In less than nine months, Israel has demolished more Palestinian homes and structures in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, over building permits than in the whole of last year, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) on 1 October 2025 said.
Caption: Eighty-six Palestinian structures have already been demolished this year in Khallet Athaba, Masafer Yatta, under Israel’s permit regime. Photo: Ahmad Al-Bazz/NRC
By 30 September, Israeli authorities had demolished 1,288 structures over building permits, nearly five a day, including 138 funded by international aid.
(UN News)* — UN aid teams on Friday [3 October 2025] highlighted the disturbing situation in Gaza’s makeshift hospitals, where premature babies cry for scant oxygen and medics attempt to save child survivors targeted by airstrikes in their tents and quadcopter victims reportedly shot while fetching bread.
Speaking from the war-shattered enclave amid the ongoing Israeli military push to take full control of Gaza City, UNICEF spokesperson James Elder described one short visit to a hospital where youngsters were either suffering or dying everywhere he looked.
This is a summary of what was said by UNHCR Representative in South Sudan, Marie-Helene Verney – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at 12 September 2025 press briefing at the Palais des Nations in Geneva.
South Sudan has been swept into a new cycle of severe flooding, just as renewed conflict threatens a fragile peace, leaving communities in some of the country’s most flood- and conflict-prone states exposed to a double crisis, warns UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency.
18 September 2025 —The water cycle has become increasingly erratic and extreme, swinging between deluge and drought, according to a new report from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). It highlights the cascading impacts of too much or too little water on economies and society.
The State of Global Water Resources report says only about one-third of the global river basins had “normal” conditions in 2024. The rest were either above or below normal – the sixth consecutive year of clear imbalance.
2024 was the third straight year with widespread glacier loss across all regions.
LONDON, Sep 26 2025 (IPS)** ––As the high-level opening week of the UN General Assembly unfolds, with heads of states delivering often self-serving speeches from the UN’s podium, the organisation is undergoing one of its worst set of crises since its founding 80 years ago.
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A view of the podium and the United Nations emblem in the General Assembly Hall. Credit: UN Photo/Loey Felipe
This year’s General Assembly – ostensibly focused on development, human rights and peace – comes as wars are raging across multiple continents, climate targets are dangerously being missed and the institution designed to address these global challenges is being hollowed out by funding cuts and political withdrawals.
24 September 2025 — Climate experts have found that countries are planning twice as much fossil fuel production as is compatible with global climate commitments.
The 2025 Production Gap Report, co-authored by the Stockholm Environment Institute, Climate Analytics, and the International Institute for Sustainable Development, found that these plans put at risk the goal of limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The experts analyzed 20 major fossil fuel-producing countries that together account for over 80 percent of global fossil fuel production.
PORTLAND, USA, Sep 23 2025 (IPS)** ––Despite anxieties, concerns, and warnings, androids or humanoid robots that rely on generative artificial intelligence (GAI) and advanced robotics are increasingly being integrated into the modern lives of human populations.
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As androids edge closer to reshaping how we work, interact, and manage conflict and resources, the absence of clear regulations leaves human rights, jobs, and social bonds unprotected. Credit: Shutterstock
This integration raises serious challenges regarding humanity’s future in an era where androids are emerging rapidly.
Some have expressed concerns that GAI and robots are embedding and intensifying existing societal biases, stereotypes, misogyny, and discrimination in the development of these new technologies.
Soon, androids are expected to change the nature of work, social interactions, conflict resolution, and resource management.
(UN News)* —Artificial intelligence holds vast potential but poses grave risks if left unregulated, UN Secretary-General António Guterres told the Security Council on Wednesday [24 September 2025].
Unsplash/Chris Yang | AI can help prevent crises and drive progress – but without guardrails, it risks fueling conflict, disinformation and instability.
“AI is no longer a distant horizon – it is here, , transforming daily life, the information space, and the global economy at breathtaking speed,” Mr. Guterres said at the Council’s high-level debate on the technology’s security implications for transforming warfare
“The question is not whether AI will influence international peace and security, but how we will shape that influence.”
(UN News)* — The explosive growth of AI tools around the world has yet to be matched by effective, internationally agreed rules on how this powerful technology is governed.
AUDIO AND SUBSCRIPTION
UN News/Anton Uspensky | AI for Good Summit 2024, Geneva
A high-profile event at UN Headquarters on Thursday [] is designed to bring effective global AI governance a step closer to reality.
Investment, optimism and anxiety: these are three of the big drivers of interest in artificial intelligence and its implications.
Because the challenges and opportunities are global, the responses also need to be far more comprehensive than the fragmented and siloed solutions that have been enacted thus far:
“If anyone hears my voice, I say: enough. We have seen death a million times. We have been displaced, killed, lost everything, lost our loved ones. No human can take this. Your child tells you they are hungry, and you cannot give them anything.”
Photo: NRC
These words belong to Eman Muqbel, site management coordinator for the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) in Gaza. She and her family are among hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living under bombardment in Gaza City and being forced to flee their homes.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 