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  • Egypt detains entire newsroom of leading fact-checking platform over ‘fake news’ allegations

    Egypt detains entire newsroom of leading fact-checking platform over ‘fake news’ allegations

    In a sweeping crackdown on independent media that press freedom advocates have labeled an unprecedented escalation against free expression in Egypt, security forces have detained every member of the full six-person editorial team of Matsada2sh, one of the country’s last remaining independent fact-checking outlets. The raids, carried out at the journalists’ private homes across September 28 and 29, targeted all staff of the outlet, whose name translates to “Don’t Believe” in English, founded in 2018 to debunk misleading and false information spread by both government and opposition sources. The detained journalists are identified as Mohamed Ashraf Abu Emeira, Abdallah Qadry, Islam Barakat, Omar Helal, Mohamed Mahmoud, and Mohamed Adel.

    Following the arrests, the total number of journalists currently held in Egyptian detention has risen to 24. Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a leading international press freedom watchdog, emphasized that this incident marks a historic first for Egypt: the detention of an entire functioning newsroom. The organization also condemned Egyptian authorities for refusing to disclose the whereabouts of the six detained journalists, a practice that RSF notes violates Egypt’s own constitution despite being common in the country. It is typical for detained Egyptian journalists to be held incommunicado, or forcibly disappeared, for days before they are officially charged and presented to a judicial body, RSF added.

    Multiple human rights organizations have confirmed that during the early morning raids, security personnel seized not only the mobile phones and laptop computers belonging to the six journalists, but also the personal electronic devices of their family members who live at the raided properties. Importantly, officers did not present any formal arrest warrants to the journalists or their families at the time of the raids, and would not answer questions about where the detainees were being transported.

    Days later, Egypt’s interior ministry released an official statement confirming the detentions, and leveled a series of accusations against the outlet and its team. The ministry claimed Matsada2sh operates as an unlicensed media platform managed from outside of Egypt’s borders, intentionally spreads disinformation, and maintains unlawful ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt’s largest historical opposition movement, has been banned as a terrorist organization under the administration of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi since 2014. This is not the first time the outlet has faced government action: one of its editors was arrested on similar charges in 2023, though he was released just two days after being detained.

    The detentions have drawn widespread condemnation from the global human rights and independent journalism community. A joint statement signed by more than 80 rights organizations and independent media outlets underscored that independent journalism is a cornerstone of any free society, and argued that the Egyptian government’s ongoing suppression of free expression directly contradicts its stated public commitments to open dialogue, governmental transparency, anti-corruption efforts, and regional leadership. The statement called the crackdown on Matsada2sh an alarming escalation against independent media that must not be tolerated.

    Abdelrahman Mansour, a co-founder of Matsada2sh who currently resides outside of Egypt, told the Associated Press this week that the detained journalists’ families still have no information about their loved ones’ location or condition. “Everyone on this team knew the risks when they went to work every day, but it’s unacceptable for the government to make false accusations and forcibly disappear journalists just because they’re afraid of a free press,” Mansour told AP. “Their families are worried, we’re worried, we just want them released unharmed.”

  • Toilet seats, toys and hair clips: The strangest items Israel still barred from Gaza

    Toilet seats, toys and hair clips: The strangest items Israel still barred from Gaza

    For 48-year-old Palestinian displaced mother Dima Awad, moving out of a rain-prone makeshift tent before the winter cold and wet season arrives hinges on one simple, increasingly unattainable item: a toilet seat.

    Awad, who now lives with her only son after being separated from her husband when he left Gaza for medical treatment during the ongoing conflict, has already paid rent on a small garage in western Gaza City and moved most of her few belongings into the space. But the unfit structure lacks a working bathroom, and she has been searching unsuccessfully for two weeks for an affordable toilet seat to complete the basic conversion.

    “Of course there is no way to find a new toilet seat at an affordable price right now. The second-hand options are also unsuitable, and still far out of my budget,” Awad explained to Middle East Eye. Current market prices for the scarce basic fixture now run between 1,500 and 2,000 Israeli shekels, or $486 to $648 — more than twice the 600 shekel ($194) monthly rent Awad pays for the garage. She had chosen the space after finding all other available housing completely unaffordable, and hoped to avoid repeating last year’s experience of sleeping in a flooded tent as winter rains poured through.

    The scarcity of toilet seats in Gaza is no accident. For nearly 20 years, Israel has enforced a blockade on the besieged enclave, barring or restricting entry to hundreds of everyday items classified as “dual-use” goods that Israel claims could be repurposed for military activity. The restricted list has long included core civilian necessities: construction materials, water and sewage pumps, electrical equipment, generators, medical devices, and even mobility aids like wheelchairs and crutches.

    When the large-scale conflict began in October 2023, Israel sealed Gaza’s border crossings entirely and drastically cut the flow of all commercial and humanitarian goods, including food, medicine, and fuel. A ceasefire agreement reached in October 2025 required Israel to lift restrictions and allow unimpeded entry to international aid — but nearly a year later, the vast majority of restrictions remain in place.

    Aid workers refer to the unpublicized roster of banned items as a “ghost list”: hundreds of goods have been added to the restricted roster since Israel last published an updated public list in 2017, leaving traders and aid groups to navigate an opaque system where shipments can be rejected without clear explanation. The ban extends far beyond construction and medical materials to include mundane, everyday items that most of the world takes for granted: batteries, lighters, children’s toys, and even hair clips.

    Imad Sersawi, a 45-year-old father of five displaced from Gaza’s Shujaiya neighborhood, says the constant disappearance of goods from local markets has made daily survival an unpredictable struggle. A single disposable lighter, a critical tool for families cooking over open fires, now costs 90 shekels ($29) and is rarely found in stock. Sersawi’s lighter is shared by the entire displacement camp whenever anyone needs to start a fire.

    “One day you find something; the next day it’s banned and disappears for God knows how long. Some things haven’t been allowed in for years,” Sersawi said. He promised his children new toys once the war ended, but even after the ceasefire, toys remain banned. Existing pre-war stock is sold at exorbitant prices: a small rubber ball now costs 100 shekels ($32), enough to feed his entire family for two days. “People outside Gaza might say that basic necessities are missing and that we are focusing on these secondary things. But the fact is that we are being left without either the essentials or the non-essentials,” he explained.

    The shortage of ordinary goods has also eroded small, routine comforts for Gazan women, many of whom live in crowded displacement camps with limited access to basic personal items. Palestinian journalist Baidaa Othman, who remains displaced in Deir al-Balah after her Gaza City home was destroyed, recently traveled across two governorates just to find a simple hair claw clip, eventually paying 10 times the original pre-conflict price. A clip that once cost 4 shekels ($1.3) set her back 45 shekels ($14.5).

    “Now it’s not just about being able to get the basic necessities. It has reached a point where, when you want to buy something very simple, you have to go to extraordinary lengths to find it,” Othman said. “Even the simplest things as basic as a hair clip have become difficult to find. On top of all the basic necessities that are unavailable in Gaza, now the everyday things that no one would normally think twice about have become unavailable.”

    Palestinian physiotherapist Sojood Hasan noted that while a missing hair clip does not cause immediate physical harm, the constant lack of even small, routine items wears away at Gazans’ sense of control over their own lives. For Othman, the shortage of ordinary goods is a deliberate policy, not a random side effect of conflict.

    “On top of the displacement and all the hardships we face, including having to cook with firewood, it’s only natural for women to want to put their hair up to keep it off their faces and necks in the heat. So it’s not a secondary item any more,” she said. “The Israeli occupation knows exactly what it is doing. This is not random; it is a policy of making even the simplest things a struggle for Gazans.”

  • Can Baghdad gain control over paramilitary groups amid US war on Iran?

    Can Baghdad gain control over paramilitary groups amid US war on Iran?

    Following the formal exit of the US-led military coalition from Iraqi territory in late September 2026, Baghdad has launched an ambitious, high-stakes effort to rein in the country’s sprawling network of powerful paramilitary groups under greater state oversight – a process that demands careful navigation of clashing domestic power dynamics and competing foreign interests between Washington, Tehran and regional stakeholders.

    Unlike a straightforward full disarmament campaign, the initiative crafted by Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi focuses on curbing the independent operational autonomy of armed factions, bringing unregulated weaponry under state management, and integrating eligible fighters into formal Iraqi government security structures. Zaidi has set a firm completion deadline of June 30, 2027, for the full rollout of the plan.

    The entire framework is built on a phased approach that kicked off alongside the US coalition withdrawal. The opening 90-day window, which launched September 30, mandates a full cessation of unauthorized military activity by all paramilitary groups. In a reciprocal agreement, the US has committed to halting unilateral military strikes against Iraqi armed groups in Iraqi territory – a marked shift from years of repeated US attacks on Iran-aligned paramilitary bases, most notably a joint US-Saudi strike on Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) targets in July 2026 that killed at least 20 fighters.

    After the 90-day de-escalation period concludes, factions – many of which already hold embedded positions within Iraq’s state security apparatus through the PMF network – will begin the process of transferring control of their weapons to government authorities. Former Iraqi prime minister and State of Law Coalition leader Nouri al-Maliki clarified in early September that the initiative is not traditional disarmament, but rather state-led containment and regulation of arms. The primary focus will fall on weapons used for cross-border and unilateral attacks on foreign and domestic targets, rather than all military hardware held by factions.

    A core strategic goal of the plan is to eliminate the ability of paramilitary groups to launch unapproved military action outside Iraq’s borders, a practice that has repeatedly dragged Iraq into dangerous regional escalation. Recent examples include drone strikes on Israel during the Gaza war and repeated attacks on US interests amid heightened US-Iran tensions, both of which put Iraq at risk of being drawn into broader, unwanted conflict.

    Another key provision of Zaidi’s plan calls for integrating fighters from non-PMF aligned paramilitary factions as individuals into state security ranks, rather than allowing the groups to preserve their existing independent command structures. In a late September interview, Zaidi stated his clear objective: “to end the existence of these factions as independent entities.”

    For armed groups to accept limits on their autonomy and offensive capabilities, however, Baghdad must meet a set of non-negotiable demands to protect their political and economic interests. Iraq’s paramilitary landscape is fractured, with factions holding varying degrees of proximity to Iran, and wielding vastly different levels of political influence and economic power across the country – internal dynamics that will shape every step of negotiations between the groups and the central government.

    Already, some moderate factions have signaled willingness to comply. Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH) and Kataeb Imam Ali announced back in June that they would place their arms under state control. For AAH, though, long-term compliance remains tied to guarantees that the group will retain its existing economic influence and the parliamentary seats held by its affiliated Sadiqoon political bloc.

    Hardline factions that have led recent attacks on US interests under the banner of the Islamic Resistance of Iraq (IRI), including Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Kataeb Hezbollah, initially refused any disarmament, citing remaining foreign military presence in Iraq as a core justification for retaining independent arms. But by late August, the groups put forward their own conditions for participating in the process, and on the day of the US coalition withdrawal, Kataeb Hezbollah announced it would halt all military activity except for defensive actions against hostile aircraft – a move that aligns broadly with Zaidi’s opening phase of de-escalation.

    Some key demands from hardline factions have already seen progress. On October 1, Turkey announced it would transfer control of the Bashiqa-Zelikan military camp near Mosul back to the Iraqi government under a agreed timeline and mechanism, fulfilling a core demand for the withdrawal of Turkish forces from northern Iraq. Parallel efforts are also underway to remove Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) forces from the region, another key request from paramilitary groups.

    Even with these early wins, Baghdad faces significant barriers to meeting all of the factions’ demands. The IRI has called for ending what it describes as US “hegemony” over Iraq’s political and economic decision-making, pointing to the long-standing arrangement that has held Iraq’s oil revenues in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York since 2003, with monthly dollar transfers to Baghdad. Many IRI-affiliated groups have also demanded strengthening Iraqi air defenses and barring foreign aircraft from using Iraqi airspace to launch strikes on neighboring countries, particularly Iran.

    Any resumption of US strikes on Iranian targets, especially during the critical 90-day de-escalation window, risks derailing the entire integration process and pushing hardline factions into open conflict with Baghdad. Ultimately, the success of Zaidi’s initiative hinges on his ability to balance the competing demands of Iraqi paramilitary groups and the United States, the foreign power that has wielded significant influence over Iraqi politics since the 2003 invasion.

    Critical details of the plan remain unresolved: the exact scope of state control over weapons, how far the government will go in dismantling independent faction command structures, and what role participating groups will hold within formal state institutions are still subject to negotiation. For the process to move forward, all key parties must avoid maximalist positions that would bring negotiations to a stall, analysts note.

    Mustafa al-Saray, research director at Baghdad-based think tank the Bayan Centre for Strategic Studies, explained that while Washington has not publicly opposed Zaidi’s proposal or the militias’ core demands, clear clarification of US red lines is required to build trust. “Similarly, even though most of these militias appear receptive to Zaidi’s plan, there is always a chance that Tehran objects to the process, and this would also change the negotiation process in Iraq,” Saray told Middle East Eye.

    Iran-aligned factions have already demonstrated their willingness to challenge Baghdad policies they oppose. In late September, the Iraqi government suspended all flights to Iran after the US announced sweeping new secondary sanctions on Iran’s aviation sector. After a senior Kataeb Hezbollah security official warned that Zaidi’s government could be “brought down”, Washington granted a one-month sanctions waiver to allow continued flights between Iran and the Shia holy city of Najaf, highlighting the outsized influence factions hold over Iraqi policy.

    The stakes for Zaidi are particularly high: he took office in May 2026 after the US effectively vetoed the candidate preferred by Iran-aligned paramilitary blocs. If he fails to balance competing domestic and US interests, factions could quickly turn against his government. Saray warned that “there is a real risk that Iraq returns to the pre-2022 equation, where the militias held prime ministers directly responsible for international actions against them.”

    Renewed sustained US strikes on Iran would also severely damage prospects for peaceful integration. As seen in previous escalation cycles, Baghdad would struggle to prevent Iran-aligned factions from launching retaliatory attacks in support of Tehran, derailing the current de-escalation trajectory. Furthermore, just as the July 2026 joint US-Saudi strike on PMF targets hardened faction attitudes toward state oversight, any future foreign attacks on Iraqi paramilitaries would almost certainly push groups to reject any limits on their autonomy.

  • Why China is missing the big AI rally

    Why China is missing the big AI rally

    In 2026, China has emerged as a surprising source of global artificial intelligence excitement for international investors. Yet despite this momentum in the AI space, it boasts one of the poorest performing major stock markets on the planet. While the wave of AI-driven investment has sent equity benchmarks in Seoul, Taipei, and Tokyo climbing to impressive gains, mainland Chinese shares continue to trend downward.

    This divergence is no random coincidence; it stems from a confluence of interconnected economic, structural, regulatory, and geopolitical headwinds that have eroded global investor confidence. The most pressing challenge is chronically weak household demand, which has continued to disappoint market expectations and put downward pressure on earnings outlooks for domestic internet platforms, automakers, and retail operators.

    Seventy percent of Chinese household wealth is tied up in the residential property sector, which remains stuck in a deep multi-year downturn. This persistent slump has erased household wealth, undermined consumer confidence, and stripped out the core support needed for a broad-based economic rebound. Ongoing soft consumer spending in turn casts a long shadow over future profit growth for both technology and traditional industrial firms operating in China.

    Beyond demand weakness, China also faces a structural misalignment with the current phase of the global AI boom. So far, the AI rally has disproportionately benefited semiconductor manufacturers over the cloud service providers and internet companies that dominate China’s tech ecosystem. With a relative lack of large, publicly traded AI hardware firms listed on domestic exchanges, China sits at a clear structural disadvantage compared to AI hotspot neighbors South Korea and Taiwan, which are home to the world’s top chip makers.

    Compounding these issues are persistent regulatory uncertainty and mounting geopolitical risks, most notably the ongoing U.S.-China trade and technology conflicts. Since Beijing’s sweeping 2020 tech sector crackdown, global investors have consistently priced Chinese equities at a significant discount, factoring in elevated policy headwinds and the chronic lack of transparency that plagues the mainland’s capital markets. The dual challenges of a sprawling property crisis that has fueled deflationary pressures and crimped both business and consumer spending, and capital market institutions that are not yet prepared for global leadership, have further pushed investors to the sidelines.

    These dynamics are clearly visible in headline index performance: the Shanghai Shenzhen CSI 300 Index has fallen nearly 6% year-to-date in 2026, while South Korea’s Kospi Index and Taiwan’s Weighted Index have both surged more than 65% over the same period, powered by their heavy exposure to AI semiconductor manufacturing.

    Notably, this slump comes even as Chinese corporate earnings have recently outperformed. Onshore listed companies notched their fastest quarterly profit growth in five years in the April-June period, with a nearly 26% year-on-year gain.

    Across fixed income markets, Chinese 10-year government bond yields have tumbled this year even as the yuan has appreciated, a divergence that signals deep investor skepticism over whether Beijing’s incremental stimulus measures are sufficient to reverse weak domestic demand. The 10-year yield currently hovers around 1.67%, a level that indicates early hopes that deflation had been fully contained have not materialized.

    Moody’s Ratings analyst Elaine Xu notes that China’s latest round of financial policy measures should deliver a modest improvement in credit transmission through policy banks and targeted lending facilities. Even so, she argues, “it’s unlikely to materially lift broader credit demand or alter the property sector’s weak trajectory.”

    The new policy package is designed to lower overall funding costs, expand policy lending tools, and reduce effective mortgage rates for eligible first-time home buyers, reinforcing the government’s more supportive policy stance amid slowing growth. However, Xu explains, this approach “is consistent with policymakers’ preference for selective easing through the financial system rather than broad-based stimulus.”

    The People’s Bank of China recently cut the one-year pledged supplementary lending rate by 25 basis points to 1.5%, expanded the facility’s scope to cover additional infrastructure investment, and raised relending quotas for technology firms, private enterprises, agricultural operations, and small businesses. While these steps will improve funding conditions for policy-directed lending and channel credit to priority sectors, Xu notes that a broad-based surge in credit growth remains unlikely, because targeted support alone cannot generate stronger private sector borrowing demand.

    Charles Wang, chairman of Shenzhen Dragon Pacific Capital Management, argues that with the Chinese economy still “very weak,” Beijing’s current policy plans are not “adequate” to revitalize either the property sector or consumer spending. Duncan Wrigley, chief economist for Pantheon Macroeconomics, adds that the incremental measures rolled out to date “won’t solve China’s structural imbalances, with sluggish domestic demand and high reliance on exports.”

    This overreliance on exports is a core long-term challenge. Since the Hu Jintao administration, Beijing has repeatedly pledged to rebalance China’s growth model away from export dependence and toward consumer-led domestic demand. Yet even with U.S. tariffs still in place, China’s annual trade surplus hit a record $1.2 trillion in 2025, leading many economists to worry that Beijing will double down on export-led growth rather than accelerate the long-promised structural reforms.

    The root of China’s current economic malaise is its deepening K-shaped recovery, defined by a booming high-tech export sector running parallel to a persistently weak domestic property market and consumer segment. This split has only grown more pronounced in recent months: as exports continue to post strong gains, consumer spending and property activity keep lagging, widening the gap between China’s external strength and domestic fragility.

    This is a sharp reversal from the narrative that dominated 2025, when coordinated gains across stocks, bonds, and the yuan sparked widespread hopes that China was shaking off its “uninvestable” label among global market participants.

    Currency markets also reflect unusual divergence this year. As Sophie Huynh, a fund manager at BNP Paribas Asset Management, told Bloomberg, the Chinese yuan “has totally disconnected from interest-rate differentials since the start of the year, thanks to the firm trade surplus, yuan internationalization and capital inflows.”

    Analysts broadly agree that the path forward requires China’s Communist Party to deliver on its 2013 pledge to grant market forces a “decisive” role in economic policy making. Over the past decade, the Xi administration has often overpromised and underdelivered on market-oriented reform, leaving key structural issues unaddressed.

    While Beijing has steadily opened Chinese equity and government bond markets to foreign investors, even adding Chinese bonds to major global benchmark indexes, market access has consistently outpaced the domestic institutional reforms needed to prepare Chinese corporations and capital markets for global leadership. While China’s “new economy” grabs global headlines, its troubled “old economy” is drawing unwanted negative attention at a precarious moment for policymakers.

    The scale of weak consumer demand is visible in corporate performance from global multinationals too. Sportswear giant Nike recently cut its full-year sales outlook specifically citing weak China demand, with revenues in its second-largest market falling 29% from its 2021 peak to $5.8 billion. “Our Nike performance business is not yet large enough to offset the pressure we’re seeing in Nike sportswear, Jordan brand, and Greater China,” CEO Elliott Hill said in an earnings call, adding that a recovery “will take time.”

    As Beijing juggles the overlapping challenges of a systemic property crisis, near-record youth unemployment, strained local government finances, and weak consumer spending, officials have once again called on the so-called “national team” of state-backed investors to stabilize sliding equity markets. Regulators, state-owned investment funds, insurers, and state-linked asset managers have been activated to shore up market confidence following a recent sharp tech selloff, a playbook that Beijing has deployed repeatedly to steady Shanghai shares. The most high-profile use of this strategy came in summer 2015, when Chinese shares fell by a third in just a few weeks, triggering a whole-of-government response that included billions in state buying, trading suspensions for thousands of listed firms, an IPO freeze, and even government marketing campaigns framing stock purchases as a patriotic act.

    The national team has been called into action repeatedly since: during the 2018 share-pledge margin call crisis, through the 2021-2022 COVID-19 pandemic, in 2023 when exchange-traded funds faced widespread outflows, in 2025 amid fallout from U.S. tariffs, and now again as global technology stocks face renewed volatility.

    A key shift between 2015 and today is the outsize role AI is playing in driving both global equity gains and regional GDP growth across Asia. Take South Korea, for example: September 2026 exports jumped 83.5% year-on-year to a record $120.9 billion, driven by a more than three-fold increase in semiconductor shipments. This marked the 16th consecutive month of export growth, with gains that echo the rapid expansion of the Asian Tiger economic boom era, far outpacing expectations for a mature $1.9 trillion economy. Even with headwinds from U.S. tariffs and Middle East geopolitical tensions, South Korea is on track to hit $1 trillion in annual exports, a milestone that underscores how AI is reshaping regional economic fortunes.

    China has a long track record of defying bearish predictions: since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, analysts and short sellers have repeatedly forecast a catastrophic debt-fueled crash that has yet to materialize. Even so, basic economic principles still apply for economies transitioning from state-led, export-focused growth to a model centered on services, innovation, and domestic consumption.

    One core principle holds that developing economies must build transparent, trusted capital markets before opening their doors to trillions of dollars in foreign capital. This requires strengthening regulatory frameworks, increasing corporate governance standards, building independent credit rating and surveillance systems, and shoring up financial architecture before global capital arrives. But under Xi Jinping’s leadership, China has become less transparent, with tighter restrictions on independent media and corporate disclosure.

    This is the core contradiction of modern Chinese economic policy: Beijing has prioritized opening markets to foreign capital first, and building a world-class, transparent financial system second. Now, as China sits on the sidelines while the global AI boom lifts the stock markets of its regional neighbors, the entire global investment community is watching to see how Beijing responds. The clock is ticking for Xi’s administration, with increasingly little room for missteps. For decades, China was the main engine accelerating Asian economic growth; today, the global AI boom is accelerating pressure on Beijing to finally deliver the long-delayed structural reforms the economy needs to reverse its market slump.

  • Netanyahu’s man: How Israel is betting on a Bolsonaro comeback in Brazil

    Netanyahu’s man: How Israel is betting on a Bolsonaro comeback in Brazil

    As Brazil prepares for its October 4 presidential election, the long-standing and multifaceted relationship between Israel and Brazil has moved to the center of political debate, driven by a high-profile show of support from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for right-wing candidate Flavio Bolsonaro. The moment of support came in late July, during Flavio Bolsonaro’s official campaign launch in Sao Paulo. A pre-recorded video from Netanyahu played for the assembled crowd, where the Israeli leader hailed Flavio as a champion of both Brazil and the friendship between the two nations. This public backing came as no surprise to regional analysts, given the deep web of political, military, and ideological ties that have connected Israel to Brazil’s right-wing establishment—and the Bolsonaro family in particular—for decades.

    Flavio, the son of imprisoned former far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, is running to unseat incumbent leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the upcoming poll. If no candidate secures an absolute majority in the first round on October 4, a runoff election will be held on October 25. Current polling shows the race is extraordinarily tight: Lula holds a narrow lead of just one percentage point in first-round surveys, and polls project a close result if the race proceeds to a second round.

    Netanyahu’s public endorsement comes as the Israeli leader faces his own domestic electoral test on October 27, at a time when Israel faces growing international isolation over its military campaign in Gaza, with widespread allegations of genocide and war crimes. David Magalhaes, an international relations professor at Brazil’s Federal University of Uberlandia, explains that a Flavio Bolsonaro victory would deliver significant strategic benefits to Netanyahu. “At a time when Israel is increasingly isolated within the international community, a situation that has worsened because of the indications of extermination or genocide in the Gaza Strip, a close ally in Brazil would be a major win,” Magalhaes told Middle East Eye. A Flavio win, he adds, would send a message to Israeli voters that their country’s international isolation is not complete.

    Flavio has already laid out plans to deepen bilateral ties if elected. He has promised to relocate Brazil’s embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move that would break with the consensus position of most of the international community, which does not recognize Israel’s sovereignty over occupied East Jerusalem. He has also pledged Brazil’s membership in the so-called Isaac Accords, an initiative launched earlier this year by Argentina’s President Javier Milei alongside Netanyahu, designed to integrate Israel into Latin America’s economic, political, and security frameworks. Ideologically, Flavio has embraced the messianic interpretation of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy, aligning himself firmly with the most hardline elements of Israeli politics. His agenda would represent a return to the close partnership Brazil enjoyed with Israel during his father’s 2019-2022 presidency, and would expand that relationship even further.

    The roots of Israel’s influence in Brazil stretch back decades, built through deep connections to Brazil’s military, security forces, and evangelical political blocs. These ties have persisted across both left- and right-wing Brazilian governments, according to academic research. Bruno Huberman, an international relations professor at Sao Paulo’s Pontifical Catholic University, explains that Israeli influence in Brazil was “built mainly through the armed forces and the police, and from there it extends to far-right parties and movements.” Huberman notes that even during Lula’s first presidential term from 2003 to 2011, when Brazil sought closer ties to Arab nations and the Global South, the relationship with Israel was maintained as a strategic counterweight, centered around arms imports that created long-term technological dependence. For Brazil’s military and police, the relationship is also underpinned by shared ideological ground around counterterrorism and Islamophobia, creating persistent internal pressure within the Brazilian state for closer bilateral ties.

    When Jair Bolsonaro took office in 2019, he doubled down on these existing military ties, appointing active and retired military officers to more than half of his federal cabinet posts and placing over 6,000 military personnel into civil service roles. Research by Huberman and Isabela Agostinelli dos Santos, an international relations professor at Sao Paulo’s FECAP higher education institution, finds that despite occasional diplomatic disagreements, “continuities outweigh ruptures” in the bilateral defense relationship, with arms trade consistently anchoring the partnership. Defense ties between the two countries date all the way back to 1964, during Brazil’s military dictatorship, and the modern defense industry relationship took shape in the early 2000s, with Israeli defense giant Elbit Systems playing a central role. By 2014, total bilateral arms deals had reached almost $190 million, with much of that business conducted under Lula’s Workers’ Party government. “So Bolsonaro didn’t usher in a ‘new era’. In fact, he intensified structural dynamics that were already under way,” Santos explains. Any Brazilian government would struggle to quickly reverse these long-standing military dependencies, giving Israel a persistent and influential role in Brazil’s defense sector.

    The Bolsonaro family has long played a central role in advancing Israeli interests in Brazil. Flavio’s brother, Eduardo Bolsonaro, is a key figure in maintaining these ties. In January 2025, when an Israeli soldier on vacation in Brazil was accused of war crimes committed during his service in Gaza, Eduardo worked directly with Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli to pressure Brazilian authorities to drop the investigation, a move he later publicly boasted about. “Thanks to our efforts with Minister Chikli, the decision not to investigate set a precedent,” Eduardo said in an interview following the incident.

    For Lula, the deep roots of Israeli influence in Brazil create a delicate political balancing act. Lula has been one of the most prominent international critics of Israel’s campaign in Gaza, calling it a genocide and an attempt to exterminate the Palestinian people. Brazil joined South Africa’s legal case against Israel at the International Court of Justice, and after Lula compared the Gaza violence to the Holocaust, Israel declared Lula persona non grata, prompting Brazil to withdraw its ambassador from Tel Aviv. Today, diplomatic relations between the two countries are maintained only at the charge d’affaires level. Yet despite this public rift at the executive level, Lula has not moved to sever long-standing defense ties. In 2024, five months after the Brazilian military signed a $210 million contract with Elbit for 36 Atmos 2000 self-propelled howitzers, Lula suspended the deal but did not cancel it entirely, reflecting the tricky balance he must maintain between his public criticism of Israel and the deep pro-Israel ties within Brazil’s political and military establishment.

    Even within Brazil’s legislature, pro-Israel sentiment has grown in recent years, driven by three powerful parliamentary caucuses, nicknamed the “three Bs”: bullets (representing legislators with military backgrounds), beef (representing powerful agribusiness interests), and Bible (representing evangelical Christian lawmakers). Brazil’s evangelical community numbers around 40 million voters, and polling shows Flavo Bolsonaro holds a commanding lead among this demographic, with 52 percent support in the first round and 62 percent in a projected runoff, compared to just 26 and 32 percent for Lula. In November 2025, even as Lula’s executive branch adopted a critical stance toward Israel, the Brazilian legislature revived the Brazil-Israel Parliamentary Front, a cross-party group first established in 2004. Flavio Bolsonaro, a member of the front, used its launch to confirm that a Bolsonaro presidency would fully restore close bilateral ties with Israel. “Even with a president who is more critical of Israel, the legislative base is becoming increasingly pro-Israel, largely because of the alliance between the evangelical caucus and the so-called ‘bullet caucus,’” Santos notes.

    For Brazilian voters, the Israel-Palestine issue rarely decides election outcomes, but it does reinforce existing political divides, according to Feliciano de Sa Guimaraes, a professor at the University of Sao Paulo’s Institute of International Relations. “Jobs, living costs and public security matter far more to most voters,” Guimaraes explains. But polling shows shifting public opinion on Israel: latest Pew Research data from earlier this year finds that just over half of Brazilians hold an unfavorable view of Israel, and more than 60 percent lack confidence in Netanyahu. Since the start of the war in Gaza, Guimaraes says, pro-Israel sentiment has shifted disproportionately to right-wing voters aligned with Flavio Bolsonaro, while left-leaning voters have moved closer to Lula’s critical position. “For most voters, the Israel-Palestine issue mainly reinforces existing loyalties, since the issue now follows Brazil’s left–right divide,” Guimaraes says.

    Lula has already raised concerns about foreign interference in Brazil’s election, issuing a public warning in June to former U.S. President Donald Trump to stay out of the race. He later reiterated that warning in a speech the UN General Assembly, where Brazilian newspaper Folha de S.Paulo reports the warning was also aimed at Netanyahu and Milei, even though Lula did not name them directly. As voters head to the polls in less than a week, the deep ties between Israel and Brazil’s political factions will remain a defining undercurrent of what is already one of the most contentious elections in Brazil’s recent history.

  • Riot police clash with students as education protests rage in France

    Riot police clash with students as education protests rage in France

    What began last week as a small, localized protest over failing education standards in Paris has exploded into a nationwide movement that has shut down more than 700 French secondary schools and sparked violent confrontations between demonstrators and riot police. High school students are leading the demonstrations, fueled by years of mounting frustration over persistent understaffing, overcrowded learning spaces, crumbling infrastructure, extended school hours, and planned national education budget cuts that threaten to worsen already strained conditions.

    By Friday, the unrest had spread to major cities across the country, including Montpellier, Nantes, Marseille, Belfort, Strasbourg, Rennes, and multiple districts of the Paris metropolitan area. In many urban centers, protesters lit barricades and trash bins on fire, blocked roadways, and damaged school property. In the northeastern city of Belfort, a 17-year-old demonstrator was taken into custody on charges of attempted homicide following an attack that targeted a serving police officer. France’s Education Ministry confirmed that at least 65 school and law enforcement staff have been injured in the unrest across the country.

    In the Parisian suburb of Pantin, police charged crowds of demonstrators and made multiple arrests after projectiles were thrown at officers. Local law enforcement deployed tear gas in Strasbourg to pre-empt escalating violence, per reports from Reuters. One of the hardest-hit sites was Nelson Mandela High School in Nantes, where a fire set by protesters destroyed the building’s glass entrance lobby and damaged multiple interior spaces, leaving an estimated €2 million ($2.1 million) in total damages. French authorities have confirmed that they seized dangerous contraband from demonstrators during raids, including homemade petrol bombs, an axe, and explosive mortar fireworks. The Education Ministry noted that hundreds of schools have suffered damaged gates, fences, and entrance facilities, labeled as “significant damage” to public education infrastructure.

    For many participating students, the government’s heavy-handed law enforcement response has only amplified their anger. “As far as we’re concerned, we’ve won – our school is closed this morning,” 16-year-old protester Lola told AFP during Friday’s demonstrations. She added, “It makes us even angrier – the police have no right to hit us or use tear gas on us.”

    The unfolding crisis comes at a critical political juncture for French President Emmanuel Macron, just six months ahead of the 2027 presidential election. Senior government officials have framed the unrest as a breakdown of public order, rather than a reflection of legitimate student grievances. French Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin confirmed that the situation has “gone from high-school student demonstrations to a public order disturbance.” He added that around 2,000 people, most of whom are minors, have been taken into custody since the movement began, and prosecutors have been instructed to seek financial damages from parents for destruction caused by their children.

    French Education Minister Édouard Geffray claimed Friday that the original student movement had been “hijacked” by external agitators with no connection to the school system. He told French broadcaster BFMTV that multiple teachers reported “the people in front of me were not my students.”

    Many parents across France have expressed growing anxiety about the unrest, fearful that their children will be caught up in escalating violence between protesters and police. In southern Paris, 53-year-old Anya told AFP she had forbidden her son from attending demonstrations but was searching for him after he left home. “We’re afraid the situation might escalate,” she explained.

    Despite the government’s condemnation, multiple major French trade unions have publicly backed the student protesters and their demands. Three leading education and public service unions—SNEP-FSU, SNUEP-FSU, and Solidaires—have called on their members to support the movement. In an official statement, the Solidaires Trade Union Federation argued, “Let’s not let them fire on our children. Secondary school pupils have the freedom of assembly, association and demonstration.”

  • The China factor behind the Iran war

    The China factor behind the Iran war

    What began as a direct military and diplomatic confrontation between Washington and Tehran has evolved into more than a bilateral conflict: unfolding alongside the Iran war is a quiet, high-stakes indirect contest between the United States and China that is reshaping the strategic dynamics of the entire Middle East.

    While Beijing is not engaging in direct military conflict with Washington over Iran, China’s deep-rooted economic, technological, and diplomatic ties to Tehran have significantly complicated Washington’s campaign strategy and eroded its ability to achieve a decisive outcome in the conflict. This shift has sparked urgent debate over a critical, long-term question: is the ongoing Iran war evolving into a new indirect front in the expanding global rivalry between the world’s two largest powers?

    Available evidence does not point to an imminent direct military clash between Washington and Beijing. Just weeks before the conflict escalated, the two nations reaffirmed public commitments to constructive bilateral engagement during a high-profile summit between former U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington. But despite this public posturing, the Iran conflict has already pushed the two powers into direct competition across multiple critical domains: energy markets, international sanctions enforcement, technology trade, maritime security, and most significantly, the future balance of power across the Middle East.

    China acts as Iran’s core economic lifeline throughout the conflict
    China holds a uniquely critical position in Iran’s war-time economy. Even before the latest outbreak of open conflict, China was Iran’s largest crude oil buyer, accounting for between 13% and 14% of China’s total crude oil imports, and it has retained its status as one of Tehran’s most important economic partners throughout the escalation of U.S. pressure.

    These continued oil purchases have provided Iran with a vital stream of revenue at a time when sweeping U.S.-led sanctions have cut off most of the country’s other global commercial ties. Independent Chinese refiners have played an outsized role in sustaining this trade, as they face far less exposure to the Western-dominated global financial system than China’s large state-owned oil enterprises, making it easier for them to evade U.S. enforcement measures.

    In response, Washington has expanded its sanctions regime to target a growing list of Chinese companies, commodity traders, and logistics networks linked to Iranian oil trade and sensitive technology transfers. U.S. regulators have also cracked down on China-linked procurement networks accused of assisting Iran in acquiring technology that could be used to advance nuclear research and ballistic missile development programs.

    This crackdown has left Washington trapped in an increasingly tight strategic bind. Sanctioning smaller Iranian entities and minor Chinese commercial players carries limited risk, but imposing harsh penalties on major Chinese financial institutions could rapidly escalate the Iran conflict into a full-scale economic confrontation between the U.S. and China.

    Recent independent reporting has also documented shipments of dual-use components from Chinese suppliers to Iran, including specialized electronics and other parts that can be repurposed to support advanced military systems and unmanned aerial drone production. U.S. officials are currently investigating allegations that Chinese entities provided targeted satellite intelligence linked to an Iranian strike on a U.S. military facility in Jordan. China has formally denied all such accusations, and former President Trump has publicly downplayed the severity of the allegations to avoid escalating bilateral tensions.

    Even so, the line between routine commercial technology trade and indirect military assistance has become increasingly blurry in modern conflict. Contemporary warfare relies heavily on precise navigation systems, high-resolution satellite imagery, secure communications hardware, advanced semiconductors, and precision manufacturing components. A major power does not need to deploy troops or send direct weapons shipments to shape the outcome of a distant conflict: it can sustain an adversary’s military capability and resilience under pressure simply by supplying critical enabling components. For this reason, U.S. national security officials are now closely monitoring all of China’s economic and technological engagement with Iran.

    The Strait of Hormuz: A point of overlapping interest and shared vulnerability
    China’s economy is deeply dependent on energy exports from the Middle East, so any disruption to commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz — the chokepoint through which roughly 20% of global oil supplies pass — poses a direct existential threat to Beijing’s economic stability. Washington also shares a core interest in keeping the strait open to free navigation, though its motivations are rooted in broader global economic and geopolitical strategy. During pre-conflict bilateral talks, Trump and Xi Jinping agreed that the strait must remain open for unimpeded energy trade. Beijing has consistently opposed moves to militarize the waterway and has repeatedly called for all parties to de-escalate tensions in the region.

    This alignment of core interests has created an unusual strategic balancing act for Beijing. China does not want to see the current Iranian regime collapse, but it also has no interest in a protracted war that would destabilize the entire Persian Gulf and put its own energy security at risk. As a result, Beijing is pursuing a dual goal: preserving Tehran’s economic survival while working to prevent the conflict from expanding beyond Iran’s borders.

    Even so, Beijing’s support for Tehran has clear hard limits. China has not joined the conflict as a formal military ally of Iran, has repeatedly called for all parties to return to the negotiating table, and has positioned itself as a potential neutral diplomatic mediator between Washington and Tehran.

    During a recent meeting with his Iranian counterpart, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reaffirmed that Beijing is committed to safeguarding Iran’s legitimate international rights and interests, while also urging both Tehran and Washington to exercise maximum restraint and resume diplomatic negotiations. China also maintains extensive economic and diplomatic ties with Iran’s regional rivals, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which makes any open-ended, unqualified commitment to Iran economically and strategically costly for Beijing. While Iran holds significant strategic value for Beijing as a counterweight to U.S. influence in the Middle East, it is far from China’s only source of energy imports or access to regional influence.

    The Iran conflict as a new testing ground for broader US-China rivalry
    The competition between Washington and Beijing over Iran extends far beyond the borders of the Middle East. For the United States, the Iran conflict is an opportunity to demonstrate that U.S. sanctions, military power, and control over the international financial system still allow it to fully isolate a hostile state that defies U.S. global order. For China, continued engagement with Iran demonstrates that U.S. punitive measures have sharp limits when another major global power maintains open trade and economic ties with the sanctioned target. Every barrel of Iranian crude that reaches Chinese markets blunts the impact of U.S. sanctions, and every shipment of Chinese technology to Tehran weakens the effectiveness of U.S. export controls.

    At the same time, disputes over security in the Strait of Hormuz expose the shared dependence and shared vulnerability of both powers to the global Middle Eastern energy system. The Iran war is thus simultaneously testing the limits of U.S. global power projection and the resilience of China’s global economic networks.

    It is important to note that framing this dynamic as an undeclared war between the U.S. and China would be a dramatic overstatement. The two powers are not engaged in direct military conflict with one another on Iranian soil. But it would be equally inaccurate and misleading to dismiss China’s role as irrelevant to the outcome of the Iran conflict.

    The Iran war has already become yet another arena in which the U.S. and China test one another’s ability to shape and dictate events beyond their own borders. Washington exercises influence through sanctions, military pressure, and financial leverage; Beijing projects power through trade, energy purchases, diplomatic mediation, and its sprawling global commercial supply chains and economic networks.

    The central question today is not whether China will openly enter the war on Iran’s side. It is whether this conflict will push the long-running U.S.-China rivalry beyond disputes over trade and technology into a broader global struggle over which power has the ability to shape the emerging new international order. That may end up being the most consequential impact of China’s role in the Iran conflict.

  • ‘We must enter first’: Yemen’s female soldiers face war, danger and a changing society

    ‘We must enter first’: Yemen’s female soldiers face war, danger and a changing society

    In the war-torn Yemeni city of Taiz, 36-year-old female security officer Tahani patrols local markets in her uniform, unarmed by conventional military standards, but carrying the weight of a historic shift in Yemeni society. Her daily work represents one of the most visible changes to Yemen’s security landscape in the decade since the 2015 outbreak of war: the rapid expansion of women’s roles in the country’s security apparatus.

    Before the war, female soldiers were virtually absent from public security roles in Yemen. Today, women serve across every corner of the national security sector, from police stations and prosecution offices to frontline military checkpoints and high-stakes security raids. Tahani is one of thousands of women who joined Yemen’s expanding women’s police force in 2022, a move that transformed her life and opened a new path for Yemeni women seeking economic independence and public service.

    A divorcee from a poor rural background who previously worked as a housewife struggling to support her only child, Tahani describes the recruitment drive for Taiz’s women’s police as the chance to fulfill a long-held dream. “Yemen needs female soldiers just as it needs female teachers,” she told Middle East Eye in an exclusive interview. On a typical day, Tahani rises early to cook breakfast for her son and get him ready for school before heading to the station, where she works alongside both male and female colleagues.

    Her role fills a critical gap in Yemeni security, shaped by the country’s conservative social norms. Many Yemeni women prefer to interact with female officers when filing reports, undergoing searches, or providing testimony, and Tahani and her colleagues specialize in supporting these women. One of her most dangerous and essential duties is participating in home raids targeting criminal suspects. Per Yemeni tradition, male security personnel cannot enter a home where women are present, so female officers must lead the entry into these properties. “This is one of the most dangerous tasks. We must be cautious and have our weapons drawn, and we never raid a home without a plan,” Tahani explains. While she has received full tactical training, she has never had to fire on a suspect, as male colleagues provide overwatch from behind during these operations.

    Today, amid a new wave of military escalation across Yemen, the work of female security officers has become even more critical. The numbers tell the story of the force’s rapid growth: back in 2014, there were just 2,868 female police officers across the entire country. Over the past decade, both the Yemeni government and Houthi authorities have ramped up recruitment of female soldiers, growing the force exponentially. Last year, the United Nations Development Programme supported capacity-building training for 69 female officers in Aden Governorate, equipping them with professional skills to carry out their duties. As security inspections have doubled and raids on suspected cells have intensified with the recent escalation, female officers have been stretched thinner than ever.

    “This is the most serious situation since I started my job in 2022, as there are more home raids requiring female soldiers to be present,” Tahani says. “My colleagues at checkpoints have also doubled their efforts, because, during war, weapons can be smuggled and sleeper cells can spread among residents, so we must stay vigilant.”

    Her more experienced colleague, 43-year-old Sali, who joined the force in 2016 and has served at checkpoints and stations across Taiz, echoes that sentiment. Sali explains that during periods of military escalation, security work becomes a 24/7 responsibility, extending even into personal time and daily commutes. “Security awareness must be high in such situations. We have to monitor all activity and people around us to prevent crime before it occurs,” she says. Sali adds that officers are also working to raise public awareness about the risks of sharing sensitive information about military and security developments on social media, noting that such posts can inadvertently provide intelligence to enemy forces.

    Yemeni army Captain Muamer Abdulmonem, a 20-year veteran of the force, says that while female soldiers play a key role in routine security, their contribution becomes irreplaceable during periods of escalation. “During the recent escalation, there has been a dire need not only for female soldiers, but also for female volunteers. Many have been supporting the army and security forces, particularly by monitoring sleeper cells and unfamiliar individuals arriving in communities,” Abdulmonem explains. He notes that sleeper cells often hide in plain sight, operating under the guise of displaced families, street vendors, or beggars, making community-based surveillance by female security personnel especially critical. The captain also points out that female officers are the only ones who can lawfully and culturally search female travelers, a key task given that criminal networks often exploit women to smuggle weapons and contraband in a society where male officers cannot search them.

    While Yemen’s women’s police force was first established in 2000, it remained a small, marginalized institution for nearly 15 years. It is only over the past decade that the force has grown significantly and won broader acceptance across Yemeni society. Tahani’s brother, 31-year-old Thaker, says his family was initially hesitant to allow Tahani to join the force, but their opposition softened once they saw that she would be working exclusively with other women on cases involving female civilians. “Tahani works with women and deals with women, so she is like any other woman working in the civil sector, and the family has accepted that,” Thaker says. “A respected woman can work anywhere to serve her country. Women are entering all kinds of professions and that society must accept female soldiers, as it is society itself that needs them to interact with women.”

    That growing acceptance is visible among the Yemeni public as well. Amni Qaheri, a Taiz resident who has interacted with female officers while reporting a stolen phone and undergone searches at city checkpoints, says she appreciates the presence of female soldiers. “It was a good experience to see that there are female soldiers we can deal with. I hope their numbers increase, or even that a women’s police station is established where all the staff are women, so we can have an even higher level of freedom,” Qaheri says. She adds that searches carried out by female officers make her feel far more comfortable, and that “they do their job perfectly.”

    Yemeni sociologist Hail Saeed says that while social acceptance of women in security roles is growing across the country, it remains uneven across different regions and demographic groups. “Some families and communities still harbour reservations due to the nature of security work, particularly regarding field operations or night shifts,” Saeed explains. Even so, he notes that female soldiers fill a uniquely critical role in a conservative society, especially when working with women and minors. “Having women in the police helps ensure greater privacy and comfort for female citizens during searches, interrogations, or when filing complaints,” Saeed says. “It also facilitates access to information that some women might hesitate to share with a male officer due to social customs in a conservative society.”

    Saeed predicts that public acceptance will continue to grow in coming years, as long as female security personnel continue to demonstrate competence, discipline, and a commitment to public service that respects local cultural norms. “Community acceptance may expand gradually if the work of female soldiers is linked to competence, discipline, and community service, while taking cultural and social sensitivities into account,” he says.

    (Note: The names of female police officials have been changed at their request to protect their privacy.)

  • Woman at centre of Cornell rape inquiry was ‘failed’ by officials, says New York governor

    Woman at centre of Cornell rape inquiry was ‘failed’ by officials, says New York governor

    A high-profile sexual assault case linked to Cornell University’s fraternity system has triggered a major leadership shakeup in New York’s criminal justice system, after Governor Kathy Hochul publicly condemned the botched initial investigation and announced sweeping steps to address long-standing gaps in state rape law.

    The case centers on a woman identified only as Jane Doe in court documents, who alleges she was drugged and gang-raped by multiple male students at a Cornell University fraternity house in 2024. When the incident was first reported, local law enforcement launched an inquiry but ultimately declined to bring any criminal charges against the accused men. The allegations only gained national public attention last month, when Jane Doe filed a civil lawsuit against the perpetrators and the university, prompting renewed scrutiny of how the initial probe was handled.

    Speaking at a televised press conference on Friday, Governor Hochul delivered a scathing rebuke of the original investigation, saying the 25-year-old accuser was let down at every stage of the process by systems designed to protect survivors of sexual violence. “Jane Doe was failed at every turn by people and institutions that had a clear obligation to protect her,” Hochul said, adding that she was “deeply disturbed” by the multiple missteps uncovered during a preliminary review of the local prosecutor’s work.

    The governor went on to announce that she had formally lost confidence in the ability of local District Attorney Matthew Van Houten’s office to oversee the reopened investigation, prompting her to appoint New York State Attorney General Letitia James to take over full leadership of the case. A key point of outrage for Hochul was the revelation that local prosecutors never personally interviewed Jane Doe to hear her account of the alleged assault, a failure she called unacceptable.

    Alongside shaking up the investigation leadership, Hochul used the press conference to unveil plans to close a critical legal loophole in New York state law that currently hinders prosecutors from pursuing rape charges in cases where the victim voluntarily consumed alcohol or drugs before the assault. Hochul argued that even if a person chooses to drink or use drugs voluntarily, that choice does not erase the fact that they cannot give sexual consent if they are too impaired to agree to sexual activity.

    “If someone is too intoxicated to consent it should not matter if they chose to use drugs or alcohol,” Hochul said. “Voluntary intoxication is not a licence for gang rape.”

    Attorney General James appeared alongside the governor at Friday’s event, and pledged to conduct a thorough, impartial inquiry guided strictly by evidence and state law. “My office will leave no stone unturned – we will interview all relevant witnesses, review every piece of available evidence, and move forward with criminal prosecutions if the facts support that action,” James said.

    For his part, Van Houten, the district attorney who led the original investigation, has defended his office’s original decision not to file charges, arguing that his team simply did not receive sufficient evidence to meet the strict legal threshold required to secure a criminal conviction. He added that most of the new information that has emerged in public debate over recent weeks was never shared with his office during the initial probe.

    Cornell University, meanwhile, has pushed back against that claim, saying it turned over all evidence collected during its own internal investigation to the district attorney’s office. That evidence includes a controversial Snapchat group chat allegedly linked to the fraternity members accused in the case, in which the men are reported to have discussed a “free” sexual encounter with Jane Doe on the night of the alleged assault.

  • Israel’s top court backs barring Palestinian politician from election over article

    Israel’s top court backs barring Palestinian politician from election over article

    In a high-stakes decision that has escalated tensions over political representation for Palestinian citizens of Israel, Israel’s highest judicial body has cleared the way for the exclusion of Balad party leader Sami Abu Shehadeh from the country’s upcoming parliamentary vote, based on an opinion piece he wrote days after the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack.

    The controversy traces back to late last year, when the Central Elections Committee (CEC), a regulatory body dominated by members of Israel’s current governing coalition, voted to bar Abu Shehadeh, a leading figure in the Palestinian-majority Joint List electoral alliance, from running for a seat in the Knesset. The disqualification was rooted entirely in an article titled *The Al-Aqsa Flood: Preliminary Observations*, published 8 October 2023 by Arabic-language outlet Arab48, one day after the cross-border attack that killed roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel, according to Israeli officials.

    In his commentary, Abu Shehadeh framed the 7 October attack as a predictable outcome of decades of Israeli occupation, blockade, and systemic mistreatment of Palestinians. He argued that the “unfolding strategic event” should not have caught anyone off guard. “What happened and is happening, up to this moment, is entirely consistent with the law of physics that we all know: excessive pressure leads to an explosion,” he wrote. “Decades of occupation and blockade, the assassination of leaders, the daily killing of people, and violations against the dignity, property, and holy places of the Palestinian people – all of this could only lead to a reaction. The real surprise is the Palestinian people’s capacity for endurance, until they reached the point of explosion.”

    Abu Shehadeh also noted that the attack exposed the fallibility of Israeli intelligence, writing that the country’s security services were not invulnerable to organized Palestinian resistance. He added that to advance Palestinian political goals, all factions of the Palestine Liberation Organization must be integrated into any political process opened by the conflict.

    Based on this text, election officials accused Abu Shehadeh of endorsing armed struggle against Israel and rejecting the country’s legitimacy as a Jewish and democratic state. The Balad leader forcefully denied both accusations, framing the disqualification as a deliberate effort to silence Palestinian political representation in the Knesset, and appealed the CEC’s ruling to the Supreme Court. His legal representative, Hassan Jabareen, argued that the article contained no explicit call for violence and did not meet the legal threshold for disqualification from running for office.

    Last Thursday, Supreme Court President Isaac Amit recommended Abu Shehadeh voluntarily withdraw his candidacy, giving him a 24-hour deadline to make a decision. The court informed the politician that a majority of justices had already agreed to uphold the CEC’s ban, meaning disqualification would be finalized if he refused to step aside. By Friday, Abu Shehadeh announced he would withdraw his candidacy.

    In an official statement released after the decision, Balad said Abu Shehadeh stepped down out of political responsibility to the Palestinian community in Israel and the Joint List alliance, to avoid broader harm to Palestinian political and parliamentary organizing. The party added that Abu Shehadeh “fought the legal and political battle all the way to the end against the fascist right and the Zionist consensus.”

    Abu Shehadeh’s disqualification is just one of several ongoing disputes over candidate exclusion ahead of next month’s election. The Supreme Court is still scheduled to review appeals against bans on the full Joint List and United Arab List, two electoral alliances representing Palestinian citizens of Israel that are widely expected to hold enough seats to play a kingmaking role in forming a new government after the vote. The court will also hear an appeal against the disqualification of Ofer Cassif, a Jewish Knesset member and prominent critic of the Israeli government’s policies toward Palestinians.

    Notably, the CEC, which moved to bar Abu Shehadeh, rejected all requests to disqualify two far-right parties linked to senior members of the current governing coalition: Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit and Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionism. Both Ben-Gvir and Smotrich have a long record of extreme public statements targeting Palestinians that rights groups and political critics say violate Israeli electoral law and international human rights standards. Ben-Gvir has previously called for the killing of unarmed Gazans, claiming they were “not worthy of life,” while Smotrich has argued that allowing two million Gazans to die of starvation “might be justified and moral” and has publicly called for the complete destruction of the Palestinian West Bank town of Huwara.