Lebanon-Israel talks in Rome were already grinding through their second day of parallel sessions on borders, military, and political files when an explosive device killed two Israeli soldiers in the south — and what happened next tested whether any deal is even possible right now.

• An explosive device detonated in the Majdal Zoun area, killing two Israeli soldiers and wounding seven others from the 55th Brigade; Israel responded with airstrikes across southern Lebanon, including a strike on the prayer hall in Tebnine that killed one person and wounded 12.
• Israel ordered residents of Mansouri, in the Tyre district, to evacuate at least 1,000 meters north; around 15 families left following the warning.
• The talks in Rome — covering political, military, and border files in three separate tracks — were adjourned early; the border track showed the most progress, with the U.S. delegation praising Lebanon's legal and historical documentation as technically sound.
• Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem accused Lebanon's leadership of "helping Israel," while P⁠M Nawaf Salam shot back that "the greatest service to Israel was by those who unilaterally dragged Lebanon into futile wars."

What to watch: Talks resume to⁠day, but Israel, edging closer to early elections, is seen as in no position to make concessions by withdrawing from areas it occupies in southern Lebanon — making the next few sessions a test of whether negotiations can survive the ground-level chaos.

Between 1985 and 2000, the Khiam Detention Center in southern Lebanon held more than 3,500 detainees — most of them ordinary villagers, not fighters — under the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army. After liberation in 2000, it became a museum of memory. Israel has now bulldozed it entirely and built a military site on the ruins.

• Former detainee and guide Ali Khashish told Al Modon the site had become "a real media crisis" for Israel because foreign delegations left with a fundamentally different understanding of the occupation — and that's why, he believes, it was targeted the moment the opportunity arose.
• The 2006 war damaged key parts of the center but left torture cells and other landmarks standing; the 2026 offensive erased what remained entirely.
• Freed prisoner Mohammed Ramadan said the destruction of Khiam hit harder than the destruction of his own home in Beit Yahoun: "When it was Khiam's turn, this event overshadowed everything."

Why it matters: Bulldozing a site that documented occupation-era detention removes one of the most visited physical records of that period, shifting the preservation of that history entirely onto survivors' testimony.

In Oct⁠ober 2023, Lebanese-based AFP journalist Christina Assi lost her leg when Israeli tank shells struck a group of journalists near the Lebanese border village of Aalma ash-Shaab — the same strike that killed Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah. Nearly three years on, no one has been held accountable. Now Assi is being formally recognized for her courage.

• The Committee to Protect Journalists announced Assi will be honored at the International Press Freedom Awards on Nov⁠ember 19 in New York.
• An independent AFP investigation concluded that two Israeli 120mm tank shells were fired from inside Israel; findings were corroborated by Reuters, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Reporters Without Borders.
• Since the attack, Assi has campaigned for justice for Abdallah's family, advocated for journalist safety, and supported a rehabilitation program for people with similar life-altering injuries.

Zooming out: The CPJ's decision to honor Assi keeps one of the most documented attacks on journalists in the conflict's recent history in the international spotlight — at a moment when accountability remains entirely unresolved.

Syria's new government overthrew Bashar al-Assad in Dec⁠ember 2024, but an investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists finds that at least 11 companies previously linked to his regime kept winning UN contracts after his fall — raising hard questions about whether the money is really going where it should.

• The UN paid nearly $10 million in 2025 to companies formerly tied to the Assad regime, according to ICIJ analysis of recently released UN procurement data.
• Security firm "Shurooq" — revealed in Dec⁠ember 2025 to have been secretly owned by a branch of Assad's intelligence agencies — won contracts worth over $1.6 million in 2025; "ProGuard" received $2.2 million, making it the UN's largest security contractor in Syria that year.
• The Four Seasons Hotel in Damascus, formerly owned by sanctioned oligarch Samer Foz, received UN contracts worth approximately $4 million in 2025 — while also serving as headquarters for the UN mission in Syria.
• The World Food Programme's supplier base grew from roughly 40 companies to over 300 after Assad's fall, as sanctions eased and the market opened up.

The bigger picture: The ICIJ findings put pressure on both the UN and Syria's new authorities to make their procurement and oligarch-settlement processes transparent at a moment when international confidence in the transition is still forming.

In the Andean town of La Oroya — listed in 2007 as one of the world's ten most polluted places — generations of children grew up breathing the emissions of a US-owned lead smelter. After 19 years in court, the company behind it has agreed to pay out.

• The Doe Run Company, a subsidiary of US billionaire Ira Rennert's Renco Group, agreed to a $150 million settlement for 1,373 Peruvians who suffered health impacts from the smelter since childhood — each receiving at least $100,000.
• A 2004 study found nearly 100% of children under age six in La Oroya had blood-lead levels above the threshold linked to growth impairment and lower IQs.
• Doe Run did not admit wrongdoing.
• Cardinal Pedro Barreto, who faced death threats for leading the two-decade campaign against the company, called the outcome "a historic milestone" but noted the money cannot fully compensate for neurological harm already done.

Zooming out: Legal experts describe this as one of the longest-running civil cases in which an American company was held financially responsible for environmental harm caused to foreign citizens in another country.

When the European Super League collapsed in Apr⁠il 2021 amid mass fan protests, FIFA president Gianni Infantino publicly condemned it. New documents obtained by The Guardian show FIFA's leadership had been negotiating a secret partnership with the project for months before that — complete with a term sheet for a deal that would have branded the breakaway as a "FIFA Super League."

• A term sheet dated Oct⁠ober 2020 proposed renaming the competition under FIFA's branding, granting FIFA a preferred equity stake and decision-making rights over format, calendar, and the appointment of a chief executive.
• The agreement would have featured 15 permanent member clubs plus 5 qualifying spots, and committed to creating a women's equivalent using the same clubs.
• Member associations around the world were bypassed in the plan's formation, and international windows would have been cut to just two fortnights per year.

What to watch: The revelations land as Infantino is already under pressure over a separate failed plan to sell chunks of the World Cup to private investors, making this⁠ week a pivotal one for his tenure at the top of global football.