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Iran Hails US Midterm Result as Vote Against War While Khamenei Warns Hostility Won’t End: November 4, 2026

Iranian officials on Wednesday welcomed the Democratic sweep in the US midterm elections as a rejection of the war with Iran, even as Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei warned that anyone expecting a change in Washington’s policy was “seriously mistaken.”

Parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s chief negotiator with the United States, wrote on X that Americans had said “NO TO WAR.”

Mohammad Mokhber, an adviser to the supreme leader, said Trump had been “slapped in the face by his own people.” Khamenei’s written message marked Iran’s annual day commemorating the 1979 seizure of the US embassy in Tehran.

Also on Wednesday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said four oil tankers caught fire after hitting naval mines in the Strait of Hormuz, the BBC reported citing the semi-official Tasnim news agency. An adviser to the IRGC commander named the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain as possible targets if Gulf states let Washington launch attacks from their territory.

Trump has warned that the US and Israel could return to all-out war after the midterms if no deal to end the conflict is reached.

Sources: Al Jazeera, BBC News

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Democrats Win Control of House and Senate in Midterm Rebuke to Trump: November 4, 2026

Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress in Tuesday’s midterm elections, a sweeping rebuke of President Donald Trump that will hand the opposition the power to check his agenda for the final two years of his term.

Democrats flipped at least seven Republican-held Senate seats, in Kansas, Iowa, Texas, Ohio, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina, while holding on in Georgia and Michigan, according to the Associated Press. They also flipped more than two dozen House districts.

By Wednesday, Democrats had won 228 House seats and were leading in 34 more, while in the Senate they had won 54 seats to 44 for Republicans, Al Jazeera reported citing the AP tally. It is the first time in 20 years that a Republican president has lost both houses of Congress, after George W. Bush in 2006.

The results include several firsts. Abdul El-Sayed’s win in Michigan makes him the first Muslim senator, Juliana Stratton’s victory in Illinois means three Black women will serve in the Senate at the same time, and former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms became the first Black woman elected governor in the US, in Georgia.

Trump acknowledged the war with Iran had weighed on his party. “I think a part of it was Iran,” he told Fox News, adding that voters “really probably weren’t willing to do the short term consequences of paying more for gasoline.”

Sources: Associated Press, Al Jazeera, NPR

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World Brief, Evening: November 3, 2026

Democrats take the House, and the Senate is suddenly in play after upsets in North Carolina and South Carolina. Trump says the US is “locked and loaded” on Iran but may not need to strike, and says US military aid to Israel will end. Ukraine’s death toll climbs after a glide-bomb attack on an aid centre. Plus Spain’s transport minister quits, Greenland ratifies its US security deal, Indonesian police generals are held over tapping the president’s phone, South Africa votes, Paraguay seizes a bank tied to its president, and Uber loses big in Australia’s High Court. Ten stories as of Tuesday evening, November 3.

1. Washington / United States. Democrats have won control of the House of Representatives, NBC News projects, which hands them committee gavels and subpoena power for the last two years of Trump’s term. They take over on January 3, and Hakeem Jeffries is in line to become the first Black speaker, NBC News reports.

The Senate is closer than anyone expected. Roy Cooper flipped North Carolina, beating Michael Whatley to become the state’s first Democratic senator since 2008. “Chaos and corruption in Washington were hurting our people. Today, you said, ‘This has to stop,’” he told supporters, BBC News reports. Then pediatrician Annie Andrews beat Republican Sen. Darline Graham in South Carolina, which hadn’t sent a Democrat to the Senate since 1998, CBS News projects. Jon Ossoff held Georgia and Chris Pappas won New Hampshire. Democrats need a net four seats, and CBS has Texas and Kansas leaning their way, with nothing final yet. In the governor races, Keisha Lance Bottoms became the first Black woman elected governor in US history, in Georgia, beating Rick Jackson, who spent more than $200m of his own money, Al Jazeera reports. Republican Byron Donalds will be Florida’s first Black governor after beating David Jolly, the Guardian reports.

2. Tehran / Iran; Strait of Hormuz. Trump told the Financial Times on Tuesday that the US has no immediate plan to strike Iran. “We seem to be getting everything we want,” he said. Asked about hints from Netanyahu that an attack could be coming, he said: “I’m ready, we’re ready. We’re locked and loaded if we need to go, but there may be no reason for it.” Tehran answered that a “maximum deterrence” plan is ready for any new US attack and promised an immediate response. Its military is updating target lists to include US and Israeli assets across a wider area, Al Jazeera reports. At sea, UKMTO said a tanker was hit in the engine room by two unknown projectiles near the strait, with no casualties reported. The Revolutionary Guards said three tankers exploded after hitting mines while crossing “without permission.”

3. Jerusalem / Israel. Trump says the US will stop its roughly $4bn a year in military aid to Israel by the end of this year. “Bibi Netanyahu and I have made a deal that we give Israel $4 billion a year, and we made a deal months ago that we’re stopping,” he told Fox & Friends. He added that Israel can still buy US weapons “whenever they want,” DW reports. The current $3.8bn-a-year agreement was meant to run to September 2028. Trump said part of the point was to blunt Democrats like Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed: “Why should we suffer the slings from lunatics like an El-Sayed when they don’t need it?” Netanyahu’s rival Gadi Eisenkot said the fact that Israel’s defence establishment learned of the change from the media “shows just how dangerous Benjamin Netanyahu’s conduct is.”

4. Zaporizhzhia region / Ukraine. Russian strikes have killed at least 38 civilians in 24 hours, BBC News reports. At least 33 died when nine 3,000kg glide bombs hit a school being used as an aid centre in the village of Komyshuvakha, and more than 50 people may still be under the rubble. Zelensky called it “one of the largest mass killings committed by Russia during this war.” Russia says it hit Ukrainian troops, but the UN monitoring mission said the aid handout had been widely publicised and the attack “seems to have violated the most fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.” In Dnipro, a missile wrecked a hospice and nearly 50 terminally ill patients had to be moved. In Kharkiv, 73 people were hurt when a hospital was hit. Talks are still set to resume in Abu Dhabi on November 10–11, and Melania Trump is due to host Russian and Ukrainian representatives at the White House on Thursday.

5. Madrid / Spain. Transport Minister Óscar Puente resigned on Tuesday, six days after the high-speed train crash near Urda that killed at least 69 people. “A transport minister in a country like Spain cannot remain in office after two accidents of this seriousness in less than a year,” he told Congress, pointing back to January’s crash on the same line, which killed 46, BBC News reports. He’s also taking his name off the lists for the November 29 snap election. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said he went “out of dignity. Of his own accord. Out of respect for the victims.”

6. Nuuk / Greenland. Greenland’s parliament ratified the security agreement with the US and Denmark. It allows two new US military bases and Trump’s “Golden Dome” missile-defence system, keeps Greenland under Danish control and reaffirms Greenlanders’ right to self-determination, DW reports. “We must accept that peace and stability are no longer something we can take for granted,” Foreign Minister Mute Egede said. Pele Broberg of the pro-independence Naleraq party said “no economic benefit has been gained.” Denmark’s parliament votes on November 19.

7. Jakarta / Indonesia. Police have detained three senior police generals on suspicion of illegally tapping the phones of President Prabowo Subianto and dozens of others between 2025 and 2026, ABC News reports. One of them is General Listyo Sigit Prabowo, a former national police chief whom the president appointed his chief of staff in last month’s reshuffle. Police say the targets included “state officials, political figures, media figures, community leaders, NGO activists and businesspeople.” No motive has been given, and the investigation is ongoing.

8. Johannesburg / South Africa. South Africans vote in local elections on Wednesday for control of nearly 300 municipalities, including the biggest cities. More than 500 parties are running, and the ANC is trying to show it can turn around a long slide. It got 70% of the national vote in 2004 and about 40% two decades later, BBC News reports. “On the 4th we will show those naysayers,” President Cyril Ramaphosa told his final rally. Water is a big issue: parts of Johannesburg have had cuts and rationing for weeks, and a water treatment failure in Tshwane recently made more than 400 residents sick, DW reports.

9. Asunción / Paraguay. Paraguay’s central bank seized the digital lender ueno after its solvency ratio fell below half the legal minimum, leaving millions of customers locked out of their accounts, AP reports. President Santiago Peña was a business partner of the group that owned the bank until March 2025. On Tuesday he asked central bank chief Carlos Carvallo, who ran ueno until 2023, to resign, and prosecutors ordered the arrest of eight people linked to the bank, Reuters reports. Peña posted on X, in Spanish, that “those responsible must answer to the courts, without exceptions and without privileges.” Deposits are insured up to about 228 million guaraníes per person.

10. Canberra / Australia. In a six-to-one ruling, Australia’s High Court found that Uber owes A$81m in New South Wales payroll tax for 2015 to 2020, holding that its drivers are employees for payroll-tax purposes and their fares are wages, ABC News reports. That ends Uber’s legal options, and later years could push the bill well past A$100m, the Guardian reports. “Local businesses pay their fair share. Uber should pay their fair share too,” NSW Finance Minister Courtney Houssos said.

Coming Up

Nov 4: South Africa’s local elections, Israel’s certified results, and the Commonwealth summit closes in Antigua. Nov 6: Pope Leo XIV begins his Uruguay–Argentina–Peru trip. Nov 7: New Zealand votes. Nov 9: COP31 opens in Antalya, and Exercise Koalicja starts in Poland (through Nov 22). Nov 10–11: Ukraine–US–Russia talks resume in Abu Dhabi, Israel’s new Knesset is sworn in, and Herzog’s deadline to choose someone to form a government. The Youth Olympic Games run in Dakar through Nov 13. The full board is on The Watch.

Sources: NBC News (House), BBC (midterms; Ukraine; Spain; South Africa), CBS News (Senate), Al Jazeera (Iran; Georgia), the Guardian (midterms; Uber), DW (Israel aid; Greenland; South Africa), AP (Paraguay), ABC News (Indonesia; Uber), Reuters (Paraguay), Financial Times (Iran interview).

World Brief: November 3, 2026

America votes, with a Supreme Court order on California ballots already in the books. The US hits Iran’s Qeshm Island on the eve of the vote, and Tehran says the ball is in Washington’s court. Trump says US aid to Israel ends this year as Israel’s opposition lines up behind Eisenkot. Russia throws 365 drones and missiles at Ukraine’s power grid and hits a Kharkiv hospital, while Zelensky says three-way talks resume next week. Plus Europe’s week of freezer hacks, flight bomb threats and a Polish border scare, the King on slavery in Antigua, South Africa and Rwanda cut from AGOA, Rubio presses Venezuela on prisoners, North Korea denies the Binance heist and Australia’s teen social media ban goes to the High Court. Ten stories as of Tuesday morning, November 3.

1. Washington / United States. Polls are open in the US midterms, with all 435 House seats, 35 Senate seats and 36 governorships on the ballot and more than 57 million early ballots already cast, Al Jazeera reported. Republicans hold the Senate 53–47 and a narrow four-seat House majority. Early hiccups were local: scanners malfunctioned in Westchester County, New York, where Attorney General Letitia James said her office is monitoring. On the eve of the vote the Supreme Court, in a one-line order, refused a Justice Department request to set aside 20,000 California ballots. California has about 23 million registered voters and had received more than six million mail ballots, BBC News reported. The AP has the running Election Day picture.

2. Qeshm Island / Iran; Doha / Qatar. The US struck Iran’s Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz, US officials told CBS, describing the strikes as limited and defensive after the Revolutionary Guards fired on a US aircraft, BBC News reported. Iranian state news agency Irna reported explosions on the island, and the IRGC said it shot down two US MQM-170 drones and an MQ-9. Trump said he is in “no rush” to ramp up strikes, though he floated going after the Pickaxe Mountain nuclear site. AP cited regional officials as saying Netanyahu pushed for a new wave of strikes after the midterms. On Tuesday parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s chief negotiator, said: “The ball is now in America’s court to prevent war.” In Doha, Qatar’s Majed al-Ansari said both sides are “reviewing the ideas and proposals we have presented.”

3. Washington / United States; Herzliya / Israel. Trump told Fox News the US will stop paying Israel at the end of the year under a deal struck with Netanyahu “months ago.” “We’ve already agreed that by the end of this year we won’t be paying Israel,” he said. “Now we’ll help Israel if they need it.” It is not clear which money he meant: the current memorandum of understanding, worth $3.8bn a year in military aid, runs to the end of 2028, and Congress appropriates the funds. The Israeli prime minister’s office had not commented, BBC News reported. In Israel, the five opposition party leaders met in Herzliya and agreed to recommend former army chief Gadi Eisenkot as prime minister, promising a “national emergency government,” a day before President Isaac Herzog starts consultations, Al Jazeera reported. They are still split over working with Arab-led parties, which hold 19 seats.

4. Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia / Ukraine; Berlin / Germany. Russia launched 289 drones, 17 ballistic missiles and 59 cruise missiles overnight at energy sites in nine regions. A strike on a Kharkiv hospital injured 73 people and damaged the cardiology ward, 17 were hurt in Dnipro and DTEK lost three of its five thermal plants, Al Jazeera reported. “It is very telling that all of this is happening on the day of the US congressional elections,” Zelensky said. The death toll from Russia’s attack on an aid distribution centre in Komyshuvakha, Zaporizhzhia region, has risen to at least 31, with three days of mourning declared, BBC News reported. In Berlin, Chancellor Friedrich Merz said of a Russian readiness for a ceasefire, “I have not seen any sign of this so far,” DW reported. Zelensky then said the Ukraine–US–Russia talks resume at team level on November 10–11.

5. Brussels / European Union; Warsaw / Poland. The cyber-attacks on supermarket freezers have now spread to at least 10 countries, among them Belgium, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Germany and Sweden, and the European Commission is treating them as a deliberate attempt to disrupt the food supply. “These are not isolated incidents,” spokesman Thomas Regnier said, BBC News reported. Separately, bomb threats hit seven flights to Rome, Murcia, Warsaw and Sofia. A Heathrow flight bound for Warsaw was diverted to Modlin, a Dublin–Rome Ryanair flight got an Italian air force escort, and no explosives were found, BBC News reported. Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk said a provocation on the Kaliningrad border was prevented overnight after allied warnings, AP reported.

6. St John’s / Antigua and Barbuda. Opening the Commonwealth summit, King Charles told the leaders of 56 countries that the transatlantic slave trade is a “shameful chapter of history” that fills him “with the most profound personal sorrow,” but he stopped short of an apology. “We cannot change the actions of those who came before us,” he said. “We can, however, learn from the past.” UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says he is open to an apology, and officials are discussing with leaders what form it could take. He also announced £40m for Caribbean infrastructure over three years, France 24 reported.

7. Pretoria / South Africa; Kigali / Rwanda. The US will drop South Africa and Rwanda from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) trade programme from January 1, 2027, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said. South Africa’s Trade Minister Parks Tau called it “unfortunate,” BBC News reported. South African exports under AGOA fell to $1.7bn in 2025 from $4bn, and total two-way trade is about $28.8bn, AP also reported. The news lands a day before South Africans vote in local elections.

8. Caracas / Venezuela. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met Venezuela’s Foreign Minister Oliver Blanco and pressed for the release of the remaining political prisoners, BBC News reported. Rights group Foro Penal counts 322 still held, though more than 1,000 have been freed since Nicolás Maduro was seized on January 3. Delcy Rodríguez is interim president, and opposition leader María Corina Machado returned to the country on October 25.

9. Pyongyang / North Korea. Kim Yo Jong denied North Korea was behind the $6.3bn Binance hack, which the FBI blames on the North Korean group TraderTraitor, BBC News reported. Binance said on Tuesday the attack began with a bogus job interview: a software engineer downloaded a “malicious code repository” as a coding assignment, and the attackers then used an internal AI tool to reach the wallet team’s systems before draining the funds on October 29, Reuters (via NBC News) reported. “This should not have happened,” the exchange said. It says it is repaying all affected customers.

10. Canberra / Australia. Australia’s ban on social media for under-16s faced its big test in the High Court, where the Digital Freedom Project, led by New South Wales MP John Ruddick, and the online forum company Reddit argued it is unconstitutional, BBC News reported. Reddit’s lawyer Perry Herzfeld called the law “ill thought out” and said it breaches the implied freedom of political expression. Communications Minister Anika Wells said the government was there to defend a child’s right “to be free from harm.” Government lawyer Joanna Davidson SC continues on Wednesday. The ban covers ten platforms, with fines of up to A$99m.

Coming up.

Nov 4: South Africa’s local elections; Israel’s certified results due and Herzog begins consultations; the Commonwealth summit closes in Antigua. Nov 6: Pope Leo XIV begins his Uruguay–Argentina–Peru trip. Nov 7: New Zealand votes. Nov 9: COP31 opens in Antalya; Exercise Koalicja begins in Poland (through Nov 22). Nov 10–11: Ukraine–US–Russia talks resume in Abu Dhabi; Israel’s new Knesset sworn in and Herzog’s deadline to name a candidate. The Youth Olympics run in Dakar through Nov 13. The full board is on The Watch.

Sources: BBC (Iran; Israel aid; Ukraine; cyber-attacks; flights; AGOA; Venezuela; Binance; Australia; California ballots), Al Jazeera (midterms; Israel; Ukraine), AP (Poland; AGOA; midterms), DW (Berlin), France 24 (Commonwealth), Reuters via NBC News (Binance).

US Carries Out Limited Strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island on Eve of Midterms: November 3, 2026

The United States carried out strikes on Iran’s Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz late on Monday, in what US officials described as limited, defensive action after Iranian forces fired on US aircraft.

Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported several explosions on the island. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had shot down two US MQM-170 drones south of the island and an MQ-9 drone east of the strait. It was the first US attack on Qeshm since June.

“We are still in a state of war,” Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, said, according to the Guardian, adding that Iran does not “tie our foreign policies to the elections of other countries.”

Talks continue through Qatari and Pakistani mediators. Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said both sides “remain committed to the negotiation process.” Iran’s chief negotiator, parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said “the ball is now in America’s court to prevent war.”

President Donald Trump told reporters he was in “no rush” to ramp up strikes on Iran, and said “no” when asked whether major strikes would resume after the midterms. The war began when the US and Israel attacked Iran in February.

Sources: BBC News, The Guardian, Al Jazeera

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South Africa Wraps Up Special Voting Ahead of Wednesday’s Local Elections: November 3, 2026

South Africans approved for special votes cast their ballots on Tuesday, the second and final day of special voting before the country’s 2026 local government elections on Wednesday, November 4.

The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) said 2,655,067 voters were approved for special votes, either at home or at voting stations. Gauteng had the most, at 480,721, followed by the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.

The commission deployed 127,000 electoral officials for the two days. It said nearly 99% of voting stations opened on time on Monday, though some areas of the Western Cape saw delays in the delivery of special vote ballots, SAnews reported.

Special votes are not counted until Wednesday, when they are tallied with ballots cast on election day. Voters who missed their home visit can still vote at their voting station on November 4, the IEC said.

Sources: Electoral Commission of South Africa, SAnews

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Reserve Bank of Australia Raises Rates to 4.85%, an 18-Year High: November 3, 2026

The Reserve Bank of Australia raised its cash rate by a quarter of a percentage point to 4.85% on Tuesday, its fifth increase this year and the highest level since 2008.

The board split six to three, with three members favouring holding rates steady.

“Inflation is too high, and our forecast suggests it will stay higher for longer. Some pain now will prevent even worse pain down the track,” Governor Michele Bullock said, according to the Guardian.

The bank expects inflation to climb to about 4.5% by the end of 2026 and not return to its 2-3% target band until late 2027. It forecast economic growth of 1.6% this year and 1.3% in 2027.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said higher fuel prices due to the Middle East conflict were the “primary driver” of inflation. Opposition leader Angus Taylor blamed “Labor’s spending spree.” Comparison site Canstar estimated the rise adds A$107 a month to repayments on a A$700,000 home loan.

Sources: The Guardian, RNZ

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2027 Asian Cup in Saudi Arabia Postponed After Deadly Attacks on Host Nation: November 3, 2026

The 2027 AFC Asian Cup in Saudi Arabia has been postponed after a series of deadly attacks on the host country, the Asian Football Confederation said.

The 24-team tournament, scheduled for January 7 to February 5, 2027, will now run from December 23, 2027, to January 21, 2028. The new dates still need FIFA approval.

The AFC cited “the current exceptional circumstances arising from developments in the region, including substantial logistical complexities and travel disruptions,” the BBC reported.

In October, a missile attack by Yemen’s Houthi movement on Riyadh’s airport killed 13 people and wounded more than 300. Several other events in Saudi Arabia have been cancelled or postponed, and the Saudi Pro League has postponed this week’s round of fixtures.

It is the second Asian Cup in a row to be moved, after the 2023 tournament was shifted to Qatar and pushed into 2024 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Sources: BBC Sport, DW

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UK and EU Settle Deal to Scrap Brexit Checks on Food and Animal Products: November 3, 2026

The UK and the European Union have settled the text of a deal removing Brexit-era checks on trade in food, animal and plant products, ahead of a UK-EU summit on November 20.

The 200-page sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement has been circulated to EU governments, and sources said it had “been settled and there will no further negotiation,” the Guardian reported. It is not expected to take effect until the first quarter of 2028.

The deal would let exports of fresh sausages, burgers, shellfish and seed potatoes to the EU resume, and remove the need for costly export health certificates. In return, the UK would follow EU food and plant rules through what is called dynamic alignment. The government says it will eventually bring £5.1 billion a year in economic benefits.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham said “public opinion has changed nationally” since the 2016 referendum but that he would “not run ahead of public opinion.” Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said dynamic alignment would be a red line, and Reform UK’s Richard Tice said it would “crush Britain’s competitiveness.”

The National Farmers’ Union said last month that British food exports to the EU had fallen by a third since Brexit.

Sources: The Guardian, BBC News

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Bomb Threats Hit Four Flights Across Europe, Briefly Closing Warsaw-Modlin Airport: November 3, 2026

Four passenger flights in Europe were searched on Tuesday after a series of suspected bomb threats, including two that departed from the UK.

A LOT flight from London Heathrow to Warsaw-Chopin carrying 118 people made an unscheduled landing at the Polish capital’s Modlin airport, which closed temporarily before reopening around midday. An SAS flight from Copenhagen landed as planned at Warsaw-Chopin and was checked. Polish authorities said the threat was not confirmed.

In Spain, a Ryanair flight from Manchester to Murcia with 121 people aboard was inspected, the Spanish government’s delegate in Murcia said. A flight from Israel landed in Sofia after a bomb threat was received by email, and counter-terrorism teams checked it for explosives, Bulgaria’s BTA news agency reported.

It was unclear whether the threats were linked. They came a day after a Wizz Air flight from London Luton made an emergency landing in Budapest, escorted by a Hungarian fighter jet, after a bomb threat; Wizz Air said nothing was found, according to the BBC.

Sources: BBC News, CBC News / Reuters

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