Italy to dispatch 500 troops to 'defend Milan' after protests and looting

Italy to dispatch 500 troops to 'defend Milan' after protests and looting

Elisa Anzolin

Italy's government will dispatch 500 army troops to "defend Milan" after two days of unrest that saw demonstrators clash with police, loot shops and vandalise property.

The troop deployment, announced Monday by Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, is expected to form part of a package of security measures to be approved at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

Luxury stores on Milan's Via Montenapoleone cleared their windows Monday and shut early, bracing for a return of the violence that hit the city over the weekend.

Brands including Chanel, Tiffany and Dior took merchandise out of their displays as a precaution while police patrolled the street, where a handful of tourists looked on.

"From words to action: 500 more troops to defend Milan," Salvini, head of the co-ruling right-wing League party, wrote on social media.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who faces a national election next year, condemned the violence. She chaired a meeting with ministers and security chiefs on Monday to discuss the situation.

"The government will respond firmly to these attacks on the state, including through measures aimed at curbing violence by minors," Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who also serves as deputy prime minister like Salvini, wrote on X.

Corriere della Sera newspaper said Meloni was considering extending preventive detention for minors and cracking down on youth gangs as part of the planned crackdown. The measures would bring forward some provisions contained in an existing security bill currently being examined by parliament.

The weekend trouble began as an initially peaceful demonstration on Saturday over poor public services and rising costs. However, several hundred hooded protesters, many believed to be minors, then set bins ablaze and looted shops in the city centre.

Ransacked stores included sports retailers Decathlon and Arc'teryx and mobile phone operator Vodafone. Clothing brands Levi's and Under Armour, as well as Decathlon, covered their shop windows with cardboard and wooden panels in fear of more violence.

The unrest followed clashes on Saturday in Milan and other northern cities including Bologna, Brescia, Bergamo and Turin, where 28 protesters were arrested, according to a police report released on Sunday.

The disturbances echoed unrest in neighbouring France, where hundreds of thousands of people angered by rising living costs and declining public services took to the streets on Saturday in some of the country's most violent protests in years.

Europe Braces For A Winter Energy Crisis As Gas Reserves Run Low

Europe Braces For A Winter Energy Crisis As Gas Reserves Run Low

Felicity Bradstock via OilPrice,

• Europe faces another expensive winter as low gas reserves and Middle East disruptions drive up energy prices. 

• Rising fuel costs threaten household budgets, industrial production, and employment across Europe. 

• Increased U.S. LNG supplies could provide some relief, but continued geopolitical risks leave energy markets vulnerable.A recent forecast by the Item Club suggested that in the United Kingdom, as many as 163,000 jobs could be lost in 2026 in relation to the war, mainly in manufacturing-heavy regions such as South Wales and the Humber region. As one of Europe's biggest gas consumers, the U.K. is highly exposed to trade restrictions, particularly because it has one of the lowest levels of domestic storage capacity, which means it relies heavily on pipeline imports from Europe and tankers from the U.S. and the Middle East. The CEO of British Gas owner Centrica, Chris O'Shea, said in August that Britain had "almost no gas in storage" for the coming winter.

  Both households and businesses across Europe could be hit hard this winter by the continued constraints on oil and gas supplies and high energy prices. This could force consumers to ration their consumption and may prompt the European Commission and governments to intervene to ensure consumers have access to vital energy supplies.

After months of elevated energy prices, Europe can expect fuel costs to continue rising through the winter months as demand grows. Ongoing energy trade constraints and threats to energy infrastructure across the Middle East are expected to limit global energy supplies and continue to drive up prices, hitting consumers hard unless governments intervene.

The European Union (EU) is thought to have paid an additional €100 billion on oil and gas so far this year, prompting EU ministers to seek ways to manage the impact of high fuel prices. Since 2022, the extra costs of energy have surpassed €900 billion, even as total demand has fallen. The price of natural gas in Europe has more than doubled since the outbreak of the U.S.-Israeli-led war in Iran. This winter could be the most challenging in terms of energy supplies and prices since the start of Russia's war on Ukraine and the subsequent sanctions on Russian energy.

Meanwhile, EU energy commissioner Dan Jorgensen has warned that the winter months could be challenging amid "very high" oil and gas prices, although he reassured consumers that no supply issues are expected. Jorgensen also proposed postponing the introduction of rules to reduce methane emissions on energy imports to help ease pressure on European energy markets.

Gas storage has fallen to its lowest level since 2022. In September, across Europe, gas storage stood at around 67 per cent full, compared with a seasonal average of around 80 per cent. Germany, which has the largest storage capacity in Europe, is roughly half full, and is expected to miss its official 80 per cent storage target this year.

Meanwhile, constrained supplies due to strict limits on energy trade through the Strait of Hormuz have sharply driven up energy prices. Oil prices increased by 65 per cent, diesel by 45 per cent, and jet fuel by 112 per cent between September 25, 2025 and 2026. This has led the European Commission to call for consumers to reduce their demand throughout the year to manage supplies.

As Europe heads into its high-demand winter months, there is no end to the war in Iran in sight. In addition, the El Niño weather cycle is expected to add an element of uncertainty to weather trends, which could further complicate the gas demand picture. Threats remain to fuel shipments traversing the Strait of Hormuz, as well as ongoing threats to energy infrastructure across the Middle East. Meanwhile, Houthi attacks in the Red Sea and against pipelines continue to be a concern. Therefore, there are likely to be restrictions on global oil trade well into 2027.

The United States has focused on increasing oil and gas production to help alleviate some of the energy supply chain constraints, but this can only partly fill the gap. Atlantic and Pacific freight rates have returned to pre-Iran war levels, as a larger share of cargoes from the United States is heading to Europe rather than Asia, thereby reducing travel distances and increasing ship availability.

Across Europe, it is not only households that are concerned about their energy bills, as several industries prepare for fuel shortages. Higher fuel prices are driving up operating costs in factories and other facilities, which could lead companies to charge more for manufactured goods, as costs will once again shift to consumers. Meanwhile, companies that cannot secure or afford adequate fuel supplies may be forced to suspend operations in the winter, leading to job cuts.

Franklin Graham: Coming Soon

Franklin Graham: Jesus Is Coming Back… And It’s Not Going To Be Far Down The Road

Breanna Claussen

During a lengthy sit-down interview with Fox News Sean Hannity, evangelist Franklin Graham boldly detailed to a largely secular podcast audience the list of extraordinary evidence showcasing that our world is living in the season of Jesus’ return.

Hannity, who subscribes to Roman Catholicism, softly noted his skepticism, telling the son of the late Billy Graham that he finds Revelation “the most difficult book of the Bible to understand” and “scary.”

“You once said to me that you think the end times are at hand,” Hannity began, “but didn’t the apostles think that?”

With this, Graham had an open door he didn’t let go to waste, unraveling a remarkable list of characteristics pointing to Jesus’ soon return, including growing enthusiasm for globalization, socialism, and antisemitism, as well as the startling emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

“John wrote the book of Revelation. In chapter [13], he speaks about a one-world system,” Graham emphasized. “George H. Bush talked about the ‘new world order.’ Both the Republicans and Democrats have been focused on this path towards globalization—a one-world system. 30 years ago, [people asked] how’s that gonna happen? Today, with AI, with supercomputers, and this push for globalization… It’s coming, Sean.”

The rise of socialism in the United States and across the West also plays a significant role, according to the evangelist, who highlighted that the future “one-world system” detailed in the Book of Revelation has an overt similarity to communism.

“The Communist Party was strong and very powerful in this country, especially with the trade unions in the 30s,” he described. “World War II comes along, and then at the end of the Second World War, you have the McCarthy hearings, and all of a sudden, it just went quiet. Where did all these people go? They went underground. They got into your universities; they got into the media. Very smart. Now here we are, 70 years past World War II, and segments of our country are embracing socialism.”

“Well, I believe, Sean, what’s happening is we’re seeing God moving the players, the pieces on this big chessboard [approaching] the return of His Son,” Graham underscored, before diving further into what the Bible says is coming.

“There is going to be a one-world system. There is going to be the Antichrist. You won’t be able to buy, sell, or trade without his mark,” he noted. “It’s going to be on the forehead or on the right hand. If you don’t have that mark, you can’t go to the hospital. You can’t go to the grocery store. You can’t buy gasoline. You can’t pay your rent.”

Graham reminded Hannity that this Antichrist system has bewildered readers of Revelation for thousands of years—but not anymore.

“It’s called the ‘mark of the beast,’ and the Bible says it’s ‘666.’ It’s numerical. What is a computer? It’s numerical,” he explained. “Even 30-40 years ago, we wondered how that was going to work. Today, that can happen. They already in Europe have been testing a computer chip under the skin that you can actually do your banking through and so forth. 30 years ago, the technology wasn’t there. It is here today. We know that in the end times, the monetary system of the world is going to be controlled by one entity, one source, one person.”

The danger of this technology isn’t going unnoticed, Graham added.

“People within AI are warning that it could be the ‘end of mankind’—this isn’t some preacher saying that,” he stated. “They could control the pathogens, they could take over the computers that control the nuclear weapons, and all of these things that could be unleashed. It’s frightened them.”

There is another hope and promise—routinely forgotten—from God’s Word: the Blessed Hope of the rapture of the church and the assurance that Jesus Christ will transform the world at His coming.

“[Revelation is] the final picture of God’s judgment against the world for rejecting his son, Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches that those that are saved will be taken out, and then God’s judgment is coming [during the seven-year Tribulation period].”

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Terry James: Anomalous End-times Signs Above

Anomalous End-times Signs Above

Terry James

My novel, The Rapture Dialogues, was accepted and published under the imprint called Anomalous. It was a story about UFOs and the crash in Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947. At least the story started there with the strange goings on that still have even the UFO experts of today wondering about exactly what took place at that time.

The government’s dealing with that long-past occurrence and the very latest incidents involving strange goings on in the dark heavens above have emerged to dominate headlines today. And they are no longer called UFOs (unidentified flying objects) but are now termed UAPs (unidentified anomalous phenomena).

My novel came out many years ago before the renaming from UFOs to UAPs. So, does that make me a prophet? Or my publisher an oracle?

Well, no, but my publisher and myself did agree that UFOs were anomalous matters, in that their true nature, although unknown by even the scientists of the world, was, we believe, made known by God’s Word. And Jesus Christ, who is the Word (John 1: 1), gave what I believe is the foretelling of just such anomalous phenomena for the wrap up of the Age of Grace.

The Lord prophesied the following in answering His disciples’ question: “What will be the sign of your coming, and of the end of the age?

And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars…(Luke 21:25a)

Jesus was saying there would be unmistakable signals to look for when the time for the wind-up of the Church Age arrived. Those watching as instructed in Mark 13: 37 and Luke 21:28 will know that these signs in the heavens will alert that Jesus is about to return as He promised (John 14:2–3).

Evidence mounts that we have reached the time Jesus spoke about. And it is this particular signal we will examine in this commentary.

Could unidentified anomalous phenomena — a new catch-all term for unidentified objects in the sky, oceans or space — be pushing the United States towards another “Sputnik Moment”?

That’s the belief of NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, who compared the uptick in reported unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP) sightings in recent years to the Cold War paranoia stirred up when the former Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to circle Earth in 1957.

Isaacman made the comments in a recent interview with Blake Burman, host of NewsNation’s “The Hill” broadcast on Sept. 25 that touched upon a range of space-related issues. And one of those was probing the space agency chief about he thinks UAP might be.

Burman made note of pilot reports and videos released of objects with flight characteristics unlike anything previously seen.

“When you watch these videos,” Burman asked Isaacman, “do you believe that anything that we’ve seen in any of this is potentially extraterrestrial. Is it military? What is it?”

Isaacman said that NASA has had “a seat at the table” since U.S. President Donald Trump earlier this year called for releasing Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) and UAP files. That call is now officially known as the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters (PURSUE).

“My position going into every one of these: one, be open-minded. I mean, it is kind of our job to go out and try to answer the question ‘are we alone?’” (“NASA chief Jared Isaacman wants to stay ‘open-minded’ about UFOs: ‘If it’s aliens, I think NASA should have a seat at the table’,” by Leonard David, SPACE, RR News October 6, 2026)

In answer to the “experts” here: We are not alone. Again, here is what God’s Word says through the Apostle Paul:

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. (Ephesians 6:12)

The dark forces of the evil one are indeed in the high places, and I believe they are manifesting against the black backdrop of deep space.

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IDF chief puts military on highest alert, orders leave freeze, ahead of Oct. 27 vote

IDF chief puts military on highest alert, orders leave freeze, ahead of Oct. 27 vote

Emanuel Fabian

Lazar Berman

Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir placed the military on its “highest state of alert” ahead of next week’s election and canceled soldiers’ leave, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israel’s enemies not to test the country.

Zamir held an assessment Monday morning with senior officers, during which he “stressed that the IDF’s mission is to enable the democratic elections to take place on schedule and safely,” according to a statement.

He said the military is “on the highest state of alert and will continue to maintain a high level of vigilance and readiness across all fronts” in the coming period, ahead of the October 27 vote.

Zamir ordered a leave freeze across IDF units starting Thursday, requiring soldiers to remain on base instead of taking planned leave, “subject to ongoing situational assessments.”

He also instructed the military to have more senior officers present in command centers “to ensure operational readiness and capability.”

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israel’s enemies not to test the country’s resolve during a visit to an unnamed Israeli Air Force base Monday.

“I say to our enemies: Do not test us,” Netanyahu said in a video released by his office. “You will suffer harder blows than you have suffered until now.”

He emphasized the air force’s “readiness, determination and capability to strike our enemies whenever required.”

“We are determined to defend ourselves,” Netanyahu added. “Do not test us.”