A missile strike on Riyadh’s airport killed 12, including an American, and Trump said the U.S. “may” join Saudi strikes on the Houthis.
The missile hit two domestic terminals at King Khalid International Airport on Saturday, Oct. 10, Saudi aviation authorities say, killing 12 and injuring 309. Hours later Trump said: “We move very quickly.”
Who fired it is contested. The Saudi-led coalition and Secretary of State Marco Rubio blame the Houthis; the Saudi aviation authority blamed no one.
October 11, 2026 · Eight stories, illustrated
- The Saudi-led coalition
Blames the Houthis.
per AP - Secretary of State Marco Rubio
Blamed “the terrorist Houthis.”
- The Houthis
No formal claim in AP’s or CBS’s reports.
But Houthi official Mohammed al-Bukhaiti told RT and the NYT the group did it, in retaliation for Saudi strikes. - The Saudi aviation authority
Its statement blamed no one.
AFP and The Wall Street Journal call it the deadliest attack in Saudi Arabia since an Islamic State mosque bombing killed 21 in May 2015; the New York Times and AP, the deadliest on any Gulf Arab state since the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran began Feb. 28. With six killed earlier in the week, per TIME, airport strikes have killed at least 18 since Tuesday, Oct. 6.
- Riyadh
A missile hit domestic Terminals 3 and 4 at King Khalid International Airport on Saturday, Oct. 10, killing 12, including an American and four Saudis, Saudi aviation authorities say.
- Abha
Oct. 6–8: airport strikes here and in Riyadh killed six, including three Saudis in a Houthi-claimed Oct. 8 attack.
- Sanaa
Yemen’s capital, taken by the Houthis in 2014.
- Strait of Hormuz
Where Iran attacks ships, per AP.
- Yemen’s Red Sea coast
Yemen’s Saudi-backed government opened an offensive on Sunday, Oct. 4 to retake coast the Houthis seized in September. That coast overlooks the main shipping alternative to the Strait of Hormuz, per AP.
The dots are city centers, not impact sites, and the Hormuz ring marks the strait, not a ship. The map does not show which stretch of coast the Houthis seized, who holds what, or any shipping route.
- What joining would do
- Put U.S. bombs behind a Saudi-backed ground war and end the May 2025 Oman-brokered deal under which the Houthis stopped attacking U.S. ships and the U.S. stopped bombing them, per NBC.
- Already
- The U.S. helps the Saudis pick Houthi targets, per AP. On Oct. 3, it refused Saudi requests to bomb the Houthis and sent targeting data instead.
- In Congress
- Reps. Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, and Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, filed a War Powers resolution on Friday, Oct. 9, to pull U.S. forces from hostilities against the Houthis. It gets a fast-track vote but skips the president, so a 1983 Supreme Court ruling leaves its force in doubt, per the Congressional Research Service.
- Last time
- Trump ordered Houthi strikes for Sunday, Sept. 20, and canceled them about three hours before launch, per NBC.
Still open: whether Trump strikes. He now says he will speak to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Read the reporting
Russian glide bombs killed 20 in Zaporizhzhia a day after the U.S. suspended sanctions on Russian diesel.
Five bombs hit apartment blocks in the southeastern Ukrainian city of about 700,000 early Saturday, Oct. 10, killing 20, including three children, per Reuters. Regional official Ivan Fedorov put the wounded at 32. It was Russia’s third mass-casualty strike in a week.
Zelensky called it Moscow’s “thanks” for the diesel deal Trump announced hours earlier.
On their Friday, Oct. 9, call, before the bombing, Putin told Trump talks can’t resume immediately, blaming Ukraine’s Sept. 20 drone attack on Moscow during Russian elections, per Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov.
- Lets Russian diesel be sold
- including into the U.S., until April 7, 2027.
- Sets no cap
- and no conditions on Russia’s war; there is no ceasefire condition.
- Blocks only
- payments from U.S. accounts of Russia’s central bank, wealth fund and finance ministry.
- Runs past 30 days
- the first such waiver since 2022 to do so, AP says.
of U.S. use: what all 4.8 million tons would cover at the roughly 3.8 million barrels of diesel a day the U.S. burns, per an analyst quoted by the BBC. Not all of it is U.S.-bound.
The first tranche is about 2.25 million barrels. Yesterday’s edition drew the four tranches to scale.
Russia, which has barred its own diesel exports since July, says it will lift that ban early. Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick plans a petition to force a House vote banning all Russian oil purchases, aiming to block the deal. It needs 218 signatures. If every Democrat signs, he and cosponsor Don Bacon make 216, so two more Republicans are needed; no text is filed, and the House is out until after the midterms.
Still open: what Russia gets in return, who pays, and whether November cargoes land before the Nov. 3 midterms. TASS, citing one source, says Witkoff and Kushner may visit Moscow within two weeks.
Read the reporting
Trump said Ukraine needs “a new president” and told Zelensky to stop striking Russian oil refineries.
Zelensky “could have settled this war many times,” Trump said on Saturday, Oct. 10, a day after Zelensky attacked the diesel deal. A U.S. official told Axios that Trump struck the deal after Zelensky ignored half a dozen U.S. requests to halt the refinery strikes.
“He better damn well stop.”Trump, who said the strikes hurt U.S. “farmers, our ranchers”
Russia has banned its own diesel exports since July because Ukrainian strikes cut its output; the International Energy Agency puts Russian diesel production down about 30%, per AP. Ukraine’s Defense Ministry claims 51% of Russia’s refining capacity is out of action; AP says that can’t be verified.
- Resignation
- Incapacity
- Impeachment 338 of 450 votes
- Death
Zelensky won a five-year term in 2019. It lapsed in May 2024, but martial law, in force since February 2022, bars elections. In a KIIS poll released Oct. 5, 24% of Ukrainians wanted elections now and 71% after the war.
Envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner warned Ukraine’s team in Miami on Friday, Oct. 9, that it was at risk unless the strikes stop.
No threat was made.
About six days, March 5–11, 2025, the only confirmed one since 2022. It ended after U.S.-Ukraine talks in Jeddah.
Section 1244 of the FY2026 defense bill requires the defense secretary to notify Congress within 48 hours of pausing military intelligence support.
Ukraine will stop if Russia stops hitting its power grid, Zelensky says. Until then, a senior official told the FT: “We will burn [Russian] refineries.” EU foreign ministers are set to approve 1,646 new sanctions listings on Monday, Oct. 12.
Read the reporting
Trump says he will decide whether to livestream the firing-squad execution of Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter.
Trump said on Saturday, Oct. 10, he would “make a decision ultimately” on streaming the execution of Hasan, who killed 13 people and wounded 32 at Fort Hood in 2009. A day earlier he said he “absolutely” approved. No U.S. execution has ever been broadcast, per the BBC.
An eight-member firing squad is to carry it out on Dec. 3. Hasan would be the first U.S. service member executed since 1961.
- Army rules
- They bar witnesses under 18 and require an approved witness list, so a stream needs a waiver or rule change, a military lawyer told Snopes.
- The platforms
- Meta bans streams of executions; YouTube and TikTok allow “public interest” exceptions, per the BBC.
“Certainly unacceptable to turn death into a spectacle.”
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state. Pope Leo called capital punishment “inadmissible” on Saturday, without naming Hasan.“Live-streaming executions is what jihadists do.”
Rep. Austin Scott, a Georgia Republican. Rep. Matt Van Epps, a Tennessee Republican, backs it.“More of an act of vengeance than an act of justice.”
Retired Lt. Gen. Sean MacFarland, who approved Hasan’s death sentence in 2013, to Bloomberg
Homicides fell 35.7% on average in the short term after heavily publicized executions. No lasting effect, and live video was not studied.
Studies could not show whether the death penalty raises, lowers or leaves homicide rates unchanged.
- 1961
- The last military execution: the hanging of Pvt. John Bennett.
- 1945
- The last military firing squad, for Pvt. Eddie Slovik, per NPR.
- Four
- People on military death row, Hasan among them.
Still open: Hasan can still file a habeas petition, a civilian-court challenge to his detention, which Yale’s Eugene Fidell says could push the execution past this administration. Whether he will is unclear, Snopes reported.
Read the reporting
The Justice Department opened an antitrust investigation of the five TV networks that suspended White House pool coverage.
It is examining whether ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News and NBC broke antitrust law by jointly suspending the TV pool, in which one network films the president and shares the footage with the rest. They did it after Trump barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico.
A judge has since ordered the barred outlets’ credentials restored, so the probe targets a protest of a ban a court has blocked for now.
- CNN
- MS NOW
- Politico
- ABC
- CBS
- CNN
- Fox News
- NBC
CBS and CNN now share a parent, Skydance, after the Paramount–Warner Bros. Discovery merger closed this week, per CBS News.
White House pool feedSuspended
“Group boycotts among commercial competitors can violate the Sherman Act.”Justice Department spokeswoman Emily Covington, on Saturday, Oct. 10. The Sherman Act is the 1890 law against competitors jointly restraining trade.
The department’s Antitrust Division asked for the networks’ pool communications, per the BBC. Trump ally Laura Loomer had urged an antitrust case two weeks earlier, per CNN.
The Supreme Court shielded a political boycott.
It refused to shield lawyers boycotting for higher fees.
The networks have run the pool jointly for decades unchallenged, per Variety.
Still open: Judge Timothy Kelly’s temporary order restoring the credentials runs to Tuesday, Oct. 13; on Oct. 8 he seemed likely to make it permanent. Reports do not say whether the department used a civil investigative demand or a subpoena.
Read the reporting
A Justice Department memo lets the attorney general, the FBI director and U.S. attorneys campaign for candidates in a personal capacity.
The memo, from the department’s top ethics official, Assistant Attorney General Jolene Ann Lauria, exempts Senate-confirmed appointees from the department’s stricter political-activity limits, PBS News first reported. It came after Attorney General Todd Blanche spoke at the GOP’s midterm convention and a North Carolina Senate rally.
- Speak at rallies
- Endorse candidates
- Canvass
- Serve as party officers
- Attend a fundraiser, or give
- Use official authority to sway an election
- Host a fundraiser
- Collect donations
Career staff keep the stricter rules, per CBS.
- 2022
Attorney General Merrick Garland barred appointees from all partisan events after the Office of Special Counsel began investigating Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins over a Democratic fundraiser.
- Under Bondi
Pam Bondi rescinded Garland’s ban. Her March guidance still told appointees to avoid a state shortly before its election.
- Now
The new memo says only that such appearances “warrant heightened scrutiny,” per PBS.
The Hatch Act, the 1939 law limiting federal workers’ politics, already exempts these officials from its campaigning ban; DOJ calls the memo a clarification. Attorneys general held appointees to a stricter standard for 20-plus years, said Joseph Tirrell, DOJ’s ethics chief until he was dismissed last year.
They still break the ban on using official authority to sway an election.
He is “not in any way violating any rule or law.”
Read the reporting
Medicaid ended Oct. 1 for refugees, asylees and other legal immigrants without green cards.
Federally funded Medicaid, the federal-state health program for low-income people, no longer covers refugees, asylees, trafficking survivors or other immigrants here legally without a green card. It is the first Medicaid change to take effect from Trump’s 2025 law, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
- Arizona
- 29,000 cut on day one, the first post-cutoff count, per AP
- Nine states and D.C.
- More than 281,000 people flagged in a KFF Health News survey; Florida alone is nearly 177,000
- California, outside that tally
- About 148,000 expected; the state is spending $365 million to cover them through July 2027
- Congressional Budget Office
- 100,000 a lower estimate that counts only people left fully uninsured by 2034
A green card now takes “well over a year,” up from about six months before 2025, a resettlement director told KFF Health News, and most new holders then wait five years for Medicaid. The 1996 welfare law created that wait but exempted refugees and asylees.
Immigrants “must be able to support themselves.”
Refugees and asylees paid about $124 billion more in taxes than they cost governments in 2005-2019.
Next: on Jan. 1, 2027, refugee or asylee status stops qualifying for Obamacare subsidies; CBO projects about 1 million lose that eligibility by 2034. The fiscal 2026 refugee ceiling is 7,500, the lowest ever.
Read the reporting
The FDA proposes letting chemicals added directly to food qualify for its low-dose exemption from full additive approval.
The exemption lets a chemical skip full additive approval when exposure is trivially low. Since 1995 it has covered only chemicals that migrate from packaging and processing equipment. The FDA’s Aug. 11 proposal to tighten GRAS, the “generally recognized as safe” label companies use to self-certify ingredients, would also open the exemption to ingredients put in food on purpose, The Guardian reported.
Old limit0.5 parts per billion × 3 kg of food and drink a day
New limit0.025 micrograms per kg of body weight × a 60 kg (132-pound) adult
Both1.5 micrograms a day
Assumptions are FDA’s: 3 kilograms of daily food and drink and a 60-kilogram adult. Carcinogens stay out.
Only chemicals that migrate from packaging and processing equipment, with “no technical effect” on food.
Also flavorings, preservatives and other ingredients put in food on purpose. The “no technical effect” rule is dropped.
FDA still grants each exemption, but on “minimal data” with no “full safety narrative,” the proposal says, and any company may then rely on it. FDA’s public inventory listed 144 threshold exemptions as of July 2026.
Advocates say some non-carcinogens, such as perchlorate and certain bisphenols and PFAS, do harm at far lower doses. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. touted the GRAS rule as “promises kept” without mentioning the expansion, and some advocates have accused him of deception, The Guardian reported. Who added the provision is unclear.
- The exemption
BASF won a threshold exemption for perchlorate, a rocket-fuel chemical that curbs the thyroid’s iodine uptake, in one-ton grain “super sacks.”
- The cereal data
FDA data showed more kids’ cereal samples containing perchlorate after 2005.
- Re-approved
FDA re-approved the use, citing no meaningful rise across 250 foods.
Next: comments close Wednesday, Dec. 9 (docket FDA-2025-N-3262).