Pakistan's Parliament has given Army Chief Asim Munir statutory command over all three armed forces — army, navy, and air force — for the first time in the country's history.

He can retire, discharge, or retain personnel across services without cabinet approval.

His five-year term runs to at least 2030.

As Field Marshal he keeps rank and legal immunity for life, and removing him requires a two-thirds parliamentary vote.

Budanov confirms Ukraine proposed a ceasefire to Russia — delivered personally to Putin — covering both strikes on Ukraine and the front line.

No response from Russia.

Budanov says Russia will likely only pause strikes on Kyiv tomorrow when Witkoff and Kushner visit.

Five of Israel's six desalination plants shut down after a massive algae bloom clogged intake pipes, cutting a major share of the country's water supply.

The bloom originated off Egypt's Nile Delta but experts say untreated sewage from Gaza — roughly 40,000 cubic meters discharged daily after wartime destruction of treatment plants — is feeding the algal growth.

Haaretz called it "sewage backfire," arguing Israel is paying the price for destroying Gaza's sanitation system.

Israel had to emergency-pump from the Sea of Galilee and aquifers, and halted pipeline water to Gaza during the outage.

Syria's Health Minister Musab al-Ali was filmed firing a pistol at a booth during the Damascus International Fair.

Al-Ali is a Deir ez-Zor-born neurosurgeon who trained in Germany and was active in the early opposition before the 2024–2025 political transition.

New photos confirm China's WZ-X stealth drone has a unique stepped wing design — broad inner sections transitioning to extremely narrow outer wings.

Wingspan is roughly 170 feet, comparable to the B-2 bomber.

Analysts estimate it cruises above 59,000 feet with a range over 12,000 miles.

It's a twin-engine flying wing likely built for high-altitude long-endurance surveillance, possibly operating near contested airspace where conventional drones would be shot down.

It's being tested at China's Malan drone base in Xinjiang alongside another massive stealth drone, the GJ-X.

Official designation, manufacturer, and mission remain unconfirmed.

SOURCE

Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte has posted $5,740 bail after a court ordered her arrest over alleged threats to have President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and two others assassinated.

Duterte denies the allegations and says her remarks were about concerns for her own safety.

Duterte and Marcos ran together in 2022 but later became political rivals, and the case could bar her from running for president in 2028 if she is convicted.

Source: AP

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee:

I can tell you categorically there is no plan of the Israelis to displace people out of Gaza against their will.

Nobody is suggesting that there will be force displacement.

I know of no one who supports that.

Reporter: If the United States has so much leverage with Israel, why aren't you using that leverage to stop "settler" violence?

Mike Huckabee: How do you know I'm not?

Reporter: But these attacks are continuing.

Huckabee: Yeah. But I think it's important for you to know that I think I've taken as strong and as public a stand as anyone has.

The AfD is about to win a German state election for the first time.

Saxony-Anhalt votes tomorrow with the far-right party polling at 41–43% — nearly double the CDU's 22–23%.

That's a 20-point swing since 2021.

Every other party refuses to govern with them, so even if they win, forming a government could be deadlocked for months.

If enough small parties miss the 5% threshold, the AfD could reach an absolute majority.

The election is the first of three German state votes this month and is being watched as a signal of where the country is heading before the 2029 federal election.

EU Spokesperson:

We reject any attempt at demographic or territorial changes in the Gaza Strip and support unifying the Gaza Strip with the West Bank under the Palestinian Authority.

There should be no forced displacement of Gazans. Gaza is part and parcel of a future Palestinian state.

Türkiye’s first domestically developed fifth-generation stealth fighter jet KAAN's chief engineer Emre Yaban says the jet doesn't compare to the F-16 — it competes with the F-22, Su-57, and J-20:

Only four countries have managed to develop fifth-generation aircraft comparable to this one.

But we are looking toward the sixth generation.

He claims KAAN "will have significantly superior air-to-air capabilities" versus its peers.

Parody account Parodyjeffx (180k followers) was suspended from X after getting Grok to call Israel's actions in Gaza "genocidal."

X says the actual reason was ban evasion — technical signals linking it to a previously suspended account.

In Al Jazeera's defense documentary, an ASELSAN engineer says Türkiye’s domestically built ALP-300G radar — part of the SİPER long-range air defense system — outperforms Russia’s S-400 air defence system’s search radar "in several aspects."

Asked whether any foreign components were used, he replied:

This radar was developed entirely inside Türkiye — from the most minute components like electronic chips all the way to the complete system.

Türkiye bought the S-400 in 2017, got kicked out of the F-35 program and hit with US sanctions.

SİPER is the domestic answer.

Netanyahu on Gaza:

There will be no reconstruction in Gaza unless there is, first of all, demilitarization. I can’t tell you what kind of reconstruction there will be; we are discussing this with our American friends.

Sometimes we see eye to eye, sometimes we don’t. And when we don’t see eye to eye, they raise their interests, and I raise Israel’s interests — and I stand by them.

Netanyahu on Iran:

Who would have believed on October 7 that we would change the face of the Middle East? I did.

My intention was that eventually we would clash with Iran.

Netanyahu on Iran:

If Iran attacks us, they will absorb such a blow that I do not want to detail it.

Netanyahu:

The central question in these elections is: Who will finish what has to be finished? Who will finally finish off this regime in Iran? Who will finally finish off Hezbollah? Who will finally finish off Hamas?

My political opponents give in to every pressure. America tells them "no," and they immediately tremble.

Will they do it? No. They won’t do it. We do it.

Netanyahu on the Qatar ties affair:

I attacked Qatar — I also bombed it and attacked them during the war, and they attacked me.

This whole Qatar thing is one big bluff. Qatar is a hostile state, but Qatar is not a state that dictated anything here.

Netanyahu:

Eisenkot cannot form a government, and he knows it. He is trying to hide that.

He cannot form a government without the Arab parties, and they reject the very existence of the State of Israel.

It is ridiculous and shameful to try to give legitimacy to something that is not legitimate. Maybe it is legal, but it is not legitimate.

Q: Where are you planning to be on the eve of the holiday?

Netanyahu: That’s a secret. I can’t tell you.

Q: I understand that something serious is planned?

Netanyahu: It's something that we're tracking and seeing.

Netanyahu on the alleged attempt against his son Yair:

I can only say that there was such an attempt. It was significant. The security services acted quickly.

They even brought reinforcements from forces we had in the United States in order to evacuate him quickly from the United States. This is completely real.

And this happened as a result of simply irresponsible — really reckless — behavior by several journalists and other people who exposed Yair’s location in real time: the exact address where he was staying, a photograph of the apartment, the floor number, the apartment number.