World roundup: November 18 2025
Stories from Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Ukraine, and elsewhere
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PROGRAMMING NOTE: With Thanksgiving approaching here in the US I will be taking several days away from the newsletter coming up. My plan is to continue through this Thursday and then resume on Sunday, November 30. Thanks for reading!
TODAY IN HISTORY
November 18, 1803: The Battle of Vertières, the final major battle of the Haitian Revolution, results in a decisive Haitian victory over a heavily outnumbered French expeditionary army. The French, under the Vicomte de Rochambeau, negotiated their withdrawal from the island and Haitian leader Jean-Jacques Dessalines declared independence on January 1, 1804.
November 18, 1910: A group of some 300 suffragettes marches on the Houses of Parliament in London to protest UK Prime Minister H. H. Asquith’s decision to dissolve parliament. Activists saw this as a betrayal of Asquith’s pledge to take up the issue of women’s suffrage, which he’d made while campaigning ahead of the January 1910 general election. The violent resistance they met from Metropolitan police and male bystanders, which killed two protesters and in several cases escalated to sexual assault, caused the suffragettes to dub the event “Black Friday.” One consequence was a return to direct action instead of organized protests by the suffragettes, as it was felt the former gave participants a better chance of evading the police.
November 18, 1916: The Battle of the Somme, which had begun on July 1, ends with over one million dead and wounded in total and only very minor Allied tactical gains to show for it. Strategically the battle did help the green British army gain experience while forcing Germany into a war of attrition that it couldn’t possibly sustain. But mostly the Somme stands as the best example of the meat grinder approach to war, and the callous indifference to lower rank casualties among the officer class, that characterized World War I.
MIDDLE EAST
LEBANON
The Israeli military (IDF) killed at least 13 people on Tuesday in an attack on the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon. That toll has risen from four to 11 to 13 in the time that I’ve been writing the newsletter so by the time you read this it may have risen again. Israeli officials later claimed that their target was “a Hamas training compound.” Another IDF airstrike killed a municipal employee in southern Lebanon’s Nabatieh province.
Elsewhere, the Trump administration had been planning to host Lebanese military commander Rodolphe Haykal in Washington on Tuesday but canceled his meetings abruptly. Although the administration hasn’t yet offered an explanation, this appears to be a response to a statement issued by the Lebanese military on Sunday that criticized an IDF attack on United Nations peacekeepers and accused Israel of “violating Lebanese sovereignty, causing instability and obstructing the army’s deployment in the south.”
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
The IDF killed at least two people in southern Gaza on Tuesday after they allegedly encroached on the “yellow line.” In the West Bank, at least one person was killed and three wounded in a “[car] ramming and stabbing” attack near the Gush Etzion settlement south of Bethlehem. Israeli forces killed two Palestinian attackers and also shot one of the three people who were wounded, which was apparently accidental. Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad both praised the attack though as far as I know neither has claimed responsibility for it.
Al Jazeera has a roundup of reactions to the UN Security Council’s vote to approve Donald Trump’s ceasefire framework on Monday. They are as you would expect: the US and allies happy, Israel and the Palestinian Authority supportive, China and Russia skeptical, and Hamas opposed.
SAUDI ARABIA
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman turned up at the White House on Tuesday as expected, where he was greeted warmly by US President Donald Trump. I was a little surprised at the lack of any conclusive announcements during their Oval Office session, but the White House later announced two major deal signings: an agreement in principle for the US to help Saudi Arabia develop a civilian nuclear energy program and a “major defense sale package” that includes the expected approval for the Saudis to purchase F-35s. The de facto Saudi ruler promised to invest a cool $1 trillion in the US, upping the $600 billion commitment he made when Trump visited Saudi Arabia earlier this year. He was also expected to appeal to Trump to take greater interest in halting the conflict in Sudan, though we’ll see if that leads anywhere.
MBS also expressed his interest in joining Trump’s “Abraham Accords” scheme but reiterated that he would not normalize relations with Israel absent “a clear path to a two-state solution.” That is a massive concession to Israel, since the Arab position on normalization used to be Palestinian statehood full stop and now all he’s demanding is a meaningless “clear path” to statehood. But it doesn’t seem that Israeli leaders are willing to take the win because even an empty gesture at Palestinian self-determination is too much for them to countenance.
At one point a reporter dared to address the proverbial elephant in the room, the fact that MBS ordered—allegedly!—the murder/dismemberment/dissolution of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. They received a predictable dressing down from Trump, who at various points asserted that the prince “knew nothing about” the murder (contradicting multiple investigations including one conducted by his own intelligence agencies) and insinuated that the “extremely controversial” Khashoggi, whom “lot of people didn’t like,” had it coming. It was one of his finer moments. The prince called the murder “painful” and “a huge mistake,” and insisted that “we are doing our best that this doesn’t happen again.”
IRAQ
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaʿ al-Sudani announced on Tuesday that he and his Reconstruction and Development party have joined, or rejoined I guess, the dominant Shiʿa “Coordination Framework” coalition. The Framework, whose support elevated Sudani to the premiership back in 2022, won a collective 175 seats (with Reconstruction and Development included) in the parliamentary election earlier this month, enough for an outright majority in the 329 seat legislature without worrying about any Kurdish or Sunni Arab parties. That does not mean that Sudani has now sewn up his second term as PM—the coalition will need to agree internally on a PM candidate before it puts the question to the parliament and there are some elements within it that have soured on Sudani.
ASIA
PAKISTAN
Authorities are claiming that their security forces killed at least 38 unspecified militants in multiple raids in northern Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Sunday and Monday. They described the militants as “khawarij,” a term that Pakistani officials usually reserve for the Pakistani Taliban.
PHILIPPINES
The sister of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., Senator Imee Marcos, accused her brother of being a cocaine addict on Monday, putting him in the unusual (for a head of state) position of having to insist that he is not hooked on drugs. These allegations have dogged Marcos Jr. for some time now—he released drug test results during his 2021 presidential campaign to try to quell them—but they’ve resurged amid his ongoing feud with former President Rodrigo Duterte and his daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte, who bring them back up from time to time. Presidential spokesperson Claire Castro accused Imee Marcos of bringing them up now to distract from a corruption investigation that may involve people close to her politically.
AFRICA
LIBYA
According to Libya’s central bank, the country’s rival eastern- and western-based parliaments have managed to agree on a “unified development program.” I don’t know what that means, but the bank seems to be treating it as a step toward bringing those dueling governments together, at least where state finances are concerned. That certainly could be a positive development.
MALI
Human Rights Watch is accusing the Malian military of killing at least 31 people in attacks on two villages in the Ségou region last month. Jamaʿat Nusrat al-Islam wa’l-Muslimin jihadists are active in Ségou but these were not JNIM fighters, they were civilians whom the military accused of “collaborating” with JNIM. It’s unclear what basis they had, if any, for that accusation. Even in cases where villagers do go along with the jihadists it should go without saying that such cooperation is often coerced or at least offered out of fear.
NIGERIA
Islamic State West Africa Province fighters attacked a village in northeastern Nigeria’s Borno state on Monday evening, killing at least nine people. Five of the victims were members of a local civilian defense force and the other four were described as “laborers.” A number of soldiers are reportedly missing in the wake of the attack.
SOMALIA
AFP reports on the struggles the Somali military is having in trying to fend off an extended offensive by al-Shabab jihadists:
Since 2007 [the Somali National Army] has relied heavily on multilateral African Union security forces, paid for primarily by Western countries.
But such support is shrinking. The latest guise of the African Union force — known as AUSSOM — was inaugurated in January with a $92-million shortfall in its planned budget, on top of an existing $100-million debt.
The SNA, always stretched thin, has been pushed to [the] breaking point, say analysts.
Somalia’s national security advisor, Awes Hagi Yusuf, conceded there were “challenges”, but said new agreements with “non-traditional” partners — the likes of Turkey and the United Arab Emirates — were helping to fill the gaps.
Those agreements may help in the short term but it’s an open question how long some of those partner nations, especially African countries like Uganda and Kenya, will be able and willing to maintain their Somali operations.
EUROPE
RUSSIA
Russian special envoy Kirill Dmitriev told Barak Ravid at Axios on Tuesday that the Russian and US governments “have discussed the possibility of conducting another prisoner exchange.” A US official later confirmed that discussions have taken place but they don’t appear to be particularly advanced. Eight of nine US nationals whose names the Trump administration passed to Moscow earlier this year remain in Russian custody.
UKRAINE
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky indicated to reporters in Spain on Tuesday that he’s hoping to restart some sort of diplomacy with Russia. He’s apparently heading to Turkey for meetings with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Trump envoy Steve Witkoff toward that end. Erdoğan has tried to position himself as a mediator in the past and does have a decent relationship with Vladimir Putin, but there’s not going to be any Russian participation in these meetings and there’s been no signal from Moscow that it’s interested in talking at the moment. Russian forces are advancing along several fronts in Ukraine, most prominently in Zaporizhzhia oblast where they are moving slowly toward the provincial capital. Putin may be reluctant to interrupt that momentum.
Ravid and Axios’s Dave Lawler reported late on Tuesday that the Trump administration, apparently feeling confident in the wake of the Gaza ceasefire, has put together a “28-point” plan for ending the war in Ukraine. Witkoff is leading the effort and has been communicating with Dmitriev, which presumably explains where that prisoner exchange idea (see above) originated. The drafting has advanced far enough that the administration has started briefing Ukrainian and other European officials on it, and Dmitriev says he feels optimistic about it because, he argues, “the Russian position is really being heard” for the first time. That sounds fairly ominous from the Ukrainian perspective but we’ll see.
POLAND
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk is attributing the apparent sabotage of the Warsaw-Lublin rail line to “two Ukrainian citizens who long worked for Russian intelligence.” He isn’t identifying them publicly but claims that one of them had previously been convicted in absentia of carrying out similar acts in Ukraine. Both men allegedly entered Poland via Belarus and have since returned.
AMERICAS
MEXICO
Donald Trump mused to reporters on Monday that, since his War on Drug Boats is going so well, he might start bombing Mexico too. “It’s OK with me,” is how he put it in one of his more presidential moments. There are obviously a lot of details that would have to be ironed out before something like this comes to fruition so I don’t know how much credence to give what sounds like a thing he said off the cuff during one of his daily bullshit sessions. But on Tuesday Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum rejected—and not for the first time—the idea that she would permit US military strikes in Mexico. So if Trump does start bombing that country anyway we should be clear that it would be an act of war.
UNITED STATES
Finally, at Africa Is a Country, Palestinian writer Jwan Zreiq considers the changing definition of “genocide” under US empire:
If Iraq taught us anything, it is that the destruction of a country is never only about that country. Looking at Syria and Palestine. The logic is the same, as the destruction rains down, turning cities to rubble, yet we’re fed this mindset that these are “civil wars” or “isolated conflicts,” tragedies that begin and end only within their own borders. If we’ve learned to see each other through the lens of division—nation over people, tribe over community, Sunni over Shia, Christian over Muslim—it’s not because our histories made it inevitable. It’s because an entire system was built to make these divisions feel natural. Borders were drawn, identities hardened, loyalties fragmented. The result is a region where solidarity is rare, and outrage is selective—where the suffering of one’s “own” is met with grief, but the destruction of neighbors is met with silence.
But empire doesn’t just divide. It destroys. Not only lives but the very conditions that make life possible. Not only bodies but the social bonds that sustain meaning, culture, continuity. This destruction has a name. And understanding it clearly is the first step in resisting it. The 1948 UN Genocide Convention defines genocide as acts intended to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group, in whole or in part. As Azmi Bishara argues in The War on Gaza: Politics, Ethics, and International Law, what matters is intent, not numbers. Whether one person dies or a million, if the motive is to eliminate people based on their identity, it qualifies as genocide. The Convention outlines five categories: (a) killing group members; (b) inflicting serious physical or psychological harm; (c) imposing conditions designed to destroy the group; (d) preventing births; (e) forcibly removing children. Crucially, genocide extends beyond direct killing to include creating conditions meant to bring about a group’s destruction. What unfolds before us is also sociocide. By definition, it is a strategic annihilation of the structures that make collective life possible. It goes hand in hand with genocide: Where genocide targets the people themselves, sociocide destroys their ability to exist as a society by stripping people of the means to sustain life, envision futures, or exist as anything beyond isolated survivors.
The architecture of sociocide reveals itself most clearly in the weapon of comprehensive sanctions, a form of violence so gradual it escapes the category of war, yet so devastating it achieves what bombs alone cannot. The logic that governed Iraq’s sanctions extends through Gaza’s blockade, now stretching beyond seventeen years. Even before October 2023, the numbers told the story: unemployment at 45 percent, water contamination at 95 percent, and electricity available only four to six hours each day. This wasn’t the randomness of conflict but the methodical application of controlled deprivation. Israel regulates every calorie entering Gaza, every medical item, every building material. The blockade does more than limit movement. It engineers malnutrition, portions out survival, and maintains conditions where a population can subsist but never flourish.