Presidential Debate

Vice President Kamala Harris debated former President Donald Trump on topics such as the economy and immigration. The Tuesday, September 10 debate — the first between the candidates — saw Trump peddle numerous falsehoods, including the absurd and unfounded claim that Haitian immigrants were eating cats and dogs, and that babies can be “abort[ed] after birth.” Flash polls found that voters generally thought Harris outperformed Trump, but swing state polls are still tight.

Israel strikes Hezbollah

At the beginning of September, escalating conflict between Israel and the Lebanese Shia militant group Hezbollah, caused by a rocket strike that killed Israeli children, settled. However, on Tuesday, September 17, pagers used by Hezbollah vibrated, then exploded. Approximately 24 hours later, portable radios used by the group exploded. The explosions left over 30 people dead, including children and civilians, and thousands injured. 

Hezbollah — which is classified as a terrorist group by the United States — started shifting to pagers following a February address by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, telling fighters “the phone in your hands…is [an Israeli] agent”. The pagers, meant to prevent Israel from pinpointing Hezbollah militant locations, were manufactured by B.A.C. Consulting. B.A.C. seemed to be a contractor for Gold Apollo, a Taiwanese pager manufacturer, the pagers were marketed as Gold Apollo products.

According to the New York Times, however, B.A.C. was an Israeli front; Israel laced the pager batteries with explosives, then sold them to Hezbollah through shell companies. The portable radios that exploded looked like Icom IC-V82s, but an internal Icom investigation found that they did not produce them.

Following the attacks, Hezbollah retaliated with rocket strikes — which injured multiple Israeli civilians — while Israel increased air and missile strikes in Lebanon. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said “we are opening a new phase in the war”. Since then, neither side backed a ceasefire deal proposed by the U.S. and allies, and in just ten days, the number of Lebanese deaths since the October 7th attacks doubled. 

Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli air strike on Saturday, September 27. On Monday, September 30, Israel crossed into southern Lebanon, intending to destroy “targets and infrastructures of the terrorist organization Hezbollah”. On October 1, Iran — the main supporter of Hezbollah and Hamas — launched 180 ballistic missiles at Israel, and Israel vowed to retaliate.

Hurricane Helene

Category 4 Hurricane Helene made landfall on Thursday, September 26. Just four days earlier, it wasn’t even a storm, only a tropical depression. Quickly gaining intensity, it barreled down the Gulf of Mexico and slammed into Florida. The intense rains and winds — up to 140 miles per hour — led to widespread flooding and multiple tornadoes. As it carved its path of destruction through Georgia, Tennessee, and the Carolinas, it killed over 120 people, and some estimates put total damages at over $100 billion.

This article was accurate as of press time on October 1.