CMR is the leading provider of funding and management support for small to medium-sized businesses and entrepreneurs 

When Erik Prince signed on with Kinshasa last year, the brief was mostly about spreadsheets: help Congo's finance ministry actually collect taxes on its minerals. But on September 17, it turned into a firefight.

According to a Reuters exclusive published Friday, a team working for Prince's Vectus Global was ambushed in South Kivu in eastern Congo, leaving roughly 20 people killed and wounded, among them at least seven Congolese and a former New Zealand special forces soldier. The wounded include Tim Kennedy, the retired Green Beret, ex-UFC fighter and podcaster with millions of social media followers (and a fight résumé in a sport the president is rather fond of, as Reuters helpfully notes), who took three gunshot wounds to the leg and is recovering at Walter Reed.

Regular readers know we have been tracking Prince's slow migration from Kinshasa's tax office to the front lines since his men and drones showed up in Uvira in February. What is new is the body count, and the fact that the war for Congo's minerals now has an American celebrity casualty - which means Washington can no longer pretend it isn't there.

"An Incredibly Dangerous Place Right Now"

Per Reuters, which said it spoke to at least 10 people with direct knowledge of the attack or briefed on it, the Vectus team was moving between locations when it was hit. Some highlights:

• Two sources working with Congo's government put the toll at about 20 dead and wounded; a Congolese security source added that villagers were likely among the casualties too.
• The dead included a former member of New Zealand's Special Forces, whom the NZ Herald has identified as NZSAS veteran Justin Conaglen, since buried in Northland. Kennedy and one other foreign contractor were among the wounded.
• It is the first time the company has taken casualties in Congo, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operation. Vectus declined to comment.
• The kicker: one government-side source suspects Rwandan forces backing M23 found the team by tracking one of its own surveillance drones. Two other sources flatly said the Rwandan military carried out the ambush; a third said the attack's sophistication pointed that way.

Kigali, Kinshasa and M23 did not respond to Reuters, and Rwanda has always denied backing M23 despite UN and Western claims that it exercises command and control over the group. Its online supporters, meanwhile, were already busy Friday recasting the ambush as one of Congo's "internal wars." Denial at its finest.

As for the irony: the drone that allegedly gave away the team's position was exactly the kind of kit Prince had been flying with lethal results in Haiti last year.

From Tax Collector To Front Line In Under 18 Months

The original pitch was decidedly un-Blackwater. When Reuters first reported the deal in April 2025, the mandate was to tighten tax collection and curb mineral smuggling in copper-rich Katanga, far from the M23 front, with one Congolese source claiming about $40 million a month in lost revenue in the Kolwezi area alone. Sources at the time stressed there were no plans to send security contractors into active conflict zones (it's call black ops for a reason).

That lasted about nine months.

In January and early February, after M23 briefly seized Uvira on the Burundi border and Washington leaned on the rebels to pull back, Prince's men and drones deployed to help Congo's army lock the town down, alongside Israeli trainers. We covered it at the time:

Erik Prince, Israeli Advisers Operated With Congolese Special Forces https://t.co/XiFBy5SqAR

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) February 12, 2026

Now Vectus is taking fire in South Kivu. Officially, of course, none of this is America's war: the State Department says it has no contracts with Prince in Congo, even as US officials have said they plan to work more closely with Vectus in Haiti. In other words, a Trump ally's private army is guarding the minerals America just signed a deal for, under a peace accord America brokered, without an American contract. Plausible deniability has rarely been this thin.

Follow The Cobalt

Why would anyone send a former Green Beret to the jungles of South Kivu? Because Congo is not just "rich in minerals." It is the cobalt market: according to the USGS, the DRC mined some 230,000 tons of the world's ~310,000 tons in 2025, or 74%. Indonesia, a distant second, managed 14%. The US? 0.1%.

And Kinshasa has learned how to use that leverage. Congo suspended cobalt exports outright in February 2025 when prices hit nine-year lows, then replaced the ban with quotas in October that will run through at least end-2027. The result: cobalt metal hit $26/lb this spring, up 160% since the ban. Nothing says "strategic mineral" like a single country being able to more than double the price by closing the border.

Washington noticed. The Pentagon went shopping for its biggest cobalt stockpile since 1990 in August 2025:

US MILITARY PLANS TO STOCKPILE COBALT FOR FIRST TIME IN DECADES

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 21, 2025

...then (in typical fashion) cancelled the purchase two months later. In December, Trump hosted Kagame and Tshisekedi to sign the "Washington Accords," pledging that the US would buy their minerals and inking bilateral deals for access. And in April, a tiny eight-person US firm founded by an ex-Green Beret (a recurring theme) took control of Chemaf, one of the biggest non-Chinese cobalt producers, after a $920 million sale to a Chinese state-owned defense group collapsed. As we reported back in July 2025, "the US is catching up" in the race with China for DR Congo's minerals.

It isn't just cobalt, either. Congo is also the swing source of new copper supply at a time when the red metal trades near $14,500/ton. In his October 7 morning note (available to pro subs), Goldman's metals specialist James McGeoch laid out the bank's published mine supply numbers: global output down 1% this year, then up 2.6% in 2027, which he calls the biggest ask for Q3 prints. And a big chunk of that growth is supposed to come from Congo:

The current published numbers at GS are mine supply -1% y/y for 2026, for 2027 we are +2.6% (the delta is mostly new growth, Chile +2% y/y, DRC +6% includes +90kt at KK v cons 100kt, Indonesia basis Grasberg at +140kt v cons +180kt, Panama the team have +190kt v cons 150kt).

Translation: with Chile's production down 8% YTD, Congo is one of the few places the Street is counting on for more copper next year. To be fair to Goldman, Kamoa-Kakula sits in Lualaba, hundreds of miles south of South Kivu. But every ambush in the east is a reminder that "DRC +6%" is a forecast that comes with a security bill attached - and someone has to pay it. Right now, that someone is apparently Erik Prince's contractors.

We've Seen This Movie Before (Different Sponsor)

None of this should surprise long-time readers. Back in January 2019, we reported that Prince was launching a fund of up to $500 million for electric-car metals, having already found a copper-cobalt deposit in Congo, explaining to the FT that battery minerals come "from generally weird, hard-to-access places." At the time, Congo supplied "more than 60%" of the world's cobalt. It's now three-quarters.

The twist? Back then Prince's Frontier Services Group was backed by China's state-owned Citic, which is why five years earlier we had asked how Erik Prince would help China subjugate Africa. A decade later, he is the tip of the (private) American spear trying to pry Congo's minerals away from Beijing. Mercenary, it turns out, is truly a flexible job description.

Bottom Line

On paper, the eastern Congo war ended in Washington last December. On the ground, M23 still controls swathes of the east, Kigali and Kinshasa keep trading accusations at the oversight committee, Congo is fighting an Ebola outbreak that has now reached Kenya, and the private contractors America relies on, but doesn't officially employ, are taking bullets. Or, as one of Reuters' sources summed it up, eastern Congo is "an incredibly dangerous place right now."

The question is what happens next. One path: the casualties (and Kennedy's megaphone) push the administration to lean harder on Kigali to enforce the accords. The other, and far more likely, path: the minerals are simply too important to walk away from, so the privatized security footprint grows, the drones get bigger, and "no plans to deploy to active conflict areas" becomes the second-funniest line in this entire saga - behind the State Department's "no contracts."

Either way, the price of three-quarters of the world's cobalt just went up. It's now measured in more than dollars per pound.

Much more in the full GS Materials morning note, available to pro subs.

Friday's diesel deal between Trump and Putin wasn't only about diesel. It was also about Kyiv.

Hours after Zelensky accused Washington of using Ukraine's negotiators as a "smokescreen" for a backroom deal with Moscow, Axios reported that Trump decided to let Russia sell diesel after Zelensky ignored half a dozen US requests to stop attacking Russian oil refineries. The alleged source was a US official with direct knowledge, who did not hold back:

"Zelensky is misreading the room. By continuing to hit refineries, he is eroding the good will that he has built with Trump over the last six months."

In other words, the sanctions waiver was as much a message to Kyiv as a gift to Moscow. So how did we get to this latest geopolitical twist, what is Trump actually got for lifting sanctions (spoiler: less than nine days of fuel), and why is the deal is on a collision course with the one Ukrainian policy Kyiv says it won't give up. Let's dig in. 

"Half A Dozen" Requests

The backstory is familiar to regular readers. One month ago, Trump - freaking out about soaring diesel prices - told reporters that Zelensky "has to stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia," and a day later he announced a truce that never really happened:

Trump says "Ukraine has agreed not to hit Russian Energy targets. Russia has agreed to do, likewise! The World’s Diesel price rise is mostly caused by the Russia/ Ukraine War, not Iran."

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 14, 2026

A few hours later, Kyiv kept hitting refineries anyway. Just last weekend Zelensky vowed to hammer more of them, and on Thursday Ukrainian drones set Russia's largest refinery at Omsk ablaze, more than 1,500 miles from the border. Axios notes the strikes were "highly effective and caused an energy crisis in Russia," prompting Moscow's diesel export ban, which then "added more pressure to global diesel markets under strain from the war in Iran."

The core disagreement is about symmetry. Zelensky told Trump, Witkoff and Kushner that he would stop hitting Russian refineries if Russia stopped hitting Ukrainian power plants. Trump wanted Ukraine to stop unilaterally, according to the official, and "didn't see the attacks on refineries as equivalent to Russian strikes on Ukraine's power grid." Or, as the official put it: "The attacks on the refineries cause pain in Russia, but it causes pain for the U.S., too."

Then there is what happened in Miami. During eight hours of talks on Friday, Witkoff and Kushner told the Ukrainian delegation that Trump was expected to call Putin and lift sanctions on Russian diesel, because Kyiv had ignored repeated requests on strikes "which were directly affecting U.S. consumers." A Ukrainian official claimed the envoys also threatened that Trump could cut Ukraine off from US intelligence if it kept ignoring him. The US official denied that, saying the envoys merely reminded Kyiv that the US provides munitions and intelligence, so Ukraine "shouldn't take actions that hurt American consumers." That is a fine distinction, and Kyiv is unlikely to see the difference.

So was Ukraine's team a "smokescreen," as Zelensky charged? Not quite: the US delegation told them what was coming. But the decision was clearly made before they sat down. Zelensky's reaction, in a statement reported by Politico:

"At this very moment, while our team is talking with the American team in Florida, at this very moment, the President of the United States is talking with the leader of the Kremlin... and has an agreement under which America is allowing Russia to export diesel fuel. That means more money for this war... I believe our team is simply being used as a smokescreen, and that is certainly not fair."

He went further in an interview with Axios, calling it "not fair and not honest" and "a happy birthday present for Putin" (who turned 74 on Wednesday), and told reporters it was "a weak decision by strong partners."

And the payoff from Putin? So far, none on peace. During the 90-minute call he declined to commit to resuming talks with Ukraine. Kremlin adviser Yuri Ushakov said Ukrainian strikes on Moscow and other cities during Russia's parliamentary elections had "thwarted the possibility of an immediate resumption of the negotiation process," adding: "The president said, we will think about when these negotiations can be resumed." That is the kind of non-answer that tends to precede more non-answers. The US official still thinks Putin "is open to a discussion on ending the war," and says Washington wants a "new proposal that will be good enough for him." Witkoff and Kushner may visit Moscow and Kyiv next week, though Axios notes it's unclear how Friday's blowup will affect those plans.

What Trump Got: 4.8 Million Tons, Mostly "Thereafter"

Here's what Trump posted on Truth Social shortly before Friday's close:

"I have just concluded a highly successful discussion with President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, wherein it was agreed that Russia will immediately supply over 300,000 Tons of Diesel Fuel to the American and Global Marketplace, another 500,000 Tons during the month of November, and 1,000,000 Tons immediately thereafter."

Another 3 million tons would follow "within a short period of time," depending on "the condition of their Diesel Refineries." That condition is the whole point, as we explain below. Then came the usual all-caps flourish: between "our TOTAL CONTROL of the Strait of Hormuz, and this great announcement on Russian Energy, Diesel Prices for Americans and, indeed, the World, will be COMING DOWN, IN RECORD NUMBERS, AND FAST!"

*TRUMP SAYS PUTIN AGREED TO RELEASE DIESEL INTO GLOBAL MARKET

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 9, 2026

Minutes later, Treasury said OFAC was "immediately issuing a temporary general license to allow the supply of Russian diesel to the global market." General License 135 authorizes the sale, delivery and import (including into the US) of Russian-origin diesel until April 7, 2027. That is six months, and according to Fortune it is the first diesel waiver since the war began to run longer than the standard 30 days. The EU and UK sanctions are unchanged, so Europe, the region that actually imports diesel, can't legally buy a drop of it.

Moscow confirmed the terms. Deputy PM Alexander Novak said Russia was ready to supply 300,000 tons in October, 500,000 in November and 1 million in December, and that "in the long run, this volume could reach three million tons per month." The Kremlin's readout said "the Russian side reaffirmed its readiness to supply oil and oil products to the American and world markets," with no dates attached. Something to look forward to in 2027, perhaps.

The algos loved it. As Goldman's US rates desk wrote in its Friday wrap (available to pro subs), "Before the close, headlines hit the tape that Russia would release diesel supply into the market, driving down diesel prices and leading to a modest rally in the front end." Both US and European diesel futures slid, with NY Harbor diesel down about 4.5% to $4.67/gallon per the FT, and WTI fell about a buck to $91.

Do The Math: Less Than Nine Days Of Fuel

Now for the arithmetic. At roughly 7.45 barrels per ton, the "immediate" 300,000 tons is about 2.2 million barrels. The US burns roughly 4 million barrels of distillate a day, so October's tranche covers about half a day of American demand. Add November and December and the first 1.8 million tons cover about 3.4 days. Even if the 3 million tons conditional on refinery health actually arrive, the full 4.8 million tons (about 36 million barrels) cover less than nine days of US consumption.

That is the best case. Trump's own post says the fuel is going to the "American and Global Marketplace", so the US share will be smaller.

For context, the Omsk refinery that Ukraine hit on Thursday produced roughly 8 million tons of diesel in 2024 (per Bloomberg). That is about 670,000 tons a month. Put differently, the entire "November tranche" is less than one month of output from a single plant that was on fire the day before the deal was announced.

The industry isn't buying it either. The FT reports that Russia is running its refineries at about 60% of capacity because of Ukrainian strikes, and quotes Kpler's head of policy and geopolitical risk Michelle Brouhard: "The thing that I'm most curious about is: where is the diesel going to come from? Russia doesn't have an export problem. It's got a refinery problem." Rapidan's Bob McNally added that Moscow had already "been leaning toward a slight easing of its diesel export ban for logistical reasons." So Trump may have paid a six-month sanctions waiver for barrels Russia was about to sell anyway.

Brouhard also warned that the deal could end up removing diesel from the market. Because the headline knocked diesel down relative to crude while freight costs are at records, "Refinery margins are now negative, which means refinery runs in Asia probably are going to come off . . . which means we're going to lose some diesel." Mission accomplished.

Why Russia Can't Spare It (And Why Trump Wants It Anyway)

The irony is that Russia isn't exporting diesel because it can't. As regular readers know, Moscow banned diesel exports back on July 8 to avoid domestic shortages after a wave of Ukrainian drone strikes on its refineries, and extended the ban through Oct. 31 last week. The IEA estimates Russian diesel output is down about 30%. In other words, Putin has just promised to export fuel his own motorists are queuing for, under a ban his own government imposed. That's either a remarkable act of generosity or a remarkably cheap promise (we know which way we lean).

The reason for the urgency is simple: diesel is still near record highs with less than four weeks until Election Day. AAA's national average was $6.23/gallon on Friday, down only modestly from the record $6.52 on Sept. 22. Goldman's commodity desk wrote last weekend in its Weekly Commodity Thoughts (available to pro subs) that the global distillate market "has been the most distressed area of the entire energy complex with gasoil cracks (gasoil vs. crude) trading to over $100/bbl in late September." That only eased after "recent US political pressure and threats to implement a diesel export ban" pushed the G7 into a 100mb emergency release. We covered that at the time under the title "Trump's Diesel Threat Worked." Goldman's desk was not impressed with the fix:

"However, while prices have moved lower the release does little to solve the structural issue has been caused by continued curtailment of Middle East exports and widespread damage to Russian refinery infrastructure."

JPMorgan's commodities chief Natasha Kaneva was blunter about the G7 headline in her latest diesel note (available to pro subs): "the headline 100 million barrels does not represent 100 million barrels of new intervention ... much of Friday's announcement represents the completion of the earlier IEA release rather than a new injection of barrels." Sound familiar?

The market had the same reaction to the G7 release. As we noted on Wednesday, diesel crack spreads "quickly shot up back over $100, as market laughs at the emergency release of 100MM barrels."

The Market Already Priced It (Sort Of)

The hedge funds saw this coming. Goldman's Robert Quinn wrote earlier this week (and available to pro subs) that in the week through Sept. 29, managed money sold $2.4 billion of gasoil, the largest amount in 18 months, split equally between liquidation and new shorts. That followed a run in which specs "purchased in all but 1 week for a cumulative +$4.3bn" from late June to mid-September. And on Oct. 6, three days before Trump's post, "October Gasoil reached intraday lows of -5.3% on reports that Russia may lift the country's ban on diesel exports for some producers in October."

Translation: a good chunk of the "Russia relief" was in the price before Friday's headline. That leaves little room for another leg lower, and plenty of room for a squeeze if the barrels don't show up.

It's The Midterms, Stupid

Why burn this much goodwill with Kyiv over nine days of diesel? Because fuel prices are what's moving the ballot. Goldman's political economists Alec Phillips and Abhay Duggirala wrote in their latest US Election Monitor (available here for pro subs) that "Gasoline prices and the Democratic generic ballot have moved together this year - the Democratic lead widened gradually after the gasoline price spike at the onset of the Iran war." Democrats now lead the generic ballot by an average of 8.9pp, and "Inflation and the economy rank highest for voters, and Trump's net approval on both is deeply negative."

Prediction markets have already reached their verdict: using Polymarket data, Goldman notes markets are "now pricing a roughly 65% chance of a Democratic sweep and less than a 10% chance that Republicans retain their House majority."

Against that backdrop, everything the White House did on diesel this week makes sense: the red-dye diesel waiver on Monday, the export-ban threats (which, as Goldman modeled, would knock just $0.25/gallon off retail diesel per week, before pushing gasoline higher), the decision not to strike Iran until after Nov. 3, and now Putin's diesel. JPMorgan's Market Intel desk summed up the shift in a client call this week: "why diesel, not crude, may now be the more important inflation signal." For a White House facing 25 days of voter anger at the pump, a Friday afternoon price dip is worth a lot. The fact that it rests on a sanctions waiver and a promise from Putin is the problem.

Bottom Line

The new Axios details turn the diesel deal from a pump-price gimmick into a test of wills with Kyiv. Trump has now tied the price Americans pay for diesel to whether Ukraine keeps burning Russian refineries - that way he has a clear scapegoat when Diesel prices keeps rising. Kyiv's answer came within hours, and it was not the "symmetrical" one Zelensky had floated. A senior Ukrainian official told the FT that the long-range drone strikes on Russian energy facilities will continue: 

"We will burn [Russian] refineries."

Which is why the deal looks doomed from the start, which ironically is just what Trump wanted as there is little chance diesel sustains a price drop for the next several weeks. As one widely shared take on X put it within minutes of the announcement, before Axios confirmed the motive:

The idea of this is not to bring diesel prices down. The idea is to stop Ukraine from striking russian refinaries and safe russian energy sector. Now every strike on russian refinaries by Ukraine will be treated as attack on American energy supply. https://t.co/ZCuGEfe0fR

— ? Constantine ? (@Teoyaomiquu) October 9, 2026

That is now, more or less, the White House's position.

The next Ukrainian drone that hits a Russian refinery will be hitting a supply chain the US president just put his name on. We expect a Truth Social broadside at Zelensky the moment that happens, along with blaming the Ukraine president for all US inflationary woes,  which much to the deep state's disgust, would leave Washington defending Putin's export capacity against its own ally, weeks before an election.

As for the barrels, we'll believe them when we see them in New York Harbor. Russia's export ban still runs through Oct. 31, its refineries are running at about 60% of capacity, and Kyiv has said outright that it will keep burning them. The most likely outcome? Putin sends out a diesel tanker, Ukraine drones the refinery that filled it, and the "deal" quietly dies, with both sides blaming Zelensky. Until then, it has done what it was designed to do: produce one good headline for the pump-price chart, and put Kyiv on notice that going forward Z will be the scapegoat for American runaway energy inflation.

Much more in the full Goldman Weekly Commodity Thoughts, Quinn's "Managed Money Gasoil Sentiment Shifting?" note, the GS US Election Monitor and JPMorgan's diesel note, all available to pro subs.

If gaming studios were run by smart people they would scrap any projects they launched in the early 2020s and start over from scratch.  The problem is, these are not very smart people.  

Much like Hollywood, the gaming industry has been ideologically captured by Reddit-brained activists for at least a decade.  Numerous media productions that began their creative life at the peak of the woke era are finally being released, with video game development often taking five years or more.  The problem is, these companies placed massive bets on woke becoming the "new normal", and they bet wrong.  

It should be noted that gamers in the US were the first large subculture that called out the far-left takeover of entertainment.  "Gamergate" will live in history as the movement that sparked the wider "culture war" against highly organized and well funded progressive propaganda.  Legacy news outlets attacked them relentlessly, but it only made them stronger.

Today, the gaming community is largely united against woke content and influence within the industry.  Using simple boycotts, they have demolished the releases of dozens of AAA titles.  Some of these games cost hundred of millions of dollars to develop, but they are crashing and burning due to lack of consumer interest.

Such is the case with "Gears Of War: E-Day", which some critics are calling the gayest AAA title yet produced. 

Gears Of War: E-Day follows the typical woke propaganda formula - Hijack a male dominated franchise, hold onto the veneer, but hollow out the game's beloved mythology and exploit it as a DEI and LGBT vehicle.  It should go without saying, but no one wants to charge into battle as a fat angry lesbian with a chip on her shoulder.  This is not the kind of character that inspires enthusiasm in the community, but this is what you're going to have to deal with regularly in Gears Of War. 

This video is all you need to know about the Queers of War: Gay Day (Gears of War: E-Day) controversy. Men bad Women good This game can go fuck itself completely. https://t.co/n7HrAwITUw

— Critically Thinking & Drinking ?? ?????????? (@TheCriticalDri1) October 3, 2026

Oh boy...here we go again.  And just in case anyone doubts the intentions behind these kinds of characters, the game has LGBT flags for player profiles, and has a trans woman technical director (a man pretending to be a woman).

The grand pursuit of the illusory "modern audience" has proven catastrophic for the gaming industry.  Multiple studios are undergoing mass layoffs and some are being absorbed into larger media conglomerates.  The good news is that the people being fired are people who were never qualified to work in games development anyway.  The bad news is that the consumer market is awash in some of the worst content of all time until the industry finishes correcting course (and who knows how long that will take). 

Gears Of War is just another casualty; another classic franchise gone awry.  The Steam player count started off rough, well below what proponents had hoped for at a peak of 31,517 and dropped by 50% in only two days.  To put this in perspective, Elden Ring, a game with a more niche audience than Gears Of War, had a peak Steam player count of 953,000.  It's an utter embarrassment for Gears developer Epic Games.

It also might be a crushing cash loss.

GOW cost approximately $300 million to produce, and must sell nearly 6 million copies (including 1 million copies on Steam) to break even.  At its current sales pace there is zero chance of this happening.  As noted, projects like Gears were set in motion in around 2019-2020, well into the madness of the woke media nightmare. 

There is a simple formula for avoiding this kind of product flop: 

Stop trying to co-opt and feminize masculine properties.

Stop putting LGBT characters into video games unless the game is low budget and is specifically tailored to that very small audience.  Clearly, no one wants to hear about aberrant sexual identities while they are trying to relax and play a shooter.  And most of all, parents do not want their children being brainwashed by LGBT propaganda.  Consumers want to play Gears Of War, not Queers Of War.    

Keep DEI out of storytelling.  Few people are bothered by minority characters, but everyone is sick of DEI tropes, low-intelligence race commentary, feminist girl-bosses, etc.  People are not going to pay for games with any hint of this stuff.     

Hire straight men for the next 10 years and tap into Gen-X storytellers.  The industry needs to relearn how to write men's stories and characters and clean house of all the freaks who have to project themselves and their sexual identities into everything.  

It's really that simple.  Will these companies do it?  No, probably not.  They'll carry out a multitude of half-measures which will inevitably lead to these outcomes, but only after they hit absolute rock bottom.

Via Middle East Eye

A top aide to US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee has repeatedly altered or suppressed embassy reporting that would have been critical of Israeli activities in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, according to a New York Times investigation.

David Milstein, 36, has blocked, rewritten or delayed reports to Washington about illegal Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence, and the killings of nine Palestinian Americans, the NYT reported, citing US officials familiar with his work.

The newspaper said it interviewed 15 US officials who had worked with Milstein, including many in Washington, as well as nine former diplomats. They were all cited anonymously for fear of reprisals.

The NYT also reviewed dozens of internal documents, including diplomatic cables, memos and other communications.

The investigation found that Milstein's interventions raised concerns among embassy staff and Washington officials that information reaching the US government was being distorted. Several officials told the NYT that Milstein's interventions surpassed those of any recent predecessor.

The sources told the paper they were concerned that Milstein was undermining diplomatic work and even contradicting US President Donald Trump's policies.

One example involved illegal Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank. In late March, Israel approved a major expansion of illegal settlements while the region was embroiled in a war with Iran. Embassy staff viewed the move as conflicting with Trump's official opposition to Israeli annexation of the occupied West Bank, and prepared an urgent report for policymakers in Washington.

According to three US officials cited by the NYT, Milstein blocked the report from being sent, and this reportedly was not an isolated incident.

There has been growing international concern over Israel's illegal settlement activity. The UK, Canada and France announced sanctions against illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank in September, with the UK accusing some settlers of being involved in "ethnic cleansing".

Praising Israel for 'cracking down' on violence

The NYT reported that Milstein had also intervened in embassy reporting on Israeli settler violence.

In one instance, embassy staff prepared reporting suggesting that the Israeli government was failing to address a rise in violence by settlers. Rather than sending that assessment to Washington, the embassy instead sent a cable praising Israel for "cracking down" on the violence, according to three officials.

In another case, Milstein reportedly blocked a detailed report on Israeli investigations into the killings of nine Palestinian Americans by Israeli settlers or security forces in the occupied West Bank in four years.

The killings attracted congressional attention. In March, 30 members of Congress led by Senator Chris Van Hollen wrote to Secretary of State Marco Rubio seeking information about the investigations and demanding accountability. 

Officers in the embassy completed the report that month, concluding that Israeli investigations into most of the killings had made little progress. Some cases had reportedly been closed, and no one had been charged. 

Instead of forwarding the report, Milstein argued that the embassy should send a message saying Israel was handling the investigations properly, according to two officials cited by the NYT.

NYT: Mr. Milstein is the stepson of the right-wing radio host Mark Levin — a close ally of both Mr. Trump & Mr. Netanyahu.

Here's David Milstein sitting side-by-side with Amb. Mike Huckabee as he led the first round of talks on merging the US and Israeli militaries. https://t.co/ctLEyD1xl3

— Chris Menahan ???? (@infolibnews) October 8, 2026

Milstein's alleged interventions also included the besieged Gaza Strip. The NYT reported that he rewrote an embassy cable concerning the notorious Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an aid organisation backed by Israel and the US that was accused of killing Palestinians while seeking aid.

American diplomats in Israel warned in a cable that the distribution operation was chaotic, deadly and could result in further "mass-casualty events".

People familiar with the cable said Milstein rewrote it to portray the foundation's operation as successful while omitting information about killings at its distribution sites.

The reported interventions also affected the volume of diplomatic reporting from the embassy. Officials said Milstein began insisting on approving communications from the embassy section responsible for Palestinian affairs shortly after arriving in Jerusalem. 

The number of cables then dropped from several per week to only a few per month, with some staff members reportedly reluctant to write reports because they feared they would be blocked or rewritten.

The NYT reported that, on at least two occasions, White House and State Department officials bypassed standard channels to communicate directly with embassy staff. With discrepancies between news coverage and the embassy's reports, they wanted a clearer understanding of events.

'So lacking in fact'

Milstein previously worked as an aide to Republican Senator Ted Cruz and former US ambassador to Israel David Friedman. During the Biden administration, he worked for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on outreach to pro-Israel voters. He returned to the embassy in April 2025 after Trump won a second term. 

The NYT reported that it is unclear how much Huckabee knew about Milstein's interventions. Huckabee and Milstein both declined requests for an interview.

As ambassador, Huckabee would need to approve significant diplomatic cables and decisions, but officials told the NYT that Milstein sometimes acted independently. They also said that Huckabee sometimes worked with Milstein to "suppress or recast" information, but also had to intervene on several occasions when he believed Milstein had gone too far.

Responding to questions about Milstein, Huckabee rejected the allegations, saying the NYT's account was "so lacking in fact" that he considered it a "farcical" endeavor. He said he "personally and categorically" rejected the newspaper's investigation. The State Department responded by stating that the team "remains focused on advancing President Trump's America First agenda".

Update (2000ET): We can only imagine how cold those discussions were when the Ukrainian officials heard about Trump's deal with Putin for the release of diesel stocks to the world.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was not best pleased. He told Axios in a phone interview on Friday that President Trump's decision to unilaterally lift sanctions on Russia and allow it to export diesel was "not fair and not honest."

"You know, it looks like a happy birthday present for Putin. It looks absolutely terrible," Zelensky said in frustration, referring to the Russian president's birthday earlier this week.

Zelensky went on to describe the deal as "an investment in a war that must be ended."

"Gifts to Putin will not bring peace or any benefit ?to the civilised world," Zelenskiy wrote on the X social ?media platform.

"Russia ?will 'repay' the diesel with ?further ?terror and perfidy. Allowing Russia to sell petroleum products is an ?investment in a ?war that must be ended, not prolonged. What is needed is real de-escalation with Russia on a reciprocal basis," Zelenskiy said.

Trump said in a post on social media that he had ?agreed in a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin that Russia ?would immediately supply diesel to the US and global marketplace.

Trump said lower prices for Americans "is my Greatest Priority".

As Timothy Frudd reported earlier for The Epoch Times, U.S. negotiators will meet with Ukrainian officials today and tomorrow in an effort to work toward a peace proposal to end the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.

The meeting comes a month after U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner visited Moscow and Kyiv to meet separately with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Both U.S. President Donald Trump and Zelenskyy have been pushing for an end to the war before winter.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday that the United States is continuing to try to facilitate a negotiated agreement between Russia and Ukraine to end the war. He warned that the war, which started in February 2022, appeared to be at a "very dangerous" stalemate.

"Special Envoy Witkoff and Jared Kushner will meet with Ukrainian officials tomorrow to discuss a new, unified proposal that is focused on all aspects of the conflict to try to end the war," a senior administration official told The Epoch Times on Oct. 8.

"They will be joined by national security advisors from the E3 countries, as well as the European Union and NATO."

Friday's scheduled meeting between the Trump administration's negotiators and Ukrainian officials was also confirmed by Zelenskyy on Oct. 8.

"Meetings are expected to take place over two days," Zelenskyy told reporters Thursday, according to The Kyiv Independent. "And we are counting on a European team to join our negotiating group and the American negotiating group."

The Epoch Times reached out to Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs for additional comment and did not receive a response before publication time.

In a prior social media post on Oct. 5, Zelenskyy said Ukraine expected that the United States would be able to arrange a trilateral meeting between Moscow, Kyiv, and Washington this month.

Zelenskyy met with Trump on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 22. During a bilateral press conference, both leaders said it is important to end the war before the upcoming winter season.

Trump told reporters last month that he believed both Putin and Zelenskyy wanted to see the war ended and that the Russian president was willing to meet to discuss a peace deal with Ukraine. He also suggested that the war could be ended sooner than people think.

During a joint press conference with Portuguese Foreign Minister Paulo Rangel on Thursday, Rubio warned that the war between Russia and Ukraine could escalate and become a "much broader and far more dangerous regional conflict" if a peace deal is not reached.

"It's an extremely dangerous war because, frankly, right now it seems to be at a stalemate, and stalemates are very dangerous," Rubio told reporters.

The secretary of state said that a stalemate is only resolved in two ways: with a negotiated peace settlement or with an escalation in the fighting.

"In the end, we do not believe that there is a military solution to this conflict, to this war. We think this war needs to end in a negotiated settlement, the sooner the better," Rubio said. "The United States stands ready to facilitate that."

He added that the United States wants to see a "permanent, enduring, and fair" negotiated settlement to end the conflict.

At least 30 people were killed on Thursday in a Russian strike on Kramatorsk, Ukraine, according to Zelenskyy. The Ukrainian president said a Russian bomb struck two city minibuses. An additional 18 people were injured in the strike.

The strike came after the Russian Defense Ministry reported that Russian air defenses had intercepted almost 900 Ukrainian drones overnight in multiple parts of the country on Oct. 6.

Gold is climbing notably this morning, underscoring the potential for the precious metal to ratchet higher into year-end thanks to sustained buying from central banks and retail investors. 

On the retail side, the total known ETF holdings of bullion are up this week, set to match the 12-week streak of gains posted through April 18, 2025. 

That means the stockpile exceeds the peak touched just before the outbreak of the Iran war.

And central banks are backing up the truck as The Financial Times reports that China has spent a record sum importing more than 1,000 tonnes of gold this year as the central bank and local investors pour cash into bullion amid rising geopolitical tensions abroad and poor returns on local assets.

The world’s second-largest economy spent $158.8bn on gold in the first eight months of the year. That compared with spending of $96.5bn for all of 2025 on 886 tonnes of gold.

The jump comes after China reined in gold purchases last year during an intense rally that sent bullion prices soaring from about $2,625 a troy ounce at the start of 2025 to a peak of $5,595 in January.

There are signs that Chinese investors are increasing gold purchases as part of broader efforts to diversify their assets. Chinese holdings of US Treasuries fell to $618bn in July — the lowest level since August 2008. 

“Both the central bank and private investors are diversifying their reserves and savings towards an asset with no counterparty risk, as part of a broader long-term wealth preservation strategy,” said Lisa Liu, managing director at Gold Mountains Asset Management, part of Zijin Mining Group — China’s largest gold miner. 

But not everyone is embracing domestic demand for the barbarous relic...

India cut a key precious metals import tax relief policy overnight amid the country's broader 2026 efforts to curb non-essential gold imports, ease pressure on foreign exchange reserves, and support the rupee amid high fuel costs and currency weakness.

The official stated reason is tax parity: to stop the tax treatment itself from making one import route (banks/nominated agencies) preferential over others (including channels such as the India International Bullion Exchange).

Simply put, the specific 'key gold import tax relief' being scrapped is the bank IGST exemption (framed politically as parity), but it is part of the same policy environment of measures taken earlier in 2026 explicitly aimed at moderating gold imports and protecting forex reserves:

In mid-May 2026 the government sharply raised effective customs duty on gold and silver from 6% to 15% (basic customs duty to 10% + Agriculture Infrastructure and Development Cess to 5%), with platinum rising similarly. Officials framed this as curbing non-essential/discretionary imports so foreign exchange could be prioritized for essentials (crude oil, fertilizers, industrial inputs, etc.) amid the West Asia crisis, elevated oil prices, and pressure on the rupee.

PM Modi publicly appealed to citizens to avoid gold purchases for a year.

Other steps included tighter rules on certain import schemes, delays in licenses/notifications, and related restrictions.

Higher import costs for gold reduce demand (or at least slow it), ease the current-account and FX drain, and thereby help limit further depreciation - the same logic that has driven gold-duty adjustments in past periods of external stress.

So China is backing up a very big truck, Retail is BTFDing in ETF-land, and India is still panicking over fuel costs (desperate to slow domestic demand for the only thing that hedges its currency's collapse).

“This isn’t a short-term trade, it’s a multiyear repositioning of household and official assets. The scale and persistence of Chinese buying is now a core driver of global gold prices and we expect it to hold as long as uncertainty over growth and geopolitics remains,” said Liu.

As Bloomberg's Garfield Reynolds notes, October in particular is looking like a sweet spot with rates traders sticking to bets that the Fed will delay any hikes until December, and with central bank appetite also showing little sign of abating, the level of demand out there has allowed bullion to show some resilience in the face of higher real yields and the resulting strength in the US dollar.

Gold is becoming an increasingly important diversifier for global investors at a time when government bonds no longer move inversely to stock markets.

Christopher Hamilton, Invesco’s head of client solutions for Asia Pacific ex-Japan, said gold prices had ceased to behave as they did during periods of rising real yields, which in the past caused gold prices to drop. “You’re in an environment where you want to own real assets,” he said.

A Nevada woman who allegedly used a string of marriages to extract money from unsuspecting men has been ordered to repay more than $280,000 after pleading guilty to bigamy and financial fraud, according to CourtTV.

Jiaying Chen, 33, was accused of maintaining a yearslong operation in which she pursued romantic relationships, married multiple men and obtained significant amounts of money before abandoning them. Investigators said she went through five marriages in just the past year. Clark County records also revealed that Chen sought 14 marriage licenses between 2019 and 2024, with seven ultimately resulting in documented marriages.

During an October 6 court hearing, prosecutors detailed the financial damage suffered by nine men, whose individual restitution claims ranged from approximately $8,100 to $81,000. One victim described making five separate trips to China in an unsuccessful effort to recover his funds. Prosecutors characterized Chen as a serial marriage scammer who had turned what should have been personal celebrations into financial disasters.

CourtTV writes that her defense argued that compulsive gambling was responsible for the misconduct and maintained that Chen wanted to make her victims financially whole. Attorneys requested that she be allowed to begin working immediately rather than remain incarcerated. Prosecutors likewise favored supervised release over prison, citing concerns that incarceration could trigger immigration consequences and complicate efforts to recover the stolen money.

District Judge Crystal Eller was unconvinced that Chen's behavior would change without meaningful treatment, raising concerns that she could simply resume similar schemes elsewhere using another identity.

The court ultimately imposed a suspended prison term of eight to 20 years, along with eight more months behind bars. Including time already served, Chen's total jail sentence will amount to roughly one year.

Following her release, Chen must complete two years of supervised probation, participate in gambling recovery programs and counseling, and reimburse her victims a combined $280,062.86. She has also received permission to move to Florida, where she reportedly intends to join a new romantic partner and take a waitressing position at a sushi restaurant owned by a friend.