Important Takeaways:
- Hurricane Milton tore a coast-to-coast path of destruction across the state of Florida, whipping up a spate of deadly tornadoes that left at least four people dead and millions without power Thursday.
- Sustained hurricane-force winds smashed inland through communities still reeling from Hurricane Helene two weeks ago, before roaring off Florida’s east coast into the Atlantic.
- Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said the storm triggered deadly tornadoes and left more than three million people were without power.
- In a statement on its website, St. Lucie County on the east coast confirmed “four fatalities as a result of these tornadoes.”
- Wind uprooted large trees and ripped apart the roof at the Tampa Bay Rays’ Tropicana Field baseball stadium in St. Petersburg, and sent a construction crane falling onto a downtown building nearby.
- As the eye of the storm exited the peninsula, communities were still contending with strong winds, heavy rainfall, and the risk of flash floods.
- By Thursday morning, Milton weakened to a Category 1 storm but was still registering powerful winds of up to 85 mph (140 kph) , according to the National Hurricane Center.
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Important Takeaways:
- United Nations investigators have accused Israel of deliberately targeting Gaza’s health facilities and killing medical personnel during its war on the besieged enclave
- A statement by ex-UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay released on Thursday in advance of a full report accused Israel of “committing war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination with relentless and deliberate attacks on medical personnel and facilities” in its assault on Gaza
- “Children in particular have borne the brunt of these attacks, suffering both directly and indirectly from the collapse of the health system,” said Pillay, whose report will be presented to the UN General Assembly on October 30.
- The Israeli government has routinely said that its attacks on hospitals and schools in Gaza are to target members of Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups.
- Hamas has denied it uses the locations as command centers.
- The COI said the “institutional mistreatment” of Palestinians was under direct order from far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
- Israel did not cooperate with the inquiry after arguing it had an “anti-Israel” bias.
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Important Takeaways:
- Before the Russian invasion in early 2022, Ukraine was exporting about 6.5 million tonnes of grain overseas every month, according to figures from the Ukrainian Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, bringing in revenues of $27.8bn for the year 2021. It was the world’s seventh-largest exporter of wheat and fourth-biggest exporter of barley, according to the Foreign Agriculture Service of the US Department of Agriculture.
- Grain exports had fallen to just over 2 million tonnes per month in mid-2023, just over a year into the war.
- The reasoning behind Moscow’s targeting of grain-exporting ships was not yet clear.
- Russia may be emboldened by its recent gains in Donbas, or it may be seeking retaliation for Ukraine’s surprise attack across the border in the region of Kursk
- It may also simply be looking for new ways to weaken Ukraine. “If you can weaken Ukraine economically, that reduces its ability to resist,” Gorenburg said.
- Rather than targeting ports, the “intimidation of commercial shippers is a much better way to do that”.
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Important Takeaways:
- The university’s highest governing body, the Corporation of Brown University, says divesting “would signal that there are ‘approved’ points of views to which members of the community are expected to conform,” which would be “wholly inconsistent with the principles of academic freedom and free inquiry and would undermine our mission.”
- “Brown’s mission doesn’t encompass resolving or adjudicating global conflict.”
- Supporters of divestment ended their encampment last spring, in exchange for a promise that their call for divestment would get a vote from the Board this fall.
- Students on both sides of the issue had made their case last month to the Advisory Committee on University Resources Management, which on Sept. 30 voted 8-2, with 1 abstention, to recommend that the board not divest.
- The Brown decision has been watched closely around the nation, as it would have been the first Ivy League school to divest from businesses with ties to Israel.
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Important Takeaways:
- Nearly 3 million Americans have cast early ballots either in person or by mail with under four weeks to go until Election Day, an election tracking site shows.
- Of that figure, nearly 504,000 people had voted early in person, and more than 2.37 million had voted by mail, the tracking site found.
- About 47.5 million mail-in ballots have been requested so far. In comparison, more than 92 million mail-in ballots were requested through the 2020 election, according to the university.
- In the states reporting how people voted by party, 56.3 percent of people who had returned early ballots were Democrats, representing about 732,378 people.
- Another 27.4 percent were Republican, representing 356,797 voters, and 16.2 percent, or 210,980, were independent or members of a third party, according to the website.
- Early in-person voting has been underway in some states for several weeks now. It begins next week in four more swing states: Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, and Nevada.
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Important Takeaways:
- Hezbollah is still without a new leader, nearly two weeks after its long-serving chief was killed in an Israeli strike and with its deputy head apparently unwilling to step into the role.
- Hezbollah’s deputy leader Sheikh Naim Qassem—currently considered the organization’s top official—said in a video address streamed by Iranian news outlet Press TV on Tuesday that a new leader would be elected, suggesting he would not take up the mantle
- Dahiyeh is described by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) as Hezbollah’s nerve center and de-facto base, and has come under heavy Israeli bombardment in recent weeks.
- Hezbollah has many branches and commanders at varying levels, many of whom Israel has said it has killed.
- Israel had reportedly targeted Safieddine late last week, but there had been no confirmation whether he had been killed.
- As well as Nasrallah and Safieddine, other leading Hezbollah figures reported to have been killed include Ali Karaki, Ibrahim Aqeel and Fu’ad Shakar.
- On Tuesday, Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant said during a visit to Israel’s northern border with Lebanon that Hezbollah “is an organization without a head,” adding that “Nasrallah was eliminated, his replacement was probably also eliminated.”
- On Tuesday, the IDF said it had killed Suhail Hussein Husseini, described by the Israeli military as the commander of Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut.
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Important Takeaways:
- A severe solar storm is headed to Earth that could stress power grids even more as the U.S. deals with major back-to-back hurricanes, space weather forecasters said Wednesday.
- The sun is near the peak of its current 11-year cycle, sparking all the recent solar activity.
- NOAA issued a severe geomagnetic storm watch for Thursday into Friday after an outburst from the sun was detected earlier this week.
- Such a storm could temporarily disrupt power and radio signals.
- NOAA has notified operators of power plants and orbiting spacecraft to take precautions.
- It also alerted the Federal Emergency Management Agency about possible power disruptions, as the organization copes with the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Helene and gears up for Hurricane Milton barreling across the Gulf of Mexico toward Florida.
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Important Takeaways:
- Hurricane Milton made landfall on Siesta Key on the Florida Gulf Coast on Wednesday night as a major Category 3 hurricane with 120 mph winds as the state endured an assault of at least 19 tornadoes that resulted in at least five of 10 reported deaths so far.
- It never lost hurricane strength as it crossed the state exiting near Cape Canaveral on Thursday morning.
- Lucie County Sheriff Keith Pearson said the county had more than a dozen confirmed tornado touchdowns, and one destroyed a senior community neighborhood made up of mostly mobile homes.
- “They didn’t stand a chance,” he said. The sheriff’s office announced Thursday that five people had died in the county.
- At 11 a.m., the hurricane was located about 135 miles east-northeast of Cape Canaveral and 205 miles north-northwest of Great Abaco Island, Bahamas with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph. moving east-northeast at 20 mph. Its eye had moved off the coast as of 4 a.m. after spending nearly seven hours crossing the state.
- More than 18 inches of rain and 101 mph gusts were reported in St. Petersburg with multiple areas flooded from rain and storm surge there and up and down the Gulf Coast. A 103 mph gust was reported as deep as Mulberry in Polk County, according to the National Weather Service.
- The 2024 Atlantic hurricane season has had 13 named storms including nine hurricanes, four of which grew to major hurricane strength, and four tropical storms.
- Hurricane season runs from June 1-Nov. 30.
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Important Takeaways:
- American Water became informed of “unauthorized activity” in its computer networks and systems Thursday, the company said in a press release.
- The New Jersey-based company later determined the activity was due to a cybersecurity incident” prompting it to disconnect or deactivate certain systems. This included shutting down the company’s portal used to bill customers, while its call center has “limited functionality.”
- The company said it is “working diligently” to get the disconnected systems back online while noting the third-party investigation by cybersecurity professionals could take some time.
- American Water, which serves an estimated 14 million people in 14 states, said it also notified law enforcement and is cooperating with the investigation.
- The utility company’s water or wastewater facilities and operations are not believed to have been negatively affected by the cybersecurity attack, and the water remains safe to drink, according to the company.
- The company manages an estimated 540 groundwater treatment plants in about 1,700 U.S. communities across 14 states including California, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.
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Important Takeaways:
- The suspect, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, 27, is a citizen of Afghanistan residing in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, according to prosecutors.
- “This defendant, motivated by ISIS, allegedly conspired to commit a violent attack, on Election Day, here on our homeland,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray in a statement on Tuesday.
- The FBI said he was attempting stockpile firearms, and had taken steps to liquidate his family’s assets and relocate members overseas.
- Mr Tawhedi is charged with providing, attempting to provide, and conspiracy to provide support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization; and with trying to procure firearms and ammunition to use to commit a felony or act of terrorism.
- Mr Tawhedi sought AK-47 assault rifles to use in the attack, authorities claim. On 7 October, he and the co-conspirator met with individuals who actually worked undercover for the FBI to purchase the weapons and ammunition.
- After the purchase, Mr Tawhedi and his co-conspirator were arrested.
- In an interview conducted after his arrest on Monday, the FBI said Mr Tawhedi allegedly confirmed he planned an Election Day attack that would target “large gatherings of people” and that he planned to die carrying it out.
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