🗳 🇧🇷 📊 Brazil (Presidential Election, second round), 72.8% counted:

Lula (PT, centre-left): 51.0% (+0.5)
F. Bolsonaro (PL, right): 49.0% (-0.5)

(+/- vs 60.9% counted)

📎 America Elects

🗳 🇧🇷 📊 Brazil (Presidential Election, second round), 81.2% counted:

Lula (PT, centre-left): 51.3% (+0.3)
F. Bolsonaro (PL, right): 48.7% (-0.3)

(+/- vs 72.8% counted)

📎 America Elects

🇧🇷🤡⭐ — President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s (PT) campaign is already celebrating the election results.

🗳 🇧🇷 📊 Brazil (Presidential Election, second round), 90.9% counted:

Lula (PT, centre-left): 51.6% (+0.3)
F. Bolsonaro (PL, right): 48.4% (-0.3)

(+/- vs 81.2% counted)

📎 America Elects

🇧🇷⚖️✔️🤡 — URGENT: THE SUPERIOR ELECTORAL COURT (TSE) CONFIRMS PRESIDENT LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA’S (PT) VICTORY IN BRAZIL’S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

🗳 🇧🇷 📊 Brazil (Presidential Election, second round), 99.7% counted:

Lula (PT, centre-left): 51.8% (+0.2)
F. Bolsonaro (PL, right): 48.2% (-0.2)

(+/- vs 90.7% counted)

📎 America Elects

Brazil 🇧🇷 - By State

🇧🇷 FLÁVIO BOLSONARO (PL)
🔵 Rio Grande do Sul
🔵 Santa Catarina
🔵 Paraná
🔵 São Paulo
🔵 Rio de Janeiro
🔵 Espírito Santo
🔵 Minas Gerais
🔵 Mato Grosso do Sul
🔵 Mato Grosso
🔵 Rondônia
🔵 Acre
🔵 Roraima
🔵 Tocantins
🔵 Goiás
🔵 Brasília

🇧🇷 LULA DA SILVA (PT)
🔴 Amazonas
🔴 Pará
🔴 Amapá
🔴 Ceará
🔴 Piauí
🔴 Maranhão
🔴 Bahia
🔴 Rio Grande do Norte
🔴 Pernambuco
🔴 Paraíba
🔴 Alagoas
🔴 Sergipe

🇫🇷🗳 France's Le Pen launches presidential bid as protests rattle the nation

"We are not living through the end of the world but the end of a world, their world," she said of her political ​opponents.

Le Pen chose to make her first campaign address in Orléans, home to Joan of Arc, the 15th-century warrior ​heroine revered by nationalists as a symbol of patriotism and sovereignty.

Addressing a crowd of cheering supporters, she ⁠promised "zero tolerance" policing and said restoring security was the state's first duty.

Seeking to ​project optimism, Le Pen built her speech around the theme of a national "Renaissance". She said France was living through a period ​of upheaval but would emerge stronger if it embraced her vision of security, prosperity and renewal.

"We say: 'Things were good before, they will be better ‌tomorrow!'," ⁠she said.

Le Pen promised a hard line on immigration, pledging to restore border controls, automatically expel foreign criminals and crack down on gangs and drug traffickers.

Le Pen herself could have to campaign wearing an ankle tag after she was convicted of embezzling European Parliament funds. She is appealing the court verdict.

On the economy, Le Pen pledged spending restraint, lower business taxes, reduced bureaucracy and support for ​industry, innovation and artificial intelligence. She ​rejected further increases in the ⁠retirement age.

The congress was designed to showcase unity at the top of the National Rally party, with Jordan Bardella re-elected party president and presented as Le Pen's choice for prime minister.

Bardella's speech ​was interrupted by activists from a Jewish student union, drawing attention to recent accusations he ​made antisemitic comments in ⁠his youth, which he denies.

On Europe, Le Pen stopped short of advocating ⁠a French ​exit from the European Union, but said she would roll back Brussels' ​influence, restore national control over borders and laws, and put French interests first, including avoiding foreign wars.

🔗 https://www.reuters.com/world/frances-le-pen-launches-presidential-bid-protests-rattle-nation-2026-10-25/

🇪🇬🇸🇦🇾🇪⚡️ — NEW: Egypt’s parliament has authorized the military to provide support to Saudi Arabia amid escalating Houthi (Ansarallah) attacks on the kingdom.

Egypt’s potential involvement is limited to defending Saudi territory and borders, ruling out any offensive operations in or against Yemen.

🇺🇸⚔️🇮🇷 US forces in the Middle East are prepared to launch new, potentially major, military operations against Iran “within 96 hours of receiving” an order from President Donald Trump, according to two US officials.

Sufficient forces are now deployed in the region to carry out the potential attacks, the sources said. The scope of new US military operations would likely go beyond efforts to simply “mow the lawn” or maintain the status quo by striking radars, launchers and other Iranian assets that can be quickly reconstituted — as has been the case since Trump halted full combat operations earlier this year, the sources added.

“It will be a big effort,” one of the officials told CNN. That view has been echoed by other current and former US officials familiar with internal military planning discussions — some of whom say it is a question of when, not if, Trump will issue a go-order. They believe it could come any time before the end of the year, though most likely after the US midterm elections.

Iranian forces are now more familiar with US tactics, and it would therefore be harder for the American military to effectively destroy all potential intended targets. However, leaders in US Central Command and the Pentagon have been developing a wide-ranging target list, which includes Iranian energy infrastructure, military sites and nuclear facilities.

Officials say that Trump has not made up his mind on what he will do after the midterms but that he appears to be leaning toward ordering major action. But officials also caution that Trump has appeared in the past to lean toward certain actions only to back off at the last moment.

US intelligence officials believe Iran and the Houthis are unlikely to carry out preemptive escalatory attacks against American personnel or Israel at this point but would not hesitate to respond if Iran is targeted first by US or Israeli forces, one of the sources familiar with the latest American intelligence assessments noted.

Additionally, nonessential US military personnel who were expected to deploy to the Middle East as part of the next troop rotation have been told they are no longer being sent, according to a US official, underscoring the possibility of looming regional escalation.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been pushing to carry out new attacks against Iran, but US officials have requested he delay until the Trump administration is ready to conduct joint operations, according to two US officials and an Israeli security source.

“Netanyahu really wanted and tried to convince Trump for a joint attack in Iran before the elections, and Trump did not give a green light,” the Israeli security source told CNN. The prime minister’s office said this was “fake news.”

One reason Trump declined is because Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Eyal Zamir told US Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, that it would harm the elections in Israel and lead to their postponement, the Israeli security source added.

Israel’s Channel 12 News reported Sunday there was an “unprecedented” confrontation between Zamir and Netanyahu fewer than 48 hours before Tuesday’s vote. According to the report, Zamir received a directive from the political echelon related to Iran but requested an in-depth discussion and legal authorizations before carrying it out, fearing the action could lead to a miscalculation that could trigger an immediate conflict.

🔗 https://edition.cnn.com/2026/10/26/politics/us-iran-strike-plans-trump

🇮🇷🇸🇦🇹🇷🇵🇰 Deputy SNSC Secretary Ali Bagheri:

Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman, Pakistan Army Chief Asim Munir, and Turkish Intelligence Chief Ibrahim Kalin will visit Tehran for a joint meeting with SNSC Secretary Mohsen Rezaei and to advance endogenous regional security.

🔗 Iran Nuances (@IranNuances)

🇸🇦⚔️🇮🇷🇾🇪 Saudi journalist and correspondent for Arab News, Hamdan al-Shehri, says the visit of the Saudi defense minister, Turkish intelligence chief and Chief of the Pakistani Army to Tehran represents a "final collective warning" from the Mecca Alliance that in the event of renewed US-Israeli bombings on Iran, if Iran decides to attack the KSA, the Royal Saudi Air Force will not sit idle and responds to Iranian missile strikes.

The meeting between the representatives of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan and Iranian officials is currently underway.

🔗 Hamdan Shehri