The Israeli foreign minister declared the UN secretary general persona non grata and banned him from entering the country.

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IDF confirms first officer casualty in ground war against Hezbollah.

Captain Eitan Olster of the IDF’s elite 'Egoz Unit', which specializes in anti-guerilla warfare, was killed in action.

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Georgian president refuses to sign bill banning LGBT propaganda

Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili didn't sign a law banning LGBT* propaganda, the administration told reporters.

"President Zurabishvili refused to sign the bill and returned it to parliament without vetoing it," presidency spokeswoman explained.

In such cases, according to Georgian law, the Speaker of the Parliament can sign the bill into law instead within 5 days.

Earlier, the Parliament of Georgia has adopted a bill on the prohibition of LGBT propaganda.

*The LGBT movement is recognized as extremist in Russia and is prohibited

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British McDonald's hired people as 'slaves'

The Czech mafia has been transporting Czech citizens to Britain for several years, forcing them to work for next to nothing. People have had their passports confiscated, been subjected to total surveillance and been banned from using mobile phones and the internet.

“I do feel partially exploited by McDonald’s because they didn’t act. I thought if I was working for McDonalds, that they would be a little bit more cautious, that they will notice it,” said one of the victims named Pavel.

It emerged that McDonald's had overlooked or deliberately ignored well-known signs of slavery, including the payment of wages to several people into a single bank account.

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❗️Ukrainian forces lost more than 300 military personnel in the Kursk region during the day, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

🇷🇺🪖 Key highlights from the Russian Ministry of Defense's daily briefing on the situation in the Kursk region:

◻️ Russia's Battlegroup Sever continued offensive operations.

◻️ Russian forces repelled five counterattacks in the directions of the villages of Plekhovo, Olgovka, Cherkasskoye and Porechnoye, enemy lost up to 30 militants.

◻️ Russian forces thwarted three attempts by Ukrainian troops to breach the state border near Novy Put. Ukrainian forces lost up to 50 servicemen.

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Durov: Telegram discloses IP addresses and phone numbers of criminals from 2018 to authorities 

Telegram can disclose IP addresses and phone numbers of criminals to the authorities from 2018; this process has already been set up, Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov wrote on his Telegram channel.

“As of 2018, Telegram can disclose criminals' IP addresses/phone numbers to authorities in accordance with our privacy policy in most countries... This process was established long before last week,” Durov reportedly said, adding that Telegram would verify the request before revealing the data.

In Brazil, the Telegram team satisfied 203 requests since the start of the year, while in India, the number of satisfied requests exceeds 6 thousand, according to Durov. He stressed that the platform streamlined and unified privacy policies for different countries last week, but that Telegram's core principles have not changed.

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For the first time, the Israeli Army has released footage of the presence of commandos and a parachute brigade in southern Lebanon.

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❗️Hezbollah claims to have ambushed an IDF unit near the border village of Yaroun, reportedly killing and wounding all the Israeli soldiers.

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Netanyahu seeks to drag US into war with Iran – ex-Italian diplomat

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a provocative address to the people of Iran a day before Tehran’s ballistic missile attack in Israel, claiming the nation would be "finally free" and that "that moment will come a lot sooner than people think."

Netanyahu is "probably provoking the Iranian leadership to react to have a further justification to hit the country and, ideally, to draw the US to join Israel in attacking Iran," Dr. Marco Carnelos, former Italian diplomat and Middle East adviser to Prime Ministers Prodi and Berlusconi, told Sputnik.

In the wake of Tuesday's missile strikes, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian stressed that Iran exercised "legitimate self-defense rights" in response to Israel's aggression. Netanyahu claimed that "Iran made a big mistake" on October 1 and "will pay for it."

"There is no doubt that Israel is leveraging Washington against Iran," Carnelos said, but it was "far from certain if the Biden Administration will decide to join Israel in attacking Iran unleashing a regional war."

The former Italian diplomat said the Biden administration wants to avoid a direct confrontation with Iran before November’s presidential election. Voters have no interest in starting "another potential endless war in the Middle East," the pundit stressed.

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JD Vance ‘made viewers feel safe,’ while Walz seemed to have brain freeze or senior moments – psychiatrist

💬 Republican Senator JD Vance “projected a steady, self-assured persona that made viewers feel safe,” Dr. Carole Lieberman, a board-certified psychiatrist and best-selling author based in Beverly Hills, California, told Sputnik commenting on his vice-presidential debate with Democratic Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota.

Walz’s “discordant words and body movements made viewers feel uncomfortable,” she argued. He was “clearly nervous and his body language showed a lot of telltale signs of lying, such as fidgeting, touching his face and breathing rapidly.”

🔸 The debate began with a possible pre-emptive strike by Israel on Iran. “Tim Walz stuttered and stumbled over his answer. He gave misinformation about Trump and a deal with Iran, but never answered the question. JD Vance, on the other hand, answered with, ‘It is up to Israel,’ which is the best answer,” the psychiatrist said.

🔸 On immigration, which Walz knew was a weak spot because Kamala Harris “as the Border Czar that had let everyone in,” he again started blaming Donald Trump. “It was obvious that his preparation for the debate focused on trying to blame Trump for everything,” Lieberman said.

🔸 Vance answered a question about hurricanes and climate change “in a straightforward manner, whereas Tim Walz started grimacing, making jarring movements and having pauses that seemed like brain freeze or senior moments,” she noted.

Vance won “because he was authentic throughout and his words matched his body language,” the psychiatrist concluded.

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It took 12 years to realize: The EU Council recognized Julian Assange as a political prisoner

88 members of the Council voted in favor of the adoption of the relevant resolution, 13 against, 20 abstained.

After 12 years of imprisonment — seven years behind the walls of the Ecuadorian Embassy and five years in a British prison — the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly has voted to confirm that Julian Assange was held as a political prisoner.

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🔥🔥🔥 Russian pensioners call out P. Diddy

The elderly women note that the disgraced rapper had close ties with former US President Barack Obama.

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Endless incursions? A deep dive into Israel's military assaults on Lebanon

The recent launch of “restricted ground raids” by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon marks yet another chapter in Israel's longstanding conflict with its northern neighbor.

Sputnik explores the intricate history behind these incursions.

2024 Operation Northern Arrows: A total of five Israeli brigades have been deployed to the Israel-Lebanon border amid reports that not all of them are expected to take part in the operation, which has already claimed the lives of over 1,500 people.

2006 Operation Just Reward, also known as the Second Lebanon War in Israel: The IDF launched a major ground offensive aimed at dismantling Hezbollah, but ultimately fell short of this objective. The ensuing 34 days of intense fighting culminated in Israel agreeing to a UN Security Council resolution for a ceasefire.

1996 Operation Grapes of Wrath: The 17-day assault’s goal was to push Hezbollah beyond the Litani River and out of reach of Israeli targets. The operation ended with a ceasefire that prohibited attacks on civilians.

1993 Operation Accountability: Israel initiated it in retaliation for Hezbollah's counterattacks on Israeli positions. The conflict concluded with a temporary truce reached through an oral agreement.

1982 Operation Peace for Galilee, also known as the First Lebanon War: The IDF launched a full-blown second invasion of southern Lebanon, claiming it was a response to attacks by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

1978 Operation Litani: It saw Israel’s first large-scale invasion of Lebanon, carried out by the IDF in order to expel PLO forces from the territory and establish a narrow occupation zone in southern Lebanon.

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📷 The rockets fired from Iran at Israel yesterday had photos of Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps General Abbas Nilforoushan on them, Fars news agency reported

They were both killed in Israeli strikes on Beirut.

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🇭🇺 Hungary blocks the EU's plan to send instructors and advisers to Ukraine to train Ukrainian troops there, and demands that it be revised, Hungarian FM Peter Szijjarto said.

According to him, the EU training mission on the territory of the community countries, which began in November 2022, is expiring soon. He added that the EU is currently discussing a proposal not only to extend it for two years, but also to send instructors and military advisers to Ukraine "so that they can take part in coordinating the preparatory mission and, as they say, in increasing its effectiveness."

"We consider this an extremely dangerous step in terms of military escalation. We see that this proposal would significantly increase the risk of the conflict expanding... So we say "no" to this proposal, we have told the EU External Action Service in Brussels that we cannot support the proposal in this form; we have asked them to revise it," Szijjarto said in a video message that was broadcast on Facebook*.

* Facebook banned in Russia as extremist.

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❗️❗️❗️Sputnik correspondent Abdel Qader Al-Bai continues his roaming report from the neighbourhood near Mar Mikhael Church in the southern suburbs of Beirut, documenting the extensive damage to buildings after the area was hit by Israeli bombardment.

At least 55 people were killed and 156 were injured as a result of Israeli air strikes on Lebanese towns and villages on Tuesday, the Lebanese Health Ministry said.

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❗️Seven Israeli soldiers have been killed in fighting in southern Lebanon, the Israeli army has reported.

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