https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Current_events
Updated every hour.
Last update: 2024-12-17 17:06:03
• Russo-Ukrainian War
□ Russian Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, head of the NBC Protection
Troops, and his assistant are assassinated in an e-scooter-laden IED
attack in Moscow. Ukraine claims responsibility for the killings. (BBC
News)
• Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
□ Two police officers are killed and three more wounded after a mass
shooting at a security checkpoint in Shangla District, Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. (AP)
• 2024–25 South-West Indian Ocean cyclone season
□ The death toll in Mozambique from Cyclone Chido climbs to 34, with
23,600 homes destroyed in the country. (DW)
• 2024 Port Vila earthquake
□ A 7.4 magnitude earthquake strikes Vanuatu's capital Port Vila
prompting a tsunami warning to be issued. At least 14 people are killed
and over 200 injured. (RNZ)
• Syrian civil war
□ 2024 Israeli invasion of Syria
☆ The Cabinet of Israel approves a plan proposing to double the
occupied Golan Heights regional Israeli settlers population. (BBC
News)
☆ Heavy overnight Israeli airstrikes are reported in Tartus
Governorate, Syria. (The Times of Israel)
□ Fall of the Assad regime
☆ A recently created mass grave containing the bodies of 17 executed
Syrian Army soldiers is discovered in the Syrian Desert near Deir
ez-Zor. (SOHR)
☆ In his first public statement since being overthrown, former Syrian
president Bashar al-Assad says that he "didn't intend to leave
Syria", claiming that he went to Khmeimim Air Base in Latakia
Governorate to "oversee combat operations" only to find that the
Syrian Army had abandoned their positions and surrendered to rebel
forces. Amid "an intensified attack by drone strikes" at the air
base, Assad says that Russia decided to airlift him to Moscow. (BBC
News)
□ Sectarianism and minorities in the Syrian civil war
☆ The brother of the Imam of the Great Prophet Mosque of Masyaf is
assassinated by unidentified gunmen, Hama Governorate, in a
potential revenge operation, due to the Imam being associated with
Hezbollah and other Iranian- and Shia-associated militias. (SOHR)
• Israel–Hamas war
□ The Gaza Health Ministry announces that the death toll in the ongoing
war has surpassed 45,000. (Al Jazeera)
• 2024 Australia heat wave
□ Walpeup, Victoria, Australia, reports a temperature of 47.1 °C
(116.8 °F), the hottest temperature reported in the state since 2019.
Extreme heat wave warnings and fire risk warnings are are also issued
for areas across Australia. (The Guardian) (ABC News Australia)
• 2024 New Jersey drone sightings
□ U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas calls for state
National Guards to be given the authority to shoot down unidentified
drones, saying that the federal government is not able to address the
issue by themselves. (The Telegraph)
□ U.S. officials say that a drone detection system is being deployed in
New York following a formal request by Governor Kathy Hochul. (BBC
News)
□ The United States Air Force confirms that Wright-Patterson Air Force
Base in Ohio had to temporarily suspend air operations for four hours
on Friday and Saturday after the airbase reported sightings of
unidentified "small unmanned aerial systems". (CNN)
□ President-elect Donald Trump cancels a planned visit to Trump National
Golf Club Bedminster in New Jersey amid drone sightings in the state.
Trump also calls on outgoing President Joe Biden and the U.S. military
to reveal the truth about the drones, saying that "the government knows
what's happening" and that they know where the drones are coming from.
(The Times of India)
• Abundant Life Christian School shooting
□ Two people are killed and six others are injured in a mass shooting at
the Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin, United States
. The perpetrator is found dead at the scene. (CNN)
• Bolivian prosecutors issue an arrest warrant for former President Evo
Morales in connection to sexual abuse allegations that he fathered a child
with a 15-year-old girl, a claim he denies. (AP)
• 2024 German government crisis, 2025 German federal election
□ German Chancellor Olaf Scholz loses a vote of confidence, thereby
allowing for early elections to be held on February 23. (BBC News)
• Resignation of Chrystia Freeland
□ Chrystia Freeland resigns as Canada's Deputy Prime Minister and
Minister of Finance amid disagreements with Prime Minister Justin
Trudeau on increased government spending and how to handle possible
U.S. tariffs imposed by the incoming Trump administration. (Reuters)
• President of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov announces that he has dismissed
Akylbek Japarov as Prime Minister. (Reuters)
• Israel–Hamas war
□ December 2024 Nuseirat refugee camp attack
☆ Al Jazeera cameraman Ahmad Al-Louh is killed in an Israeli
airstrike on a civil defense point in the Nuseirat refugee camp in
central Gaza Strip. (WAFA) (anews)
• Syrian civil war
□ 2024 Israeli invasion of Syria
☆ Israeli Air Force fighter jets strike missile and weapon depots in
Tartus Governorate, Syria, with the Syrian Observatory for Human
Rights describing the strikes as the heaviest in the region since
the start of the civil war. (AFP via Barron's)
• Free trade agreements of the United Kingdom
□ The United Kingdom joins the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement
for Trans-Pacific Partnership, becoming the 12th member and the first
European member. (Reuters)
• 2024–25 South-West Indian Ocean cyclone season
□ Thousands of people are believed to have been killed by Cyclone Chido
in the French overseas department of Mayotte, with the cyclone also
causing damage in the Comoros and Mozambique. (The Independent)
• 2024 Kerch Strait oil spill
□ At least one person is killed when two Russian oil tankers,
Volgoneft-212 and Volgoneft-236, are damaged due to bad weather in the
Kerch Strait with oil from the tankers actively leaking into the
strait. (NOS) (CNN)
• Australia–Indonesia relations
□ Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announces that the remaining
five members of the Bali Nine drug-trafficking group, who were serving
life sentences in Indonesia, have returned to Australia following an
agreement between the two countries to end their imprisonment. (CNN)
• Ireland–Israel relations
□ Israel announces that it will close its embassy in Dublin, Ireland,
over Ireland's alleged "extreme anti-Israel policies". (Reuters)
• 2024 New Jersey drone sightings
□ White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby says that
the United States Coast Guard has confirmed that there is no evidence
of any "foreign-based involvement" in the unidentified drones that are
being sighted over the Northeastern United States. (The Times of India
via MSN)
• ABC News settles a defamation lawsuit filed by U.S. President-elect Donald
Trump over statements made on air by anchor George Stephanopoulos about the
E. Jean Carroll v. Donald J. Trump lawsuits, with ABC agreeing to pay $15
million to the Trump presidential library as well as $1 million for legal
fees. (AP)