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Oct 16, 2026 - World

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk pitched President Donald Trump on slowing Ukraine’s military Starlink service before publicly blaming him for it, The Telegraph reported.Four people familiar with the talks told the British newspaper that the idea of throttling the system, which crippled Ukraine’s drone defenses, came from Musk.One said Trump “agreed,” after which the Pentagon slowed Starshield, the military-grade version of Musk’s satellite network. The Telegraph said it had approached SpaceX for comment, and the Pentagon has not offered a public explanation.The limit, about 160 kilometers per hour (about 100 mph), left Ukraine’s interceptor drones unable to catch Russian jet-powered drones and missiles moving at twice that speed, The Telegraph reported.“So people were killed because not enough destroying, not enough interceptors, including interceptors with Starlink, which didn’t work, of course,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told British broadcaster Piers Morgan on Wednesday.“Starlink connectivity at speeds of up to 160 km/h is being restored. Removing Starshield’s speed limit entirely is now critical for Ukraine’s defense. Thank you, @elonmusk. We hope for your continued support,” former Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov wrote on X the same day.“Starshield systems are owned and controlled by the US government. Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS. Starlink is a commercial service owned and controlled by SpaceX,” Musk replied, distinguishing the government-controlled Starshield from SpaceX’s commercial Starlink.“He tweeted out that he was innocent and that it was the US administration that did it. The reality is that they were both in it,” a senior source told The Telegraph.The same source said Musk grew worried about a consumer backlash in Europe after what was described as a “night of carnage” in Kyiv, the newspaper reported.“As your European customers, we are watching you,” Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski wrote to Musk on social media, according to the newspaper.Poland has purchased Starlink services from SpaceX for Ukraine.The order to slow the service came from inside the White House, two U.S. officials and a Western official told Reuters on Thursday. The move came as Trump pressed Kyiv to stop striking Russian oil refineries, the news agency reported.The officials said Defense Department leaders received a message that the service “needed to be slowed.”Ukrainian officials who called the White House, State Department and Pentagon were told it was a White House decision, a senior Ukrainian official told Reuters.“No such request was ever made by the president,” a senior U.S. official told Reuters, though the White House did not answer whether other administration officials might have made it.“Well, I don’t know if it was anybody, because it wasn’t me, and I don’t think it was Elon,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday.“And I think it’s probably functioning, from what I understand,” Trump added.Zelenskyy, who called the slowdown a “very dangerous and unpleasant surprise,” said Friday on the sidelines of a European Union summit in Brussels that service was coming back.“Our defence ministry is in touch and my partners, they told me that there were signals from the White House that they would return these capabilities. Have they returned to the previous speed limits? No. But is it coming back now? Yes,” he said, according to The Telegraph.

Oct 16, 2026 - World

Beijing warns against ‘discriminatory’ step after France drops opposition to British role in Made in Europe packageNo 10 has left the door open to imposing tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles as part of the Made in Europe package, prompting a warning from Beijing that such a move would be “discriminatory”.Downing Street said on Friday that it would “welcome the objective to have the UK included in the Industrial Accelerator Act” after France dropped its opposition to Britain joining the scheme. Continue reading...

Oct 16, 2026 - World

Abhijeet Dipke was detained before planned anti-government demonstrations in DelhiThe leader of the Cockroach Janta party (CJP) youth movement, Abhijeet Dipke, was detained by police on Friday and then later formally arrested as authorities cracked down on fresh anti-government protests in the Indian capital.Dipke was detained before a planned Friday evening demonstration he had called in central Delhi, urging supporters of the movement to come out and hold up the Indian flag. Continue reading...

Oct 16, 2026 - World

An audience laughed at President Donald Trump during a European summit after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy answered a question about Trump’s midterm troubles with only a smile.The exchange closed Zelenskyy’s press conference Friday at the European Council summit in Brussels after Sky News Europe correspondent Alistair Bunkall asked him the question.“President Trump is facing pretty difficult midterm elections. His personal popularity is very low. Diesel prices in the U.S. are very high. And the war that he started in the Middle East is not going the way he wants it,” Bunkall said.“Do you think you are being treated as a scapegoat for his own problems?” Bunkall asked.Zelenskyy paused for about eight seconds, looked down at his podium and then smiled at the audience.The room broke into laughter as Zelenskyy opened his hand toward the crowd, the video shows.“This is my answer,” Zelenskyy said.The reply drew a second wave of laughter, according to the video.“Thank you so much,” Bunkall said.Al Jazeera reported that the question came a week after Trump struck a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to buy diesel, then blamed Zelenskyy’s strikes on Russian oil refineries for high U.S. diesel prices.“I think it’s time for Ukraine to get a new president,” Trump told reporters at the White House the next day, the outlet reported.“He wants to make problems for our farmers, our ranchers, with diesel fuel,” Trump said, according to Euronews.Euronews reported that Trump puts the blame for diesel prices solely on Zelenskyy, but the refinery strikes are part of Ukraine’s defense against the invasion Russia launched in 2022.Ukrainian drones were striking Russian refineries months before the Iran war, hitting two major plants in a single night in August 2025, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported.U.S. diesel prices surged after Trump launched his war with Iran on Feb. 28, rising from $3.81 a gallon to $6.19 by early October, according to Energy Information Administration figures cited in an Al Jazeera analysis. The analysis found that those figures show the war in Ukraine changed prices little.The spike has become a political liability for Republicans ahead of next month’s midterm elections, Al Jazeera reported.“Prices are rising because of the war in the Middle East, the blocking of Hormuz,” Zelenskyy told ABC News the day after Trump called for his replacement, according to Mother Jones.Tensions spread to Ukraine’s military internet Wednesday, when a Zelenskyy adviser said SpaceX had slowed Starlink satellite service on moving terminals without warning Ukraine’s forces, CNBC reported.“Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military, and ultimately POTUS [the president],” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on X about Starshield, the military version of Starlink, the outlet noted.SpaceX began restoring Starlink speeds that day, CNBC reported, even though Musk insisted his company had nothing to do with the limits.“I am sure they knew what they did, absolutely,” Zelenskyy told British journalist Piers Morgan that day, referring to Trump and Musk.“I’ll be frank—this was a very unpleasant and dangerous surprise regarding the ‘Starlink’ satellites,” Zelenskyy said when asked about it again at Friday’s press conference.Trump kept up his criticism Thursday, a day before the press conference, calling Ukraine’s renewed refinery strikes a “disgrace” after Kyiv dropped his energy ceasefire.“I think I find Zelenskyy to be more difficult to deal with than Putin,” Trump told Newsmax.

Oct 16, 2026 - World

Two Americans were “severely” beaten Thursday and Friday in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and outrage poured in as U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee remained silent on the matter.Heidi Levine, a veteran journalist and photographer for The Washington Post, was “severely” beaten Friday, the Post reported, while “wearing a protective vest clearly marked PRESS on front and back.” She was “kicked repeatedly” after being knocked to the ground, and “stripped of her cameras and phone” by Israeli settlers.“I just got back actually two days ago from three weeks in Ukraine,” Levine said from a hospital bed, video shared by independent journalist Jasper Nathaniel showed. “I’ve been covering this conflict here for over three decades, and this is the second time that I’ve been brutally attacked — 15 years ago I was also attacked in front of the [Israeli] army.”Haitham Taysir, a U.S. citizen, was assaulted on Thursday “while working in his family’s olive groves,” The Vulnerable People Project reported.Huckabee, the chief diplomatic representative in Israel whose top responsibilities include protecting U.S. citizens, has condemned Israeli settler violence in the past. He has also, however, ignored violent attacks on Americans in Israel.“An American citizen, Haytham Taysir, was just severely beaten by settlers in his olive groves in Burqa, Ramallah,” wrote Nathaniel in a social media post on X. “[Huckabee], how’s that crackdown on settler terrorists going?”Nathaniel, who rushed to Levine’s aid shortly after the attack, provided additional details on the incident.“The [Israel Defense Forces] provided cover, with tear gas and machine guns, while the settlers beat Washington Post journalist Heidi Levine nearly to death,” Nathaniel wrote. “Then the IDF shot a Palestinian bystander, and aimed their guns and shoved the paramedics who were trying to treat him. All of this [is] documented.”Journalist and former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan was left shaken by video of Levine receiving medical treatment.“Israeli settlers, funded and protected by the United States, attacked this female American journalist in her sixties,” Hasan wrote in a social media post on X.There are more than 700,000 Israeli settlers illegally living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with instances of Israeli settler violence reaching record-high levels in recent months.Heidi Levine is up and speaking from the hospital in Ramallah. https://t.co/VAar6Z7PSS— jasper nathaniel (@infinite_jaz) October 16, 2026