India have claimed a 2-1 win in the five-match T20 series against Australia after the final match was abandoned due to rain after just 4.5 overs in Brisbane.
After losing the toss and being sent in to bat on Saturday, India’s openers Abhishek Sharma (23) and Shubman Gill (29) took the score to 52 for no loss before a thunderstorm swept across the Gabba cricket ground, forcing the players from the field.
Gill took the early initiative and pummelled six fours in his 29 not out. Abhishek was dropped by Glenn Maxwell and Ben Dwarshuis on his way to an unbeaten 23.
The sellout crowd at the Gabba hung around optimistically, waiting for play to resume, but the stormy weather persisted, and the match was abandoned some two and a half hours after it started.
The pitch at the Gabba cricket ground remains covered amid heavy rainfall during the fifth T20 match between Australia and India in Brisbane [Darren England/AAP Image via AP]
The opening match in the series in Canberra was also washed out before Australia won the second in Melbourne by four wickets on the back of the bowling of paceman Josh Hazlewood.
Australia withdrew Hazlewood and some other players named in the Ashes squad so they could prepare to face England with the red ball, and India won the third T20 by five wickets in Hobart and the fourth on the Gold Coast by 48 runs.
Abhishek was named Player of the Series for his 163 runs at an average of 40.75.
“The way everybody chipped in in every game and we came back from being one match down, I think credit goes to all the boys; a complete team effort,” India captain Suryakumar Yadav said.
India, who top the ICC rankings in the shortest format, will head home with confidence and plenty of player options, hoping to defend their T20 World Cup title on home soil early next year.
“I thought all in all it was a good series, two teams really going at it,” said Australia captain Mitch Marsh.
At least 11 people have been killed, and more parts of Ukraine have been plunged into darkness, after another night of intense Russian attacks across the country, local authorities said, as diplomatic momentum to end the nearly four-year war falters.
Ukraine’s military announced on Saturday morning that hundreds of Russian drones, as well as missiles launched from the air, ground and sea, targeted critical infrastructure, a frequent Kremlin target as another harsh winter of war looms.
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Ukraine said its air force detected 503 air attacks, including 45 missiles and 458 drones, launched by Russian forces overnight. Most of the missiles went through defences, with only nine successfully shot down, but 406 of the drones were intercepted.
The Russian attacks concentrated mostly on gas and power infrastructure, leading to power cuts in several regions.
Residential buildings during a power blackout after critical civil infrastructure was hit by Russian missile and drone attacks, in Kyiv, Ukraine, November 8, 2025 [Gleb Garanich/Reuters]
In the front-line Zaporizhzhia region, Governor Ivan Fedorov said three people were killed and six wounded in overnight Russian attacks on several districts, which hit a residential building, among other targets.
Two more people were reported killed in two districts of Donetsk, according to local authorities. Oleksandr Prokudin, governor of Kherson, reported another two people killed and 10 wounded after several multistorey buildings, private homes and vehicles were hit.
Kyiv Governor Mykola Kalashnyk said an attack in the Vyshhorod district injured a woman and hit civilian areas and energy infrastructure.
At least three people were killed and 11 others, including children, wounded after a Russian strike hit a building in the eastern region of Dnipro, local authorities said.
A “massive” strike was reported by Governor Volodymyr Kohut in the Poltava region, where another person was injured and rolling blackouts are in place to compensate for damaged power infrastructure.
‘More pressure is needed’
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy renewed a call for further sanctions on Russia and freezing its assets in the European Union before winter, saying “Russian strikes show that the pressure must be stronger.
“Russian nuclear energy is still not under sanctions, Russian military-industrial complex still receives Western microelectronics, more pressure is needed on oil and gas trade as well,” he said in a statement.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence confirmed in its latest combat report overnight that it launched a “massive strike with high-precision long-range weapons from air, land and sea platforms”, including hypersonic ballistic missiles.
It said Russian air defences brought down two guided aerial bombs and 178 unmanned aerial vehicles launched by Ukrainian forces. Another eight drones were reportedly shot down before noon on Saturday.
Fierce house-to-house fighting also continues to rage in Pokrovsk, the city in Donetsk where tens of thousands of Russian troops have converged to push for control of more territory and to “liberate” buildings held for more than a year by Ukrainian soldiers, in intense close-range clashes.
Israel’s war on Gaza has not only razed entire neighbourhoods to the ground, displaced families multiple times and decimated medical facilities, but also poisoned the very ground and water on which Palestinians depend.
Four weeks into a fragile ceasefire, which Israel has violated daily, the scale of the environmental devastation is becoming painfully clear.
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In Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood, what was once a lively community has become a wasteland. Homes lie in ruins, and an essential water source, once a rainwater pond, now festers with sewage and debris. For many displaced families, it is both home and hazard.
Umm Hisham, pregnant and displaced, trudges through the foul water with her children. They have nowhere else to go.
“We took refuge here, around the Sheikh Radwan pond, with all the sufferings you could imagine, from mosquitoes to sewage with rising levels, let alone the destruction all around. All this poses a danger to our lives and the lives of our children,” she said, speaking to Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim Alkhalili.
Heavily damaged buildings are reflected in a water basin in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood of Gaza City on October 22, 2025 [File: Omar Al-Qattaa/AFP]
The pond, designed to collect rainwater and channel it to the sea, now holds raw sewage after Israeli air attacks destroyed the pumps. With electricity and sanitation systems crippled, contaminated water continues to rise, threatening to engulf nearby homes and tents.
“There is no doubt there are grave impacts on all citizens: Foul odours, insects, mosquitoes. Also, foul water levels have exceeded 6 metres [20ft] high without any protection; the fence is completely destroyed, with high possibility for any child, woman, old man, or even a car to fall into this pond,” said Maher Salem, a Gaza City municipal officer speaking to Al Jazeera.
Local officials warn that stagnant water could cause disease outbreaks, especially among children. Yet for many in Gaza, there are no alternatives.
“Families know that the water they get from the wells and from the containers or from the water trucks is polluted and contaminated … but they don’t have any other choice,” said Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City.
A boy fills a plastic bottle with water in a camp for displaced Palestinians, at a school-turned-shelter in the Remal neighbourhood of Gaza City on November 5, 2025 [Omar Al Qattaa]
Destroyed water infrastructure
At the COP30 Climate Summit in Brazil, Palestinian Ambassador Ibrahim al-Zeben described the crisis as an environmental catastrophe intertwined with Israel’s genocide.
“There’s no secret that Gaza is suffering because of the genocide that Israel continues to wage, a war that has created nearly a quarter of a million victims and produced more than 61 million tonnes of rubble, some of which is contaminated with hazardous materials,” he said.
“In addition, the deliberate destruction of sewage and water networks has led to the contamination of groundwater and coastal waters. Gaza now faces severe risks to public health, and environmental risks are increasing,” al-Zeben added.
Israel’s attacks have also “destroyed” much of the enclave’s agricultural land, leaving it “in a state of severe food insecurity and famine with food being used as a weapon”, he said.
In September, a UN report warned freshwater supplies in Gaza are “severely limited and much of what remains is polluted”.
“The collapse of sewage treatment infrastructure, the destruction of piped systems and the use of cesspits for sanitation have likely increased contamination of the aquifer that supplies much of Gaza with water,” the report by the United Nations Environment Programme noted.
The Israeli government is facing what it calls a “public relations disaster” after a video surfaced showing soldiers torturing and sexually assaulting a Palestinian prisoner – a clear war crime under any legal system. Public outrage in Israel has focused less on the abuse itself and more on the leak. And the military’s chief prosecutor, who admitted leaking the footage, has been arrested and branded a traitor. The saga is yet another example of Israeli society’s unwillingness to confront what it has become.
Contributors: Chris Doyle – Director, Council for Arab-British Understanding Mairav Zonszien – Senior Israel analyst, International Crisis Group Ori Goldberg – Academic and political commentator Yara Hawari – Co-director, Al-Shabaka
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The title sponsor of Israel-Premier Tech has ended its association with the cycling team with immediate effect after protests against the team’s participation in races and despite the outfit saying it would undergo a full rebrand for the 2026 season to operate under a new name.
Canadian company Premier Tech said on Friday it had broken off its sponsorship deal after the team was targeted by pro-Palestinian protesters at several races this year, with stages of the Vuelta a Espana grand tour in August and September disrupted by demonstrators before the race was abandoned by organisers.
The sponsors removed their full name from riders’ jerseys at the Vuelta.
The team, owned by Canadian-Israeli property developer Sylvan Adams, was created in 2014 by Ron Baron and Ran Margaliot and is based in Israel.
It was also subject to isolated protests during the sport’s other two main stage races: the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France, and had been accused of sportswashing by pro-Palestine groups.
After the Vuelta, the Canadian multinational Premier Tech called for the team to change its name to remove “Israel” and to adopt a new identity and brand image.
The team agreed to move away from its “Israeli identity”.
However, the Canadian-based manufacturer and horticulture firm Premier Tech said it would step down as co-title sponsor of the team with immediate effect.
“Although we took notice of the team’s decision to change its name for the 2026 season, the core reason for Premier Tech to sponsor the team has been overshadowed to a point where it has become untenable for us to continue as a sponsor,” the company added.
“We want to thank the team – riders and staff – for the four unforgettable seasons by their side, and to acknowledge their incredible accomplishments and professionalism, both on and off the road.”
Canadian cyclist Derek Gee, who finished fourth overall at this year’s Giro d’Italia, also left Israel-Premier Tech shortly before the Vuelta over what he described as “personal beliefs”.
Last month, Gee said he was facing a damages claim of 30 million euros ($35m) from the team.
In September, a United Nations inquiry found that Israel’s war on Gaza was a genocide and held the Israeli government responsible for the war that has killed at least 68,875 Palestinians.
Although the team is privately-owned rather than state-run, Adams had dubbed himself an unofficial ambassador for Israel, and the outfit had been hailed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for refusing to quit the Vuelta ahead, despite protests, until the race was eventually abandoned.
In October, Adams stepped back from his day-to-day involvement with the team and no longer speaks on its behalf.
The team joined the World Tour elite level of road racing before the 2020 season and in July that year recruited four-time Tour de France winner Chris Froome.
Amid the pro-Palestine protests at the Vuelta, Spanish Sports Minister Pilar Alegria had called for a ban on Israeli sports teams in the same way that Russian sides broadly were banned in 2022 after the country invaded Ukraine, highlighting a “double standard”.
“It is difficult to explain and understand that there is a double standard,” Alegria told Spanish radio station Cadena SER in September.
“Given that there has been such a massacre, a genocide, such an absolutely terrible situation we are living through day-by-day, I would agree that the international federations and committees should take the same decision as in 2022,” she added.
![A boy fills a plastic bottle with water inside a camp for displaced Palestinians at a school-turned-shelter in Al-Rimal neighbourhood of Gaza City on November 5, 2025. [File: Omar Al Qattaa]](https://i0.wp.com/www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/000_834T3FC-1762594052.jpg?w=696&ssl=1)
