Category World News

More Department of Justice files on the Epstein case are being approved by the US Congress.

Despite opposition from European allies who claim that the US-backed plan favors Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has indicated that he is willing to collaborate with the US on a strategy to end Russia’s war against Ukraine.

On Thursday, Zelenskyy’s office confirmed that he had received a draft of the plan and that he would meet with US President Donald Trump.

The Ukrainian leader “outlined the fundamental principles that matter to our people,” but his office did not directly comment on the plan’s content, which has not been made public.

The President of Ukraine anticipates meeting with President Trump to discuss the current diplomatic opportunities and the pressing issues that need to be resolved, Zelenskyy’s office said.

According to a number of media reports, Ukraine is ceding territory and weapons as part of the 28-point plan. Axios reported that the plan would give Russia parts of eastern Ukraine that Moscow does not currently control in exchange for a US security guarantee for Ukraine and Europe against upcoming Russian aggression.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed on Thursday that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and US special envoy Steve Witkoff have been quietly working on the agreement for a month. Both Ukrainians and Russians have expressed their desire for terms that both sides will agree with.

She said Trump has been informed and supports the emerging proposal, but she declined to comment on specifics.

We think it should be acceptable to both Russia and Ukraine, and we think it is a good idea. And we’re putting in a lot of effort, Leavitt said.

Later, Zelenskyy confirmed to me that he and US Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll had a discussion about the plan in Kiev.

Without making any direct comments on the plan, Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram that “our teams, the USA and Ukraine, will work on the points of the plan to end the war.” We’re prepared for work that is both fair, honest, and timely.

Any new US initiative that Russia appeared to downplayed.

Consultations are not currently occurring. Contacts are made, of course, but there is no such thing as consultation, according to Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the Kremlin.

Despite Zelenskyy’s pledge to work with the Trump administration on a ceasefire, Kyiv’s allies in Europe have expressed doubt.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot stated at a meeting of European Union foreign ministers in Brussels that “Ukrainians want peace – a just peace that respects everyone’s sovereignty and a durable peace that can’t be questioned by future aggression.” However, “peace cannot be a capitulation.”

Any peace proposal must be supported by Europe and Ukraine, according to EU foreign policy head Kaja Kallas, with Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski claiming that any potential agreement that includes Europe, whose security is “at stake,” should be discussed.

“I hope it’s not the victim that has restrictions on its ability to defend itself put on, but it’s the aggressor”, he said.

Fighting continues despite peace talks

Zelenskyy is facing pressure to join the US-backed diplomatic initiative as Ukrainian troops continue to lose ground to Russian forces in the country’s east.

Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed in October that Russian forces had seized almost 5, 000 square kilometres (1, 930sq miles) of Ukraine this year.

On September 25, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, independently assessed the real figure to be closer to 3, 434sq km (1, 325sq miles).

Russia’s General Staff said Thursday that Moscow’s forces had seized the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk and controlled large sections of the towns of Pokrovsk and Vovchansk – a claim Ukraine vigorously denied.

“The General Staff of Ukraine’s armed forces hereby announces that Kupiansk is under the control of Ukraine’s defence forces”, the Ukrainian General Staff said in a late evening bulletin.

“Also untrue are statements suggesting that 80 percent of Vovchansk in the Kharkiv region has been captured and 70 percent of the city of Pokrovsk”.

This week, a devastating Russian aerial assault on Ternopil in western Ukraine killed at least 26 people and wounded dozens more, Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko confirmed Thursday.

Zelenskyy said on Thursday that 22 people were still missing at the site of Wednesday’s attack on Ternopil when Moscow unleashed 476 drones and 48 missiles across Ukraine. The attack damaged energy infrastructure across seven Ukrainian regions, prompting nationwide restrictions on power consumption.

“Every brazen attack against ordinary life indicates that the pressure on Russia]to stop the war] is insufficient”, Zelenskyy said on Telegram.

The bombardment coincided with Zelenskyy’s visit to Turkiye aimed at reviving peace talks with Russia following his European diplomatic mission.

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has announced new oil drilling off the California and Florida coasts for the first time in decades, advancing a project that critics say could harm coastal communities and ecosystems, as Trump seeks to expand US oil production.

The White House announced the news on Thursday.

The oil industry has been seeking access to new offshore areas, including Southern California and off the coast of Florida, as a way to boost US energy security and jobs.

What’s in the plan?

The administration’s plan proposes six offshore lease sales through 2030 in areas along the California coast.

It also calls for new drilling off the coast of Florida in areas at least 160km (100 miles) from that state’s shore. The area targeted for leasing is adjacent to an area in the Central Gulf of Mexico that already contains thousands of wells and hundreds of drilling platforms.

The five-year plan also would compel more than 20 lease sales off the coast of Alaska, including a newly designated area known as the High Arctic, more than 320km (200 miles) offshore in the Arctic Ocean.

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in announcing the sales that it would take years for the oil from those parcels to get to market.

“By moving forward with the development of a robust, forward-thinking leasing plan, we are ensuring that America’s offshore industry stays strong, our workers stay employed, and our nation remains energy dominant for decades to come”, Burgum said in a statement.

The American Petroleum Institute said in response that the announced plan was a “historic step” towards unleashing vast offshore resources. Industry groups have pointed to California’s history as an oil-producing state and say it already has infrastructure to support more production.

Political pushback

Leaders in both California and Florida have pushed back on the deal.

Last week, Florida Republican Senator Ashley Moody and Rick Scott co-sponsored a bill to maintain a moratorium on offshore drilling in the state that Trump signed in his first term.

“As Floridians, we know how vital our beautiful beaches and coastal waters are to our state’s economy, environment and way of life”, Scott said in a statement. “I will always work to keep Florida’s shores pristine and protect our natural treasures for generations to come”.

A spokesman for California Governor Gavin Newsom said Trump officials had not formally shared the plan, but said “expensive and riskier offshore drilling would put our communities at risk and undermine the economic stability of our coastal economies”.

California has been a leader in restricting offshore oil drilling since the infamous 1969 Santa Barbara spill that helped launch the modern environmental movement. While there have been no new federal leases offered since the mid-1980s, drilling from existing platforms continues.

Newsom expressed support for greater offshore controls after a 2021 spill off Huntington Beach and has backed a congressional effort to ban new offshore drilling on the West Coast.

A Texas-based company, with support from the Trump administration, is seeking to restart production in waters off Santa Barbara damaged by a 2015 oil spill. The administration has hailed the plan by Houston-based Sable Offshore Corp as the kind of project Trump wants to increase US energy production as the federal government removes regulatory barriers.

The announcement comes as Governor Newsom attended the COP30 climate conference in Brazil.

“He]Trump] intentionally aligned that to the opening of COP”, Newsom said.

Even before it was released, the offshore drilling plan met strong opposition from Newsom, a Democrat who is eyeing a 2028 presidential run and has emerged as a leading Trump critic.

Newsom pronounced the idea “dead on arrival” in a social media post. The proposal is also likely to draw bipartisan opposition in Florida. Tourism and access to clean beaches are key parts of the economy in both states.

Democratic lawmakers, including California Senator Alex Padilla and Representative Jared Huffman, the top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, warned that opening vast coastlines to new offshore drilling would hurt coastal economies, jeopardise national security, ravage coastal ecosystems, and put the health and safety of millions of people at risk.

“With this draft plan, Donald Trump and his Administration are trying to destroy one of the most valuable, most protected coastlines in the world and hand it over to the fossil fuel industry”, Padilla and Huffman said in a joint statement.

The federal government has not allowed drilling in federal waters in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, which includes offshore Florida and part of offshore Alabama, since 1995, because of concerns about oil spills. California has some offshore oil rigs, but there has been no new leasing in federal waters since the mid-1980s.

Since taking office for a second time in January, Trump has systematically reversed former President Joe Biden’s focus on slowing climate change to pursue what the Republican calls US “energy dominance” in the global market.

Trump, who recently called climate change “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”, created a National Energy Dominance Council and directed it to move quickly to drive up already record-high US energy production, particularly fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas.

Marjayoun district, Lebanon – In his southern Lebanese hometown of Hula, a few metres away from the border with Israel, Khairallah Yaacoub walks through his olive grove. Khairallah is harvesting the olives, even though there aren’t many this year.

The orchard, which once contained 200 olive trees and dozens of other fruit-bearing trees, is now largely destroyed. After a ceasefire was declared between Hezbollah and Israel in November 2024, ending a one-year war, the Israeli army entered the area, bulldozed the land, and uprooted trees across border areas, including Hula – 56, 000 olive trees according to Lebanon’s Agriculture Minister Nizar Hani. Israeli officials have said that they plan to remain indefinitely in a “buffer zone” in the border region.

Israeli forces are not currently stationed in what remains of Khairallah’s farm, but the grove is fully exposed to Israeli positions in Menora, on the other side of the border. That makes the olive farmer’s every movement visible to the Israeli army, and is why he has been so afraid to venture to his trees before today.

Harvesting under fire

“This was the place where my brothers and I lived our lives”, said Khairallah, as he walked next to the olive trees that he said were more than 40 years old. “We spent long hours here ploughing, planting, and harvesting. But the]Israeli] occupation army has destroyed everything”.

Khairallah now has 10 olive trees left, but their yield is small for several reasons, most notably the lack of rainfall and the fact that he and his brothers had to abandon the orchard when war broke out between Hezbollah and Israel on October 8, 2023. Khairallah’s aim now is to begin the process of restoring and replanting his olive grove, the main source of livelihood for the 55-year-old and his four brothers.

The farm in Hula, which lies in the district of Marjayoun, once provided them with not just olives, but olive oil, and various other fruits. They also kept 20 cows on the land, all of which have died due to the war.

But with the presence of the Israelis nearby, getting things back to a semblance of what they once were is not easy, and involves taking a lot of risks.

“Last year, we couldn’t come to the grove and didn’t harvest the olives”, Khairallah said. “]Now,] the Israeli army might send me a warning through a drone or fire a stun grenade to scare me off, and if I don’t withdraw, I could be directly shelled”.

Systematic destruction

Like Khairallah, Hussein Daher is also a farmer in Marjayoun, but in the town of Blida, about five kilometres (3.1 miles) away from Hula.

Hussein owns several dunams of olive trees right on Lebanon’s border with Israel. Some of his olive trees, centuries old and inherited from his ancestors, were also uprooted. As for the ones still standing, Hussein has been unable to harvest them because of Israeli attacks.

Hussein described what he says was one such attack as he tried to reach one of his groves.

“An Israeli drone appeared above me. I raised my hands to indicate that I am a farmer, but it came closer again”, said Hussein. “I moved to another spot, and minutes later, it returned to the same place I had been standing and dropped a bomb, if I hadn’t moved, it would have killed me”.

The United Nations reported last month that Israeli attacks in Lebanon since the beginning of the ceasefire had killed more than 270 people.

The dangers mean that some farmers have still not returned. But many, like Hussein, have no choice. The farmer emphasised that olive harvest seasons were an economic lifeline to him and to most other farmers.

And they now have to attempt to recoup some of the losses they have had to sustain over the last two years.

According to an April study by the United Nations’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 814 hectares (2, 011 acres) of olive groves were destroyed, with losses in the sector alone estimated at $236m, a significant proportion of the total $586m losses in the wider agricultural sector.

“We used to produce hundreds of containers of olive oil, today, we produce nothing”, said Hussein, who has a family of eight to provide for. “Some farmers used to produce more than 200 containers of olive oil per season, worth roughly $20, 000. These families depended on olive farming, honey production, and agriculture, but now everything was destroyed”.

Abandoned

The troubles facing the olive farmers have had a knock-on effect for the olive press owners who turn the harvested olives into Lebanon’s prized olive oil.

At one olive press in Aitaroun, also in southern Lebanon, the owner, Ahmad Ibrahim, told Al Jazeera that he had only produced one truckload of olive oil this year, compared with the 15 to 20 truckloads his presses make in a typical year.

“Some villages, like Yaroun, used to bring large quantities of olives, but this year none came”, Ahmad said. “The occupation destroyed vast areas of their orchards and prevented farmers from reaching the remaining ones by shooting at them and keeping them away”.

Ahmad, in his 70s and a father of five, established this olive press in 2001. He emphasised that the decline in agriculture, particularly olive cultivation in southern Lebanon, would significantly affect local communities.

Many of those areas are still scarred from the fighting, and the weapons used by Israel could still be affecting the olive trees and other crops being grown in southern Lebanon.

Hussein points to Israel’s alleged use of white phosphorus, a poisonous substance that burns whatever it lands on, saying the chemical has affected plant growth.

Experts have previously told Al Jazeera that Israel’s use of white phosphorus, which Israel says it uses to create smokescreens on battlefields, is part of the attempt to create a buffer zone along the border.

But if Lebanese farmers are going to push back against the buffer zone plan, and bring the border region alive again, they’ll need support from authorities both in Lebanon and internationally – support they say has not been forthcoming.

“Unfortunately, no one has compensated us, neither the Ministry of Agriculture nor anyone else”, said Khairallah, the farmer from Hula. “My losses aren’t just in the orchard that was bulldozed, but also in the farm and the house. My home, located in the middle of the town, was heavily damaged”.

The Lebanese government has said that it aims to support the districts affected by the war, and has backed NGO-led efforts to help farmers.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Agriculture Minister Hani said that the government had begun to compensate farmers – up to $2, 500 – and plant 200, 000 olive seedlings. He also outlined restoration projects and the use of the country’s farmers registry to help the agricultural sector.

“Through the registry, farmers will be able to obtain loans, assistance, and social and health support”, Hani said. “Olives and olive oil are of great and fundamental value, and are a top priority for the Ministry of Agriculture”.

But Khairallah, Hussein, and Ahmad have yet to see that help from the government, indicating that it will take some time to scale up recovery operations.

That absence of support, Hussein said, will eventually force the farmers to pack up and leave, abandoning a tradition hundreds of years old.