Crypto News: A year of Middle East tragedy

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If it wasn't clear on Oct. 7 last year that Hamas' savage attack on Israel would change the Middle East, it is now.

Crises have multiplied across the region and become a focal point in the US elections, with President Joe Biden seemingly impotent to influence Israel's response.

Israel is fighting on multiple fronts, not just in Gaza, where Hamas continues to mount attacks and hold hostages despite perhaps half of its 35,000-odd fighters being killed and the Palestinian territory devastated.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sent troops into Lebanon to take on Hezbollah in what Israel hopes will be a short incursion. Its forces are also regularly hitting militias in Syria that, like Hamas and Hezbollah, receive training and funding from Iran.

WATCH: Explosions shook Beirut as Israel conducted what it said were "targeted strikes" on the city aimed at Hezbollah weapons storage facilities and infrastructure sites.

From Yemen, the Houthis are causing havoc with attacks on Israeli- and Western-linked ships in the Red Sea. And they're firing drones and missiles at Israel, despite being almost 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles) away.

And then there's Iran, which followed up its first-ever direct attack on Israel in April with a barrage of 200 ballistic missiles last week after the assassination of Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

Though the damage was slight, Netanyahu has vowed to retaliate and is under pressure, especially from extremists in his far-right administration, to make sure he does so aggressively.

Diplomatically, Israel is increasingly isolated as anger about the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza and Lebanon grows. A US-led deal to normalize ties with Saudi Arabia — seemingly close a year ago — is on ice.

Netanyahu points to Israel's successes in degrading Hamas and Hezbollah, as well as withstanding Iran's missiles, to say his country is changing the balance of power in the Middle East.

The problem is there's no end in sight. And Netanyahu has no plan for Gaza once the fighting is over or for achieving peace with the Palestinians.— Paul Wallace

Palestinians mourn relatives at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital after an Israeli strike in the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza on Oct. 1. Photographer: Ahmad Salem/Bloomberg

The Netherlands delivered a first batch of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, Dutch Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans said on X yesterday, without indicating how many of the promised 24 planes were sent. Ukraine said it conducted a missile attack targeting an oil terminal in Russian-occupied Crimea overnight that's used to provide fuel to Moscow's army.

Oil executives have emerged as an increasingly important source of cash for Donald Trump's race to win reelection next month. The former US president is promising to make it easier to "drill, baby, drill," repeal Biden-era pollution curbs on autos and power plants and immediately end the administration's pause on new natural gas export licenses.

Elon Musk joins Trump onstage on Saturday. Photographer: Justin Merriman/Bloomberg

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour administration is trying to correct course after less than 100 days in office as he replaced his chief of staff and the Treasury acknowledged that key tax-raising plans were under review. The dramatic shake-up came as doubts hung over Labour's fiscal proposals just three weeks before a make-or-break budget, reinforcing a sense that Starmer and his team are struggling to make the transition from opposition to government.

Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu swept into power a year ago on a campaign to push India out of the island nation's affairs and draw closer to China. As a debt crisis looms and earlier Chinese loans come due, he is in New Delhi looking to mend fences, with the country's financial crisis likely to be a key feature of discussions with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government.

Syndicates involved in cyber crime raked in as much as $37 billion last year and are intensifying operations across Southeast Asia, the United Nations said. The illegal activity has ballooned since the Covid-19 pandemic with Mekong region countries — Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos — becoming a hotbed for groups to carry out so-called romance-investment schemes, crypto fraud, and money laundering.

Candidates backed by former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro are pulling ahead in municipal elections that are considered a barometer of political sentiment two years before a presidential vote in which Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will likely seek another term.

S. Iswaran is set to become the first ex-cabinet minister in Singapore to be jailed in almost half a century in a scandal that has riveted a city that prides itself on good governance.

Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte today filed his candidacy for mayor in the southern city of Davao, according to a close aide, Senator Bong Go.

Even as the American southeast struggles to recover from the rampage of Hurricane Helene, another powerful storm threatens Florida's Gulf Coast and Tampa. Hurricane Milton has the potential to cause billions of dollars in damage and bring more misery to the region.

At the same time, assistance for Helene has encountered political heavy weather. Biden has asked Congress to provide $1.6 billion for the Small Business Administration so it can properly respond to the devastation. But House Speaker Mike Johnson told Fox News yesterday that swift action by Congress wasn't necessary.

The Biden administration has been combating misinformation on the government's disaster response, the White House said. That includes a false claim advanced by Trump that disaster relief funds had been diverted to undocumented migrants.

One thing to watch today: The president and First Lady Jill Biden will take part in a candle-lighting ceremony commemorating a year since the assault on Israel by Hamas.

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The European Union's decision to impose tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles has moved the focus to how and when Beijing will retaliate for the escalation in its biggest trade dispute with the bloc in years. While talks continue, crucial clues may lie in the votes cast by individual EU member states on the EV measures last week.

Noluthando Geja isn't looking forward to summer, when the sun beats down on the steel-sheet roof of her home in a maze of tightly packed, rudimentary brick structures and tin shacks in the Itireleng shantytown near South Africa's capital, Pretoria. Just 25 miles to the east, in the affluent Waterkloof suburb, spacious gardens face onto streets lined with purple-flowering jacaranda trees. A heat-mapping campaign found the poorest neighborhoods are far hotter than wealthier suburbs, a disparity that can be traced back to apartheid when urban planners kept Black South Africans in poorly developed townships on city margins.

Tin shacks in Itireleng. Photographer: Leon Sadiki/Bloomberg

Thanks to the 41 people who answered Friday's quiz and congratulations to Mond McKenzie for being the first to name Japan as the country whose new leader describes himself as a "defense nerd."

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