On Monday, the charity Oxfam published a report on the growth of social inequality in the United States, titled “Unequal: The Rise of a New American Oligarchy.”

The report notes that the “past year has been indelibly shaped by concentrated wealth and power.” It cites data showing that in the past 12 months alone, the 10 richest US billionaires got approximately $700 billion richer. Over this period, their wealth grew by a staggering 40 percent, from $1.79 trillion to $2.5 trillion.

Oxfam: 10 US billionaires have had their wealth increase 6-fold since 2020

Andre Damon

Beneath the diplomatic pomp and illusions of partnership, France is bitterly discovering that in the Atlantic Alliance, allies have no friends but their own interests.

Paris’s futile efforts: why is French military-technical cooperation with its allies failing?

    Mohamed Lamine KABA

CIA Director John Ratcliffe met with EU officials last week in an attempt to rebuild strained relations with US intelligence agencies, Politico reported, citing three people familiar with the matter.

According to the report published on Friday, Ratcliffe met with the EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, as well as senior officials from the EU Intelligence and Situation Center (INTCEN) and the EU Military Staff Intelligence Directorate (EUMS). He sought to reaffirm Washington’s commitment to intelligence-sharing and to convey that the CIA “wants to keep lines open,” Politico said.

The first in a series of first-hand accounts of the Dismissal, from the man who was there: John Menadue.

Deceit is the one word that comes to mind when I think about the Dismissal.

Many in the Coalition, with a born-to-rule view after 23 years of conservative rule, believed that the election of the Whitlam Government in 1972 was an aberration.

More bills were defeated in the Senate in the three years of the Whitlam Government than in the previous 72 years.

John Menadue

The new Support at Home Program for older people is introducing a ‘free market’ transactional aged care system. It’s a retrograde step, Sarah Russell reports.

Forty years ago, the Hawke Government introduced a significant aged care initiative that was in line with traditional Labor values. The Home and Community Care (HACC) program provided government-subsidised home and community-based support services. These services – such as meals on wheels, community transport and nursing care – enabled older people to live independently in their own homes.

Pay per shower: fully-funded aged care turns market-driven aged support
by Dr Sarah Russell

Palestinian women share how Israeli forces used them as human shields in Gaza and the West Bank
Throughout the Gaza genocide, testimonies have documented the Israeli army’s use of Palestinian women as human shields. These are not isolated acts by rogue soldiers but a systematic practice known to Israeli commanders and acknowledged by soldiers.

BY MAJD JAWAD 

Editor’s Note: This article first appeared in Arabic on Raseef22, and has been translated into English for republication with permission. The original article can be found here.

The Kremlin welcomes Japan’s desire to sign a peace treaty with Russia, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday. This follows a statement by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who told parliament that pursuing an agreement is part of her government’s foreign policy agenda.

Japan and Russia never signed a peace treaty after the end of World War II. The absence of a treaty stems from a longstanding dispute over the four southernmost islands of the Kuril archipelago, which were incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1945 as part of the postwar settlement. Tokyo, however, continues to claim what it calls the Northern Territories.

“The Japanese government’s policy is to resolve the territorial issue and finalize the peace treaty,”Takaichi told parliament.

The US will work to reduce its dependence on rare earth metals from China, considering the country unreliable, said US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

In an interview with the Financial Times on October 31, Bessent expressed confidence that Washington would find an alternative to Chinese sources of rare earth metals within two years.

According to him, China’s influence over the US in the rare earth metals sector will last no longer than 12 to 24 months.

"We're going to go at warp speed over the next one, two years, and we're going to get out from under the sword that the Chinese have over us," Bessent said in an interview with CNN.

He added that both Eastern and Western US allies are working to establish their own supply chains to avoid reliance on Chinese rare earth metals, as China plans to impose export restrictions.

People all over social media are publicly threatening to steal food once their EBT benefits run out. Some of them are taking it one step further by threatening to get violent with anyone that tries to prevent them from stealing food. So what is our country going to look like if this actually happens on a widespread basis? Today is day 26 of the government shutdown, and there is no end in sight. It appears that food stamp benefits will not be paid out to 42 million Americans at the beginning of November, and nobody is exactly sure what is going to happen next.

“The Well Has Run Dry”: Are The People That Are Having Epic EBT Meltdowns Serious About What They Plan To Do Next?

BY MICHAEL SNYDER

Personally, I have never seen as much anger directed toward the federal government as I am seeing right now.

Beirut – Does the unified Iranian-Russian-Chinese stance affirming the expiration of UN Resolution 2231 pose a challenge to Western efforts to revive the “snapback mechanism,” signal a shift in international relations, and herald the emergence of a multipolar world order?

WILL DISABLING THE “TRIGGER MECHANISM” LIMIT UNIPOLAR HEGEMONY AND HASTEN THE BIRTH OF MULTIPOLARITY?

BY Hassan Hardan

Here’s Israel’s strategy to continue the war on Gaza: find a pretext, no matter how baseless, use it to kill dozens of civilians and fighters, stop fire and claim you’re honouring the ceasefire. Then do it again.

The Israeli army announced that a soldier in Rafah had been killed by gunfire on Tuesday. Before the source of the gunfire could be confirmed, Netanyahu blamed it on Hamas, and gave the order for the army to launch “powerful strikes” on Gaza.

Tareq S. Hajjaj

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth claimed a new US strike on a vessel that, according to him, was used for drug trafficking in the Caribbean Sea and belonged to a "terrorist organization."

"Today, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out a lethal kinetic strike on another narco-trafficking vessel operated by a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO) in the Caribbean," Hegseth said on X.

Three men were on board the vessel during the attack, which was carried out in international waters, he added.

"All three terrorists were killed, and no U.S. forces were harmed in this strike," Hegseth added.

The Finnish region of South Karelia has been losing an estimated €1 million ($1.2 million) in tourist income every day since the country closed its border with Russia, Bloomberg reported on Saturday.

Finland shut all crossings along its 1,430km land border with Russia in late 2023, accusing Moscow of orchestrating an influx of migrants from Africa and the Middle East. Russia dismissed the allegation as “completely baseless.”

For decades, South Karelia, which lies closer to St. Petersburg than to Helsinki, had enjoyed lucrative ties with Russia – from cross-border shopping and tourism to lumber imports and local jobs in the forest industry. The loss of Russian visitors has reportedly left hotels, shops, and restaurants deserted, dealing a heavy blow to the local economy.

Opponents of Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky have accused his administration of using lawfare to sideline political opposition, Politico reported on Friday, citing lawmakers and anti-graft activists.

The outlet cited last week’s indictment of the former chairman of Ukraine’s national energy operator, Ukrenergo, Vladimir Kudritsky, as being seen as part of the pattern.

Kudritsky, who was dismissed from his post in 2024, told Politico that the embezzlement charges against him are political, aimed at facilitating a centralization of power under Zelensky and his top aide, Andrey Ermak.

Some Ukrainian executives fear that as Russia intensifies long-range strikes on the country’s energy and military-industrial facilities, Zelensky will be looking for scapegoats, local media reported in October.