“Some 90 volunteers with Rabbis for Human Rights were [abducted] by the IDF in the West Bank on Wednesday, including congressional nominee Brad Lander (D-NY) and former deputy attorney-general Yehoshua Schoffman, sources told The Jerusalem Post. Police took the foreign volunteers to the Etzion Regional Brigade headquarters for questioning, a source at the scene told the Post. Sources added that no one was harmed in the incident. … The IDF arrived two hours after the volunteers had begun working and declared the field a closed military zone. Activists told the Post that they complied with the military orders and agreed to leave the area, but were still [abducted]. KAN News later reported that the area that the volunteers were harvesting in does not require prior coordination with the IDF.” (10/21/26)
“The parliament [sic] in the West African junta-run nation of Burkina Faso has adopted a new penal code reinstating the death penalty for crimes including terrorism, espionage and treason. … The development ends the abolition of the death penalty, which had been in effect since 2018 under the previous and democratically elected president, Roch Marc Christian Kabore. The last known execution in Burkina Faso took place in 1988, according to Human Rights Watch. The junta’s Council of Ministers approved a bill reinstating capital punishment in December, prompting a backlash from human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, which criticized the move as repressive and an effort to suppress dissent.” (10/21/26)
“The Supreme Court on Wednesday said the Trump administration cannot enforce a new policy that restricts treatment for transgender inmates in federal prison. The justices in a brief order rejected an emergency application filed by the administration that sought to block a lower court injunction against the proposal. There are about 1,000 transgender inmates in federal custody. … The court order included no explanation, saying only that two conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, would have granted it.” (10/21/26)
“A protest by Italian truck drivers over fuel prices and the cost of living is causing food shortages in shops, with deliveries disrupted and fresh produce rotting, retailers said on Wednesday. The protests, which began in southern Italy last week, have also disrupted operations in two regional airports in Calabria because they cannot get deliveries of aviation fuel. With traffic snarled in various parts of the country, long queues formed on the A1 motorway near the southern city of Naples after truckers restricted access. … The protests come as Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government deals with unrest last weekend in northern cities including Milan where gangs of mainly young people went on the rampage. The ANCD-Conad group, representing retailers operating under the Conad supermarket brand, said large quantities of perishable products including fruit and vegetables, as well as milk and meat were stranded on trucks and in warehouses.” (10/21/26)
“The Federal Aviation Administration approved Boeing’s 737-10, a stretched variant of its fourth generation 737 MAX family of narrow-bodied aircraft, clearing the way for the company to begin the first deliveries in the next few months of more than 1,500 orders. Boeing said in a news release Tuesday that its newest and largest 737 MAX had completed a comprehensive certification process that included almost 1,000 test flights and ‘extensive safety assessments and design reviews.’ … Regulatory clearance follows a six-year delay from when the aircraft was scheduled to enter service, including an eleventh-hour call over a navigation system issue that FAA officials eventually determined was not a safety concern.” (10/21/26)
“Google is facing a backlash from some staff members over the company’s deployment of its AI technology for military use. The BBC has spoken to several tech workers who have either recently resigned from Google’s AI company, Google DeepMind, or are in the process of leaving, over concerns with the tech firm’s military contracts. Sofia Liguori, a London-based research engineer, is one of them. She resigned from Google DeepMind this week and spoke about her concerns exclusively with the BBC, despite her contract restricting her from doing so. ‘Realising my company is pushing more and more for AI systems in military operations makes me feel ashamed to work at Google,’ Liguori said, speaking in a personal capacity.” (10/21/26)
“Russia on Wednesday freed an American who had been jailed for more than four years on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine, in a deal completed during a visit by a top U.S. envoy and at a time when President Donald Trump has taken a series of actions meant to benefit Moscow. … Hubbard was sentenced in 2024 to nearly seven years in prison following a closed trial. Prosecutors said he had signed a contract with the Ukrainian military after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, and that he fought alongside Kyiv’s forces until being captured two months later. The U.S. government under the Biden administration designated Hubbard as wrongfully detained.” (10/21/26)
“Emmanuel Macron has accused Donald Trump and other foreign leaders of making ‘stupid comments’ about France’s street unrest for political gain, as the country prepared for more protests this weekend. Speaking during a visit to Qatar, the French president did not name names but said ‘manipulation of information’ after Saturday’s riots had led to ‘comments that are as unacceptable as they are stupid, from many people, including foreign leaders. Asked if he was referring to Donald Trump, Macron replied: ‘Among others.’” (10/21/26)
“The online predictions market platform Polymarket has removed a contract that allowed users to bet on whether any of the seven men accused of sexually assaulting or exploiting a Cornell student in 2024 will be charged with a felony sex crime. More than $450,000 had been wagered on this question before it was taken off Polymarket’s platform. It had been available since Sept. 30 and was slated to close on Jan. 31. The company’s U.S. exchange is regulated by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which bans trading related to ‘activity that is unlawful under Federal or State law.’ … Online critics characterized the Polymarket contract as degrading and questioned why celebrity ambassadors would associate themselves with the company.” (10/21/26)
“Crucial vulnerabilities in a programming language that underpins much of the internet are so severe that U.S., European and British authorities have recommended websites temporarily go offline until they can be fixed. The flaws are in PHP, a little-known but crucial programming language which powers how web servers process code. The security team that maintains PHP released patches to fix the problem around 10 a.m. ET. But several websites were temporarily down as of Wednesday morning, citing fear that hackers could take them over. They included Pinboard, a bookmarking site and some parts of Wikipedia. Two massive but largely unmoderated forum sites, 4Chan and Something Awful, both went offline to wait for a patch.” (10/21/26)
