🚨 HAPPENING RIGHT NOW 🚨
A gunman firing from a moving car tore through Kraków's historic Main Market Square Saturday afternoon, an attack that left six people dead and at least 15 wounded, including two officers in serious condition. Police shot and wounded the 24-year-old Polish suspect, found with a military-style rifle; three more bodies, believed to be family members, were later discovered inside his home. Investigators have not established a motive, though a prosecutor said he appeared to fire “at random.” Prime Minister Donald Tusk urged politicians not to exploit the tragedy amid a period of national mourning.
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 8th, 2026
Before we get to today's news, here's what happened on this date in history.
German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen stumbled into one of modern medicine's biggest breakthroughs on November 8, 1895, when a strange glow from a chemically coated screen in his Würzburg laboratory led him to discover what he named X-rays while testing whether cathode rays could pass through glass. He quickly found the mysterious rays could pass through human flesh but not bone, letting doctors see inside a living body without surgery for the first time; soldiers benefited from X-ray-guided treatment as early as the 1897 Balkan War. Röntgen won the first-ever Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901 and chose never to patent his discovery.
Amid the bloodiest war in American history, President Lincoln turned back Democratic challenger George McClellan on November 8, 1864, winning roughly 55% of the popular vote and carrying 22 of 25 states to secure a second term few had expected him to get. McClellan — the general Lincoln had fired in 1862 over his reluctance to pursue Robert E. Lee's army — carried only Kentucky, Delaware and New Jersey. The win let Lincoln press ahead with his vision for ending the war, laid out months later in his second inaugural address's call for “malice toward none,” a vision cut short when he was assassinated just 41 days after that address.
🇮🇱 Herzog Taps Netanyahu Rival Eisenkot to Form Israel's Next Government
Israeli President Isaac Herzog handed opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot the first shot at forming a government Saturday, a sharp setback for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu two weeks after Israel's inconclusive October 27 election, with Eisenkot set to formally receive the mandate at 5 p.m. local time Sunday.
Eisenkot's four-party “change bloc” drew 67 recommendations, including from the Arab-led Ra'am and Joint List, but holds only 48 of the Knesset's 120 seats; Netanyahu's outgoing coalition controls 53, and 61 are needed for a majority.
Netanyahu warned that “a government dependent on terror supporters will not fight terror” and called instead for a unity government, while Eisenkot proposed a “national emergency government” built around recognizing Hamas as a terrorist group and requiring universal service.
Eisenkot now has 28 days, extendable by 14, to assemble a coalition; if he fails, Herzog could hand the mandate to Netanyahu or another lawmaker, with a third election a real possibility if talks collapse.
🗳️ Mississippi Senate Race Still Unsettled as Colom's Lead Widens to Nearly 2,600 Votes
Mississippi's Senate race remained too close to call Saturday as Democrat Scott Colom's lead over Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith grew to roughly 2,600 votes, with nearly 1 million ballots counted and several thousand mail-in and provisional ballots still outstanding.
Secretary of State Michael Watson's office says just over 3,000 mail-in ballots still need processing, with ballots postmarked by Election Day accepted through Tuesday, Nov. 10; the Colom campaign estimates as many as 15,000 provisional ballots could still be resolved.
Colom told reporters “everybody who knows the math, it's going in our direction” and said he's confident of victory, while Hyde-Smith's campaign insists “this election is not over” and “we are not backing down.”
A Colom win would make him Mississippi's first Black senator elected by popular vote and the state's first Black senator since Reconstruction; Mississippi has no automatic recount law, so both sides have lawyers monitoring the count.
⚖️ Peltola Sues Alaska Over Rejected Ballots as 'Decoy Dan' Fallout Drags On
Democrat Mary Peltola's Senate campaign sued the State of Alaska on Friday for access to records on absentee ballots the state rejected, as her roughly 600-vote lead over Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan edges toward a ranked-choice tabulation expected to begin Nov. 18.
Peltola's campaign argues it “cannot ensure that its voters' lawful votes were properly counted” without seeing why ballots were rejected; Alaska's Division of Elections says giving that information to one campaign before affected voters themselves would be unfair and could delay the count.
The ranked-choice outcome may hinge on roughly 3,600 votes cast for a spoiler candidate sharing Sullivan's name, dubbed “Decoy Dan,” plus about 4,800 votes for a third candidate, Gerald Heikes — votes that could shift to the real Sullivan if those voters ranked a second choice.
Alaska accepts absentee ballots for up to 15 days after the election, meaning the final outcome likely won't be known for days yet; a DOJ grand jury probe into whether Peltola allies recruited the decoy candidate continues separately.
🏛️ Stephen Miller Readies to Formally Take Over as Trump's Chief of Staff Monday
Stephen Miller is set to be sworn in as White House chief of staff Monday, two days after President Trump tapped his longtime deputy to replace Susie Wiles following her resignation in the wake of Tuesday's Republican midterm losses.
Wiles, who held the job for 21 months — the longest tenure of any Trump chief of staff across both terms — called her service “the honor of a lifetime,” and a White House official described her departure as amicable.
Trump said Miller “gets it” in explaining his pick, pointing to Miller's hardline immigration record and years as deputy chief of staff; some newly elected Democratic lawmakers have publicly attacked the choice.
Miller, one of the chief architects of Trump's immigration crackdown, is expected to bring a more combative, process-driven approach to the West Wing as Republicans brace for a Democratic-controlled Congress in January.
⚔️ U.S. Destroys Iranian Air-Defense System in Fresh Strike as Trump Weighs Bigger Campaign
President Trump said U.S. forces carried out a fresh round of “minor” strikes on Iran this week, destroying a newly built anti-aircraft installation near Qeshm Island within minutes, as he weighs whether to resume a broader military campaign against Tehran.
Trump told reporters Friday the strike targeted an anti-aircraft system Iran had been building for about two months, saying “we knocked it out in about 15 minutes, maybe five”; Iranian officials separately claimed they shot down a U.S. drone over the same island, a claim U.S. officials haven't confirmed.
Vice President JD Vance, envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner are pursuing intensive back-channel talks through Qatari and Pakistani intermediaries on a proposal that would lift the U.S. naval blockade in exchange for IAEA access to damaged nuclear sites, though Iran is also demanding sanctions relief and compensation.
Iranian military officials warned that any further U.S. or Israeli strikes would draw an “immediate response with no geographic limits,” as Trump said he'd decide “soon” on next steps, with officials noting Nov. 9's new moon favors military operations.