U.S., Ukraine negotiators reconvene in Berlin for renewed peace talks

December 15, 2025

US, Ukrainian negotiators resume peace talks in Berlin — The talks began in Berlin yesterday

At the table in Berlin: a fragile conversation about frozen cash, warm bodies, and the future of a nation

There is a distinct hush in the high-ceilinged room where diplomats and leaders are gathering — not the brittle silence of too many prepared statements, but the kind of low, expectant quiet that arrives before a crucial decision. Outside, traffic threads through Berlin like veins. Inside, chairs were pulled close together; maps and dossiers lay open. Tonight, the talks will swell when EU heads and the NATO secretary general join the already ongoing discussions between U.S. envoys and Ukrainian representatives. The aim is not small: to find a path toward ending a war that has reshaped Europe’s security architecture and tested the international order.

Frozen money, hot politics

At the heart of the debate is a stark arithmetic problem dressed in legal and moral garb: Europe holds hundreds of billions of euros in immobilised Russian assets. Some proposals would convert a portion of that pile — figures as high as €210 billion have been floated — into a long-term loan program to keep Ukraine afloat through its winter and beyond. For many in capitals from Dublin to Vilnius, turning dormant foreign reserves into a lifeline for Kyiv is both symbol and substance: a way to punish an aggressor and rebuild the victim.

“It feels like a justice issue,” a Brussels-based diplomat confided, sitting with a coffee that had gone cold. “These assets were never meant to be used to finance aggression. If we can lawfully redirect them to help rebuild a democracy, why wouldn’t we?”

But the path is thorned with legal, political, and ethical questions. Belgium is cautious. Italy, Malta and Bulgaria have suggested alternatives such as joint EU borrowing. Hungary and Slovakia oppose the idea outright. Ireland — echoing voices across northern and western Europe — argues that using frozen assets is the clearest, most direct option.

Options on the table

Convert frozen Russian assets into a long-term loan for Ukraine (majority favoured by many EU states).
Issue joint European debt to fund Ukraine, avoiding direct use of the immobilised funds.
Explore bespoke bilateral arrangements with the U.S. and other allies to share costs and risks.

Each has pros and cons. Turning assets into a loan is politically satisfying and administratively efficient — but it requires legal groundwork and a united front. Joint borrowing dilutes the moral clarity of the action and may take longer. Small states worry about precedent: what message does it send if frozen foreign assets can be turned into a wartime credit line?

Leaders gather; the clock ticks

EU foreign ministers are meeting in Brussels while Berlin hosts the first, face-to-face phase of Ukrainian-U.S. talks since a controversial 28-point paper was tabled last month. That paper, quietly circulated and widely discussed, included a proposal — one that startled many in Kyiv — to deploy some frozen assets in joint US-Russian investment projects. Moscow’s unexpected reference in the document has hardened some European instincts against any compromise that might reward the aggressor.

A senior EU official, speaking on condition of anonymity, offered a blunt summation: “We are under time pressure. Ukraine’s treasury files show a narrowing window. If we do nothing, the consequences will be immediate and painful for civilians and soldiers alike.” Published estimates in recent briefings suggest Kyiv could face a severe financing gap by April of next year, a date that has become a sobering line on many calendars.

On the ground in Ukraine: cold, hope, and skepticism

In Kyiv, the mood is a mixture of weary resolve and anxious pragmatism. Winter is more than a season here — it is a test of infrastructure, a threat to heating systems, to hospitals keeping lights on in the regions where the lines of front have already shifted. “We will fight with what we have,” said a volunteer coordinator at a community centre that doubles as a shelter. “But we also need to know that someone is holding the other end of the rope.”

Another resident — a teacher who had been collecting donations for displaced families — put it this way: “Words are important. Money is even more so. When the classroom heater goes out, you can’t send a letter to the Kremlin and ask them to be kinder.” These small, direct images bring the abstract debate about frozen assets down to stoves, hospital generators, and schoolrooms.

The strategic red lines

Equally thorny is the question of territory. Ukraine’s leadership has signalled a willingness to discuss security guarantees — even floating the possibility of setting aside its long-cherished bid for NATO membership if rock-solid protections from Western partners can be guaranteed. For many in the EU, however, any deal that requires Kyiv to cede parts of the Donbas or other regions is a non-starter. “If you give up Donbas, you give up the wall that keeps the rest from falling,” warned an EU security analyst in Brussels.

This is not simply a regional quarrel; it is a debate over deterrence, sovereignty, and the rules that have bound post-World War II Europe together. Allowing territorial grabs to stand in order to secure a temporary ceasefire would set a precedent with global ripples.

Drones, airports, and the wider theatre of conflict

Even as talks proceed, the battlefield is not idle. On the other side of the conflict, Russia reported that its air-defence units intercepted dozens of Ukrainian drones overnight — a figure running into triple digits in some official statements — and said many were aimed at Moscow. Airline disruptions followed: Moscow’s Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports, among others in Russia’s south, temporarily suspended operations. The contest over the skies — and the economic disruptions that ripple from every closure and interception — reminds negotiators of a basic truth: ceasefires seldom stay quiet for long without clear, enforceable mechanisms.

Why this matters to you

You might live continents away from Kyiv or Berlin, but these negotiations matter because they ask a question central to modern international life: how do we marry law and force, finance and principle? If frozen assets can be retooled to underwrite recovery and defend a country against aggression, what does that do for the future of sanctions? If they cannot, what tools remain to deter revisionist powers?

Consider these points: Europe’s unity on sanctions and funding sets precedents for how states respond to aggression worldwide; the economics of war — freezing assets, rerouting funds, underwriting reconstruction — will shape global finance in the decades to come; and, perhaps most importantly, the human costs remain immediate and brutal.

Closing the room, opening a path

Tonight’s session will broaden into a summit in Brussels where leaders will attempt to firm consensus. The air will be thick with competing urgencies — humanitarian, strategic, legal, domestic political pressures. For negotiators, there will be technical conversations about bonds, legal mechanisms, and conditionality. For citizens, there will be the simpler, sharper question: who will keep the lights on?

And for each of us reading from afar, there is another question: what sort of international order do we want to live in? One where sovereignty can be traded away at the negotiating table? Or one where frozen assets can be mobilised to protect people and punish unlawful aggression? The choices being shaped in Berlin and Brussels this week will ripple far beyond their conference rooms. The task for leaders is to blend courage with caution, law with compassion — and to remember the faces behind the dossiers.

“We need decisive action, not just statements,” an aid worker said as she packed thermal blankets bound for the east. “If the world hesitates now, the people who suffer are the ones who can’t wait.” What will you, as a global citizen, ask of your leaders?

Chile elects Kast as president, signaling a conservative shift

hanad

December 15, 2025

Chile elects Kast as president in rightward shift — Jose Antonio Kast secured some 58% of the vote

At the crossroads: Chile wakes to a new, hard-right chapter

In the early hours after the count closed, Santiago felt like a city pulled taut between relief and dread. Car horns bounced off glass towers in the financial district, while in quieter neighborhoods the flags of a man who has stirred both fervent devotion and sharp fear hung from balconies like thunderheads.

Jose Antonio Kast, a 59-year-old father of nine and a three-time presidential candidate, won roughly 58% of the vote, according to official tallies — a margin that leaves little doubt about the mandate he claims. His opponent, Jeannette Jara, a labor minister who led a broad left coalition, conceded the race and told her supporters that “voters have spoken loud and clear.”

The result marks the clearest swing to the right in Chilean presidential politics since the return to democracy 35 years ago. For many, it’s the end of one political cycle and the beginning of another whose contours few can fully predict.

Scenes from the street: jubilation and unease

At Plaza Italia, the traditional pulse point of public life and protest, jubilation and anxiety had their own separate languages. Supporters beamed beneath plastic Chilean flags, cheering as Kast took the stage and promised to “restore respect for the law.” Someone nearby beat a drum; someone else unfurled a portrait of Augusto Pinochet. Moments later, a small group of counterprotesters — mostly students and a few older faces — chanted back, and police kept a wary watch.

“Finally, someone who will act,” said Gina Mello, a retiree whose voice wavered between relief and impatience. “We want order. If he brings the military to protect our streets for a time, I won’t oppose it.”

Not everyone felt so reassured. “I’m fearful,” admitted Cecilia Mora, 71. “I saw what Pinochet did. This man admires him. That scares me — I don’t want repression.” Her hands wrung the strap of her bag, and behind her, a mural remembering the disappeared from the dictatorship era was splashed with fresh paint like a silent rebuttal.

Kast’s promises — and the numbers behind the rhetoric

Kast’s campaign leaned on a handful of visceral issues that had climbed to the top of the national agenda. Polling in the run-up to the vote showed more than 60% of Chileans cited public security as their primary concern — a statistic politicians could neither ignore nor easily fix.

Key campaign pledges included:

Expulsion of some 300,000 migrants he said were in the country illegally
Sealing the northern border and bolstering deportation machinery modeled after U.S. immigration enforcement
A hard line on crime, promising to strengthen police powers and deploy security forces to troubled neighborhoods
A pro-market economic reset meant to kick-start growth after what he and his allies describe as four years of floundering policy

Chile remains the world’s top copper producer and a major supplier of lithium — commodities at the heart of global decarbonization efforts. Markets responded to Kast’s victory with cautious optimism: the peso strengthened and local equities rose as traders bet on deregulatory, business-friendly policies. But those market ripples don’t erase the human questions on the street about who benefits from growth and at what social cost.

Migration, security, and a region in motion

Organized crime groups have exploited Chile’s long northern deserts and bustling ports, and migration from countries in crisis — notably Venezuela, but also Peru, Colombia and Ecuador — has added complexity to an already fraught public conversation about security. Crime statistics show a notable increase in violent incidents over the past decade, though Chile still ranks relatively safe by regional comparisons. Fear, however, has outpaced statistical change.

“Security is both a reality and a perception,” said Richard Kouyoumdjian, a former naval officer and security consultant. “Any government that doesn’t address both risks losing credibility fast. The challenge is complex: borders, policing, social programs and intelligence all need coordination — not slogans.”

History’s long shadow: authoritarian nostalgia and painful reminders

Kast’s public defense of elements of Chile’s military past — and the applause some of his supporters offered for General Augusto Pinochet — have provoked a visceral reaction in a country still healing from human rights abuses of the 1973–1990 dictatorship. Chanting “Pinochet! Pinochet!” in the streets, some of his backers embraced a nostalgia for order over the memory of repression.

Questions about Kast’s own family history have only deepened the unease. Investigations have reported that his father served in the German army and was a member of the Nazi party; Kast maintains his father was conscripted and not a supporter of Nazism. Such revelations add layers of moral and historical complication to an already polarized debate.

“This election forced us to choose what kind of memory we carry forward,” said Ana Fuentes, a human rights lawyer in Valparaíso. “Democracy isn’t just about elections — it’s about protecting the dignity that was attacked for decades. That work continues, regardless of who sits in the Palacio de La Moneda.”

Constraints and the road ahead

Despite a strong presidential result, Kast will not have a blank check. The Senate remains evenly balanced between left and right, and the lower house has become a shifting battleground where a populist swing vote can dictate major legislative outcomes. His more radical proposals will face scrutiny, negotiation and likely legal challenge.

“A president is powerful in symbolism; legislation is where real change happens,” said political scientist María Soler of the University of Chile. “Kast’s administration will need to form coalitions. Otherwise, bold promises will hit the hard wall of institutional checks.”

He is set to take office in March, inheriting a nation that has woven protest and reform through its recent history: mass demonstrations in 2019 over inequality, a bruising constitutional rewrite process that faltered, and the long tail of a pandemic that strained public services and social trust.

What should the rest of the world watch for?

Chile’s trajectory matters beyond its borders. As a leading supplier of minerals crucial to the green transition and as a bellwether for regional politics in Latin America, the country’s choices will reverberate. Will a tougher approach to migration and security inspire similar policies elsewhere? Will business-friendly reforms attract investment without exacerbating inequality?

And here is the core question for all of us who watch democracies in motion: how does a country reconcile the craving for order with the imperative of rights? How do you keep your streets safe without sacrificing the liberties that define a free society?

In the days to come, Chileans will test those answers on the ground: in border towns where new enforcement may be felt first, in courtrooms where legal battles over policy will be fought, and in neighborhoods where families decide whether their future remains within Chile’s borders or beyond them.

For now, the city breathes, waits and debates. The flags will stay up for a while — fluttering, for some, with hope, for others, with apprehension. Which way Chile leans next will be a story not only of votes, but of voices: those who cheered at Plaza Italia, those who painted murals for the disappeared, and the many quieter voices in between. Will they be heard? That is the narrative yet to be written.

Australian PM calls for tougher gun laws in wake of shooting

hanad

December 15, 2025

Australian PM proposes tougher gun laws after shooting — Mourners gather by tributes at the Bondi Pavillion

Bondi Beach, a Light Doused: How One Night of Celebration Became a Reckoning

Bondi Beach is a place of ritual — dawn swims, fishermen with their lines like punctuation against the horizon, teenagers with chipped Vans and sun-bleached hair. On a Sunday evening in early December, that familiar rhythm was broken. A Hanukkah festival meant to mark light in the darkest days of winter turned into chaos when gunfire ripped across Archer Park and into the sand where more than a thousand people had gathered.

By morning the numbers were grim and specific: 16 people dead, dozens wounded, and a community reeling. Officials said the attack appeared targeted at the Jewish event. Two men — a father and son — opened fire with long guns, witnesses recalled. The father, a 50-year-old man who had held firearms licences since 2015, was later found dead at the scene. His 24‑year‑old son was critically injured and remains in hospital. Police confirmed about 40 people were treated in hospital; among them were two officers in serious but stable condition. The victims’ ages spanned generations, from a child of ten to an elder of 87.

The Ten Minutes That Changed a Beach

“I thought they were fireworks at first,” said Morgan Gabriel, a 27‑year‑old Bondi local who had been on her way to the cinema. “Then people started running up the street — screaming, phones ringing, shoes and blankets left on the sand. Ten minutes felt like forever.”

Those ten minutes, witnesses said, were both horrifying and oddly cinematic: people diving for cover behind palm trees, families sprinting toward side streets, and, amid it all, strangers pulling others to safety. One video went viral — a bystander wrestling a gun away from one of the shooters. That man, later identified as Ahmed al Ahmed, a 43‑year‑old fruit shop owner who served previously with police, was shot twice as he intervened. He survived after surgery; an online fundraiser for him has now topped A$350,000 (€198,539).

“He didn’t hesitate,” said Mohamed Fateh al Ahmed, speaking through a translator. “He saw people lying on the ground and he had to act. He has always felt he must protect others. Today we are proud — he is a hero of Australia.”

A Nation’s Conversation Reignited

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Bondi Beach the next day and planted flowers on the sand. His voice carried the weight of national mourning and a challenge: tougher gun laws. “Licences should not be in perpetuity,” he said, bluntly stating what many were already whispering in op-eds and living rooms — that existing rules had gaps. He announced he would take reforms to National Cabinet, urging state premiers to act.

“What we saw yesterday was an act of pure evil, an act of anti‑Semitism,” the prime minister told reporters. “The Jewish community are hurting today. All Australians wrap our arms around them.”

Officials said the father held licences for six firearms, which police believe were used in the attack. Surveillance footage and cellphone clips showed what appeared to be a bolt‑action rifle and a shotgun. Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said investigators were still building a picture of motive and background: “We are very much working through the background of both persons. At this stage we know very little.”

Faces, Flags and a Makeshift Memorial

Within hours, a line of flowers, candles, and Israeli and Australian flags formed a makeshift memorial near the Bondi Pavilion. Mourners left scarves, flip‑flops and thermoses — items abandoned by people fleeing the beach — and lined them up for collection. An online condolence book filled with messages from Australia and abroad: “We are with you,” wrote strangers in different languages.

Private Jewish security volunteers joined police at the site. Elders, children and teens came to lay flowers; for some, the ceremony was also an act of defiance. “Light defeats darkness,” Albanese urged the nation, asking Australians to light candles in solidarity — a line he repeated, invoking Hanukkah’s promise of small, persistent lights against long nights.

Heroes, Questions, and a Community Bruised

There were quiet acts of courage everywhere: fishermen offering their boats to ferries, café owners handing out shirts and towels to those who lost their footwear, and medics working until late into the night. Yet the city also asked tough questions. How had men with licensed weapons been radicalised? How long had they been under observation, if at all? Should firearm licences be renewable rather than indefinite? Could stricter caps on ownership help prevent future attacks?

Home Minister Tony Burke disclosed that the father arrived in Australia in 1998 on a student visa, while his son was Australian‑born. The attack lands amid an uptick in anti‑Semitic incidents across the country since the Israel‑Gaza war reignited last October. In August, Australia expelled Iran’s ambassador, accusing Tehran of directing at least two anti‑Jewish attacks. International leaders also weighed in: messages of condolence arrived from capitals, a reminder that this is not just a local tragedy but part of global currents.

Gun Control in the Shadow of Port Arthur

Australia’s relationship with guns has long been shaped by Port Arthur, the 1996 massacre in Tasmania that killed 35 people and led to sweeping reforms — a national buyback, tighter licensing, and limits on semi‑automatic weapons. Those measures were hailed worldwide and have correlated with a steep drop in mass shootings.

Still, Port Arthur is decades ago. Societies change, radicalisation finds new arteries in social media and fractured communities. “Laws are only as strong as the systems that enforce them,” said Dr. Laila Hassan, a criminologist at the University of Sydney. “We must look beyond possession: risk assessment, mental health, community support, and surveillance of extremist networks matter.”

Australia’s firearm homicide rate has been among the lowest in the OECD for years — estimated at around 0.1 to 0.2 per 100,000 people — but as experts note, a single mass shooting alters a nation’s sense of security. “Rare doesn’t mean impossible,” Dr. Hassan reflected. “And policy must evolve accordingly.”

What Comes Next?

There will be inquiries, policy meetings and political pressure. The prime minister has signalled a limit on how many firearms one person can own and suggested licences should require renewals and reassessments. Opposition and states will debate details, and civil liberty groups will watch closely for proportionality.

But beyond the technical measures is a quieter, harder task: healing a community. How do you comfort a child who hid beneath a towel as shots rang out? How do you honor the dead while ensuring their faces become a lesson for future prevention? These are the questions residents keep asking on Bondi’s hilltops as the tide moves in and out.

“We have to remember the people, not just the politics,” said Rabbi Miriam Stein, who has been counseling families. “Yet we must also be practical. Today we mourn. Tomorrow we rebuild and make sure light truly defeats darkness.”

Invitation to Reflect

How should democracies balance individual freedoms with collective safety? What responsibility do we carry as neighbours, employers, online citizens to identify harm before it manifests? As you read this, consider the rituals you cherish — the festivals, public spaces, the ordinary moments — and imagine them safeguarded by conversations that are both urgent and compassionate.

Bondi’s sand will eventually be washed smooth again by the Pacific. For the families and friends of those lost and injured, some scars will never fade. For the rest of the country, an old lesson must be relearned: the cost of complacency is sometimes measured in lives. The challenge now is to turn grief into policy and memory into prevention, so that the lights we kindle in winter are only ever symbols of hope, never the response to another night of terror.

Footage shows bystander tackling and disarming gunman at Bondi Beach

hanad

December 15, 2025

Watch: 'Hero' tackles and disarms gunman at Bondi Beach

When Ordinary Courage Blooms on Bondi Beach

It was the kind of autumn afternoon that makes Sydney feel like the whole world has gone to the shore: sun low, salt in the air, surf stretching into an indecipherable blue. Families draped in towels, a man with a metal detector scanning the sand, teenagers doing tricks on the promenade rail. Then the sound—impossible at first—of gunfire fracturing the soundtrack of waves and chatter.

In the panic that followed, one figure stands out in smartphone footage that rippled across the globe: a man who sprinted toward a gunman, reached for the weapon, wrestled it away, and turned the tide of a scene that might otherwise have become a massacre. His name, reported by local outlets, is Ahmed al Ahmed. He is 43, a fruit seller who works near the beach, the kind of person whose mornings begin before sunrise sorting crates of oranges and whose face you recognize if you’ve queued for figs from a market stall.

What Happened

Authorities later described the incident as a terrorist attack that targeted members of the Jewish community. Eleven people were killed and many more injured in one of Australia’s deadliest shootings in recent memory.

Footage circulating online shows Ahmed lunging at one of the shooters as gunshots ring out. He manages, amid the chaos, to prise the firearm from its owner. For a moment, the weapon is pointed back at the assailant. The attacker retreats. Witnesses scrambled to help the wounded. Ahmed himself suffered two gunshot wounds and was taken to hospital.

Voices from the Sand

“He ran straight at the shooter without thinking,” said Layla, a local café owner whose outlet overlooks the beach. “I saw him grab the gun like he was grabbing a hot pan. He didn’t calculate, he didn’t panic—he acted.”

Ahmed’s cousin, who gave his name as Mustapha to a local reporter, waited at the hospital and spoke with a trembling mixture of fear and pride. “We don’t fully know what the doctors will say yet,” he told journalists. “But he is my cousin, and he is a hero. He always looked after his family, and now he has looked after strangers.”

A lifeguard who helped ferry people away from the scene described the mood afterwards. “There was this silence—like the sea had swallowed its breath. Then people started helping. Strangers carried others, shopkeepers opened up, someone turned a surfboard into a stretcher.” The local council worker who coordinated volunteers later said those windowless acts of compassion were the most important things in those first hours.

Why This Moment Matters

Australia is, by many measures, not a country accustomed to mass shootings. The nation’s painful pivot after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre brought sweeping gun reforms and a national reset. Since then, large-scale shootings became far rarer here than in many other Western countries. That rarity makes this attack not just a criminal act or a terrible statistic—it is a rupture in a social contract that promised safer public spaces.

And yet, even in the darkest hour, there is a stubborn bloom of bravery. Ahmed’s intervention was not the result of training or nationalist script. It was an act of improvisation: a fruit seller using his hands, his body, his will. He became what neighbors and leaders called, in the immediate aftermath, a symbol that ordinary people can still make extraordinary choices.

First-responders, neighbors, strangers

Paramedics worked alongside volunteers, police secured the precinct, and citizens set up impromptu aid stations. “People brought water, towels, blankets. Old men offered their jumpers. A yoga teacher started giving breathing support to hysterical kids,” said one volunteer on the promenade. “You saw the city’s better instincts awake.”

It’s worth asking: what creates that willingness to help? Neighbors told me it’s the nature of Bondi itself—a kaleidoscope of cultures, a place where a Portuguese fishmonger knows the names of surfers and an Iranian café owner buys bread for a night shift nurse. In times of crisis, those relationships become lifelines.

Public Response and Political Ripples

Across the country, political leaders expressed shock and grief, praising the acts of those who interceded. But the event also reopened old debates about public safety, the proliferation of extremist ideologies, and how a globalized world raises the stakes for how we protect minority communities.

Analysts say that attacks singled out for religious or ethnic reasons have been a growing concern globally. Community organizations here and abroad monitor a rise in anti-Jewish incidents and worry about spillover from conflicts overseas. In Australia, where social cohesion is both celebrated and contested, this attack forces renewed conversations about integration, radicalization, and communal security.

Human Stories, Not Just Headlines

Beyond the figures and the briefings are the people who tide through trauma to tell their stories. A nurse who treated victims told me she keeps replaying one detail: “A little girl kept saying she wanted to go home. It wasn’t about politics; it was a child wanting the banal comfort of bedtime.” A pensioner who helped bandage wounds later said, “I don’t feel brave. I just couldn’t look away.”

Such testimonies matter. They remind us that attack narratives often flatten individuals into data points. The dead and injured were mothers, sons, students, retirees—people whose phone contacts now hold names that will never again ring.

Questions for a Global Audience

When a tranquil beach becomes a crime scene, what do we owe one another? How do urban communities knit safety into everyday life without curbing the openness that makes them vibrant? And how should democracies respond when an attack has clear targeting of a minority group?

These are not questions with easy answers. Policies can change; policing can be re-evaluated. But the first line of any response is something more human: conversation, solidarity, and a commitment to remembering the people behind the headlines.

What Comes Next

Ahmed remains in hospital. The community has rallied—food donations, fundraisers, vigils at the promenade—and yet the sense of shallow grief hums beneath the noise. Investigations continue. Authorities are piecing together motives, affiliations, and the sequence of events.

For now, the immediate lesson is simple and stubborn: in moments of terror, people can reach for one another. They can turn toward danger to pull others back. History may debate the causes and the remedies; in the sand, in the emergency rooms, and around kitchen tables, people are already doing the hard work of care.

Closing Reflection

What would you do if you were there? It’s not a challenge to glorify risk but an invitation to consider the small preparations that make big differences: first aid, awareness, knowing how to check on a neighbor. The violence that punctured Bondi’s calm will be measured in reports and time lines. But its deepest counterweight may be the everyday courage—like Ahmed’s—that refuses to let terror win the final image.

When the tide pulls back, Bondi will keep drawing visitors who come for surf and sun. They will also come to a place changed in ways both visible and invisible—where a stallholder’s quick hands and a community’s open hearts were as decisive as any policy in saving lives. That, perhaps, is the lesson the world needs right now: how ordinary generosity and decisive action can push back against extraordinary harm.

Ukraine war pushes European nations toward revived military conscription

hanad

December 14, 2025

Ukraine war sparks European march towards conscription — Danish conscripts during a training exercise in June 2024

The Return of the Draft: Europe’s Quiet Reboot of Citizen Armies

On a rain‑slick morning in Ahlen, western Germany, a line of young people hunched into their jackets waiting to register. Some chatted about university applications; others clutched CVs and sported the nervous energy of first‑time job seekers. A stern drill sergeant barked orders in the distance, but what you could see, more than the uniform, was a question etched on every face: what does service mean in a Europe that suddenly feels less certain?

Since Russia launched its full‑scale invasion of Ukraine, governments across the continent have quietly but decisively rewritten a chapter many thought closed after the Cold War. Once, the post‑1990s orthodoxy favored lean, professional armies and the idea that national defence could be outsourced to small standing forces and international alliances. Today, the drumbeat is different: call it a return to citizen soldiers, a revival of conscription in new clothes, or simply a pragmatic move to ensure readiness.

From Professional Armies to Mass Reserves

What we’re seeing is less a monolithic return to compulsory national service and more a range of hybrid models. Some countries are reintroducing mandatory drafts. Others are offering attractive short‑term contracts, incentivised voluntary programs, or national training courses designed to build large reserve pools. The logic is straightforward: trained bodies are the backbone of deterrence.

“We no longer live in a security environment where ambition equals complacency,” said Dr. Elena Kovac, a defence analyst in Brussels. “European capitals have recalibrated. It’s not nostalgia for the past; it’s an insurance policy for the future.”

Germany and France: Different Flavors of the Same Idea

Germany’s parliament voted in early December to create what officials call a voluntary conscription system — a phrase that has already been contested on the streets and in cafés. Young men turning 18 will complete a digital questionnaire and a medical review, and those who opt in will serve six to 11 months. Recruits will receive a monthly pay of roughly €2,600 and, after their initial service, will become part of the reserves. The target is striking: the Bundeswehr aims to grow from about 184,000 active personnel and 60,000 reservists today to roughly 260,000 full‑time soldiers and 200,000 reservists by 2035.

But the law also contains a caveat that sits uneasily with many: it permits the activation of a wider draft if security conditions demand it or if enlistment goals fall short. Thousands of students protested across German cities the weekend the bill passed. “We’re not opposed to security; we’re wary of sudden powers,” said Lara Meier, a sociology student in Cologne, holding a handmade placard. “This bill feels like a first step that could turn into something bigger.”

France, too, is reviving a form of national service for 18‑ and 19‑year‑olds after a two‑decade hiatus. President Emmanuel Macron framed the plan as aligning France with its European partners: recruits will spend 10 months in service, earning around €800 a month, as Paris aims to enrol 10,000 volunteers annually by 2030. “We must not stand still,” Macron said when announcing the plan, pointing to a changing security landscape that leaves no room for complacency.

Northern Europe: A Longstanding Sense of Frontier

Closer to the eastern flank, the scars of past geopolitics have kept conscription alive or born it anew. Lithuania reintroduced compulsory service in 2015, and Sweden resurrected a selective conscription system in 2017 for both men and women. The Swedish model is meritocratic and surgical: all 18‑year‑olds answer an online questionnaire, undergo tests and interviews, and the military selects under 10% in a given year — last year that meant about 7,000 recruits serving between nine and 15 months.

Finland never abandoned the draft. Every man is eligible for six to 12 months of service, with conscientious objectors able to opt for civil service, often twice as long. These conscripts become reservists until their 50s: in crisis, Finland can mobilise up to roughly 280,000 trained reservists. “This isn’t about aggression; it’s about readiness,” explained Captain Aino Pietilä at a Finnish training base. “We prepare so that citizens know how to protect what they love.”

Estonia, which has maintained conscription since breaking free from the Soviet Union in 1991, counts about 40,000 reservists and treats military service as a civic rite for many. “I met people who came back from service more confident, more community‑minded,” one young Estonian teacher told me. “It’s woven into a sense of national survival.”

Varied Responses Further West

Not every European government is marching in the same direction. Poland, which ended conscription in 2008, has opted for flexible, modular training: a recent program allows citizens to sign up for between one and 30 days of basic military and survival training, with a target of training 100,000 people by 2027. Political surveys in Poland are mixed — one late‑November poll suggested 59% support for reinstating compulsory service, while other polls paint a less enthusiastic picture.

The United Kingdom, despite being one of Europe’s nuclear powers, has no plans to revive conscription. Ireland and Malta, both neutral, have no history or appetite for a draft. Italy and Spain rely on professional forces, though Italian officials have floated voluntary service models similar to France and Germany. The farther west and south you travel from NATO’s eastern flank, the less appetite there seems to be for mandatory service — a pattern as much cultural as it is strategic.

Quick Overview: Who’s Doing What?

Germany: new voluntary conscription (6–11 months), pay ~€2,600, reserve targets by 2035.
France: 10‑month national service for 18–19 year olds, €800/month, aim 10,000/year by 2030.
Sweden: selective conscription for men and women, <10% conscripted, ~7,000 last year.
Finland: continuous conscription for men, mobilisable reserves up to ~280,000.
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania: conscription reintroduced or maintained; Baltic states especially focused on reserves.
Poland: modular training for civilians; large reserve and training ambitions.

What This Means for Young People and Societies

At stake is more than manpower. Europe’s revival of conscription-like programs forces a conversation about citizenship, intergenerational obligations, and the militarisation of daily life. For some families, service is a source of pride — a rite that teaches discipline, first aid, camaraderie. For others, especially in large metropolitan areas, it raises questions about civil liberties, the role of the military in society, and unequal burdens across socioeconomic lines.

“We must ask: who bears the cost?” wondered Professor Marta Delgado, a sociologist in Madrid. “If conscription becomes the patch to fix budget shortfalls, it risks becoming coercive. If it’s a well‑resourced civic program, it can knit communities closer together.”

There are practical questions, too. How do countries ensure meaningful employment and retraining pipelines for reservists? How will these programs adapt to new forms of warfare — cyber, drones, information operations? And what will happen if political winds shift and the urgency that drove these reforms cools off?

Conclusion: A Continent Rethinking Its Contract

Walking past the registration tent in Ahlen, a woman in her sixties paused to watch. “When I was young, we marched for hope,” she said, eyes bright with a mixture of worry and resolve. “Now they march for safety. That’s a different kind of hope.”

Whether Europe’s new emphasis on citizen soldiers will prove a prudent hedge or a slippery slope is a question only time can answer. For now, what is clear is that the post‑Cold War era of small professional forces has been reassessed. Governments are betting that a broader base of trained citizens—whether through conscription, voluntary service, or modular training—will strengthen deterrence and deepen civic ties.

So I’ll leave you with this: should defence be a private choice, a public duty, or something in between? The answer may define a generation.

Hamas warns Israel’s killing of commander risks derailing ceasefire

hanad

December 14, 2025

Hamas says Israel killing commander threatens ceasefire — Thousands of Hamas supporters rallied in central Gaza City at a funeral for senior commander Raed Saed

Fog of Coffins: How One Assassination Could Unravel a Fragile Truce in Gaza

They carried the coffins like a current through the streets — a river of green flags, faces wrapped in keffiyehs, shoes dusty from rubble. The chants rose and fell, one steady heartbeat: “Martyrs are dear to God.” For many in Gaza City, yesterday’s funeral was more than a ritual farewell. It was a public dare: to whom does the ceasefire belong, and who will bend its arc?

At the center of the procession lay Raed Saed, a senior commander whose killing has sent shockwaves through an already tense truce. Alongside him, three other bodies were placed in the earth, each one a reminder that even where guns have ostensibly fallen silent, violence continues to shape the politics — and the daily life — of the enclave.

The moment, the man, and the message

From the rooftops, young men waved green banners and shouted slogans; an old woman pressed her palm to the metal of a coffin and wept. “He built things here,” said a shopkeeper who asked to be identified only as Bassam. “Not just machines, but an idea of resistance. You can’t take that with a missile.”

Hamas’s chief negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, who speaks from exile, did not mince words in a televised address after confirmation of the strike. “The continued Israeli violations of the ceasefire agreement … and latest assassinations that targeted Saed and others threaten the viability of the agreement,” he said, appealing directly to the United States to pressure Israel to honor the terms of the truce.

In Gaza’s public square, those words landed like pebbles dropped into still water — each one rippling outwards. “If the guarantor of the deal is silent when one side kills, what is the point of a guarantor?” wondered Lina Hamdan, a schoolteacher watching the funeral from a collapsed building’s courtyard. “People here keep asking: who will stop the stoppage from stopping?”

Ceasefire on paper, fractures in the ground

The ceasefire that took effect in October — heralded as a fragile step towards stabilizing a battered territory where more than two million people live — has not erased the underlying contest for control. Israel retains a heavy military presence in the eastern, largely depopulated half of Gaza. Hamas and associated authorities have reasserted themselves in the western districts, where life carries on amid flattened buildings and makeshift markets.

That division is more than geographic. It is an everyday reality: checkpoints where once there were shops; children who have known little but blackout nights and curfews; bakeries that open and close with the truce’s tenuous rhythms. “People are exhausted,” said Omar Qassam, a nurse at a field clinic. “We patch wounds and run out of supplies. Then a strike like this comes and it’s like someone pulled the bandage off and said: keep bleeding, let’s see what happens next.”

Politics of assassination

Israel described Saed as one of the architects of the 7 October 2023 attack — the incursion that escalated into the full-blown war. Hamas confirmed his role as a senior figure in its armed wing and said it had already selected a replacement for his responsibilities in “military manufacturing.”

Targeted killings have long been part of the playbook in this conflict. But doing so during a negotiated halt tests the limits of any ceasefire’s terms — and the patience of the negotiators tasked with shepherding a fragile peace. “Assassinations during a truce are a strategic lever,” said Dr. Nadine Salim, a researcher on conflict mediation. “They signal that one party views the truce as tactical respite rather than a durable settlement.”

Violence from within: the shadow of internal conflict

Outside the funeral, violence shadowed the headlines: in central Gaza, masked gunmen shot dead Ahmed Zamzam, described by local authorities as a senior officer in a Hamas-run security service that pursues suspected collaborators. The Gaza Interior Ministry blamed collaborators acting on Israeli orders; a suspect was detained.

For his part, Ghassan Duhine — head of the Popular Forces, an anti-Hamas group operating in the Israeli-held sector of the strip — reportedly claimed responsibility, calling the killing “a fair revenge.” Duhine and other groups bitterly deny Hamas’s rule, accusing the movement of responsibility for Gaza’s devastation.

“This is not a neat two-sided war,” observed Mariam Al-Khatib, a community organizer. “There are fractures inside Gaza. There are grudges, and there are people who saw survival as taking sides. The truce did not stitch those wounds; it merely paused the bleeding in places.”

What comes next: forces, guarantees, uncertainties

Negotiations around the truce include plans for a UN-authorized International Stabilisation Force to help keep the peace. The United States — which was named a main guarantor by Hamas negotiators — has taken an active role in planning. U.S. Central Command is convening partner nations in Doha on 16 December to discuss the shape and scope of that force, according to officials who spoke to international media.

Hamas’s negotiators insist the proposed international force should be limited to Gaza’s borders rather than deployed inside the territory itself. Israel, meanwhile, has insisted on guarantees that Hamas will be disarmed and excluded from any future administration in Gaza — demands that seem, for now, non-negotiable.

“Who polices the policers?” asked an anonymous Western diplomat involved in the talks. “An Outside force has to be perceived as impartial. If it’s not, it will become either a target or a partner, and neither of those outcomes will stabilize Gaza.”

Beyond the headlines: questions for readers

So where does accountability rest in a ceasefire that is sustained by mutual wariness? If a guarantor is called upon to enforce terms, what leverage does it realistically hold over a state determined to pursue its security objectives? And perhaps most urgently: how do the people who live through this keep rebuilding lives that can be snatched away by a single targeted strike?

Gaza’s bazaars, its children who learn arithmetic on cracked sidewalks, its women who trade recipes and rations — these are the quiet witnesses to decisions made in rooms far from their streets. Their daily resilience, their refusal to be merely numbers in a diplomatic ledger, is a form of testimony.

“We want more than promises,” said Bassam, the shopkeeper, as he folded a flag at the end of the day. “We want the right to bury our dead without fear that another coffin will follow in a week.”

Final thought

Ceasefires can offer a breath; whether that breath becomes life depends on how the world chooses to listen when it is broken. The killing of Raed Saed is a story of strategy and force — but it is also, unmistakably, a story about the fragility of peace and the human cost of diplomacy gone awry. If international actors mean to stabilize Gaza, they must reckon with both the state actors and the invisible fractures inside Gaza’s own society. Until then, the chants in Gaza’s streets will continue to ask the same question: who will hold the ceasefire when the bullets stop calling the shots?

Twelve killed in shooting at Bondi Beach Hanukkah celebration

hanad

December 14, 2025

12 dead in shooting at Bondi Beach Hanukkah event — A member of the public leaves the scene with her child, who is covered in an emergency blanket

A night at Bondi that began with candles and song — and ended in terror

It was a hot Sydney evening, the kind that smells of sunscreen, salt and seaweed, when thousands drifted toward Bondi for the small joys of summer: an after-work swim, fish and chips eaten on paper, the rhythmic thump of music from a nearby bar.

On the first night of Hanukkah, a community had come together on the sand to celebrate — menorahs glowing, children laughing — a scene that, for many, felt like the very image of a peaceful, multicultural Australia.

Then the night split apart. Gunfire cracked across the beach. People fled with bare feet and sandals trailing behind them; plates were forgotten on picnic blankets. Within minutes, what began as a festival of light became a nightmare of blood and confusion.

What happened

Police later confirmed that at least 11 people were killed and 29 wounded, among them two officers. One suspected shooter was dead at the scene; a second was fighting for life in hospital. Authorities said they were investigating whether a third person took part.

A bomb-disposal team was combing the area after officers discovered several suspected improvised explosive devices. The event — attended by roughly 1,000 people, according to police estimates — collapsed into chaos in what New South Wales officials are treating as an explicitly anti-Semitic and targeted attack against people celebrating Hanukkah.

Heroism in the sand

In the middle of the terror, a single act of courage became a bright point in a dark story. Local shopkeeper Ahmed al-Ahmed — 43 years old, known in the neighborhood for his fruit stall and for teaching his kids to surf at sunrise — saw one of the gunmen raise a rifle.

“I saw him lift the gun, and I just ran,” Ahmed told a reporter later, his voice still hoarse. “I grabbed him from behind. I didn’t think, I just grabbed. I kept pulling until the rifle came away.”

Video that evening showed a bystander grappling with an assailant, wrestling the weapon free — a sequence that dozens of survivors later credited with saving lives. “There are many, many people alive tonight as a result of his bravery,” New South Wales Premier Chris Minns said, calling Ahmed “a genuine hero.” Locals have since been leaving flowers and melons — a nod to his trade — outside his tiny shop on a nearby street.

Voices from the sand

“We thought it was someone laughing with a loudspeaker at first,” said Marcos Carvalho, 38, who had been packing up after a day at the beach when the shots began. “Then I heard a sound like a popcorn machine on high. People screamed, then everyone ran. I left my flip-flops and my phone. I just ran.”

Grace Mathew, a Bondi resident, described the surreal shift from leisure to terror. “At sunset the beach feels like a painting — orange sky, surfers coming in. Within minutes it was ugliness and fear. You don’t expect this here. You don’t expect to tuck your child into bed and wonder if you’ll be next.”

Officials respond — and the wider questions

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese convened the national security council and issued a stark warning about hatred erupting into violence. “Tonight, our nation has watched something evil unfold,” he said in a radio address. “This was a targeted attack on Jewish Australians on a day of celebration. We must stand together against this hatred.”

New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said officers were treating the incident as a deliberate act of anti-Semitic violence and were working to establish any wider networks or accomplices. Australian intelligence chief Mike Burgess confirmed that at least one of the suspected attackers had been known to authorities previously — but had not, until now, been deemed an immediate threat.

“When someone slips under the threshold of concern, the consequences can be catastrophic,” said Dr. Elena Weiss, an expert in radicalization at the University of Melbourne. “It’s a reminder that violent extremism is not some distant thing we study in books — it can manifest suddenly within communities we thought were safe.”

Context: a wave of hatred and a small community shaken

Australia’s Jewish community is relatively small — around 150,000 people in a nation of roughly 27 million — but deeply woven into the country’s cultural and civic fabric. About one in three Australian Jews live in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, the same neighborhoods that string along the city’s beaches and cliff walks.

Since October 2023, when conflict in Gaza escalated, community monitoring groups and police have reported increases in vandalism, threats and attacks against Jewish institutions across Australia. While mass shootings remain exceptionally rare here — the last event on this scale was the Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania in 1996, which claimed 35 lives and forever altered Australia’s gun laws — this attack has shaken the sense of safety many Australians took for granted.

“We have seen a worrying rise in anti-Jewish incidents — graffiti, threats, harassment — over the past year,” said Alex Ryvchin, co-chief executive of a national Jewish community council. “But to be singled out so violently in the open, in broad daylight — that is something else entirely. It’s a scale of cruelty that is hard to fathom.”

International echoes

The attack reverberated beyond Australia. Israel’s prime minister described the killings as “cold-blooded murder” and warned that tensions abroad had a direct impact on communities at home. Religious and civic leaders worldwide, including Muslim and interfaith councils within Australia, issued statements of condemnation, stressing that violence has no place in a pluralist society.

“These acts of violence and crimes have no place in our society,” the Australian National Imams Council said. “Those responsible must be held fully accountable.”

After the smoke clears: questions that remain

Police continue to piece together motive and connections. For now, families mourn, synagogues and community centers are on high alert, and a city famed for sun and surf is learning what it means to grieve in public.

What does safety mean in a world where ancient prejudices can be translated into modern weaponry? How should communities balance vigilance with openness? And when a single person, like Ahmed, stands between strangers and slaughter, what do we owe him — and one another — afterward?

In Bondi in the days ahead, you’ll see memorials on the sand: candles, scarves, hand-written notes from people who came to love this beach not for its surf, but because it held the rhythm of their lives. You will also see questions. Not just of blame or policy, but of the fragile trust that binds a city together. For a country that has long taken pride in its safety, this is a test — of institutions, of neighbours, of the very idea of community.

As investigations continue, as names are released and funerals are planned, one aching truth remains: for the families of the dead and the wounded, Bondi will never again be simply a place of sun and laughter. It will be a scar. And in that scar will be written the obligation to remember why we refuse to let light be snuffed out by hate.

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