A new US-led ceasefire plan, according to Sudan’s army chief Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan, was criticized as “the worst one presented” by mediators, including the United Arab Emirates. The RSF claims to have accepted the truce. The largest humanitarian crisis in the world has resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands in the 30-month conflict in Sudan.
Published On 24 Nov 2025
She’s a Neighbours legend who shot to fame starring in the Australian soap during its golden years in the 1990s.
But now, Rebecca Ritters, who played Hannah Martin between 1992 and 1999, is almost unrecognisable in a completely different career which has taken her to some of the world’s most dangerous places, including war zones.
Rebecca, now 41, was only eight years old when she first started playing Hannah on Ramsay Street. She participated in a number of significant storylines over the course of her seven years, including the death of her mother.
Hannah’s name continues to appear in fans’ lists of the all-time most annoying Neighbor characters, a testament to young Rebecca’s acting prowess, without a doubt. According to The Herald Sun, Hannah is regarded by many as “the most annoying character ever on soap.”
In the same way, Hannah’s profile was detailed in Sky’s 2010 celebration of Neighbours’ 25th anniversary: “The majority of plots revolved around one of three scenarios: either Hannah was crying because no-one liked her at school; or Because of her conflict with Debbie, Hannah was crying. or that Hannah was crying because her father, Phil, was on a date.
After leaving Neighbours in 1999, Rebecca briefly returned in 2005 for the show’s 20th anniversary, but her acting journey didn’t end there. She appeared in other TV shows, including Coronation Street as Jules Robinson, and even toured Europe with the British Shakespeare Company in productions of Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
However, she switched from acting to journalism, which was the big plot twist. Rebecca began her career in news production after earning a degree in politics and international relations in 2015 at Deutsche Welle (DW) in Berlin, Germany.
Far from the gentle world of soap sets, she now reports from some of the most dangerous places in the world, including war zones in Ukraine and Afghanistan, as a foreign correspondent. More recently, she spent two years in Jerusalem, covering the Israel-Palestine conflict.
In September 2024, she shared a moving post about the experience on Instagram. She posted an image showing her in protective clothing with debris burning behind her
She continued, “The experience was profound in ways that I could not have imagined.” It was actually life changing, despite how cliche it sounds. Many of the outstanding local colleagues, many of whom became close friends, were a result of our efforts. and to the numerous non-work friends that were present.
Thanks, though, to the numerous strangers who had faith in me when they faced the most difficult circumstances. ”
Her DW colleagues have acknowledged that they were Neighbours fans when they were younger and are shocked to see them working alongside their pre-teen on-screen hero.
Rebecca herself claims that having spent more time with Neighbours helped her develop her storytelling skills. The fame, however, was challenging to comprehend.
She stated, “My happiest memories are with the wonderful cast and crew, and I had a great time on the show.
Up until 1999, I spent seven years on the program, which completely altered my life. Neighbours deserves a lot, but it was also challenging.
Ruth Langsford has opened up about a ‘hard lesson’ she learned about her parents amidst their struggles with a debilitating condition. The star’s 94-year-old mother is battling Alzheimer’s – the most common form of dementia – just 13 years after Ruth’s father died of the same disease.
Although their symptoms, including memory loss, have certainly been challenging, Ruth said she is now better at caring for her mum than ever before. Speaking on Loose Women, the 65 year old said she learned from ‘all the mistakes’ she made with her dad and stressed the need for increased awareness about the disease.
“I am so much better looking after my mum and being with my mum because of all the mistakes I made with my dad,” Ruth said in a recent episode of the ITV show. “Because there was so little awareness, and there needs to be more, but we are more aware now.
And so it was when my father would say things like, “Oh, I’ve been here before, haven’t I?” and I would say, “No, dad, you couldn’t have been here before,” as if I had imagined helping him remember. And I used to say, “Dad remember, dad remember when, remember remember.”
She continued, “And now I look back and believe he didn’t remember.” He was unable to recall. I don’t do any of that, my mother. And if she says, “Oh, I’ve been, I’ve sat here and done this show,” I’ll just go, “Yes, that’s nice. There is no stress because it is completed. However, you are aware that it was a difficult lesson to learn.
On the surface, telling white lies to a person with dementia may seem unfair, especially when it appears easier to correct them or simply tell the truth. However, official advice from the Alzheimer’s Society suggests it’s much preferable to lie if ‘doing anything else would cause the person significant physical or psychological harm’. This is often referred to as a ‘therapeutic lie’.
“We instinctively want to lean towards the ‘whole truth’ end of the spectrum, but we also want to minimise any distress our response causes to the person with dementia,” the society’s advice reads. “But these aims often contradict, leaving us to seek a balancing act or a ‘least-bad’ trade-off. (We should not forget our own well-being either, as we don’t want to end up feeling bad about ourselves.)”
The society goes on to say that “the entire truth here could mean repeatedly disclosing the death of a parent as if it had just happened, over and over again.” What could possibly be crueler”?
Joan, Ruth’s mother, lives close to the star’s Surrey home. Joan can’t remember what she had for lunch or breakfast, according to Ruth, who said in August.
According to a previous Mirror report, Ruth said: “She wouldn’t remember what she’s had for her lunch or breakfast, and if I go and see her, when I leave, if you said to her was Ruth here today, she’d say no. But in the moment, she still knows it’s me – as soon as she sees me, she says ‘Oh, what a lovely surprise!’ like she hasn’t seen me for months.
Because of my dad, I’m much more knowledgeable about this than my mother, which is very difficult. When he got Alzheimer’s or dementia, we as a family were a little lost. With my dad, I received a lot of lessons.
Ruth also acknowledged during the interview that she occasionally wonders if she might be a victim of memory loss and that she occasionally gets anxious whenever she has a memory lapse.
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She doesn’t intend to take any tests to assess her risk of dementia, though. I can feel the panic when she says, “Every time I forget something, those blank moments where you go, I’ve totally forgotten that person’s name, and I work with them every day.”
“And sometimes I look back and think, “I was tired that day,” but I’m thinking about it because both of my parents have dementia, and I’m aware of tests that can determine your level of vulnerability, but I don’t want to know.
There may seem a little childlike, but I don’t want to know because there isn’t a cure for it and I am aware of what it involves. I simply want to live my life. I get it if I want it. “I hope not,”
NHS figures indicate that over 944,000 people in the UK have dementia, including one in every 11 people over 65 years old. According to the World Health Organisation, Alzheimer’s disease is the most prevalent type of dementia, representing roughly 60 to 70% of cases.
Alzheimer’s is a progressive disease that gradually gets worse over time. The first symptoms of memory loss, typically include minor forgetting names or conversations, are typically less severe.
However, the NHS suggests that additional symptoms may arise as the condition worsens.
There is no treatment for Alzheimer’s disease, according to the NHS’s guidance, but medications are available to treat some of the symptoms. Making changes to your home environment to make it easier to move around and remember daily tasks is one of the other options that can be used to help people with Alzheimer’s live as independently as possible.
“Psychological treatments like cognitive stimulation therapy may also be provided to improve your memory, problem-solving abilities, and language ability.”
Ariana Grande returned for an Oscar-worthy performance as Glinda The Good in Wicked: For Good, the second and final instalment to the Wicked saga which started with part one last year.
The film’s enormous success earned it record-breaking box office receipts, cementing its position as one of the most popular musical adaptations.
The greatest gift of my life was being asked to join this most amazing group of people on a most creatively and emotionally fulfilling journey, wrote Ariana in a heartfelt letter in response. More than anyone else has taught me about Glinda.
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But amid the praise, the same complaints have landed on social media since Wicked: For Good’s debut on Friday 21 November. One disgrunted fan took to TikTok in a video that has garnered over eight million views to ask: “Who is responsible for Ariana Grande’s strip lashes?!”
Fans couldn’t help but agree in the comments, with one saying, “Wood couldn’t do better than this, and the budget for wicked was 145 MILLION”?
Another actress claimed that her lashes caused her to lose focus, saying, “I could not pay attention because the strip lashes were THAT problematic.” Couldn’t we at least have employed a tech for this? “?
Some critics, however, responded to Ariana’s Glinda makeup, with one revolving the camera’s attention. The user typed “I can’t believe people have vexed about this…like did you actually care about the movie?”
Others claimed that Glinda’s real character was influenced by her makeup, which she was not at all good at.
Isn’t that at the core of the point, then? One argumentation was made, and another added, “I kinda like that not everything has to be ‘perfect’.'” Glinda is all about the performance from a distance.
For Good’s many fans believed Ariana had created her own makeup. The changes in Glinda’s makeup were explained by Frances Hannon, an award-winning makeup, hair, and prosthetics artist who worked on both films.
“One of the changes that we chose going from Wicked 1 and Wicked: For Good was that we didn’t change her foundation or her eyeshadow but we framed her eyes much stronger within the density in the lashes and the stronger [lash] line,” she told @illumin_arty.
She continued, “Ari has really strong eyes, which really gave her a different quality. She matured, not it, but it did, in my opinion.
Published On 24 Nov 2025
After beginning food distribution in the Palestinian enclave in May, the group sparked controversy.
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It has received a lot of bad press for avoiding Gaza’s UN and other humanitarian aid facilities and for deadly violence that Israeli soldiers and its own security contractors frequently erupt at or close to its crowded distribution centers.
In a statement released on Monday, GHF Executive Director John Acree stated that the organization’s initial objective was to address an urgent need, demonstrate that a new approach could succeed where others had failed, and ultimately transfer that success to the broader international community.
The statement cited provisions from the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas as the justification for putting an end to the organization’s operations.
That included Israel allowing UN-backed aid distribution efforts to partially resume and the establishment of the US-backed Civil-Military Coordination Center, which is intended to coordinate aid to Gaza.
As a result, we are closing down our operations because we have succeeded in demonstrating there is a more effective way to provide aid to Gazans, according to the statement, which claims to be the only aid operation that reliably and safely delivered free meals to Palestinians in Gaza, at a scale and without distraction.
Many prominent figures in the world’s humanitarian community were directly offended by the statement.
28 UN experts called for the GHF to be shut down in August, citing the situation as an “utterly disturbing illustration of how humanitarian aid can be used to advance covert military and geopolitical goals in grave violation of international law.”
According to them, “Israeli forces and foreign military contractors continue to fire indiscriminately at people seeking aid at so-called “distribution sites” operated by GHF.”
At least 859 Palestinians have been killed near GHF sites since its launch in late May, according to the experts at the time.
The experts noted, among other things, that the scheme required aid seekers to travel for a long time to a few GHF sites to get supplies, which was contrary to the UN’s aid delivery model, which emphasizes delivering aid more directly to the affected communities.
According to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification system, the US had proposed the GHF as a way to aid in Gaza at a time when Israel’s restrictions on humanitarian operations were causing famine in some areas of the war-torn territory.
The best way to address the crisis, according to UN officials, was to grant independent aid workers unrestricted access to the area.
The GHF acknowledged in a statement released on Monday that it had only opened four distribution centers in Gaza, three of which were in southern Gaza and one close to Gaza City. It still praised the organization’s performance as a model for upcoming aid deliveries.
Richard Kone played in the ninth-tier of English football less than two years ago. He is currently a citizen of the Ivory Coast.
The fact that the striker was homeless when he was 16 makes his rise to the top of the Queens Park Rangers’ standings even more impressive.
Kone was merely attempting to survive on Abidjan’s streets in 2019.
He will represent the United States, Canada, and Mexico at the 2026 World Cup if he is chosen to play for the country once more in the summer.
Being homeless in my country is incredibly difficult, according to Kone, who stayed in Abidjan, a city on the Ivory Coast’s south coast.
When you try to ask for a little help or a little money, some people won’t talk to you.
However, one friend eventually helped Kone by recognizing his potential and introducing him to the Don’t Forget Them Association, the president of the Ivory Coast.
It ultimately led to Kone’s selection to represent his country at the 2019 Homeless World Cup in Cardiff.
He had never flown on a plane before, let alone at the UK tournament.
A 16-year-old Kone relocated to east London’s Hackney after winning the Homeless World Cup.
And there, a purely by chance encounter would cause him to sign for Athletic Newham, a non-league team in the Eastern Counties League Division One South, the 10th tier of the English football pyramid.
According to Robert Kone, “History with Athletic Newham began in Hackney Marshes, in the most unexpected of places,” according to Athletic Newham chairman Kennedy Tavares.
When I noticed him, he was out playing football on his own. Richard immediately caught my attention for something.
We never looked back when I asked him to join the team for training, and we never looked back. An incredible time spent at the club followed.
On his September 2019 debut against Fire United, Kone immediately scored a hat-trick.
In his first two seasons with Athletic Newham, Kone helped them advance to the Essex Senior League in 2021, scoring 25 goals in 40 games across all competitions.
His scoring prowess grew as he scored 82 goals in 90 games over the course of the following two seasons.
Professional clubs could not help but protest Kone’s prolific finishing ability by the end of the 2022-23 campaign.
Wycombe Wanderers, a League One team, extended Kone’s trial that summer.
In the months that followed, he scored 18 more goals for Athletic Newham, and he signed for the Chairboys at the age of 20.
As they say, history is the rest.
And Kone’s 3-1 win over Peterborough in October 2024, which was the club’s fastest-ever EFL hat-trick within nine minutes, literally made history.
In August, he was also given the PFA League One player of the year award.
After attending the EFL Awards in April of this year, Kone declared, “It’s an unbelievable accomplishment.”
“I wouldn’t have imagined this two years ago, and it’s amazing to be in the team of the season and to have won two awards.”
Sam Avery, a BBC Three Counties Radio commentator, called Kone’s rise to prominence as one of the most sought-after strikers in the EFL “nothing short of remarkable.”
Kone quickly established himself as an important player and very impressive goalscorer, according to Avery, who was brought in as an unknown quantity and from the ninth tier.
“He took his every step and demonstrated maturity beyond his years,” he said, “even when the spotlight was on him.”
Regardless of where Kone is playing his football, it seems like he has never lost his charisma throughout his entire career.
Tavares remarked, “Richard was the kind of player who just loved the game.”
Another milestone, perhaps the biggest of them all, was just around the corner, as has been the case throughout Kone’s rollercoaster journey over the past two years.
His first senior call-up and debut in the Ivory Coast.
Kone made his first international appearance on November 18th, 1993, in Al-Seeb as a 62nd-minute substitute in a 2-0 friendly win over Oman.
After signing for QPR, Kone stated on the Rising Ballers YouTube channel, “That’s what I’m playing football for, to represent my country at international level.”
“Afcon, perhaps the World Cup,” I thought, “because I’m always fighting and striving to be best so I can get called up.”
Tavares claimed Kone “always knew there was something special about it” at Athletic Newham.
“Those who saw him every day will not be surprised by his progress, and he has eventually gotten the opportunity he deserved,” he continued.
Kone, who attended the Homeless World Cup six years ago, still remembers where it all began and described the experience as “life-changing.”
He said, “It gave me the opportunity to grow and set me on the path to where I am today.”
The organizers of the Homeless World Cup said they had “watched with enormous pride” as Kone transitioned from a non-league player to an international.
According to spokesperson Matthew Williams, Richard’s story demonstrates the true potential of each and every player who enters our competition, showing that extraordinary things can happen with support, opportunity, and belief.
Richardson “embodies the Homeless World Cup spirit,” he said, adding that his success demonstrates how football can change people’s lives.
Kone stated at the 2019 tournament that he wanted to return to school and “pose the possibility of becoming a lawyer or doctor.”
