Financial Times - Mehul Srivastava, Raya Jalabi , Chloe Cornish and Najmeh Bozorgmehr / Israel strikes Beirut after Iran missile attack stokes fears of wider war

• Israeli forces bombarded Beirut and southern Lebanon overnight as the region braced for Israel’s response to a missile attack by Iran that intensified fears of a wider war in the Middle East. 

• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed retaliation against Tehran after dozens of missiles were fired into Israel. “Iran made a big mistake — and it will pay for it,” Netanyahu said on Tuesday. “Whoever attacks us, we will attack them.”.  

• Only a handful of the Iranian missiles slipped past Israel’s sophisticated air defences, including one that appeared to have struck near the headquarters of the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence service. 

• In oil markets, the international benchmark Brent crude edged up 1.4 per cent to $74.55 a barrel on Wednesday, while the US benchmark West Texas Intermediate climbed 1.5 per cent to $70.9 a barrel.

   

The Washington Post - Tyler Pager, Michael Scherer and Cleve R. Wootson Jr. / Vance, Walz square off in what could be final meeting of presidential campaigns

• In marked contrast to the September presidential clash between former president Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris — who hardly concealed their disgust with each other — the running mates often went out of their way to be gracious, while focusing more on policy differences than personal slights. 

• Walz turned from the first question about the Middle East to argue that the nation doesn’t need “a nearly 80-year-old Donald Trump talking about crowd sizes” to solve the situation. He quoted Trump’s recent dismissal of the traumatic brain injuries sustained by U.S. troops during his presidency as “headaches.” And he chided Trump for conducting diplomacy on Twitter and for not paying federal taxes.  

• Walz followed up by criticizing Vance for repeating unsubstantiated claims that immigrants in the senator’s home state had been eating the pets of their neighbors, a claim that local officials say lacks evidence. He also said Trump had helped to scuttle a bill that would have solved the immigration problem, because he wanted to run on immigration reform.

• Vance said he had never called for a national abortion ban, though he has said he would like abortion to be illegal nationwide. He and said Trump’s stance is that a diverse array of states should have the ability to make their own decisions.

   

Bloomberg - Ellen Milligan and Jorge Valero / Starmer Starts Long Road to Brexit Revamp With Brussels Trip

• Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s trip to Brussels on Wednesday will be his first real foray into forging a new post-Brexit relationship with Europe, a process expected to take months, if not years amid competing priorities.

• Starmer’s Labour, in power for the first time since 2010, is trying to repair the damage to the UK’s ties with the bloc caused by years of fractious negotiations over Brexit. To signal a significant shift in relations, Britain and the EU are looking to hold their first bilateral summit next year, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named discussing plans that haven’t been finalized. 

•  As part of the rapprochement, Foreign Secretary David Lammy is also likely to attend a meeting of EU foreign affairs ministers later this month, and he and Nick Thomas-Symonds, the minister in charge of EU negotiations, will meet their counterparts in Dublin this week after Starmer’s Brussels visit, the people said. 

• Starmer wants closer cooperation on defense, a relaxation of food checks, mutual recognition of professional qualifications and a special visa for touring artists. The UK has also made clear that longstanding red lines remain on not rejoining the single market and customs union.

   

Reuters - Olena Harmash and Gleb Garanich / Russian troops reach centre of Ukrainian bastion Vuhledar

• Russian troops have reached the centre of Vuhledar, a bastion on strategic high ground in eastern Ukraine's industrial Donbas region that had resisted Russian assaults since Moscow's full-scale invasion, a regional Ukrainian official said on Tuesday. 

• "The enemy is already nearly in the centre of the city," Vadym Filashkin, governor of the Donetsk region that makes up part of the broader Donbas historical area, told Ukrainian TV, describing the situation as very difficult. 

• Vuhledar has strategic significance because of its high ground and its location near the junction of the two main fronts, in eastern and southern Ukraine. Russian forces reached the outskirts last week and have since intensified their push. 

• Full control over Vuhledar would help Moscow's troops to improve their logistics by using railways more actively, easing their further advance in the region and giving them positions on heights from which to fire artillery.

   

Our opinion reads for today:

• Politico - Daniel Gros / Draghi report on Europe’s competitiveness falls short 
• Foreign Policy - Allan J. Wind / U.S. Double Standards Are Failing Palestine