THE WORLD NEWSREEL

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2026 — INTERNATIONAL EDITION

Know today the truths of tomorrow.

SUNDAY EXTRA — THE STORIES SHAKING THE WORLD

October 25, 2026

IRAN PLANS NEW STRIKES ON AMERICANS — U.S. EMBASSIES ON ALERT!

Intelligence warning raises fears of a new phase in the Persian Campaign

WASHINGTON. American intelligence officials say Iran is in the advanced stages of planning attacks against U.S. diplomats and personnel in the Middle East and possibly beyond.
The warning, reported by The New York Times, has prompted Washington to reduce staffing at diplomatic missions in Jordan, Lebanon, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Nonessential personnel and their families have also been ordered to leave Saudi Arabia.
Two senior Iranian officials reportedly acknowledged that Tehran was preparing operations against American personnel. One was identified as a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.
The officials described the contemplated attacks as retaliation for the killing of Iranian officials during the American-Israeli campaign.
U.S. intelligence also reports indications of Iranian operatives operating inside the United States.
The warnings come eight months into the American-Israeli war against Iran, with energy prices rising and American military installations across the region facing sustained pressure.
The intelligence assessments have not established when or where an attack might occur.
But the strategic significance is clear.
The Persian Campaign may be entering a phase in which diplomatic personnel, intelligence networks and civilian infrastructure become increasingly important targets.
An embassy is not a battlefield.
It may nevertheless become a front.
Sources: The New York Times report · The Times of Israel, October 25

NETANYAHU VOWS TO TOPPLE IRAN'S REGIME — TRUMP BLOCKS PLANNED AIR OFFENSIVE!

Israeli premier orders military and intelligence chiefs to pursue regime change — reports reveal a major bombing campaign was prepared for October

JERUSALEM, October 25. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declared the overthrow of Iran's government a central objective of Israeli national security, saying he has instructed the armed forces, Mossad and other security agencies to pursue that goal.
Speaking to military officers on October 21, Netanyahu accused Iran's leadership of attempting to rebuild its nuclear and military capabilities.
He argued that destroying weapons and military installations would not be sufficient while the present government remained in power.
The announcement followed an even more explicit pledge to Israeli journalists on October 18: Netanyahu said he intended to bring down the Iranian regime.
But the most consequential development may have occurred behind closed doors.
According to the Financial Times, Israel prepared a major bombing offensive against Iran for the weekend of October 10. The operation reportedly envisaged several days of strikes against power stations, nuclear facilities and government targets.
It never began.
President Donald Trump reportedly opposed renewed large-scale hostilities before the American midterm elections on November 3.
Netanyahu has continued pressing for action. Washington, however, has not publicly committed itself to another offensive.
The distinction is critical.
Israel has demonstrated the capacity to strike Iranian military and strategic installations. Whether air power can actually overthrow a government is a different question, one that military history has repeatedly left unresolved.
There is also the electoral calendar.
Israel votes on October 27. The United States votes on November 3.
Two governments face voters while considering decisions that could determine the next phase of the Persian Campaign.
THE BOMBERS WERE PREPARED. THE OPERATION WAS STOPPED. THE OBJECTIVE HAS NOT BEEN ABANDONED.
Sources: Financial Times · ANSA, October 21 · The Times of Israel · AFP

NETANYAHU THREATENS WEST BANK OFFENSIVE ON A SCALE UNSEEN SINCE 1967!

Israeli troops move into Hebron as prime minister promises sweeping military action — just four days before election

JERUSALEM, October 25. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Israel is preparing a major military operation in the occupied West Bank, invoking the Six-Day War of 1967 as the measure of its unprecedented scale.
The announcement followed Friday's shooting near Hebron, where Palestinian gunmen killed two Israeli soldiers and wounded three others. Israeli forces subsequently killed the attackers.
Netanyahu said the army was ready and that his government would determine the timing of the wider offensive.
Israeli forces have already begun demolitions and evacuations around Hebron. Palestinian families have been displaced, while military checkpoints and road closures have severely restricted movement.
In a television interview, Netanyahu also promised a major surprise for the Palestinian Authority, without specifying what action he intended.
The timing is politically significant. Israel votes on Tuesday, October 27, and the prime minister has made national security central to his campaign.
The reference to 1967 carries exceptional historical weight. The Six-Day War brought the West Bank and East Jerusalem under Israeli occupation and transformed the territorial foundations of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Whether the proposed offensive will fundamentally alter the West Bank's political arrangements remains unknown.
But the announcement has already raised the stakes of the Palestinian Campaign.
SIXTY YEARS AFTER 1967, THE WEST BANK IS AGAIN AT THE CENTRE OF ISRAEL'S MILITARY AND POLITICAL CALCULATIONS.
Sources: AFP / Arab News · NPR, October 24 · Agenzia Nova

FRANCE EXPLODES AGAIN! 410,000 MARCH — NEARLY 1,000 DETAINED!

Paris sees tear gas and water cannon as the government deploys 70,000 security personnel

PARIS. More than 410,000 people marched across France Saturday in another massive wave of demonstrations against rising living costs, education cuts and economic inequality.
The CGT union claimed participation was considerably higher, approaching 800,000.
In Paris alone, police estimated 110,000 demonstrators.
The government mobilised approximately 70,000 security personnel in an effort to prevent a repetition of the previous weekend's widespread rioting and looting.
Most demonstrations remained peaceful.
But clashes erupted in Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Bordeaux, Toulouse and Rennes.
Masked protesters threw fireworks and other objects. Police responded with tear gas, water cannon and charges against sections of the crowds.
Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez reported nearly 1,000 detentions nationwide.
The movement began with student protests over inadequate school funding and staff shortages. It has since expanded to include workers demanding better wages, improved educational facilities, additional student support and measures against rising housing costs.
The political consequences are growing.
Marine Le Pen's National Rally is preparing for the presidential contest, while Jean-Luc Mélenchon's political movement has expressed support for the demonstrators.
The Yellow Vests have called for further protests on October 31. Trade unions are preparing another day of action in November.
France is not witnessing a single demonstration.
It is witnessing a prolonged confrontation over the distribution of economic burdens.
The police can clear a square.
They cannot clear a national budget.
Sources: Associated Press · Euronews, October 25 · CNN

RIYADH UNDER MISSILE THREAT! HOUTHIS TARGET AIRPORTS AND OIL!

Saudi defences intercept fresh attacks as the Red Sea Campaign widens

RIYADH. Saudi air defences intercepted drones and missiles Sunday as the country's confrontation with Yemen's Houthi movement intensified.
Saudi authorities reported the interception of drones and ballistic missiles aimed at Riyadh and southern Saudi Arabia, including threats to Taif, Yanbu and Khamis Mushait.
The Houthis claimed attacks on airports, oil facilities and military installations.
Their military spokesman renewed warnings against using Riyadh's King Khalid International Airport, describing it as a military target.
The airport had suspended operations after an October 10 attack that killed 13 people and injured more than 300. Limited operations were scheduled to resume Sunday.
The new attacks follow Saudi strikes against Houthi positions in Yemen and renewed fighting over territory near the Red Sea coast.
The strategic geography is unforgiving.
Saudi Arabia's airports connect the kingdom to international commerce. Its oil installations influence global energy markets. The Bab el-Mandeb Strait is a principal passage for maritime trade between Europe and Asia.
The Houthis do not need to occupy Riyadh to impose costs upon it.
They need only make its essential infrastructure more difficult, expensive and dangerous to operate.
This is the economic logic of the Red Sea Campaign.
The missiles are local.
The consequences travel.
Sources: Reuters, October 25 · Anadolu Agency

MUSK'S SATELLITES, UKRAINE'S WAR -- WHO CONTROLS THE SWITCH?

Starlink restrictions lifted after days of disruption to Ukrainian military operations

KIEV. Ukraine announced Saturday that normal operating speeds had been restored to Starlink and Starshield satellite communications after days of restrictions affecting military operations.
President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed the restoration, thanking American officials and others who had helped resolve the dispute.
The interruption had affected Ukrainian drone operations, reconnaissance and battlefield coordination.
Military personnel reported communication losses and restrictions affecting equipment travelling at high speeds.
The affair drew the attention of President Trump, members of Congress and the American State Department.
But an important question remains unanswered.
Who ordered the restrictions?
SpaceX chief Elon Musk said Starshield was controlled by the United States government. Administration officials denied responsibility for the interruption.
The episode exposed an extraordinary feature of contemporary warfare.
A national army depends upon communications infrastructure supplied by a private corporation. The corporation operates within a commercial, technological and governmental environment that does not correspond neatly to military command.
The result is a new strategic vulnerability.
A battlefield communications network may be interrupted without a single enemy missile being fired.
For Ukraine, the immediate problem has been resolved.
For military planners everywhere, the larger question remains.
Who controls the switch?
Sources: Office of the President of Ukraine, October 24 · The Washington Post · Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
THE WORLD NEWSREEL — SUNDAY EXTRA
Know today the truths of tomorrow.

THE WORLD GOES TO THE POLLS — WHILE THE WAR COMES HOME!

Brazil chooses a president, Serbia's students challenge a strongman, Bulgaria votes under the shadow of Black Sea drone attacks, and Europe's streets become the newest political battleground.

TODAY'S MORE HEADLINES

BRAZIL IN A DEAD HEAT! Lula and Bolsonaro's son battle for the presidency — with Washington watching.

STUDENTS TAKE ON SERBIA'S STRONGMAN! An uprising born from a railway disaster reaches the ballot box.

DRONE WAR REACHES NATO'S BLACK SEA COAST! Bulgaria votes after deadly attacks on merchant shipping.

ITALY BRACES FOR ANOTHER WEEKEND OF UNREST! Police deploy across major cities as demonstrations continue.

STARLINK SHOWDOWN! Ukraine's military communications become the subject of a dispute with Elon Musk.

SIX GOALS IN NAPLES! Napoli and Roma provide the sort of entertainment politicians can only promise.

STRATEGIC DESK — DISPATCHES FROM HW1

DRONES STRIKE IN THE BLACK SEA — BULGARIA GOES TO THE POLLS!

SOFIA. Bulgarian voters are choosing a president today under circumstances that would have seemed extraordinary only a few years ago.

Drone attacks on merchant vessels off the Bulgarian Black Sea coast have reportedly killed approximately two dozen international seafarers. Sofia has sought allied assistance to strengthen maritime security.

Bulgaria has not formally blamed Russia for the attacks. Prime Minister Rumen Radev has nevertheless said their consequences benefit Moscow.

The leading presidential contenders offer different responses to the Ukrainian war. Acting President Iliana Iotova emphasizes diplomacy and public exhaustion; former caretaker prime minister Andrey Gyurov advocates stronger support for Kiev.

The presidency is largely ceremonial. The political signal will not be.

The Black Sea has become a place where commercial shipping, military technology and electoral politics meet.

STARLINK BACK ON — MUSK AND KIEV TRADE ACCUSATIONS!

KIEV. Ukraine says its Starshield communications service has returned to normal after disruption. Elon Musk, meanwhile, has accused Kiev of violating the terms governing its use.

The dispute is more than a quarrel over a subscription service.

Satellite communications have become an important component of modern battlefield coordination. Yet the infrastructure is supplied by a private company whose commercial and contractual decisions may carry strategic consequences.

The central question is not whether Ukraine needs communications. It plainly does.

It is whether a modern army can safely depend on infrastructure whose ownership, governance and military obligations do not resemble those of a conventional defence establishment.

The nineteenth century had private arms manufacturers. The twenty-first has private communications systems operating inside the chain of military effectiveness.

That is an interesting development for anyone still convinced that war is exclusively a government enterprise.

HOUTHI WARNING PUTS RIYADH AIRPORT IN THE SPOTLIGHT!

RIYADH. Yemen's Houthi movement has renewed its warning against the use of Riyadh airport amid reports of attacks involving Saudi infrastructure and oil facilities.

The wider Red Sea and Arabian Peninsula theatre remains a reminder that the geographical boundaries of the Middle Eastern confrontation are remarkably elastic.

Airports, shipping routes, oil facilities and insurance premiums are all potential pressure points.

In conventional military history, the capture of a city could decide a campaign. In contemporary strategic warfare, threatening the systems through which a city functions may be sufficient to produce political and economic effects.

The immediate military claims require continued verification. The strategic logic is unmistakable: pressure the infrastructure, and the costs travel far beyond the battlefield.

WORLD DESK

BRAZIL'S POLITICAL DYNASTIES COLLIDE — LULA FIGHTS FOR HIS JOB!

SÃO PAULO. Brazil votes today in a presidential runoff that has turned into a battle between two of the country's most powerful political traditions.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva faces Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former president Jair Bolsonaro.

Flávio finished the first round with 47 percent of the vote against Lula's 45 percent, but the final polls indicate a contest too close to call.

The election has revolved around crime, corruption, household debt and the cost of living. It has also acquired an unmistakable American dimension.

President Trump has criticized the prosecution of Jair Bolsonaro and imposed tariffs on Brazil. Flávio promises a tougher approach to crime and has pledged to free his father, convicted in 2025 over an attempted coup plot.

The stakes are enormous. Brazil is Latin America's largest economy, a major agricultural power and a country whose diplomatic alignment matters well beyond South America.

For the moment, the voters have the last word.

That privilege expires when the counting begins.

SERBIA'S STUDENTS CHALLENGE VUČIĆ AT THE BALLOT BOX!

BELGRADE. A protest movement that began after the deaths of 16 people in the collapse of a railway station canopy at Novi Sad in 2024 has reached its most consequential test.

Serbia holds a snap parliamentary election today.

The student-led opposition is challenging the political establishment of Aleksandar Vučić, who has dominated Serbian politics for more than a decade.

What began as anger over a construction disaster developed into a broader campaign against corruption and the concentration of political power.

The transformation from street movement to electoral challenge is the central story.

Demonstrations can express dissatisfaction. Elections can convert it into institutional authority — provided the votes are counted, the results accepted and the institutions remain capable of transferring power.

Serbia is about to discover whether the energy of its university campuses can survive contact with the electoral machinery.

FROM PARIS TO BARCELONA, EUROPE'S STREETS ARE RESTLESS!

EUROPE. France experienced another day of largely peaceful demonstrations punctuated by violence in Paris. Barcelona reported arrests after rioters looted shops and set fires. Italian cities also saw extensive police deployments.

The grievances differ from country to country. So do the organisations involved.

But the combination of high living costs, political frustration, international conflicts and social-media mobilisation is becoming a familiar European pattern.

It would be a mistake to assign a single cause to all these disturbances.

It would be an equally serious mistake to imagine that the techniques of mobilisation, amplification and imitation stop at national frontiers.

In the age of digital political organisation, a protest can acquire an international audience long before its organisers have acquired a coherent political programme.

ITALY & AFFAIRES

POLICE FLOOD ITALIAN CITIES — PROTESTS CONTINUE, MAJOR LOOTING AVERTED!

MILAN / TURIN / ROME. Italy's police were deployed in force Saturday as antiwar and cost-of-living demonstrations continued across the country.

Reuters reported clashes in Turin, Rome and Bologna, while Milan's rallies were largely peaceful. Despite fears of a repetition of the previous weekend's looting and property damage, its correspondents reported no comparable incidents on Saturday.

The authorities had prepared for trouble. Many shops closed as a precaution.

Police also detained an individual suspected of involvement in organising the online October 17 Movement, whose messages had encouraged further demonstrations.

The legal investigation into that network continues.

For the moment, the immediate result is straightforward: the demonstrations went ahead, some clashes occurred, but the extensive destruction feared by shopkeepers did not materialise.

A city may survive a demonstration. Whether its political institutions can answer the grievances that produced it is another question.

EDITORIAL DESK

THE WAR HAS FOUND ITS WAY INTO THE VOTING BOOTH

By the Editorial Desk

Good evening.

There was a time when governments fought wars abroad and elections at home. It was a convenient arrangement. The soldiers knew where the front was, the politicians knew where the voters were, and the public was invited to believe that the two activities belonged to different departments.

That arrangement is becoming difficult to maintain.

Today, Brazil votes for a president while the United States makes no secret of its interest in the outcome. Serbia's students seek to translate nearly two years of demonstrations into parliamentary power. Bulgaria chooses a president after lethal drone attacks on shipping in the Black Sea. Across Europe, protesters are discovering that a public square can become an international stage without anybody having to cross a frontier.

These are separate events. They have different causes, different histories and different political actors. Yet their simultaneity tells us something about the world in which they occur.

International conflict no longer waits politely outside domestic politics.

It enters through energy prices, public debt, military spending, digital communications, migration, propaganda and the everyday arithmetic of the household budget.

An army can occupy territory. A war can occupy the political imagination of a continent.

This is the central proposition behind our continuing coverage of HW1 — The First Hybrid War. Not that every disturbance is ordered from the same headquarters, nor that every election is secretly a military operation. Such claims would require evidence, and evidence is not improved by enthusiasm.

The proposition is more interesting: the contemporary international struggle is being conducted through several systems of power at once.

Military operations alter economic expectations. Economic expectations alter elections. Elections alter alliances. Alliances alter military operations.

The battlefield is no longer a sufficient map of the war.

Consider the extraordinary spectacle of the next ten days. Brazil, Serbia, Israel and the United States face consequential electoral contests. The candidates do not agree on much. But they all know that their decisions will be judged against an international order already under strain.

The old distinction between foreign affairs and domestic affairs has not disappeared.

It has simply become increasingly expensive to maintain.

Good night, and good luck.

THE SILVER SCREEN

JANE AUSTEN RETURNS — AND GOTHAM GETS UGLY!

ROME. Italian cinemas have welcomed an unusually entertaining collision of literary respectability and comic-book horror.

Sense and Sensibility brings Jane Austen's Dashwood sisters back to the screen under director Georgia Oakley, with Daisy Edgar-Jones as Elinor.

Thirty years after Ang Lee's celebrated adaptation, the question remains whether a new generation can improve upon Emma Thompson's formidable achievement.

The costumes, fortunately, have never been the problem.

Clayface, directed by James Watkins, takes a Batman villain into the territory of body horror. Gotham's criminal population apparently has decided that ordinary organized crime is insufficiently unpleasant.

For those seeking something more serious, Urchin, Harris Dickinson's directorial debut, follows a homeless young man struggling through London's streets. It arrived in Italian cinemas on October 22.

TRAINSPOTTING RETURNS AFTER THIRTY YEARS — THE RENT IS STILL DUE!

Danny Boyle's Trainspotting has returned to Italian cinemas in a restored 4K edition marking its thirtieth anniversary.

The film that once seemed to define the rebellious 1990s now qualifies as a historical document.

Ewan McGregor and his companions are still young, Edinburgh is still unforgiving, and the soundtrack still makes respectable middle age seem a regrettable misunderstanding.

A film about people who refused to grow up has itself become thirty years old.

That may be its cruelest joke.

FASHION DESK

LORO PIANA TAKES CASHMERE TO THE ART MUSEUM!

HOUSTON. The Fall/Winter 2026–27 campaign from Loro Piana is photographed by Mario Sorrenti at the Menil Collection and Rothko Chapel.

It is a clever choice of setting.

The campaign presents clothes through movement, texture and the restrained architecture of the galleries rather than the customary theatrics of the runway.

There are two kinds of luxury advertising. One announces the price. The other assumes that anybody who needs to ask has entered the wrong building.

Loro Piana has traditionally preferred the second.

The photography does the work.

No catwalk required.

Explore the official Loro Piana Fall/Winter 2026–2027 campaign, photographed by Mario Sorrenti at Houston's Menil Collection and Rothko Chapel.

THE NINETEENTH HOLE — GOLF

SIX MILLION DOLLARS AT STAKE IN BERMUDA!

SOUTHAMPTON, BERMUDA. The PGA Tour's Butterfield Bermuda Championship reaches its final round today at Port Royal Golf Course, with a $6 million purse.

The tournament brings professional golf to one of the sport's more photogenic settings, where Atlantic winds can turn a routine approach shot into an argument with geography.

Adam Schenk is the defending champion.

Elsewhere, the LPGA's BMW Ladies Championship concludes in South Korea, while the PGA Tour Champions plays the Stifel Charity Classic in Missouri.

Three tournaments, three generations of professional golf, and a reminder that the sport remains one of the few occupations in which a man can spend four hours walking through beautiful countryside and describe the experience as a terrible day at the office.

CHACARRA WINS IN INDIA — THE GLOBAL GAME HAS NEW ADDRESSES!

Spain's Eugenio Chacarra won last week's DP World India Championship in New Delhi.

The victory is another reminder that international golf is no longer organised exclusively around the traditional British and American centres.

The game now travels through Asia, the Gulf, continental Europe and the Americas.

The nineteenth hole has become a remarkably international institution.

SOCCER DESK — CALCIO

SIX-GOAL MADNESS IN NAPLES! ROMA REFUSE TO DIE!

NAPLES. Napoli and Roma drew 3–3 on Saturday in the weekend's outstanding Serie A spectacle.

Scott McTominay scored twice for Napoli, including a goal in the 83rd minute that appeared to have secured the match.

Roma, however, had other plans.

Leonardo Balerdi equalised in the 89th minute, completing a comeback in a game that had already featured goals from André-Frank Zambo Anguissa and Matías Soulé.

Napoli collected one point. Roma collected one point.

The spectators collected six goals and an excellent reason to complain about their blood pressure.

TORINO SCORES THREE — AND STILL FINDS TIME TO SUFFER!

TURIN. Torino defeated Monza 3–2 on Friday in a match that appeared determined to keep its spectators nervous until the final whistle.

Kian Fitz-Jim, Rafik Belghali and Nikola Vlašić scored for the home side. Monza's late consolation came through an own goal in stoppage time.

Three goals, three points and absolutely no guarantee of tranquility.

The city can now return to its customary concerns, at least until the next fixture.

INTER HOST FIORENTINA — JUVENTUS FACE LECCE!

Sunday's Serie A programme features Inter against Fiorentina, Atalanta against Frosinone, Genoa against Venezia, Lecce against Juventus and Udinese against Milan.

Saturday's results included Como's 2–0 victory over Sassuolo, Bologna's 2–0 win at Cagliari and Lazio's 2–1 defeat of Parma.

Italian football has arranged a full weekend of entertainment.

The country's politicians should consider asking the league for scheduling advice.

ACADEMY & ARCHAEOLOGY

THE LOST CHURCH OF VENICE FOUND — AFTER SIXTEEN CENTURIES!

ALTINO, ITALY. Archaeologists from Ca' Foscari University of Venice have identified the remains of what is probably the oldest episcopal church in the Venetian area.

The church, constructed between the late fourth and early fifth centuries, measures approximately 30 by 20 metres. Beside it stands a substantial complex believed to have served as the bishop's palace.

The discovery is particularly interesting because written sources had long indicated the existence of an important Christian community at Altino, but its principal ecclesiastical buildings had remained elusive.

The excavation also illuminates the gradual movement of settlement and authority toward the islands of the Venetian lagoon.

Venice did not simply appear from the water.

Its institutions had ancestors on the mainland — and those ancestors have begun to emerge from the earth.

TROY GIVES UP A FLUTE — 2,800 YEARS AFTER THE MUSIC STOPPED!

ÇANAKKALE, TURKEY. Excavators at Hisarlık, the site of ancient Troy, have recovered a fragment of a bone flute approximately 2,800 years old.

Turkish authorities describe it as the first musical instrument discovered at the site.

Researchers have also recovered an anthropomorphic idol head from an earlier phase of occupation, approximately 4,500 years old.

The objects belong to different periods of Troy's long history, a useful reminder that the archaeological city was inhabited and rebuilt across many centuries.

Homer gave Troy its most famous voices.

Archaeology has now supplied evidence of an actual instrument.

Unfortunately, the musician has declined to be interviewed.

AN ANCIENT GODDESS RETURNS — WITH THREE NYMPHS!

IVAYLOVGRAD, BULGARIA. Archaeologists excavating the Balak Dere sanctuary have uncovered a rare marble relief depicting Cybele, the great mother goddess, accompanied by three nymphs.

The sanctuary appears to date from the third century AD and remained associated with pagan worship into Late Antiquity.

A water channel around the complex may help explain the presence of the nymphs, divinities closely associated with springs and natural waters.

The building was destroyed by fire around the middle of the fifth century. Whether religious conflict was responsible remains uncertain.

The discovery is an excellent reminder that the Christianisation of the Roman world was neither instantaneous nor geographically uniform.

The old gods did not all leave on the same afternoon.

A CHILD'S TOMB, THIRTY OFFERINGS AND A LOST CIVILISATION!

TRUJILLO, PERU. Archaeologists working at Huaca de la Luna have uncovered the approximately 1,400-year-old burial of a child apparently associated with the Moche elite.

More than thirty ceramic objects accompanied the remains. Their imagery includes birds, prisoners, ritual scenes, combat and divinities.

Investigators also report traces of a possible copper mask near the skull.

The discovery suggests that status and ritual significance could attach to children as well as adults.

The Moche left no newspaper archives.

Their tombs, fortunately, were rather more durable.

THE ANCHORMAN DESK — THE WORLD'S STRANGEST AFFAIRS

WORLD'S BIGGEST PIZZA! 630,496 SLICES OF PEPPERONI — AND NOT A SINGLE SMALL APPETITE!

LOS ANGELES. The officially recorded largest pizza in the world covers 1,296.72 square metres.

It was created in January 2023 by YouTuber Airrack and Pizza Hut at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

The ingredients included approximately 6,193 kilograms of dough, 2,244 kilograms of tomato sauce, 3,992 kilograms of cheese and 630,496 pepperoni slices.

The pizza was assembled and baked in sections before being distributed to charitable organisations.

The record is a triumph of American ingenuity.

It also proves that, somewhere in the United States, somebody looked at an ordinary pizza and concluded that what it really needed was the floor space of a respectable supermarket.

The Italians invented pizza.

The Americans invented a logistical operation to deliver it to history.

AN ANCIENT LETTER REVEALS THE SAME OLD PROBLEM: SOMEBODY WON'T PAY!

KANESH, TURKEY. Researchers using modern scanning techniques have begun reading Assyrian letters still enclosed in their original clay envelopes.

One 3,800-year-old message was written by a woman named Anna-anna to her husband, Ennum-Ashur.

Her complaint concerned a debtor who refused to pay money owed to her husband directly to her.

Nearly four millennia later, the situation requires remarkably little translation.

Civilisation has invented banks, credit cards, electronic transfers and sophisticated financial regulation.

The debtor remains essentially unchanged.

THE KITCHEN — SUNDAY TABLE

THE SUNDAY POT: BEEF BRAISED IN RED WINE

A proper Sunday meal does not require culinary acrobatics. It requires time, good ingredients and the willingness to leave a saucepan alone.

Brasato al vino rosso — Serves four

Use 1 kg of beef chuck, one bottle of dry red wine, two carrots, one onion, two celery stalks, two cloves of garlic, rosemary, bay leaf, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Brown the beef thoroughly in a heavy pot. Remove it, soften the vegetables, return the meat and add the wine, herbs and enough water or stock to keep the liquid about halfway up the beef.

Cover and cook gently for approximately three hours, turning occasionally, until the meat is tender. Reduce the sauce and serve with mashed potatoes or polenta.

A Nebbiolo would be welcome, although it is not necessary to mortgage the house for a Barolo.

The secret is not complicated: cook slowly, eat slowly, and never trust a Sunday lunch that can be prepared in twelve minutes.

BOOKS & IDEAS

THE ARTIFICIAL FRIEND ARRIVES — ISHIGURO'S MACHINE GETS ITS CLOSE-UP!

The release of Taika Waititi's film adaptation of Klara and the Sun brings one of contemporary literature's most interesting questions back into public view.

Klara is an artificial companion whose observations of human life expose the peculiar mixture of affection, calculation and self-deception in human relationships.

The novel is not simply about whether a machine can think.

It asks what human beings expect from a being they have created to serve their emotional needs.

The question is particularly relevant in a culture that increasingly treats artificial intelligence as both a technical instrument and a social interlocutor.

We have spent centuries asking whether machines might become human.

Ishiguro asks a less comfortable question: what happens when human beings begin to behave like the machines they imagine?

ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO — OCTOBER 1926

THE WORLD OF 1926: PEACE ON PAPER, TROUBLE IN THE MARGINS!

One hundred years ago, Europe was living through the diplomatic optimism that followed the Locarno agreements.

Germany had entered the League of Nations in September 1926. The European powers were attempting to consolidate a security order built around treaties, arbitration and the promise of reconciliation.

The international system looked increasingly institutional.

Yet its foundations remained uncertain.

Germany's eastern frontiers lacked the same guarantees as its western ones. The Soviet Union remained outside much of the European diplomatic settlement. Colonial empires continued to govern vast populations without their consent.

The peace was real, but it was incomplete.

The lesson is not that every peace conference must fail.

It is that a diplomatic settlement can be successful in the questions it answers while remaining dangerously silent about the questions it leaves open.

The world of October 1926 was not already at war.

It was learning how to mistake a partial settlement for a permanent order.

THE PRESS REVIEW — THE FRONT PAGES ON TRIAL

FOUR ELECTIONS, THREE CONTINENTS — AND EVERYBODY HAS FOUND A DIFFERENT CRISIS!

Today's international press offers an instructive spectacle.

Reuters concentrates on the immediate machinery of elections, protests and strategic developments: Brazil's runoff, Serbia's parliamentary contest, Bulgaria's vote and the extension of insecurity into the Black Sea.

The Guardian sees a broader contest over democratic institutions, placing Brazil, Serbia, Israel and the United States within a common political narrative.

Italian reporting, meanwhile, gives understandable prominence to domestic unrest and the policing of demonstrations.

Each approach selects a different centre of gravity.

The wire service asks what happened.

The political newspaper asks what it means.

The national press asks whether it is happening outside the reader's front door.

All three are legitimate journalistic questions. None is the whole story.

There is also a fourth question, rather less fashionable and considerably more uncomfortable:

What connects these events without making them identical?

That is the question this newspaper intends to keep asking.

Not every demonstration is a revolution. Not every election is a referendum on the international order. Not every drone is the beginning of a new war.

But when elections, protests, communications infrastructure and military campaigns begin to affect one another, it becomes difficult to maintain that each belongs in a separate newspaper section.

The front page has become a map.

And the map is getting crowded.

THE WORLD NEWSREEL

Sunday, October 25, 2026

Know today the truths of tomorrow.

Labels

10/25/26