Amnesty International highlighted the failure of successive Iraqi governments to ensure justice, truth and reparation for the lethal crackdown on the 2019 Tishreen (October) protests, in a report published Sept. 30. Titled "We hold them responsible for the blood of our youth," the report reveals ongoing neglect and impunity five years after nationwide demonstrations that led to hundreds of deaths and disappearances, and thousands of injuries among the protesters.

Iran launched scores of ballistic missiles into Israeli territory on Oct. 1, in what it described as an exercise of its "legitimate right to self-defense under the UN Charter." The attack came hours after Israel announced a ground incursion into Lebanon, and as UN experts warned of the dire consequences of regional hostilities.

Twenty-six countries on Sept. 26 expressed their support for a legal initiative to hold the Taliban accountable at the International Court of Justice for systematic human rights violations against women and girls in Afghanistan. In a joint statement, the countries condemned Taliban policies that have severely curtailed the rights of Afghan women and girls since the Taliban took control of the country in 2021.

In the first CounterVortex meta-podcast of February 2018, we noted the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' decision to advance the minute hand of its Doomsday Clock to two minutes of midnight, citing the threats of nuclear weapons, climate change and "cyber-based disinformation." The clock was most recently moved to 90 seconds to midnight in January 2023, in light of the Ukraine war—the closest it has ever been. The clock did not move forward in 2024, despite Israel crossing the genocidal threshold in Gaza—a conflict now spreading to Lebanon, with potential to ignite the entire Middle East and even the world. The threat of Iran being drawn into the conflict could bring its patron Russia nose-to-nose with Israel's patron, the United States. This comes just as Vladimir Putin has announced a revision to Russia's nuclear weapons doctrine, allowing a first strike if its territory is attacked even by a non-nuclear state that is backed by a state with nuclear weapons. This appears to add frightening credibility to the mounting nuclear threats from Moscow. All this as the "normal" functioning of the capitalist system continues to compel the apocalypse. The some 50 left dead by Hurricane Helene in the US South are among hundreds killed in extreme weather events around the world in recent days—obvious signals of global climate destabilization. The multi-faceted systemic crisis portends imminent human extinction.

UN officials on Sept. 26 warned of a rapidly worsening humanitarian crisis in Lebanon as death tolls mount from Israeli air-strikes. Secretary-General António Guterres told the Security Council:  "Hell is breaking loose in Lebanon and we should all be alarmed by the escalation." The warnings came just as Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu arrived in New York for the UN General Assembly. Human Rights Watch one day earlier called for urgent UN action, reporting that some 1,600 Israeli strikes have killed at least 558 people, including 50 children, and injured thousands in the span of two days. The UN's Refugee Agency revealed that some 90,000 Lebanese residents had been displaced in the span of 72 hours.

The Haitian Bridge Alliance (HBA), a non-profit organization advocating for Haitian immigrants, filed criminal charges against former US President Donald Trump and Senator JD Vance, his running mate in the current presidential race, on Sept. 24. The charges, brought before the municipal court in Ohio's Clark County, stem from false claims made by Trump and Vance alleging that Haitian immigrants in the town of Springfield were abducting and eating local pets.

Typhoons, storms and flooding have killed hundreds and left millions homeless across four continents in recent days. More than 600 people—mostly in Vietnam and Myanmar—died when Super Typhoon Yagi, one of the strongest typhoons to hit Southeast Asia in decades, tore through the region, triggering landslides. In China, Typhoon Bebinca battered the commercial capital, Shanghai, forcing more than 400,000 people to evacuate. In Europe, at least 23 people died when Storm Boris dumped five times September's average rainfall in a single week. In the United States, parts of North and South Carolina recorded 45 centimeters of rain in 12 hours—a statistic so rare it's considered a once-in-a-thousand-year event. Inevitably, the wild weather has been devastating for more vulnerable countries. In conflict-affected northeastern Nigeria, half of the city of Maiduguri is under water after a local dam overflowed following torrential rains; recently emptied displacement camps are being used to shelter the homeless. In neighboring Chad, meanwhile, flooding has killed more than 340 people in the country's south.

The French government deployed the special anti-riot police, the Republican Security Companies (CRS), to Martinique on Sept. 22 in response to ongoing protests over the rising cost of living on the French-ruled Caribbean island. The deployment marks the first time CRS units have been sent to Martinique since they were banned from the territory in December 1959, following violent protests in departmental capital Fort-de-France that drew widespread criticism over heavy-handed police intervention. The CRS 8 unit, established in July 2021, is designed for "urban violence and high-intensity law enforcement operations," according to the French Ministry of the Interior.