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Being There: Are These People In the Room With Us?
These truly-through-the-looking-glass days, it seems the drunk great-uncle you really didn't wanna ask to dinner is somehow getting worse. Scarily and no longer mirthfully, the befuddled "head" of a GOP blitzed on projection daily spirals deeper into phantasmagoria - slurring words, crafting fictions, renaming oceans, rekindling grievances, losing it over trifles and consorting with imaginary friends as the world burns. An Orange-Stain plea from No Kings for the coming election: "Clean Up On Aisle USA" please. Soon.
To be clear, Trump was a lying fabulist from way back. In the glitzy 1980s and 1990s, he regularly posed as a successful businessman, savvy dealmaker and cad-about-town who'd infamously call reporters or publicists as "John Barron" to boast about his money or conquests - a ploy he admitted in later court depositions he learned from his Nazi father. In power, like "a pre-teen with a girlfriend in Canada nobody's met," he's long invented "friends," fans, sources who praise him and his dreadful policies, from cultists invariably with tears in their eyes who "thank me for saving the country" to U.S. CEOs and "one of the great people of China, from the highest echelons" who inexplicably extol his disastrous tariffs.
Lately, though, the GOP is reportedly freaking out, watching the line between fact and fiction increasingly blur in Dear Leader's mashed-potato mind as the economy keeps tumbling and vital mid-terms approach. They want him to celebrate (albeit largely imaginary) tax cuts, trade deals, safe borders, winning fights against drag shows and "transgender for everyone" (sigh). Instead, he raves about livestreamed executions, the hotness of GOP candidates, often in the wrong state - "His ass, shit, it's like a pile of muscle" - his bestie Putin who's been "fine on Ukraine," how "not a single" undocumented immigrant has entered America since he took office, how soaring gas and diesel costs are "a small price to pay," though it's unclear for what.
He garbles words or makes them up - "When we had the hurricane...We call it a watercane" - prompting excited patriots to up their expectations: "OK, cancel the Blue Wave, we want a Blue Watercane." Wearily, he jokes about creating a robot lookalike on the campaign trail- "Nobody would know the difference" - so he can stay home and watch TV, his true, small vocation. Weirdly, he fantasizes about trashing other countries: He boasts about "polling higher than anyone has ever polled in Venezuela," which is why "after I finish with this" he'll to go Venezuela, "learn Spanish quickly, it won't take long, I'm good at languages" and run for president there, and yes we are here for it.
Hopefully, Venezuela won't have pesky reporters asking him questions that drive him to melt down in "dementia anger-flare." Because he lacks both impulse control and any trace of decency, he's also lauded Vivek Ramaswamy's grotesque ad against rape survivor and Dem opponent Amy Acton, wherein her estranged, unhinged mother calls her a liar, charging the Fake News "is trying to convince everyone this Ad is bad because it’s so good!...It's called 'hitting pay dirt.’” He adds that if his "legendary" mother "said anything bad about me, (it) would go down as the Ad of the Decade — Maybe the Century!" Vivek should keep the ad up, he says, so people know Acton is "a DISASTER who, uncontrollably, lies, cheats, and steals!” Killer pot/kettle.
There are more. The racist fraudsters who got rich on corruption - and turned Minneapolis into Fallujah - want us to rat on our neighbors for...fraud under Trump's stammered "Fraud Whistle...Blower Incentive...Program" whereby "Americans (can) report theft of taxpayer dollars," with DOGE "skunk-works" stragglers helping. Turn in someone with $1 billion, you get 1%: "That's a lot of money.” Except the cap is $30K, you probs won't see it, and it's queasily akin to Nazi bounties on Jews. Stephen Goebbels was even there to smear phantom Somalis who get $30 million for a fake daycare, buy BMWs or mansions, fly their kids "first class all over the world...living the high life." What a sick fuck. Meanwhile, America urges, "Call in fraud at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue."
Alas, the more loopy he gets, the more openly he flies his violent, racist, crassly unfettered flag. There are more curses and more bellicose AI slop like the video of a macho white guy put in prison with three scary black guys, by one scary black cop, who takes them all down: "Bullies Can’t Break a Strong Man." (So many pots/kettles!) The rallies grow more pugnacious too: In the second assault this month, a South Carolina sheriff's office is investigating an attack on a protester - punched in the head, neck and chest - that Trump cheered on, praising the thugs' "courage." "Who's the guy that threw that punch?" he excitedly asked. "I love that." He also mocked the victim as "a very unattractive guy," for a rare combo sick fuck and pot/kettle.
That was at a rally, in a reported “livestock arena” say what, for Darlene Graham, who’s “gonna have a big win.” If so, no thanks to his shambolic speech, which roamed from renaming the Atlantic Ocean - “I was always high end” - to insisting he doesn’t ramble while rambling - “I got - I know everything I’m doing. I got aptitude they dream about” - to again whining about the prizes he didn’t win: The Pulitzer for writing - “The people that got it shouldn’t have gotten it” - and the usual Nobel, despite being “one person who deserves it more than any yuman being." ”Not that I want it - it’s just ridiculous,“ he babbled. ”How the hell do you not get the Nobel Prize? i settled like 8 wars. The woman that got it, I don’t know where the hell she comes from.“ Losingest loser ever.
Finally, amidst all the lame, foul, daft fails, there are his deeply undignified transfers: The careening burlesque of a walk to his helicopter in Alaska. The ambling approach to his beloved, million-year helipad when he suddenly stops to acknowledge, salute and wave to a crowd of supporters, aka thin air. Eventually, the camera zooms out to show...empty space. A few seconds later, aides walk out from a different direction; other angles - here and here - show the same abyss, for which Fox would've run Biden out of town. Same for last week's event, ostensibly to honor first responders where, amidst a losing war, crumbling economy, burning planet and hungry children, Nero nattered and raved about his house projects. Nothing to see here.
“You're seeing this for the first time. This used to be grass. So if we did this, you couldn't do it. It was unusable. You know, this is built on a wetland. So the grass was always wet. Even if you were in a drought, the grass was soaking wet. And especially women with the high heels, they'd be holding their shoes. They go out and buy beautiful new high heels that go into the White House and they come back and their shoes are destroyed. But we did a job with the same stone that matches the White House stone and hasn't been totally finished. We're going with the black over here, too, because the limestone doesn't hold up well. Never, never did. Never will. But what we've done here is really amazing. We put a brand new coat over the White House, brand new coat. We fixed up the walls. They were all broken, chopped, terrible shape. A lot of the ornamentation, like around the windows, was broken. And many years ago, 30, 40, 50 years ago, probably a lot during Biden three years ago because he had no idea what the hell he was doing. But you'd look at a window and you'd see ornament on the right side. And on the left side, you'd see it was it had fallen off. Some people think that's OK, but I don't think it's OK. So we had molds made of the right side. We put it on the left side. It's all perfect now. So we re-skinned. Basically, it's a re-skinning. And that building is good to go for another 100 years or at least actually. But even this, the you see the the top sections where it was so bad, I didn't even like standing under it. The thing was all cracked and broken all over the place. We put the sign up, solid brass, half inch thick, as opposed to laminate. You ever see these laminate? They they don't want to spend the money on the brass. So they have a piece of brass laminated. It's about a hundredth of an inch thick. And they put it on a piece of wood to save a lot of money. And then in about two years, it decomposes and it's laying all over the floor. We don't do that. But up there is the Rose Garden. And then we, as you know, that wall has sat for 150 years empty. And I said, something has to be on that wall. And I just had the the notion I've often thought of it because I've never seen it before. A presidential walk of fame. So we went from George Washington to Trump. And that will be extended on this wall right up here because somebody said, oh, but you have no room for anybody else. I said, no, it extends this way. And but I'm going to have to leave that because whoever it is, maybe they won't be able to figure that out. And if they don't figure it out, I don't know what they're going to do. You know, but we have we have at least one hundred and twenty five years of extension going this way. So it's fun. But everybody loves the presidential walk of fame. Nobody knows if there is any. And we have a very generic, very good description of every president from Washington all the way down. And we get a little bit more personal as we get closer to my my year. Talk a little bit about in more detail about what we've had to put up with....All I do is write the truth.” - Donald J. Trump
Ladies and gentlemen, the President (sic) of the United StatesGetty Image
As Biodiversity Summit Begins, 'Systems That Sustain Life on Earth Are Under Threat'
Four years after world leaders agreed to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, representatives from nearly 200 nations gathered in the Armenian capital on Monday for a summit to review progress on the agreement and discuss future actions to protect nature.
In the lead-up to the 17th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP17) in Yerevan, the United Nations Environment Program released a "State of Biodiversity Action" report. UN Secretary-General António Guterres said that the framework "has inspired action across the globe," with nearly 90% of parties establishing national targets, but "progress is uneven, and far too slow."
The framework—sometimes called the "Paris Agreement for Nature"—features 23 targets for 2030 and four for 2050. The world isn't on track to meet any of them, including its key goal to protect 30% of all land and water by the end of this decade. Guterres noted that "even if current national commitments are met, only 26% of terrestrial and 12% of marine ecosystems would be protected" on that timeline.
The Guardian pointed out that "the last biodiversity summit, COP16 in Cali, Colombia, ended in disarray with no clear agreement on key topics after negotiations ran out of time. Another round of talks were needed in Rome to finish the meeting."
Agence France-Presse reported Monday that "only a handful of world leaders, including UN chief Antonio Guterres but mostly heads of state from nearby Central Asian nations, turned up for a high-level session on Friday ahead of the formal negotiations."
Armenian Environment Minister Hambardzum Matevosyan, who is presiding over the summit, told AFP that success "will not be measured simply by the number of participants, high-level statements, or decisions adopted," but whether nations actually take action. He added at the opening session that "over the next two weeks, our task will be to bridge the differences, build consensus, and ensure that COP17... deliver[s] results commensurate with the urgency of the challenges before us."
Those who are participating in the summit and parties to the convention face pressure from conservation leaders, including Jeffrey Parrish, the Nature Conservancy's global managing director for nature protection, who declared that "our planet is in peril. The biodiversity that sustains us is being lost faster than ever, and ecosystems that fuel our health and economies are fraying."
Parrish called on those in Yerevan to turn the review process "into an acceleration agenda" to boost progress on the 2030 goals, "transform our financial systems" to mobilize investment at the necessary scale, "integrate biodiversity into infrastructure and development decision-making," and "strengthen policy frameworks to deliver durable, area-based conservation outcomes."
Nature COP17 starts today, with governments gathering to assess progress towards restoring nature The target to protect 30% of land for nature by 2030 seems within reach, but ‘paper parks’ won’t cut it - eg just 7% of England is *properly* protected for naturewww.theguardian.com/environment/...
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— Guy Shrubsole (@guyshrubsole.bsky.social) October 19, 2026 at 3:34 AM
An Lambrechts, head of advocacy group Greenpeace's delegation to the summit, said in a statement that "we're halfway to 2030 and the evidence is clear: We are far off track to reach the 30×30 targets. The systems that sustain life on Earth are under threat, and decisions made at COP17 must deliver a clear course correction to protect our planet's ecosystems."
"This COP can't become a mere entry in a vast log of destruction," she argued. "Governments need to agree on concrete actions that tackle the drivers of biodiversity loss, increase finance, and redirect money flows to where they are needed. But decisions in Yerevan will only matter if governments follow through at home. They cannot continue promising to protect nature while supporting its destruction through harmful subsidies and incoherent policies. Any more delay is a threat to our survival on the planet."
Nichanan Tanthanawit, global project lead for Greenpeace's Ocean Justice Campaign, stressed that "protecting 30% of the planet by 2030 is not just a numerical target. Our ambition must be centered around justice, equity, and those who protect nature. Indigenous Peoples and local communities have cared for these lands and waters for generations, yet their knowledge, rights, and leadership are still too often overlooked."
Camila Jardim, an international political expert at Greenpeace Brazil, highlighted how biodiversity concerns connect to the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis—which world leaders have also failed to adequately address, despite scientists' warnings.
"The world is moving towards a looming 1.5ºC overshoot and the sixth mass extinction, with the human-caused climate and biodiversity crises already severely impacting people all over the world," Jardim said, referring to the Paris Agreement's temperature rise target for this century. "Those are not separate issues, but pieces of the same puzzle, and action is more urgent than ever."
"Governments can make the most impact with aligned policies to address both crises... together, with clear actions for the short, medium and long term," she continued. "This is especially critical for primary forests, which are essential for both climate stability and biodiversity protection, and the Brazil-led roadmap to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030 offers a real opportunity for strengthening synergies between conventions. Protection means tackling not only deforestation but also degradation, and ensuring that climate and biodiversity commitments reinforce each other rather than pull in different directions."
Europe can’t lead on nature at COP17 while cutting biodiversity cash at home
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— euobserver — EU news that matters (@euobserver.com) October 18, 2026 at 3:08 PM
Also attentive to the talks in Armenia on Monday, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) released recommendations and guidance on how to incorporate ecological integrity—or "how closely an ecosystem’s species, structure, functions, and ecological processes remain within their natural range of variation"—into relevant policies and practices.
"The world has made ambitious commitments to halt and reverse biodiversity loss, but success cannot be measured by simply counting the number of conservation areas established, the species protected, or the amount of land and water conserved," said John G. Robinson, a Wildlife Conservation Society scientist who co-chairs the IUCN Task Force on Ecological Integrity.
"The real test is whether natural ecosystems—forests, grasslands, freshwater systems, and oceans—are maintaining or recovering the ecological integrity needed to sustain life," Robinson explained. "Do these places continue to support healthy wildlife populations, functioning ecosystems, and the natural processes that make life possible? By focusing on ecological integrity, we can make conservation more effective, and governments can be more accountable for results."
'Consumers Are Feeling Spooked': Trump's Failed Economic Policies Send Price of Halloween Candy Soaring
President Donald Trump's illegal war with Iran and his global tariffs have tag-teamed to jack up the price of Halloween candy, according to a report published Tuesday.
The new analysis by Groundwork Collaborative and The Century Foundation finds that the price of popular Halloween candy has increased by more than 15% during the last year, which is several times the overall rate of inflation over the same period.
The biggest jump in price came from candy maker Mondelez, whose sour gummy candy variety pack saw its price shoot up by more than 39% in the last year.
Other notable price hikes included the Hershey variety pack, which increased by nearly 20%; the Ferrero chocolate pack, which increased by 19%; the Mars chocolate variety pack, which increased by over 13%; and Tootsie seasonal lollipops, which increased by over 7%.
The report notes that Trump's illegal Iran War and his aluminum tariffs have had an impact on candy prices by driving up packaging costs for sweets.
However, the report also points the finger at the candy companies, which have continued to raise prices even after receiving a tariff exemption for cocoa and getting refunds for illegal tariffs Trump charged them last year.
"Hershey’s profit margin jumped 50% year over year, helped by pocketing a $9 million tariff refund that never made its way back to shoppers," the report notes, "while Mondelez saw a similar 30% bump in margins."
Kyle K. Moore, chief economist at The Century Foundation, said that Trump's policies had helped turn "a fun family tradition into another terrifying bill."
"With debt and high prices eating into families’ Halloween budgets," said Moore, "it's no wonder consumers are feeling spooked."
Elizabeth Pancotti, vice president of policy and advocacy at Groundwork Collaborative, pointed out that consumer sentiment recently hit record lows, as Americans are also struggling with the rising costs of gasoline and groceries.
"Trick-or-treaters will have to make due with miniature candy bars this year to accommodate Trump’s king-size price hikes," Pancotti said.
A Sunday report in The Cleveland Plain Dealer highlighted an additional reason for the high price of Halloween candy: The price of sugar, which has been affected by "poor weather and weaker production forecasts in several major sugar-producing regions."
A survey released earlier this month by Lending Tree found that Americans expect to spend significantly less on Halloween overall this year, with 23% saying they plan to buy fewer overall Halloween items compared to a year ago, while 24% said they expected to go into debt while celebrating the holiday.
Data released by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics last week showed inflation in September rising to its fastest level in six months, driven in large part by costs related to the Iran War.
Brazil's Lula Wins 'Historic Victory' Against Right-Wing Trump Ally Flávio Bolsonaro
In a historic comeback, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva triumphed in Sunday's run-off election over right-wing challenger Flávio Bolsonaro, the son of former Brazilian President and convicted coup-plotter Jair Bolsonaro.
Lula's victory comes despite the best efforts of US President Donald Trump and his Big Tech backers, as Trump's administration openly intervened on behalf of Bolsonaro and Meta boosted pro-Bolsonaro over pro-Lula content on its social media platforms.
"Lula won, Brazil won, democracy won, the Americas won," said Pennsylvania Democratic House nominee Chris Rabb from Lula's campaign headquarters in Sao Paulo, Brazil, after the results were announced around 9:15 pm Brasilia time. "They declared victory for Lula da Silva for his fourth term against a raging fascist, rubber-stamped for Donald Trump."
"These elections have represented a historic victory for the majority of the Brazilian people, who mobilized to defend democracy against the threat of fascism."
Rabb noted that Lula's victory marked an important turning point for the left in Latin America, as far-right parties had won every other national election in the region since the start of Trump's second term. "This is the first victory for democracy in this hemisphere since Trump took office," Rabb said.
With 99.99% of the votes counted, Lula won by 51.79% to Bolsonario's 48.21%, making him the first Brazilian candidate since the restoration of democracy in 1985 to win a second-round election after coming in second in the initial round.
“I would like to thank the Brazilian people for the generosity they have shown me for a long time,” Lula said in his victory speech in São Paulo late Sunday. “And, in this second round, I want to thank the generosity of the Brazilian youth, who took to the streets to defend democracy.”
After finishing two percentage points behind Bolsonaro in the October 4 poll, Lula re-energized his campaign by finally shortening the Brazilian workweek from six to five days, as his supporters launched demonstrations against the far-right.
"These elections have represented a historic victory for the majority of the Brazilian people, who mobilized to defend democracy against the threat of fascism," Francesca Emanuele, senior international policy associate with the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), told Common Dreams from Sao Paulo, Brazil, where she was monitoring the elections. "It was the Brazilian people themselves (students, working-class, and middle-class Brazilians) who took to the streets and mobilized tirelessly from the very first day after the first round of voting to overturn the first-round results and secure Lula’s victory."
Reginaldo Lopes, a federal deputy for Lula's Workers' Party, told The Guardian: “I feel incredible… This is Brazil telling the world that the extreme right is fascist, that the extreme right is against Black people, is against the poor, against the state, against gay people... We are going to reorganize the democratic forces [in this country.]"
Sunday's victory did not come easily, as the Lula campaign complained of bus shortages in the key cities of Salvador and Sao Paulo, requesting that the Brazilian Supreme Court extend the voting by two hours. The court granted the request, so polls closed at 7 pm Brasilia time instead of 5 pm.
"Lula’s win is the first good news for the planet in a while!"
"Lula has won despite the unfair practices his campaign has faced from Meta, interference from the Trump administration, and severe disruptions to public transportation on election day in major cities (where up to 50% of bus fleets were reportedly out of service)," Emanuele told Common Dreams. "These disruptions disproportionately affected working-class voters, who rely heavily on public transportation and have historically been a key part of Lula’s electoral base."
She continued: "Despite all these obstacles, Lula’s campaign managed to turn around a first-round result that, just a few weeks ago, had seemed extremely difficult to reverse. This is a major victory for the majority of the Brazilian people."
Several advocates and lawmakers hailed the election results as a rebuke to the far-right and the Trump administration in particular.
"During his campaign, President Lula characterized 2026’s elections as a choice between 'sovereignty or submission.' Brazil has clearly chosen sovereignty," the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), who sent a delegation to observe both rounds of Brazil's elections, wrote in a statement.
Progressive Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) posted on social media: "People all across the world are fighting back against extremism. With Lula in Brazil, they just won. Authoritarian leaders always attack democracy because they stand no chance against the will of their people. Trump must respect the results and not undermine Brazil’s elections."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said: "Congratulations to Lula on his extraordinary reelection victory in the Brazilian presidential election. Lula has stood up for Brazilian workers & democracy—and will continue to do so in the next four years."
"Lula's hard-fought victory is an indictment on the right-wing wave sweeping through Latin America," Joseph Bouchard, a journalist and researcher who focuses on Latin America, told Common Dreams. "Except for [ Salvadorian President Nayib] Bukele, the right across the region is still incredibly unpopular, and rightly seen as corrupt, autocratic, and uncommitted to fixing systemic issues. Lula shows there is still a fight for democracy worth having, while the region is plunged into its darkest, most regressive period since the Cold War. The entire region is populated by vassal states for US interests, who have declared states of exception to curtail rights, freedoms, and basic principles of social democracy, in the name of a failed and anti-human war on drugs."
Lula's victory also has planetary consequences, as he brought deforestation in the Amazon rainforest back down to record lows after it accelerated during the tenure of Jair Bolsonaro, who attacked environmental protections and Indigenous rights.
"Lula’s win is the first good news for the planet in a while!" wrote 350.org and Third Act co-founder Bill McKibben. "I bet it shaves a tenth of a degree off how hot our Earth eventually gets, which will save millions of lives. Thank you Brazil!"
Lula still faces a fight ahead, as Bolsonaro announced it was "impossible to concede the election result" due to the extension of polling hours, even though his team had also sought an extension in parts of southeastern Brazil because of unfavorable weather.
Bouchard pointed out that "Lula will fight an uphill battle with a far-right Congress, inept Supreme Court, and constant outside pressure.."
"Trump's silence on the result is worrisome, with Flavio not conceding and demanding an annulment," he told Common Dreams. "Sadly, much of the corporate press has legitimated these claims, despite the right's concerted efforts at destroying democracy. No matter how much the authoritarians try to tip the scales, the people can still prevail, if the left is willing to fight. This might prove to be a confidence boost to the demoralized and overpowered left all over the region, and may hopefully set the region back toward progress, hard fought after decades of dictatorship and neoliberal transitions."
US-based Lula allies urged others in the US to defend Brazil's democracy from Trump administration interference and to take their own stand against the far-right in the upcoming midterm elections.
The DSA wrote:
However, the fight continues—the thin margin of this victory indicates that continued struggle and mobilization will be crucial. As global capitalism fails to solve worsening problems of its own making, the capitalists turn to right-wing authoritarianism. Brazil’s left-wing coalition will face a right-wing Congress at home, a hostile Trump administration in the US, and hostile capitalists both [at] home and abroad in the years ahead. We of the DSA stand in solidarity with our comrades in the PT [Lula's Partido dos Trabalhadores], PSOL [Brazil's left-wing Socialism and Liberty Party], and Brazilian social movements in this fight for democratic self-determination.
This solidarity means recognizing our country’s role in the threat to Brazilian democracy. These elections were marred by interference from the US, whether by Trump’s politically motivated tariffs, or by manipulation of social media by US-based tech companies like Meta. They aimed to subvert Brazil’s democracy to favor its far-right allies grouped in the "Shield of the Americas," and to get their hands on crucial natural resources, such as lithium, cobalt, and rare earth minerals as well as petroleum and iron ore, which Brazil possesses in abundance and which Lula has sworn to protect as national patrimony. The DSA categorically denounces these meddlesome, imperialist efforts. We fight for a working-class foreign policy—one which centers peace, multilateralism, and respects national self-determination, free from US interference.
Rabb concluded his message with a call to action, and a celebration: "This is a big deal for us in the United States. This shows that Trumpismo is waning, and it is our responsibility now to make sure that we kill the beast. That beast is injustice, it's oligarchy, it's neoliberalism. All of these things. Now it's our turn, folks. November 3 is right around the corner, but right now I'm going to party with these Brazilians."
Update: This piece has been updated with commentary from Joseph Bouchard.
Under Assault From Trump, Embattled ICC Wins Top Human Rights Prize in Europe
The European Union on Thursday awarded its most prestigious human rights prize to the International Criminal Court and its officials in a rebuke to President Donald Trump’s efforts to destroy the institution.
The EU’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought—previously awarded to figures such as Nelson Mandela and Malala Yousafzai—follows another international honor this month for a former ICC judge. Earlier in October, Navi Pillay, a former judge for the war crimes court, received the Nobel Peace Prize.
“The European Union is built on respect for multilateralism and international institutions," said European Parliament President Roberta Metsola as she announced the award on Thursday. “With the award of the Sakharov Prize to the International Criminal Court and its officials, the European Parliament recognizes the court’s important work in upholding international law and justice.”
Welcoming the award, which will be presented in December, ICC president Tomoko Akane noted that it “comes at a time when the court and its officials face unprecedented challenges.” She added, “There is no peace without justice and no security without law.”
In retaliation for the ICC’s 2024 arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Trump administration has declared war on the court, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying the goal was to “dismantle” it.
The US and Israel have not ratified the Rome Statute that created the ICC in 2002, and they claim that the court therefore has no power to hold their citizens accountable for war crimes. Supporters of the body argue that it has jurisdiction over crimes committed by Americans or Israelis in member states, such as Afghanistan and Palestine.
At last month's United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York, Trump raged against the court as an "evil group of people" and declared that he would "never allow US service members or anyone else to be investigated or given show trials by an anti-American tribunal with no jurisdiction over us." During the same speech, he threatened to "annihilate" Iran and bragged about seizing Venezuela's oil as "spoils" of war.
After sanctioning individual judges, UN experts, and human rights organizations that provided evidence of Israeli war crimes in Gaza, the Trump administration earlier this month sanctioned the court as a whole—threatening to cut it off from financial services and technology it needs to function. Human rights organizations have decried the sanctions as a fundamental assault on international law itself and a declaration of impunity by the United States.
Yannis Maniatis, a Greek lawmaker and vice president for foreign affairs of the European Parliament’s Socialists and Democrats bloc, which nominated the ICC for the prize, said the honor was meant to reinforce the idea “that no one is above the law.”
“We stand by the ICC and its officials, and we are committed to safeguarding its work," he said Monday. "We must guarantee that the ICC is able to operate independently, free from pressure or external interference."
"The court ensures that victims around the world have access to justice," he added. "It is a people-based organization, not a political one. If the aggressors become the victims, and if we stand by helplessly as international justice erodes, we risk allowing those who believe themselves above the law to prevail."
Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, likewise welcomed the award.
"For victims of the world's gravest crimes, justice means a voice," she said. “The [ICC] must be free to pursue its mission independently and without pressure or intimidation.”
Some European lawmakers have warned that expressions of solidarity with the ICC will mean little unless the EU takes decisive action to shield the court from US sanctions.
Earlier this month, the chairs of five European Parliament bodies said that "targeting the court as an institution crosses a fundamental red line, one that threatens the independence and integrity of a tribunal established to uphold accountability for the gravest crimes of concern to the international community."
"The European Union must now demonstrate unwavering solidarity with the ICC and its personnel—not only with words but also with concrete acts," they said. "The European Commission must immediately trigger the EU Blocking Statute, shielding the court and European actors from the extraterritorial reach of these sanctions. Europe must stand firm in defense of international law and the rule of law.”
On Monday, European Commission spokesperson Siobhan McGarry confirmed that the measure remained under consideration but announced no decision or timeline for activating it.
The Left, a coalition of socialist and other left-wing parties in the European Parliament, said awarding the Sakharov Prize to the ICC sent a “strong signal to the European Commission to immediately invoke the Blocking Statute and protect international justice from US sanctions and intimidation.”
'Flat-Out Lying,' Israel Claims Palestinian Farmers, Brad Lander Entered Restricted Area Before Detention
An official Israeli military map belies claims made Wednesday by Israel's government that Palestinian olive harvesters accompanied by activists and US congressional candidate Brad Lander had entered a restricted area of the illegally occupied West Bank prior to their detention earlier in the day.
Israeli occupation forces detained Lander and scores of other people—including Israeli leftists, members of Rabbis for Human Rights, and Jewish American activists—near the town of Nahalin as they accompanied Palestinians who sought to harvest the olives that provide economic and cultural sustenance to their families and communities.
Lander, the Democratic nominee for New York's 10th Congressional District, was released after roughly three hours with what he called a "warning." Many of the other detainees remained in custody, according to The Times of Israel.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israeli Foreign Ministry initially said that harvesting in the area required prior coordination with the authorities. But a map distributed to Palestinian farmers by Israel's Civil Administration, the military's administrative arm in the occupied territory, showed that the location did not require coordination.
The discrepancy prompted questions about why the farmers and their supporters were detained at all—and condemnation of an illegal occupation and apartheid system that forces Palestinians to get permission to work their own land.
"The Israeli Foreign Ministry is lying. No coordination was required, and we were never told that it was," Lander said on X. "We were not in a restricted security area. We did not pass any checkpoints. Palestinian farmers do not—and should not—need permits to harvest their own olive fields. But they fear doing so, because the IDF doesn’t protect them from settler violence."
Responding to an Israeli Foreign Ministry social media post claiming "Brad Lander's latest stunt" was "not about harvesting olives," but rather "harvesting headlines," Palestinian human rights activist Ihab Hassan retorted, "If you stopped Israeli settler terrorists from storming Palestinian villages and communities, murdering civilians, stealing olives, setting homes on fire, and seizing land, there would be no headlines to harvest."
Hassab said in a separate post: "The Israeli Foreign Ministry is flat-out lying about Lander and the other activists entering a restricted area. The IDF’s own map shows they were not in a restricted area."
Some observers responded with mockery, like Jerusalem attorney Daniel Seidemann, who quipped that the apprehended Palestinians were guilty of "aggravated harvesting in the first degree."
New York social worker David Grossman posted a photo of an SUV belonging to World Central Kitchen that was bombed by Israeli forces in Gaza in one of multiple Israeli massacres of workers and volunteers for the food charity during the ongoing genocide.
Israeli journalist Haim Goldich acknowledged on X that "there's a chance there's a big mess here and 80 people were detained for no reason."
Wednesday's events took place against a backdrop of a particularly violent olive harvest season. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said Monday that between September 1 and October 12, Israeli settlers carried out 199 attacks connected to the harvest, killing one Palestinian, injuring 124, and damaging more than 2,500 trees and saplings.
OCHA documented more than 2,060 settler attacks resulting in Palestinian death, injury, or property damage across the occupied West Bank since the beginning of 2026—an average of seven attacks a day.
According to OCHA, at least 1,138 Palestinians—at least 250 of them children—have been killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank since October 2023.
While Israeli leaders have sometimes condemned individual attacks—even while casting aspersions on victims like US photojournalist Heidi Levine—critics argue that the state's broader policies enable the violence. Settlements receive state infrastructure and protection, while Palestinians face restrictions on movement, land access, construction, and agricultural activity.
The result is a system in which Palestinians can face military detention for attempting to harvest their own trees, even as settlers attack Palestinian farmers and destroy their livelihood with impunity.
“The harvest orders tell the story of the government’s criminal policy: Settlers are illegally seizing more and more hilltops with government encouragement and support, while the military, for its part, closes off vast areas to Palestinians under the pretext of defending those illegal outposts," the Israeli group Peace Now said last week.
"This is a system of dispossession and plunder," the group continued, "and it is a disgrace to the State of Israel.”
UN Report Details Israeli Crimes Against Humanity in Palestine, Including Extermination, Rape, and Torture
The UN-mandated commission of inquiry found that Israel's genocidal acts are ultimately aimed at "blocking any viable attempts to realize Palestinians’ right to self-determination."
A United Nations-mandated commission of inquiry on Monday issued a report detailing Israeli crimes against humanity in the occupied Palestinian territories, while also affirming that Israel's genocide continues in Gaza, despite a nominal yearlong ceasefire.
"Israel has committed war crimes and the crimes against humanity of extermination, persecution, torture, rape, and other forms of sexual violence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, intentionally targeting Palestinian civilians as it continues to commit genocide in Gaza," the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said in a summary of the 19-page report.
"In Gaza... Israeli authorities and forces continue to commit genocidal acts even after the so-called ceasefire agreement, with the intent to destroy the Palestinian people, in whole or in part," OHCHR saids of the report, which was authored by the UN-mandated Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.
"Israeli forces have also deliberately killed and inflicted serious bodily and mental harm against children in the West Bank—as they have in Gaza—committing age-based persecution against Palestinian children," the report found. More than 21,500 Palestinian children, including over 1,000 infants, have been killed in Gaza over the past three years.
The commission documented cases of rape and sexual assault of Palestinians, including at the notorious Sde Teiman prison in Israel, where, according to the report, a prisoner "was raped with a stick and forced to insert it into his mouth until he vomited."
Previous reporting, including by The New York Times, detailed sexual violence against Palestinian prisoners, including one man who died after allegedly being sodomized by an electric baton.
The commission's report also affirmed that Israeli forces sexually abused Global Sumud Flotilla activists who were seized upon the high seas and abducted to Israel, including one male activist who was raped with a metal detector.
The report comes as Israeli forces intensify a military lockdown and ethnic cleansing in the occupied West Bank, including expulsions and home demolitions in Hebron, following the killing of two Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers by Palestinians resisting the nearly half-century occupation, and ahead of Tuesday's Israeli elections.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza—is trying to shore up support for his far-right coalition ahead of the elections. Netanyahu and other senior officials, including Defense Minister Israel Katz, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich have vowed to annex parts or all of the West Bank and to ethnically cleanse Gaza.
Netanyahu and members of his Cabinet have also said that Israel is planning to launch the biggest military operation in the West Bank since it was captured and occupied during the 1967 Six-Day War. Both the occupation and colonization of the West Bank are illegal under international law.
More than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded in Gaza since the Hamas-led attack of October 2023. Roughly 1.9 million others have been forcibly displaced, often multiple times. Israel's conduct in Gaza is the subject of a genocide case filed by South Africa at the International Court of Justice. A ruling is not expected until at least 2029.
The new report shows how the scale of deadly violence has increased dramatically in the West Bank. Six Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes there between 2008 and October 6, 2023, compared with 254 killed in aerial bombardments between October 7, 2023 and September 30, 2026.
OCHCR has documented 1,143 Palestinians killed in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, between October 7, 2023 and October 9, 2026. At least 250 of those killed were children.
“The intentional killing and injuring of Palestinian civilians and destruction of homes in the West Bank combined with Israel’s persistent denial of responsibility form part of a broader strategy to exterminate and displace Palestinians and impose conditions of life that are unliveable,” Srinivasan Muralidhar, who chairs the commission of inquiry, said in a statement. “Meanwhile, Israel’s expansion of territorial control in Gaza continues to result in the killing and harming of Palestinian civilians."
The commission also faulted the Palestinian Authority for targeting Palestinians for voicing dissent to its policies and actions and for its failure "to conduct effective and impartial investigations into incidents of killings and to ensure effective remedy, including financial compensation to victims and their family members."
The report found that Israel's actions ultimately are designed to thwart any possibility of an independent Palestinian state.
“Seizing maximum land while minimizing the Palestinian population in relation to size, autonomy, and viability stems from Israel’s colonizing policies and is rooted in historical practices and patterns of action, resulting in the excessive and discriminatory application of lethal force, displacing, injuring, and killing Palestinians over generations,” said Muralidhar.
“Attempting to equate Palestinian statehood with a threat to the existence of Israel is blocking any viable attempts to realize Palestinians’ right to self-determination," he added.
Israel Bars International Delegation From West Bank Amid Attacks on Palestinian Olive Harvesters
"It is clear that Israel is trying to erase Palestinian life in the West Bank and Gaza with minimum fuss and attention—cutting off support and solidarity from the outside world."
Amid international outcry over escalating settler terrorism against Palestinian farmers, the Israeli government on Monday blocked a group of European legislators seeking to observe the olive harvest in the occupied West Bank.
The group denied entry to the West Bank from Jordan included British Labour Member of Parliament Clive Lewis, Scottish National Party MP Lara Bird, Scottish Green lawmaker Kate Nevens, former Labour MP Sam Tarry, and Spanish Sen. Josu Estarrona Elizondo of EH Bildu, along with other international activists.
The lawmakers were set to join Palestinian olive harvesters on October 31 at the Qamar al-Balad Farm in the village of Farkha in the central West Bank. Earlier this month, Israeli settlers attacked the farm and attempted to burn its poultry shed before being repelled by local residents.
“I came to stand alongside Palestinians being attacked for harvesting olives on their own land. Instead, we were turned away at the border with no reason given,” Bird said. “More than ever, Palestinians are being subject to terror and violence by the [Israel Defense Forces] and illegal settlers. Increased blockades, demolitions, and unthinkable violence have become the norm for Palestinians in the West Bank.”
The United Nations has documented at least 272 attacks since September 1, eclipsing the full-season totals for 2024 and 2025, including assaults by armed Israeli settlers against farmers, journalists, and European diplomats. Last week, Israeli authorities detained around 80 volunteers accompanying Palestinian farmers, including US House candidate Brad Lander, a Jewish New York Democrat.
“For more than eight hours, we were held, interrogated, and made to feel as though we had done something wrong simply by attempting to enter,” Lewis said. “The simple truth is we had done nothing wrong. We went to show our support for the Palestinian people and highlight the terrible injustice and violence being perpetrated against them. We want to ensure that people back home do not look away from the reality of what is happening.”
The Israeli government has promised to crack down on violence by settlers, but the military has often aided them. Meanwhile, Defense Minister Israel Katz has pursued removal orders against activists seeking to protect Palestinian olive harvesters.
“We are dismayed that Israel has barred our entry to Palestine,” said Nick Dearden, director of Global Justice Now, which participated in the delegation. “But this is clearly part of a much wider campaign in which Israel is increasingly stopping politicians, observers, and even aid workers from entering the West Bank to witness or provide support to Palestinians.”
In retaliation for a UK policy cutting off trade with the settlements, which are considered illegal under international law, Israel placed 11 members of the UK Parliament on a “ban” list—including Your Party MP Jeremy Corbyn, Labour MP Diane Abbott, and Green MP Carla Denyer.
American activists who’ve traveled to Israel and the occupied territories to provide support for Palestinians at risk of settler attacks have also had their legal status revoked, including several Jewish Americans—even though Jewish Americans are generally encouraged to migrate to Israel.
The exclusion of international observers comes just before a highly visible national election on Tuesday, in which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is at risk of having his government toppled.
Netanyahu has ramped up military assaults on Palestinians in the West Bank in recent days, particularly after an attack that killed two Israeli soldiers Friday in Hebron. In what has been decried by the United Nations human rights office as "collective punishment," nearly 4,000 Palestinians have been forced from their homes while houses and businesses have been raided and demolished by the military.
While the surge in settler violence has drawn global condemnation and heightened Israel's pariah status, Netanyahu has praised Israel's "heroic settlers" in the final days of his campaign and vowed to expand settlements.
"It is clear that Israel is trying to erase Palestinian life in the West Bank and Gaza with minimum fuss and attention—cutting off support and solidarity from the outside world," Dearden said. "In this context, it is more essential than ever that the UK and other governments act with extreme urgency and courage to deter Israel’s attacks on Palestinians. This can’t wait.”
Former Biden Official With AIPAC Ties Tapped for Trump's 'Corrupt, Anti-Palestinian' Board of Peace
"Democrats should firmly oppose it regardless of how many former AIPAC employees the Trump administration sends up to the Hill to sell it," said one policy expert of the Board of Peace.
As President Donald Trump's Board of Peace, the organization that is tasked with overseeing a peace plan in Gaza, looks to boost its bipartisan appeal ahead of the midterm elections, in which Democrats could take control of one if not both chambers of Congress, the board announced Monday that it had appointed a former Biden administration official to help smooth the effort.
Shelley Greenspan, who served in the State Department and then as the White House liaison to the Jewish community for two years under President Joe Biden, was selected to lead external affairs, including outreach to members of Congress and think tanks in Washington, DC.
Greenspan has previously worked for Amazon in global innovation policy, for the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign in 2016, and as a legislative manager for the powerful pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
Her appointment comes just before the US elections, but also legislative elections in Israel, which have held up the peace process as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to take steps on the peace plan before the country goes to the polls Tuesday.
Recent polling has projected that a bloc of opposition parties could win more seats than Netanyahu's far-right nationalist alliance.
Greenspan has promoted Trump's 20-point peace plan as one that could bring "practical results" to Palestinians in Gaza.
In a statement to Axios on Monday, she said that in her last federal government role at the State Department, "I saw how the president's 20-Point Plan can tangibly deliver for the peoples of Gaza and Israel. I look forward to continuing that work with the Board."
But rights groups have warned the Board of Peace has failed to deliver safety to Palestinians. In May, five months after the board was established at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland—where Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, presented a vision for a "new Gaza" complete with data centers and luxury high-rises—Human Rights Watch found that 865 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli forces since the October 2025 ceasefire and humanitarian aid was still "far below required levels."
The Board of Peace was given a mandate by the United Nations Security Council to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, with Trump serving as "chairman for life." Last month, it unveiled a $2.45 billion recovery plan, including 66 projects.
But as Eric Reidy wrote at The New Humanitarian last week, the board "has put forward grand visions for redevelopment that are entirely disconnected from Gaza’s past and present as well as preliminary plans for stabilization that lack any viable path for implementation."
Meanwhile, Israel has continued to wage deadly attacks on Palestinians and daily life in the exclave has been "suspended in an intolerable state of limbo," he wrote.
"Trump’s 20-point peace plan says that Israel 'will not occupy or annex Gaza,' but it makes no mention of the West Bank," Reidy added. "The question of Palestinian self-determination is kicked indefinitely down the line to some point in the future when 'the conditions may finally be in place.' There is no mention of Palestinian rights or of justice and restitution, let alone recognition of Israeli crimes. Can there really be a path forward in Gaza that would benefit its people without addressing, or even acknowledging, the underlying causes of their suffering, namely Israel’s colonization and subjugation of Palestinians?"
Meanwhile, allegations of corruption have emerged, with Trump pledging $10 billion in taxpayer funds to the Board of Peace.
Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy, urged Democrats in Congress to oppose to board despite its attempt to cast itself as a bipartisan operation by appointing Greenspan.
"There's no 'fixing' the Board of Peace, and it's doing exactly what the world expects of it: serving as a Trump slush fund while validating continued Israeli control of Gaza, at the expense of Palestinian lives and rights," said Duss. "That is its purpose. No one should pretend otherwise."
Greenspan's appointment, said Akbar Shahid Ahmed of The Washington Sun, "underscores continuity in Biden-Trump policy for ongoing Palestinian suffering," and the "reluctance to pressure Israel even for stated US goals" such as an end to Israeli attacks on Gaza.
The Board of Peace, said progressive organizer Melissa Byrne, "is war and subjugation by another name."
Israel's Intensified Ethnic Cleansing of West Bank Spurs Calls for 'Urgent Action'
“The world cannot stand by as Israel continues its assault on Palestinians, waiting for yet more neighborhoods to be emptied and erased before intervening,” said the Israeli rights group B'Tselem.
Human rights groups on Monday implored the international community to act in the face of Israel's accelerating ethnic cleansing of West Bank Palestinians following a resistance attack that killed two Israel Defense Forces soldiers and ahead of Tuesday's Israeli elections.
Al Jazeera reported that more than 3,000 Palestinians have been forced from their homes in Hebron in the illegally occupied West Bank, a city long beset by Israeli settlement expansion and displacement. In addition to a military lockdown, Israeli occupation forces have detained scores of Palestinians since two IDF soldiers were shot dead on Friday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—whose far-right coalition is trying to shore up support ahead of Tuesday's elections—and other senior officials have openly indicated plans to ramp up the ethnic cleansing of the area. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich have vowed to treat the West Bank like Gaza, where more than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded and around 1.9 million others have been forcibly displaced amid a "complete siege" since the Hamas-led attack of October 2023.
“This is not only a humanitarian crisis but a deliberate assault on the economic foundations of Palestinian life, as families lose their homes and livelihoods," Mustafa Tamaizeh, Oxfam International's West Bank response lead, said Monday. "The destruction of factories, workshops, and business premises is wiping out years of investment and hard work."
"These illegal actions amount to collective punishment and are accelerating the forced displacement of Palestinian communities across the West Bank," Tamaizeh continued. "They come during the olive harvest, one of the most important sources of income for Palestinian farming families."
“In recent days, high-ranking Israeli officials have openly acknowledged they are considering plans for the largest military operation in the West Bank since 1967, with calls for operations in the West Bank to be conducted like those in Gaza," he added. "Against this backdrop Oxfam is calling for urgent action by the international community to stop Israel’s campaign of mass forced displacement, demolitions, and state-backed settler violence, which amount to a policy of ethnic cleansing.”
The International Commission to Support Palestinian Rights (ICSPR) said Monday that it "strongly condemns the escalation of Israeli occupation crimes across the occupied Palestinian territory, including the siege, raids, home demolitions, and forced displacement of residents in Hebron and other areas of the West Bank."
"These violations coincide with raids on more than 15 towns and cities in the northern West Bank, the arrest of numerous Palestinians, escalating settler attacks, and road closures, alongside the continued mass killings and war crimes against civilians in the Gaza Strip," ICSPR continued.
"ICSPR calls on the United Nations and the states parties to the Geneva Conventions to take immediate and binding measures to halt Israeli occupation crimes and provide international protection for civilians in Gaza, the West Bank, and occupied East Jerusalem," the group added. "It calls for an end to forcible evictions, home demolitions, settler attacks, and settler terrorism."
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres weighed in Monday, invoking the "specter of ethnic cleansing" and calling for "the realization of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination."
Community Peacemaker Teams (CPT), a Christian human rights group, also condemned Israel's actions, issuing a statement Monday asserting that “families should never have to live in fear of being forced out of their homes or separated from the places where they have built their lives."
CPT stressed that "every Palestinian has the right to live safely and with dignity in their own home." The group urged the international community "and diplomatic missions to act now to protect civilians in Hebron," and "people of faith and conscience to contact their elected representatives and call for action to protect Palestinian civilians."
At least one Israeli rights group also condemned the government's and IDF actions.
“The world cannot stand by," B'Tselem said, "as Israel continues its assault on Palestinians, waiting for yet more neighborhoods to be emptied and erased before intervening."
'I'll Be Senator Mohamed to You, Bro': El-Sayed Hits Back at Trump's Islamophobic Attacks
“I don’t care how he pronounces my name,” the Michigan Democrat said. “Because he can just go on and call me senator after November.”
Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic candidate for US Senate in Michigan, remained undeterred on Sunday night after President Donald Trump and his supporters ramped up their overt attacks on his Muslim faith at a rally earlier that day.
Continuing to refer to the former public health official by his middle name “Mohamed,” Trump told a frothing crowd in Port Huron on Sunday afternoon that El-Sayed—who would be the first Muslim elected to the Senate—was a “jihadist Muslim Brotherhood member,” escalating the false attacks made by his Republican opponent, former US Rep. Mike Rogers.
"I get that the president takes personal offense to my first name," El-Sayed said at his own rally in Grand Rapids later that evening. "He doesn't mind as much when it's the Saudis who are funding his son-in-law's private equity. Doesn't seem to mind as much when it's the Qataris who are giving them a $400 million private jet. He just seems to have trouble pronouncing it when it's my name."
"I don't care how he pronounces my name. I don't even care that he remembers my whole name. Because he can just go on and call me senator after November," he continued. "I'll be Senator Mohamed to you, bro."
The continued attacks on El-Sayed’s name and Muslim faith were part of a barrage of racist and Islamophobic remarks from Trump and his allies at the rally, which several observers on social media, including the prominent left-wing streamer Hasan Piker, compared to a “Klan rally.”
Portraying El-Sayed as a terrorist, Trump said the Democrat should not be allowed to fly on airplanes and, if elected, should be required to pass through a metal detector when entering the Senate.
Contrasting El-Sayed with Rogers, whom he described as American as “apple pie,” Trump said that El-Sayed, who has frequently emphasized his commitment to religious pluralism on the campaign trail, wanted to impose Sharia on the United States.
He also directed his ire at Jewish voters who may vote for El-Sayed, a frequent critic of US support for Israel.
“Any Jewish person that supports this guy should be ashamed of themselves,” Trump said, again invoking the antisemitic trope that Jewish Americans hold dual loyalty to both the US and Israel. “I’m polling 99% in Israel, and I cannot understand how anybody who’s Jewish can even think about voting for this guy.”
Trump compared stopping El-Sayed to stopping the 9/11 hijackers. Underscoring the point, he brought out David Beamer, whose son Todd died fighting the hijackers aboard Flight 93, to deliver more blood-and-soil invective.
"Mike Rogers is an American. Abdul has a birth certificate. The birth certificate says he's a citizen of America," Beamer said. "A birth certificate doesn't make you an American."
"He has a birth certificate, but he's not an American," he said of El-Sayed, who was born and raised in Michigan. "He had the choice. He had the choice to be an American or not. He has chosen otherwise. He has blood that's red. However, he has chosen to remove any strain of the white and blue part in his blood."
"We cannot, cannot allow this man to invade and occupy our country," Beamer said.
Though Rogers has attacked El-Sayed’s religious background relentlessly in the final months of the campaign, an average of polls from FiftyPlusOne shows El-Sayed with roughly a three-point lead just over a week before Election Day.
Rogers has struggled to defend Trump’s unpopular record as El-Sayed has hammered him over inflation, corruption, and the Iran war. El-Sayed, meanwhile, has stayed focused on a three-part pitch to Michiganders: “Money out of politics, money in your pocket, Medicare for All.”
Joining El-Sayed in Grand Rapids, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) suggested Republicans were resorting to Islamophobia because they had nothing of substance to offer voters on the economy.
“Mr. President, instead of slandering Abdul and his family, what are you going to do about the healthcare crisis in America? What are you going to do about the housing crisis? What are you going to do about income and wealth inequality?” Sanders asked. “These guys have nothing to say about the real issues impacting working families, and all they can do is foment hatred and divisiveness.”
"The reason that in many respects this race here in Michigan is... the race that people all over the world are looking at, is whether or not the people of Michigan are going to stand up to that vile racism," Sanders continued. "And I have every confidence in the world that's exactly what you're going to do."
Republican attacks seem to have alienated some of the Arab American voters who unexpectedly broke for Trump in 2024 over the Biden administration's support for Israel's genocide in Gaza.
"The remarks are out of line and crazy," said Bishara Bahbah, a founder of Arab Americans for Trump. "I mean, no sane individual would say these things."
"They are crossing a red line. They are racist," Bahbah told The Associated Press. "The president of the United States saying that about a person because of his religion, that is just not acceptable. And people are going to remember that on November 3."
Brazil's Lula Wins 'Historic Victory' Against Right-Wing Trump Ally Flávio Bolsonaro
"This shows that Trumpismo is waning, and it is our responsibility now to make sure that we kill the beast," Pennsylvania Democratic House nominee Chris Rabb said.
In a historic comeback, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva triumphed in Sunday's run-off election over right-wing challenger Flávio Bolsonaro, the son of former Brazilian President and convicted coup-plotter Jair Bolsonaro.
Lula's victory comes despite the best efforts of US President Donald Trump and his Big Tech backers, as Trump's administration openly intervened on behalf of Bolsonaro and Meta boosted pro-Bolsonaro over pro-Lula content on its social media platforms.
"Lula won, Brazil won, democracy won, the Americas won," said Pennsylvania Democratic House nominee Chris Rabb from Lula's campaign headquarters in Sao Paulo, Brazil, after the results were announced around 9:15 pm Brasilia time. "They declared victory for Lula da Silva for his fourth term against a raging fascist, rubber-stamped for Donald Trump."
"These elections have represented a historic victory for the majority of the Brazilian people, who mobilized to defend democracy against the threat of fascism."
Rabb noted that Lula's victory marked an important turning point for the left in Latin America, as far-right parties had won every other national election in the region since the start of Trump's second term. "This is the first victory for democracy in this hemisphere since Trump took office," Rabb said.
With 99.99% of the votes counted, Lula won by 51.79% to Bolsonario's 48.21%, making him the first Brazilian candidate since the restoration of democracy in 1985 to win a second-round election after coming in second in the initial round.
“I would like to thank the Brazilian people for the generosity they have shown me for a long time,” Lula said in his victory speech in São Paulo late Sunday. “And, in this second round, I want to thank the generosity of the Brazilian youth, who took to the streets to defend democracy.”
After finishing two percentage points behind Bolsonaro in the October 4 poll, Lula re-energized his campaign by finally shortening the Brazilian workweek from six to five days, as his supporters launched demonstrations against the far-right.
"These elections have represented a historic victory for the majority of the Brazilian people, who mobilized to defend democracy against the threat of fascism," Francesca Emanuele, senior international policy associate with the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), told Common Dreams from Sao Paulo, Brazil, where she was monitoring the elections. "It was the Brazilian people themselves (students, working-class, and middle-class Brazilians) who took to the streets and mobilized tirelessly from the very first day after the first round of voting to overturn the first-round results and secure Lula’s victory."
Reginaldo Lopes, a federal deputy for Lula's Workers' Party, told The Guardian: “I feel incredible… This is Brazil telling the world that the extreme right is fascist, that the extreme right is against Black people, is against the poor, against the state, against gay people... We are going to reorganize the democratic forces [in this country.]"
Sunday's victory did not come easily, as the Lula campaign complained of bus shortages in the key cities of Salvador and Sao Paulo, requesting that the Brazilian Supreme Court extend the voting by two hours. The court granted the request, so polls closed at 7 pm Brasilia time instead of 5 pm.
"Lula’s win is the first good news for the planet in a while!"
"Lula has won despite the unfair practices his campaign has faced from Meta, interference from the Trump administration, and severe disruptions to public transportation on election day in major cities (where up to 50% of bus fleets were reportedly out of service)," Emanuele told Common Dreams. "These disruptions disproportionately affected working-class voters, who rely heavily on public transportation and have historically been a key part of Lula’s electoral base."
She continued: "Despite all these obstacles, Lula’s campaign managed to turn around a first-round result that, just a few weeks ago, had seemed extremely difficult to reverse. This is a major victory for the majority of the Brazilian people."
Several advocates and lawmakers hailed the election results as a rebuke to the far-right and the Trump administration in particular.
"During his campaign, President Lula characterized 2026’s elections as a choice between 'sovereignty or submission.' Brazil has clearly chosen sovereignty," the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), who sent a delegation to observe both rounds of Brazil's elections, wrote in a statement.
Progressive Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) posted on social media: "People all across the world are fighting back against extremism. With Lula in Brazil, they just won. Authoritarian leaders always attack democracy because they stand no chance against the will of their people. Trump must respect the results and not undermine Brazil’s elections."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said: "Congratulations to Lula on his extraordinary reelection victory in the Brazilian presidential election. Lula has stood up for Brazilian workers & democracy—and will continue to do so in the next four years."
"Lula's hard-fought victory is an indictment on the right-wing wave sweeping through Latin America," Joseph Bouchard, a journalist and researcher who focuses on Latin America, told Common Dreams. "Except for [ Salvadorian President Nayib] Bukele, the right across the region is still incredibly unpopular, and rightly seen as corrupt, autocratic, and uncommitted to fixing systemic issues. Lula shows there is still a fight for democracy worth having, while the region is plunged into its darkest, most regressive period since the Cold War. The entire region is populated by vassal states for US interests, who have declared states of exception to curtail rights, freedoms, and basic principles of social democracy, in the name of a failed and anti-human war on drugs."
Lula's victory also has planetary consequences, as he brought deforestation in the Amazon rainforest back down to record lows after it accelerated during the tenure of Jair Bolsonaro, who attacked environmental protections and Indigenous rights.
"Lula’s win is the first good news for the planet in a while!" wrote 350.org and Third Act co-founder Bill McKibben. "I bet it shaves a tenth of a degree off how hot our Earth eventually gets, which will save millions of lives. Thank you Brazil!"
Lula still faces a fight ahead, as Bolsonaro announced it was "impossible to concede the election result" due to the extension of polling hours, even though his team had also sought an extension in parts of southeastern Brazil because of unfavorable weather.
Bouchard pointed out that "Lula will fight an uphill battle with a far-right Congress, inept Supreme Court, and constant outside pressure.."
"Trump's silence on the result is worrisome, with Flavio not conceding and demanding an annulment," he told Common Dreams. "Sadly, much of the corporate press has legitimated these claims, despite the right's concerted efforts at destroying democracy. No matter how much the authoritarians try to tip the scales, the people can still prevail, if the left is willing to fight. This might prove to be a confidence boost to the demoralized and overpowered left all over the region, and may hopefully set the region back toward progress, hard fought after decades of dictatorship and neoliberal transitions."
US-based Lula allies urged others in the US to defend Brazil's democracy from Trump administration interference and to take their own stand against the far-right in the upcoming midterm elections.
The DSA wrote:
However, the fight continues—the thin margin of this victory indicates that continued struggle and mobilization will be crucial. As global capitalism fails to solve worsening problems of its own making, the capitalists turn to right-wing authoritarianism. Brazil’s left-wing coalition will face a right-wing Congress at home, a hostile Trump administration in the US, and hostile capitalists both [at] home and abroad in the years ahead. We of the DSA stand in solidarity with our comrades in the PT [Lula's Partido dos Trabalhadores], PSOL [Brazil's left-wing Socialism and Liberty Party], and Brazilian social movements in this fight for democratic self-determination.
This solidarity means recognizing our country’s role in the threat to Brazilian democracy. These elections were marred by interference from the US, whether by Trump’s politically motivated tariffs, or by manipulation of social media by US-based tech companies like Meta. They aimed to subvert Brazil’s democracy to favor its far-right allies grouped in the "Shield of the Americas," and to get their hands on crucial natural resources, such as lithium, cobalt, and rare earth minerals as well as petroleum and iron ore, which Brazil possesses in abundance and which Lula has sworn to protect as national patrimony. The DSA categorically denounces these meddlesome, imperialist efforts. We fight for a working-class foreign policy—one which centers peace, multilateralism, and respects national self-determination, free from US interference.
Rabb concluded his message with a call to action, and a celebration: "This is a big deal for us in the United States. This shows that Trumpismo is waning, and it is our responsibility now to make sure that we kill the beast. That beast is injustice, it's oligarchy, it's neoliberalism. All of these things. Now it's our turn, folks. November 3 is right around the corner, but right now I'm going to party with these Brazilians."
Update: This piece has been updated with commentary from Joseph Bouchard.
'A Vote for Rogers Is a Vote for the Trump Agenda' Says El-Sayed as Rogers Hedges in Interview
Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers twice dodged questions about his support for President Donald Trump and the MAGA movement.
In another indication that the cratering popularity of President Donald Trump and his policies is making GOP midterm candidates nervous, Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers stammered before saying there was something wrong with his earpiece when asked if a vote for him was "a vote for the Trump agenda."
The moment came during an interview with Kristin Welker on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday morning.
"I'm apologizing, I'm having some difficulty in my earpiece, but, 'Is a vote for you...' I'm not sure, I'll tell you what a vote for me is, it's a great day for the state of Michigan," Rogers said.
His midterm opponent, Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, shot back on social media: "Lemme pick that up for him: Yes, yes it is. A vote for Rogers is a vote for the Trump agenda."
Lemme pick that up for him: Yes, yes it is. A vote for Rogers is a vote for the Trump agenda.
— Dr. Abdul El-Sayed (@AbdulElSayed) October 25, 2026
Throughout the interview, Rogers hedged on his relationship to the president and the MAGA movement that put him in power. In his extended answer to the first question, he mentioned that there were things that he disagreed with Trump on, namely some of the Canadian tariffs and the Iran War, but argued that a Republican majority was better placed to "work with" Trump on those issues rather than "just go back to poke him in the eye." He did not say why a Republican Congress had not been able to make progress on either ending the war or mitigating the tariffs to date.
However, when Welker then asked him if he would vote to repeal some of Trump's tariffs, Rogers also sidestepped the question, saying, "The best way to do this is walk in and say, 'Can we work this out?'"
Toward the end of the same interview, Rogers also would not answer directly when Welker asked, "Big picture: Do you consider yourself to be a MAGA Republican?"
Rogers responded by calling the question "a little bit disgusting" and spending the rest of the interview talking over Welker about Democrats who had told him they would not vote for his opponent El-Sayed.
Oh my goodness -- for nearly 3 minutes, Mike Rogers refuses to answer Kristen Welker's repeated questions about if he considers himself to be "a MAGA Republican" https://t.co/q4uSP5hgam
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 25, 2026
"He’s too afraid to admit he’s a MAGA Republican and he’s too afraid to admit he’s not," writer and director Andy Ostroy wrote on social media. "Mike Rogers is a weak, feckless coward who has nothing to offer Michiganders except outrageously racist lies about @AbdulElSayed, and the good people of Michigan know it. Which is why Abdul is going to win…"
Rogers' flailing came days after Trump's net approval ratings fell to a new career low of 31%, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling.
Social media account The Measured Take noted that "Mike Rogers has tied himself to Donald Trump for years. With nine days until the election and Trump’s approval rating in the low 30s, he sees the writing on the wall and is trying to distance himself."
The interview reflects a growing trend of Republican midterm candidates tepidly and belatedly criticizing some of Trump's policies, especially the war with Iran, without taking any real action to back up their words.
El-Sayed had previously slammed Rogers for reversing course on the war in late September.
“You’ve spent your entire campaign supporting the war in Iran," he said. "Liar, coward, fraud.”
'Just Run This as an Ad': Trump Dismisses Pump Pain to Boast of Oil and Gas Profits
"I don't give a damn, I'm going to say it: We're making a freaking fortune," the president said at a rally in Georgia.
If there was any doubt, President Donald Trump made it very clear Saturday evening that he cares more about wealthy oil and gas executives than ordinary people.
During a midterm campaign rally in Perry, Georgia, Trump acknowledged the high price of oil and gas, but said that the US fossil fuel industry was "making hundreds of billions of dollars."
His advisers, he told the crowd, had instructed him not to mention this "because people are paying a little higher," he said in a condescending voice. "That number's going to come way down," he continued, "but what we've done for this country, we're making money like this country has never made before," seemingly conflating the fortunes of wealthy oil and gas companies with the US as a whole.
TRUMP on HIGH GAS PRICES: We’re making money like we’ve never made before. They’ll say: President Trump is bragging about all the money they're making while people are suffering at the pump. I don’t give a damn. We’re making a freaking fortune. https://t.co/KZ2pYsTPyR
— Acyn (@Acyn) October 25, 2026
"Trump to people who want lower gas prices: 'Fuck you, I’m making money!'" Melanie D'Arrigo, the executive director of the Campaign for New York Health, posted on social media. "Just run this as an ad."
Nation writer Jeet Heer made a similar point, saying that Trump's remarks were an "amazing closing argument—for the Democrats. They just need to run this clip."
Drop Site News reporter Ryan Grim noted the tone of Trump's voice.
"Trump here does a widdle baby voice to mock people who are complaining about high gas prices, explaining that the oil and gas industry is making 'hundreds of billions, trillions,'" Grim wrote on social media. "It’s never been clearer how much he hates the people who voted for him."
"Like the epigraph for the entire Trump 2.0 presidency: 'I don’t give a damn. We’re making a fortune.'"
Trump seemed to anticipate a negative reaction to his statement, which echoed similar points he had made at a rally in Arizona over a week before.
"I can just see the fake headlines," he said. "President Trump is talking about all the money they're making while people are suffering at the pump. That will be the headline. But I said, I don't give a damn, I'm going to say it: We're making a freaking fortune."
Yet his supposedly fake headline is just a factual restatement of his own words.
It is true that major oil companies have made a killing from the Iran War, with ExxonMobil and Chevron reporting combined second-quarter profits for 2026 of $26.5 billion. This has been good for Trump, who owns stock in oil companies that has made him between $1.5 million and $4.4 million richer since the illegal war he started. However, this windfall has not reached ordinary Americans, who have spent around $1,100 per household in additional gas and diesel costs since the war began, according to the running Iran War Energy Cost Tracker maintained by the Watson School of International and Public Affairs and the Climate Solutions Lab at Brown University.
In fact, and in contradiction to Trump's boasting of shared American prosperity, Big Oil's windfall exists because of consumer suffering, as Climate Solutions Lab director Jeff Colgan pointed out.
“The profits for Big Oil are huge, and they are coming straight out of the pockets of American consumers at a time when many people are feeling the pinch,” Colgan told HuffPost on Tuesday.
Ron Filipkowski, editor in chief at MediasTouch, also noted the divide between the wealthy few benefiting from Trump's policies and everyone else when responding to Trump's remarks on Saturday.
"We are making the oil oligarchs rich. We are making Trump and his cronies rich. It is literally at our expense every day. There’s no trickling down happening. And Trump is bragging about it knowing nobody in the Republican Party will stand up to him and say enough," he wrote on social media.
New Yorker writer Susan Glasser said Saturday's statement was "like the epigraph for the entire Trump 2.0 presidency: 'I don’t give a damn. We’re making a fortune.'"
Jamie Henn, the director of Fossil Free Media, clarified on Sunday what Trump meant when he said "we."
"When Trump says 'we' are making money he doesn’t mean you, me, or the United States. He means Exxon, Chevron, and his other Big Oil donors," Henn wrote on social media.
In a separate post, however, he offered a policy solution that would actually benefit the majority of Americans.
"A Big Oil Windfall Profits Tax could return thousands of dollars to families who are struggling most to pay for fuel at the pump," he wrote.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) also weighed in on Sunday:
"Trump just said the quiet part out loud: He doesn’t “give a damn” about higher gas prices, as long as his billionaire friends are making a fortune," Sanders wrote on social media. "Trump doesn’t tell the truth very often, but he did last night!"
The Young Turks executive producer and host Ana Kasparian summed it up on Saturday: "The government tells us they hate us every single day."
Update: This piece has been updated with quotes from Sen. Bernie Sanders and Jamie Henn.
'Dismantle ICE' Says Jayapal After 60th Death in Agency Custody During Trump 2.0
"When our country detains people, we have the responsibility of ensuring both their physical and mental health—not driving them, though incredible cruelty, to commit suicide," Jayapal said.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed on Saturday that a man had died in its custody the day before, marking the 60th death in ICE custody since President Donald Trump resumed office with the promise of mass deportations.
Luis Sandoval, a 48-year-old man from El Salvador, was found early on Friday morning with a "ligature around his neck" in the Folkston D. Ray ICE Processing Center in Folkston, Georgia, according to a press release from the agency.
"Today I received notification of the 60th death in ICE custody since Trump returned to office. Sadly, this appears to be a death by suicide," Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) wrote on social media in response to the news. "When our country detains people, we have the responsibility of ensuring both their physical and mental health—not driving them, though incredible cruelty, to commit suicide. Dismantle ICE."
"We call for an immediate independent investigation into this tragic death and for accountability. Folkston must be shut down immediately.”
Sandoval was detained in Newark, New Jersey on October 2 and transferred to Georgia on October 8. ICE said that staff attempted "life-saving measures" upon discovering him Friday and that Charlton County Emergency Medical Services also attempted to save him when they arrived on the scene. ICE added that the death was "under investigation."
“This was a preventable tragedy,” Azadeh Shahshahani, legal and advocacy director for the Georgia-based Project South, said, as The Guardian reported. “We hold ICE and the private prison corporation fully responsible for any harm that migrants suffer at Folkston. We call for an immediate independent investigation into this tragic death and for accountability. Folkston must be shut down immediately.”
The Folkston detention center is contracted to the private prison company GEO Group. Immigrant rights advocates and Democratic lawmakers have raised alarms about the Folkston before Sandoval's death due to its treatment of detainees, approximately 500 of who launched a hunger strike in early October over a lack of due process in their asylum cases as well as poor conditions in the facility.
“People have reported seeing bugs in the water. People have reported getting rashes, presumably from the water that they never had. Skin rashes that they’ve never had before,” Samantha Hamilton, senior litigation staff attorney at Asian Americans Advancing Justice Atlanta, told The Current. ”People have reported their hair falling out as a result of taking showers from the water, and because the water is so disgusting, people really try to avoid it at all costs.”
Sandoval died the day after Georgia Democratic Sens. Jon Ossof and Raphael Warnock sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and the DHS inspector general calling on them to launch an “immediate investigation” into how the facility was treating detainees, and hunger strikers in particular, as The Current reported further.
It is not yet known if Sandoval was among the hunger strikers.
Sandoval is not the first person to die in ICE custody at Folkston. In April 2024, Jaspal Singh died after being placed under medical observation when he reported feeling chest pains. A review by ICE determined that the medical care he received at Folkston contributed to his death.
An average of one person has died in ICE custody every 10 days this year, Relevant Research president Austin Kocher, who is also an American University research fellow, told The Guardian.
“Even in the past, there has not been such an overt dehumanization and overt view that migrants’ lives are expendable,” Kocher said. “I worry that that tone [from the Trump administration] has a tendency towards neglect and viewing migrants as disposable.”
The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline—which offers 24/7, free, and confidential support—can be reached by calling or texting 988, or through chat at 988lifeline.org.
Thousands March Across Europe Against Inequality and 'for Young People’s Future'
“Looking at countries like the United States, we don’t want to end up like them, where part of the population has everything and the others have nothing,” one French protester said.
Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets across Europe on Saturday as anger continues to build over the rising cost of living and deteriorating social services.
While demonstrators emphasized different demands in different countries, the protest wave reflects a sense that the status quo has ceased to work for ordinary people, especially the young.
“I see so many more similarities than differences,” Alice de Brito, the vice president of French student union UNEF, told CNN of the protests. “We are all talking about the need for investments in education, in the universities, in youth in general. But we are also talking about the cost of living, about housing.”
France
Across France, between 410,000 and 800,000 people turned out in the continuation of protests that erupted in September when students began to mobilize against underfunding, teacher shortages, and other poor conditions in their schools. Adult workers have joined with the students, criticizing widespread inequality and the rising cost of living, leading to mass demonstrations on October 17 and again a week later.
“Looking at countries like the United States, we don’t want to end up like them, where part of the population has everything and the others have nothing,” Paris protester Louis Ledoux--Xatard told The Associated Press.
“Too many billionaires; we are preparing the revolution," one group of protesters chanted, according to Al Jazeera.
There were 289 protests in France, including in Marseilles, Nantes, Nice, Lyon, Bordeaux, and Orleans. Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said that almost 1,000 people were arrested, though the number was expected to grow. Two people sustained significant injuries.
"Behind every police officer, a compliant camera."
The protest in Paris had originally been scheduled to run through the center of the city, but authorities relocated it to outskirts and banned marches organized by groups other than unions.
"It won’t stop the movement. It won’t stop students from demanding better conditions in schools,” nurse Soumaya Abed told AP of the changes.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who leads the left-wing France Unbowed party, criticized the government of President Emmanuel Macron for changing the route, but also praised the marchers for carrying on.
"Total victory for the social movement," Mélenchon wrote on social media. "The march gathered at the new authorized point and is now flowing calmly over more than four kilometers. The provocations for disorder by the Paris police prefect and [French Prime Minister Sébastien] Lecornu are a total failure. For the authorities, it is time to give in, or soon they will have only the exit door left."
Victoire totale du mouvement social. La marche s'est rassemblée au nouveau point autorisé et déferle dans le calme sur plus de quatre kilomètres. Les provocations aux désordres du préfet de police et de Lecornu sont un échec total. Pour les autorités, il est temps de céder, sinon il ne leur restera bientôt que la porte de sortie.
— Jean-Luc Mélenchon (@JLMelenchon) October 24, 2026
Media reported that the Parisian demonstration was largely peaceful until the end, when police released tear gas and fired water cannons and some black-clad protesters threw projectiles.
Reporters with Agence France-Presse said they saw:
police charge several times and vigorously use tear gas and batons against some, mostly young, protesters.
"The police started moving towards everyone, telling them to get down and back off. They were just taking people down, you know, beating protesters," one demonstrator bleeding from a baton blow to his face, who gave his first name as David, told AFP.
Other witnesses also described a repressive police response to The Guardian:
Mike, a 23-year-old student who also declined to give his surname, said: “Look around, they’re just teenagers. Is it normal for teenagers to be teargassed and beaten with batons?”
For Jessica, a 24-year-old student, said: “I just don’t understand why there’s so much violence. I feel like our right to protest is being trampled on.”
Mélenchon lambasted the police and the media for working together to discredit the movement.
"In Paris, to ruin the day and unwind, the so-called forces of law and order gas and fire into the crowd at the back of the procession, all in a bid to get footage for the domestic news channels that spent the whole week airing the images that spurred the Trappes killer," he wrote on social media, referring to a racially motivated shooting west of Paris on Friday that killed one and wounded five.
In a second post, he added: "It continues with the policing of minds through the televisions of power. Tonight, staging of the « tails of the procession » to spew hatred against the popular movement. Without a single image of the masses in peaceful action. Behind every police officer, a compliant camera."
He encouraged readers to "turn off the televisions! Form your own opinion without a guardian. Journey through social networks. Stay free to think for yourselves."
Belgium
In neighboring Belgium, hundreds of people marched in Brussels in a continuation of demonstrations for improvements in the education system.
“We are here for young people’s future, for better work," rally speaker Celia Ponce told the crowd, as The Brussels Times reported.
She also accused governments of wanting to "destroy public services."
Protesters build barricades with bikes and scooters in Brussels, Belgium.Follow Press TV on Telegram: https://t.co/1ymjeeywxb https://t.co/TtQNj1BQYU
— PressTV Extra (@PresstvExtra) October 24, 2026
Police used tear gas to disperse some protesters and, in an incident reported by Reuters, kicked and hit one demonstrator after they fell during a chase.
Spain
Approximately 25,000 people marched in Madrid to support Spain's pension system and demand that it keep pace with inflation and that a gender gap be eliminated, according to Al Jazeera.
"How beautiful Madrid is when it defends its rights," Emilio Delgado, deputy spokesperson for left party Mas Madrid, wrote on social media. "We propose that no pension should be below the minimum wage. A lifetime of work deserves a dignified retirement."
Un aviso a @NunezFeijoo: No vamos a permitir que recortéis las pensiones. https://t.co/lQ7V0cQomZ
— Emilio Delgado (@EmilioDelgadoOr) October 24, 2026
The protests come a month ahead of Spain's general election, in which current Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's Spanish Socialist Workers' Party will face off against the right-wing Popular Party. Popular Party leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo has promised to adjust pensions according to inflation if his party wins, but demonstrators are still concerned about what a right-wing victory would mean for the pension system.
Portugal
In Portugal, meanwhile, the main demand was affordable housing.
People marched in Lisbon, continuing a movement that began October 10 in the city of Porto calling on the government to address the country's housing crisis, according to The Resident.
Palco dos protestos promovidos pelo movimento Acampada de Lisboa, o Rossio voltou a acolher "um mar de gente" que reivindica soluções do Governo para a atual crise da habitação.Veja a reportagem em direto no local: https://t.co/gpSIyl2mLr#agitacaosocial #europa #protestos #manifestacoes #lisboa #rossio #pais #portugal #habitacao #custodevida #noticias #sicnoticias
— SIC Notícias (@SICNoticias) October 24, 2026
"We have no home, so we set up tents!” read the slogan of the March, organized by the Acampada de Lisboa movement.
The protesters also opposed new policies from Prime Minister Luis Montenegro that would weaken a limit on annual rent increases and make it easier to evict people who are unable to make rent payments, according to AP.
Italy
Thousands of people joined demonstrations across Italy to protest the affordability crisis as well as the right-wing government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Protests were called for eight cities including Milan, Turin, and Rome, with 10,000 attending the Milan demonstration alone.
“We are here because of the rising prices and because I believe that our government has no respect for its citizens,” a 17-year-old student participant, who did not give a name, told Al Jazeera. “There are four people in my family. My mother works in a factory, but my father is about to lose his job. It’s hard to make ends meet on just one salary."
Thousands of protesters took to the streets across Italy to demonstrate against Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing government and the rising cost of living, as hundreds of soldiers were deployed to Milan as protests continue.🔗: https://t.co/JquqwnAyhj https://t.co/B97TnZaY9L
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) October 24, 2026
The Italian protests were a continuation of demonstrations that have taken place throughout October. There were fewer clashes between police and demonstrators on Saturday compared with earlier marches, though some protesters tried to enter the Colosseum before being pushed back.
Albania
In Albania, outrage over plans by US President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner to build a luxury resort near a protected wildlife area—which is widely seen as an example of government corruption—has dovetailed with demands by students for less corruption in the education system specifically as well as lower tuition fees and more funding.
A demonstration in the capital of Tirana on Saturday marked the 12th day of anti-government protests this month following a summer of mobilizations against the luxury hotel.
Some protesters lit fires and threw projectiles, while police used tear gas, rubber bullets, and water cannons.
Protesters in Albania have fought running battles with police, on a 12th day of anti-government protests. Police in the capital, Tirana, used water cannon, tear gas and rubber bullets after Prime Minister Edi Rama warned he would take strong action to quell unrest. https://t.co/6oZMYPU7Ei
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) October 24, 2026
One demonstrator, the 28-year-old Daniel Tahiri, told Reuters that the Albanian government was a "dictatorship with the clothes of democracy."
"Albanians have woken up," Tahiri said.