West Bank
About 80 Israeli settlers have attacked Palestinians harvesting olives in the occupied West Bank, beating people with clubs, using slingshots to hurl rocks and viciously assaulting a 64-year-old American journalist, who a group of men kicked and pummeled with sticks as she lay on the ground. A Reuters photographer also saw at least one settler fire a gun. The settlers, dressed in black with their faces masked, descended from a hill above a terraced olive grove where people from the Abu Falah village had gathered to pick the fruit, a cherished tradition of Palestinian life and a vital economic lifeline. Several of the settlers carried gas canisters, according to Reuters, and olive trees were set ablaze. The Israeli army arrived as the attack was underway but did not stop it. Instead, soldiers fired tear gas and live ammunition at Palestinians who had fled down the hill and picked up rocks to defend themselves. One Palestinian man was shot in the thigh by the soldiers, journalists on the scene reported. Speaking from a hospital bed, Washington Post photographer Heidi Levine, visibly distraught, said she was kicked at least 50 times on the ground, as well as clubbed, and that she feared she would be dead if she hadn’t been wearing a helmet and flak jacket. Settler attacks on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have rocketed since the beginning of the harvest, with at least 170 reported since September 27.
More from Reuters here.
DR Congo
More than $700 million in funds intended to fight the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are unaccounted for, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said today. Speaking at a press conference in Kinshasa, Africa CDC Director-General Dr. Jean Kaseya said $962 million was disbursed to organizations leading the Ebola response in DRC but that a joint verification exercise with Congolese authorities could only trace just over $200 million. Kaseya said it was too early to speak of embezzlement but that it was clear there was a problem with transparency and financial reporting. The number of confirmed Ebola cases in what is the fastest-growing outbreak on record has passed 9,000, according to new figures, and 4,381 people have died.
More from Africa News here.
India
The founder of India’s cockroach political movement was detained ahead of a planned protest in Delhi as ongoing youth-led demonstrations continue to pose one of the biggest challenges to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his 12 years of power. Abhijeet Dipke’s “preventive” detention came after police banned the protest and thousands of security personnel flooded the center of the capital to prevent it. Dipke's Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) has, alongside several opposition parties, been marching to demand the resignation of India's election chief over a revision of voter lists they say favors Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. Two other CJP leaders were arrested this week and jailed for five days for defying a separate protest ban. The cockroach movement has emerged as a significant youth-led force since successfully forcing the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan earlier this year over persistent exam paper leaks.
More from BBC here.