DOHA, Qatar (AP) — On their way to Argentina’s decisive game against Poland, Mohit Daga and Aayush Verma approached the stadium carrying a massive painting of their heroes Lionel Messi and Diego Maradona with the World Cup trophy.

Daga had spent 17 days painting it. It weighed 5 kilos. An offering. Anything for Messi, whom he described as a “God.”

“He is the epitome of everything. He is the source of inspiration and happiness,” said Daga, who is from Kolkata, India. “He brings happiness to our life.”

Argentina is finding a legion of passionate superfans from India, Bangladesh and other Asian countries at the World Cup in Qatar.

Thousands have traveled to the Gulf nation specifically to see Messi and his team with their own eyes, while many others are among migrant workers that make up about 90% of the emirate’s population of 3 million.

Other Argentina fans cheered from afar. In Indonesia, social media showed hundreds of people celebrating Argentina’s team’s 2-0 win over Poland after watching the game on large screens. They paraded on motorbikes waving flags after Argentina secured progress to the knockout stages. A newsreader wore an Argentina shirt during a broadcast.

Smitha Issac, originally from India, now living in Qatar, was attending the game with her family, including two sons who were “too excited” to see Messi.

“He is something like Messiah,” Isaac said. “We are expecting that he will just make something like magic today.”

Outside Stadium 974 shortly before kickoff on Wednesday, Argentina fans were still scrambling for any spare tickets to see the game. Demand far outstripped supply for the 44,000-capacity stadium.

Mohammed Haque from Bangladesh, now living in Australia, was one of the lucky ticket holders. He waved a large Argentina flag as he walked toward the flood-lit stadium made of shipping containers, approaching it like a holy shrine.

“It’s unbelievable,” Haque said of seeing Messi for the first time. “I’ve actually been preparing for the last two or three weeks for this. I had a sleepless night last night.”

Argentina has had a big following in Bangladesh since the days of Maradona, one of the greatest to play the game, and an icon to fans around the world.

“Diego Maradona, he was exceptional. And from then I just loved this country and especially the soccer every time,” Haque said. “Then later, (Gabriel) Batistuta, (Hernan) Crespo, every Argentine player, and now Messi is the legend.”

Bangladesh, India and Pakistan — where cricket is king — have never played a World Cup. So when the tournament comes along, many soccer fans typically root for Argentina or Brazil, soccer powerhouses admired for their attacking style of play and a long line of international stars, including Messi, Maradona and Pele.

Fans who had traveled from Argentina to support their team in Qatar were delighted with the support from non-Argentines.

“We love to see other countries showing their love for Messi and Maradona,” said Mauricio Neraj from Mendoza, Argentina. He posed for pictures next to the Messi and Maradona painting by Daga outside the stadium.

Some of the South Asian fans in Qatar said they were deeply hurt by speculation on social media and in some Western media before the tournament that they were hired actors, paid by Qatar to fill the stadiums. The World Cup organizing committee rejected the reports as false.

“It is coming from the bottom of our hearts. It is not coming from any outside forcing or anything like that,” said Binoy John, and Indian worker in Qatar who has been an Argentina fan since childhood when he saw Maradona lead Argentina to win the 1986 World Cup. “All the fans are true fans. There is nothing like fake fans out here.”

Argentina has a following among Arab soccer fans, too. Messi-devotion brought Ahmed Qassim Nasher from Yemen to see his favorite player as Argentina advanced.

“Football is a festival, joy, celebrations. It connects people from different nationalities, different languages, and different ethnicities,” Nasher said. “You will find Arabs and non-Arabs coming to cheer for Messi. It’s common sense that he will have the best audience and fans, because he is the best player throughout history.”

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AP video journalist Lujain Jo contributed to this report.

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AP World Cup coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/world-cup and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to return to office, from where he could try to make his yearslong legal troubles disappear through new legislation advanced by his far-right and ultra-Orthodox allies. Critics say such a legal crusade is an assault on Israel’s democracy.

Netanyahu, 73, who is on trial for corruption, will likely be buoyed by a loyal and comfortable governing majority that could grant him a lifeline from conviction.

Defenders of the justice system say the proposed changes would allow legislators to abuse their authority and disrupt the tenuous balance of powers that keeps them in check.

“It brings us to a situation where our entire democracy boils down to elections, but once you are elected you can do whatever you want,” said Amir Fuchs, senior researcher at Jerusalem’s Israel Democracy Institute think tank. “It is not a normal situation in any democracy.”

Israel’s right wing has for years sought to change the justice system, portraying it as an interventionist and left-leaning roadblock to its legislative agenda. The makeup of the expected coalition now clears a path for such changes.

Netanyahu is on trial for fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three scandals involving wealthy associates and powerful media moguls. He denies wrongdoing and has portrayed himself as a victim of a witch hunt by law enforcement and the justice system.

Netanyahu’s political rivals say such allegations of purportedly politicized prosecutors and judges are part of a campaign to erode the public’s faith in the legal system and ultimately weaken it.

Netanyahu has claimed that proposed legal changes would not impact the outcome of his trial. While on trial, he is bound by a conflict of interest arrangement limiting his dealings with the justice system, although it is unclear if that will be enforced.

Here’s a look at the legal maneuvers that could help Netanyahu:

THE OVERRIDE CLAUSE

The most contentious change would target Israel’s Supreme Court in what critics say is a direct blow to Israel’s democracy.

Netanyahu’s partners say the Supreme Court steps in far too often to throw out right-leaning laws. They say voters choose their lawmakers to create legislation and having the Supreme Court challenge those laws is an affront to the people’s choice.

Israel has no constitution, relying instead on a set of “basic laws” that enshrine rights and freedoms. The courts are tasked with verifying that legislation measures up to those laws. The Supreme Court is seen as the final recourse for minorities and other groups challenging legislation they perceive as discriminatory.

The override clause, expected to be among the coalition’s first steps, would allow the government to treat some decisions by the Supreme Court as nonbinding. Under the proposal, still being negotiated, the coalition could override rulings with any majority, giving the governing bloc overwhelming power to disturb Israel’s system of checks and balances.

Yaniv Roznai, a law professor at Reichman University near Tel Aviv, said that once the override clause is passed, the government could approve other changes in the law that could clear Netanyahu.

THE “FRENCH LAW”

Netanyahu’s allies plan to craft a law that would postpone the prosecution of a sitting prime minister for alleged crimes until he leaves office. It’s dubbed the “French law” because in France, sitting presidents are immune from prosecution.

Sitting Israeli prime ministers can be prosecuted. But unlike in France, Israeli leaders have no term limits, meaning the shield of immunity could possibly last for years. Netanyahu is Israel’s longest-serving leader, having ruled for 15 years and he has no plans to retire.

Under the plan, a prime minister could be prosecuted for some crimes, but it excludes corruption charges. Fuchs, the researcher, said that makes the law appear tailor-made for Netanyahu.

CHANGING THE PENAL CODE

Netanyahu’s allies have pledged to remove from the penal code the very charge Netanyahu is accused of in three cases: fraud and breach of trust.

They say the crime is poorly defined, giving the court too much discretion when deciding on a conviction. They say it places lawmakers overly at risk for unjustified prosecution.

Critics say erasing the charge would remove a safeguard against corruption. They argue that targeting the very charge Netanyahu is accused of could erode the rule of law, opening the door to further changes to the legal code to rescue other lawmakers.

Yoav Sapir, a former Israeli chief public defender, said cancelling an offense has a retroactive effect. That could lead to charges in all three of Netanyahu’s cases being dropped and having two out of three cases thrown out entirely.

RECONFIGURING THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

Today, Israel’s attorney general consults with the government on the legal viability of legislation and represents it in court, while also being tasked with protecting the public interest from any harm posed by government authorities. The attorney general is nominated by the government and must be cleared by a professional committee made up of former justice officials and others.

Netanyahu’s allies want to split the post of attorney general into three separate jobs, while making at least two of the positions political appointments.

The current attorney general, Gali Baharav-Miara, was nominated by the outgoing government and she appears to have backed her predecessor’s decision to indict Netanyahu. And while firing her is complicated and has bad optics, splitting the position would keep her in her post until the end of her term in 2028 while shifting some of her responsibilities to a political appointee who could decide to halt the trial.

OUTSIZED LEVERAGE

Netanyahu’s legal woes give outsized leverage to his prospective coalition partners, who have been driving a hard bargain in tougher than expected talks now underway to form a government.

His allies are asking for influential portfolios, such as defense, finance and public security. They also want to grant legal immunity to soldiers operating against Palestinians, allow gender segregation in certain public spaces and increase government stipends for tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews who instead of working study Jewish texts.

Ultra-Orthodox and far-right parties could hold the key to Netanyahu’s legal salvation, granting them great power in deciding the next government’s agenda and shaping Israel’s future.

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Appeals court declines to revive Biden’s debt relief plan

A resident navigates a canoe to his flooded home on Whitecomb Drive along the shore of Lake Harney in Geneva, Fla., Thursday, Oct. 6, 2022. Despite the lake leveling off at a crested 8-feet above normal level, floodwaters from the St. Johns River have put his neighborhood underwater and continue to inundate other areas of Geneva and Sanford following historic levels of rainfall from Hurricane Ian. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel)

The U.S. Military awarded a $1.2 billion deal to Raytheon Co., to assist Ukraine bolster its air defenses by procuring six Countrywide Highly developed Surface-to-Air Missile Units (NASAMS), the Pentagon introduced Wednesday. 

Washington very last thirty day period pledged to send out Ukraine eight NASAMS as Kyiv and Western nations search to fend off Russia’s frequent barrage of missile fireplace.

Two of the highly developed programs are currently running in Ukraine which have been “really productive” in accordance to a report by the U.S. Office of Defense this 7 days. 

BIDEN ADMIN PLEDGES Further $53M TO BOLSTER UKRAINE’S Electric power GRID

The other 6 missiles will be despatched to Ukraine when they have been designed.

The NASAMS ended up 1st pledged to Kyiv beneath the Ukraine Protection Help Initiative (USAI) in July and bids were opened to military contractors for the development of the other six programs.

Furnishing arms to Ukraine underneath the USAI allows the Biden administration to procure weapons for Ukraine from marketplace contractors fairly than applying presidential drawdowns to mail arms from present weapons stocks. 

ZELENSKYY WARNS RUSSIA IS ‘PLANNING SOMETHING’ IN SOUTH While UPPING AGGRESSION IN NORTHERN UKRAINE

The contract with Raytheon also contains giving Ukraine with involved machines, expert services and spare sections to hold the advanced air defense units operational.

The perform to establish the NASAMS, which will be executed in Tewksbury, Mass., will be completed by Nov. 28, 2025.

Chief weapons consumer for the Army, Doug Bush, confirmed very last week that the U.S. was accelerating its weapons acquisition procedure to additional efficiently replenish its weapons stocks as the war in Ukraine continues, noted Reuters. 

“Acquisition velocity and agility is a major precedence,” Bush said in a assertion Wednesday. “The rapid award of this contract is yet another case in point of the Army’s ability to speed up the supply of essential abilities as a result of our field partners to our allies.”

Russia has amplified its bombing marketing campaign throughout Ukraine as its forces on the entrance lines have faltered. 

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In spite of substantial gains in Kharkiv and Kherson Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this 7 days warned that Russia is attempting to progress in equally sectors on the entrance traces. 

Defense officers have assessed that Russia’s missile shares are waning, and its forces are now deploying unarmed cruise missiles to focus on civilian populations – indicating Russian troops are relying on the destruction prompted by the power of the missile alternatively than the greater effects that a warhead would obtain. 

That’s in accordance to UN’s top unexpected emergency reduction formal, Martin Griffiths, Ukrinform studies, referring to UN Information.

The dimensions of the enchantment – 25 for each cent increased than this year’s – displays the simple fact that the complete quantity in require is 65 million extra than in 2022, the UN and companion corporations noted.

Requires are “shockingly high”, Martin Griffiths mentioned, warning that it was extremely probably that this year’s emergencies would continue on into 2023.

Read through also: First Girl of Türkiye visits Ukrainian orphans evacuated from Odesa

“The wants are heading up for the reason that we have been by smitten by the war in Ukraine, by COVID, by climate,” he claimed. “I fear that 2023 is likely to be an acceleration of all those people developments, and that is why we say … that we hope 2023 will be a year of solidarity, just as 2022 has been a calendar year of suffering.”

Talking in Geneva at the start of the Worldwide Humanitarian Overview report 2023, Griffiths explained the enchantment as a “lifeline” for people on the brink.

He discussed that quite a few nations around the world experienced been hit by lethal droughts and floods, from Pakistan to the Horn of Africa. In addition, the war in Ukraine had “turned a part of Europe into a battlefield.

A lot more than 100 million men and women are now displaced around the world. And all of this on top rated of the devastation still left by the pandemic between the world’s poorest.”

If the humanitarian outlook for 2023 is so grim, it is in huge section due to the fact reduction requires are by now so high.

At minimum “222 million folks … will face acute food insecurity in 53 international locations by the conclude of this year”, Mr. Griffiths stated.

Turning to the menace of famine, he reported that 5 international locations “are already encountering what we connect with famine-like problems, where by we can confidently and unhappily say that men and women are dying as a result – and it tends to be young children – of displacement, food insecurity, absence of food stuff, starvation.”

As noted, on July 22 at the suggestion of the United Nations, Ukraine, Turkey, and UN Secretary Standard António Guterres signed a 120-working day initiative on the risk-free transportation of grain and food items goods from the ports of Odesa, Chernomorsk, and Pivdennyi.

The 1st ship carrying Ukrainian food stuff remaining the port of Odesa on August 1.

On November 17, Ukraine, the UN, and Turkey agreed to prolong the “grain initiative” for another 120 days.