03 World

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President Donald Trump revealed on Sunday night that Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted their summit meeting to be held “anywhere” but the United States, saying it was “very hard” for Putin to make an appearance in Alaska for the high-stakes meeting.

Trump made the revelation in a Truth Social post on Sunday night, in which he took aim at the media over criticism of having Putin on U.S. soil for a summit that ultimately ended with no ceasefire or peace deal in the Ukraine war.

“The Fake News has been saying for 3 days that I suffered a ‘major defeat’ by allowing President Vladimir Putin of Russia to have a major Summit in the United States. Actually, he would have loved doing the meeting anywhere else but the U.S., and the Fake News knows this. It was a major point of contention!” the U.S. president said.

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Pope Leo XIV has taught, in accord with the Church’s doctrine, that Judas Iscariot was damned for his betrayal of Our Lord.

During his August 13 weekly audience, while giving a catechesis on Judas’ betrayal of Christ and reflecting on Our Lord’s words, ‘better if he had never been born,’ the pontiff noted that Judas chose to exclude himself from salvation through his betrayal. Pope Leo’s brief statement is in stark contrast to that of his immediate predecessor, Pope Francis, who said that he did not know if Judas went to hell.

“When [God] sees evil, he does not avenge it, but grieves. And that ‘better if he had never been born’ is not a condemnation imposed a priori, but a truth that any of us can recognize: if we deny the love that has generated us, if by betraying we become unfaithful to ourselves, then we truly lose the meaning of our coming into the world, and we exclude ourselves from salvation,” Pope Leo said.

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Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Wednesday that he treats leaders of other countries with respect after his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu attacked him over his decision to recognize a Palestinian state.

“I don’t take these things personally, I engage with people diplomatically. He has had similar things to say about other leaders,” Albanese said during a media briefing.

Netanyahu’s personal attack on Albanese has further strained relations between the two countries. Ties soured after Australia decided last week to conditionally recogniz a Palestinian state at the U.N. General Assembly in September.

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NATO defense chiefs held a “candid discussion” Wednesday about what security guarantees they could offer Kyiv to help forge a peace agreement that ends Russia’s three-year war on Ukraine, a senior alliance official said.

Italian Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the chair of NATO’s Military Committee, said that 32 defense chiefs from across the alliance held a video conference amid a U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the fighting.

He said there was a “great, candid discussion” in the call. “I thanked everyone for their always proactive participation in these meetings: we are united, and that unity was truly tangible today, as always,” he wrote on social platform X without providing further details.

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The Pentagon is betting heavily on autonomous maritime drones to counter China’s growing naval power in the Pacific. Inspired by Ukraine’s successful use of cheap, kamikaze-style sea drones against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, US defense planners envision swarms of high-tech, AI-driven vessels patrolling the Taiwan Strait and deterring a Chinese advance. But a string of recent mishaps shows just how steep the learning curve may be.

Setbacks at sea

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Shock killings in Mexico as six severed heads found on the road(Image: Anadolu via Getty Images)

Six severed heads have been found on a road in central Mexico, sparking a major investigation.

The discovery was made by local authorities early on Tuesday morning in an area that is usually peaceful and not associated with cartel violence.

The route where the severed heads were found links the central states of Puebla and Tlaxcala. Police have not yet provided a motive behind the killings, nor have they revealed any information regarding which criminal groups operating in Mexico could have been behind the horrific act.

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A bus crash in northwestern Afghanistan killed at least 79 people returning from Iran, including 19 children, an official said.

Two people were also injured in the crash, Ministry of Interior spokesperson Abdul Mateen Qani told The Associated Press.

Tolo News, citing the official, said the accident happened Tuesday around 8:30 p.m. local time in Herat province. The bus collided with a truck and a motorbike, causing a massive fire that killed many on the spot, the outlet reported.

<b>Israel begins invasion of Gaza City after calling up 60,000 troops to finally wipe out terror group Hamas</b>- <i> www.thesun.co.uk</i>

Israel begins invasion of Gaza City after calling up 60,000 troops to finally wipe out terror group Hamas – thesun.co.uk

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ISRAEL has begun its full invasion of Gaza City as it aims to completely wipe out Hamas, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced on Wednesday.

IDF troops now control the outskirts of the besieged city, one of the terror group’s last strongholds, Israeli military spokesperson Brig Gen Effie Defrin said.

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President Trump has set the record straight when it comes to possibly military intervention in Ukraine.

While being interviewed on Fox & Friends, Trump reassured Americans that he will not send U.S. troops to fight in the Ukraine-Russia war.

Trump did, however, note that two European nations are weighing in on the idea of sending soldiers to Ukraine for security assurances.

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Everything, and I mean everything, spewed by the Jew hating leftist/Islamic alliance is a lie. “Jewish Voices for Peace” is actually “Muslim Voices for Genocidal Jew Killing.”

 Jew-hating jihadi Berkeley professor Hatem Bazian is an infamouse anti-semite.

Hatem Bazian is the founder of the anti-Israel organizations Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and American Muslims for Palestine (AMP). As of March 2021, he served as AMP chairman.

Bazian has spread classic anti-Semitism, reportedly promoted religious anti-Semitism, denied Jewish peoplehood and Jewish history and has compared Israel to Nazi Germany. Bazian has also shown support for and attended pro-Hamas student encampments in 2024.

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Most Austrians see Christianity as an important part of the country’s cultural heritage.

According to a recent survey presented by Austrian Family Minister Claudia Plakolm, 69 percent of Austrians favor keeping crosses in public school classrooms even in areas with a non-Christian majority. Moreover, 79 percent said they want Christian (and specifically Catholic) holidays like St. Nicholas’ Day, Easter, and St. Martin’s Day to be celebrated in schools.

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Israeli troops repelled Hamas’s large-scale attack on a military position in southern Gaza, eliminating at least ten terrorist infiltrators. Around 20 terrorists emerged from nearby underground tunnels in a coordinated attempt to kill and kidnap Israeli soldiers, news reports say.

“Assessments indicate the terrorists emerged simultaneously from several adjacent shafts,” the Israel National News/Arutz Sheva reported. “According to the military, the attackers likely intended to abduct soldiers, as they were carrying stretchers during the assault. However, no kidnapping attempt was successful.”

Two IDF soldiers were reportedly killed in the sneak terror attack. “Three Kfir soldiers were wounded in the unusual incident — one seriously and two moderately,” the news website added.

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European and NATO leaders are joining Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Washington on Monday to present a united front in talks with President Donald Trump as US special envoy Steve Witkoff on Sunday said Russia is open to the idea of the US and its European allies offering Ukraine a security guarantee resembling NATO’s collective defence mandate.

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President Donald Trump seemed to crack on Truth Social Sunday as he condemned the media for reporting on his apparent pro-Russia stance following his Alaska summit with Vladimir Putin.

Instead of pursuing a ceasefire agreement as originally planned, Trump said he would try to convince Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky to concede land to the Kremlin in order to put an end to the more than three-year war.

Critics saw this outcome as an obvious bow to Putin, but the president disagreed.

“It’s incredible how the Fake News violently distorts the TRUTH when it comes to me. There is NOTHING I can say or do that would lead them to write or report honestly about me.” Trump wrote on social media.

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An Australian court fined Qantas Aus$90 million (U.S.$59 million) on Monday for illegally laying off 1,800 ground staff during the COVID-19 pandemic, ending a five-year legal battle over the workers’ rights.

Federal Court Justice Michael Lee said he wanted the penalty to be a “real deterrence” to firms that might be tempted by the financial rewards of breaching employment law.

Qantas decided to sack the workers and outsource their jobs in August 2020, a period of lockdowns and border closures when no COVID-19 vaccine existed.

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Truly, this is a moment as important as it is unusual. History does not provide us a guide here.

Never before have we seen so many world leaders gather at such short notice for a meeting like this at the White House, and with a president as consequential as he is unpredictable.

The speed with which it has been organised is remarkable. A diplomatic source has framed the hasty gathering as “organic”; the obvious next step after the Alaska summit, the source said.

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German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul on Monday called for stepped-up pressure on Russia, including more aid for Ukraine, to push Moscow into concessions toward a “just and lasting peace.”

Wadephul spoke in Tokyo as U.S. President Donald Trump prepares to host Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders including German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. The gathering follows Trump’s talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday.

“It is probably not an exaggeration to say the whole world is looking to Washington,” he said at a press briefing alongside Japanese Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya.

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Coastal flooding and life-threatening rip currents are expected as Hurricane Erin barrels towards the East Coast this week, and the powerful storm has the potential to unleash 100-foot (30 meter) waves, forecasters warn.

Hurricane Erin emerged as the first hurricane of the 2025 Atlantic season over the weekend, rapidly intensifying on Saturday (Aug. 16) to become a Category 5, the strongest type of hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale. Erin then weakened and strengthened again and, at the time of writing, is a Category 4 with sustained wind speeds of about 130 mph (215 km/h).

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The State Department just made clear that America will no longer aid or ignore foreign censorship, calling out threats to Americans and American companies.

State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce took a subtle jab at the Biden administration when on Aug. 12 she announced that new additions to the 2024 Human Rights Report, are “addressing abuses that had not previously been covered,” including the global free speech crisis developing in places like the United Kingdom (U.K.). Bruce criticized the previous administration’s approach to human rights, saying that this year’s report “Is responsive to the legislative mandates that underpin the report rather than an expansive list of politically biased demands and assertions.”

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As Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders prepare for talks in the White House, Russia has continued to pound targets including a deadly strike on a residential building in Kharkiv.

Just hours before the talks with US President Donald Trump, the Kharkiv strike killed seven people, including two children, and injured at least 20 others.

“Among the dead are a 1.5-year-old girl and a 16-year-old boy. The youngest injured is just 6 years old,” Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said, declaring a citywide day of mourning.

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It promises to be a day unlike any other at the White House later, when world leaders make a rare collective visit for crunch talks on Ukraine.

What had been billed as a meeting between two presidents, Donald Trump and Volodomyr Zelensky, has now become more of a summit.

Leaders from the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Finland, the EU and Nato have dashed across the Atlantic to have their say on how the three-year-old war with Russia should end and on what terms.

<b>US envoy to discuss ceasefire with Israel after Lebanon commits to disarming Hezbollah</b>- <i> www.euronews.com</i>

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The US special envoy to Lebanon said on Monday that his team would hold talks with Israel on a long-term ceasefire after Beirut endorsed a Washington-backed plan for Hezbollah to disarm.

Following a meeting with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in Beirut, Tom Barrack also said Washington would seek an economic proposal for post-war reconstruction in the country.

“I think the Lebanese government has done their part. They’ve taken the first step,” said Barrack. “Now what we need is for Israel to comply with that equal handshake.”

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If you want to know why the media shills for Hamas, rewatch this segment on CNN with Josh Rogin and Scott Jennings. The Gaza war was the topic, since Israel announced they were going in to destroy the rest of the terror group and occupy the rest of the strip.

Rogin then went on some cockamamie analysis about how Israel wants to prolong the war, the suffering, and said that if occupying Gaza would destroy Hamas, it would’ve worked by now. It hasn’t. My man, its last stronghold has been untouched by Israeli forces. They still have an enclave of control. Jennings rightly said that Hamas doesn’t want a ceasefire, and they don’t want to release the hostages. Nothing can happen until Hamas is gone, to which Rogin said, “Hamas is part of Palestinian society in all ways and forms. So, you can’t completely eliminate it.”

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Incredible reports coming out of Alaska after the Trump/Putin summit has wrapped up.

There’s no deal yet, mainly because Ukraine will have to also agree to all points, but Trump and Putin announced many points are now agreed to.

Watch here:

Putin actually made the opening remarks:

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According to a survey conducted by National Public Research Canada for Campaign Life Coalition (CLC), Battle River–Crowfoot voters are staunchly pro-life, at the same time as pro-abortion Poilievre attempts to win a seat in the Alberta riding.

“Pierre is out-of-step with the voters on abortion”, said Jeff Gunnarson, National President of Campaign Life Coalition. “The survey results place Poilievre’s stance within the small minority of just under 12% of Battle River-Crowfoot voters who support abortion-on-demand throughout all nine months of pregnancy, for any reason or no reason at all.”