on all goods brought into the US from the five top importers of Russian crude oil or gas, including China and India. They could also have imposed equal penalties on countries deemed to have knowingly bought oil or gas from Russia 30 days after the law’s implementation, or to be among the top five countries helping Moscow circumvent sanctions on sales of its oil.

The waiver will hold until the Trump administration believes “further action is appropriate”, according to the executive order.

US Congressman Don Beyer, a Democrat from Virginia, said the sanctions waiver amounts to a “surrender to Putin” that “betrays our Ukrainian partners and defies clear congressional intent”.

Who will benefit from this?

Vasily Astrov, an economist at the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, told Al Jazeera that the Russian government will likely be the greatest beneficiary because the easing of sanctions means Russian oil will not have to be further discounted.

He estimated that about 60 cents of every extra dollar in the price of a barrel of Russian oil would “end up in state coffers”.

Russian official Kirill Dmitriev, an envoy for Putin, hailed the US decision to waive the sanctions as “an important and truly historic moment”.

Other beneficiaries include major importers of Russian oil and gas, such as China and India, who are now less exposed to the risk of secondary US penalties.

While Trump hopes the measures will also help bring down oil prices for US consumers before November mid-term elections, experts say that is less certain.

Addressing the US’s recent diesel deal with Russia, EU economy chief Valdis Dombrovskis said it is unlikely to have a significant impact on global prices.

According to Trump, that deal would bring 300,000 tonnes of diesel fuel into US and global markets “immediately”, followed by 500,000 tonnes in November, and 1 million tonnes afterwards.

“If we look at the volumes, they are not of any macroeconomic significance, and frankly, there are strong doubts whether Russia is even able to supply those volumes, and according also to US quality standards, those are big question marks,” Dombrovskis told the AFP news agency.

Which countries still buy oil from Russia?

China and India are the largest buyers of Russian crude oil, purchasing 6 billion euros ($6.74bn) and 3.6 billion euros ($4.04bn) worth respectively in September, according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), a nonprofit think tank.

Hungary and Slovakia, the landlocked EU members that have exemptions to the bloc’s ban on Russian crude, also remain big customers, buying a combined 290 million euros ($326m) worth of the commodity in September, said CREA. Turkiye imported 172 million euros ($193m) worth of Russian crude oil the same month, the think tank added.

Since the end of 2022, the largest importers of Russian oil products, which include diesel, have been Turkiye, China, Saudi Arabia, Brazil and Singapore.

Saudi Arabia imported the most Russian oil products in September at 534 million euros ($600m), followed by Turkiye with 321 million euros ($361m), China with 304 million euros ($342m) and India with 161 million euros ($181m).

Is Europe buying increasing amounts of gas from Russia?

“The European Council regrets the United States’ decision to temporarily lift sanctions on Russian diesel,” European leaders said in a joint statement adopted following a two-day European Council meeting in Brussels this week.

But despite its own near-blanket ban on Russian oil, the EU has continued to import large quantities of Russian gas, though it plans to phase out those imports next year.

Urgewald, a Germany-based group that researches coal companies, reported this week that more than 12 million tonnes of Russian Arctic LNG was transported into EU ports from January to September this year, a 9.5 percent jump from the same period last year.

In September, EU countries imported 817 million euros ($918m) of pipeline gas, and 615 million euros ($691m) of liquefied natural gas (LNG), according to CREA.

EU members France and the Netherlands were the largest LNG importers, bringing in 446 million euros ($501m) and 116 million euros ($130m) respectively, according to the think tank. France’s LNG imports represented a 103 percent increase from the previous month, it added.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron has been among the most outspoken about Trump’s diesel deal with Russia, saying on Friday that it “sends a negative message” and would have no impact on global prices.

Hungary imported the most Russian pipeline gas of any EU member by far during the month, with 414 million euros ($465m) worth. Slovakia and Bulgaria brought in 161 million euros ($181m) and 132 million euros ($148m), respectively, according to CREA data.

For months before carrying out Canada’s deadliest school shooting in almost four decades, Jesse Van Rootselaar was consulting an unlikely adviser on how to perpetrate mass murder.

“In a hallway, indoors, or a crowded classroom, the 870 [Remington shotgun] is brutal … Close quarters is its playground,” OpenAI’s ChatGPT guided the 18-year-old, according to reports.

On February 10, 2026, Van Rootselaar shot his mother and half-brother at home before going to a school in the small British Columbia town of Tumbler Ridge, where he killed another six people – including five students – before taking his own life.

Earlier this week, on October 14, US authorities charged a Washington State man with allegedly conspiring with Van Rootselaar to plan the attack. But the mass shooting incident has raised questions that go beyond the traditional legal understanding of culpability.

The British Columbia government in September filed a civil lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, accusing them of failing to prevent the incident and claiming they were aware of the conversations that turned deadly. Families of the victims also filed separate lawsuits. OpenAI’s leadership issued a public apology for their failure to notify authorities.

The company has not responded to requests from Al Jazeera for its comments on the lawsuits.

But as the case against OpenAI progresses, it has spurred a familiar debate: Where should a line be drawn between reporting potentially dangerous behaviour and protecting an individual’s privacy?

“The question of whether companies should be required to turn such information over to law enforcement is extraordinarily difficult, particularly if they don’t already screen chats for indications of such types of threats,” United States-based civil liberties lawyer Jenin Younes told Al Jazeera.

“Forcing companies to implement a surveillance system implicates very serious civil liberties concerns, and that’s probably a bridge too far for me,” Younes added.

“On the other hand, AI gives individuals access to types and quantities of information they didn’t have previously that may facilitate the commission of mass casualty events, a concern it’s not easy to dismiss.”

AI’s ability to distinguish thoughts from threats

One of the biggest challenges facing AI companies is determining whether a user expressing violent thoughts actually intends to act on them.

In August, Anthropic, the company behind AI chatbot Claude, flagged a user to San Francisco police after discovering conversations allegedly threatening its CEO, Dario Amodei.

According to the San Francisco Standard, citing a police report, the user had claimed to possess an AR-15 gun and suggested he had Amodei “in his sights”.

However, when contacted by the newspaper, the man said he was joking and had no intention of carrying out any form of violence. The person was neither charged nor detained, the Standard said.

Fazl Barez, a senior researcher at the University of Oxford specialising in AI safety and governance, said current AI models cannot “reliably” determine whether an interaction with an AI chatbot “is purely hypothetical or is likely to lead to harmful behaviour”.

“Suppose you are a creative writer working on a fictional story and want to explore how a murder plot might unfold. From the context, it may be clear that this is simply a fictional narrative. If the threshold for flagging potentially harmful content is too low, such a writer could be wrongly flagged,” he told Al Jazeera.

“Similarly, consider a graduate student in biology or chemistry studying pathogens that, if misused, could have serious consequences. They might be trying to understand the risks associated with these pathogens and how to mitigate them. Such discussions may be necessary for legitimate research and education. Even when the subject matter is sensitive, they should not automatically be flagged without considering the broader context.”

The researcher said identifying a credible threat may require examining a user’s interactions across multiple conversations, rather than relying on isolated statements.

Barez said someone experiencing intrusive violent thoughts might turn to a chatbot for support, while another person planning an attack may reveal their intentions gradually across several conversations.

“Distinguishing between the two requires careful consideration of context, intent and patterns of behaviour, rather than relying on individual statements alone,” he added.

Chinmayi Sharma, a law professor at Fordham University, said the debate has parallels with the duty imposed on mental health professionals to warn identifiable third parties about credible threats.

However, she said there was a key difference – therapists have professional training, knowledge of their patients and enforceable standards governing their conduct. AI companies do not necessarily have comparable safeguards.

“My concern with AI companies is that right now there’s not a concerted effort to hire mental health professionals, sociologists, individuals that would have the unique expertise on what the indicators of threat are here,” Sharma told Al Jazeera.

“Secondly, licensed professionals are accountable to concrete, legally enforceable standards in their discipline. We don’t have something like that for AI companies.”

The privacy dilemma

The privacy implications extend beyond whether AI companies can accurately identify threats. Millions of people use chatbots to discuss relationships, emotional distress, mental health concerns and deeply personal experiences.

Civil liberties lawyer Younes said many users may not realise how vulnerable those conversations could be to disclosure.

“They often reflect a person’s innermost thoughts, questions, and desires. The majority of people assume that these dialogues will never be viewed by another person,” Younes, president and legal director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said.

Younes warned that the consequences of greater monitoring could extend well beyond those planning violence.

“If people fear their chats can be turned over to law enforcement simply because they express disturbing thoughts/violent fantasies etc, many will be dissuaded from using them,” she told Al Jazeera.

Younes argued that forcing companies to establish systems for monitoring users and reporting conversations could raise serious constitutional concerns in the US, including protections against unreasonable searches.

Meanwhile, Fordham’s Sharma also raised an issue about who could be disproportionately affected by heavy monitoring by AI chatbots.

“The concern is always there about either intentional or unintentional targeting, because if you have models trained on what we consider dangerous speech, they’re almost always going to reflect biases,” she said. “Certain minorities’ speech is over‑flagged as a threat, while other comparable speech is not.

“Even in a world in which everyone is benevolent, we should still be concerned about disparate outcomes,” she said, warning that machines could reproduce such disparities at scale.

‘Not a licensed therapist’ – When do AI companies become liable to report?

While AI companies may face moral pressure to prevent violence, their legal obligations are less clear, legal experts say.

Bryan Choi, a professor of law at the University of Colorado Boulder, said US law recognises a duty to warn in certain circumstances, including when mental health professionals become aware of imminent threats or when a special relationship exists between parties.

But those principles do not necessarily apply to AI companies.

“Under present case law, it seems unlikely that a company such as OpenAI would be held to have such duties to warn,” Choi told Al Jazeera. “The chatbot is not a licensed therapist. There is no special relationship between the company and the victims.”

Choi said existing negligence and product liability laws could potentially be applied to AI companies, but proving responsibility would present significant challenges.

Finding a balance

Fordham’s Sharma suggested that independent institutions could help establish reporting standards rather than leaving decisions entirely to private companies or requiring immediate disclosure to police.

Such bodies she said could develop procedures for assessing threats and explore ways of sharing only relevant information while protecting users’ identities and other personal details.

Meanwhile, Younes argued that users should, at a minimum, be clearly informed about whether their conversations are monitored and what circumstances could lead to information being shared with law enforcement.

“This is almost certainly an issue that will be wrestled with over the coming years, and I’m not sure anyone knows the solution at this particular point in time,” she said.

“Events that have not yet occurred will likely influence how these policies are shaped.”

US president’s executive order comes two days before sanctions deadline and a week after diesel deal with Putin.

US President Donald Trump has put on hold a sweeping package of sanctions on Russia that he signed into law last month, telling Congress the pause is in the national interest.

Trump signed an executive order on Friday, two days before a deadline in the law that would put the sanctions into effect.

The law – named after Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator who died unexpectedly in July after returning from Ukraine – had passed in the House of Representatives and the Senate by large margins. The bipartisan legislation was drafted by Graham and Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal.

It sought to starve Moscow of money for the war by sanctioning Russian officials, banks and a shadow fleet of tankers carrying its energy.

It also directed Trump to impose tariffs of up to 100 percent on the five biggest importers of Russian oil or gas, with an exception for countries that import less than 15 percent of Russia’s natural gas exports and are taking steps to cut them.

Diesel deal and criticism

The decision to suspend the sanctions comes a week after Trump said the US had signed a deal to buy diesel from Russia to try to lower global fuel prices.

Both Republicans and Democrats, criticising the deal, said it would help Russia’s war effort without affecting fuel prices.

Democratic Representative Don Beyer said he and others had “warned” that Trump might do this, in reference to Trump’s deal with Moscow.

Beyer called on Congress to “fix this flawed law to stop Trump from capitulating to Putin and ensure that it truly supports Ukraine”.

Trump has also increasingly criticised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lately for failing to reach a deal with Russia.

As Republicans try to keep control of Congress in the November 3 midterm elections, an AP-NORC poll released on October 1 found Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of the Iran war and blame him for higher prices among several other domestic policy issues.

At least 11 people believed to still be missing, with rescue operations underway.

The US coastguard has said it rescued 16 people from the Pacific Ocean after a boat sank off Mexico’s Baja coast.

The coastguard said on Friday it responded to a Mayday call reporting that a boat was sinking. The search is ongoing for 11 people believed to be still missing.

The boat went down about 225km (140 miles) west of Ensenada, Mexico.

A rescue helicopter reached the site about two hours after someone on the boat transmitted the Mayday call at about 1am (08:00 GMT) on Friday, said coastguard Lieutenant Santiago Tamburini.

It took about 90 minutes for the coastguard crew, which included a rescue swimmer, to pull the 16 people from the water, Tamburini said.

The people rescued were Mexican nationals, according to the Mexican consulate.

One survivor was being treated for a suspected shark bite and two were in critical condition, authorities said.

The rescued were flown by helicopter to San Diego, California, and transported to hospitals. The Mexican consulate in San Diego said it offered consular assistance.

The coastguard and US Navy are continuing to search the area with two helicopters, a fixed-wing plane, a cutter and a navy combat ship.

The boat sank in an area frequented by smugglers transporting migrants to the US. It is also popular with fishing and leisure boats.

Details about the boat’s origin, destination and what it was doing are not clear. No vessel, only debris, was found, and it was unclear what type of boat was involved, the coastguard said.

“Boats in that area can be for fishing, leisure, personal recreation. We just don’t know what they were doing out there. We all know it’s a suspected smuggling route,” Tamburini said.

A teacher fought the teenage shooter and a parent shot him dead, police say on Friday, a day after four people were killed.

The 16-year-old who killed three children and a teacher at an elementary school in the US state of Oregon was a former special-needs student at the school, police and school officials have said.

Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz identified the attacker on Friday, a day after the shooting at Silver Rail Elementary School, as Griffin J. John II.

He said the teenager attacked a classroom of special-needs students, where all the victims were shot.

Steven Cook, superintendent of Bend-La Pine Schools, said John was not enrolled in the local public school system at the time.

“That classroom was a special needs classroom, and the suspect was a special needs student in that school,” Cook told a news conference.

Krantz said John shot his way through locked doors with a 12-gauge shotgun, firing as many as 15 shots, and had about 44 rounds left when he was killed. Police are still trying to determine how he obtained the gun.

Under Oregon law, a minor may possess a shotgun if provided by a parent or with a parent’s consent.

The shooter’s mother, Shauntai Nickerson, separately told reporters outside her apartment: “I’m so sorry, I wish I could have done something.”

A teacher threw her phone at the gunman, then tackled and fought him, likely saving lives, Krantz said, calling her actions “heroic”. She was not injured.

A 36-year-old father, Kaylub Giamanco, who has two children at the school, then followed the gunman inside and shot him dead minutes after the first 911 call.

US President Donald Trump called Giamanco a “great hero”. “It’s a terrible thing, but thank goodness for a man that had a gun and knew how to use it,” Trump said.

The children killed were aged five, eight and 11, and the teacher was Meghan Lambert, 25, police said.

A seven-year-old child and a 54-year-old teacher were taken to hospital in critical condition.

The shooting is the 28th mass killing in the US this year, according to a database by The Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University.

The Gun Violence Archive in the US has documented 369 mass shootings in 2026, defined as incidents in which four or more people are shot.

The Everytown for Gun Safety group has counted at least 100 incidents of gunfire on school grounds this year, with 34 deaths.

China is increasing its gold reserves in a bid to reduce its dependence on US dollar assets and protect against financial and geopolitical risks, analysts say, while households are turning to the precious metal amid uncertainty over the domestic economy.

The People’s Bank of China reported buying gold for a 23rd consecutive month in September, when the country’s central bank also made its largest monthly purchase in nearly three years. The sustained buying points to a longer-term effort to spread risk associated with its vast reserves, experts say.

Among concerns is high US debt and Western governments’ freezing of assets, which has highlighted the inherent risk in holding money overseas, particularly for emerging market and Global South economies. Gold bought and stored domestically offers protection against that risk because access does not depend on the will of another government.

But central bank buying and household demand for gold in China have different drivers. While Beijing is managing its financial exposure, private investors are seeking somewhere to preserve their savings. Here is what we know.

How much gold has China bought?

China’s central bank added approximately 23 tonnes of gold in September, bringing its reported holdings to about 2,410 tonnes, according to the World Gold Council. That was its largest monthly purchase since October 2023. Gold accounted for 8.5 percent of China’s total official reserves at the end of September, compared with 5.5 percent at the end of 2024.

Reserves are assets central banks hold to ensure they can meet international payments and respond to financial disruption. They usually include foreign currencies, foreign government debt and gold.

Private demand for gold within China has also risen, with purchases of gold bars and coins 28.4 percent higher in the first half of 2026 than during the same period last year, according to the China Gold Association. The buying of gold has continued amid falling prices, with gold down around 8.5 percent over the month.

The World Gold Council attributed the decline in gold prices partly to a stronger dollar and higher returns on US government debt. With interest rates going up in an attempt to curb inflation, these investments are attractive for buyers as they pay interest, making them more attractive to private investors than gold, which does not.

Why is China buying more gold?

A key objective is to reduce dependence on US government debt, known as Treasuries, according to Thu Lan Nguyen, head of commodity research at Commerzbank in Frankfurt.

China holds substantial reserves in dollar-based assets and, therefore, buying gold reduces its exposure to decisions taken in Washington. “China’s gold purchases are part of a broader effort to make its reserves more resilient,” Nguyen told Al Jazeera.

The freezing by Western countries of roughly $300bn in Russian Central Bank overseas assets following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 demonstrated how reserves held abroad can quickly become inaccessible.

The concern for China may be that a future confrontation with Washington could expose some of its overseas assets to similar restrictions. “Gold held domestically has a crucial advantage in this respect: it does not represent a claim on another country and is therefore much less exposed to sanctions or asset freezes,” Nguyen said.

“I would interpret it primarily as risk management,” she added, pointing to increased geopolitical tensions and economic and fiscal risks.

America’s rising debt, which hit $40 trillion for the first time in history earlier this year, adds another source of uncertainty. In February, the US Congressional Budget Office projected that federal debt held by the public would rise from 101 percent of the size of the US economy in 2026 to 120 percent in 2036. That provides context for concerns about Washington’s ability to repay that debt going forward should an economic crash occur. Much of this debt is held by China. Gold, therefore, offers a less volatile and risky asset to hold.

Chinese households have different motivations for buying gold. When confidence in other investments weakens, gold can become more attractive as a way to hold savings. “Strong demand for gold can partly reflect a search for alternative stores of value,” Nguyen said.

The World Gold Council has identified weak Chinese share markets as one factor supporting domestic demand for gold, while its property market is burdened by heavy borrowing and overbuilding, contributing to a fall in housing prices, making it a poorer investment.

What this means for the US dollar

Analysts warned that China’s increased buying of gold does not signal an imminent end to the dollar’s global dominance. “I would be cautious about describing this as a major shift away from the dollar,” Nguyen said. “The dollar remains by far the dominant global reserve currency.”

But a gradual shift could still matter if China and other central banks put more of their new reserves into gold, buying fewer US assets than they normally would. That could weaken one source of demand for US government debt. But the effect would depend on how widely and quickly the shift developed.

“The key point is, therefore, that this is likely to be a slow diversification process rather than a sudden abandonment of the dollar,” Nguyen said. She added that the consequences for the US economy would remain limited unless the trend broadened and accelerated substantially.

Central banks also need readily available foreign currency to support international payments and the dollar remains central to those transactions. So gold can provide financial protection, but it cannot directly replace all the functions of dollar reserves.

Who else is buying gold?

China is part of a wider trend, particularly among central banks in emerging economies, Nguyen said.

“The trend is particularly visible among emerging market central banks,” Nguyen said. “But sanctions are only part of the story.”

Poland has also become a more prominent buyer. Its central bank purchased 31 tonnes in the first quarter of 2026 and another eight tonnes in July, according to the World Gold Council.

Large holdings do not necessarily indicate recent purchases. India, for example, confirmed in June that its physical gold stock remained unchanged at about 880.5 tonnes. India’s gold reserves have changed little since mid-2025, according to the World Gold Council. It bought about four tonnes in 2025, down from 73 tonnes in 2024.

Despite China’s sustained buying, its reserves remain far smaller than those of the United States. Its holdings of about 2,300 tonnes at the end of 2025 amounted to less than one-third of the US stockpile of approximately 8,133 tonnes.

United States President Donald Trump has for the first time explicitly ruled out the use of a nuclear weapon against Iran, but has not denied US media reports that his administration is considering deploying the US’s most lethal non-nuclear munition, nicknamed the “mother of all bombs” in the near future.

In an interview published on Thursday by right-wing American news site Newsmax, Trump suggested he does not plan to use nuclear weapons, but also clarified that the devastating aerial weapon, the GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb (MOAB – ‘mother of all bombs ) “is not nuclear”.

“I wouldn’t use nuclear. We don’t have to. We’re the greatest nuclear power in the world,” he told Newsmax.

The comments marked Trump’s first definitive statement on the nuclear topic following speculation about a possible atomic conflict earlier in the US and Israel’s war on Iran. They also appeared to confirm speculation that another phase of the war is imminent, likely after the US midterm elections on November 3.

Here’s what we know:

What did Trump say?

Trump told Newsmax that the US might indeed launch another strike on Iran’s nuclear sites, particularly on Pickaxe Mountain, where Tehran is believed to be hiding a nuclear facility deep under layers of granite.

He ruled out using a nuclear weapon or a tactical nuclear weapon.

“I wouldn’t use nuclear. We don’t have to. We’re the greatest nuclear power in the world,” he said.

He also clarified that the MOAB, which CNN reported the US government is considering using, “is not nuclear”.

Responding to a question about whether the MOAB is “tactical nuclear” – meaning smaller nuclear munitions – Trump reiterated that it is not.

“Well, the mother of all bombs is not nuclear,” Trump said. “It’s not nuclear at all. This is just an extremely large bomb.”

Trump declined to say whether he had authorised its use in Iran.

Trump also suggested renewed attacks are likely in the near future. The US cannot end the war now because it has to ensure Iran cannot produce a nuclear weapon, he argued, saying he believes that “if they had it, they would use it, in my opinion, instantaneously”.

Trump also reiterated that the war would end “very soon” whether by force or diplomacy and that oil prices would then drop.

When asked if he would put “troops on the ground”, Trump said: “No, I don’t see that, I don’t see it.” Earlier in the war, Trump had made comments regarding sending in troops, a move analysts said would be devastating for US soldiers because of Iran’s mountainous territory.

What is the ‘mother of all bombs’?

The MOAB carries a massive payload of about 8,500kg (18,000 pounds or 8.5 tonnes) of high explosives. It weighs 9,800kg (21,605 pounds or nearly 10 tonnes) – about the same as four cars – and is just over nine metres (about 30 feet) long. Stealth bombers are too small to carry it, so it has to be deployed by larger, Lockheed C-130 Hercules transporters.

It is designed to explode a few metres above the ground, sending out intense fireballs that can blast buildings and other hard-surface structures within a 1km radius, experts have told Al Jazeera. It is so powerful that a mushroom cloud from its blast has been seen 32km (20 miles) away in tests, the US Air Force has said.

“Its large explosive charge can produce devastating blast effects against exposed personnel, equipment and vulnerable structures,” Brussels-based military and weapons analyst Elijah Magnier said. “Its purpose is to generate an exceptionally powerful blast across a surface area.”

However, Magnier said there is doubt about whether using the massive surface explosive would be effective against deeply buried nuclear installations in Iran. He added that the terrain in Iran could be difficult for larger cargo aircraft to access.

What has Trump previously said about nuclear weapons?

Trump has never explicitly mentioned using a nuclear weapon, but he has also never ruled it out.

Speculation regarding whether Washington might use nuclear weapons was rife in the early days of the conflict, largely because of the extreme nature of Trump’s numerous threats against Tehran.

In April, for example, as Iran enforced a blockade on ships in the Strait of Hormuz, Trump posted on his Truth Social site that “…a whole civilisation will die tonight, never to be brought back again”, if Iran did not agree to a peace deal and reopen the strait.

He also threatened to destroy Iran’s infrastructure, saying a bombing campaign “will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one”, in Iran.

Experts widely interpreted his statements as a threat of nuclear destruction, but one that still failed to force Iran to the table.

Although Trump largely moved away from his sabre-rattling rhetoric in the following weeks, he reiterated at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last month that he could “annihilate” Iran. He also told the assembly that he believed a deal would emerge after the midterms.

What is a ‘tactical’ nuclear weapon?

“Tactical” nuclear weapons (TNW) are smaller nuclear munitions designed for the battlefield as opposed to strategic nuclear munitions designed for mass destruction.

Some perceive TNWs as having a lesser impact than an atomic bomb, but experts warn that their names are misleading and they can nevertheless be devastating. Their explosive yield, between 0.3 and 50 kilotons, can impact areas within a 500-600km radius.

The US dropped a 15-kiloton nuclear bomb on Hiroshima, meaning that weapon would today be considered a TNW. The US, North Korea and Russia have TNWs in their arsenals, although no country has ever used them. TNWs are not subject to any international treaties and are largely unregulated.

What might another US attack on Iran look like?

With Trump failing to rule out dropping the MOAB, analysts speculate that the US might launch another – perhaps final – intensive bombing campaign targeting Iran’s nuclear and defence sites, particularly Pickaxe Mountain.

The US could also continue its naval blockade on Iranian ports, while providing escorts for commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran has vowed to respond to escalatory strikes by targeting oil and digital infrastructure in neighbouring Gulf states.

Senior defence officials have also warned that Iran will invade its neighbours if the US launches a ground operation, although Trump appears to have ruled that out.

Earlier in the war, he hinted at the possibility of sending ground forces to retrieve some 400kg of “yellowcake” – highly enriched uranium that Washington and Israel claim Tehran has hidden underground.

Trump’s phone calls in March to Kurdish militia groups fighting Iran provoked speculation that Washington could coordinate with them for an invasion, although that did not happen.