World News
A leading human rights group has condemned Hungary’s decision to place state-run youth detention centers under police oversight after abuse scandals triggered calls for Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s resignation.
Growing frictions between the United States and its European allies emerged Thursday after tense conversations over how to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War Two, the ongoing war in Ukraine.
European Union health authorities have warned that “changing diets and an aging population” may contribute to a rise in serious and sometimes deadly Listeria infections across the continent.
Thailand and Cambodia rushed reinforcements to their shared frontier Wednesday as artillery exchanges and air strikes shattered a fragile ceasefire, forcing thousands of residents on both sides of the border to flee. The crisis raised fears of a widening conflict in one of Southeast Asia’s most volatile regions and impacted churches.
The Czech Republic, regarded as one of Europe’s most atheist nations, was preparing for a new government Wednesday after a Trump-style billionaire was appointed as its new prime minister amid ongoing scrutiny from the European Union.
The United States has seized a large crude tanker used to transport sanctioned oil from both Venezuela and Iran, a dramatic enforcement action that immediately raised oil prices and heightened tensions with the Maduro regime.
South Africa’s authorities have released new details about a mass shooting that killed 12 people, including children, at an unlicensed bar near the administrative capital Pretoria.
Britain is facing calls for stronger safeguards on the planned use of facial recognition cameras across the country after the Home Office admitted the system is more likely to incorrectly identify black and Asian people than their white counterparts.
Indonesia’s capital was plunged into mourning late Tuesday after at least 22 people, including a pregnant woman, were confirmed dead when a massive fire swept through a seven-story office building in central Jakarta.
A magnitude 7.6 earthquake centered in the Pacific Ocean some 45 miles west of Misawa, Japan, shook the northern region of the archipelago around 11:26 p.m. local time.
Israel News
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on December 7 that the U.S.-brokered cease-fire between Israel and Hamas is close to completing its first stage and is expected to transition soon into a “more difficult” second phase centered on disarming Hamas and demilitarizing the Gaza Strip.
Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal on Saturday again called for Israel’s destruction, publicly rejecting U.S.- and U.N.-backed demands that the Iranian-supported terror group disarm and accept a demilitarized Gaza under the terms of President Donald Trump’s ceasefire and transition plan.
US President Donald Trump is preparing to unveil Gaza’s long-awaited “Board of Peace” and formally announce the transition to phase two of Washington’s Gaza stabilization plan within the next three weeks, Axios and additional US and regional officials said Thursday. The move would mark the most significant diplomatic step since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect nearly two months ago.
Newly released Hamas Interior Ministry documents—seized by the Israel Defense Forces and analyzed by NGO Monitor—reveal the extent to which Hamas infiltrated and controlled foreign aid organizations operating in Gaza. Spanning 2018–2022, these Arabic-language files describe an “institutionalized framework of coercion, intimidation, and surveillance” that allowed Hamas to shape humanitarian work, manipulate international NGOs, and exploit aid systems for intelligence and military gain. NGO Monitor president Gerald Steinberg said the level of penetration “was far beyond the scope of our expectations.”
U.S. President Donald Trump said Wednesday that phase two of his Gaza peace plan is “moving along well” and will begin “pretty soon,” even as Hamas breached the ceasefire hours earlier in Rafah, wounding six Israeli soldiers.
Israel formally delivered its Arrow-3 long-range missile defense system to the German Air Force on Wednesday, completing a landmark $4.6 billion deal — the largest defense export agreement in Israel’s history and the first time the cutting-edge system has ever been deployed by a nation outside Israel or the United States.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israel is prepared to reach a diplomatic arrangement with Syria’s new regime, but only under conditions that firmly protect Israel’s security and prevent the rise of new threats along its northern border.
U.S. News
The man accused of assassinating born-again Christian activist Charlie Kirk, the founder of the Turning Point USA movement, was to make his first in-person court appearance Thursday, nearly three months after he was taken into custody.
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday approved its third consecutive interest rate cut, lowering the benchmark federal-funds rate by a quarter percentage point to a range of 3.5% to 3.75%, the lowest level since early 2022. But the decision—passed in a 9–3 vote, the most divided in six years—exposed unusually sharp disagreements over the path forward as policymakers wrestle with a slowing labor market and stubborn inflation.
In a major victory for religious liberty and parental rights, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday reversed a lower court ruling that had upheld New York State’s strict vaccine mandates for schoolchildren, directing the appeals court to reconsider the case under newly strengthened constitutional protections.
A Hindu nonprofit organization is moving forward with plans to construct a massive 155-foot Hindu idol of Lord Murugan in rural Chatham County—an enormous structure that, once completed, would stand taller than the Statue of Liberty’s figure.
President Donald Trump on Monday unveiled a $12 billion bailout package aimed at supporting U.S. farmers who have absorbed the brunt of global market disruptions and retaliatory tariffs stemming from the administration’s ongoing trade war with China.
Federal agencies have canceled or significantly scaled back 43 wasteful government contracts worth a combined ceiling value of $3.5 billion, saving taxpayers $222 million, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) announced in a Dec. 6 post on X.
Following the assassination of Charlie Kirk, half of the nation’s college students report feeling less comfortable attending controversial public events on campus and nearly half are less comfortable voicing opinions on controversial subjects in class.
Christian News
A young Christian woman who was allegedly abducted and forced to marry and convert to Islam appeared before a Pakistani court after her parents raised urgent concerns, Christians told Worthy News on Sunday.
Concern remained Sunday over the mistreatment of impoverished Christian laborers in Pakistan, with at least one sanitary worker suffering head injuries after being beaten in recent days by his Muslim supervisors.
Four Christian brick-kiln workers have been abducted in Pakistan’s Punjab province after demanding the payment of their lawful wages from their Muslim employer, investigators told Worthy News Wednesday.
Desperate parents in northwest Nigeria were still missing their children Monday as the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) confirmed that suspected Islamic gunmen kidnapped at least 303 students and 12 teachers at a Catholic school — the nation’s largest such attack in more than a year.
In one of the most sweeping crackdowns on underground Christianity in recent years, Chinese authorities have formally arrested 18 leaders of the Beijing Zion Church, according to the Christian rights organization ChinaAid. The arrests finalize detentions that began in early October as part of a multi-province operation targeting unregistered Christian groups.
At least scores of students were abducted from a Catholic mission school in Nigeria’s troubled North Central region early Friday, just days after gunmen attacked a church, killing two people and taking dozens of worshippers hostage, officials and witnesses said.
A new investigation shows threats, violence, and arson attacks targeting Christians in Europe grew significantly more severe over the last year, highlighting mounting concerns about the spread of radical Islam and anti-Christian sentiments across the continent.