war

Here are the key events from day 1,362 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, November 17:

Fighting

• Russia said its forces had moved forward sharply in Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhia region, taking the settlements of Rivnopillya and Mala Tokmachka as part of a major push aimed at taking control of the entire region. Currently, Russia says it controls 75 percent of the area.
• Ukrainian forces have struck the Novokuibyshevsk oil refinery in Russia’s Samara region, Kyiv’s General Staff said. It said it had recorded explosions and a fire at the site of the strike, but was still assessing the extent of damage.
• Ukrainian officials said on Sunday morning that Russian attacks on the country had killed at least four civilians and wounded 17 others over the last 24 hours.
• The Russian TASS news agency reported that Ukrainian attacks on Russia wounded two civilians in the Belgorod region.
• TASS added that Russia’s air defences destroyed more than 50 Ukrainian drones on Sunday evening. Earlier on Sunday, it said Russian air defences intercepted two Neptune guided missiles, four HIMARS rockets and 197 drones.

Energy

• Russia’s Novorossiysk port resumed oil loadings after a two-day suspension triggered by a Ukrainian missile and drone attack, the Reuters news agency reported, citing two industry sources. The Ukrainian attack has been described as the most damaging to date on Russia’s main Black Sea crude export infrastructure.

• Ukraine has secured imports of US liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Greece to cover its winter needs from December through to March next year, officials said during a visit to Athens by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

• Russian President Vladimir Putin had a conversation with Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin last week during a visit by Kazakhstan’s president to Moscow, state media reported, as United States-led sanctions continue to take a financial toll on the company.

Environment

• The Greenpeace environmental campaigning group has revealed that France was sending reprocessed uranium to Russia for treatment so it can be reused, despite the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine. Greenpeace said that while it was legal, the trade was “immoral” as many nations seek to step up sanctions on the Russian government over its invasion of Ukraine, launched in 2022.

Chief investigator declines to say how many arrested; some were identified by videos on social media.

Syria has arrested members of the country’s security and military services as part of a probe into sectarian violence in the southern province of Suwayda earlier this year that left hundreds dead.

Judge Hatem Naasan, head of a committee investigating the eruption of violence in Suwayda in July, said that members of security services and the military “who were proven to have committed violations” based on findings and videos posted online had been detained.

“Videos posted on social media clearly showed faces, and they were detained by the authorities concerned,” Naasan said, adding that security personnel were detained by the Interior Ministry while members of the military are being held by the Defence Ministry.

Videos that surfaced online had shown armed men killing Druze civilians kneeling in public squares and shaving the moustaches off elderly men in an act of humiliation.

Naasan did not specify how many arrests were made. Nor did he announce a death toll, saying this would come in the final report that is expected by the end of the year.

He acknowledged that “some foreign fighters randomly and individually entered the city of Suwayda”, saying that some had been detained and questioned. He stated that none of them were members of the Syrian armed or security forces.

Fighting broke out in the Druze-majority province after a Druze truck driver was abducted on a public highway, drawing in Bedouin tribal fighters from other parts of the country.

Government forces were deployed to restore order, but were accused of siding with the Bedouins. Hundreds of civilians, mostly Druze, were killed, many by government fighters.

A ceasefire was established after a week of violence.

Claiming that it was protecting the Druze, Israel also intervened, launching dozens of air attacks on government forces in Suwayda and even striking the Syrian Ministry of Defence headquarters in the centre of the capital Damascus.

Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes around the country since the end of the 54-year al-Assad dynasty in December, mainly targeting, it says, assets of the Syrian army, but also carrying out incursions.

After the acts of violence in July, many in Suwayda now want some form of autonomy in a federal system. A smaller group is calling for total partition.

President Ahmed al-Sharaa has been painstakingly trying to usher Syria back into the international fold, with notable successes. In September, he was the first Syrian leader to address the United Nations General Assembly in six decades, and he was invited to the White House on Monday for a second meeting with United States President Donald Trump.

Al-Sharaa, who wants to unify his war-ravaged nation and end its decades of international isolation, was the first-ever Syrian leader to visit the White House since the country’s independence in 1946.

Both the US and European Union have dropped sanctions against Syria, and major Gulf Arab investment is giving the war-devastated nation a critical economic lifeline.

But al-Sharaa’s quest for national unity after a 14-year ruinous civil war still faces major internal and external challenges ahead.

The exchanges have been the only progress of any note in negotiations between the two countries as the war rages on in its fourth year.

Ukraine is working to resume prisoner exchanges with Russia that could bring 1,200 Ukrainians home, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says, a day after his national security chief announced progress in negotiations.

“We are … counting on the resumption of POW exchanges,” Zelenskyy wrote on X on Sunday. “Many meetings, negotiations and calls are currently taking place to ensure this.”

Rustem Umerov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council, said on Saturday that he held consultations mediated by Turkiye and the United Arab Emirates on resuming prisoner of war exchanges, which the two sides have carried out successfully multiple times.

He said the parties agreed to activate prisoner exchange agreements brokered in Istanbul to release 1,200 Ukrainians.

The Istanbul agreements refer to prisoner exchange protocols established with Turkish mediation in 2022 that set rules for large, coordinated swaps. Since then, Russia and Ukraine have traded thousands of prisoners although the exchanges have been sporadic.

But the swaps have been the only progress of any note in talks between the two sides as the war rages on and another punishing winter approaches with oil and energy sites being targeted by both Moscow and Kyiv.

Authorities in Moscow did not immediately comment on the issue.

Umerov said technical consultations would be held soon to finalise procedural and organisational details, expressing hope that returning Ukrainians could “celebrate the New Year and Christmas holidays at home – at the family table and next to their relatives”.

Finland says ‘sisu’ needed

Meanwhile, Finnish President Alexander Stubb told The Associated Press news agency that a ceasefire in Ukraine is unlikely before the spring and European allies need to keep up support despite a corruption scandal that has engulfed Kyiv.

Europe, meanwhile, will require “sisu”, a Finnish word meaning endurance, resilience and grit, to get through the winter, he said, as Russia continues its hybrid attacks and information war across the continent.

“I’m not very optimistic about achieving a ceasefire or the beginning of peace negotiations, at least this year,” Stubb said, commenting that it would be good to “get something going” by March.

In other developments, energy infrastructure was damaged by Russian drone strikes overnight into Sunday in Ukraine’s Odesa region, the State Emergency Service said. A solar power plant was among the damaged sites.

Ukraine is desperately trying to fend off relentless Russian aerial attacks that have brought rolling blackouts across Ukraine on the brink of winter.

Combined missile and drone strikes on the power grid have coincided with Ukraine’s efforts to hold back a Russian battlefield push aimed at capturing the eastern stronghold of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region.

Russia launched 176 drones and fired one missile overnight, Ukraine’s air force said on Sunday, adding that Ukrainian forces shot down or neutralised 139 drones.

Ukrainian forces struck a major oil refinery in Russia’s Samara region along with a warehouse storing drones for the elite Rubicon drone unit in partially Russian-occupied Donetsk, Ukraine’s general staff said on Sunday. Russian officials did not immediately confirm the attacks.

Months of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian refineries are aimed at depriving Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue the war.

Russia’s Ministry of Defence said on Sunday that its forces shot down 57 Ukrainian drones overnight.

It also said its troops had captured the settlements of Mala Tokmachka and Rivnopillya in eastern Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region.

Here are the key events from day 1,361 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, November 16:

Fighting

• The Ukrainian military said it struck Russia’s Ryazan oil refinery, located about 200km (125 miles) southeast of Moscow, as “part of efforts to reduce the enemy’s ability to launch missile and bomb strikes”.
• The Ukrainian military said the strike caused multiple explosions and a large fire at the site.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence said its forces have taken control of the village of Yablukove in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region.
• The Ukrainian military confirmed withdrawing from the village of Novovasylivske in Zaporizhia, saying the retreat was necessary in order to relocate to “more favourable defensive positions”.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the widow of the first victim of the 1986 disaster at the Chornobyl power plant was among several people killed in a barrage of Russian strikes on the capital of Kyiv in recent days. He said Nataliia Khodemchuk’s death was the result of “a new tragedy caused once again by the Kremlin”.
• Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency reported that conditions are stable at the Moscow-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine after an external power line was switched off as a precautionary measure on Friday.
• The Russian state-run TASS news agency reported that Ukrainian forces have launched a drone attack on residential buildings in the Russian city of Volgograd, damaging “the facades and glazing of apartment buildings and the surrounding area”.
• The Russian Defence Ministry said it shot down eight Ukrainian drones in the course of four hours over the regions of Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk, as well as Russian-occupied Crimea, according to TASS.

Politics and diplomacy

• Russia and Ukraine have agreed to move forward with a prisoner exchange that will see the release of about 1,200 Ukrainians, according to a Ukrainian official. The announcement came after several days of talks overseen by Turkiye and the United Arab Emirates, rejuvenating an exchange process laid out during previous negotiations in Istanbul.
• President Zelenskyy promised a “reboot” of state-owned energy companies, including reforms to root out corruption, as his government continues to grapple with a major scandal in which investigators said $100m was embezzled from power firms.
• Polish President Karol Nawrocki signed a bill providing social assistance for Ukrainian refugees, but stated it was the “last time” he would do so until new solutions to the issue were found. The Polish leader has argued that the provision of assistance to Ukrainian refugees, about one million of whom are living in Poland, is “unfair to Poles”. The legal status of Ukrainian refugees in Poland is set to expire in March.
• Serbian officials said that the United States will not ease sanctions on the Serbian oil firm NIS unless it changes the company’s majority-Russian ownership share, despite pleas for leniency from Belgrade. Energy Minister Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic said that the US “clearly and unequivocally” demanded changes to Russian ownership, giving Serbia until February 13 to find a solution.

Military aid

• Zelenskyy called for additional air defence resources, following a wave of Russian strikes on Kyiv that killed at least seven people and injured dozens more. The Ukrainian leader said that the attacks underscore the need for more assistance and “greater resolve” from allies following the strikes, which struck apartment buildings across the capital city on Friday.

RSF is burning and burying bodies near a university, mosque, camp for the displaced people, and hospital in el-Fasher, Yale University researchers say.

The government-aligned Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have recaptured two territories in the North Kordofan state from the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), as the paramilitary group continues burning and burying bodies in Darfur’s el-Fasher to hide evidence of mass killings.

Footage circulating online this week showed army soldiers holding assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades celebrating their takeovers of Kazqil and Um Dam Haj Ahmed in North Kordofan, the state where intense fighting is expected to rage over the coming weeks.

Kazqil, which had fallen to the RSF in late October, is located south of el-Obeid, the strategic capital city of the state in central Sudan, which the paramilitary group is trying to capture from the army.

أبطال القوات المسلحة من داخل ” كازقيل” بولاية شمال كردفان#السودان #السودان_ينتصر pic.twitter.com/wVflEodHK5

— Sudan News 🇸🇩 (@Sudan_tweet) November 15, 2025

The fighting between the two rival generals leading the army and the paramilitary group, which started in April 2023, has increasingly turned east over the past weeks as the RSF solidifies control over the western parts of the war-torn country, now in its third year of a brutal civil war.

The fighting, fuelled by arms supplies from the region, has created what the United Nations has called the largest displacement crisis in the world. More than 12 million people have been forced from their homes, and tens of thousands have been killed and injured. The UN has also confirmed starvation in parts of the country.

The RSF said last week it accepted a ceasefire proposal put forward by the United States and other mediators, with the announcement coming after an international outcry over atrocities committed by the paramilitary group in el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur state in western Sudan.

But the army has refused to agree to a ceasefire under the current battle lines, and both sides have continued to amass troops and equipment in the central parts of the country to engage in more battles.

The RSF launched an offensive against the Kordofan region at the same time as it took el-Fasher late last month, seizing the town of Bara in North Kordofan state as a crucial link between Darfur and central Sudan. The army had recaptured the town just two months earlier.

Satellite images reveal mass graves

More than two and a half weeks after fully capturing el-Fasher from the army, the RSF has continued to dispose of bodies in large numbers.

An analysis of satellite imagery released by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) on Friday exposed four new locations where paramilitary fighters are disposing of bodies in and around el-Fasher.

Activities consistent with body disposal are visible at the University of Alfashir, a structure on the edge of Abu Shouk camp for internally displaced people, a neighbourhood near al-Hikma Mosque, and at Saudi Hospital, where RSF forces massacred hundreds.

The HRL could not conclude how many people the RSF had killed or how quickly, but it said the observations are alarming, given the fact that the whereabouts of many civilian residents remain unknown.

🚨ATROCITY ALERT🚨@HRL_YaleSPH has identified four new locations where the RSF is disposing of bodies in and around El Fasher. #KeepEyesonSudan

🛰️@Vantortechhttps://t.co/y5gaMRlBm2 pic.twitter.com/OsCVb1ihTf

— Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) at YSPH (@HRL_YaleSPH) November 14, 2025

Nathaniel Raymond, the lead researcher of that report, said an estimated 150,000 civilians are unaccounted for, and daily monitoring of city streets shows no activity in markets or water points, but only RSF patrols and many bodies.

“We can see them charred. So the question is, where are the people and where are the bodies coming from?” he told Al Jazeera.

Raymond said the evidence also includes numerous videos released by the RSF fighters themselves, who are “the most prodigious producers of evidence about their own crimes”.

WASHINGTON — On the campaign trail, Donald Trump was unapologetic about putting America first. He promised to secure the nation’s borders, strengthen the domestic workforce and be tough on countries he thought were taking advantage of the United States.

Now, 10 months into his second term, the president is facing backlash from some conservatives who say he is too focused on matters abroad, whether it’s seeking regime change in Venezuela, brokering peace deals in Ukraine and Gaza or extending a $20-billion currency swap for Argentina. The criticism has grown in recent days after Trump expressed support for granting more visas to foreign students and skilled immigrant workers.

The cracks in the MAGA movement, which have been more pronounced in recent weeks, underscore how Trump’s once impenetrable political base is wavering as the president appears to embrace a more global approach to governing.

“I have to view the presidency as a worldwide situation, not locally,” Trump said this week when asked to address the criticism at an Oval Office event. “We could have a world that’s on fire where wars come to our shores very easily if you had a bad president.”

For backers of Trump’s MAGA movement, the conflict is forcing some to weigh loyalty to an “America first” ideology over a president they have long supported and who, in some cases, inspired them to get involved in the political process.

“I am against foreign aid, foreign wars, and sending a single dollar to foreign countries,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who in recent weeks has become more critical of Trump’s policies, said in a social media post Wednesday. “I am America First and America Only. This is my way and there is no other way to be.”

Beyond America-first concerns, some Trump supporters are frustrated with him for resisting the disclosures about the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his network of powerful friends — including Trump. A group of Republicans in the House, for instance, helped lead an effort to force a vote to demand further disclosures on the Epstein files from the Justice Department.

“When they are protecting pedophiles, when they are blowing our budget, when they are starting wars overseas, I’m sorry, I can’t go along with that,” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) said in a CNN interview. “And back home, people agree with me. They understand, even the most ardent Trump supporters understand.”

When asked to respond to the criticism Trump has faced in recent weeks, the White House said the president was focused on implementing “economic policies that are cutting costs, raising real wages, and securing trillions in investments to make and hire in America.”

Mike Madrid, a “never Trump” Republican consultant, believes the Epstein scandal has sped up a Republican backlash that has been brewing as a result of Trump deviating from his campaign promises.

“They are turning on him, and it’s a sign of the inviolable trust being gone,” Madrid said.

The MAGA movement was not led by a policy ideology, but rather “fealty to the leader,” Madrid said. Once the trust in Trump fades, “everything is gone.”

Criticism of Trump goes mainstream

The intraparty tension also has played out on conservative and mainstream news outlets, where the president has been challenged on his policies.

In a recent Fox News interview with Laura Ingraham, Trump was pressed on a plan to give student visas to hundreds of thousands of Chinese students, a move that would mark a departure from actions taken by his administration this year to crack down on foreign students.

“I think it is good to have outside countries,” Trump said. “Look, I want to be able to get along with the world.”

In that same interview, Trump said he supports giving H-1B visas to skilled foreign workers because the U.S. doesn’t have workers with “certain talents.”

“You can’t take people off an unemployment line and say, ‘I’m going to put you into a factory where we’re going to make missiles,’” Trump argued.

Trump in September imposed a $100,000 fee for H-1B visas for skilled workers, a move that led to confusion among businesses, immigration lawyers and H-1B visa holders. Before Trump’s order, the visa program had exposed a rift between the president’s supporters in the technology industry, which relies on the program, and immigration hard-liners who want to see the U.S. invest in an American workforce.

A day after Trump expressed support for the visa program, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem added fuel to the immigration debate by saying the administration is fast-tracking immigrants’ pathway to citizenship.

“More people are becoming naturalized under this administration than ever before,” Noem told Fox News this week.

Laura Loomer, a far-right activist and close ally of Trump, said the administration’s position was “disappointing.”

“How is that a good thing? We are supposed to be kicking foreigners out, not letting them stay,” Loomer said.

Polling adds on the heat

As polling shows Americans are growing frustrated with the economy, some conservatives increasingly blame Trump for not doing enough to create more jobs and lower the cost of living.

Greene, the Georgia Republican, said on “The Sean Spicer Show” Thursday that Trump and his administration are “gaslighting” people when they say prices are going down.

“It’s actually infuriating people because people know what they’re paying at the grocery store,” she said, while urging Republicans to “show we are in the trenches with them” rather than denying their experience.

While Trump has maintained that the economy is strong, administration officials have begun talking about pushing new economic policies. White House economic advisor Kevin Hassett said this week that the administration would be working to provide consumers with more purchasing power, saying that “we’re going to fix it right away.”

“We understand that people understand, as people look at their pocketbooks to go to the grocery store, that there’s still work to do,” Hassett said.

The acknowledgment comes after this month’s elections in key states — in which Republicans were soundly defeated — made clear that rising prices were top of mind for many Americans. The results also showed Latino voters were turning away from the GOP amid growing concerns about the economy.

As Republicans try to refocus on addressing affordability, Trump has continued to blame the economic problems on former President Biden.

“Cost, and INFLATION, were higher under the Sleepy Joe Biden administration, than they are now,” Trump said in a social media post Friday. He insisted that under his administration costs are “tumbling down.”

Stories will long be told about what Gazans have endured these last couple of years, and movies will be part of that unburdening. This spring, Iranian filmmaker Sepideh Farsi believed she would be unveiling a uniquely dignified portrait of one Palestinian woman’s experience when the Cannes Film Festival accepted her documentary “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” which comprised her year of spirited video chats with positive-minded 25-year-old photojournalist and poet Fatma Hassona. The day after the Cannes news, Hassona and her family were killed by an Israeli missile.

It’s not unheard of for a completed movie to become something entirely different overnight. But what’s quietly miraculous about “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” considering its added tragic weight, is what the force of Hassona’s personality and Farsi’s filmmaking choices still manage to do: speak to what’s ineffably beautiful about our human capacity for hope and connection.

In her opening narration, Farsi explains how she’d been looking for a way into Gaza to understand it beyond the media reports. Physically, that proved impossible, but through a refugee friend, she was connected to Hassona in April 2024. In their first video call, which Farsi, then in Cairo, recorded with a separate smartphone, Hassona’s beaming face immediately dispels any notion that all Palestinians must exist in a defeated state amid relentless bombing. Asked how she feels, Hassona — who had just witnessed a huge explosion the day prior — says, “I feel proud.” With unforced lightness, she assures Farsi that they will continue to live their lives and laugh, that they are “special people.” She knows every day is about actively not letting themselves get used to it. The documentary’s title is Hassona’s description of what she does when she leaves her house.

You believe her. That high-wattage smile registers as whatever the opposite of a bomb is. But it’s also easy to notice Farsi’s ingrained cynicism about the state of things, having once been imprisoned as a teenage dissident during the years following her country’s Islamic Revolution, now in exile. In her voice-over, Farsi describes meeting Hassona as if encountering a mirror, realizing “how much both our lives are conditioned by walls and wars.”

Farsi threads in many of Hassona’s photographs. The images of daily life amid destruction and rubble — children, bicyclists, workers, laundry drying from high floors in a half-destroyed building — hint at an inextinguishable flame carrying on through a campaign of death.

Though Farsi knows how to ask for details about her life in Gaza, the vibe isn’t one of interviews conducted to make a film, but a genuine curiosity and warmth, the ebb and flow of real interaction captured whenever possible. Meanwhile, war, politics and failed leadership can be glimpsed in brief interludes of news reports on Farsi’s television. But they’re always cut short, as if to say: I’d rather hear from my friend who’s living it.

Hassona’s face becomes so familiar to us, we can tell when her cheery disposition is hard to maintain. But her energy and hope never feel like depletable resources. “I want to be in a normal place!” she blurts out in one of their last conversations, almost as if she were a musical protagonist about to break into song. But Hassona never got more than a first act.

Farsi doesn’t draw the ending out: just sparsely worded text after witnessing their final chat, followed by a video Hassona had taken rolling through her devastated city, somehow grounded in a palpable, undying everydayness. You’ll feel loss, but the afterimage of this singular woman’s belief in finding light is what will burn.

Reporting from Washington — It was classic Donald Trump: The president, angry and embarrassed that most Philadelphia Eagles players planned to boycott the traditional White House victory celebration for Super Bowl champs, dramatically lashed back with his own punishing spin.

Not only did Trump disinvite the entire team late Monday, but he transformed the celebration on Tuesday to dramatically inflame the culture war he ignited two years ago — casting the mostly African American players as unpatriotic and ignoring their protests both of police brutality and of Trump’s perceived divisiveness.

The president, in an early morning Twitter statement, said the White House would hold an alternative celebration of patriotism for the fans, “where we will proudly be playing the National Anthem and other wonderful music.”

“NFL, no escaping to the Locker Rooms!” Trump added, referring to the league owners’ new policy of requiring players to stand for the pregame playing of the national anthem or stay off the field. Though that policy is largely viewed as a response to the president’s pressure, Trump made plain that he was not satisfied; he’s called in the past for owners to force players to stand or be fired.

Later, at the fete on the South Lawn with military bands at the ready, Trump briefly opened the program before an audience that seemed to have fewer than the promised 1,000 Eagles fans, bolstered by a number of administration aides.

“I want to use this opportunity to explain why young Americans stand for the national anthem,” Trump said. “Maybe it’s about time that we understand. We stand to honor our military, and to honor our country and to remember the fallen heroes who never made it back home.”

The president’s reaction this week was more dramatic than his response to a similar snub last year by the 2017 National Basketball Assn. champion Golden State Warriors. That reflects not only his long-running fight with professional football players about the flag and the anthem, but also renewed tensions between Trump and the National Football League that date to the 1980s. Trump failed then both in acquiring an NFL team and in challenging the NFL commercially as a prominent owner in a new, rival sports league, the USFL, which subsequently folded.

Since the campaign, Trump has often used the NFL player protests to rally his supporters and distract from other controversies. Polls show a plurality of Americans, and large majorities of whites and Republicans, do not support the player protests.

As Trump was attacking the Eagles, a variety of other controversies swirled and vied for attention.

Former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was accused by federal prosecutors of witness tampering in his tax and money-laundering case. Trump’s press secretary and lawyer were under fire for falsely saying Trump did not dictate the misleading statement last year about a meeting that Trump’s son, son-in-law and Manafort had with a Russian lawyer promising “dirt” on rival Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign.

Trump himself faced new questions after his tweet Monday that he had the “absolute right to PARDON myself.” And he was being assailed for ignoring a new study estimating that about 4,600 Americans died from the hurricanes last year in Puerto Rico, not 16 or 17 as he’d said in the past.

The Eagles’ snub presented yet another controversy, but one Trump sought to turn to advantage.

“These cultural issues that stir controversy, they’re winners for the president,” said one Trump ally who speaks with the president and his top aides regularly and requested anonymity.

No Eagles players knelt in protest during the 2017 season. Torrey Smith, a former Eagles player, tweeted, “The President continues to spread the false narrative that players are anti-military.”

Many pro athletes on championship teams, especially African Americans, have been conflicted about White House visits during the Trump presidency, or simply stayed away. The Warriors had their invitation for a visit with Trump rescinded after publicly equivocating about attending.

LeBron James of the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, arguably the league’s most influential player, told reporters on Tuesday that “no matter who wins” the NBA Finals now underway between the Cavs and the Warriors, “no one wants to go anyway” to the White House. Warriors star guard Stephen Curry agreed.

Trump, on Twitter, noted that he’d hosted celebrations at the White House for other professional and college teams and sports, including NASCAR, the Chicago Cubs, Houston Astros, Pittsburgh Penguins, New England Patriots, the University of Alabama and Clemson University.

Trump decided late Monday, less than 24 hours before the planned Super Bowl tribute, to instead make it “a celebration of the American flag,” as White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders called it in a statement Tuesday. Fewer than 10 players out of more than 70 who were eligible had been expected to attend, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Sanders blamed the Eagles for botching the visit. She said 81 people from the team — including employees, coaches, managers and players — had accepted invitations to come, along with 1,000 fans. With only a small number of players expected, the team tried Friday to reschedule the event, Sanders said, to a time when Trump planned to be overseas.

The White House said that “despite sensing a lack of good faith” on the Eagles’ part, it tried to work with the team “to change the event format that could accommodate a smaller group of players.”

“Unfortunately, the Eagles offered to send only a tiny handful of representatives, while making clear that the great majority of players would not attend the event, despite planning to be in D.C. today,” she said. “In other words, the vast majority of the Eagles team decided to abandon their fans.”

In a statement, the NFL Players Assn. said it was “disappointed” with Trump’s decision to disinvite the team, adding that it led to the cancellation of several “player-led community service events for young people in the Washington, D.C., area.”

“The NFL players love their country, support our troops, give back to their communities and strive to make America a better place,” the union said.

The Eagles ownership released a statement Monday night that did not mention Trump or the canceled visit, calling it “an inspiration” to watch “the entire Eagles community come together.”

Individual players showed more frustration. The team’s star tight end, Zach Ertz, tweeted angrily after Fox News, Trump’s media ally, used file footage of Eagles players kneeling in prayer to falsely suggest they were kneeling in protest during the anthem.

“This can’t be serious,” Ertz wrote. “Praying before games with my teammates, well before the anthem, is being used for your propaganda?! Just sad, I feel like you guys should have to be better than this.”

Fox News issued a rare correction on Twitter.

Some of Pennsylvania’s Democratic lawmakers also weighed in. Sen. Bob Casey wrote on Twitter, “I’m skipping this political stunt at the White House and just invited the Eagles to Congress.”

Follow the latest news of the Trump administration on Essential Washington »

[email protected] | Twitter: @noahbierman

Special correspondents Eli Stokols and Eliza Fawcett contributed to this report.

UPDATES:

2:35 p.m.: This article was updated with details of White House celebration.

This article was originally published at 12:15 p.m.

Here are the key events from day 1,359 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Friday, November 14:

Fighting

• Russian forces launched a “massive” attack on Kyiv early on Friday, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, with air defences in action and a series of explosions reported in the capital.
• Klitschko said falling debris had struck a five-storey apartment building in Dniprovskyi district on the east side of the Dnipro River, and a high-rise dwelling was on fire in Podil district on the opposite bank.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited troops near Ukraine’s southeastern front line, where he warned of the need to shore up defences after his troops lost ground in increasingly high-intensity battles far from Russia’s main offensive in the east of the country.
• President Zelenskyy said the situation near the city of Orikhiv in the Zaporizhia region was “one of the most difficult” along a sprawling front line and that thwarting Russian forces there was key to shielding Zaporizhzhia city.
• Ukraine’s military said its troops hit a Russian oil terminal in occupied Crimea and also an oil depot in the occupied Zaporizhia region.
• The Ukrainian General Staff said Russian oil facilities and other military targets were hit by domestically produced weapons, including the “Flamingo” ground-launched cruise missile, drone missiles, and drones.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence said its forces have captured two more Ukrainian settlements: Synelnykove in the Kharkiv region and Danylivka in the Dnipropetrovsk region.
• Russian air defence units destroyed and intercepted 130 Ukrainian drones overnight over Russia, the state-run TASS news agency reports, citing daily data from the Defence Ministry in Moscow.

Peace talks

• The Kremlin said Ukraine would have to negotiate an end to the war “sooner or later” and predicted that Kyiv’s negotiating position would worsen by the day.
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said he hoped Washington would take no actions liable to escalate the Ukraine conflict.
• Lavrov said United States President Donald Trump had long advocated dialogue with Russia, had sought to fully understand the Russian position on Ukraine and “demonstrated a commitment to finding a sustainable peaceful solution”.
• “We are counting on common sense and that the maintaining of that position will prevail in Washington and that they will refrain from actions that could escalate the conflict to a new level,” Lavrov said.

Ukraine energy scandal

• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and President Zelenskyy have discussed the $100m energy corruption scandal that has engulfed Kyiv, the German government said in a statement.
• Zelenskyy pledged complete transparency, long-term support for independent anticorruption authorities and further swift measures to regain the trust of the Ukrainian people, European partners and international donors, the statement said.
• Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko also announced an audit of all state-owned companies, including in the energy sector, following the scandal that has led to the suspension of two cabinet ministers.
• The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) said it is lending 22.3m euros ($26m) to a Ukrainian energy firm as part of a pipeline of deals, signalling its ongoing support for the sector despite the corruption scandal.
• The EBRD cash will go to private Ukrainian energy company Power One to finance new gas-piston power plants and battery energy storage systems, the lender said in a statement.

Aid to Ukraine

• The International Monetary Fund (IMF) will soon begin a staff mission to Ukraine to discuss its financing needs and a potential new lending programme, IMF spokesperson Julie Kozack said.
• Ukraine is in talks with the IMF about a new four-year lending programme for the country that would replace its current four-year $15.5bn programme. Ukraine has already received $10.6bn of that amount.
• European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the European Parliament that the European Union could either borrow the money needed to cover Kyiv’s financial needs in 2026 and 2027 against the collateral of its long-term budget, or each EU country could borrow on its own and extend a grant to Ukraine.
• A third option was a proposal from the Commission to organise a loan that would effectively become a grant, on the basis of the Russian central bank assets frozen in the EU. European finance ministers agreed that funding Ukraine with a reparations loan based on immobilised Russian assets would be the most “effective” of the three options being considered.
• Europe’s top development banks and Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz signed a deal to provide an EU grant of 127 million euros ($127m) in additional funding to the firm, on top of a 300 billion euro loan ($349bn) it outlined last month to secure Ukraine’s natural gas supply, amid the ongoing attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure by Russia.
• Nordic and Baltic countries will together contribute $500m to the Prioritised Ukraine Requirements List arms initiative, their defence ministers said in a joint statement.

Russian sanctions

• About 1.4 million barrels per day of Russian oil, or almost a third of the country’s seaborne exporting potential, remain in tankers as unloading slows due to US sanctions against energy firms Rosneft and Lukoil, according to US financial services firm JPMorgan.
• Bulgaria’s parliament has overruled a presidential veto on legislation allowing the government to take control of Lukoil’s oil refinery and sell it to shield the asset from looming US sanctions.
• Bulgarian President Rumen Radev had attempted to veto a move by lawmakers giving a government-appointed commercial manager powers to oversee the continued operation of Lukoil’s refinery in Bulgaria beyond November 21, when the US sanctions are due to take effect, and to sell the company if needed.
• Russia’s Port Alliance group, which operates a network of sea cargo terminals, said foreign hackers had targeted its systems over three days in a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack and an attempted hack.
• The group said critical elements of its digital infrastructure had been targeted with the aim of disrupting export shipments of coal and mineral fertilisers at its sea terminals in the Baltic, Black Sea, Far East and Arctic regions. The attack was successfully repelled, and operations remained unaffected, Port Alliance said.

The head of the UN migration agency says more than 10 million people have been forced to flee their homes in Sudan because of the war between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The agency says humanitarian operations in North Darfur are on the brink of collapse.

IOM chief calls for ceasefire to allow aid groups to reach Sudanese civilians trapped in war-torn Darfur region.

The head of the United Nations’ migration agency has called for a ceasefire and a humanitarian corridor to help tens of thousands of civilians trapped in el-Fasher, the city in Sudan’s Darfur region that fell to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) last month.

Amy Pope, director-general of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that “the primary concern is getting access” to residents who have been largely cut off from humanitarian aid and services in el-Fasher.

“When humanitarian actors are themselves at risk – when they’re killed, when they’re shot, when they’re detained – we can’t get the people what they need to survive,” Pope said.

“The primary issue is ensuring that there is a ceasefire, a humanitarian corridor, so that aid groups can bring in that aid to the civilians who are very much caught in the middle.”

Human rights groups have accused the RSF, which has been battling the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) for control of Sudan since April 2023, of committing widescale massacres in its capture of el-Fasher on October 26.

While thousands of residents remain stuck in el-Fasher, the capital of Sudan’s North Darfur state, nearly 90,000 others have fled since the RSF’s takeover, according to the latest IOM figures.

On Wednesday, Pope said displaced families have described dangerous journeys out of el-Fasher.

“They spoke about seeing dead bodies as they walked. They spoke about having to create makeshift trenches to avoid being shot at, or being harmed by the drones. They spoke of unspeakable, unbearable, sexual trauma [and] sexual abuse,” she said.

“The stories are really harrowing, and they’re happening now even as we speak.”

Her comments come a day after the IOM warned that humanitarian aid efforts in Sudan were “on the brink of collapse” due to continued insecurity and a lack of funding.

“Warehouses are nearly empty, aid convoys face significant insecurity, and access restrictions continue to prevent the delivery of sufficient aid,” the agency said in a statement, noting that violence is also spreading to other parts of the country.

Nearly 39,000 people have fled intense fighting in North Kordofan state, east of el-Fasher, between October 26 and November 9, the IOM said.

Meanwhile, Anna Mutavati, the regional director for East and Southern Africa at UN Women, told reporters this week that women and girls who fled el-Fasher now face serious threats of sexual violence in displacement camps around the city.

“What the women tell us is that … every step that they’ve taken – to fetch water, to collect firewood, or to stand in a food line – is carrying a high risk of sexual violence,” Mutavati said during a news conference in Geneva on Tuesday.

“There is mounting evidence that rape is being deliberately and systematically used as a weapon of war,” she added.

“Women’s bodies … have just become a crime scene in Sudan.”

FORGET who will be the next Bond or AI taking over acting.

There’s currently a bigger issue that’s tearing Hollywood in two… and standing in the middle of it is a doe-eyed firebrand named Sydney Sweeney, who might – or might not – know exactly what she’s doing.

Over the past few months, Sydney, 28, has found herself in the eye of a raging public storm, thanks to never-ending questions over her social and political leanings, and her unapologetic refusal to set the record straight. 

On the one side, we have fans, mostly on the right, praising their “anti-woke warrior” after she chose not to comment on or apologise for her controversial American Eagle advert. 

On the other, the woke corner of the internet accuses her and the commercial – which plays on saying she has “good jeans/genes” – of having a Nazi-like stance on eugenics. 

So, the fact that she hasn’t desperately begged for forgiveness in the wake of all the frenzy and outrage is music to woke-fatigued ears.

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Add to that the fact that Sydney’s been revealed to be a registered Republican and a MAGA supporter – with President Donald Trump himself publicly praising her – and it’s no surprise she’s copping flak to go with her fandom. 

In the past week, whether coincidental or not, her Oscar-touted biopic Christy has definitively bombed at the box office, making a paltry $1.3million in the US in its opening weekend.

Now, no one knows what to think. Has the young budding starlet, who could have been Hollywood’s next leading lady, shot herself in her genetically blessed foot? Or is this all just a storm in a teacup?

The jury’s still out, but for every commenter yelling “anti-woke warrior”, there’s another shouting “white supremacist!”

Yes, Sydney’s swiftly becoming the most polarising thing since pineapple on pizza.

And that’s before you consider her other public stunts – including, but not limited to, her overtly sexual self-branding and her apparent romance with another very controversial character in Scooter Braun.

Scooter, 44, is the disgraced record executive who people’s princess Taylor Swift called a “manipulative bully” after he bought the rights to her first six albums and blocked her performing some of the songs.

He’s also had very public fall-outs with his former protegés Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande and Demi Lovato.

With all this in mind, getting into bed – so to speak – with such a figure may not do Sydney any favours. But does she care? 

Fresh fury

Last week, the star caused fury again, after speaking to GQ to promote her new movie Christy, in which she plays the boxer Christy Martin. 

During the – at times – uncomfortable chat, the topic turned to all the noise surrounding the alleged white supremacist undertones of her American Eagle “good jeans” ad. 

The interviewer began: “White people shouldn’t joke about genetic superiority; that was the conversation. Since we’re talking about this, I just wanted to give you an opportunity to talk about that situation specifically.”

Seemingly unfussed, Sydney simply replied: “I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear.”

Elsewhere in the Q&A, she said: “I did a jean ad. I mean, the reaction definitely was a surprise, but I love jeans. All I wear are jeans. I’m literally in jeans and a T-shirt every day of my life.” 

As for President Trump’s praise for the jeans campaign – he called it “the hottest ad ever” specifically after hearing that Sydney was a registered Republican – the actress remained coy. She simply responded that his endorsement was “surreal”. 

Again, the masses were divided. Fans – and some loyal celebrity friends – spoke out in defence of the Euphoria star.

Sydney’s former Anyone But You co-star Glen Powell called the public indignation over the ad “bulls***”, while Amanda Seyfried – who’s starring in the upcoming movie The Housemaid alongside Sydney – commented under one of her posts: “You Kill. Brave and true.”

She’s also been publicly supported by Euphoria co-star Maud Apatow and fellow lightning rod Nicola Peltz-Beckham, who have both liked her Instagram posts over the past week.

Woke backlash

But then, there are the celebrities who have no time at all for Sydney’s supposed alt-right politics – and they’re letting it be known. 

In response to YouTuber Jupiter Baal’s video – shared to Instagram – in which he chastised the actress and said, “She was given an opportunity to push back, she didn’t, therefore she’s in on it”, actress Christina Ricci responded: “100%” .

Likewise, fellow The White Lotus star Aimee-Lou Wood made her own feelings known – posting a vomit emoji under a post that talked about the now notorious ad. 

According to insiders, Sydney’s Euphoria co-star Zendaya is refusing to speak to her co-worker, and she won’t be associated with her in any capacity…which makes their future promo trail for season three of Euphoria tricky. 

“It’s a difficult position for Zendaya to be in,” a source told Mail Online this week. “Because if she even stands next to Sydney on the red carpet, it can be read as her excusing Sydney’s views on Trump and her refusal to apologise for the racist ad.” 

I did a jean ad. I mean, the reaction definitely was a surprise, but I love jeans. All I wear are jeans.

Sydney Sweeney

Then, there’s model and actress Ruby Rose, who went apoplectic on Tuesday in response to a post shared by Sydney.

Earlier in the week, Sydney had reflected on the film’s box office failure, telling her followers: “We don’t always just make art for numbers, we make it for impact. And Christy has been the most impactful project of my life.”

But Ruby – who had previously been cast in the project before being let go – was having nothing of it, writing in a scathing Threads post: “Everyone had experience with the core material. Most of us were actually gay [like Christy]. It’s part of why I stayed in acting. Losing roles happens all the time.

“For her PR to talk about it flopping and saying SS [Sydney Sweeney] did it for the ‘people’. None of the ‘people’ want to see someone who hates them, parading around pretending to be us. You’re a cretin and you ruined the film. Period. Christy deserved better.”

She later doubled down in her comments again, calling Sydney a “psychopath”.

Joining the anti-Sydney brigade, Downton Abbey actor Dan Stevens reshared a post which read: “Sydney Sweeney’s GQ interview is a reminder that ‘not having a stance’ on white supremacy is 100% having a stance on white supremacy.”

So, what’s the strategy? And is there even one to begin with?

Brand and culture expert Nick Ede is unconvinced. Speaking exclusively to The Sun, he says that – whether it’s naivety or not –  Sydney’s not helping her career prospects, proven by the fact that her most recent film flopped. 

He explains: “She’s a young girl – she’s making a lot of money, but this proves she’s not a box office draw.

“That not only goes towards her movie career, but her brand deals too, and suggests that the equity she had really isn’t there anymore.

“She might decide to write an autobiography at this early age and be really honest about her opinions and how she felt. And that’s always a cathartic way of getting your story across and winning the affection of the public again. 

“But I think she’s almost too big now to be a character in a film or a show. You just go and see Sweeney and that can be really detrimental to her in the future.”

No backing down

All evidence so far suggests that apologising for herself is the one thing Sydney’s not willing to do. 

Last year, she teasingly wore a T-shirt that read: “Sorry for having great tits and correct opinions”. 

The suggestion was that she knew that people were writing her off as an overtly sexualised starlet – but that she was laughing all the way to the bank.

What’s more, in her most recent GQ interview, she again hinted at her secret shrewdness. 

She said: “I think as time goes on, people will see that I’m way more aware of things than people think.”

Then, in response to the interviewer’s claim that – by not speaking more about her intentions – she’s giving us permission to “keep taking what you do and putting it up on our board of ‘What does Sydney think?’ the actress remained non-committal. 

“I can’t wait to see what the board says,” she deadpanned. 

Last laugh

Sweeney has also got billionaire Jeff Bezos in her corner, who’s reportedly invested “seed money” into a private equity business that will help Sydney launch her very own lingerie line soon. 

Now that Jeff’s Amazon Prime empire has the rights to the James Bond franchise, his admiration for the actress might just clinch her that ultimate prize of being the next Bond girl.

In which case, again, this could all be nothing but hot air surrounding her supposed demise – and prove she might have the last laugh anyway.

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One thing we do know is that Sydney’s not about to go on some self-flagellating apology tour anytime soon. 

Love her or hate her, like Marmite, she’s here to stay. 

Undated video circulating on social media shows Russian troops moving through dense fog in Pokrovsk as Moscow steps up efforts to reinforce positions. Ukraine says around 300 Russian soldiers are in the town and are trying to push north to encircle the area.

Iran states it has more missiles now than it had during the 12 Day War with Israel. While the accuracy of that claim is questionable, experts who follow Tehran’s missile program say that the country has ramped up production in an effort to have its arsenal ready to overwhelm Israeli missile defenses, which were degraded during the war. All this comes amid growing concerns about a new conflict over Iran’s nuclear program.

“Our missile power today far surpasses that of the 12-Day War,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi recently proclaimed. “The enemy in the recent 12-day war failed to achieve all its objectives and was defeated.”

“Iran’s defense production has improved both in quantity and quality compared to before the 12-day Israeli-imposed war in June,” Brig. Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh, the country’s defense minister, said on Monday.

Meanwhile, Iranian officials have told Ali Vaez, the Iran project director at the International Crisis Group, that “missile factories are working 24 hours a day,” The New York Times reported. Vaez added that if there is another war, “they hope to fire 2,000 at once to overwhelm Israeli defenses, not 500 over 12 days” as they did in June. “Israel feels the job is unfinished and sees no reason not to resume the conflict, so Iran is doubling down preparedness for the next round.”

While “it’s not clear exactly how many missiles in a larger volley the Islamic Republic may choose to fire, there is no doubt that they may still try to find a way to overwhelm either interceptors or dependent sites with a greater number of projectiles fired at once,” Vaez added.

In addition to increasing the number of missiles it is producing, Iran is also applying lessons learned from the 12-Day War to improve their effectiveness, Behnam Ben Taleblu, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) think tank, told TWZ.

“The Islamic Republic also learned how to fire less and get more bang for your buck based on the targets and based on the location and based on the firing sequence, or the launch formula, that the regime employed when it fired for some bases that were further east in Iran during the 12-Day War,” he explained. “There is no doubt the regime wants to improve the lethality of its missile force. It certainly has learned a lot between Operation True Promise One, True Promise Two and True Promise Three.”

During the conflict, Iran claimed it used what it calls the Fattah-1 medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM). Authorities in Iran explicitly touted those, the Haj Qassem and Kheibar Shekan, as offering high terminal maneuverability and/or high speeds specifically intended to reduce their vulnerability to missile defense interceptors. You can see videos claiming to show Fattah-1 missiles hitting Israel.

While it is unclear exactly what mix of new missiles Iran is building, increasing the production of higher-speed, more survivable ones would be a problem for Israel, given their increased ability to pierce missile defenses.

Improving the overall effectiveness of their ballistic missile barrages is clearly a top priority for Tehran, just as defending against future attacks is for Israel. As we previously noted, Iran launched 631 missiles during the 12-Day War, of which 500 reached Israel, according to assertions made by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Of those missiles that did land on Israeli soil, 243 hit open areas, requiring no air defense response. A total of 36 missiles hit populated areas, while 221 missiles were intercepted. That represented an 86% success rate, the Israeli analysis claimed. We cannot independently verify the details provided by Israel.

Still, having to fire so many interceptors placed a huge strain on Israel’s vaunted integrated air and missile defense system (IADS), according to several published reports, which the IDF denied. The U.S. expended many advanced interceptors during the onslaught, as well.

“U.S. and Israeli defenses were stretched thin and vast numbers of interceptors were needed to defend against Iran’s ragged retaliation,” the Foreign Policy Research Institute concluded.

Beyond interceptions, Israel managed to destroy a significant number of Iran’s launchers during its aerial interdiction campaign over Iran, as well as temporarily blocking or destroying missile storage sites, and disrupting command and control of Iranian missile forces during the war, greatly reducing Tehran’s ability to get off shots. It is unknown how many missiles were destroyed on the ground during the war and how many were left untouched.

“Iran also has learned about its vulnerabilities, and it is seeking to build back better, as safely as possible,” Taleblu suggested. “But the rate and the speed at which it rebuilds, probably in the short term, may outpace the rate and the speed at which Israel is rearming to defend itself.”

We detailed the overall battle of attrition between Iranian standoff weapons and Israeli (and U.S.) air defenses during the war. What is happening after the conflict is part of a broader issue with missile defense — the enemy can, and usually does, seek to outproduce the defensive capacity of the missile shield, and usually can at a lower comparative cost.

You can read more about Israel’s IADS in our deep dive here.

Iranian officials say concerns about their missiles, as well as their nuclear energy program, are being used as a pretext for possible future attacks.

“What does this issue have to do with the West that it feels entitled to comment on the range of Iran’s missiles?” Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council Ali Larijani rhetorically asked on Monday. “No country has the right to interfere in the independent defensive capabilities of another nation.”

As it works to rebuild its missile arsenal, Iran is getting help from China.

“European intelligence sources say several shipments of sodium perchlorate, the main precursor in the production of the solid propellant that powers Iran’s mid-range conventional missiles, have arrived from China to the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas,” CNN reported late last month. 

The shipments, containing some 2,000 tons of sodium perchlorate, began arriving on Sept. 29, the cable network explained. They were bought by Iran from Chinese suppliers in the wake of the war.

“The purchases are believed to be part of a determined effort to rebuild the Islamic Republic’s depleted missile stocks,” the news outlet added. “Several of the cargo ships and Chinese entities involved are under sanctions from the United States.”

“China is appearing to play a key role here by providing precursor chemicals that do go into solid propellant, rocket fuel, and oxidizer,” Taleblu observed.

Beyond assisting Iran’s offensive missile capabilities, China is reportedly considering a deal to give Tehran advanced HQ-9 air defense systems to help make up for those destroyed by Israel during the 12-Day War. While Iran’s long-range weapons arsenal are often the focus, rebuilding the country’s air defenses is also clearly a top priority after Israel quickly obtained air supremacy over the country.

The issue of new Iranian missile production comes against the backdrop of concerns that Tehran has developed a new facility to continue what U.S. officials claim is its nuclear weapons ambitions. The U.S. says it destroyed a great deal of Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons during June’s Operation Midnight Hammer, in which U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bombers dropped 14 30,000-pound GBU-57/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) bunker buster bombs on Iran’s Fordow and Natanz nuclear facilities. A U.S. nuclear-powered, guided missile (SSGN) submarine in the Central Command Area of Responsibility launched more than two dozen Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles against key surface infrastructure targets at Isfahan, officials added.

However, as The New York Times noted, Iran “appears to be continuing to work on a new enrichment site known as Pickaxe Mountain. It has refused to give international inspectors access to that site or any other suspected nuclear sites other than those already declared.”

The result “is a dangerous stalemate — with no negotiations, no certainty over Iran’s stockpile, no independent oversight,” the newspaper explained. “And many in the Gulf believe that makes another Israeli attack on Iran almost inevitable, given Israeli officials’ long-held view that Iran’s nuclear program is an existential threat.”

The pace of Iran’s missile development could be a large factor for the timing of any future conflict with Israel, Taleblu told us.

“There is a race to build back better. For Israel, it’s interceptors. For the Islamic Republic of Iran, it’s medium-range ballistic missiles,” Taleblu posited. “The fuzzy math between the two may determine the time when the next round between Israel and Iran takes place.”

Contact the author: [email protected]

Speaking at this year’s COP30 in Brazil, UN chief Antonio Guterres called the inability to limit global warming to 1.5C (2.7F) a “deadly moral failure”.

But does the same apply when it comes to protecting the environment in conflict?

Israel’s two-year war on Gaza has created 61 million tonnes of rubble, with nearly a quarter contaminated with asbestos and other hazardous materials.

And scientists warn that Israel’s use of water, food and energy as weapons of war in Gaza has left farmland and ecosystems facing irreversible collapse.

In Syria, President Ahmed al-Sharaa has cited his country’s worst drought in more than six decades as evidence of accelerating climate change and warned that it could hinder Syria’s post-war recovery.

So, why isn’t conflict seen as a climate issue? And why is the environmental toll of war so often ignored?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests: Kate Mackintosh – deputy chair of the Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide

Elaine Donderer – disaster risk specialist

Farai Maguwu – director of the Zimbabwe-based Centre for Natural Resource Governance

Ukraine says European allies can give up some of their Patriot missile systems now and get future deliveries.

Most regions of Ukraine are undergoing scheduled power outages amid a new wave of attacks on energy sites by Russian drones and missiles.

Ukrenergo, the state-run electricity transmission systems operator in Ukraine, said the blackouts will last at least until the end of Monday as repairs are conducted on infrastructure damaged over the weekend and demand remains high as the onset of winter approaches.

The Poltava and Kharkiv regions are suffering from a deficit of high-voltage capacity after damage to their power transmission lines while the areas of Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhia, Kyiv and other central and northern regions have been affected as well.

According to Ukraine’s military, Russian forces used two air-launched ballistic missiles, five surface-to-air guided missiles and 67 drones, including those of Iranian design, during their attacks overnight into Monday.

The Ukrainian army did not report shooting down any of the missiles, but it said 52 of the drones were intercepted and the remaining 15 conducted strikes on nine locations.

Russia has maintained its attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure as United States-led diplomatic efforts to end the war make little progress. Ukraine has also been hitting Russian oil and fuel infrastructure in a stated effort to disrupt resources going to the front lines.

An explosion rocked Russia’s port town of Tuapse on the Black Sea overnight after Ukrainian forces launched sea drones towards the major oil terminal and refinery in the town. No casualties were reported.

Russia’s Ministry of Defence announced on Monday that four naval drones were destroyed near the port in the northeastern Black Sea.

It added that its air defences shot down six US-made HIMARS rockets and 124 fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles.

Ukraine wants Patriots from Europe

While calling for tougher sanctions and asset freezes to punish Russia, Ukraine is also looking to buy more arms.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Monday that Ukraine would like to order 25 Patriot air defence systems from US weapons makers as it tries to fend off Russian attacks at the brink of winter.

Zelenskyy acknowledged that the missile systems are expensive and such a large order could take years to manufacture. But he suggested that European countries could give their Patriots to Ukraine and await replacements, stressing that “we would not like to wait.”

Ukraine is also advancing with an internal drive with a stated aim of weeding out corruption in the energy sector.

The National Anti-Corruption Bureau announced on Monday that it was conducting searches in cooperation with a specialised anticorruption judicial office in premises connected to Tymur Mindich, a former business partner of the president.

Mindich, who reportedly fled before the searches, is coowner of Zelenskyy’s Kvartal 95 production company. The Anti-Corruption Bureau said the searches are in relation to a “high-level criminal organisation in the energy and defence sectors” that engaged in money laundering and illegal enrichment.

Here are the key events from day 1,355 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, November 10:

Fighting

• The Russian Ministry of Defence said its forces captured the Ukrainian settlement of Rybne in the southeastern Zaporizhia region.
• Fighting also continues in and around the city of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine. The rate of Russian advances in the strategic city “remains temporarily decreased” as Moscow’s forces slow ground activity “to extend logistics and bring up reinforcements to southern Pokrovsk”, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington, DC-based think tank.
• Elsewhere in Ukraine, repair crews were racing to restore power to thousands of people after Russian drone attacks on Saturday targeted energy infrastructure across the country.
• Ukraine’s central Poltava area, as well as the northeastern regions of Kharkiv and Sumy, were the hardest-hit, with 100,000 customers in Kharkiv alone without electricity, water and heating, Deputy Prime Minister for Restoration of Ukraine Oleksii Kuleba said on Sunday.
• Russia faced its own power outages after Ukraine struck back with drone and missile attacks, cutting power and heating to thousands of households in the Russian cities of Belgorod and Voronezh.

Politics and diplomacy

• In an interview with Russian state news agency RIA Novosti, Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov said that ending Moscow’s war on Ukraine is “impossible” without “fully taking into account Russia’s legitimate interests and addressing its root causes”.
• Lavrov added that discussions with the US were under way, but “not as rapidly as we would prefer”, noting that he was ready to meet face-to-face with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
• Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu travelled to Egypt for meetings with top officials, including President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Russia’s state TASS news agency reported, with plans to discuss “military and military-technical cooperation”.
• Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told reporters that the United States agreed to provide a “financial shield” to Hungary in the event of economic or budgetary pressures, though he did not explain further. The comments came after Hungary announced it had secured a one-year waiver from US sanctions on Russian oil and gas.

Sanctions

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv and its European partners were preparing a 20th package of sanctions on Russia.
• Ukraine will propose “including Russian legal entities and individuals that are still profiteering from energy resources”. The package is expected to be signed within a month, the president added.
• Zelenskyy also signed new Ukrainian sanctions against eight Russian individuals, including an FSB agent accused of “information sabotage” and financier Kirill Dmitriev, who runs Russia’s sovereign wealth fund and is President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy on international economic and investment cooperation.
• Another set of new sanctions will target five Russian businesses, including publishing houses engaged in “justifying aggression” and “spreading Russian propaganda worldwide”, Zelenskyy’s office said.

Regional security

• In Belgium, three drones were detected above the Doel nuclear power plant on Sunday evening, according to the Reuters news agency, the latest in a series of drone sightings that have prompted the temporary closure of two major airports over the past week.
• The United Kingdom said it plans to provide equipment and personnel to Belgium in light of the incidents. Air Chief Marshal Richard Knighton told the BBC broadcaster that while the source of the drones was not yet known, Russia has been involved in a pattern of “hybrid warfare” in recent years.

During the past several years, war scenarios and analyses issuing from Washington have hewed to a familiar but deceptively reassuring image of the future: one of an “absoluteness of reliance on technological superiority, precision initial strikes, and the illusion of a ‘quick victory’ as some sort of magic solution to crises like a Chinese attack on Taiwan.” This is arguably decisive and reassuring on the surface but is, on closer and realistic examination, a dangerous fantasy rather than a practical operational scenario. Not only is it wholly incompatible with the military, industrial, and political situation in which the United States currently finds itself, but it also conceals the danger of involving the world in a nuclear escalation and a prolonged conflict, which the United States cannot afford.

In reality, U.S. military strategists are faced with an insoluble dilemma: Insisting on the “quick victory” doctrine raises the chances of a preemptive nuclear response from Beijing to certainty. If they start preparing for a long, grinding war, the more important question becomes: Is the U.S., in terms of industry, military capability, and political will, even capable of it? The realistic answer is no—at least not on the scale that many American decision-makers imagine.

Most Pentagon war plans, accordingly, emphasize cyberattacks and long-range strikes against China’s command structures, communication hubs, logistical networks, and missile bases. Ideally, this would leave China paralyzed within days, with a collapsed will to fight. In the real world, this can backfire: hitting essential Chinese systems, the leadership in Beijing—operating under unprecedented isolation and pressure—might revert to “escalation vertically,” that is, the early use of nuclear weapons to sustain their deterrent.

China’s nuclear arsenal, though still smaller than that of the US, is growing rapidly. By 2040, estimates suggest, China could possess some 600 operational warheads, compared with the United States’s stockpile of about 3,700. This growing disparity could be driving Beijing toward a more perilous posture—one in which it resorts to using nuclear weapons before that option disappears. Most Chinese missile systems are dual-use, meaning they can be equipped with either conventional or nuclear warheads. A U.S. strike against DF-21 or DF-26 launchers might thus be viewed as an attack on the survivability of China’s nuclear deterrent and could invite a nuclear response.

This is far from theoretical. Recent Pentagon war games have set off alarms. In many of the simulations, U.S. anti-ship missile stocks are depleted in just days; long-range munitions, in two weeks. Even scenarios in which Taiwan, supported by the U.S. and Japan, resists Chinese aggression depict victories at a devastating cost: dozens of ships sunk, hundreds of aircraft destroyed, and thousands of U.S. casualties—numbers that the American public and policymakers could scarcely accept.

For a global power, effective strategy must correspond with the country’s real industrial, financial, and societal capacity. In recent decades, the U.S. has drastically reduced its military production capabilities while increasing dependence on foreign supply chains. The war in Ukraine has given a glimpse of how even modest arms support for allies can deplete critical stockpiles quickly. Imagine the strain should the U.S. fight a full-scale war with the world’s second-largest economy thousands of miles from its shores.

The problem goes far beyond military planning and munitions shortages. Domestically, the U.S. does not have political and social consensus with regard to defending Taiwan. In contrast with the Cold War era, when the Soviet threat unified the American public, today Americans feel much less that their vital interests in East Asia are at stake. In such a context, how could the public accept tens of thousands of casualties and astronomical costs to defend a small island?
It is during any protracted conflict that national will plays as important a role as weapons and technology. Without political unity, industrial capacity, and societal tolerance, technological superiority means nothing. Washington will continue to remain enmeshed in the same fantasy that has brought empires low: that technology and military power can somehow substitute for strategic judgment.

A way out of this deadlock is quite evident, but the political will is lacking. Firstly, the U.S. should recognize that technological superiority does not necessarily translate into strategic dominance. Secondly, if it is serious about defending Taiwan, it needs to start rebuilding industrial capacity now, expand munitions production lines, and level with its people about what war would really look and feel like. Thirdly, diplomacy and sustainable deterrence must be reinstated—not through threats or arms races, but through dialogue, crisis management, and reduction of the risk of miscalculation between Washington and Beijing.

If the U.S. keeps on fantasizing about a quick and cost-free victory, then it will not only face defeat on the battlefield but also push the world to the brink of a nuclear catastrophe. The ability to engage in war depends not only on the number of missiles and ships but also on political wisdom, economic capability, and a clear-eyed view of reality—three things the U.S. plainly lacks in its confrontation with China. It is time for Washington to wake up from its comforting illusions of power and face reality in terms of true strength—before it is too late.

People fleeing el-Fasher for Al Dabbah tell Al Jazeera many died on the way from wounds or lack of food.

A Sudanese medical organisation has accused the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of engaging in a “desperate attempt” to conceal evidence of mass killings in Darfur by burning bodies or burying them in mass graves.

The Sudan Doctors Network said on Sunday that paramilitaries are collecting “hundreds of bodies” from the streets of el-Fasher, in Sudan’s western Darfur region, after their bloody takeover of the city on October 26, saying the group’s crimes could not be “erased through concealment or burning”.

“What happened in el-Fasher is not an isolated incident but rather another chapter in a full-fledged genocide carried out by the RSF, blatantly violating all international and religious norms that prohibit the mutilation of corpses and guarantee the dead the right to a dignified burial,” it said in a statement.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that 82,000 of el-Fasher’s total population of 260,000 fled after the RSF seized the last Sudanese military stronghold in the region, amid reports of mass killings, rape, and torture. Many residents are believed to still be trapped.

Reporting from the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, Al Jazeera’s Hiba Morgan said many people fleeing el-Fasher for Al Dabbah in the north died on the road, “because they had no food or water, or because they sustained injuries as a result of gunfire”.

Morgan said that escapees told Al Jazeera they learned of the deaths of relatives from social media videos of their killings posted by RSF fighters. Several videos depicting extreme acts of violence have emerged in the public domain since the group overran the city.

Targeted ethnic killings

With the “communications blackout” in the city, many did not know what happened to their family members.

“They believe if their relatives are still alive inside el-Fasher, then they may not be so for long because of a lack of food and water… or because the RSF has been targeting people based on their ethnicities,” Morgan reported.

The RSF, which has been fighting the Sudanese army for control of Sudan since April 2023, traces its origins to the predominantly Arab, government-backed militia known as the “Janjaweed”, which has been accused of genocide in Darfur two decades ago.

Between 2003 and 2008, an estimated 300,000 people were killed, and nearly 2.7 million were displaced in campaigns of ethnic violence.

Sylvain Penicaud of Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, who spoke to civilians who fled el-Fasher for the town of Tawila, said many of those fleeing said they were “targeted because of the colour of their skin”.

“For me, the most terrifying part was [civilians] being hunted down while they were running for their lives; being attacked simply for being Black,” Penicaud said.

The Zaghawa, the dominant ethnic group in el-Fasher, has been fighting alongside the army since late 2023.

The group, which initially remained neutral when the war began, aligned with the military after the RSF carried out massacres against the Masalit tribe in West Darfur’s capital, el-Geneina, killing up to 15,000 people.

Hassan Osman, a university student from el-Fasher, said residents with darker skin, especially Zaghawa civilians, were subjected to “racial insults, humiliation, degradation and physical and psychological violence” as they fled.

“If your skin is light, they might let you go,” he said. “It’s purely ethnic.”

Here are the key events from day 1,354 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, November 9:

Fighting

• Russian forces fired more than 450 drones and 45 missiles at Ukraine overnight on Saturday, targeting its energy infrastructure and killing seven people, according to Ukrainian officials.
• Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said that Russian forces targeted substations that power two nuclear power plants in Khmelnytskyi and Rivne, and condemned Moscow for “deliberately endangering nuclear safety in Europe”.
• Energy facilities in Kyiv, Poltava and Kharkiv regions were also hit, disrupting the power and water supply for thousands of people, Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said.
• Ukrainian energy company Naftogaz said the attack on its gas infrastructure was the ninth since early October, according to the AFP news agency.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence confirmed launching “a massive strike with high-precision long-range air, ground and sea-based weapons” on weapon production and gas and energy facilities in response to Kyiv’s strikes on Russia.
• The ministry also said that Russian forces had taken more territory around the towns of Pokrovsk and Kupiansk, and captured the village of Volchye in eastern Ukraine.
• Russia’s TASS news agency, citing the Defence Ministry, said that Russian forces had shot down 15 Ukrainian drones over Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014, the Black Sea and Russia’s Rostov region on Saturday night. It also said Russian forces downed two guided bombs and 178 drones over the past day.
• TASS also reported another Ukrainian drone attack in Russia’s Belgorod region late on Saturday, and said at least 20,000 people were without power.

A rescue operation is underway in Dnipro. Overnight, Russia struck the city, hitting an apartment building. As of now, 11 people have been reported wounded, including children. Unfortunately, one person has been killed. My condolences to the family and loved ones. Dozens of… pic.twitter.com/TFUG3SjxpA

— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) November 8, 2025

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for Europe, the G7, and the United States to step up sanctions on Russia’s energy sector following its latest attack.
• “So far, Russia’s nuclear energy sector is not under sanctions, and the Russian military-industrial complex still obtains Western microelectronics. There must be greater pressure on its oil and gas trade as well,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.
• Sybiha, the Ukrainian foreign minister, meanwhile, called for the International Atomic Energy Agency to meet over the attacks on the substations supplying the nuclear power plants and address “these unacceptable risks”.
• Sybiha also called for India and China to put pressure on Moscow to stop its “reckless attacks that risk a catastrophic incident”.
• Hungary said it has secured an indefinite waiver from US sanctions on Russian oil and gas imports, as a White House official reiterated that the exemption was for only a period of one year.