US Congress passes Lindsey Graham’s Russia sanctions bill

If signed into law, the legislation would allow the president to impose tariffs on countries buying energy from Moscow

Published 16 Sep, 2026 22:44 |

The US House of Representatives has passed a bill authorizing President Donald Trump to slap tariffs on countries purchasing Russian energy and impose tougher sanctions on Moscow over the Ukraine conflict.

The lower chamber approved the legislation on Wednesday by a vote of 262-159. According to The Hill, 203 Republicans and 58 Democrats voted in favor, while seven Republicans and 152 Democrats opposed it. The bill passed the US Senate last month.

The bill, which also grants Trump the authority to impose additional sanctions on Iran, is named in honor of hawkish Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who unexpectedly passed away last month. A major Trump ally and vocal supporter of Ukraine, Graham traveled to Kiev ten times after 2022 and co-wrote the original version of the legislation, calling for “bone-crushing”sanctions against Russia.

The version adopted by Congress allows Trump to impose additional tariffs of up to 100% on countries importing or reselling Russian oil and gas.The bill is aimed at “the top five countries facilitating Russian oil sanctions evasion,” with China and India expected to be among those targeted.

Many Democrats argued that the bill would grant Trump additional powers amid his ongoing trade war with much of the world. “What this legislation will do is give Donald Trump, perhaps, unfettered authority to unleash tariffs on the American people,”House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said.(these people are crazy!)

The legislation championed by Graham remained stalled for monthsas Trump favored diplomacy to broker peace between Russia and Ukrainewhile refusing to exclusively blame Moscow for the conflict. Trump’s envoys discussed ways to normalize economic ties in talks with their Russian counterparts.

Negotiations on Ukraine, however, largely paused after Trump launched a war against Iran in late February. After a period of inactivity, Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner visited Moscow and Kiev in September.

The bill was passed amid an ongoing energy crisis exacerbated by disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz due to the Iran war. Trump recently blamed Ukraine for rising diesel prices and urged Kiev to stop striking Russian refineries. On Monday, Trump claimed that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to halt attacks on each other’s energy sites, but both sides quickly denied that such a truce was in place.

Speaking during a trip to India last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the country had successfully adapted its economy to mitigate the impact of the “illegal” restrictions. “More than 30,000 sanctions have been imposed on Russia – almost twice as many as on all other countries in the world combined,” he said.

https://www.rt.com/news/645883-us-house-graham-russia-sanctions/

NEWS

NYC is charging 60 bucks for one loaf of bread…

September 15, 2026 (a day ago)

New York City has found a way to make toast into a full-blown financial decision. There’s a loaf of bread selling for $60 bucks, and at that price, we’d think it should probably butter itself.

That’s a lot of money for something you’ll probably eat in your jammies, leaning over the kitchen sink. But before we write this off as another absurdly expensive New York food trend, we’re willing to hear the bread out.

Apparently, there’s a reason for the absurdly high price tag.

The case for this pricey loaf starts with how it’s made. And if you’re expecting a laundry list of luxury ingredients that ain’t happenin’.

New York Post:

At first glance, the flat-topped loaf resembles a holiday pie, its unscored crust a mound of mottled brown and white.

The bread is made from nothing but salt, water and imported organic rye flour grown in what Auer calls “ancestral soil.” Unlike sourdough products at other high-end Big Apple bakeries such as Breads Bakery and Ole & Steen, there are no sugar, seeds or spices.

The only other “ingredient,” as Auer calls it, is time. He should know as the scion of an Austrian family that’s been baking acclaimed loaves for four generations.

Each loaf is naturally fermented for 24 hours before it’s baked, yielding a flavor complexion that’s slightly nutty, slightly malty and almost-but-not-quite sweet.

The sourdough bread is moist on the palate when it comes out of the oven, so it “rests” on wooden racks for at least eight hours before sale.

Okay, so there’s a lot of craft here, and we appreciate that. Making something really good and high-quality from a few basic ingredients takes solid skill. When there’s so little going into the bread, the bread has to do all the work. There’s no high fat, sugar, or big salty flavor to hide behind.

Still, understanding the effort behind something and agreeing with the price aren’t the same. The real test comes when you take a bite. And at sixty bucks a pop, just “pretty good” would be a flop review.

This bread should stop you dead in your tracks… because of the taste, not the bill… and we’re not sure “gummy” is the 5-star review we’d be looking for.

NYP:

The crust is firm but not crunchy. It’s chewy beneath the surface — a quality I found appealing but which some tasters in our office called “gummy.” It’s a matter of taste but nobody can deny the care and attention that went into it.

But that didn’t stop people. Apparently, the place is selling loaf after loaf of “gummy” 60-dollar bread.

And the owners of Rye know that they’re charging a lot.

NYP:

The Auers know that $60 is a heavy lift. So they offer it in quarter- and half-loaf sizes for $15 or $30. Customers can also sample the bread by ordering a single slice topped with a choice of fourteen sweet or savory toppings, priced from $6 for butter and chives to $14 for “roe on rye.”

To be honest, fifteen bucks is also totally absurd for a loaf of bread, and so is 6 bucks for a slice. But this is New York City, we’re talking about. Food costs in the city average about 39 percent higher than the national average. It ain’t cheap to live in the Big Apple… a casual, no-frills meal out could be as high as $35 per person.

And that brings us to a loaf of bread with a very different price tag.

If 60 dollars is too much for you, how about a loaf of bread for 60 cents?

Sounds more like it.

This woman hasn’t bought bread in 24 years. She makes her own, and it costs her 60 cents.

Honestly, we’d rather try the 60-cent bread slathered in butter. But we wouldn’t be opposed to trying a slice of the pricey stuff. And if we did end up bringing home a loaf, anybody who left the bag open would be in serious trouble.

I Haven't Bought Bread in 40 Years — The 60-Cent Loaf That Beats the Bakery Anyway

Dot Baumann

Homemade bread costs a fraction of what a bakery charges — a basic loaf comes down to pennies of flour, water, yeast, and salt — and it can taste better than anything on the shelf. Once you know the method, there's little reason to buy bread at all.

This video covers the simple, cheap homemade loaf that beats the bakery, what goes into it, and why baking your own is so much cheaper and better than store-bought.

11 minutes

https://revolver.news/2026/09/nyc-is-charging-60-bucks-for-one-loaf-of-bread/

Trump accuses Democrats of mishandling his assassination attempt probe

The president has said that information about the 2024 shooting was “missing, altered, corrupted, or gone” when he returned to office

Published 16 Sep, 2026 19:50 | Updated

US President Donald Trump has claimed that an FBI probe into his attempted assassination in July 2024 was deliberately mishandled as part of a “Democrat plot” to prevent him from winning a second term.He also referred to “new info” that supposedly appeared in the case, but provided no details.

In 2024, Trump, then the Republican presidential candidate, narrowly escaped death at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a 20-year-old man fired shots from a rooftop, grazing Trump’s ear and killing one attendee and injuring two others.

Trump claimed at the time that President Joe Biden and his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, were partly to blame as they allegedly made it more difficult for the Secret Service to protect him, while peddling rhetoric that could have encouraged the shooter.

The would-be assassin, Thomas M. Crooks, was killed by the US Secret Service.An internal review released later that year concluded that the Secret Service made multiple mistakes ahead of the shooting.

“Everybody knows the Crooked Joe Biden FBI didn’t do what they should have with respect to the Lunatic who shot me in Butler,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday.

He also claimed that “most of the information [on the case] was missing, altered, corrupted, or gone” by the time he took office in January 2025. “This was all a Democrat Plot, to get me out of the Election, that failed,” the president stated,adding that some new information on the case had emerged recently, but provided no details.

Trump also blamed former FBI Director Christopher Wray for mishandling the probe and maintainedhe “should pay a price for the way he handled this assassination attempt, and certainly for the things he said.”

Wray, who was nominated by Trump himself during his first term in office, stated that his agency did not find any accomplices of the shooter during testimony to the House Judiciary Committee. He also said it was unclear if Trump had been hit directly by a bullet or by shrapnel, provoking sharp criticism from Trump at the time. Wray resigned before Trump’s inauguration in January 2025.

The current FBI director,Kash Patel, told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that his agency looked into Crooks’ possible connection to any accomplices but found none. “We found no evidence that that individual was literally even speaking to any other human being other than his parents, who he resided with,” he said.

Attorney GeneralTodd Blanche mentioned during the same hearing that new information related to the case had surfaced recently. “It is new information about the shooter and about his background, about his history and that’s stuff that we didn’t know before,” he said while refusing to elaborate.

Trump has been targeted in several assassination attempts. Two months after the July 2024 incident, a pro-Ukraine activist was arrested after being spotted with a rifle near Trump’s golf course in Florida. He was later found guilty of trying to assassinate Trump.

In April 2026, the president and First Lady Melania Trump were rushed from the Washington Hilton after gunfire broke out at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. The suspect, Cole Tomas Allen, was later charged with attempting to assassinate the president as well.

https://www.rt.com/news/645878-trump-democrats-assassination-attempt-probe/

==Houthis downed Saudi F-15 fighter jet over Marib, Yemen, terror group spox. claims

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said later on Wednesday that the group had attacked an airbase in Khamis Mushait as well as Aramco facilities in Yanbu.==

ByJAMES GENN

SEPTEMBER 16, 2026 09:32

A model of a Saudi Royal Air Force F-15 fighter jet is seen during the Dubai Airshow on November 12, 2017, in the United Arab Emirates; illustrative.

A model of a Saudi Royal Air Force F-15 fighter jet is seen during the Dubai Airshow on November 12, 2017, in the United Arab Emirates; illustrative.

Updated: SEPTEMBER 16, 2026 21:40

Yemen’s Houthis reported that they downed an F-15 fighter jet belonging to the Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) over Yemen’s Marib Governorate, the Iran-backed terror group’s military spokesperson Yahya Saree said on Wednesday.

“The fighter jet was downed using a locally manufactured surface-to-air missile (SAM),” Saree stated.

He did not specify when the alleged incident occurred, though he said that RSAF jets had conducted “over 450 airstrikes” so far this week.

Saree added that the Houthis were able to repel two formations of RSAF F-15s and Typhoon fighter jets searching for the F-15 wreckage, utilizing the same type of SAMs that downed it.

The Houthi spokesperson also denied that the terror group had targeted Mecca in a drone strike.

Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree speaks on the ballistic missile launched at Israel, September 15, 2024

Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree speaks on the ballistic missile launched at Israel, September 15, 2024 (credit: SCREENSHOT/X)

Houthis deny posing threat to Mecca, Medina

“The fabrications and lies… cannot deceive anyone,” Saree said, adding, “There is no threat whatsoever from Yemen to the holy sites [Mecca and Medina].”

“Our operations target their oil facilities and military bases and are far removed from the holy places,” he said.

Saree’s statements on Mecca referred to an incident in which Saudi Arabia’s air defenses intercepted and destroyed a drone launched by the Houthis on Tuesday before it entered prohibited airspace over the holy city of Mecca, according to the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, which said so on Wednesday.

The coalition spokesperson Turki al-Malki said in a statement that it was the second Houthi attempt to target Mecca, Islam’s holiest city and the focal point of the annual Hajj pilgrimage; the first was a ballistic missile launch in July 2017, the coalition said.

Houthis claim attack on Saudi Arabia's Aramco facilities, military airbase

Saree said later on Wednesday that the Houthis had attacked an airbase in Khamis Mushait, as well as Aramco facilities in Yanbu.

Saudi Arabia did not confirm either of the attacks.

Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-908742#google_vignette

Inside JD Vance’s Little-Known Years at Yale Law | Vanity Fair

September 16, 2026

(Hit job on Vance)

In June, just after my conversation with Heilbrunn, Vance visited the Richard M. Nixon Library and spoke favorably of the disgraced ex-president.In today’s social media world, Vance said, the Watergate scandal wouldn’t last more than 12 hours. In fact, the two politicians share other traits: their anger toward elites and their belief in a so-called deep state.

And one other thing: Nixon believed in conspiracies. As a California senator, an ally of the virulently anti-communist senator Joseph McCarthy, Nixon had peddled the myth that the US government was riddled with Soviet spies.

Vance, for his part, is a self-avowed conspiracy theorist. This was evident on September 10, 2025, when the Trump White House got word that Charlie Kirk, the head of Turning Point USA, had been assassinated as he spoke at Utah Valley University.

Vance and a few of his team had been texting with Kirk, the VP’s close friend,just before the shots were fired. “I walked into Susie [Wiles]’s office and she was crying,” Vance had told me last year. “Usha happened to be there. And I can’t even remember why. You know, normally, she doesn’t hang out in the West Wing a whole lot.” (Usha had an office in the nearby Eisenhower Executive Office Building.)

A suspect in the shooting was quickly arrested. But Vance thought there might be more to it.

“I’ve had many, many questions,” he claimed. “I don’t know how he was radicalized—or if there were people in his network egging [him] on, encouraging [him] to do it, maybe even financing.”

Publicly, Vance spoke ominously of “a leftist infrastructure” fomenting violence against conservatives. “My view,” he said, “is it reveals something that’s sort of gone pretty dark in a particular corner of the far left in this country.” Yet the evidence suggests that what it actually revealed was the twisted mind of a lone individual. Kirk’s alleged shooter, Tyler Robinson, has yet to enter a formal plea.

It was Kirk’s widow, Erika, Vance writes in Communion, who convinced him and Usha to have another baby; she had told them that she’d regretted not having more children. This July, Usha gave birth to a boy, Alec. They have two other boys, Ewan, 9, and Vivek, 6, and a girl, Mirabel, 4.

In 2018 Vance and Usha were traveling in France.During a stroll through a cathedral, he writes in Communion, he underwent a kind of epiphany; in mid-August of the next year, he was baptized as a Catholic in a private ceremony. Usha, who is Hindu, had no intention of converting, but believed that her husband’s move was “good” for him. Vance says his new faith helped him develop patience. Moreover, he writes, “I needed grace.” But Vance has displayed little grace in his public exchanges with his religious superiors.

In 2025 he clashed with Pope Francis on the plight of migrants. Last April, after Pope Leo XIV criticized Trump’s policies on immigration and the Iran war, Vance chided him as though scolding a wayward student: “I think it’s very, very important for the Pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology.”

In Communion, rather than apologizing, Vance doubles down on his remarks, accusing Vatican officials of offering platitudes instead of specific critiques of Trump’s immigration policy. What is it about the phrase “humane treatment”—for which the Vatican was advocating—that the vice president doesn’t understand?

In Communion, Vance’s defense of Trumpism is facile, shallow—and brief.He devotes a total of three pages to the period from his election to the Senate to Trump’s second inauguration.

Explaining his adoption of the MAGA cause, the vice president writes, for instance, that Trump “had proved me wrong by being an effective president.” Maybe—if you consider governmental paralysis, futile attempts to repeal health care, a botched response to a lethal pandemic (Trump at first denied its existence and then minimized its severity), massive job losses (more than any president since Herbert Hoover), two impeachments, and an attempted insurrection to be effective.No wonder Usha was so much better at moot court.

https://archive.is/uLKaZ

They are starting the hit job now, trying to drum up a bad reputation so he can’t run for president when the time comes. Personally I think Trump is gonna stay for four more years.

POLITICS

Detroit News Endorses Mike Rogers In Gushing Editorial While Taking Shots At Abdul El-Sayed

September 16, 2026

The Detroit News on Wednesday night endorsed Republican Mike Rogers for U.S. Senate in a gushing editorial, while, in contrast, taking sharp shots at Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed.

The editorial bagan:

Mike Rogers is the prototype of a United States Senator.

He spent 14 years in the House of Representatives, rising to chair of the vital Intelligence Committee. The 63-year-old Republican left Congress at the end of 2014, having been elected to his House seat seven times by his mid-Michigan constituents. Rogers then embarked on a successful career in private industry, becoming an expert in cybersecurity.

He's also served his country as an officer in the U. S. Army and as an FBI agent assigned to the organized crime division. He is mature, trustworthy and more than prepared to sit at the table with national and world leader.

Rogers' experience, clear thinking, and temperament are bound to quickly vault him into the Senate's leadership ranks should he prevail in the Nov. 3 election.

Conversely, the editorial had little good to say about El-Sayed.

By contrast, his Democratic opponent, Abdul El-Sayed, has a thin career background that contains little to recommend him for one of the nation's most powerful leadership jobs…

There is a bigger concern about El-Sayed: He has worked so hard covering his tracks leading up to this Senate race that it's impossible to know who he really is or where he would stand in the Senate.

He has deleted social media posts that reportedly called into question his attitude about America in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He's taken down roughly 100 YouTube videos that paint an unflattering picture of him and his cultural views. A candidate who feels the need to hide his past from voters is not someone who can be trusted to be the same person after Election Day as he was on the campaign trail.

The Detroit News has traditionally endorsed Republican candidates in major races, except in the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, when the publication withheld an endorsement.

https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/35076/detroit_news_endorses_mike_rogers_in_gushing_editorial_while_taking_shots_at_abdul_el-sayed

Townhall.com on X:"EXCLUSIVE: TALARICO SUPER PAC CAUGHT PAYING VOTERS!"We are paying people $25…a roundabout way of paying people for their votes." Video obtained by Townhall catches Sky McAdams, organizing manager for Texas Majority PAC, on undercover video explaining the scheme to elect Talarico in November. "You can't pay someone to vote for someone" "If I was a Republican, I would be pissed." In the video, McAdams says it’s called a “paid relational program,” which is operated by Relentless that uses software called Rally.

In a campaign finance report filed in July, Texas Majority PAC said it paid Relentless $500,000 for a “relational organizing program,” or about 20 percent of all its expenditures up to that point. At $25 per vote, that could be good for 20,000 ballots. Details below 👇"

@townhallcom

Townhall.com

@townhallcom

EXCLUSIVE: TALARICO SUPER PAC CAUGHT PAYING VOTERS!

"We are paying people $25…a roundabout way of paying people for their votes."

Video obtained by Townhall catches Sky McAdams, organizing manager for Texas Majority PAC, on undercover video explaining the scheme to elect Talarico in November.

"You can't pay someone to vote for someone"

"If I was a Republican, I would be pissed."

In the video, McAdams says it’s called a “paid relational program,” which is operated by Relentless that uses software called Rally.

In a campaign finance report filed in July, Texas Majority PAC said it paid Relentless $500,000 for a “relational organizing program,” or about 20 percent of all its expenditures up to that point. At $25 per vote, that could be good for 20,000 ballots.

Details below 👇

Revealutionary Films

9h

His name is Dylan "Sky" MacAdams who organized pro-abortion student walk-outs and founded "The Coalition Austin"

Rally by Relentless, PBC

Relentless was formed in 2022 by co-founders Davis Leonard, Greta Carnes, and Zoe Stein.

It is incubated by the Democrat technology Show more

https://x.com/townhallcom/status/2100249527303155787

https://x.com/townhallcom/status/2100249527303155787

Collin Rugg on X: "Golden Retriever brings his toy to a home intruder after the man broke into the home in San Diego, CA. The 'watch' dog,

Nash, watched the home intruder make himself at home and even tried to get the man to play with him. The dog's owner, who wasn't home, says he watched the entire scene unfold on his phone. "Nash is not the greatest guard dog. ==We thought he was going to be barking at people, and he did the exact opposite.""

@CollinRugg

Collin Rugg

@CollinRugg

Golden Retriever brings his toy to a home intruder after the man broke into the home in San Diego, CA.

The 'watch' dog, Nash, watched the home intruder make himself at home and even tried to get the man to play with him.

The dog's owner, who wasn't home, says he watched the entire scene unfold on his phone.

"Nash is not the greatest guard dog. We thought he was going to be barking at people, and he did the exact opposite."

https://x.com/CollinRugg/status/2100273492319195261

White House Press Aide Jabs Back at Journalist Who Dismissed Her as ‘Blonde Trump Flunkie’

Sean JamesSep 15th, 2026,

White House Press Assistant Ellie Acrajabbed back at liberal journalist Aaron Rupar on Tuesday, two days after he branded her a “blonde Trump flunkie” for shooing away journalists from President Donald Trump.

“BREAKING: I am a press wrangler actually wrangling!” Acra posted on X.

She was responding to a clip Rupar shared on Sunday, where Acra was seen telling reporters they were finished speaking with the president because he was about to board his flight back from Ireland. The C-SPAN clip showed Acra repeatedly thanking reporters but telling them they were done asking questions, all while Trump spoke to his family a few feet away.

“Sorry, that’s what I’m told to do,” she was heard saying. “You have to go. Press! Thank you, thank you.”

But Rupar felt she was a bit too aggressive, apparently.

He captioned the clip, “Another blonde Trump flunkie starts literally shoving photographers away from Trump.”

The clip only showed Acra’s head, so it’s unclear if she was “literally shoving” people away, as he claimed.

Before Acra’s response on Tuesday, several reporters from right-leaning outlets and other White House officials came to her defense and bashed Rupar.

The Daily Wire reporter Mary Margaret Olohan called Rupar’s post “ignorant” and “misogynistic,” and Fox News reporter Peter D’Abrosca scoffed at his complaint, saying Acra’s “job is literally to wrangle the press.”

Rupar is one of the top accounts on X when it comes to clipping videos of Trump and other politicians.

The self-described “lifelong liberal Democrat” was dubbed “the man who watches Trump all day, every day” in an April profile by The Times, which reported he spends 80 hours a week monitoring the president. Rupar has made no secret to his 1.1 million followers that he loathes Trump , including in a post earlier this year when he called the president a “demented old man.”

His beef with Acra comes on the heels of theWhite House ripping Rupar for his “creepy” posts about Trump’s executive aide Natalie Harp.

https://www.mediaite.com/media/white-house-press-aide-jabs-back-at-journalist-who-dismissed-her-as-blonde-trump-flunkie/

Netanyahu proposes stripping IDF critics of Israeli citizenship

The prime minister vowed to introduce bills punishing those who “defame” the country’s troops

Published 17 Sep, 2026 02:44

Israelis should be stripped of their citizenship if they are found guilty of slandering the military, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said, as the IDF faces new accusations of killing Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

In a video address on Wednesday, Netanyahu lashed out at the recently released documentary NAZA,which alleges that the Israeli military and intelligence services used AI-assisted systems to select targets and treated potential civilian deaths as acceptable collateral damage. The film by Oscar-winning Israeli directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor premiered at the Venice Film Festival on September 10 and won the Special Jury Prize.

Netanyahu vowed to introduce two bills punishing those he said were causing “immense damage” to the IDF.

“The first, to revoke the citizenship of anyone who defames [Israeli] soldiers, and the second to hit them in their pockets and increase the statutory damages for defamation they can be sued for by 20 times,” he said, as quoted by Reuters.

“Hit them both in the pocket and through their citizenship, because they have no place among us,”Netanyahu added, according to Ynet.

In his speech, he mentioned Yair Golan, leader of the left-wing Democrats and a former IDF deputy chief of staff, who said last year that Israeli troops “kill babies as a hobby.” Netanyahu also mentioned Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, who was removed as the IDF’s chief military advocate after admitting that she authorized the leaking of a video allegedly showing the abuse of a Palestinian detainee at an Israeli detention facility.

The team behind NAZA stood by their investigation, which they said was based on interviews with Israeli service members. “It’s important as Israelis that we recognize what our government has done in Gaza,”Abraham said.

Multiple countries, the UN and human rights groups have accused Israel of indiscriminately killing civilians. Nearly 74,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the war broke out in October 2023 following a surprise Hamas attack on Israel.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has outstanding arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), a separate institution, is hearing a genocide case brought against Israel over its conduct in Gaza.

Israel denies the allegations, while acknowledging some civilian killings as isolated violations of IDF protocols, and accuses Hamas of using civilians as human shields. Israeli officials have also accused UN agencies of aiding Hamas and argued that the group counts its killed fighters among civilian casualties.

https://www.rt.com/news/645884-israeli-netanyahu-citizenship-bill/

Merz abandons UN trip amid sinking approval – Reuters

The German chancellor is facing calls to resign from within his own party

Published 16 Sep, 2026 14:17 |

German Chancellor Freidrich Merz has reportedly canceled his planned trip to the UN General Assembly in New York,as his political future hangs in the balance after a landslide loss to the right-wing AfD in state elections.

Merz was scheduled to travel to New York next week, where high-level meetings between world leaders kick off at UN headquarters. However, a German government source told Reuters on Tuesday that the trip had been canceled,as the chancellor’s “presence is required in Berlin.”

According to another source, Merz’ Christian Democrats (CDU) have called a special meeting for Sunday.

The CDU is reeling from its state election loss to the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt last week. The AfD secured 43.8% of the vote, with the CDU a distant second at 17.2%. Merz’ party has been trailing the AfD in opinion polls for over a year, and an equally dismal performance is expected in elections in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Berlin this weekend, where the CDU is polling at 7% and 20%, respectively.

Just over a year into his chancellorship, CDU members and the German public are losing confidence in Merz. Both Merz and his center-left predecessor, Olaf Scholz, have presided over a country in rapid industrial decline, with Germany’s largest manufacturers – including Volkswagen and BASF – closing plants due to spiraling energy costs, a direct result of Berlin’s self-imposed embargo on Russian oil and gas.

Merz has poured money into an ambitious rearmament program, promising last year to build “the strongest conventional army in Europe.” Meanwhile, ordinary citizens have been told to work more and warned that the “welfare state as we have it today can no longer be financed.” In May, Merz’ government announced new social spending cuts and plans to raise the retirement age from 67 to 70.

Merz loses at home and abroad

Over the weekend, an INSA poll found that a majority of CDU voters no longer support the chancellor,while 78% of the general public disapprove of his leadership.

As Merz’ approval rating tanks at home, Germany’s standing at the UN has diminished. In June, the country lost a bid for a temporary seat on the UN Security Council for the first time in history. Critics blamed Berlin’s iron-clad support for Israel– with the German government going as far as describing Israeli strikes on Palestinian schools as “self-defense” – coupled with fierce opposition to Russia, a position that appeared hypocritical to the Global South.

“When it comes to Russia, international law counts, but when it comes to the USA and Israel, it doesn’t,” left-wing politician Sahra Wagenknecht told the Berliner Zeitung at the time. “This double standard was voted out by the international community yesterday.”

Back in Germany, Merz has vowed to stay the course. After promising to unveil measures to lower fuel costs “very soon,”the chancellor said on Tuesday that he was “elected for four years, and I would like us to use these four years to steer the country out of ​this difficult period.”

https://www.rt.com/news/645858-germany-merz-cancels-un/

Look at his head, isn’t it strange?

EU bans former Zelensky aide from parliament

Yulia Mendel, who has consistently called for peace and criticized her ex-boss, had been invited by an MEP from Germany’s AfD party

Published 16 Sep, 2026 12:41 | Updated

The EU banned a former aide to Vladimir Zelensky from entering the European Parliament on Wednesday, when she was due to speak at an event promoting diplomacy instead of escalation in the Ukraine conflict.

Yulia Mendel, who was Zelensky’s top communications liaison from 2019 to 2021 and who has since become a consistent critic of her former boss, had been invited to speak on the same day Ursula von der Leyen delivered her State of the Union speech.

According to Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, Mendel was invited to give a speech in an EU Parliament session, “Ukraine: Daring for Peace. Diplomacy Instead of Escalation.” She had hoped to “shed light” on the conflict’s central political issues and discuss its possible end.

“On the day of my speech, I was barred from entering the European Parliament. I directly attribute this to Zelensky’s sanctions,” Mendel wrote on X on Wednesday.

“But the speech will go ahead anyway, because I know that I represent a huge segment of society that longs for peace and wants to be heard.”

Zelensky imposed sweeping sanctions on his former spokeswoman last week after accusing her of promoting Russia’s speaking points in his latest crackdown on critics at home.

In a May interview with American journalist Tucker Carlson, Mendel unleashed a series of allegations against her former boss, accusing him of corruption, habitual drug use and obstructing peace efforts.

Mendel has suggested that the sanctions were timed to undermine her EU Parliament speech.

Moscow has accused both Kiev and Brussels of censoring voices which oppose their escalatory chosen political course.

https://www.rt.com/news/645859-eu-bans-ex-zelensky-aide-mendel/