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'Organizing Is Not a Crime': Turkish LGBTQ+ Rights Defenders Defy Crackdown With COP31 March
“It feels like I am living in a prison in this country," said one protester. “We can do this because the eyes of the international media are here.”
Nov 15, 2026
Defying an escalating government crackdown, LGBTQ+ rights defenders marched in Antalya, Türikye on Saturday, surrounded by thousands of activists in town for the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
Intersectional solidarity was on full display in the streets of Antalya as COP31 climate campaigners formed a protective cordon around the LGBTQ+ activists, shielding them from potential police suppression as they displayed rainbow flags and placards.
"Őzgür," a 20-year-old Turkish LGBTQ+ activist who marched with a rainbow flag draped over her shoulders, told The Guardian that displaying the banner "feels a bit dangerous."
“It feels like I am living in a prison in this country. I am running all the time,” she said. “We can do this because the eyes of the international media are here.”
Another activist, who identified herself only as Beren, said she was excited to wave the rainbow flag but lamented the absence of a friend who was detained because she is transgender.
“I would love my friend to be here,” she said.
Saturday's march took place amid a sweeping campaign by the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan targeting LGBTQ+ organizations, activists, and public expressions of queer identity.
In September, police launched coordinated raids on LGBTQ+ organizations, HIV-support groups, bars, and nightclubs in five cities. At least 112 people were arrested, including at least 24 LGBTQ+ activists, organizational founders, and executives, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
The government called the crackdown “My Family Is Safe,” invoking Erdoğan's campaign to promote what his administration calls traditional family values. The president designated 2026-35 the “Decade of Family and Population."
“This crackdown is a blatant attempt to criminalize and marginalize LGBT people and silence the groups that stand up for their rights,” Benjamin Ward, HRW's deputy Europe and Central Asia director, said at the time.
In an article published last month by The Nation, Turkish human rights lawyer Levent Pişkin described the September raids as an escalation of a decadeslong campaign against queer visibility and organizing.
“What this month showed is a state that has found other ways to criminalize queer life and now presents such measures as family policy,” Pişkin wrote.
Turkish Minute reported Wednesday that prosecutors were seeking to dissolve the Istanbul-based Social Policy, Gender Identity, and Sexual Orientation Studies Association (SPoD), the third LGBTQ+ rights organization targeted for closure in less than two months.
Prosecutors cited the organization's 15 years LGBTQ+ advocacy, with four members facing potential prison sentences of one to three years, while two have been held in pretrial detention since September.
“Yes, we did all of these things," SPoD defiantly declared. "And we would do them all again!”
“Organizing is not a crime; it is a right," the group added. "Defending LGBTI+ rights, showing solidarity, and coming together are not crimes."
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'Scenes That Are Impossible to Bear': 70 Bodies, Including 10 Children, Recovered From Gaza Rubble
Civil Defense officials in the obliterated Palestinian exclave say 8,000 people are still missing after three years of Israeli genocide.
Nov 15, 2026
A mass funeral was held Sunday for 70 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces whose remains, mostly skeletal, were finally retrieved from the rubble of the obliterated Gaza Strip years after they were massacred in the ongoing genocide.
Gaza's Civil Defense said the bodies—60 of whom have been identified, and include at least 10 children—were recovered from beneath what were once 20 homes in a residential complex in Beit Lahia, as well as from under the ruins of buildings in Jabalia, both in the north.
" Gaza is no longer burying one or two martyrs at a time, but entire families who have remained buried beneath the rubble for years," Civil Defense Major Hamed Abdel Qader told The New Arab. "We ask where the conscience of the world is when it sees children trapped beneath the rubble for all this time without lifting a finger."
Speaking on behalf of the families of the deceased, Bilal al-Sharif told The New Arab that "the martyrs were denied their basic right to have their bodies laid to rest and remained beneath the rubble for many long months. Our feelings of grief are mixed with pride, because the dead must be honoured and buried in a manner befitting their human dignity."
Sometimes called "the world's largest mass grave," the Gaza Strip is believed to have more than 8,000 bodies still buried beneath its rubble after more than three years and over 220,000 metric tons of explosives falling on its 141 square miles.
Israel’s destruction and denial of the heavy equipment needed for such a monumental recovery operation initially left Palestinians largely reliant upon rudimentary tools such as shovels, pickaxes, wheelbarrows, rakes, hoes, and even their bare hands. Earlier during the genocide, they worked amid the stench of death and decomposition that lingered in the air.
Civil Defense said its workers used two bulldozers and two transport trucks and toiled more than 230 hours to recover the 70 bodies buried Sunday. The remains of 90 more people have yet to be removed from the work sites.
"Many bodies remain trapped beneath the rubble, waiting to be recovered so their families can bid them farewell and lay them to rest," said al-Sharif. "This makes it imperative to stand alongside the teams carrying out this work and provide them with the equipment needed to complete the task."
Palestinians are struggling to dig through more than 60 million tons of debris after over 80% of all structures in Gaza were destroyed or damaged by two years of Israeli bombardment. That’s more than 200,000 buildings and other structures.
United Nations experts estimate it would take seven years for 100 trucks to remove all debris across Gaza, where more than three-quarters of roads are damaged, and unexploded ordnance and Israeli booby traps beneath the debris continue to pose deadly threats to recovery workers and survivors in general.
"We call on all international organizations and relevant bodies to intervene urgently and provide the resources needed to recover the remaining bodies," Qader said. "During field search and recovery operations, Civil Defense teams have witnessed scenes that are impossible to bear. Their work has not been limited to clearing rubble; they have also been confronted with entire families buried beneath the ruins of homes that were once safe."
An analysis of Gaza's civil registry published earlier this year found that 2,700 families in the strip had been entirely wiped out since October 2023, when Israel launched its war in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack that month.
Meanwhile, despite a supposed ceasefire in force since October 2025, Israel continues to launch daily attacks in Gaza. More than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed, over 21,500 of them children—although experts say the actual toll is likely much higher. Roughly 176,000 others have been wounded.
A United Nations commission of inquiry and many experts around the world—including numerous Israeli and other Jews—say Israel is carrying out a genocide in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.
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Accusing Progressives of Wanting to Destroy Israel, Fetterman Threatens to Quit Dems if Van Hollen Leads Senate
"Don't let the door hit you on the way out," said one nonplussed observer.
Nov 14, 2026
US Sen. John Fetterman on Saturday again threatened to leave the Democratic Party if Sen. Chris Van Hollen is elected majority leader in January, saying he doesn't think he'll find "any more common ground" with progressives, whom he falsely accused of wanting to destroy Israel and the United States.
Fetterman (D-Pa.) appeared on Fox News' "Saturday in America," whose host, former Trump White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, began the interview by noting that the senator "tried to stop" progressives endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America from winning their midterm races.
McEnany played footage of Fetterman previously calling progressives "incredibly anti-American" and "willing to even wipe their mouths with the American flag." In another clip played by the host, Fetterman laments what he called "the dancing days of the dirtbag left" and says he doesn't get along with Sen-elect Abdul El-Sayed (D-Mich.), whom he baselessly said "absolutely supports Sharia law."
Asked if there's a "red line for you if the party does go far left that you would walk away," Fetterman replied, "Yeah, absolutely."
"It would be troubling if my caucus elects someone like Van Hollen (D-Md.)," he continued. "[He] has really made his name being very... hostile to Israel. You know, if you are going to be angry or hostile towards any countries in the region, why not make that, you know, Iran or Hezbollah or Hamas as well, too?"
Van Hollen is challenging Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for the post of majority leader following Democrats' "blue tsunami" midterm victory. Van Hollen has criticized Israel for what a UN commission of inquiry and many other experts have called its genocide in Gaza and what the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has found to be an illegal occupation and apartheid in the West Bank. He has supported measures to stop the sale of offensive weapons to Israel.
"Both in the House, now in the Senate, now their first instincts are to punish Israel," Fetterman said of the nation facing a genocide case at the ICJ, and whose prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, including murder and forced starvation.
Fetterman contended that progressives "can't identify Iran as an enemy" and are "committed to destroying Israel and our nation as well."
The senator also described himself as "pro-data center," a position at odds with not only progressives and many corporate Democrats, but also numerous Republicans.
While insisting that he's still a Democrat, Fetterman said that "I don't expect my party to change, but I'm always going to put our country before party."
Asked about Pennsylvania Democratic Senate candidate Ahmed Moor, who was born in Gaza, Fetterman falsely denounced the Philadelphia writer and entrepreneur as "someone who is very... pro-Hamas."
Fetterman hasn't said whether he will seek reelection in 2028.
"I am always going to support Israel," stressed Fetterman, who has taken nearly half a million dollars in campaign contributions from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's United Democracy Project and other Zionist interests, according to Track AIPAC.
This isn't the first time that Fetterman has threatened to quit the Democratic Party over the issue of Israel. After he did so earlier this year, one journalist quipped, "What region of Pennsylvania is Israel located in?"
President Donald Trump has also urged Fetterman—who has voted with Republicans on matters ranging from supporting the Iran War to approving the president's nominees—to switch parties.
Responding to Saturday's interview, Sarah Jones and Jason Easley wrote for the progressive site The Daily that "one of the positives of Democrats winning a large Senate majority is that John Fetterman... has no power and leverage."
"Since John Fetterman backed the wrong horse, he is now playing his last card: threatening to leave the Democratic Party," Jones and Easley added.
The Contrarian editor-in-chief Jen Rubin called Fetterman's threat "a great reason to vote for Van Hollen."
Calling Fetterman "fucking delusional," Rubin added, "don't let the door hit you on the way out."
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'Duffy Lied': Air Traffic Controllers Refute Trump Transportation Secretary's Ground Stop Explanation
"I’ve spoken with 60 air traffic controllers tonight about what Sean Duffy said at the White House today," said one journalist. "None of them are buying what he said."
Nov 14, 2026
Air traffic controllers are rejecting US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's explanation for Friday's nationwide flight ground stop, raising questions about the Trump administration's account of a communications failure that disrupted air travel across the United States, affecting an estimated 1.5 million travelers.
Washington Examiner homeland security reporter Anna Giaritelli told CNN's Laura Coates during a Friday night interview that she'd spoken with 60 air traffic controllers about the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ground stop, which was just the third to ever occur.
"None of them are buying what he said," Giaritelli said. "The controllers were saying, 'We don’t buy that this is actually what’s happening, the reason that Sean Duffy is saying this has happened.'"
Duffy lied.
[image or embed]
— Ron Filipkowski (@ronfilipkowski.bsky.social) November 14, 2026 at 3:24 AM
At a White House briefing Friday evening, Duffy blamed the disruption on America's aging air traffic control infrastructure, saying overloaded switches and routers had produced inconsistent radar and communications data.
“Our switches, our routers actually got overloaded with data,” he said. “And because of that, we shut the system down.”
But Giaritelli said the controllers she contacted questioned the plausibility of the administration's account, particularly the timing of the alleged equipment changes.
“These types of switches... that the FAA is doing, they don't happen during the day,” she told Coates. “They don't happen during busy times like a Friday afternoon. They're doing these midweek, middle of the night, when there is no air traffic going on."
Giaritelli's comments came as the Trump administration struggled to explain how a failure in the nation's air traffic control network could have escalated into a shutdown affecting airports nationwide. The FAA lifted the ground stop at approximately 8:15 pm Eastern on Friday, but the disruption continued Saturday.
Duffy offered a new detail on Saturday, saying that a system overload occurred when contractor L3Harris Technologies Inc. was replacing a section of the air traffic control system’s old copper wire with new fiber wire.
“Our contractor didn’t meet the moment or the equipment didn’t meet the moment,” the secretary said, adding that officials were investigating whether the contractor's "incompetence" or a faulty router was to blame.
Duffy emphatically denied that the FAA's recent nationwide rollout of an $875 million artificial intelligence system called Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes, and Trajectories (SMART) had anything to do with Friday's disruption, claiming that the system "is not even plugged in."
The FAA said earlier this week that it "will now use SMART in the airspace of all 22 [air traffic control] centers across the country to reduce delays, reduce fuel consumption, and improve the travel experience for the flying public."
Duffy also used the crisis to renew his demand for $50 billion in congressional funding to overhaul the nation's air traffic control system, arguing that the aging infrastructure would continue to fail without additional investment.
The administration's shifting account has added to calls for an independent investigation. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Friday that investigators had found no evidence of a cyberattack, although he acknowledged that the possibility had not been entirely ruled out.
Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-Va.) was among those who challenged the administration's explanation, suggesting that Duffy had concealed the role of the Trump administration's own modernization efforts.
Walkinshaw cited a September report from the Government Accountability Office warning that precisely this could happen.
“In essence, the FAA is buying delivery speed at the risk of cost uncertainty and potential disruptions," GAO said. "The net effect could be that air traffic controllers are forced to continue to rely on severely outdated systems that are prone to failure leading to more system outages, ground stops, flight delays, or worse—safety incidents.”
The fiasco prompted critics, including Democratic New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, to call for Duffy's resignation.
"From chronic air traffic controller shortages to repeated communications breakdowns, serious lapses in our aviation system have become a pattern on Sean Duffy’s watch," Hochul wrote on Facebook.
"Through it all, he’s been more focused on starring in his own reality show than addressing the crisis at his agency," she added, referring to the former MTV "Real World: Boston" and "Road Rules: All Stars" participant's "The Great American Road Trip" travel series, which features his family, including his wife, Fox News personality Rachel Campos Duffy.
The ground stop was the longest nationwide aviation shutdown in 25 years, with more than 3,500 aircraft already airborne when the FAA ordered the grounding. More than 4,100 flights were canceled Saturday alone, according to FlightAware.
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said Saturday that normal operations were expected to resume by Sunday evening.
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Ecuadorian Fishers Who Survived 'Manifestly Unlawful' US Boat Strikes Sue Trump Admin
“There is no actual armed conflict that could justify the use of military force against the boats," states the lawsuit, which accuses the US of "kidnapping and torture."
Nov 14, 2026
Sixteen Ecuadorian fishers are suing the US government over "catastrophic" harm resulting from a drone strike in the eastern Pacific Ocean earlier this year, and what they say was their subsequent abduction and torture, as part of the Trump administration's boat-bombing spree supposedly targeting drug smugglers.
The Guardian reported Saturday that the lawsuit is set to be filed Monday in the US District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. The suit concerns a March 17 drone strike on the fishing vessel La Negra Francesca Duarte II, which the fishers said was returning from a two-week expedition when it was bombed approximately 385 nautical miles off Ecuador's coast.
According to the filing, Ecuadorian authorities had inspected the vessel shortly before the attack and concluded it was carrying no drugs and that its crew had no affiliation with drug cartels.
However, two drones bombed the vessel, setting it ablaze and seriously burning two crew members. The fishers jumped into the water and escaped aboard smaller emergency boats before being intercepted by US military personnel, who allegedly restrained them with zip ties and covered their heads with plastic hoods.
The survivors say they were subsequently taken to a detention center in El Salvador, where they were held for several weeks before being returned to Ecuador. Their lawsuit seeks unspecified financial compensation for what it describes as a "manifestly unlawful" attack and the subsequent "kidnapping and torture."
Other survivors of US boat strikes have also said they were abducted and tortured by American forces.
“There is no actual armed conflict that could justify the use of military force against the boats, nor was there one on March 17 when the attack took place," the lawsuit states. "The US’ campaign of bombings against defenseless vessels and individuals violates long-standing and well-accepted international law.”
Dan Kovalik, the attorney filing the lawsuit, told The Guardian that the men "go out fishing, they don’t come home for a month, they’re... in a migrant detention center in El Salvador, and as we know those centers are not so nice."
"So there’s a lot of trauma there," he continued. "It was catastrophic for them. They are home now, but they are struggling financially, and the two guys who were hurt bad are still dealing with that.”
“They would also like the US to stop these boat strikes," Kovalik added. "That’s another goal of all this, and I think the US public and the media have been, honestly, not outraged enough about these strikes.”
The suit is the latest legal challenge to President Donald Trump's Operation Southern Spear, which the administration launched in September 2025, ostensibly to combat drug trafficking. But US officials have provided scant evidence to support claims that targeted vessels were engaged in narcotrafficking.
The Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights NGO, estimates that as many as 250 people have been killed in the campaign.
In January, relatives of two Trinidadian fishers killed by a US boat strike last year filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Trump administration in a Massachusetts court. The men were among six people killed in an October 14, 2025 missile strike while traveling from Venezuela to Trinidad. Their families, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), are seeking damages under the Death on the High Seas Act and the Alien Tort Statute.
The ACLU, CCR, and New York Civil Liberties Union also filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit last December demanding the release of a secret Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel opinion purportedly providing the legal framework for the strikes.
Relatives of a Colombian man killed during Operation Southern Spear also lodged a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights last December, accusing US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth—who earlier this week survived an attempt to impeach him, in part over the boat strikes—of ordering murder.
Meanwhile, The Washington Post reported in August that strikes on Ecuadorian fishing boats near the Galápagos Islands earlier this year were carried out by the Central Intelligence Agency.
Eight crew members of one vessel, the Fiorella, also disappeared after an apparent attack in January and remain missing.
The Former Judge Advocates General Working Group, which includes former officials who served as legal advisers for the US military, said last year that Hegseth's alleged order to "kill everybody" in one September 2025 boat strike—which resulted in a follow-up attack on two survivors—suggested that the defense secretary committed "war crimes, murder, or both."
Kovalik said he looks forward to the incoming Democrat-controlled Congress holding Trump administration officials accountable for the strikes.
“Some of the Democrats that we met with are very interested in doing hearings on these boat strikes,” he said. “We hope this case will encourage the Democrats when they get sworn in in January to start some hearings. I think it will have that impact.”
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'Miracle on the Mississippi': All Accounted for After Tanker Hits New Orleans Riverboat With 120+ Aboard
New Orleans Mayor Helena Moreno credited first responders, who she said "literally jumped right in to help," with saving victims' lives.
Nov 13, 2026
A large asphalt tanker struck a river cruise boat in New Orleans on Friday afternoon, causing the paddleboat carrying more than 120 passengers and crew to capsize and partially submerge in the Mississippi River.
Thirty-two people were injured and taken to local hospitals after the 520-foot asphalt and bitumen tanker Atlantic Asphalt lost control and perpendicularly struck the American Heritage, a docked paddlewheel riverboat operated by American Cruise Lines, at approximately 12:30 pm local time, according to Nola.com.
The cruise vessel was in the process of disembarking passengers when it was hit. Video posted on social media showed passengers swimming away from the listing boat.
One witness, Jamie Holford, told WDSU that the American Heritage took approximately 15 minutes to overturn after the initial impact.
Holford described the scene as "surreal."
New Orleans Mayor Helena Moreno, a Democrat, said the tanker had apparently lost control before striking the riverboat, sending passengers and crew members into the Mississippi River.
"At this moment, the information that we have, we have zero people unaccounted for, which truly is a miracle on the Mississippi," Moreno said at a news conference. She credited local, state, and federal emergency personnel who "literally jumped right in to help."
The injuries suffered by the 32 passengers were described by officials as noncritical. Two New Orleans Harbor Police officers were also hospitalized after helping with rescue efforts.
The US Coast Guard temporarily closed a three-mile stretch of the Mississippi River to commercial and recreational vessel traffic while emergency crews conducted rescue operations and assessed the damage.
The National Transportation Safety Board said it would dispatch an investigative team to New Orleans on Saturday to determine the circumstances surrounding the crash.
The incident raised questions about maritime safety along one of the nation's busiest commercial waterways.
Maritime law expert Martin Davies of Tulane University told WVUE that the tanker could have caused an even greater catastrophe had it struck the nearby Crescent City Connection bridge, which carries an estimated 160,000 vehicles daily.
In March 2024, the Maersk-chartered Dali, a Singapore-flagged container ship with a history of problems, lost power and steering before crashing into a support pier of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, triggering a catastrophic collapse. Six highway maintenance workers were killed and a seventh was seriously injured.
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Mexican Officials Fear Stephen Miller Will Push Trump to 'Authorize Direct US Military Action' in Their Country
Miller is reportedly demanding that Mexico drive the number of daily unauthorized border crossings to zero, which they have told him is impossible.
Nov 13, 2026
Officials in Mexico are reportedly worried that new White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller will goad President Donald Trump into launching a military invasion of their country.
Politico reported Thursday that concerns about Miller—a fanatical anti-immigration zealot with a long documented history of promoting white nationalist literature and conspiracy theories—are being expressed by "government officials, business leaders, and other power players" throughout Mexico.
Specifically, these officials fear that Miller will "push Trump to authorize direct US military action on Mexican soil" if it doesn't do even more to crack down on migration at the US southern border.
John Feeley, a former senior US diplomat who has been in contact with several Mexican officials, told Politico that "no one is pleased, to say the least" about Miller's promotion.
A Friday report in The New York Times revealed that Miller has been haranguing Mexican officials for weeks to get unauthorized crossings into the US down to zero per day, which they have told him would be impossible given that the US-Mexico border is roughly 2,000 miles long.
In a Thursday social media post, Trump threatened Mexico over a purported migrant caravan that he claimed was heading toward the US border.
"Many of the people in these Caravans are those that various countries don’t want—'Send them to America,' they say," Trump wrote, without citing any evidence to back up his claims. "But they will not be accepted! MEXICO MUST STOP THEM, NOW, and if they do not do so, the Tariffs on Mexico will be IMMEDIATELY DOUBLED."
A Tuesday op-ed written by columnist Leo Zuckermann published in Mexican media outlet Excelsior declared Miller a "danger" and the polar opposite of predecessor Susie Wiles, whom he described as "a skilled, disciplined, and pragmatic political operative."
Zuckermann also cited reporting from New York Times journalists Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan that Miller in the past has demanded military attacks on Mexican soil against suspected drug cartels.
"Let's be clear," Zuckermann emphasized. "The new chief of staff is a racist who does not look favorably upon our country... At any moment, he could revive plans to attack Mexico and convince Trump of their necessity."
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Israel's Spy Chief Reportedly in DC to Cajole Trump Back Into Iran War
The Mossad director's trip comes amid efforts by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to persuade the US president to abandon diplomacy and resume military strikes on Iran.
Nov 13, 2026
The head of Israel's foreign intelligence agency was in Washington, DC on Friday, reportedly trying to persuade the Trump administration to renew the illegal US-Israeli war of choice against Iran.
Mossad Director Roman Gofman was scheduled to meet with CIA Director John Ratcliffe in the nation's capital before traveling to Miami for talks with White House Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, according to reporting from Axios' Barak Ravid.
Other sources, including The Jerusalem Post, confirmed that Gofman was in Washington to discuss the Iran War.
Gofman's trip comes amid an increasingly public campaign by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to persuade US President Donald Trump to abandon diplomacy and return to military strikes on Iran.
According to Axios, Trump has so far resisted Netanyahu's demands, instead favoring continued economic pressure and a naval blockade while leaving open the possibility of a negotiated agreement.
"I could end it immediately," Trump said Thursday of the 258-day war—a claim he has made dozens of times in one form or another. "At the request of the nations that I'm looking to protect, we are doing it a little bit longer... a little bit more civilly."
The president claimed that leaders of countries including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain said they preferred that the US maintain the current approach rather than resume fighting.
Netanyahu had reportedly been lobbying Trump to resume strikes immediately after the US midterm elections, in which the Iran War played a major role in Republicans' losing control of Congress, according to exit polls.
Israel's domestic political turmoil may also be playing a part in Netanyahu's machinations. His Likud-led far-right bloc lost its parliamentary majority in last month's election, and opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot has a mandate to try to form a new government.
Some Israeli opposition figures fear Netanyahu could initiate another attack on Iran—or provoke an Iranian response—in an effort to sabotage Eisenkot's efforts and cling to power. Eisenkot, who met with Netanyahu for two hours Thursday, said Friday that he had warned the outgoing prime minister against taking advantage of the political transition to pursue military objectives.
Trump's own rhetoric has become increasingly bellicose. On Thursday, he said that he had "no hesitation" about using military force against Iran and that renewed strikes were possible "right now" if he decided to give the order.
In a separate Truth Social post, he declared: "We don't need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed."
Thousands of Iranians—including more than 3,500 civilians, at least 380 of them children—have been killed and tens of thousands more wounded by US and Israeli attacks since February 28, according to Iranian and international officials. More than 20 US troops and dozens of people in Gulf Arab states have been killed in Iranian counterattacks.
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Working Families Party Joins Call for Schumer to Step Aside in Senate Leader Race
"Voters demanded change, and many of them made clear to us that they meant change in Democratic leadership too."
Nov 13, 2026
Echoing a call from a key machinists' union earlier this week, the Working Families Party on Friday became the latest organization to acknowledge Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's years of leadership—as it urged the New York Democrat to allow the party to begin a new chapter with fresh leadership.
The group's leaders wrote to Schumer on behalf of its hundreds of thousands of members "and the working-class people we organize" to thank him for helping to pass crucial relief packages during the coronavirus pandemic and the Inflation Reduction Act.
But the leaders emphasized that regardless of previous Democratic successes, the voters who turned out in last week's historic elections and handed the party control of the US Senate and House, flipping numerous seats from red to blue, were not giving their "endorsement of business as usual for either major party."
"Our coalition knocked on hundreds of thousands of doors this election year, and heard from voters who are fed up with a political system that has failed to deliver change at the scale they need," reads the letter. "Voters demanded change, and many of them made clear to us that they meant change in Democratic leadership too."
The letter came as some Democrats in the Senate, including Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (RI) and Mark Kelly (Ariz.), credited Schumer with securing the party's new majority in the elections. Sens. Ruben Gallego (Ariz.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), and Angus King (I-Maine) all reached for a baseball metaphor to explain why they were supporting Schumer, comparing the election to the World Series.
Democrats who won those races have expressed doubt that their supporters were hoping to secure a majority led by Schumer, a staunch supporter of Israel and opponent of the broadly popular Medicare for All proposal who has held public office for over four decades.
Sen.-elect Adam Hamilton (Kansas) has called Schumer a "divisive figure" in his home state, while Sen.-elect Scott Colom (Miss.) on Friday rejected the idea that the Senate minority leader had "recruited" him.
"It’s fair to assume not a single American cast their 2026 vote believing it was an enthusiastic affirmation of Chuck Schumer," said David Sirota of The Lever. "There were lots of Americans who believed they were voting for change—including a change in the Democratic Party. Democrats ignore this at their peril."
"Working-class voters are demanding a government that will fight for them with urgency and conviction," said WFP. "With deep respect for your service, we urge you not to seek another term as Senate Democratic leader. It's time for a new generation of leadership in the Senate to carry forward the agenda the voters demanded last week: taxing the rich to fund the needs of working families, guaranteeing healthcare and childcare, lowering the cost of housing, ending the corrosive influence of money in politics, and making our democracy work for the many, not the few."
The group later said it was endorsing Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who announced late Thursday that he was challenging Schumer for the role, and called on Democrats in the Senate to back him.
WFP noted that Van Hollen is a co-sponsor of the Medicare for All Act "and has said Democrats must stop tinkering around the edges of a broken system," showed leadership in the fight against President Donald Trump's mass deportation agenda when he went to El Salvador to demand the return of his constituent, Kilmar Ábrego Garcia, and has long called for the US to condition aid and block weapons sales to Israel.
“The voters who just elected a new Senate majority are asking for a new generation of leadership that will deliver on housing, healthcare, and childcare. We believe Senator Van Hollen is the right choice for this moment to lead that fight, and we are proud to stand with him," said Jasmine Gripper, state director of the New York Working Families Party.
According to a tally by Drop Site News, 16 senators have expressed support for Schumer and eight have backed Van Hollen or are leaning towards supporting him, based on their previous comments on the minority leader. Twenty-two senators have indicated they are undecided, and nine have not said what their position is on the race.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) has called for new leadership, and said Friday that she will not be supporting Schumer, but did not say specifically that she plans to vote for Van Hollen.
Paul Blest of More Perfect Union posited that support from Slotkin, who has presented herself as a "moderate" Democrat, would be key for Van Hollen.
"If it becomes a progressive vs. moderate thing, Schumer wins that every time because there are more moderates in the Senate," said Blest. "It would need to be about retiring an unpopular leader to signal it’s a different party."
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Next Democratic President Must Say ‘No More Foreign Wars—None!’ Declares Ro Khanna at Summit in Denver
Khanna, who has floated a 2028 presidential run, said Democrats' midterm performance showed "being uncompromised" is the way "to reach disaffected independent and MAGA voters who want change."
Nov 13, 2026
US Rep. Ro Khanna, a leading progressive contender for 2028, was met with cheers at a Democratic strategy conference in Denver on Friday as he called on the next Democratic president to categorically reject foreign wars.
"When the foreign policy blob comes, and they say, 'Mr. President, we need an aerial bombing campaign on a rogue regime,' a president must say, 'Not on my watch,'" Khanna said. "And when they come back, and they say, 'It will only be a few days, it will only be a few places, it will only be a few planes,' the next American president must stand firm and say, 'No more foreign wars! None!'"
Khanna (D-Calif.) was one of several Democratic politicians who headlined the "What's Next" conference, put on by the group Majority Democrats in the wake of the party's blowout midterm victory earlier this month.
According to exit polls, opposition to President Donald Trump’s war with Iran and the resulting economic fallout were major factors that fueled unprecedented gains for Democrats in territory that has been represented by the GOP for decades.
That includes the victories of Sens.-elect Abdul El-Sayed (D-Mich.) and Troy Jackson (D-Maine), who won competitive elections while aggressively criticizing the US foreign policy establishment and advocating for a progressive domestic agenda.
Khanna told the crowd that the election results showed "being uncompromised" is the way "to reach disaffected independent and MAGA voters who want change."
"This means standing up to private insurance and drug companies and delivering Medicare for All. No half measures!" he shouted. "It means saying no to the defense contractors and cutting a $1 trillion, bloated Pentagon budget. It means a wealth tax on the billionaires who are the economic royalists of our time... It demands rejecting AIPAC [the American Israel Public Affairs Committee], calling out the genocide that Americans saw with their own eyes, and saying zero aid to Israel!"
Khanna told MS NOW on Friday that Democrats' historic wins “made it more likely than not” that he'd launch a presidential bid, joining a field of possible contenders that includes other similarly minded progressives, such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).
“We elected so many unique candidates: a Muslim senator in Michigan, a young preacher in Texas, an African American district attorney in Mississippi,” he said, referring to El-Sayed and Sens.-elect James Talarico (D-Texas) and Scott Colom (D-Miss.).
“It shows that this country is open to diversity," Khanna added. "It shows that they’re open to people who are not part of the establishment, unique outside voices, and that someone can surprise."
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Air Traffic Control Outage Blamed as FAA Orders Nationwide Ground Stop, Citing 'Extraordinary Circumstances'
"All departing traffic should remain ground stopped until further notice," said the Federal Aviation Administration.
Nov 13, 2026
This is a developing story. Please check back for possible updates.
All US flights were ordered not to take off Friday afternoon as the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a "national ground stop."
"Due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety," said an alert from the FAA, "by order of the Federal Aviation Administration all airports are ground stopped. All departing traffic should remain ground stopped until further notice."
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the ground stop was due to "a communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers.”
A major outage appeared to be affecting the FAA's air traffic control system, The New York Times reported.
“FAA technicians are investigating the issue,” Duffy said. “We will provide immediate updates as we have them."
The FAA issued an unprecedented nationwide ground stop order and closed the nation's airspace after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. An outage in the FAA's system that alerts pilots of safety issues had an outage on January 11, 2023, which also required a ground stop.
According to the flight tracking app Flighty, there were more than 30,000 departures and arrivals scheduled for the remainder of the day when the ground stop was ordered.
The Times reported that the FAA has recently incorporated an artificial intelligence model into its system, but it was not clear late Friday whether that contributed to the outage. The tool, Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes, and Trajectories (SMART), was made by an AI company called Air Space Intelligence, which won an $875 million contract to develop the program. The tool is aimed at avoiding flight delays.
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