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Thousands expected to march in Delhi on Saturday, as anger mounts over controversial changes to voter lists in world’s largest democracy India’s Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), which began as a satirical movement but is now emerging as a political force among gen Z’s, says authorities have begun detaining its members en masse days before a major anti-government protest in Delhi.Opposition parties, their student units, and the “Cockroach” youth movement have been holding almost daily demonstrations seeking the resignation of chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over a controversial revision of ⁠voter lists. Continue reading...

Free-roaming Aldabra population far exceeds human population of Seychelles after decades-long recovery programmeA survey of the world’s largest free-roaming giant tortoise population has discovered that the once endangered species is thriving.A population of Aldabra giant tortoises lives on an island in Seychelles called Aldabra Atoll. Continue reading...

A senior aide to U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee stopped an urgent warning from reaching Washington that Israel might be violating one of President Donald Trump's clearest demands, according to a new report.The New York Times reported that Israel approved in March more West Bank settlements at once than it ever had before , and staff at the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem saw the move as possibly crossing Trump's red line against annexing the West Bank – so they wrote an urgent memo for policymakers in Washington.According to three U.S. officials, Huckabee's top adviser David Milstein quashed it.The Times reported that this wasn't the only time. A dozen people who work with Milstein told the paper that since he arrived in April 2025, he has repeatedly blocked or rewritten embassy reporting to make Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government look better.When settler violence in the West Bank surged this spring, embassy staff drafted reports suggesting Israel was failing to stop it, but officials said Milstein blocked them. The cable that instead went to Washington, with Milstein listed as first author, was titled "Government Cracks Down on Escalating West Bank Violence."Milstein also buried a report on investigations into the killings of nine Palestinian Americans by Israeli settlers and soldiers, according to officials. Embassy staff found that most of the cases had stalled, some had been closed and no one had been charged. Milstein argued for telling Congress that Israel was handling the cases properly."If you don't get accountability, you endanger more American citizens," said Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), who led 30 lawmakers in asking for answers.Embassy cables dropped from several a week to a few a month after Milstein took control of the section that handles Palestinian affairs. Staffers told the Times they stopped writing reports because they expected him to block them, and he also reportedly asked colleagues whether they were "pro-Israel" or "pro-Hamas."The gap between what the embassy reported and what was in the news became wide enough that White House and State Department officials contacted embassy staff directly at least twice to find out what was happening, the Times reported.Some senior White House officials have complained about Milstein to colleagues.The Times said it isn't clear whether Milstein's actions changed White House policy. It also isn't clear whether the blocked memos would have reached Trump himself. But since February, Trump has said little about annexation even as Israel has expanded its control of the West Bank.Milstein, 36, is the stepson of right-wing radio host Mark Levin, a close ally of both Trump and Netanyahu, and officials told the Times those relationships affect how he is treated. He previously worked for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TeX) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis."The embassy ought to tell Washington everything — the good, the bad and the ugly," said Dan Kurtzer, who was ambassador to Israel under President George W. Bush. "If they're not doing so, they are damaging the policy-making process and possibly undermining the president's policies."Huckabee didn't address any of the specific incidents, and he blew off the Times' reporting as "so lacking in fact that it ranks up with other Times farcical endeavors" and said he "categorically" rejects it.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie says the revelation that two of President Donald Trump’s top political advisers worked for a pro-Russian government in the Balkans while the midterms loom is a sign Republicans are looking beyond Trump, according to Politico.Christie, a Republican who Politico says is considering another White House run, said the episode is indicative of the party looking past the Trump era.“If your top political advisors are not paying attention to the midterms and instead are paying attention to taking money off the table in a foreign country, that seems to indicate to me that they’ve moved on from Donald Trump as their top priority, and I think you’re going to see a lot of that,” Christie said.His comments follow a New York Times report that Chris LaCivita and James Blair spent several days in Republika Srpska, a partly self-governing region of Bosnia, in the week before Sunday’s elections there. Each was reportedly paid hundreds of thousands of dollars through a Washington law firm to advise the government on voting issues. The midterms are Nov. 3.Trump, who according to Politico, wasn’t aware of the trip, distanced himself from the pair in a Truth Social post on Wednesday. “They do not work for me, other than as outside consultants,” he wrote, adding that they are “allowed to do work for others” and that if there is a conflict, “I will terminate them, immediately!” The post came just months after Trump hailed Blair as “one of the brightest political minds in the Country” and tasked him with helping Republicans win the midterms, Politico noted.Not everyone sees the trip as a problem for the party’s midterm push. A Republican consultant working for MAGA Inc. told Politico the group’s work wasn’t affected because most of it is done by phone. “We were summoned to a 9 a.m. Saturday conference call where we went over polling information for two hours,” the consultant said. “I didn’t know they were out of town till I read it in The New York Times.”

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is asking the Trump administration for proof after U.S. officials claimed that U.S. service members were fired upon from Mexico.“We asked for all the evidence because we have no evidence,” Sheinbaum said Monday during her daily news conference, just one day after U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ronald Johnson claimed U.S. Coast Guardsmen were “fired upon” near the Rio Grande in Texas.The incident reportedly occurred on Sept. 26, with U.S. Coast Guard service officials telling Stars and Stripes last week that the initial gunshots came from the Mexican side.The incident comes as tensions between Sheinbaum and Johnson remain high. As noted by Al Jazeera, the Trump administration has threatened to carry out military strikes inside Mexico to target cartels, and Johnson “has sought to push the Mexican government to cooperate with [President Donald] Trump’s demands.”“The fight against cartels should unite us, not divide us,” Johnson wrote in a social media post on X in June. “Every moment spent turning this shared security challenge into a political dispute is a missed opportunity to strengthen our partnership and protect the people we serve.”Sheinbaum fired back at Johnson the next day during her daily news conference, demanding the Trump appointee respect Mexico’s sovereignty.“It is also very important, and I say this respectfully, to remember that ambassadors should focus on coordination and collaboration,” Sheinbaum said. “Ambassadors must respect the internal political affairs of their countries.”Since the alleged shooting, the United States has sent some 500 troops to the border, according to Mexico News Daily. Relations were already strained by an April car crash in Chihuahua that reportedly killed two CIA agents, and Sheinbaum said her government was never informed of their activities in the country.

President Donald Trump’s glib comments about Iran attacking Los Angeles and San Diego were greeted with amusement by MS NOW host Catherine Rampell, who claimed the president is making life miserable for the Republican Party.On Monday night, the president defended the costs of his war on Iran, insisting once again he prevented the country from developing nukes. He then added, “They could take out a city. Let them take — Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego.” On Tuesday morning, Rampell joked with MS NOW’s Peter Alexander that California's Republican candidates must be cringing —particularly the GOP nominee for governor.“You know, I bet Steve Hilton is having a terrific day today,” she joked with tongue in cheek.She continued, “I think that this is an easy thing for Democrats to tee up as an attack on Donald Trump and evidence that he does not have the voters' interests at heart, including in places where there are a fair number of Republicans like San Diego. And this is a very difficult position for Republicans to be in, because how are they supposed to defend this?”Pressed about Trump’s ongoing campaigning in red states where he is creating campaign fodder for Democrats, she added, “I feel like there are a lot of Republican candidates who are out there secretly saying, ‘Please stop helping us stop. Just stay home, go in your bunker and keep your mouth shut.’” - YouTube youtu.be

Despite widespread reporting that the mass protests in France were sparked by students over deteriorating school conditions, President Donald Trump took to social media Tuesday to claim they were instead about Muslims’ purported desire to “take over” the European nation.The protests began last month in Paris suburbs, led by high school students protesting “overcrowded classrooms, teacher absences, outdated facilities and other grievances,” Euronews reported. The protests soon spread nationwide and have resulted in violent clashes with police. More than 5,000 people have been arrested, 190 students injured, and a 15-year-old boy reportedly lost his hand in clashes with law enforcement.Trump insisted he knew different, however, blaming the civil unrest squarely on migration and the nation’s Muslim population.“What’s happening in France is nothing less than out of control mass migration,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. “This isn’t about schools, this is about Islam wanting to take over a once great Country!”Trump has long targeted Muslims in both rhetoric and policy. During his first presidential campaign, he called for an explicit ban on Muslims entering the country. Shortly after taking office in 2017, he signed an executive order barring travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries, a policy widely dubbed the “Muslim ban.”In June 2025, Trump revived the policy with a sweeping ban on travelers from 12 countries, including the Muslim-majority nations of Afghanistan, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

Donald Trump’s comment that Iran is free to attack major population centers on the West Coast has created outrage among those seeing it on the news, but failed to have much impact on his rally attendees.That is according to MS NOW’s Mychael Schnell, who is traveling with the president and was on hand when he blurted, “They can take out a city. Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego — it’ll be over very soon.”Appearing with MS NOW host Stephanie Ruhle, Schnell admitted, “I can tell you for myself, I was standing on the press riser in that room, and it was the moment where I thought to myself, ‘Did I really just hear that correctly? Is that what the president said?’”“I can tell you there were some applause and some claps in the room after that line, but there wasn't a rousing reaction that maybe President Trump would anticipate,” she continued before offering, “Because, to that point that you just alluded to, Nebraskans right now are struggling with high gas prices, particularly high diesel prices that are well over $6 a gallon, which is squeezing farmers.”“Farmers make up such a key part of the workforce here,” she elaborated. “They're unable to power up their tractors, their pickup trucks and other machinery on their farms because of the high diesel costs, so Nebraskans here don't see this as a laughing matter.” - YouTube youtu.be