The US aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is heading home from its extended deployment, multiple media outlets reported on Thursday, citing officials.

The carrier’s deployment began in late November last year and was originally scheduled to end in May, but it was repeatedly extended due to its participation in the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran. The vessel now holds a modern US Navy record for the longest consecutive, uninterrupted period at sea, with roughly 5,000 sailors and Marines aboard and more than 260 days spent largely without port calls.

The deployment has reportedly been plagued by supply and maintenance issues, including shortages of food and basic supplies, a lack of hot and potable water, and plumbing problems. Crew members’ families have raised alarm over what they described as collapsing morale, burnout, and mental health issues. Several crew members reportedly attempted to jump overboard.

Reports about the troubled deployment have prompted calls for the dismissal of Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, who dismissed concerns raised in the media as “completely misrepresented.”

Last week, US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Hegseth “must be fired immediately” over the USS Abraham Lincoln situation.

”When Pete Hegseth was nominated, everyone knew he was completely incompetent. Now our brave sailors are paying the price in a horrific and unfathomable way,” the Democratic leader said.

The politics of Vladimir Zelensky’s Ukraine remain a smelly swamp, producing a ceaseless seepage of scandals occasionally percolating to the surface in big, toxic bubbles that pop with a noxious stink. Recently, for instance, the returning ambassador to the US – no less – has become the subject of a corruption case bad enough to require bail equivalent to $130,000.

The very latest Zelensky regime stink bubble to burst, however, is centered on a former double minister. Before ending up at the center of yet another big pile of dirt, compliments of Zelensky and cronies, Herman Galushchenko had served as minister of energy and then of justice. And if you know Kiev’s political culture – for want of better terms – you won’t be surprised to hear that, in the end, he ended up arrested under suspicion of very large-scale corruption.

To be precise, Galushchenko is one of the main suspects in the massive scandal featuring the Energoatom, aka Mindich-Gate after Timur Mindich, an intimate friend of Zelensky who, clearly tipped off about his impending arrest, has long fled to Israel. Galushchenko, too, tried to run, but was not fast enough, or more likely, lacked the same level of premium protection, namely from the president himself, and got caught at the border.

Yet if the story had ended there, this would not be Ukraine.  Now we are into the sequel, and it’s at least as bad as the first part. Because in essence, Galushchenko in a cell was a thought that Zelensky and his crew could not tolerate. Surely out of sheer mafia-like camaraderie! Perish the thought – they were afraid of any deals the former minister might strike and names he might name. But getting Galushchenko out was expensive: Here as well the court had set bail, and as Mindich-Gate was a $100-million case, the bail wasn’t cheap.

Central to this operation and the highest-ranking official to have lost her position at this point is Irina Mudraya, the deputy head of Zelensky’s very own office, as well as a former deputy minister of justice. But the circle of suspects is much wider, as always in Ukraine where corruption is the passionate national sport of those running and ruining the country, while its ordinary citizens are hunted by military press gangs in broad daylight.

Also officially under suspicion and investigation are Maksim Mikitas, a former parliamentary deputy; Vadim Stolar, a currently serving parliamentary deputy; Viktor Dubovik, another high official from Zelensky’s presidential office; Elena Ferens, a deputy minister of justice; Nikolay Gladishchenko, Oleg Stupak, Liudmila Snygur, all three high up in the management of state-owned Sens Bank, which served as the financial vehicle for the launder-and-pay-for-Galushchenko scheme.

Then we also have “businessman,” a “person linked to Mikitas,” the director of the Metrostroy company, a driver who also happens to run Montazh Servis (a construction company by the name of it – good for concrete foundations to bury the talkative), and a bodyguard who doubles as the director of a firm calling itself The Philosophy of Development.

These, in sum, are typical pillars of the Ukrainian establishment as it really is. Suffice it to say that, in 2018, high-flyer Irina Mudraya, trained at Lviv University, received a ‘Best Legal Adviser in Banking and Financial Law’ award (sure, just be honest next time and call it ‘Best Consigliere in Mafia Ukraine’). In 2021, she won ‘Women Leaders who have Influenced the Development of the Legal Community’ (and unfortunately, she probably has). And just two years ago, Business Woman magazine honored her achievements in “Politics and Diplomacy.”

Yet one man who may be looking at an uncertain near-future in conjunction with ‘Operation Forrest Gump’ – the code name for this investigation – is the current head of Zelensky’s administration, Kirill Budanov. Formerly mostly busy with black ops, lies, and terrorism, Budanov has taken his office as Zelensky’s top manager only recently. His predecessor Andrey Yermak, another very close, intimate friend of Zelensky, had been forced out because of his deep involvement in Mindich-Gate. Or probably, really due to both his own crimes and those of Zelensky himself that needed a fall guy.

As caught by eavesdropping, Mudraya reminded an accomplice that “he says that corruption needs to be organized and controlled; we must not fight it.” According to Ukrainska Pravda, the mysterious “he,” the real author of that arrogantly direct and brashly cynical statement, was her boss Budanov.

It is intriguing, as another Ukrainian publication has pointed out that it is precisely Ukrainska Pravda that has dared name Budanov. For the outlet is among the supporters of Mikhail Fedorov, the tech whizz kid and former minister of defense, who has turned from a Zelensky regime insider into a challenger by calling for presidential elections even during wartime. That is, in reality, for calling for an end to the Zelensky regime, because the incumbent, polls show, can be beaten.

The swamp that is Ukrainian politics keeps festering. The greed and cynicism of Kiev’s ‘elite’ knows no limits. At the same time what may be even more tragic for Ukraine is that any attempt to reign in the rampant corruption by finally holding everyone accountable, no matter how high up, is not only unlikely to succeed but dishonest too.

Naming Budanov? Yes, but not because he should face scrutiny and accountability but because he needs to be weakened so that another ambitious establishment representative has a better chance at beating him at coming elections. In Kiev, stories of messianic redeemers are popular again and again. Zelensky was once the most enthusiastically endorsed of them all. And yet it is his regime that has become the very worst. Why would Fedorov be any different? Or for that matter, anyone else. Ukraine does not need personnel change; it needs a massive reset.

Dozens of Ukrainian soldiers have deserted while undergoing military training in Germany, Die Zeit has reported, citing interviews with ten men who fled their units.

Kiev has increasingly relied on forced mobilization as it struggles to replenish battlefield losses. Videos regularly circulate online showing recruitment officers detaining men in public places and forcing them into vehicles, sometimes after violent confrontations. The practice has become widely known in Ukraine as “busification.”

Die Zeit reported on Wednesday that during the early years of the conflict, Ukrainian troops sent to Germany for training were generally experienced and highly motivated. More recently, however, many of those arriving have been newly mobilized recruits.

In Saxony-Anhalt alone, the regional Interior Ministry has recorded around 80 cases of Ukrainian soldiers deserting, while the nationwide total is believed to run into the hundreds, according to the weekly.

Among those interviewed was Vladimir Shulgin, a 39-year-old former pianist from Dnepr. He told Die Zeit that after Ukraine intensified its mobilization campaign, he largely avoided leaving home while his wife supported the family.

According to his account, he initially had no intention of deserting. He changed his mind after allegedly being physically abused by Ukrainian superiors and threatened with death upon his return to Ukraine.

After a German military doctor referred him to a hospital in Berlin, Shulgin did not return to the training facility. He has since applied for asylum and is living in a refugee shelter.

Another deserter interviewed by Die Zeit said he had fled because he did not want to kill or be killed.

“I simply don’t want to die, and I don’t want to kill. Not at the front, and nowhere else. Is that enough?” he said.

Their prospects of obtaining asylum are “likely slim,” however, according to the newspaper.

Similar desertions have occurred during Ukrainian training programs elsewhere in Europe. In late 2024, Ukrainian media reported that around 50 soldiers from the 155th Mechanized Brigade had deserted during training in France.

The Ukrainian authorities have acknowledged tens of thousands of desertion and unauthorized-absence cases since the conflict with Russia escalated in 2022.

Russia has accused the leadership in Kiev and its Western backers of being willing to fight “to the last Ukrainian.”

The US Navy is reportedly considering whether to rename an upcoming aircraft carrier honoring World War II black hero Doris Miller after President Donald Trump in an unprecedented move.

The ongoing discussions were first reported on Friday by CNN, citing three sources familiar with the matter. The report was corroborated by CBN News, with two unnamed US officials confirming to the broadcaster that deliberations have been going on.

The USS Doris Miller is set to become the fourth Ford-class aircraft carrier and is expected to be commissioned in the mid-2030s. Under the first Trump administration, the US Navy announced the decision to name it after Miller, who distinguished himself during the attack on Pearl Harbor. The sailor, an enlisted cook with no appropriate training, managed to shoot down at least one incoming Japanese aircraft during the attack, becoming the first black recipient of the Navy Cross for his feat.

The navy is now reportedly weighing renaming a different warship after Miller, as well as posthumously recommending him for the Medal of Honor, the top US decoration for military valor. The sailor was killed in 1943 in the Japanese torpedoing of the USS Liscome Bay, which remains the deadliest carrier sinking in US Navy history, with over 700 crew lost.

A recent Trump executive order, in which he tasked the Pentagon and US Navy to come up with a plan to replace electromagnetic aircraft launch systems on carriers with old-school steam and hydraulic catapults, also referred to the ship only by its hull number.

The US president has shown a great interest in shipbuilding during his second term. In December last year, Trump announced plans to construct a ‘Golden Fleet’ of massive, aptly named Trump-class battleships that would be “100 times more powerful” than any ever built. Trump said he approved building two ships to start, with plans for up to 25. 

The ‘Golden Fleet’ affair reportedly resulted in the downfall of Navy Secretary John Phelan, who was sacked this April for allegedly failing to deliver a plan to build the Trump-class battleships on a “nearly impossible timeline.”

As more US police departments deploy Flock cameras to monitor traffic and track criminals, public backlash has grown. In San Diego, a protester dressed as Darth Vader showed up to a city council meeting to portray Flock as a tool for tracking “rebel scum.”

There are now more than 130,000 Flock cameras dotting the US, with law enforcement departments in at least 4,000 cities erecting the AI-powered surveillance devices on intersections, parking lots, and public land. Flock Technologies says the cameras have helped police stop burglaries, carjackings, and homicides, but opponents say they encroach on civil liberties.

At a meeting of the San Diego City Council on Wednesday, a man dressed as Star Wars villain Darth Vader shared his opinion on the technology, approaching the podium with his character’s signature mechanical breathing.

“The Emperor is a fan of Flock, and we must continue utilising Flock technologies so that we can surveil the rebel scum,” he declared. “As they move from playground to playground, from playground to pool, from pool to gymnasium, because we all know that the Flock cameras are not only following the license plate readers, they are following children.”

Darth Vader comes out in favor of Flock cameras pic.twitter.com/YL3jaiwIEx

— Orwell Day (@OrwellDay) August 20, 2026

Flock is best known for its Falcon ALPR (Automated License Plate Recognition) cameras, which capture still images of passing vehicles. However, the company’s Condor PTZ video cameras can be used by police departments to track the movement of individuals across multiple cameras with AI, and search for people via description.

Flock’s Falcon ALPR cameras have already been used by more than 50 police officers to stalk women – including ex-wives and partners – without their consent, the Washington Post reported earlier this month. Vulnerabilities in Flock’s software have also left images of children, recorded with the company’s video cameras, exposed online. 

“I need this so I can stalk my ex-girlfriend,” ‘Darth Vader’ told the city council meeting. “This technology will help us find Luke Skywalker as he traverses the universe in his X-Wing.”

The rollout of Flock cameras began at scale in 2020, but the process has not been smooth.  Flock cameras have been shot, spray-painted, cut down, and obstructed across the country. According to FlockStats, a website that counts confirmed incidents of vandalism against the devices, at least 162 have been destroyed nationwide. 

As the cameras have proliferated, so have their detractors. Republican Representative Thomas Massie is among the highest-profile opponents of the technology, introducing a bill last month that would withhold federal funding from police departments deploying the cameras. Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont, a Democrat, has also ordered cities to pause the installation of Flock cameras until the state develops new privacy legislation. 

Israeli airstrikes on Syria’s Abu al-Duhur airbase on August 18 unexpectedly turned what might otherwise have looked like another familiar episode of Israeli military activity inside a neighboring country into something far more dangerous.

This time, the real recipient of Israel’s warning was neither Iran nor Hezbollah, but Türkiye, which has emerged as one of the principal political and military partners of Syria’s new leadership since the fall of Bashar Assad. Eight strikes hit the airbase, located roughly 70 kilometers from the Turkish border, damaging runways and military infrastructure.

Israel said the operation was intended to prevent Syria from allowing Turkish forces to establish a presence there, while US and Israeli officials indicated that one of the objectives was also to disrupt the delivery of advanced Turkish weapons systems to the facility. Shortly before the attack, Mossad chief Roman Gofman had reportedly discussed with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Shaibani the expansion of Türkiye’s military footprint, arms sales to Damascus and the possible transfer of drones to the Syrian armed forces.

Turkish-Syrian military cooperation itself is hardly a secret. As early as August 2025, Ankara formally agreed to assist the reconstruction of Syria’s armed forces through weapons, military equipment, logistics, training and advisory support, and over the past year, the two governments have steadily deepened that relationship. What remains unconfirmed, however, is whether a new shipment of Turkish weaponry was physically delivered to Syria on August 20. Yet the issue goes beyond that particular shipment.

Israel increasingly views the transformation of Turkish assistance from a reconstruction program into a permanent military infrastructure as a strategic shift in the regional balance. It is especially concerned about drones, electronic warfare systems, radar networks and, above all, the eventual deployment of modern air-defense systems that could restrict Israel’s long-standing freedom of action in Syrian airspace.

The escalation between Türkiye and Israel is advancing at a remarkable speed. For the moment, the confrontation remains largely rhetorical, diplomatic and indirect, but Syria has created the very real possibility of a proxy conflict between two states that both possess modern armed forces, sophisticated defense industries and competing visions of the regional order. Syria could become the arena in which those visions collide via the arming of allies, the destruction of military infrastructure and attempts to enforce rival red lines. Such a scenario could become the point of no return.

The most important change is that post-Assad Syria is no longer merely a battleground for Israel’s campaign against Iranian influence. For years, Israel operated within a relatively predictable framework. Airstrikes targeted assets linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, weapons depots and supply routes serving Hezbollah, Syrian air-defense systems and other infrastructure capable of restricting Israeli operational freedom. Türkiye was not directly a part of that equation.

Now, Ankara has acquired the opportunity to rely not only on its long-standing military presence in northern Syria and on armed groups historically aligned with it, but increasingly on the central government in Damascus itself. Syria’s new authorities need investment, reconstruction, military training, infrastructure and international political backing, all of which Türkiye is well placed to provide. For Ankara, this represents an unusually favorable strategic opening, allowing it to convert years of costly involvement in the Syrian conflict into lasting influence over the political and military architecture of the neighboring state.

Israel sees the Turkish presence as a threat. If the Syrian army remains weak, fragmented and technologically backward, Israel can preserve near-unrestricted operational freedom across large parts of Syrian territory. But if Türkiye helps Damascus rebuild a centralized army, restore airfields and radar networks, acquire drones and eventually field modern defensive systems, Israel could face a fundamentally different Syria within several years. More importantly, that Syria would no longer be backed by a sanctions-battered Iran, but by a NATO member with a rapidly expanding defense-industrial base.

The attack on Abu al-Duhur is an attempt to establish a preventive red line. Netanyahu said after the strike that Israel would not tolerate a Turkish military presence in Syria that threatened Israeli security, adding that an earlier message had apparently not been understood clearly enough. Türkiye replied by accusing the Israeli prime minister of pursuing an “expansionist and destabilizing policy,” while Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz warned Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan against testing Israel’s determination.

Even Israel’s allies in Washington are concerned. US envoy Tom Barrack described the strike as an unnecessary escalation, while the US has accelerated efforts to create a deconfliction mechanism between Israel, Türkiye and Syria. The very fact that such a mechanism is now considered necessary shows that Washington is increasingly treating an accidental or deliberate confrontation between two of its most important regional partners as a scenario that requires technical safeguards rather than as an abstract possibility.

Yet it would be a mistake to think that Israel is solely pursuing military goals. Parliamentary elections are scheduled for October 27, and the campaign has already transformed Israel’s foreign policy into one of the central arenas of domestic political competition.

For Benjamin Netanyahu, this may be one of the most difficult election campaigns of his career. For decades, he built his political brand around two propositions – that he alone could guarantee Israel’s security and that he possessed a unique ability to manage relations with Washington and other world powers. Both claims are now under scrutiny. The October 7 attack shattered much of Netanyahu’s long-cultivated image as Israel’s ultimate guarantor of security. Years of war and mobilization have not produced an uncontested political outcome; relations with allies have grown more complicated, and domestic tensions have been intensified by disputes over ultra-Orthodox military service, the confrontation over the judiciary and Netanyahu’s continuing criminal trial on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust, all of which he denies.

His problem is compounded by shifts within the electorate itself. Netanyahu must simultaneously recover more moderate right-wing voters and prevent the radical wing of the nationalist camp from drifting toward politicians such as Itamar Ben-Gvir and other parties positioned to the right of Netanyahu’s Likud party. That creates almost ideal conditions for a return to one of Netanyahu’s most effective political instruments – the politics of the besieged fortress.

The more threatening the external danger appears, the easier it becomes to move the election away from questions about Netanyahu’s personal responsibility, his court cases, the social cost of prolonged mobilization and economic pressures, and instead turn it into a referendum on who can be trusted to lead Israel against a growing circle of enemies.

That strategy has become explicit in Likud’s campaign messaging. Billboards have placed Erdoğan alongside Iran’s supreme leader, Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, beneath the slogan that they all want Netanyahu to lose. Erdoğan is no longer a difficult foreign leader or an unreliable partner, he now stands among Israel’s traditional adversaries and is being used as part of domestic electoral mobilization.

Netanyahu’s critics are attacking him from opposite directions. Naftali Bennett, himself hardly a dove, argues that Israel’s international position has deteriorated dramatically under Netanyahu and has proposed the creation of a special public-diplomacy body to fight for Israel’s image abroad. Bennett’s criticism carries weight: There is no fundamental disagreement between him and much of the Israeli right over the need to confront hostile regional forces. The disagreement is over method and results. According to Bennett, Israel possesses enormous military power but has failed to efficiently convert it into diplomatic clout.

Ehud Barak, by contrast, has attacked Netanyahu for moving too far in the opposite direction. He described the strike on Abu al-Duhur as “reckless and foolish” and argued that it carried a strong political flavor of manufacturing security fears before the election. Barak’s position is that Türkiye is not Iran and not Assad’s Syria, and that the tensions with Ankara can still be managed through discreet channels coordinated with Washington.

Netanyahu now finds himself squeezed between those that demand he prove that Israel can still impose its will on the region, and those accusing him of turning foreign policy into an extension of his election campaign. In this tight spot, backing down before Ankara may carry almost as much domestic political risk as escalating further.

The situation in Türkiye’s domestic politics is similar in some aspects, but different in others. The next scheduled presidential and parliamentary elections are formally due in 2028, yet the possibility of an early vote remains a recurring subject in Turkish politics. The issue is especially relevant for Erdoğan because constitutional limits complicate another presidential run unless the legal and electoral framework changes or early elections are triggered under specific conditions. At the same time, the government continues to promote the idea of a new constitution, a project that the opposition views partly through the lens of Erdoğan’s political future.

Türkiye is also approaching the next electoral cycle from a position of persistent economic and political strain. Inflation remains high, purchasing power has been severely eroded, and the cost of housing and food continues to shape everyday voter sentiment. Even as Ankara has adopted more orthodox economic policies and rebuilt parts of its financial credibility, the social consequences of years of inflation remain politically toxic.

The political environment is also tense. Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, Erdoğan’s most formidable long-term rival, has been imprisoned, while the main opposition party CHP has endured a severe internal crisis and leadership struggle. Turkish authorities reject accusations that legal proceedings against opposition figures are politically motivated, but the struggle over the country’s post-Erdoğan future, or perhaps Erdoğan’s continued political dominance, has already begun well before the formal campaign.

Confrontation with Israel offers Erdoğan several political advantages. It appeals simultaneously to religious-conservative and nationalist constituencies, allows Türkiye to present itself as a state capable of shaping the Middle East, and turns foreign policy activism into proof that Ankara remains an autonomous center of power despite its economic problems.

By backing the government in Damascus, Türkiye can embed itself in Syria’s future security and political architecture, weaken Kurdish armed formations, expand markets for its defense industry and deepen its political presence all the way to the Mediterranean. Erdoğan has already argued that Israeli military activity in Syria and Lebanon has reached a stage where it threatens Türkiye’s own security.

This creates a problem similar to Netanyahu’s. Once Ankara publicly presents itself as a state capable of protecting its partners and influencing the regional balance, retreating after a direct Israeli strike on an object associated with Turkish-Syrian cooperation becomes politically costly. The more Türkiye’s regional strategy depends on the perception that it can defend its interests, the harder it becomes to ignore Israeli attempts to define the limits of Turkish involvement by force.

On August 7, Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed a defense agreement in Mecca. The pact reportedly includes principles of mutual protection, political and military coordination, joint exercises and cooperation in defense production, including drone manufacturing, electronic warfare and emerging technologies. Riyadh has emphasized that the arrangement should not be understood as a sectarian bloc or as an alliance directed against any particular state.

The agreement brings together Türkiye, which possesses one of NATO’s largest militaries and a rapidly growing defense industry, Saudi Arabia, which features enormous financial resources and ambitions to shape the Arab political order, and Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state with one of the largest militaries in the Muslim world.

From an Israeli perspective, this is the kind of development that feeds concern over the emergence of a new Sunni axis. What matters is not whether the three countries have formally created an anti-Israel alliance. They have not. Their interests differ, their relationships with Washington are distinct, and Saudi Arabia in particular has reasons to avoid being locked into an overtly anti-Israeli structure. But Israeli strategists are increasingly focused on the possibility that Turkish military power, Saudi financial weight and Pakistani strategic capabilities could gradually become parts of a broader political-security architecture capable of limiting Israel’s freedom of maneuver.

This concern is not limited to Netanyahu’s camp, either. Bennett has previously warned of the danger of Türkiye becoming a kind of “new Iran” and of a hostile Sunni strategic framework emerging with the involvement of nuclear-armed Pakistan. Once Saudi Arabia is added to that picture, the implications become even more uncomfortable for Israel, especially because normalization with Riyadh was for years regarded as one of the top strategic objectives of Israeli diplomacy. After decades of confronting what Israeli strategists described as an Iranian-led “Shiite crescent,” Israel may now be facing the early outlines of a very different regional center of gravity – one that conflicts with the idea of Israel as the uncontested dominant power of the region, and potentially with the nationalist expansionist vision of ‘Greater Israel’ itself.

For Ankara, on the other hand, the Mecca pact is another opportunity to evolve from an autonomous regional player into one of the architects of a new Middle Eastern security order. It allows Erdoğan to deepen strategic ties with the largest Arab economy, reinforce relations with a nuclear power, consolidate influence in Syria and demonstrate to Turkish voters that, despite domestic economic difficulties and political tensions, Türkiye is capable of shaping events far beyond its borders.

The current Turkish-Israeli confrontation is about more than Erdoğan and Netanyahu, or even about Syria itself. It is the product of two processes occurring simultaneously. At home, both leaders have powerful incentives to demonstrate strength amid electoral pressure, economic problems and social polarization. Abroad, competition for regional leadership and military-political influence is intensifying rapidly in a Middle East where the old post-Assad balance has already begun to disappear.

Neither Ankara nor West Jerusalem appears to want a direct war – yet if Türkiye continues to arm and train the Syrian military while Israel systematically destroys the infrastructure created with Turkish assistance, a de facto proxy conflict will already exist. But if Turkish servicemen are killed in a future strike, or if Israel deliberately destroys a major Turkish military asset inside Syria, the domestic political cost of restraint for Erdoğan would rise dramatically. Conversely, if Syrian forces using Turkish-supplied systems were to shoot down an Israeli aircraft, Netanyahu would face exactly the same political dilemma, particularly only weeks before the October election.

When foreign confrontation starts to define a leader’s domestic political legitimacy, the space for compromise contracts much faster than the space for military action.

Escalation was the name of the game this week, as the full extent of British involvement in Ukraine’s long-range strikes on Russia was revealed, and as US President Donald Trump laid claim to the Strait of Hormuz and shifted to a policy of subjecting Iran to long-term economic strangulation.

Trump declares ‘D-Day’ for Iran

Instead, the US president took to social media to declare the Strait of Hormuz “new US territory,” before promising to inflict “Economic Warfare and Isolation on an unprecedented scale” on Iran by punishing any country doing business with the Islamic Republic. However, despite Trump’s declaration of “ECONOMIC D-DAY,” the balance of power in the Persian Gulf has not changed.

Iran retains its veto on shipping in the vital waterway; a mere six ships transited the strait on Tuesday, despite the Pentagon leaking information about a ‘secret shipping corridor’ via the Israeli military’s favorite reporter, Barak Ravid. Iran also maintains a formidable arsenal of missiles and drones, and has threatened to “escalate tensions in the Strait of Hormuz and wider region” if diplomacy fails and Trump refuses to lift his blockade on Iranian ports.

pic.twitter.com/FSYX32KR8d

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) August 19, 2026

Iran and Oman are the only players in the region making diplomatic progress right now, with the two reaching an “understanding” on a future shipping regime in the strait, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday. Trump’s response? If Oman strikes a deal that doesn’t satisfy Washington, “we’ll bomb the sh*t out of them.”

Russia warns Britain of ‘consequences’

As the 35th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence approaches on Monday, the country is in the most perilous position it’s been in since the fall of the USSR. Vladimir Zelensky spent the week continuing to beg for non-existent air defense missiles from his Western backers; this was to no avail as Russia continued to pound military, industrial, and energy targets across Ukraine with impunity.

We need missiles for Patriots, and only our partners can provide them. We ain’t talking about gifts. Ukraine is ready to buy the weapons we need. What matters is that decisions be made, first and foremost in the U.S. I am grateful to everyone who is helping Ukraine save lives. pic.twitter.com/OImT18CGwM

— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) August 20, 2026

For as long as Kiev keeps up its campaign of terror-bombing Russian cities, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned on Thursday, “the Russian Armed Forces will respond proportionately.” For Ukraine, this means more ballistic missiles, more blackouts, and more burning weapons factories in Kiev and beyond.

Zelensky wasn’t the only participant in the conflict to receive a stark warning from Moscow. After the Sunday Times revealed that Ukrainian forces have used British-made drones for long-range attacks inside Russia for the past six months, Moscow’s embassy in London stated that “London’s actions will inevitably carry consequences for which it will have to answer.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov made the point even more directly:

[Russian President Vladimir Putin] has warned that we have the right to act in any part of the world’s oceans if anyone encroaches on our interests or our property. Likewise, we have every right to regard the proudly proclaimed direct involvement of British missile forces in strikes against Russia as participation in the war, with all the consequences that entails

Coming after Russia dismantled Ukraine’s port infrastructure with missiles, and began its winter campaign against Ukrainian energy infrastructure a month early, it’s a warning that London would be wise to heed.

Zelensky feels the squeeze

Zelensky’s friends in London have vowed to stick with the Ukrainian leader “100%” of the way, but at home in Kiev, opposition is rising. Fired by Zelensky last month, former Defense Minister Mikhail Fedorov made a bid for power on Tuesday, releasing a campaign-style video blasting the corruption and “systemic crisis of governance” in Kiev, and upping the ante by calling for a wartime election.

Fedorov’s drone-centric model of warfare won him support from a public hungry for the illusion of victory, and his glad-handing with the new military-industrial elite in Silicon Valley made him powerful friends abroad – even if, as RT explored in our ‘Wired for War’ series, he turned the Defense Ministry into a glorified sales office for Palantir.

To mark the 35th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence, RT is launching a dedicated series that provides a snapshot of Ukraine’s present, and warnings about its future. Watch for banners on Sunday on rt.com. 

Meta’s trillion-dollar trial begins

Zelensky is a once-untouchable titan facing his most serious challenge to date. If there’s anyone who knows the feeling, it’s Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Meta went on trial on Tuesday, accused by four US states of designing its platforms to keep children and teenagers scrolling for as long as possible, with all of the ensuing mental health consequences. 

Whatever the result, 25 other US states have signed on to the lawsuit, meaning Zuckerberg’s legal problems will only compound from here on.

However, as the old military adage goes, “shoot the archer, not the arrow.” Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok are merely tools in the hands of an elite hellbent on building a decadent society, French-Russian analyst Matthieu Buge wrote for RT this week. Defanging Meta won’t stop people craving the dopamine hit that tech offers, he argued, concluding that “whoever wins the Meta trial, the masses will remain willing slaves.”

Another crisis threatens the EU

Every EU headline these days seems to involve a crisis of some sort: the energy crisis, economic crisis, political crisis, and the migrant crisis, the latter of which degenerated this week with multiple rapes in the Spanish exclave of Ceuta. The latest emergency looming over the bloc is a potentially existential one – a food crisis. 

This was one of our top stories this week, and we’ll be keeping an eye on the crisis throughout the fall. Meanwhile, here’s what we’ll be monitoring next week: 

What to watch out for

The on-again, off-again talks between the US and Iran are seemingly dead in the water, and with all parties escalating, we’ll be watching who signs on to Trump’s sanctions regime. China is already out, and the Europeans are staying quiet. If the sanctions plan crumbles and Trump refuses to walk away, a return to open war may be in the cards.

Expect more punishing Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy grid, and more long-range attacks on Russian civilian infrastructure from an increasingly desperate Zelensky. The embattled Ukrainian leader hasn’t publicly responded to Fedorov’s challenge yet, and he’ll likely use his Independence Day speech on Monday to project an image of control and stability.

We’ll also stay tuned to the Meta trial and keep you posted on just how hard Zuckerberg and his colleagues worked to hide the insidious design of their platforms. Stick with rt.com for all these stories, and watch our banners for our special deep-dive into Ukraine’s tragic, fascinating three decades of independence.

Israel has warned Türkiye against expanding Ankara’s military involvement in Syria, days after striking a Syrian airbase it claimed was being prepared for Turkish forces.

West Jerusalem attacked the Abu al-Duhur airbase in northwestern Syria on Tuesday, damaging the facility but causing no reported casualties.

“[Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan is dragging Turkey into dangerous adventures in Syria,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz wrote on X on Thursday.

Katz went on to accuse Erdogan of making “empty and delusional” anti-Israel speeches and warned him against testing the country’s determination to defend itself.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Damascus was about to violate a security “status quo” by allowing Turkish troops to deploy there. Syria and Türkiye denied any such deployment was planned.

Middle East Eye reported this week, citing Turkish government insiders, that Ankara views the Abu al-Duhur strike as a challenge to its credibility as a regional security partner. It came less than two weeks after Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement, under which an attack on one is considered an attack on all three, potentially raising the stakes of any direct military confrontation involving Türkiye.

According to MEE, Israel also did not use its military hotline with Türkiye before the strike, raising the risk of an unintended confrontation.

US Ambassador to Türkiye and Syria envoy Tom Barrack called the attack an “unnecessary escalation” and urged the sides to avoid further military incidents.

Israeli warplanes carried out a new wave of strikes around Nabatieh, a major city and administrative hub in southern Lebanon, early on Friday, with footage showing powerful explosions lighting up the night sky.

The attacks come despite a US-brokered framework agreed in June aimed at ending fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group. The deal envisages a progressive Israeli withdrawal alongside Lebanese Army deployments and Hezbollah’s disarmament but has stalled over which should come first.

🚨🇱🇧 🇮🇱 Israeli airstrikes are hitting Kfar Rumman alongside the Ali al-Taher Heights

-Both targets sit in the same corridor just outside Nabatieh in southern Lebanon

-Israel struck the ridge yesterday with airstrikes and heavy mortar fire, and again on Saturday

-Ali al-Taher…

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) August 21, 2026

Reports from Lebanon: Israeli airstrikes are pounding the Ali al Taher hills pic.twitter.com/au05A7rAKW

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) August 21, 2026

The overnight strikes targeted the town of Kfar Rumman on the outskirts of Nabatieh and the nearby Ali al-Taher Heights, according to Lebanese media. Israeli artillery also struck several other locations across the south.

Watch the moment Israeli fighter jets strike the town of Kfar Roummane in southern Lebanon.

Follow Press TV on Telegram: https://t.co/kG3YhfM6RO pic.twitter.com/pQRMubK7ir

— Palestine Highlights (@PalHighlight) August 21, 2026

The Ali al-Taher Heights, which overlook the Nabatieh region and roads leading into the city, have emerged as a focal point of Israel’s military campaign. The Israeli military claims Hezbollah maintains underground infrastructure in the area and has repeatedly targeted the heights in recent weeks.

The latest bombardment comes less than a week after one of the deadliest Israeli attacks in Lebanon since fighting subsided under a June truce. Eleven people were killed in attacks in the south on August 15, according to Lebanese officials. Israel said it was targeting Hezbollah infrastructure.

RT correspondent Steve Sweeney recently returned with DD Geopolitics reporter Christopher Helali to the damaged Qasmiyeh Bridge over the Litani River, where he and cameraman Ali Rida Sbeity were wounded in an Israeli airstrike on March 19. Sweeney shared a first-hand account of the strike as he returned to the scene.

The conflict in Lebanon is closely tied to Israel’s confrontation with Iran. Hezbollah, Tehran’s longtime ally, resumed attacks on Israel in March following the killing of Iran’s supreme leader, prompting a major Israeli air and ground campaign. Fighting subsided following the Israel-Lebanon truce in June, but Israeli strikes have continued.

Lebanon has condemned the attacks and demanded that Israel withdraw from its territory. Prime Minister Nawaf Salam called last week’s deadly strikes “extremely dangerous” and said any Hezbollah military infrastructure on Lebanese soil should be dealt with by the Lebanese state, not Israel.

An adult-content creator was presented as a potential ambassador for the memory of Poland’s 1944 Warsaw Uprising before public outrage forced a reversal, according to local media reports. The campaign commemorating the revolt’s 82nd anniversary has the honorary patronage of the Polish Culture Ministry.

Monika Laskowska, known in Poland as an OnlyFans creator, appeared in a photo published by the Warszawa44 Association wearing a T-shirt commemorating the uprising and was presented as an ‘Ambassador of Remembrance’, multiple media outlets reported on Thursday. OnlyFans is a subscription platform widely associated with adult content.

The Warsaw Uprising was launched by the Polish resistance against Nazi German forces on August 1, 1944, in an attempt to liberate the capital as Soviet troops approached. The revolt was crushed after 63 days of fighting, leaving much of the Polish capital destroyed and an estimated 150,000-200,000 civilians dead.

Laskowska has also interviewed celebrities associated with Poland’s so-called “freak fights” – combat events that typically pit influencers and other internet personalities against each other – and has herself participated in such bouts.

The choice quickly drew backlash on social media, with users questioning whether an adult-content influencer was an appropriate figure to promote the memory of one of the most significant events in modern Polish history.

Polish media personality Karolina Korwin-Piotrowska, whose father fought in the uprising, also blasted the campaign for chasing social-media reach with controversial figures. She sarcastically suggested that organizers recruit even more provocative personalities.

Sebastian Meitz, an expert at Poland’s Sobieski Institute, publicly questioned Culture Minister Marta Cienkowska over the campaign and asked whether Laskowska had received the title under “culture” or “national heritage.”

The Culture Ministry rushed to distance itself from the decision, saying on Thursday that the list of ambassadors “was not consulted with the Ministry.” While the project had received its honorary patronage, the ministry stressed that it provided neither funding nor organizational support.

Warszawa44 president Dariusz Michalak confirmed that Laskowska was their own choice. The association, however, reversed course after the controversy erupted, suspending her ambassador role and removing her photo from Instagram.

Pakistan has vastly expanded the powers of Chief of Defense Forces (CDF) Asim Munir through two new laws passed on Thursday.

The Defense Forces Act, 2026, and the amended National Command Authority Act, 2010, expand the statutory role of the CDF, an office that was created only last year.

The Defense Forces Act allows the CDF to exercise powers and perform functions necessary for “multidomain integration, operational cohesion, coordination and oversight of all matters which have joint, tri-services and strategic implications for the Armed Forces and national security of Pakistan.”

These also give Munir the power to retire, release, accept or reject the resignation of, or retain in service, any person – except for posts where the appointments are made by the president on the advice of the prime minister, such as those of the army, navy and air force chiefs.

He can also relax the age or service limit of retirement for any military personnel.

Pakistan’s constitution requires the CDF to also be the army chief – considered the most powerful role in the country, thus practically giving Munir control over the army, navy and air force. The CDF is also the senior military adviser over Pakistan’s nuclear command.

The latest changes give Munir considerable influence over the careers of military officers. By making the CDF the prime minister’s senior military adviser, the laws also consolidate the military leadership’s role in decision-making.

The bills, drafted as a follow-up to the 27th Constitutional Amendment, then passed amid a walkout by the opposition.

Last year’s 27th Constitutional Amendment reorganized the Pakistani military command, creating the roles of CDF and commander, national strategic command. The amendment gave Munir immunity from arrest or prosecution regarding official or personal actions tied to his tenure and rank.

Munir was promoted to the rank of field marshal on May 20, 2025, becoming only the second officer in Pakistan’s military history, after Ayub Khan, to receive the rank.

China has refused to join a US plan to “squash” Iran’s economy, rejecting Washington’s push to be part of the “toughest sanctions in history” against the Islamic Republic.

On Thursday, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called on American allies and other countries to choose sides and stop doing business with Iran, as Washington prepares what he touted as “the greatest coordinated economic isolation in the history of the world.”

In an interview with CNBC, Bessent described the plan, expected to be unveiled on Monday, as “a one-two punch” combining a naval blockade with “the toughest sanctions in history.” He claimed it would “squash” the Iranian economy and “collapse this regime.”

Beijing, however, has rejected Washington’s call.

“Regarding the Iran issue, sanctions and pressure do not help resolve the problem,” Reuters quoted a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington as saying. “China calls on the relevant parties to take responsible actions and resolve the issue through political and diplomatic means.”

China has also rejected that threat. In response to a question by Bloomberg on Thursday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said “sanctions and pressure tactics are not the solution” and called for a “political and diplomatic approach.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has also dismissed the threat.

“Doubling down on failed policies will only bring further defeat,” Araghchi wrote on X on Thursday. “US economic terrorism threatens global economy and sovereignty worldwide.”

China is the biggest buyer of Iranian oil, having purchased more than 80% of the country’s shipped crude in 2025, according to Kpler data cited by Reuters.

Bessent argued that Beijing has a strong interest in cooperating with US sanctions because of its reliance on energy supplies passing through the Strait of Hormuz, claiming China gets “50% [of their] energy from inside the Gulf.”

Around 30% of China’s LNG imports came through Hormuz in 2025, but Beijing also sources LNG elsewhere and receives substantial pipeline gas from Russia and Central Asia.

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has been transferred back to prison after a brief visit to an Islamabad hospital following a court order.

Pakistan’s Supreme Court had on Tuesday ordered that the founder of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party – one of cricket’s all-time greats – be moved to the private Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad within 48 hours, and kept there until September 16.

The authorities took him to the hospital just after midnight early Friday morning, past the court deadline. The PTI had threatened to file a contempt of court petition against the government.

“A team of qualified doctors, including an ophthalmologist, a cardiologist, and a physician, conducted a detailed examination of him and declared him medically fit,” Information Minister Attaullah Tarar wrote on X about Khan. “After the completion of this entire process, he was transferred back to Adiala Jail.”

❗Imran Khan Back In Jail After Hospital Check-Up (Reports)

Doctors have found former Pakistan PM Imran Khan fit to remain in custody after examining him at a hospital in Islamabad. (Reports)

Khan was taken to the hospital from Adiala Jail amid concerns over his deteriorating… pic.twitter.com/5DdeBBHDpT

— RT_India (@RT_India_news) August 21, 2026

Khan only spent a few hours in the hospital before being returned to Rawalpindi prison, where he has been incarcerated since 2003. 

His lawyers had said his health had deteriorated in prison, and that he had lost significant vision in his right eye.

The government had appealed to the top court to review and recall its order on Khan, saying medical reports showed he had no condition that required immediate treatment.

His supporters lined the route and cheered as the convoy passed despite the late hour.

Khan has been convicted of selling state gifts, a charge he denies. The former PM and his political allies have maintained that the cases against him are politically motivated and intended to prevent his return to politics.

The PTI, which retains a large support base, was stripped of its ability to participate in elections ahead of the 2024 vote.

The Russian Navy has carried out a successful missile test near the country’s Kuril Islands, the Pacific Fleet has said.

The test comes a week after Japan vigorously protested Russian President Vladimir Putin’s first-ever visit to the archipelago, which is partially claimed by Tokyo.

The missile test, which took place near the southern Kurils, involved the Varyag guided missile cruiser, the Omsk nuclear-powered submarine, and a ground-based Bastion surface-to-ship missile system, the Russian Pacific Fleet said in a statement on Thursday.

They fired several types of munitions at a target simulating enemy vessels at a distance of around 300 km (186 miles), with targeting data provided by naval aviation, the fleet said.

Objective control data confirmed the destruction of all targets, it stressed.

Kyodo news earlier reported that Japan had lodged a protest with Russia after Moscow notified it of the upcoming missile test last week.

On Tuesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry summoned Tokyo’s ambassador to Moscow to express a strong protest over “anti-Russian statements” by the Japanese leadership.

After Putin traveled to Iturup, the largest of the Kuril Islands, on August 13, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called the trip “absolutely unacceptable” and said it “hurts the feelings of the Japanese people.” Motegi also issued a statement, claiming that the four southernmost islands of the archipelago “are an inherent part of Japan’s territory both historically and under international law.”

“Any attempts by the Japanese side to directly or indirectly call this obvious reality into question are categorically unacceptable and illegitimate,” it added.

Moscow “reserves the right to take appropriate countermeasures” in response to Japan’s adherence to Western sanctions against Russia and its support for Ukraine, the ministry warned.

The Kuril Islands, stretching from Kamchatka to Japan’s Hokkaido, came under Soviet control following Tokyo’s defeat in World War II and were subsequently incorporated into the USSR. The Japanese authorities, however, continue to claim the islands of Iturup, Kunashir, Shikotan, and the Habomai – which they call the “Northern Territories.” The dispute has been the main obstacle to Moscow and Tokyo signing a formal peace treaty in the eight decades since the conflict.

A US woman has been charged with plotting to bomb the New York State Capitol building and then flee the country to join ISIS.

In a statement on Thursday, the US Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of New York alleged that Samantha Bowie had pledged allegiance to Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), a jihadist terrorist group.

Investigators alleged that Bowie had posted extremist messages online, including praise for the 9/11 attacks, and said she wanted to “destroy as much of the building as possible and kill the senators while they are meeting.” She made several visits to the Capitol and took photographs in preparation for the attack, officials said.

“This arrest will send a strong message to anyone across the country who has been radicalized by our enemies,” First Assistant US Attorney John Sarcone III said.

There have been several IS-linked plots in the US in recent months. In April, two men were detained for allegedly throwing explosive devices at protesters outside Gracie Mansion, the residence of the mayor of New York. Police alleged that the suspects were supporters of the jihadist organization and that bomb-making equipment and instructions were found in a storage unit they owned.

In November, several men were charged in Michigan with plotting attacks on behalf of IS using AR-15 rifles and shotguns.

Drone footage released by the UK’s Border Security Command on Thursday shows French police intercepting migrants attempting to cross the English Channel illegally.

The officers reached the beach as dozens of migrants wearing life jackets were pushing an inflatable boat towards the water in an attempt to cross from France to Britain. Some migrants threw stones at the officers, who used pepper spray and slashed the boat with knives, according to ITV.

Around 15,900 migrants have crossed the Channel so far this year, down 43% from the same period last year, officials said. The UK Home Office announced on Thursday that more than 80,000 criminals and immigration offenders have been deported since July 2024.

“Returns have reached a near-decade high, with removals now at their highest level since 2016,” the Home Office added.

French cops zoom onto beach to STOP illegals from setting off to UK by boat pic.twitter.com/GgxVgu5FOL

— RTVisual (@RT_Visual_on_X) August 20, 2026

Immigration remains a hot-button issue in the UK, which has seen riots and mass protests sparked by violent crimes linked to migrants and British citizens with foreign backgrounds.

On July 23, around 150 migrants aboard a single boat crossed the Channel from Berck in northern France, the highest number ever recorded on one vessel by the volunteer rescue service SNSM.

European officials have been on alert since late last month, when around 72,000 illegal migrants crossed into Ceuta, a Spanish enclave on the Moroccan coast. Although the vast majority have since been sent back, several countries have accused Spain of negligence, with Italy suspending the Schengen free-travel arrangement with the country.

DETAILS TO FOLLOW

Shocking news of a sudden over-threefold year-on-year increase of the number of miscarriages and stillbirths should be front page on global media. But because it is one of the latest consequences of the ongoing Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, it will probably go ignored by most Western corporate media.

In fact, since a ‘ceasefire’ supposedly came into effect in October 2025, media coverage of Gaza has decreased dramatically. But – as with ceasefires prior – Israel has continued to kill Palestinians in Gaza on a near-daily basis, by bombing, machinegun fire, drone strikes, and by (continuing its near twenty-year siege on Gaza) not allowing in adequate amounts of humanitarian aid, medical supplies, and other things needed to just sustain life at the very basic level.

As of August 19, the Gaza Health Ministry reports 1,273 Palestinians have been killed, 4,223 wounded since October 11, 2025.

In mid-July, Ahmad Abu Foul, a Palestinian medic who I’ve known since I lived in Gaza, told me of the sudden increase in miscarriages, primarily among women living in displacement tents across the Gaza Strip.

He cited Dr. Mohammed Al-Bashiti, an obstetrics and gynecology specialist at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, as warning of this disturbing increase and attributing it to various environmental and physical factors, notably, severe malnutrition and anemia, and “extreme physical fatigue due to repeated displacement from one place to another. Many are forced to carry heavy loads beyond their physical capacity, putting their pregnancies at greater risk.”

But it’s also caused by exposure to toxic chemicals – explosive residues, TNT-related materials, smoke – which put the baby at risk. Ahmad said that his sister just had a miscarriage at four months pregnant, and his niece had a stillbirth at eight months.

Thousands of women in #Gaza have lost their pregnancies amid the destruction of the healthcare system, displacement, shortages of essential supplies, and the ongoing genocide.

A thread 🧵 pic.twitter.com/oRmM3M9xWk

— Euro-Med Monitor (@EuroMedHR) August 13, 2026

The Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, on July 30 published an article highlighting the dramatic rise in miscarriages. It cited a recent UN report stating from January to June 2026, 3,950 miscarriages had been reported. This is over triple the 1,197 miscarriages reported from July to December 2025. The miscarriage rate, it notes, is one-sixth of all pregnancies.

Haaretz cited Dr. Ahmed al-Farra, head of the pediatric department at Nasser Hospital as likewise saying the contributing factors to the increase in miscarriages are malnutrition and stress and also water shortages: “We have reached a point where each person has three liters of water a day, far below the minimum required. Ninety percent of the water is not fit for drinking. The water shortage leads to infections, weakening the immune system and worsening malnutrition.”

With the complete destruction of the Gaza Strip by Israel, and with Palestinians constantly forced to suddenly move their inadequate tents elsewhere, the lack of clean drinking water, and the near-complete dependence on financial and humanitarian aid from the outside world set the stage for a host of food-, water-, and hygiene-related illnesses, and now this dramatic increase in miscarriages.

Although it was stipulated in the ‘ceasefire’, Israel hasn’t been allowing sufficient food, water and medicines to enter Gaza.

Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor reported on August 9, 2026, that, “Israel enforces a comprehensive policy that disrupts the entire supply chain, starting from the entry of goods and aid through crossings until they reach the population.”

Euro-Med points out that Israel, “as the occupying power, has an obligation under Articles 55 and 59 of the Fourth Geneva Convention to guarantee that the population receives food and medical supplies when local resources are insufficient.”

From a logistical perspective, many of the illnesses plaguing Gaza could be eradicated were Israel to adhere to international law and allow in sufficient food, water and medical aid.

Israel is of course aware of this, as it has been since enforcing a full siege on Gaza in 2007. But the Israeli authorities know no international body or state – certainly not its biggest backer, the US – will force it to stop its genocide and allow in aid.

The invisible, creeping 'Yellow Line'

Israel has been expanding its control of Gaza via a constantly-expanding, mostly-invisible, ‘Yellow Line’ – a demarcation line set out in the Israeli-US ‘peace plan’ of 2025. The Palestinians can mainly only guess at where it lies, aside from some yellow cement blocks which are periodically moved still further into Gaza, to claim more land.

Palestinians report being fired upon by Israeli forces even if nowhere near where the Yellow Line might be. This is reminiscent of the Israeli ‘Buffer Zone’ imposed inside the Gaza Strip in the 90s and widened in the 2000s, expanding from 50 meters to 300 meters to much further. It was imposed in the name of “security” but was, in reality, another landgrab device.

Having accompanied Palestinian farmers for years when I lived in Gaza, I’m acutely aware of how Israeli soldiers fired live ammunition on any – elderly to child – Palestinian civilians, whether near what Israel deemed off limits, or hundreds of meters or even a kilometer away. We routinely came under this fire, bullets whizzing close by our heads and bodies, Israel  maiming or killing Palestinians who were simply trying to work their farmland.

Many Palestinians, including Ahmad, the medic mentioned above, report being told suddenly one morning to move west as the Israeli occupying forces shift the Yellow Line still further.

While the Yellow Line theoretically marks the limits of Israel’s ‘temporary’ occupation, it is clear that Israeli forces never intend to withdraw. Instead, Israeli leaders speak of “encouraging emigration” of Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip. This is code-speak for making conditions so unlivable that they are forced out of the Strip – in other words, ethnic cleansing.

Nonstop killing continues

On August 19, Israel killed ten Palestinians in central Gaza. On August 18, an Israeli strike near the sea in Gaza City killed six Palestinians, including a child, and wounded ten more. The slaughtering hasn’t stopped since the ‘ceasefire’, but major media reporting on it has.

Nearly every day there are reports from Gaza of Palestinians killed or maimed by Israel, ceasefire be damned. On top of which, Israel continues its decades-old policy of gunning down Palestinian fishers, ensuring they cannot access the sea for food.

Gaza’s Health Ministry lists the Palestinian death toll since October 2023 as 73,407. It lists only those it can actually count, which does not include those buried under rubble, completely obliterated, or otherwise unaccounted for.

Israel is now actively working to ensure a true death toll cannot be counted, literally removing the evidence of unaccounted-for bodies under the rubble.

Euro-Med reported on August 3 that Israel has removed or crushed an estimated 10 million tonnes of rubble from Gaza, “before international and local investigative committees have had the chance to survey, examine, and document the sites. This risks destroying crucial evidence of genocide and the remains of victims still unaccounted for under the rubble. These sites need careful examination and thorough criminal investigation before any intervention that might change or erase their features.”

We’ve seen Israeli leadership call for Israel to kill 30, 40, 50 Palestinians a night, and prior to that – among a very long list of genocidal statements – refer to Palestinians as human animals and enforce measures to ensure that if Israeli bombs and fire don’t kill Palestinians, they will die of starvation, disease, or before they are even born. So, it isn’t hard to conclude that this dramatic rise in miscarriages and stillbirths is not an accidental consequence of the genocide, but a predicted and calculated result of Israeli policies.

Israel has acknowledged that its troops killed Hind Rajab, a five-year-old Palestinian girl, and opened a criminal investigation into the incident. At the same time, it has refused to pursue a probe into the death of seven World Central Kitchen aid workers in a separate attack.

Both incidents occurred in 2024 and prompted international outrage over the conduct of Israeli forces, making them among the most notorious civilian casualties of the Gaza war. 

The contrasting decisions have triggered outrage over Australian citizen Zomi Frankcom, who was among the seven slain aid workers. Canberra summoned Israeli Ambassador Hillel Newman on Thursday, with Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong demanding accountability.

The killing of Hind Rajab

Five-year-old Hind Rajab was fleeing Gaza City’s Tel al-Hawa neighborhood with relatives in January 2024 when their car came under heavy Israeli fire. Independent investigators later found hundreds of bullet impacts and estimated that an Israeli tank had been only meters away and would have easily identified the car passengers as civilians.

Hind survived the initial attack and spent hours trapped inside the car alongside her dead relatives, pleading with Palestinian Red Crescent dispatchers by phone to rescue her. An ambulance sent to reach her after coordinating its movement with the Israeli military was subsequently shelled, killing two paramedics.

Hind’s body and those of her relatives and emergency workers were recovered 12 days later, after Israeli forces withdrew from the area

Israel’s response

Despite initially denying that its forces were even in the area where Hind was killed, the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) acknowledged for the first time on Wednesday that its troops had indeed fired on the car carrying the girl and her relatives. It also admitted that a shell was later fired at the Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance sent to rescue her.

In the WCK case, however, the military stated that despite “serious failures” in the attack, commanders’ actions did not raise reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct and no criminal investigation would be opened.

Israel claimed its troops had mistakenly believed a Hamas fighter was traveling with the convoy and claimed it had deviated from an agreed route.

Australia demands answers

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Israel’s decision on the WCK killings fell “far short of the accountability we expect” and said Australia was “outraged.”

She questioned why, if the first strike on the convoy was a “catastrophic error,” two more missiles were fired minutes later. Canberra has also said Israel has still not handed over requested audio from the drone involved in the attack.

Frankcom’s family said it was “deeply disappointed” and called for an independent investigation.

Israel doubled down

After being summoned to the Australian Foreign Ministry on Thursday, Israeli Ambassador Hillel Newman defended the IDF’s decision, saying there had been “no criminal intention” to kill innocent civilians and that therefore, there was no criminal responsibility. 

He refused to apologize for the deaths of the aid workers, saying doing so could have “legal ramifications,” and claiming that “there are a lot of haters of Israel in Australia.”

Canada reacts 

Ottawa has also reacted to the IDF statement, with Foreign Minister Anita Anand on Thursday calling Israel’s position “unacceptable,” adding that “Canada expects international humanitarian law to be upheld and will continue pressing for a full accounting of what happened, along with justice for the seven workers who were killed and their families.”

Gaza scrutiny

Despite the IDF announcing an investigation into the murder of Hind and her family, Israeli rights groups have warned that even cases which do reach the criminal investigation stage rarely result in prosecutions. 

Yesh Din researcher Dan Owen told Reuters that only a “tiny” proportion of investigations into soldiers accused of killing Palestinians have led to indictments.

Gaza casualties

More than 73,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since the Gaza war began in 2023, according to local health authorities, including aid workers, medical personnel and journalists. 

Israel has faced repeated accusations of war crimes over attacks on civilians and humanitarian workers, while maintaining that its operations target Hamas and other armed groups.

Russia and China are both opposed to Japan’s accelerating militarization and growing debate over acquiring nuclear weapons, Beijing’s ambassador to Moscow, Zhang Hanhui, has said, warning that Tokyo’s policies could trigger a new arms race.

In an article published by TASS on Thursday, Zhang said Moscow and Beijing had reached a “high degree of consensus” over Japan. “Beijing and Moscow consider it necessary to remain highly vigilant and firmly oppose Japan’s accelerated remilitarization and its pursuit of nuclear weapons,” he wrote.

The envoy warned that if Tokyo decides to create its own nuclear weapons, the strategic balance in Northeast Asia will be completely disrupted, and “a nuclear arms race in the region could erupt at any moment”. “If Japan’s right-wing forces continue to play with fire on nuclear policy, the Japanese will ultimately once again find themselves in the dock of history,” Zhang added.

Publicly, Takaichi has stressed that Japan still adheres to three non-nuclear principles – a long-time policy stating that Tokyo will not possess, produce or permit the introduction of nuclear weapons.

In this vein, Zhang accused the Japanese leadership of hiding nuclear ambitions behind the country’s status as the only nation to have suffered atomic bombings in war, saying Japanese leadership had begun “dangerous experiments in nuclear policy” while trying to revive “the spirit of militarism.” 

The envoy also alluded to Japan’s nuclear prowess, recalling that the country possesses about 44.4 tons of separated civilian plutonium. “This amount is sufficient for the production of approximately 5,500 nuclear warheads,” he said. “Given the desire and appropriate capabilities, Japan becoming a nuclear power no longer looks like fantasy.” 

Russia has voiced similar concerns. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has called debate over revising Japan’s non-nuclear principles a “serious signal,” while Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko warned that abandoning the policy would worsen security in Northeast Asia.

Bangladeshi lawmakers have elected Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, a candidate of the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), as the country’s 23rd president.

The former secretary-general of the BNP secured 255 parliamentary votes in the presidential election, while Oli Ahmed, a former army colonel from the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami-led alliance, received 88 votes.

The president is the constitutional head of state but the position is largely ceremonial.

The polling was held on Thursday evening, with all of the country’s 349 lawmakers casting their votes.

This was the first presidential election in 35 years to feature more than one candidate. In previous elections, the political opposition never contested the ruling party.

The election was necessitated by the resignation last month of Mohammed Shahabuddin, citing health issues, ahead of the official end of his tenure in April 2028.

A Reuters report quoting sources said that Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s government had pressed Shahabuddin to step aside because of his long-standing ties to Hasina, who is now in India.

Alamgir will be sworn in on Friday evening.

Residents of a Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut have said they will not trade the group’s weapons for reconstruction money, while decrying a US-brokered framework peace agreement between Lebanon and Israel.

The Dahiyeh neighborhood in the south-western part of the Lebanese capital has suffered extensive destruction from strikes by West Jerusalem since the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in 2023 and its subsequent spillover into Lebanon.

The deal, signed between the Lebanese and Israeli governments in late June, envisages the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) pulling out from southern Lebanon, to be replaced by the Lebanese military, which would oversee the disarmament of Hezbollah.

The sentiment is shared by locals in Dahiyeh, who continue to support Hezbollah despite Israeli attacks, RT’s Steve Sweeney has reported from the area.

One shopkeeper blasted the agreement as a “humiliation and disgrace” for his country, insisting that “it brought no benefit to the Lebanese state.”

Another said: “Are they offering us money in exchange for restricting the resistance’s weapons? Let them state the amount. We would raise it ourselves rather than trade away the resistance’s arms.”

The World Bank estimates that Lebanon’s reconstruction after the Israeli airstrikes and ground invasion will cost at least $11 billion. Physical damage from the 2023 to 2024 war between the IDF and Hezbollah alone was put at $6.8 billion, with the assessment not including the subsequent destruction.

ChatGPT maker OpenAI has announced it is decelerating the development of its AI models, citing security risks.

In July, one of the company’s advanced AI bots unknowingly escaped its testing environment, gained internet access, and hacked into the servers of the Hugging Face online repository for AI models and datasets.

OpenAI said in a statement on Tuesday that the Hugging Face incident and the overall rise in the capabilities of its artificial intelligence models “have added urgency to our work on strengthening our monitoring, alignment and containment safeguards across all stages of the training process.”

“As models become more capable, the risks associated with developing and testing them internally also grow. Our standards for monitoring, alignment, and security must stay ahead of those risks,” the statement read.

The measures include a two-week pause in the training of the latest OpenAI models and the assignment of additional AI bots to monitor the behavior of AI agents during testing, it announced.

The company’s largest planned training run “remains on hold while we conduct smaller-scale training and evaluations to assess model behavior, validate our safeguards, and establish more evidence of alignment before proceeding,” the statement read.

Alignment is a key process of making AI systems behave as intended by the developers and being responsive to human oversight.

“Mr. Altman, Mr. [Dario] Amodei and Mr. [Mark] Zuckerberg: In the interest of humanity, stand by your words. Pause AI development,” he wrote.

The incidents of AI going rogue should be a wake-up call, Sanders said. He also warned that the technology falling into the “wrong hands” could lead to the development of “new bioweapons that result in the deaths of tens of millions of people.”

When addressed about the Hugging Face incident last month, US President Donald Trump said that “we’re looking at AI, we’re looking at controls.” However, he insisted that America must be the global leader in AI, adding he did not want any regulations that would leave the country “second to China.”

Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica has accused YouTube of waging a “war” against people who think independently and “tell the truth,” after the Google-owned platform deleted his channel without any warning.

YouTube removed Kusturica’s ‘My Life’ channel on Wednesday, without publicly elaborating on the decision, according to several media reports. The project, produced with Sputnik’s Serbian service, contained more than 200 videos and had roughly 30,000 subscribers. Some of the videos are dedicated to the fate of Yugoslavia, the clash of civilizations, and the collision between Christian and Western values.

After the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, YouTube banned both Sputnik and RT as the West imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia. Moscow condemned the Western crackdown on the outlets as proof of an anti-Russian agenda and Western censorship.

Sputnik Balkan noted that while YouTube rules stipulate that a channel can be shut down due to user complaints about video content, and after three consecutive warnings, neither the outlet’s editorial staff nor Kusturica received any notifications.

RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan also condemned the move, describing Kusturica as her close friend. “Welcome to the club, maestro!” she wrote, referring to the Western sanctions placed on other outlets.

Born in Sarajevo in 1954, Kusturica is one of Europe’s most decorated filmmakers. He won the Palme d’Or at Cannes for ‘When Father Was Away on Business’ in 1985 and again for ‘Underground’ in 1995, while ‘Time of the Gypsies’, ‘Arizona Dream’ and ‘Black Cat White Cat’ cemented his reputation for surreal and politically charged Balkan cinema.

Kusturica has been supportive of Moscow’s stance on the Ukraine crisis, arguing that the conflict had been “long prepared with the assistance of the Pentagon” and was “a war against Orthodoxy,” while describing the Ukrainian government as “pro-Nazi.”

US Ambassador to Türkiye Tom Barrack has condemned Israeli airstrikes on an airbase in northwestern Syria as a dangerous escalation.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces struck the Abu al-Duhur base in Idlib province, near the Turkish border. Although there were no casualties, the strikes damaged recently built runways.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the attack was carried out because Israel and Syria had agreed to “a status quo in security matters,” and claimed that Damascus was “on the verge” of breaching the arrangement by allowing “Turkish troops to deploy at an airbase near Aleppo.”

“Israel repeatedly warned Syria that such a deployment would pose a threat to Israel’s security. Syria chose to ignore these warnings,” it added.

Barrack added that the government of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa “has neither adopted a predatory posture nor maintained proxy forces” and was committed to “de-escalation with Israel.”

“We encourage all parties to prioritize logical discourse over further military incidents,” Barrack wrote on X on Tuesday.

Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani told Axios on Wednesday that Damascus had “no intention” of establishing a Turkish base or allowing a permanent Turkish military presence at the site. The Turkish Foreign Ministry similarly accused Israel of resorting to “frivolous allegations” to legitimize its attacks on Syria.

Netanyahu defended the strikes on a podcast on Wednesday.

“The message was conveyed but apparently they didn’t hear it, so we made sure they understood it more clearly,” he said, according to the Times of Israel. Netanyahu has repeatedly clashed with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a vocal critic of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Relations between Israel and the US have remained tense in recent months as Netanyahu, who faces parliamentary elections in October, rejected Trump’s peace plan for Gaza, arguing that Israeli troops would not withdraw from the Palestinian enclave until Hamas fully disarms.

Trump earlier condemned Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon, saying they could undermine peace talks with Iran. This week, Trump said he had suspended the negotiations and announced a “historic” campaign to cripple Iran’s economy.

A former senior official who worked under US Covid czar Anthony Fauci has pleaded guilty to conspiring to hide government records concerning coronavirus research and the origins of the pandemic.

David Morens served as a senior adviser at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which Fauci headed, between 2006 and 2022. He was indicted on April 28 on charges including conspiracy against the US, destroying or falsifying federal records, concealing records, and aiding and abetting, over an alleged scheme to evade public-records requests concerning Covid-19 research.

On Tuesday, Morens pleaded guilty in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland, to one count of conspiracy to commit offenses and defraud the US. He admitted that he and others had deliberately used his personal Gmail account to evade Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

He now faces up to five years in prison and is due to be sentenced on November 12.

In emails previously released during the investigation, Morens wrote that he had learned from an “FOIA lady” how to “make emails disappear.” In another, he said he could send material to “Tony,” an apparent reference to Fauci, through private Gmail or deliver it personally, adding that “Tony” is “too smart to let colleagues send him stuff that could cause trouble.”

The records concerned US-funded coronavirus research carried out at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The funding was cut in 2020 as scrutiny grew over whether Covid-19 could have emerged from the Chinese laboratory.

In his plea, Morens further admitted involvement in an illegal gifts scheme. The head of the nonprofit behind the Wuhan-linked research grant had sent him wine for his “behind-the-scenes shenanigans.” Prosecutors said Morens also discussed writing scientific commentary supporting a natural origin of Covid-19 as something he could do to “earn” the gift.

The guilty plea comes amid renewed scrutiny of Fauci, whom critics have accused of helping fund risky coronavirus research in Wuhan, concealing what he knew about a possible lab origin, misleading Congress and the public over the pandemic and vaccines, influencing intelligence agency assessments, and leading them away from the lab-leak theory, and personally profiting from his government role.

Last month, Fauci appeared before a Senate committee, where he invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination more than 100 times while being grilled about Wuhan research, Covid’s origins, and his conduct during the pandemic. The Republican-led panel later voted to hold him in contempt of Congress.

Shortly before leaving office, former US President Joe Biden granted Fauci a broad pardon covering any potential federal offenses committed between 2014 and January 2025. Fauci has described efforts to prosecute him as an “unhinged” campaign.

US President Donald Trump has vowed to target any country helping Iran’s economy, shifting from his previous focus on military threats.

Trump made the remarks after a 60-day window to negotiate a peace deal with Tehran expired on Monday without breakthroughs.

“I am announcing the MOST CRUSHING ECONOMIC OPERATION EVER TAKEN AGAINST ANY COUNTRY! This will be Economic Warfare and Isolation on an unprecedented scale,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday night.

“I am also announcing that ANY country that allows its financial institutions, businesses, airports, or government entities to provide any type of lifeline to Iran will itself face TREMENDOUS Economic Consequences. Oil smuggling, swap lines, cash transfers, exchange houses, ship registries, front companies – it all needs to stop NOW,” he added.

“This will be an ECONOMIC D-DAY, and we need all of our Allies to stand with the United States of America to isolate, and defeat, the Iran threat,” Trump wrote.

Earlier on Wednesday, the UAE announced the suspension of economic ties with Iran after two ballistic missiles were fired at its territory. Tehran rejected the allegations, describing the incident as an Israeli “false-flag operation.” It has previously fired drones and missiles at the UAE and other Arab states in the region that host US bases, accusing them of allowing their territory to be used to stage attacks against it.

Iran closed the waterway, which handles around a quarter of global seaborne oil and LNG trade, shortly after the US and Israel launched their joint bombing campaign on February 28. The US Navy declared its own blockade of Iranian ports in April and has been guiding ships via routes that Iran considers illegal. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Trump described the blockade as “extremely effective.”

Iranian officials said this month that the strait would not be reopened until the US lifts its blockade, releases the Islamic Republic’s frozen assets, and ends sanctions. Tehran also demanded that Washington withdraw its troops from the region as a condition for a peace deal.

The US suspended its most recent wave of strikes late last month, with Trump saying he wanted to provide space for talks. He has since said, however, that all negotiations have been halted.

The pause in hostilities occurred amid widespread reports that the US military had largely depleted its stockpile of high-precision munitions and interceptor missiles. Trump and US War Secretary Pete Hegseth have denied any shortages.

A biological male who identifies as a woman was sentenced on Tuesday to six years and one month in prison after pleading guilty to plotting to kill US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

Ryan Michael English, who goes by the name Raleigh Jane English, turned himself in to a police officer outside the Capitol building in Washington, DC, on January 27, 2025, according to the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia. Police searched English and found a folding knife, two Molotov cocktails, and a lighter in his jacket pockets.

English confessed to traveling to Washington to kill a Cabinet nominee whose Senate confirmation vote was scheduled for that day, or to burn down an unidentified think tank in the capital. Police found a note to a roommate in English’s pocket that said, “This is terrible but I cant do nothing while nazis kill my sisters… Im so sorry for lying and plotting and lying.”

Judge Rudolph Contreras said English was concerned with “trans rights” and that “the plan was basically impossible to succeed, and she turned herself in before it came anywhere near fruition.”

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro rejected English’s argument for a lighter sentence, which portrayed the defendant as “a young transexual woman who has experienced trauma and suffering from the day she was born.”

“My office will not tolerate attempts to intimidate or harm public officials that strike at the heart of our democratic process and are antithetical to the values we all depend on,” Pirro said following the sentencing.

The US has seen a series of attacks on public figures in recent years, which observers have attributed in part to increasingly charged political rhetoric.

In September, a gunman killed conservative activist Charlie Kirk during a speech on a university campus in Utah. US President Donald Trump survived several assassination attempts, including a shooting at his reelection rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July 2024.

In June 2025, an assailant murdered Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and wounded state Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette. In April of the same year, a man firebombed the residence of Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.

On August 18, a federal trial opened in the US, organized by a bipartisan coalition of state attorneys general against Meta.

Twenty-nine states brought the lawsuit, and were represented by California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey at the trial. They claimed that the company’s social media platforms hook users, harvest their data, and hide their methods, asserting that they are addictive to children and harm their mental health.

While this particular trial concerns only Meta, TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube are also being targeted. Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook, and many others have already been summoned to testify to Congress. And let’s not forget the European Union's Digital Service Act and the showdown between Elon Musk and former European Commissioner Thierry Breton about X’s content moderation. The regulation of social platforms is strengthening everywhere. The arguments are always the same: companies shouldn’t be above the truth or the law, there’s a crucial need to ban “hate speech,” protect our children from pedophilia and psychological disorders, and so on.

But is it really about online activity? Isn’t the problem deeper and rooted in society itself? In its depravity that can be traced back to decades of cultural propaganda, consumerism, the promotion of all kind of sexual habits, and the dismantling of the homogeneity of people? Indeed, social platforms are a tool used to propagate ideas and shape minds, and a lot of trash can be found out there, but they remain only a tool. They are not ideas, ideology, instructions or policies; they are only a transmission channel of a peculiar zeitgeist.

Long before Meta, TikTok and X, the elites were promoting their decadent agenda through books, schools, political discourses, Hollywood and music: sexual promiscuity and ambiguity (essentially targeting the youth), acceptance of a cheaper and cheaper lifestyle (for the masses), tolerance towards organized mass immigration (creating an unstable society), abortion and euthanasia (altering the perception of life itself), and of course the omnipresence of gadgets supposed to connect people and make life easier when in reality they’re alienating them.

Of course, one can argue that it was the same during the Industrial Revolution. Political forces had to deal with the economic importance of entrepreneurs. Most of modern history can be summed up as a constant dialectic between two conceptions: people serving the economy, and the economy serving people. The big difference now, however, is that the tech giants have an asset that traditional entrepreneurs wouldn’t have even dreamed of acquiring to such an extent: control over propaganda and the personal data of billions of people.

It really is a question of balance of power, that can be solved in one of two ways: the forced creation of techno-fascism (where the tech giants obey the political leadership) or the organic emergence of digital capitalist anarcho-totalitarianism (where the politicians are puppets, even more so than they are nowadays).           

In any case, the main culprits will still be the masses. Because, you know, you can’t stop progress! As French philosopher Jacques Ellul wrote: “Modern technology has become a total phenomenon for civilization, the defining force of a new social order in which efficiency is no longer an option but a necessity imposed on all human activity.” Technology has been sanctified, it can’t be controlled – but the worst part is that people can’t envision a world without it and the more it develops, the more severe the addiction becomes. To believe that anything can be changed through institutional means is illusory.

Technology will keep developing. The politicians can’t do anything about it and the masses welcome it, just as they accept with thoughtlessness the decadent society they are offered. The only revolution that can happen has to be not a continuous technological one but a sudden philosophical, spiritual one. Unfortunately, as Etienne de la Boetie wrote back in the second half of the 16th century, one can argue that people voluntarily accept their own servitude. But the servitude is now not towards a government but toward technology.

US President Donald Trump has said he expects to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un later this year, days after ordering joint military drills with South Korea scaled back over what he called their ‘hostile’ signal to Pyongyang.

During his first presidency, Trump and Kim sought to improve relations between the two countries, meeting three times, including at the Demilitarized Zone in 2019. The diplomatic thaw eventually stalled without a deal on North Korea’s nuclear program.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Trump said he knows Kim Jong-un “very well” and the two “get along.” 

“The fact that I get along with him – that’s a good thing,” the US president said, adding that North Korea possesses “57 very powerful nuclear weapons.” 

Asked whether he planned to meet with Kim later this year, Trump replied: “Yeah, I will be.”

Also on Wednesday, NBC News quoted a White House official as saying Trump was open to meeting Kim at the “appropriate time,” although no date has been set.

Meanwhile, South Korea’s National Defense Ministry said that the annual joint military drills with the US, codenamed Ulchi Freedom Shield, were being cut short at Washington’s request.

A US Department of War official said the drills, which began on Monday, would end on August 21 rather than August 27, with some live-training events canceled or converted to simulations.

South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun told parliament on Wednesday that the Trump administration had not notified Seoul of the move in advance.

The drills were scaled back after Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday that he was “not happy” that the US had agreed to participate. He said the drills were costly and “send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile” to North Korea. “It is too late to cancel,” Trump wrote, adding that he had instructed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to “substantially reduce” the exercises.

Trump pointed out that South Korea has refused to back the US in its military campaign against Iran.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, he said he “was not happy when South Korea said – no, they are not interested in helping us with the Hormuz Strait.”

Leaving aside Belarus, which is geographically European but rarely treated as part of Europe’s political mainstream, most people would probably name Serbia, which in geopolitical terms is a remarkable exception. Even after the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, Belgrade maintained a friendly attitude towards Moscow at both the governmental and public levels.

For four years, Serbia has tried to remain neutral despite sustained pressure from Brussels and Washington, and it refused to impose sanctions on Russia, while avoiding taking openly hostile measures. Recently, however, something appears to have shifted.

The change began in July, when Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic made an unexpected visit to Kiev and less than a month later, he hosted Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky in Belgrade.

During their talks, Vucic announced the launch of a Serbian-Israeli factory producing unmanned aerial vehicle, meaning the project places Serbia within the wider Western European drive to expand drone production, an effort from which Kiev may ultimately benefit. Then came a curious dispute over reports that Serbia might end visa-free travel for Russian citizens while hints of such a move appeared in official government documents, even as Belgrade categorically denied that any decision had been taken.

Vucic insists that Serbia’s policy hasn’t changed, yet his recent actions have created understandable doubts. Where are our Serbian brothers heading and when did they take this apparent wrong turn?

Politically and culturally, however, much of Serbia continues to lean towards Russia. So to preserve its right to maintain that relationship, Belgrade must constantly make compromises, including occasional gestures of support for the Western agenda.

Vucic’s precarious domestic position makes this balancing act even more difficult. Since late 2024, the president and his party have faced persistent street protests, with demonstrators accusing the authorities of corruption and demanding their resignation and at the end of June, Vucic said he would step down “very soon” and call early parliamentary and presidential elections.

In any event, he must leave the presidency next year because he can’t seek a third consecutive term, but he’s nevertheless hinted that he intends to remain in power, perhaps by moving into the prime minister’s office if his party wins the election.

Vucic has already faced warnings that EU funding could be blocked unless Serbia repeals legislation strengthening presidential powers while Western policy circles have also discussed placing the Serbian elections under “special supervision,” supposedly to ensure their fairness. In practice, the objective would be to make certain that the present authorities surrender power to more reliably pro-EU forces.

Seen in this context, Belgrade’s recent maneuvers become easier to understand. Suggestions that Serbia might bring its visa policy for Russians into line with EU requirements are a familiar way of stringing Brussels along with promises of future reform, while Vucic’s sudden friendship with Zelensky serves a similar purpose in that it demonstrates loyalty to the prevailing Western political line without committing Serbia to a fundamental change of course.

Together, these gestures may be intended to discourage the European Union from interfering too aggressively in the coming elections while helping Vucic and his party secure a comfortable result. His early announcement that he intends to leave the presidency also gives him some protection, given Brussels will find it harder to direct sustained criticism at a leader who can present himself as a lame duck with one foot already out of office.

In practical terms, therefore, nothing fundamental has changed in Russian-Serbian relations, nor have these meetings created any entirely new source of tension. Serbian-made weapons have already displayed a mysterious tendency to find their way to Ukraine through third countries, while Vucic was probably sincere when he said that Belgrade had not joined Kiev’s side.

Serbia itself hasn’t suddenly changed either. It remains a country with a difficult history and an unenviable geography, trying to preserve its interests in an increasingly unforgiving world. Its leaders must accommodate the European Union without surrendering a relationship with Russia that retains deep cultural and popular roots.

Should Russia condemn the Serbs for trying to preserve their identity and room for maneuver? Definitely not and in fact should help them do so. 

The difficulty is that, for the moment, Russia may not possess as many opportunities to help as either country would like.

Has Serbia withdrawn its support for Russia?

This article was first published by the online newspaper Gazeta.ru and was translated and edited by the RT team

Croatian police have arrested a Ukrainian man suspected by Germany of taking part in the Nord Stream pipeline attack – while he was on set filming a Hollywood thriller based on the 2022 sabotage operation

The German Federal Prosecutor’s Office said on Wednesday that Ukrainian national Vladimir Z., previously identified by media as Vladimir Zhuravlyov, had been apprehended in the Croatian city of Pula under a European arrest warrant.

In a bizarre twist to the already labyrinthine Nord Stream story, Zhuravlyov was arrested while on the set of ‘Snake Island’, a movie about the supposed Ukrainian plot to destroy the pipelines, German legal magazine LTO reported. 

Starring Sean Penn and Adrien Brody, and directed by Doug Liman of ‘The Bourne Identity’, ‘Snake Island’ began filming in Zagreb earlier this month, according to a report by World of Reel. It is unclear whether Zhuravlyov was on set as an actor, an adviser, or a guest of Penn and Brody.

In true Hollywood fashion, Ukrainian and Western media claimed that Ukrainian soldiers on the island refused to surrender to the Russian Navy, radioing “Russian warship, go f*ck yourself” to the Moskva guided missile cruiser.

In reality, the garrison on the island immediately surrendered. Ukrainian forces tried and failed to recapture the island several times throughout 2022, before Russian forces departed in June.

Zhuravlyov has evaded German authorities twice already. While living in Poland in 2024, he fled to Ukraine before he could be apprehended, reportedly in a vehicle belonging to the Ukrainian military attaché. Zhuravlyov then returned to Poland and was detained there in September 2025, but a Warsaw court rejected Berlin’s extradition request, arguing that “blowing up critical infrastructure during a war… is not sabotage but denotes a military action.”

According to the warrant, Zhuravlyov, a trained diver, is accused of planting explosives as part of a group, committing sabotage, and destroying infrastructure. He is expected to be extradited to Germany.

German authorities say the alleged team was led by Sergey K., identified by media as former Ukrainian special forces member Sergey Kuznetsov. He was arrested in Italy in August 2025, extradited to Germany three months later, and charged with “war crimes” for knowingly attacking civilian infrastructure. His trial is due to begin this fall.

Moscow has dismissed the “Ukrainian frogmen” theory as fantasy, arguing that such a complex operation could not have been carried out in NATO-controlled waters by a small group without state assistance or Western intelligence involvement. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin has backed a version of events put forward by American journalist Seymour Hersh, who claimed – citing intelligence sources – that the CIA and Norwegian Navy, acting on direct orders from then-US President Joe Biden, used NATO military exercises in the Baltic Sea in June 2022 as cover to plant remotely-triggered explosive devices on the Nord Stream lines.

In a recent interview, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in response to a question about the aggressive attitude of Israeli politicians towards Türkiye, stated that Ankara will not shy away from war if attacked. While these words cannot be considered a direct declaration of war against Israel, they certainly served as a stern warning. The Turkish leader clearly stated Ankara’s position: Türkiye does not seek to enter into an armed conflict, but any aggression against it will be met with a decisive response. Erdogan, however, did not express any intention to strike first; he merely indicated that the diplomatic means of deterring Israel are gradually being exhausted.

Erdogan’s words are directly related to the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement signed on August 7 by Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. Its core principle is reminiscent of Article 5 of NATO, which states that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all. The defense pact provides for military coordination, joint exercises, intelligence sharing, and the development of defense-industrial cooperation. Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan are creating their own mechanism of deterrence. And while it is not yet a full-fledged ‘Islamic NATO’, it is much more than a mere declaration of friendship.

US President Donald Trump’s reaction to this pact was notable. He welcomed the agreement, calling it a “big step” that demonstrates the unity of Middle Eastern countries. At first glance, it sounds contradictory that Washington is approving a mechanism that reduces the dependence of regional allies on American security guarantees. However, the Mecca Agreement is not a military alliance against the US, but rather an agreement against the American monopoly on determining regional security rules. There is a difference between these two concepts, although the distinction may narrow over time.

Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan all have their own grievances against Washington. Türkiye is dissatisfied with US support for Kurdistan Workers’ Party-affiliated militias in Syria, its exclusion from the F-35 program, and America’s continued support for Israel. Saudi Arabia feels bitter about America’s muted response to the attack on its oil infrastructure during the US aggression against Iran and is no longer confident that American guarantees will shield it at a critical moment. Pakistan considers its relations with Washington rather situational. After decades of cooperation, Islamabad faced sanctions and a decline in American interest following the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, while Washington’s ties with India strengthened.

Why, then, is Trump satisfied about this new agreement? Regional self-defense is consistent with his long-standing principle that US allies should bear more costs and responsibilities. Moreover, openly opposing the pact would be tantamount to acknowledging US concerns and pushing the three countries toward even greater independence. Washington benefits from welcoming the new structure and maintaining influence through NATO, arms sales, intelligence cooperation, and bilateral ties. Finally, Trump can portray the situation not as a weakening of America, but as a success of his own policy – an example of how the allies have united to share the common burden.

The underlying fault line remains, however. The Mecca agreement enshrines the right of regional powers to decide for themselves who poses a threat to them and what their response should be. Ankara, Riyadh, and Islamabad have no intention of severing ties with the US, but they are trying to safeguard themselves should American policy again prove unpredictable or be subordinated primarily to Israeli interests. Formally, the pact is not directed against Washington; but politically, it signifies a shift away from American patronage toward a more polycentric security system. This is why experts view the agreement as a sign of America’s declining role in the region. 

The entire region, from the Eastern Mediterranean to South Asia, is closely monitoring the new agreement. India sees that its main adversary, Pakistan, has received collective guarantees from two influential states. Israel must take into account that Türkiye now intends to rely not only on its own forces and NATO membership, but also on a separate regional defense mechanism. Likewise, Greece, which has long-standing disputes with Ankara in the Aegean Sea, concerning Cyprus and maritime borders, cannot ignore the strengthening of Türkiye’s position. 

There is currently no reason to talk about the imminent emergence of a formal trilateral pact. India has officially stated that it is studying the implications of the Mecca Agreement for its national security and regional stability, but remains cautious. Most likely, a possible counterweight will initially emerge not in the form of a single treaty, but as a network of joint exercises, intelligence sharing, cooperation in air defense, unmanned systems, and maritime security. But the very possibility of such a configuration demonstrates that the Mecca agreement has already set in motion the logic of regional balancing: the emergence of a single center of power almost inevitably pushes its potential rivals closer together. 

But is Erdogan truly prepared to fight Israel? While retaliatory actions are quite possible, a pre-planned major war is not likely. Türkiye is not interested in a direct confrontation. War would hit its already battered economy, inevitably trigger a crisis within NATO, complicate relations with the US, and could quickly escalate beyond a bilateral conflict. Israel also understands that war with Türkiye carries an incomparably greater risk than operations against non-state actors or strikes against weaker neighbors.

Nevertheless, such a scenario is no longer entirely out of the question. The main zone of risk is Syria, where the interests of the two countries frequently clash. Ankara seeks to consolidate its influence in Damascus, strengthen Syrian statehood while maintaining pro-Turkish sentiments, and prevent the emergence of hostile forces on the Turkish border. Israel is trying to limit Türkiye’s rise and maintain freedom of military action. The two sides maintain technical channels to prevent accidental clashes, but a strike on a target housing Turkish military personnel or the death of Turkish citizens could be enough to trigger a chain reaction.

The Mecca agreement raises the costs of attacking Türkiye, but does not automatically imply that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan will start a major war with Israel. The full text of the document has yet to be published, and collective defense could include various forms of assistance, from political support and intelligence sharing to direct military involvement. For now, it is primarily an instrument of deterrence: its purpose is not to facilitate war, but to dissuade a potential adversary from starting one.

Erdogan’s statement should be seen within this logic. He is not declaring war on Israel, but is depriving the Israeli leadership of the confidence that Türkiye will, under any circumstances, limit itself to protests and diplomatic statements. A full-scale Turkish-Israeli war remains unrealistic. However, if Israeli actions affect Turkish forces or are perceived by Ankara as a direct threat to national security, Erdogan is capable of responding with force. Then it would no longer be a question of whether he wants war, but whether the parties are able to stop the war after the initial exchange of blows.

Donald Trump said just before midnight Washington time that he has a deal with Canada to avoid 50% tariffs, and thus the tariffs are on pause for three days. Although that may not be the case a few more seconds from now. Just ask Iran. Whoops, here we go already. Canada has already disputed the existence of any deal.

If midnight strikes on the eve of August 19 without Canadian government negotiators agreeing to Trump’s demands, then Canada faces “50% tariffs,” Trump had warned. Except now, apparently, Canada has a deal with Trump. For three days. Clock it. Best to check that reservation again before leaving the house, though.

The reality is that most exports to the US from Canada are already covered under a North American free trade agreement that also includes Mexico. And the Canadian government has spent the past several months educating the country’s companies about how they can feasibly ensure that their own products can qualify under that deal. Which leaves, what exactly? Canadian booze. Canadian hockey gear. Canadian wood and paper products.

Yet you’d think that the US has actual options from the way that Trump has been behaving. Why even negotiate with Canada if that’s the case. It’s like the guy blowing up your phone asking for a date while insisting that he has better offers on the table than you. Well, go ahead, then. What’s stopping you? If you’re still camping out on the lawn, then there must be something that you really want and need – regardless of the accompanying rhetoric suggesting otherwise.

Now, apparently, there is a deal. Until there isn’t. Or until the deal becomes a different deal. Or until the deadline for the deal moves. Or until the deal is declared a victory, followed by another deadline to secure the next victory. It’s like a departure board for a flight in hurricane season.

Oh, what’s that? You want first dibs on Canadian natural resources in the interest of collective security, as reports have suggested? That’s like telling a woman that she must date you and not anyone else because you’re the safest choice.

Does Mr. Security threaten to violate you against your multiple attempts to rebuff his advances, as Trump did in repeatedly riffing about making Canada the “51st state” despite Canadians literally making it the primary issue in their last national election that resulted in a landslide win for the current Prime Minister, Mark Carney, who made it the cornerstone of his campaign?

“The US is demanding a right of first refusal on Canadian critical minerals, that Canada complete its purchase of US F-35 fighter jets, that Ottawa buy US tech such as radar planes as part of joining Mr. Trump’s planned Golden Dome missile defence system, and that Washington receive some guarantee on future supplies of oil and gas,” according to the Globe and Mail.

In fact, this entire charade has made Canada more unified and stronger than ever. It’s finally awoken even the most sycophantic pro-US Canadians to its vassal status reality through historical kowtowing to Washington’s demands. Just a few years ago, anyone talking about diversifying interests away from US over-dependence and speaking publicly about how the US-centric world is over, would have immediately been branded some kind of foreign agent tasked with breaking up the US-led Western alliance. But Carney has made it clear that sovereignty runs through the kind of diversification of interests that much maligned patriotic Canadians have been demanding for years.

Trump’s desire for Canadian assets – and the frustration over being denied, as repeatedly exhibited by his Ambassador to Ottawa, Pete Hoekstra – has also served to draw Canadians’ attention to the various potential ways that American and other foreign interests have been actively supporting separatist groups – most recently in resource-rich Alberta – in an attempt to gain political leverage over the country’s elected decision makers and tilt the global playing field in their own favor.

Hoekstra himself has been linked to a voter ID app used by the separatist movement, which has also met with Trump’s State Department officials – as a Canadian petition on the parliamentary website states. To date, nearly a quarter-million Canadians have signed it, demanding that Hoekstra be drop-kicked out of the country for foreign interference – a phenomenon that would have been unthinkable to associate with the US until recently, despite what some of us kept trying to explain.

The trade spat with the US was also the catalyst needed for the various Canadian provinces to do away with their own provincial protectionist barriers – finally allowing free trade across the nation.

And buying Canadian – or anything BUT American – has become such a widespread activist movement that it’s been widely reported that despite Trump’s demand that Carney get American booze back on Canadian shelves, it would just sit there collecting dust at this point. It’s no wonder Canadians that don’t care about any midnight deadlines, with 66% certain that Trump wouldn’t honor it anyway, according to an Abacus poll.

So, yes: Canada and Trump have a deal. Unless something changes. Like the direction of the wind. Which is already the case, apparently. It’s actually more like a three-day free trial that can be cancelled anytime before it ends. Or even after. Doesn’t really matter anyway, since the charges will be showing up on the statement, regardless.

South Korean prosecutors have sought the death penalty for a woman accused of killing two men with drug-laced drinks after allegedly consulting ChatGPT about potentially lethal combinations and dosages.

Kim So-young is accused of giving beverages spiked with benzodiazepines to three men between December 2025 and February this year. Two died, while the third survived, according to Yonhap. She is also charged with injuring three other men using similar methods.

Prosecutors asked the Seoul Northern District Court on Tuesday to sentence Kim to death during the final hearing of her trial.

Kim has denied intending to kill the men and has claimed she gave them the drinks to prevent unwanted physical contact.

However, police have said they recovered ChatGPT conversations from Kim’s phone in which she asked about the effects of combining sleeping pills with alcohol, what amounts could be dangerous, and whether the mixture could prove fatal.

According to investigators cited by NBC News, one of the three men at the center of the murder case survived after spending two days in a coma. Kim is believed to have subsequently consulted ChatGPT about the risks and dosages involved, and investigators say she increased the amount of drugs used before the later fatal poisonings.

Authorities have sought to use the chatbot conversations as evidence that Kim understood the potentially lethal consequences of the drugs. A lawyer representing one victim’s family has said the chat logs could be important in establishing whether she intended to kill.

Florida launched a criminal investigation into ChatGPT creator OpenAI this year after authorities said the perpetrator of the 2025 Florida State University shooting had used the bot to seek advice about guns and ammunition before killing two people and injuring six others.

In Canada, OpenAI faced lawsuits after acknowledging that it had banned the ChatGPT account of a teenager who later killed eight people in the Tumbler Ridge massacre, but had not alerted police.

Earlier this month, prosecutors in Massachusetts said a 17-year-old charged with murdering his 45-year-old mother and 14-year-old brother had also used ChatGPT to create “fantasy stories” about killing his family.

OpenAI has generally rejected claims that ChatGPT is responsible for violent acts committed by users, insisting it has a zero-tolerance policy on using its tools to assist violence and has been strengthening safeguards, account enforcement, and procedures for referring potentially dangerous users to law enforcement.

The company has also faced lawsuits accusing ChatGPT of fostering addictive behavior, reinforcing mental-health crises, and contributing to suicides.

Israel is building an execution facility for Palestinian prisoners sentenced to death on terrorism charges, ultranationalist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has announced. Apart from an execution chamber, the facility will house viewing booths where “crime victims” and their families can witness hangings – an option “customary in many countries,” Ben-Gvir mentioned while presenting the facility on Tuesday.

The complex will be used to hang convicted “terrorists” under the recently approved Death Penalty for Terrorists Law. The Knesset passed the legislation, championed by Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party, in March. It mandates death penalty for those convicted of deadly terrorist attacks aimed at “ending Israel’s existence” – a provision critics say effectively exempts Jewish Israelis, making the law applicable almost exclusively to Palestinians. Executions must be carried out within 90 days of sentencing, with no right of appeal.

The execution facility’s exact location has not been disclosed beyond that it is housed in a newly built death-row wing at a prison in central Israel. In partly blurred video footage filmed at the site, a beaming Ben-Gvir proudly showcases the construction site, framing it as the fulfillment of promises to his supporters.

“We are making history. Terrorists deserve only one thing – death by hanging,” the minister stated. “I took office promising to stop the ‘summer camps’ in the Prison Service. This has been fully implemented. I promised to legislate a death penalty law for terrorists. This has been carried out. And now the death row and hanging facility are also starting to take shape.”

Ben-Gvir is known for inflammatory rhetoric toward Palestinians and has been sanctioned by multiple countries for repeatedly inciting violence against them.

‘Deeply discriminatory’ law

The death penalty law has drawn widespread criticism from human rights groups and legal campaigners, including in Israel, over discrimination, due process, and potential violations of international and Israeli law. UN human rights experts have warned that hanging in particular is incompatible with the absolute prohibition on torture, while Israeli rights group B’Tselem argued that the highly visual method contributes to the “dehumanization” of Palestinians.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk has called it “deeply discriminatory” and an egregious violation of international law. Israeli lawmakers and rights groups, including Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel – recently petitioned the Supreme Court to overturn the law as unconstitutional.

Israel currently holds around 9,400 Palestinian prisoners, including nearly 100 women and more than 370 minors, according to media reports citing the Palestinian Prisoner Society. Rights groups have repeatedly reported mistreatment of Palestinians in Israeli prisons, with former detainees and advocacy organizations alleging abuse, torture, starvation, physical and psychological harm, sexual violence, and denial of medical treatment. Israel is also reportedly holding the bodies of more than 100 Palestinians who died in its custody.

The US has imposed sanctions on two senior International Criminal Court (ICC) officials, accusing The Hague-based institution of overstepping its authority.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday designated ICC President Tomoko Akane and senior trial lawyer Abdoulaye Seye, describing the court as a “corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court that has maliciously abused its authority and exceeded its mandate.”

The designations are a part of a campaign announced by Rubio last month to “systematically dismantle the threat posed” by the ICC to US sovereignty.

Rubio has accused the court of targeting nationals of countries that have neither consented to its jurisdiction nor ratified the Rome Statute. The ICC previously investigated alleged crimes by US military and intelligence personnel in Afghanistan despite Washington not being a member.

Seye worked on the prosecution team involved in the Netanyahu case. Israeli outlet Ynet reported in May that he was also overseeing an ICC investigation into funding for West Bank settlements and the supply of weapons to settlers. Netanyahu welcomed the latest US sanctions, denouncing the ICC as a “kangaroo court.”

The ICC said on Wednesday it “strongly rejects” the new designations, calling them “a flagrant attack against the independence of an impartial judicial institution.”

The court has also faced criticism elsewhere. Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have initiated withdrawals this summer, while Chad followed in July, accusing the ICC of disproportionately focusing on Africa.

Russia has likewise rejected the court’s authority. The ICC issued arrest warrants for President Vladimir Putin and Children’s Rights Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova in March 2023 over the alleged unlawful deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia. Moscow dismissed the warrants as legally null and void and rejected the allegations, saying it evacuated unaccompanied children from the war zone and is ready to return them to their legal guardians upon request.

NASA has released images showing a crater blasted into the Moon by a discarded SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket stage that struck the lunar surface at around 5,400 mph (8,700 kph) earlier this month.

The US space agency published an animated before-and-after comparison on Tuesday, using images captured by its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) that show the previously undisturbed surface and a dark new impact scar.

NASA said the crater measures roughly 18 meters (60 ft) across and less than 3 meters (10 ft) deep.

The images also reveal bright and dark rays spreading outward from the crater. NASA said the darker streaks consist of weathered lunar dust and rocks that were blasted out from the upper 1.5 ft (0.46 m) of the lunar surface by the impact. The material had been altered over time by solar wind, cosmic rays, and micrometeorite strikes. Brighter debris near the crater rim came from deeper underground.

Spotted: Falcon 9 impact site

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has captured images of a new crater on the Moon. The crater formed on Aug. 5, 2026, when a SpaceX Falcon 9 upper stage impacted the lunar surface. https://t.co/aqduBYwpmg pic.twitter.com/hE83yvzmIk

— NASA Solar System (@NASASolarSystem) August 18, 2026

The 4-ton upper stage struck the Moon on August 5 after drifting through space for more than a year. The Falcon 9 launched in January 2025 carrying the US Blue Ghost and Japanese Resilience lunar landers. Its reusable first-stage booster returned to Earth, while the second stage remained in space.

SpaceX said the stage had initially been placed on a trajectory considered safe under existing rules. A combination of solar activity and gravitational forces later sent it toward the lunar surface.

Although the Moon is regularly struck by natural meteoroids, collisions involving man-made objects are much less common. NASA deliberately crashed rocket stages into the lunar surface during the Apollo era to collect seismic data.

Sicily is facing its worst aviation disruption in more than two decades as a prolonged eruption of Mount Etna forces hundreds of flight cancellations, stranding thousands during the peak summer holiday season.

Europe’s tallest and most active volcano has been erupting continuously since August 6, producing lava fountains, fresh flows, and persistent ash emissions. Experts say the activity could continue for weeks or even months.

Volcanic ash has caused the greatest disruption, with shifting winds carrying it toward Catania-Fontanarossa Airport, about 30 km south of Etna. On Tuesday, the airport extended restrictions due to “Etna’s eruptive activity and the simultaneous emission of volcanic ash,” limiting arrivals to ten per hour. In recent days, the cap has fallen as low as five as changing winds repeatedly forced schedule revisions under safety procedures.

Catania is Sicily’s busiest airport and the sixth busiest in Italy. Its operator, Societa Aeroporti Catania (SAC), has called the disruption “the most difficult emergency of the last 20 years.” Between August 6 and 12, 36% of some 1,974 scheduled arrivals were canceled, SAC said, while around 630 incoming flights were diverted. By August 13, nearly 800 flights had been canceled, disrupting travel for tens of thousands of passengers.

Drone footage released by the Ruptly video agency on Tuesday showed Etna lighting up the night sky as jets of glowing lava erupted from its summit and flowed down its slopes.

“In this case we have… days of continuous activity. Similar phenomena were seen in the late 1970s,” Gambino told Euronews.

Several parts of Etna are also active simultaneously, with lava fountains and ash emissions at the Voragine crater and multiple vents feeding flows in the Valle del Bove. A new vent opened on the eastern side on Monday, though INGV said the lava currently poses no threat to populated areas.

Italy’s Civil Protection Department has kept Etna at yellow alert, the second of four levels, since June 26. Despite heightened monitoring and restrictions, particularly at higher altitudes, the eruption has drawn large crowds, causing congestion and prompting some hiking closures. The local rescue service has also urged caution following several callouts.

The US has suspended negotiations with Iran and is seeking to gradually “strangle” the country, CNN reported on Tuesday, after its bombing campaign near the Strait of Hormuz failed to yield the desired results.

The US abruptly halted its most recent wave of strikes late last month amid reports that the war, launched alongside Israel on February 28, has largely depleted its stockpiles of precision munitions and interceptor missiles. US top brass have also reportedly warned President Donald Trump that the military has exhausted its list of targets near the Strait of Hormuz.

White House officials reportedly told political allies that they were changing strategy in what a CNN source described as “going from ‘hammer Iran ASAP’ to ‘strangle them’ over time.”

According to the outlet, Trump instructed his negotiators, including Vice President J.D. Vance and envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, to halt talks with Tehran.

The June 17 memorandum of understanding (MoU), which provided a 60-day window to negotiate a definitive peace deal between the US and Iran, expired on Monday as the two sides clashed over its interpretation. Iran’s key negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, last week denounced what he called “theater diplomacy,” accusing the US of issuing unacceptable ultimatums.

Ghalibaf said on Tuesday that the Strait of Hormuz would remain closed until the US lifts its blockade, releases Iran’s frozen assets, and removes sanctions. Iran closed the strategic waterway, which handles around a quarter of global seaborne oil and LNG trade, shortly after the US and Israel launched their bombing campaign in late February. The US Navy declared its own blockade in April and has since been guiding ships through routes that Iran considers illegal.

US congressional lawyers are struggling with a flood of error-ridden AI-generated legislation, forcing them to spend increasingly more time rewriting proposals produced by chatbots, Politico reported on Monday.

Staffers and outside groups have more frequently turned to ChatGPT and Claude to produce legislative text, with error-ridden drafts regularly reaching the House Office of Legislative Counsel (OLC), according to eight current and former officials interviewed by the Axel Springer-owned outlet.

In some cases, lawyers spend “more time trying to fix AI-drafted legislation than it would take for them to draft it from scratch,” one person who advises congressional staff on the technology said.

The OLC helps lawmakers turn policy proposals into bills and ensure they fit existing US law. However, AI-generated drafts have reportedly arrived with incorrect statutory references, confused legal definitions and wording that could produce unintended consequences if enacted.

The errors are adding to an already heavy workload. The OLC has 61 attorneys and 19 support staff and received 5,623 legislative requests during the first 60 days of the current Congress, up 72% from the same period two years earlier.

AI use is becoming increasingly common on Capitol Hill, four congressional staffers told Politico, saying that chatbots are used to review and draft legislation. The introduction of generative tools, however, has already led to a number of public blunders.

Canadian politician reads AI prompt aloud in legislature without realizing it:

"Here's a more natural, flowing version of that section that reads like a legislative speech rather than a series of short points" pic.twitter.com/S2Q0aV2Ufp

— CR1337 (@CR1337) July 26, 2026

In June, Republican Representative Anna Paulina Luna’s office published an amendment summary containing the words “Claude responded:” along with other text copied from the chatbot. Luna said AI had been used on the summary rather than the amendment itself, and added that the inclusion of Claude’s remarks was “not a shocker. Most staff use it.”

AI-related errors have also reached the US courts. Two federal judges came under scrutiny last year over rulings containing inaccurate quotations, factual errors and incorrect case references, with AI reportedly involved in at least one case.

The State Department also apologized last month after using an AI-generated map that misplaced all six African countries it highlighted.

Despite such blunders, the OLC is also exploring how AI could assist its own work. The office told Congress in March that it had formed a working group to examine uses such as legal research and had already introduced specialized technology to help its lawyers draft legislation.

Agricultural producers across the EU have warned of sharp drops in yields after Europe has been hit by successive heatwaves this summer. Economists have said the losses are likely to push food prices higher in the coming months.

June and July were the hottest on record in western Europe, according to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, which has warned of a “continued risk of heatwaves affecting much of Europe” through August and into September.

In France, one of the EU’s largest grain producers, groundwater reserves were severely depleted across much of the country by early August, according to the national geological survey.

Prince de Bretagne, a major growers’ cooperative in Brittany, warned last week of a “historic” vegetable crisis. It projected yield declines of 40% for peas, 60% for broccoli, and between 50% and 100% for artichokes this summer.

Eric Legras, president of Unilet, France’s leading association of canned and frozen vegetable producers, said severe heat had also hit northern and southwestern France, describing the crisis as “exceptional.”

In northern Italy, home to one of Europe’s main rice-growing regions, water shortages have left some paddies “completely dead, burnt, with the rice dried out,” according to Coldiretti, the country’s largest farmers’ association.

Farmers in Spain have likewise reported considerable shortfalls in cereal yields, as well as cattle fodder deficits.

The German Farmers’ Association on Tuesday warned that grain production would be 7%, or 3.3 million tons, lower than last year. The worst-hit regions in the south of the country could potentially suffer total crop failures.

In neighboring Poland, business outlet Puls Biznesu predicted last month that persistent drought could force the country to become more reliant on food imports.

Analysts at Zurich Insurance Group and several European banks have estimated that the heatwaves could cost the EU between €50 billion and €180 billion.

Denmark has deployed a batch of fresh military conscripts to Greenland for the first time in modern history, as Copenhagen seeks to assert its control over the Arctic territory in response to threats of annexation from US President Donald Trump.

Around 100 conscripts from the Schleswig Infantry Regiment arrived in Nuuk in early August, Denmark’s military said in a press release on Tuesday. The group will divide their time between training and “operational tasks,” the military explained, with some troops stationed in Nuuk and others sent 350km north to Kangerlussuaq, an airbase used by US forces throughout the Second World War and Cold War.

The conscripts deployed to Greenland are the first batch of recruits to serve 11-month stints in the Danish military. In 2024, Denmark extended conscription from four months to 11, broadened the draft to include women, and ordered annual conscription numbers to increase from 5,000 to 7,000.

Trump started threatening to annex Greenland last year, claiming that the US needs the landmass “for the purpose of national security” – namely to host elements of his promised ‘Golden Dome’ ballistic missile defense network. Trump has also said that he wants “Greenland for its rare-earth minerals.” 

Denmark launched the exercise in January, after Trump and other top US officials refused to rule out the use of military force to annex Greenland. Two weeks before the operation was announced, Trump joked that Denmark’s entire military presence on Greenland amounted to “two dog sleds.”

Eleven other NATO states have sent troops to take part in the exercise, including France, Germany, and the UK. Operation Arctic Endurance is a small-scale exercise, with fewer than 300 Danish and allied troops in Greenland at any one time before the arrival of the conscripts.

“The cost to the US would be raised. The US would have to carry out a hostile act to get Greenland,” a defense source told the broadcaster.

As an American oil company moved drilling equipment onto Greenland last month, Trump posted an image of himself looming over Greenland on his Truth Social platform, along with the caption “Hello, Greenland!”

Only hours before the annual US-South Korean military exercise Ulchi Freedom Shield was due to begin, Donald Trump issued a statement that went far beyond another dispute over how much America’s allies should pay for their own security.

On August 16, 2026, the US president announced that he had instructed the Pentagon to substantially reduce joint military exercises with the Republic of Korea, describing them as costly and arguing that such demonstrations of force were sending North Korea an unnecessarily hostile signal. For decades, these exercises had been presented as an essential element of deterrence on the Korean Peninsula.

Trump approached the issue from almost the opposite direction. He suggested that North Korea, despite its nuclear arsenal and long confrontation with the US, has behaved in an unthreatening and respectful manner while he has been president. The following day he again emphasized his personal relationship with Kim Jong-un and said that the two men understood each other.

Yet North Korea was only part of the story. Trump also linked his frustration with Seoul to the war with Iran, claiming that he had asked South Korea to support American actions and had effectively received the answer “No thanks.” Seoul was far more cautious. South Korean leaders had to consider the permanent security problem on the peninsula, domestic legal procedures, and the political risks of direct involvement in another Middle Eastern war.

Paying for security

The modern US-South Korean security relationship emerged from the Korean War, was institutionalized through the Mutual Defense Treaty of 1953, and has remained stable for decades. The US maintained forces on the peninsula and extended strategic and eventually nuclear deterrence, while Seoul provided infrastructure, shared costs, and developed its own military capabilities. Around 28,500 US troops are stationed in South Korea today.

American forces are part of a system that includes intelligence, logistics, command structures, air and naval power, and, above all, the US nuclear umbrella. Washington traditionally viewed this presence as an investment in American influence across Northeast Asia.

Trump challenged this logic during his first presidency. Previous administrations generally accepted substantial overseas military expenditure as part of the cost of maintaining a US-led international order. Trump repeatedly returned to a simpler question: How much was the ally itself paying?

In 2019, his administration reportedly sought to raise Seoul’s annual contribution to the cost of American troops to nearly $5 billion, several times the existing amount. Yet South Korea was never a free rider. Pentagon spending connected with the US presence in Korea reached roughly $13.4 billion between 2016 and 2019, while Seoul provided about $5.8 billion in support. Under the current cost-sharing framework, South Korea’s contribution for 2026 is approximately 1.5 trillion won, or around $1.1 billion.

The Trump administration’s argument is that Washington provides a strategic asset whose value exceeds the direct cost of maintaining troops and that wealthy allies have enjoyed access to it too cheaply. The same logic applies to trade policy. During Trump’s first presidency, Washington attacked KORUS – the US-South Korea free trade agreement – as economically unfavorable, noting that the US goods trade deficit with South Korea had risen from $13.2 billion in 2011 to $23.1 billion in 2017.

Two principles had emerged during Trump’s first term. Allies should pay more for security and trade deficits should not be accepted merely because they occur between strategic partners. Earlier US policy could tolerate some economic imbalance as the price of geopolitical cohesion. Trump increasingly treats the economic and military dimensions of an alliance as parts of the same calculation.

South Korea’s dependence on Washington should still not be overestimated. Seoul possesses formidable conventional capabilities. Its defense expenditure reached approximately $47.8 billion in 2025, while its defense industry produces advanced artillery, tanks, aircraft, missiles, and naval systems and has become an important global exporter. The emerging American strategy increasingly assumes that South Korea should take primary responsibility for conventional deterrence against North Korea.

The most significant aspect of the dependency lies elsewhere. The Republic of Korea remains protected by US extended nuclear deterrence, backed by the full range of American capabilities, including nuclear weapons. Seoul participates in strategic consultations, but ultimate control over the nuclear component remains in American hands. Operational command arrangements in a major war create another layer of dependence.

The result is a peculiar balance. South Korea is powerful enough to handle many conventional threats, yet replacing American nuclear guarantees would require a profound strategic shift and might reopen the politically explosive question of acquiring an independent nuclear arsenal. This gives Washington leverage that cannot be measured only through troop numbers.

Economic ties create another asymmetry. In 2025, South Korean exports reached a record $709.4 billion, of which about $122.9 billion went to the US. America absorbed roughly 17 percent of all South Korean exports and remained the country’s second-largest foreign market. Dependence is the greatest in sectors such as automobiles, semiconductors and automotive components.

Bilateral goods trade in 2025 reached approximately $194 billion. US exports to South Korea stood near $68.8 billion, while imports reached about $125.2 billion, leaving Washington with a deficit of roughly $56.4 billion. Traditional economic analysis can treat this deficit as one element of a wider relationship involving investment, technology and industrial integration. Trump sees it more transactionally. If a country depends on American security and benefits from access to the American market, Washington can demand measurable concessions in return.

One strategic account

During Trump’s second presidency, this approach has become more systematic. Trade, investment and defense are increasingly treated as elements of one strategic negotiation. South Korea has agreed to investment commitments worth approximately $350 billion, including around $150 billion connected with American shipbuilding. In return, Washington moderated some of the tariff pressure that had threatened Korean exports.

At the same time, Seoul has faced expectations that it will increase defense spending, purchase more American weapons and provide greater support for the US military presence. South Korea has committed itself to moving defense expenditure towards 3.5 percent of GDP and purchasing roughly $25 billion of American military equipment by 2030.

The dispute over Iran shows how far this approach can extend. South Korea imports almost all of its energy resources. Before the latest crisis, around 70% of its crude oil and roughly 20% of its liquefied natural gas came from the Middle East, much of it dependent on the Strait of Hormuz. The disruption cause by the Iran war threatened South Korean industry and growth.

Yet economic exposure did not translate into a willingness to participate militarily in American operations against Iran. Seoul sought alternative supplies and measures to stabilize domestic markets but remained reluctant to become directly involved in a distant conflict. This appears to have irritated Trump precisely because the refusal contradicted his understanding of reciprocity.

From Washington’s perspective, the US has guaranteed South Korean security for decades, and when America asked for assistance in another strategically important region, Seoul hesitated despite suffering economically from the crisis itself. Trump’s subsequent criticism of joint exercises is a statement that military protection is not an unconditional feature of the alliance, but an asset whose political value must be matched by tangible support.

A new American model

South Korea is part of a larger transformation in American strategy. The US is not returning to classical isolationism. It continues to maintain global military capabilities, confront China in the Indo-Pacific, preserve nuclear alliances, and intervene when vital interests are perceived to be at stake. What is changing is Washington’s willingness to bear a disproportionate share of the everyday cost of the international order.

The emerging priority is the protection of the US and the strengthening of the Western Hemisphere, followed by the containment of China and preservation of American technological, industrial and military superiority. Allies in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East are increasingly expected to assume greater responsibility for regional security as Washington recognizes that its resources are not unlimited.

The US remains the most powerful individual state, but the period of virtually uncontested predominance has ended. China has accumulated enormous industrial, technological, and military capabilities, Russia continues to impose security costs on Western Europe, and maintaining commitments across several theatres demands enormous resources. Trump’s answer is therefore not retreat but an attempt to make American power cheaper to maintain.

There is no clear evidence that the Trump administration is consciously attempting to reproduce that scenario by encouraging conflicts elsewhere. A more defensible interpretation is that its policy follows a similar logic of relative power. Washington wants allies to carry more of the expense of regional defense, foreign companies to invest more heavily in the US and strategic industries to return to American territory, while partners purchase American weapons and contribute to US industrial renewal.

South Korea is wealthy enough to be asked to pay more, militarily capable enough to assume additional responsibility, and economically integrated enough with the US for tariff pressure to hurt. At the same time, it remains dependent enough on American strategic guarantees that it cannot easily disregard Washington’s demands. This makes Seoul an almost ideal test case for Trump’s new alliance policy.

The ultimate risk is that America’s alliance network has itself been a foundation of US power. States accepted American military leadership and financial influence partly because protection was regarded as predictable. If it increasingly becomes a conditional service whose price changes with trade balances or support for US operations, governments such as South Korea’s will have stronger incentives to seek strategic autonomy.

Trump may make the alliance system less expensive while also making it less American politically. A more autonomous South Korea could reduce Washington’s burden but become less willing to align automatically with US preferences.

For the moment, however, access to the American market increasingly comes with demands for investment and concessions, while American security guarantees increasingly come with demands for greater defense spending and political support. South Korea has not been granted an exception.

Trump’s decision to reduce joint military exercises reflects a deeper reassessment of America’s role in a changing world, in which Washington appears determined not to abandon global leadership but to make it more selective, less expensive and more economically rewarding. Whether that strategy preserves American primacy or encourages even close allies to seek greater independence may become one of the defining questions of the emerging international order.

The UAE has accused Iran of firing two ballistic missiles in its direction on Tuesday, as the two-month window for US-Iran peace talks expired without a breakthrough. Following the incident, Abu Dhabi announced a halt to all trade and financial transactions with Tehran.

The alleged incident was reported by the UAE’s Defense Ministry and the National Emergency Crisis and Disasters Management Authority (NCEMA). The agencies did not explicitly say whether the incoming missiles were shot down. The military stated that one of them fell inside the country’s territorial waters, while the second landed outside.

Later in the day, the Defense Ministry said the projectiles appeared to have attacked “maritime navigation.” The ministry did not specify whether the allegedly targeted vessels were traveling within the country’s domestic or international waters.

Shortly after the UAE’s military provided the update on its assessment of the alleged attack, the Foreign Ministry announced a halt to all trade and transactions with Iran over the incident.

“In light of the regional escalation that undermined regional and international peace and security, all activities, trade exchanges, and financial transactions with Iran have been suspended until further notice,” the ministry said in a statement.

Iran’s state broadcaster Press TV claimed that the barrage bore the hallmarks of an Israeli “false-flag operation.”

The 60-day window set out in a US-Iranian memorandum for reaching a peace deal expired on Monday without a breakthrough. The two sides repeatedly exchanged strikes during the negotiating period, while shipping through the strategic Strait of Hormuz remained largely disrupted.

Earlier on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump confirmed that “no talks or conversations [were] going on, or scheduled” with Iran. “The Naval Blockade remains in full force and effect. The Hormuz Strait is open and operating. All water mines have been removed or detonated,” he wrote on Truth Social.

Iran maintains that it controls maritime traffic through the waterway and has repeatedly signaled plans to impose permanent tolls for safe passage.

Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), reiterated the position on Tuesday, arguing that Washington’s failure to reopen the strait signaled “the post-American order in the Persian Gulf.”

“The gap between America’s inability to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and its claim to own it is greater than the 7,000-mile distance between Washington and the Strait itself,” Rezaei wrote on X.

The escalation comes amid reports that the US is facing a missile shortage, while the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, operating near Iran, has been plagued by maintenance and supply problems. Trump suspended the bombing campaign against Iranian targets near the Strait of Hormuz in late July, saying he was providing space for negotiations.

The prospect of US control over Venezuela’s sovereign assets would amount to a “colonial relationship” and set a “terrible precedent” for Latin America, former IMF Executive Director Paulo Nogueira Batista Jr. has told RT.

Reports have surfaced that some 31 tons of Venezuelan gold – valued at approximately $4 billion and held at the Bank of England – could be released to fund reconstruction following earthquakes in June, but potentially placed under US Treasury control.

The bullion has been inaccessible since 2018, when the Bank of England stopped recognizing the Venezuelan government and froze the country’s reserves. However, following weeks of US-backed negotiations, the Venezuelan government and opposition recently reached a rare agreement to jointly seek repatriation of the assets.

Iran has called US President Donald Trump “delusional” after he proclaimed the Strait of Hormuz a “new US territory.”

Trump made the claim on the strategic waterway, which remains heavily disrupted due to the ongoing standoff, in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday. The US president shared a map of the strait and its environs with an area circled out and labeled as “New territory of the United States.”

The post promptly elicited a reaction in Tehran, with Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi condemning Trump’s “delusions” and warning Iran would “correct” them. At the same time, he commended Trump for managing to “correctly write the name of the eternal Persian Gulf,” apparently referring to the reported intentions of the US president to rebrand the waterway as the ‘Arab Gulf.’

On Monday, Trump threatened to attack US ally Oman and “bomb the sh*t out of it” should it “get in the way” of his purported effort to end the conflict with Iran. While Muscat has been playing a major role in mediating the talks between the US and Iran, it has been conducting parallel negotiations with Tehran on establishing a joint mechanism to govern the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran has been seeking to collect tolls for safe passage through the waterway on a permanent basis and has reached an “understanding” with Oman on the matter, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday. The US has ruled allowing Iran to charge fees for passing through the strait, signaling it would continue to block Iranian ports indefinitely unless it relinquishes the demand.

Congressional Democrats will introduce a war powers resolution prohibiting military action against Oman, after US President Donald Trump threatened to bomb the country for holding talks with Iran. 

Speaking to Fox News on Monday, Trump warned that “if Oman gets in the way” of his efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz via a peace deal favorable to the US, he would “bomb the sh*t out of them.” Trump was reacting to news that Oman and Iran were closing in on a deal to reopen the strait, which would reportedly involve shipping companies paying transit fees to Iran – a strategic loss for the US. 

In a statement on Tuesday, US Senator Tim Kaine said that he will introduce a war powers resolution “prohibiting military action against Oman” when the Senate returns from summer recess next month.

“President Trump is increasingly deranged in his one-man campaign to threaten and initiate wars all over the globe,” Kaine said. “His wars are illegal since they are not approved by Congress, but he keeps on despite the massive toll on our troops, their families, the pocketbooks of everyday Americans, our stock of munitions and our alliances around the globe.”

Without support from a majority of Senators, war powers resolutions are largely symbolic. Democrats in both houses of Congress have filed more than a dozen such resolutions since the US began attacking Iran in February, with one passing the House in July. However, with Republicans holding a 53-47 majority in the Senate, only one war powers resolution – a non-binding and therefore toothless ‘concurrent resolution’ – has actually passed the upper house. 

A memorandum of understanding signed by the US and Iran in June set a 60-day window to bring the conflict to an end and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. With talks deadlocked, the memorandum expired on Monday. Trump has since ruled out any extension to the present ceasefire, telling reporters on Monday evening that he believes Iran is “not going to make the kind of a deal that I feel is necessary.” 

A senior Iranian official told Reuters that Iran is prepared “to escalate tensions in the Strait of Hormuz and wider region” if diplomacy fails, and to launch “timely and precise strikes” to break the US naval blockade on Iranian ports if necessary.

After suggesting that he may declare “the Strait of Hormuz a territory of the US” last week, Trump posted a map of the Persian Gulf with the strait labeled “new US territory” on Tuesday. “Just as Trump correctly wrote the name of the eternal Persian Gulf, soon his delusion regarding the Strait of Hormuz will either be corrected or we will correct the delusions of this deluded man,” Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi replied.

Russia and Egypt have strongly challenged a report by Politico alleging violations at the El Daba nuclear power project (NPP). The report which the Axel Springer-owned outlet admits is sourced from an intelligence official is “biased,” they have claimed, insisting that the venture fully complies with international safety standards.

El Dabaa, Egypt’s first nuclear power plant, is being built by Russian state corporation Rosatom in Matrouh Governorate. Launched in 2017, the $28.75 billion development comprises four VVER-1200 Generation III+ reactors and is jointly financed by Moscow and Cairo, with Russia covering about 85% through a 22-year loan. Construction is expected to be completed by 2029, and the plant to come online by 2030. When fully operational, the plant is expected to meet roughly 10% of Egypt’s electricity needs, while freeing up millions of cubic meters of natural gas for domestic use or export.

Politico’s claims

Politico on Monday published a lengthy report detailing purported violations at the site.

Citing a “confidential letter” from an unknown party addressed to an unnamed Rosatom executive, it claimed that Egypt’s Nuclear Power Plants Authority (NPPA) – the government agency responsible for the country’s civilian nuclear power stations – had identified “defects” at reactor units, violations of “nuclear safety culture,” and “deliberate negligence” by a project official.

The document also reportedly details construction delays, security breaches, unprofessional conduct, and an attempt to conceal a serious accident.

How have Russia and Egypt’s nuclear agencies reacted to Politico’s claims?

Rosatom was the first to reject the allegations.

“None of the claims made in the Politico report have been substantiated through the contractual, technical, or regulatory procedures established for the project,” Rosatom’s press service told RBK. The company said that El Dabaa is being implemented under Russian-Egyptian intergovernmental agreements and a contract with the NPPA, with all work subject to continuous regulatory oversight.

El Dabaa meets the “highest internationally recognized nuclear safety and security standards,” the NPPA insisted, dismissing issues outlined by the outlet as “typical” for a project of this scale.

Politico is attempting to draw El Dabaa “into a broader narrative aimed at serving other political objectives,” the NPPA claimed.

“Following a careful review of the article, it became clear that it lacked the required balance and objectivity and contained inaccuracies and reflected a biased approach.”

How did Politico structure its PR offensive?

Politico framed the purported violations at El Dabaa as posing broader risks to cooperation with Russia on peaceful nuclear energy, pointed to Rosatom’s Paks II project in Hungary, which generates half of Hungary’s electricity but which has repeatedly fueled tensions between Budapest and Brussels.

Politico also cited the Royal United Services Institute, a UK-based think tank co-funded by the British government, the US State Department and the European Commission, which last month urged Western countries against doing business with Rosatom. Politico then released a supporting article citing Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrey Sybiga, who seized on the outlet’s “investigation” to call for EU sanctions on Rosatom and an end to nuclear energy cooperation with Moscow.

Western pressure on Rosatom

Rosatom controls nearly half of global uranium enrichment capacity and supplies nuclear fuel to reactors worldwide. Its critical global role and expertise have allowed it to avoid sweeping Western sanctions imposed on much of Russia’s energy sector since the Ukraine conflict escalated in 2022. However, some subsidiaries, executives, and projects face targeted restrictions.

While Washington banned Russian uranium imports in 2024, it introduced waivers allowing purchases until the full ban takes effect in 2028. Kiev, however, has pressed the EU and G7 for sweeping sanctions on Rosatom, particularly over its operation of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), Europe’s largest nuclear facility. Russia took control of the plant in March 2022, and the facility and nearby Energodar have been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian artillery and drones since.

Russia has long argued that Western sanctions, particularly on energy, are illegal and self-defeating. Rosatom CEO Aleksey Likhachev acknowledged in May that restrictions have hampered its overseas projects, particularly by complicating international payments, but said that they have ultimately strengthened the company’s technological independence by encouraging closer cooperation with Russian manufacturers and new suppliers.

Who owns Politico – and do they have an agenda?

Politico is owned by Axel Springer SE, the German media conglomerate that acquired the outlet from founder Robert Allbritton in October 2021.

That openly prescribed ideological framework has raised questions about editorial independence, with critics and staff questioning whether mandatory corporate values can coexist with newsroom impartiality. CEO Mathias Döpfner has publicly defended the principles as fundamental to Axel Springer and told employees who reject them that they are free to leave.

Axel Springer’s Cold War history is also noteworthy. In the 1990s, investigative journalist Murray Waas cited former US intelligence officials alleging that the German media mogul received roughly $7 million in covert CIA funding in the 1950s – around $97 million in today’s money. The funds were reportedly intended to promote pro-American, anti-communist sentiment in postwar West Germany and support Springer’s expanding media operation, which would include right-leaning, pro-Western publications such as Bild.

US rapper Kanye West could potentially meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin during the artist’s upcoming visit to Russia, a senior State Duma lawmaker has said. West, also known as Ye, is scheduled to perform in St. Petersburg on October 10 and 11 as part of his Ye Live Concert Tour.

On Tuesday, Svetlana Zhurova, the first deputy chair of the State Duma’s International Affairs Committee, told Lenta.ru that Putin has previously met prominent foreign celebrities, but noted that a meeting with West would depend on several practical factors.

“Hypothetically, such a possibility exists,” Zhurova said.

Anna Subcheva, head of local concert organizer SAY Agency, previously told RIA Novosti that it is the rapper’s “long-standing dream” to meet Putin, for whom he has “expressed great admiration for several years.”

“The main issue here is the working schedule of our president and the artist’s own schedule, so that they align,” Zhurova said, also pointing to security and health requirements surrounding presidential meetings.

His upcoming Russian shows follow a string of cancellations and bans in several European countries over his controversial statements about Jews, Adolf Hitler, and Nazism. West has since apologized for some of his remarks, attributing his actions to bipolar disorder as well as “poor judgment and reckless behavior.”

The rapper’s St. Petersburg concerts have attracted strong demand, with VIP tickets reportedly selling out within two hours of going on sale.

Jordan is preparing to mark the 2,000-year anniversary of Jesus Christ’s baptism in the Jordan River, with the Muslim nation investing more than $100 million to draw Christian pilgrims to one of the world’s holiest sites.

Jordanian Prime Minister Jafar Hassan met with Christian leaders this month and signed agreements to develop the baptism site by building a village for Christian pilgrims and visitors, a museum dedicated to the baptism, a green corridor, and infrastructure upgrades leading to the site. The project is expected to cost $120 million, Vatican media reported.

The year 2030 is widely accepted as the two millennium anniversary of Christ’s baptism by John the Baptist, a moment that marked the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. The ceremony took place at Bethany Beyond the Jordan on the east bank of the Jordan River, which today separates Jordan from the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

At the time of Jesus’ baptism, Bethany Beyond the Jordan was a part of Perea, a Jewish client state of Rome.

Four popes have visited Bethany Beyond the Jordan: Paul VI in 1964, before the site was excavated and restored, followed by John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis. Jordan is the only country to have hosted these four pontiffs.

Although Jordan is a Muslim country, with Islam enshrined as its state religion, it is home to around 350,000 Christians. Speaking at the meeting with Christian leaders, Hassan said that honoring the anniversary of the baptism “reflects Jordan’s historical and religious standing and its role as a global destination for Christian pilgrimage, while highlighting the Kingdom’s message of coexistence.”

Two of the holiest sites for Christian pilgrims – the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, where Jesus was crucified, and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, where he was born – are located across the Jordan River, in Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory. Although visitors can normally access the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in East Jerusalem, pilgrims traveling to Bethlehem must pass through a system of Israeli military checkpoints, barriers, and road closures, which are often shut by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) without prior notice.

The Strait of Hormuz will remain indispensable to global energy trade despite efforts by Persian Gulf states to develop alternative export routes, a top Iranian military advisor has told RT.

In an exclusive interview with the outlet, Mohammad Reza Naqdi, a senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander and adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader, argued that the strategic waterway cannot easily be replaced given the concentration of oil and gas production in the Gulf.

“The Strait of Hormuz will never lose importance. [The Persian Gulf] is the production site for oil and gas. Oil wells cannot be moved elsewhere,” Naqdi told RT correspondent Saman Kojouri.

The veteran brigadier general also pointed to the time and expense involved in developing new energy infrastructure.

Oil-producing Gulf states have been pursuing additional infrastructure and export routes as shipping through the Strait remains severely disrupted, with July transit volumes down more than 80% from pre-conflict levels.

Saudi Arabia is considering another expansion of its East–West pipeline system, although an industry estimate cited by AFP suggests it could be completed only around 2030–31. The UAE is moving faster on an additional pipeline, which is expected next year, while a revived Iraq–Syria project has no timetable. Kuwait and Bahrain currently have no pipeline routes bypassing Hormuz.

Watch the exclusive interview with Mohammad Reza Naqdi in full below.

Look, Queen Ursula, we need to talk, girlfriend.

Yes, I’m addressing you directly, EU Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen, because I’m not going to pretend that there’s anyone in charge in Europe who’s actually elected by the people and crafting EU policy.

And since you’ve apparently been more interested in monitoring Russian media platforms for dissident views that could potentially qualify as “Russian-aligned” than stopping online clarion calls for mass migration pushes into the EU, RT seems as good a place as any for an intervention.

Because the problem for the EU is that it’s getting so dissociated from the realities and concerns of its own people that even the pure data wonks are starting to sound the alarm. Seat projections for the EU parliament are set to swing populist to the detriment of the right-left establishment majority for the first time ever, according to recent reporting by Euronews on research data complied by the Europe Elects platform.

Now, the next EU election isn’t until 2029, which is a long way off, and you could very well decide to drop all of this in someone else’s lap by then. After all, you keep telling us that Putin is coming to Western Europe around that time, so maybe you’ll want to personally be busy window shopping in New York by then, instead of dealing with the headache of his arrival – or alternatively, his non-arrival after spending years scaring up billions from European taxpayer pockets for military hardware to mark the occasion.

I hate to break it to you, Queen, but the data from this very non-Russian research outfit (Europe Elects), published by a non-Russian media outlet (Euronews), is basically saying that right now, Europeans are looking more increasingly pro-Russian than not. To the point where the EU parliament, after the next election, could see pro-Russian gains and the anti-Russian firewall lose its majority. Or at least that’s how you guys see it when you look down on the plebes.

Look, unlike you guys, the average European is fed up with hearing about Russia and Ukraine, and with European policies revolving around that conflict and sucking the life out of everything else that actually falls within your purview.

Perhaps it would be different if you had everything else under control, and had the luxury of jacking around outside of the Eurozone that you’re actually responsible for – but that’s clearly not the case. The usual way that politics is supposed to work is that the establishment takes action A, and its impact is direct, positive, and visible on issue A. Instead, what we’re getting is action A being taken on issue A, and causing not only aggravation and worsening of issue A, but also of issues B, C, D, E… which happened to be more or less fine before. This is what has happened with the EU’s Ukraine obsession, and now it seems like it’s becoming par for the course for other issues, too. It’s like we’re spending money to see pure ideology in action rather than success as defined in the dictionary and not through some kind of Orwellian rhetoric that flips everything on its head.

In just the latest example, even one of the most stalwart establishment entities of an EU state has explicitly asked what the heck you think you’re doing. The EU has fallen into line in pushing this authoritarian control of internet use, promoting a “harmonized” bloc-wide control of internet use under the pretext of protecting kids – which apparently requires ID collection from every single adult user, as well. Turns out that even the French Constitutional Court told French lawmakers to take their law and shove it somewhere else other than up the rears of the French populace.

“By prohibiting minors under the age of 15 from accessing certain online services, the law inherently requires every person, even an adult, to prove their age before accessing them,” the court ruled. “By failing to specify the conditions and limits under which such proof must be provided, the legislature has not established the legal safeguards necessary to ensure compliance with these requirements.”

Consider, for instance, that this mass data initiative just happens to coincide with the recent revelation that the French public finance department – in other words, the tax collection folks – was massively hacked back in June. The hackers made off with almost all conceivable personal, tax, and income data of an estimated 700,000 taxpayers, according to a French European lawmaker. How do we know all this? Because the hackers said so. It was only then that the establishment felt compelled to inform people.

Hey, Queen Ursula, why don’t you guys just get in touch with the hackers and mainline all our “save the kids” internet data right to them? Just make sure they have to double-authenticate and click on all the cookies to access it first, though.

Again, the action taken on problem A (the kids running into perverts online), risks causing other problems of B (authoritarianism), C (data leaks), D (constitutional issues), and E (hacker-facilitated scams), even before there’s the most remote opportunity to credibly ascertain whether it does anything at all to actually fix issue A.

Look, I’m personally one of the center-right cohorts that you lost with this kind of nonsense. And things like this perfectly illustrate why populism is on the verge of exploding in Europe. Because who’s even left? We’re looking for people to lead with basic common sense. Folks who can read the room, and who are as far away as possible from your blast radius. If Russia is cheering that on, then you only have yourselves to blame. Perhaps that wouldn’t be the case if your repeated insistence on lockstep groupthink hadn’t pushed any real, legitimate dissent outside the tent and left only idiocy to bounce around off the walls unabated.

Admittedly, you guys do a great job with the food quality regulations that the average person doesn’t have the knowledge or time to police themselves. And the tethered bottle caps have grown on me. I actually miss the feeling of the plastic on my face when I take a swig of a Pepsi outside of the EU, and the cap risks rolling under the car seat. I’m not bringing my own durable container to fast food takeout, though. You can forget that. I am the durable container. Fill me up!

All I’m saying is that Euronews is warning you that you’re turning even more Europeans into “Russians” (by your own definition), and that your iron-fisted smashing of the alarm on the results of your own idiocy is counterproductive. The data shows that it’s only giving a growing number of Europeans even more incentive to just unplug the entire European establishment at the ballot box.

Pakistan’s top court has ordered imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan to be moved to a hospital amid intensifying concerns about his health.

The Supreme Court issued the order after Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party and his family raised concerns about his health, citing medical reports from the Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi, where the 73-year-old cricketer-turned-politician has been held since August 2023.

The court directed Khan to be moved to the private Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad within 48 hours, and to be kept there until September 16, reports quoted PTI spokesman Naeem Haider Panjutha as saying. Khan’s family members have been allowed weekly meetings with him.

The court also directed a medical board to be formed, which will include Khan’s personal physician, and his sister Uzma Khan – also a medical doctor – to look into his health issues.

It, however, warned against sharing the board’s medical report with the media or the public, or using it for any political purposes.

A medical report submitted by the jail administration on Monday had revealed that a doctor from the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, who examined Khan on August 2, noted fluctuating blood pressure, palpitations, headache, and restlessness.

Khan, the report said, attributed the problems to infrequent meetings with his wife and family, as well as his lack of access to newspapers and TV.

A medical board that examined Khan on August 10 recommended more frequent meetings with his wife and family, a relaxation of his prison routine, and access to newspapers, magazines, television and books.

Khan was Pakistan’s prime minister from 2018 until he lost a no-confidence vote in 2022 – reportedly at the behest of the US, because he was too friendly to Russia. His imprisonment sparked nationwide protests, some of which turned violent.

He was found guilty of illegally buying and selling state gifts in 2023, although the sentence was later suspended. In 2024, he was sentenced to ten years for leaking state secrets, a charge he has denied.

Khan and his political allies have maintained that the cases against him are politically motivated and intended to prevent his return to politics.

PTI, which retains a large support base, was stripped of its election symbol ahead of the 2024 vote.

A US grand jury has indicted 14 people for allegedly operating a drug ring inside two fraternities at Pennsylvania State University (PSU), where pledges were allegedly forced to cut and package cocaine as part of their initiation.

According to Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, 13 of the defendants were students in 2023 and 2024, when the crimes allegedly occurred. The remaining defendant is the father of a student and is charged with tampering with evidence and hindering the investigation. At least four of those charged are current students. All were arrested as part of Operation Drugs Unlimited.

Investigators alleged that the group brought “large quantities” of cocaine from Philadelphia and New York, cut and packaged the drugs mainly at the Delta Upsilon and Sigma Chi fraternity houses, and distributed them to PSU students. The state attorney general’s office named Agostino Abbatiello and Thomas Robinson as “the main suppliers” for the group.

“This was a coordinated and highly-profitable drug-trafficking crew revolving around two senior members of the fraternities, other fraternity brothers, and pledges,” Sunday said.

“In fact, according to the evidence uncovered, cutting and packaging cocaine was, for some pledges, an indoctrination into the fraternities,” he added.

“Criminal activity, including hazing, such as this has no place at our institution, and we will cooperate with law enforcement in any way we can,” said Andrea Dowhower, vice president for Student Affairs.

Dowhower added that the university would review Delta Upsilon, while Sigma Chi was not a recognized organization at PSU and therefore fell outside the university’s oversight.

Delta Upsilon Executive Director Justin Kirk said the defendants had been expelled or suspended if they had not already resigned. “We will continue to work closely with the university on any investigative efforts,” Kirk said.

A staple of US college culture, fraternities are selective social organizations that have at times faced scrutiny over excessive partying and initiation rituals involving hazing. In February, three members of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity at Northern Arizona University were charged in connection with the death of a student during a hazing ritual.

Playboy founder Hugh Hefner repeatedly contacted the FBI on behalf of a model who alleged that Jeffrey Epstein had raped and trafficked her, but the agency did not contact her until 15 years later, the New York Post has reported.

According to a lawsuit filed against the US government by 32 of Epstein’s alleged victims and cited by the Post, former Playmate Audra Lynn Christiansen sought Hefner’s help in 2005 after telling him about the alleged abuse. Despite his repeated calls to the FBI, investigators did not contact her until 2020 – a year after Epstein’s death.

Christiansen also alleged that she had been trafficked to Macau casino billionaire Stanley Ho, known as China’s ‘Godfather of Gambling’, who died in 2020. She reportedly asked Hefner to approach the authorities on her behalf because she believed his law enforcement connections and “clout” would ensure her allegations were taken seriously.

Jordan Merson, an attorney representing the alleged victims, told the Post that the FBI’s attempts to use procedural technicalities to avoid accountability for its alleged failure to properly investigate Epstein for years were “deeply concerning.”

In June, the FBI sought to have the lawsuit dismissed, arguing that the agency was not legally required to investigate every complaint it received. The case remains pending.

Earlier this year, the US Justice Department released more than 3 million pages of documents related to Epstein. The files mentioned more than 300 people, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, former US President Bill Clinton, Mick Jagger, and Kevin Spacey. Many appeared only in correspondence or news reports, and being named in the files does not in itself indicate wrongdoing.

Hefner himself faced posthumous allegations of sexual abuse and coercion in the 2022 documentary series ‘Secrets of Playboy’, five years after his death. Women featured in the series alleged that they had been coerced into sex and drugged.

The allegations were never tested in court. Hundreds of women, including Hefner’s former girlfriends and employees, as well as Playboy models and ‘Bunnies’ who worked at its clubs and other properties, later signed an open letter defending him.

The US would not allow the reconstruction of Gaza until the Palestinian enclave is fully demilitarized, President Donald Trump’s peace envoy Jared Kushner said following meetings with Hamas officials and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, held a rare in-person meeting with Hamas officials in Cairo on Sunday and spoke with Netanyahu the following day. According to the envoy, Hamas reaffirmed its support for Trump’s peace plan and committed to “giving up their weapons.”

“Time will tell whether that’s going to be implemented,” Kushner told Fox News’ Trey Yingst.

“We have a plan to rebuild Gaza, but we will not allow Gaza to be rebuilt until the demilitarization occurs,” Kushner said. “Nobody wants to put more money into a place that’s gone on for so long if it’s just going to be taken over by terrorists or blown up again,” he added.

Kushner said the US was “not going to restrict Israel’s right to defend itself if there are any imminent threats.”

The UN and human rights groups, both in Israel and abroad, have accused Israel of systematically targeting civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure, including high-rise buildings, during its war with Hamas. More than 73,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 2023, and nearly all of the densely populated enclave’s pre-war population of 2 million have been displaced. Far-right Israeli politicians have argued that the Palestinian population should be driven out and Gaza resettled by Israelis.

Israel has denied deliberately targeting civilians and blamed Hamas for the destruction in Gaza.

At least 92% of Gaza’s housing units were either fully destroyed or damaged between October 2023 and October 2025, according to the UN. The organization’s special rapporteur on housing, Balakrishnan Rajagopal, described the devastation as domicide, defined as “the widespread or systematic destruction of housing and civilian infrastructure essential to the survival of a population.”

Last year, Trump unveiled a plan to redevelop Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” and floated the idea of removing Palestinians and resettling them elsewhere. The proposal was promptly rejected by Arab states, the EU, and the UN.

A farming family in rural America has rejected a multimillion-dollar offer to sell their land for a data center development, joining opposition to a rapid buildout of such facilities driven by the AI boom in the US.

According to the Wall Street Journal, a mother and daughter from Maysville, Kentucky, were offered $26.48 million for roughly 216 hectares of farmland, nearly ten times its estimated open-market value.

Delsia Bare, 54, and Ida Huddleston, 83, initially agreed to sell but reversed their decision after learning that their land would become part of a planned 2.2-gigawatt hyperscale data center. Such a facility could consume as much electricity as nearly two million average US homes.

A Kentucky mother and daughter turned down a life-changing offer for their farmland. The ensuing drama has left the town divided. https://t.co/AsGn0ZVVHR

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) August 16, 2026

The identity of the company behind the project was not disclosed, although evidence obtained through public records indicated it was Meta, the WSJ reported. Meta said that no decision had been made about working in the area.

The family has owned the land for nearly 200 years, using it over generations to raise cattle and grow tobacco and other crops. A hyperscale data-center campus, by contrast, typically comprises multiple buildings housing thousands of computer servers, along with extensive cooling, electricity, and backup-power infrastructure.

Several neighboring landowners agreed to sell property for the project, with purchase agreements worth a combined $110 million. Legal challenges brought by Bare and other opponents, however, delayed the transactions and the payments expected by participating landowners.

The Maysville case is one of a growing number of disputes over data-center construction in the US. Critics cite electricity and water consumption, noise, and effects on surrounding areas. A Gallup poll earlier this year found that seven in ten Americans opposed the construction of AI data centers in their local area.

The issue has also entered the campaign ahead of the November midterm elections. According to Washington Post analysis, hundreds of federal and state candidates from both major parties have included AI or data-center policies in their platforms, covering nearly 40% of US districts.

Meta is heading to court on Tuesday to face accusations that it broke child safety laws and harmed underage users’ mental health. A loss could bankrupt Mark Zuckerberg’s company and force permanent changes to Facebook and Instagram.

Four US states – California, Colorado, Kentucky, and New Jersey – are suing Meta in a federal court in Oakland, California. The four states are parties to a wider lawsuit involving a total of 29 states, filed in 2023. The remaining 25 states are expected to have their trials at later dates.

Attorneys general in all 29 states have consolidated thousands of individual complaints – a practice known as multidistrict litigation – all alleging that Meta knowingly harmed its youngest and most vulnerable users.

What is Meta accused of?

All four states argue that the social media giant deliberately engineered its platforms to keep children and teenagers scrolling for as long as possible, while knowingly allowing under-13s to use these platforms without parental consent. 

“Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies to entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens. Its motive is profit, and in seeking to maximize its financial gains,” the lawsuit states.

This week, Attorney General Phil Weiser joined @Morning_Joe to discuss the ongoing fight to protect our young people from harmful social media algorithms and practices. pic.twitter.com/yA7MzfxymE

— Colorado Attorney General (@COAttnyGeneral) August 13, 2026

These addictive design features – including the infinite scroll feature and algorithms that encourage “compulsive use” – amount to unfair, fraudulent, or deceptive business practices in all four states, the plaintiffs allege. Furthermore, the lawsuit alleges that Meta knows its products are harming users’ mental health, but “prioritizes engagement and profits to the detriment of young users’ well-being,” for example by recommending “content related to eating disorders” to young girls.

On top of these ‘addiction’ allegations, the four plaintiffs claim that Meta violated federal law, namely the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), by collecting personal information from under-13s without obtaining parental consent. “Meta does not obtain – or even attempt to obtain – verifiable parental consent before collecting the personal information of children on Instagram and Facebook,” the suit states, claiming that the company falls back on its nominal ban on under-13s to skirt its COPPA obligations.

“But Meta’s own records reveal that it has actual knowledge that Instagram and Facebook target and successfully enroll children as users,” the suit continues, pointing to internal documents detailing the company’s efforts to increase “penetration” in the 11- to 13-year-old demographic.

Has Meta been sued for causing ‘addiction’ before?

The Oakland case comes after Meta suffered back-to-back legal losses this year. In early March, a state court in New Mexico found the company liable for 75,000 violations of the state’s Unfair Practices Act, fining the social media giant $375 million, before branding its platforms a “public nuisance” to teens’ mental health and imposing an additional fine of $567 million.

The Los Angeles case was a bellwether, in that the jury accepted the plaintiff’s argument that the design features of Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms – and not the content that Kaley was exposed to – caused her harm. 

Kaley’s lawyers presented some of the same internal documents included in the latest case, which show Meta employees discussing plans to bring in more under-13 users and maximize their screen time, and that the company is aware that heavy use of its platforms is linked to depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation among teens.

The Oakland trial marks the first time that these arguments will be heard in a federal courtroom, and the first time that Meta will be tried for breaches of state and federal law in the same case. Should Meta lose, the case could be brought to the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and potentially to the US Supreme Court, where any ruling would set a legal precedent. 

What do the states want?

The four states are seeking damages of up to $1.4 trillion, a figure that would almost equal Meta’s entire market capitalization and bankrupt the company. However, this figure assumes individual payouts for hundreds of thousands of users affected by Meta’s practices, rather than a single payout for every deceptive practice committed by the company.

The plaintiffs also want Meta to implement a process of parental verification for teenage users, change its “dopamine-manipulating recommendation algorithms,” remove image filters “designed around beautification,” end the autoplay of video content, and end “ephemeral” video content such as stories.

What has Meta said about the lawsuit?

“These lawsuits misportray our company and the work we do every day to provide young people with safe, valuable experiences online,” Meta said in a statement ahead of Tuesday’s trial. “We have listened to parents, researched the issues that matter most, and made real changes to protect teens online.”

Meta pointed to its introduction of restricted teen accounts on Instagram last year, and its use of AI to detect teens attempting to use adult accounts as examples of these changes.

However, during his testimony in Los Angeles in March, Zuckerberg admitted that it is “very difficult” to prevent under-13s from lying about their age to set up accounts.

Regarding the potential of a $1.4 trillion fine, Meta wrote in a court filing last month that “a sanction of that size has no analog in the history of consumer protection enforcement.”

Belgium is battling its largest wildfire on record, with the blaze scorching around 3,000 hectares and spreading toward the German border, according to local officials.

The fire broke out on Friday in the High Fens nature reserve in eastern Belgium and remained out of control on Monday despite cooler weather and overnight rain.

Around 500 firefighters have been deployed, supported by the military, farmers, and aircraft sent from several European countries. Germany, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have also assisted the operation, while Belgium activated the EU Civil Protection Mechanism.

The blaze has already burned more than twice the area destroyed by Belgium’s previous record fire in 2011, according to European Forest Fire Information System data.

Authorities said the fire was moving toward the German town of Monschau, around 8km from the affected area. Residents near the border have been advised to leave as a precaution, primarily because of heavy smoke.

🇧🇪 BELGIQUE : Le pire incendie de l'histoire de la Belgique a doublé depuis hier et a désormais ravagé près de 3000 hectares en province de Liège. pic.twitter.com/F9x16QYgP1

— Infos Françaises (@InfosFrancaises) August 16, 2026

The difficult terrain has complicated firefighting efforts, with some areas inaccessible to ground crews. Officials have also warned that flames could continue smoldering underground in the region’s peat soil for weeks or even months before flaring up again.

Firefighting efforts elsewhere have also been complicated by EU sanctions on Russia. Spain has been left unable to use its former fleet of Russian-made Kamov Ka-32 helicopters, which are considered especially effective in difficult wildfire conditions due to their high water-carrying capacity and maneuverability.

EU restrictions have blocked access to spare parts and Russian maintenance specialists to service the helicopters, forcing the Spanish authorities to rely on less effective replacement aircraft.

Latvia wants Brussels to provide billions in additional funding as lost trade with Russia and soaring military spending put growing pressure on the Baltic state’s finances, Prime Minister Andris Kulbergs has told Politico.

The Baltic state has asked Brussels to provide €7 billion ($8.2 billion) under the EU’s next seven-year budget, on top of other funding.

The sum would cover almost half of Riga’s projected €15.1 billion ($17.3 billion) military spending bill for 2028-2034.

Kulbergs said that Latvia is taking on debt to finance what its government views as security spending benefiting the rest of Europe. “We are getting our budget deficit to the maximum,” he told Politico, saying Latvia is borrowing to pay for “the defense of the whole of Europe.” 

Latvia has been one of the EU’s strongest advocates of sanctions on Russia and has steadily dismantled trade, transport and energy links with its eastern neighbor since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022.

The policies, however, have led to a significant economic decline across the region. Politico reported last year that cross-border trade with Russia had “largely collapsed” across the Baltic states, while tourism and investment had also declined, prompting Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia to seek additional financial aid from Brussels.

“We are losing money … we are talking about how to support Ukraine, but we are a victim,” he told Politico, adding that economic ties with Russia should eventually be restored.

Despite seeking billions from Brussels to offset the fallout, Kulbergs has called for even tougher measures against Moscow, including a total EU visa ban for Russian citizens and renewed attempts to use frozen Russian sovereign assets for Ukraine.

Russia has long argued that the Baltic states have devastated their own economies by dismantling previously profitable ties while sharply increasing military spending over what their governments describe as a potential threat from Russia.

Moscow has repeatedly denied having plans to attack the Baltic states or other NATO members, dismissing such claims as “nonsense” and Russophobic fearmongering intended to justify inflated military budgets to taxpayers, while warning that European nations are preparing for a full-scale war against Russia.

A US Navy destroyer spent four days without power in the South China Sea last month, depriving its crew of hot meals, flushing toilets, and air conditioning, CNN has reported. The report comes as US sailors in the Persian Gulf are facing similar conditions.

The USS Benfold, an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, suffered an “engineering casualty involving its generators” while on an exercise in the South China Sea last month, a Navy spokesman told CNN on Monday.

The Benfold lost the ability to maneuver on its own, and lost galley services, toilets, air conditioning, and drinking water, the spokesman said. At the time of the incident, temperatures in the South China Sea averaged between 32 and 37 degrees Celsius.

Another US warship, the guided missile cruiser USS Robert Smalls, provided hot meals to sailors aboard the Benfold, before it was towed to the Philippines for repairs. The Benfold has since returned to duty.

The USS George Washington has since been ordered to redeploy to the Persian Gulf to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose crew have been at sea for almost nine months. Conditions on board the Abraham Lincoln have deteriorated, with toilets reportedly out of order, food running short, and multiple sailors attempting suicide. 

A photo circulating on social media last week suggested that frustrated sailors were writing anti-Israel messages on the wings of the Lincoln’s aircraft, including “be a good goy and do what Israel tells you to,” and “Bibi’s cucks.”

US servicemen’s morale is completely depleted in war against Iran, writing anti-Israel messages on a dust flap:

"Be a good goy and do what Israel tells you to"

"Operation Epstein Fury"

"Peace deal #64 incoming... ALL THIS FOR THE HOLY LAND"

"LOVE ISRAEL I AM A GOOD GOYIM"… pic.twitter.com/xBmHE6MyCQ

— AF Post (@AFpost) August 16, 2026

The Pentagon already rotated one aircraft carrier – the USS Gerald R. Ford – out of the Persian Gulf after it suffered repeated malfunctions, including a fire in its laundry room and the overflow of raw excrement from its toilets. The Ford, which is the only vessel in its class and the most advanced aircraft carrier in the US Navy’s fleet, is now undergoing repairs at Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia, and is expected to be out of commission for around a year.

US President Donald Trump has threatened to “bomb the sh*t out of” Oman if it strikes a separate deal with Iran on control of the Strait of Hormuz, despite Oman’s key role as a mediator between Washington and Tehran.

In addition to brokering talks between the US and Iran, Omani negotiators have been conducting parallel negotiations with Tehran aimed at establishing a safe route for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. Iran reportedly wants to charge fees for safe passage of the strait after an interim period, and Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told reporters on Monday that Iran had reached an “understanding” with Oman on the matter.

Asked about these Omani-Iranian talks, Trump told Fox News that “if Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the sh*t out of them.” 

The US rejects any agreement that would involve Iran collecting tolls, and Washington has signaled that it will not lift its blockade on Iranian ports unless Tehran relinquishes this demand. Speaking in New York on Friday, Trump claimed that the Islamic Republic was “very badly defeated,” and that he would soon “be declaring the Strait of Hormuz a territory of the US.”

A senior Iranian official told Reuters that Iran is prepared “to escalate tensions in the Strait of Hormuz and wider region” if diplomacy fails, and to launch “timely and precise strikes” to break the US naval blockade if necessary. Trump did not reply directly to this threat in his comments to Fox News, but demanded that Iran “raise the white flag of surrender.”

In a post on X on Saturday, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi urged Trump to “accept the reality” that the US had suffered “strategic and heavy defeats.”

“The Strait of Hormuz has been Iranian, is Iranian, and will remain Iranian,” Gharibabadi wrote, adding that the waterway “will only be closed and opened under Iran’s command.”

US-Israeli strikes on Iran in late February prompted Tehran to close the Strait of Hormuz, with Washington responding by imposing a naval blockade of Iranian ports. The blockade disrupted traffic through one of the world’s most important energy corridors, sending global oil prices soaring to as high as $120 a barrel.

Israel should carry out 30 to 40 “targeted assassinations” in Gaza every night, National Security Minister and prominent war hawk Itamar Ben-Gvir has said, claiming that some in the Palestinian enclave “are not people.”

While a claimed ceasefire is supposed to have been in effect over Gaza, Israel has continued air strikes while negotiations stalled over the issue of disarmament by Hamas and the withdrawal of the IDF from the territory.

In a podcast interview Saturday, Ben-Gvir reiterated his opposition to the reduced level of Israeli military operations under the armistice.

“We need to carry out targeted assassinations in Gaza, taking down 30-40 every night. Not just those who endanger you at that moment,” he said.

There are people there who are not human beings. They don’t need to live, they are not people.

“In my imagination, I see all of Gaza as ours, very consolidated settlements, throughout Gaza,” he said.

Since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel that triggered the Gaza war, Ben-Gvir has consistently advocated policies well to the right of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including harsher conditions for Palestinian prisoners and the death penalty for Palestinians convicted of terrorism.

West Jerusalem’s hardline policies and conduct in Gaza have generated widespread international condemnation, while Netanyahu’s push for military action against Iran has further strained perceptions of the Jewish State in the US, its most important ally.

A Pew Research Center survey published in June found that 60% of Americans had an unfavorable view of Israel, compared with 42% in 2022. Across 36 countries surveyed by the pollster, majorities in most expressed unfavorable views of Israel, including 68% in France, 69% in the UK and 73% in Germany.

Afghanistan has marked five years since the Taliban swept back to power amid a chaotic US withdrawal. Celebrations have been held across the country, with officials describing Afghanistan as safer and “free.”

The US invaded Afghanistan in late 2001 following the September 11 attacks, for which Washington identified Al-Qaeda as being responsible. The group’s leaders, including Osama bin Laden, were based in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan at the time.

US forces withdrew as the country’s Western-backed government rapidly collapsed and the Taliban recaptured Kabul in August 2021. Once central to US foreign policy – with American taxpayers footing an estimated $2.3 trillion bill for the 20-year occupation – Afghanistan has since largely faded from Western attention.

However, Afghanistan remains under sweeping sanctions, while the Taliban government is still largely unrecognized abroad.

RT India’s Runjhun Sharma traveled to Afghanistan to see how much the country has changed – and whether it is now as safe as its authorities claim, noting “there’s a lot of nuance, a lot of layers to the Taliban story.”

Gulf states are covertly shipping oil through the Strait of Hormuz on tankers with their transponders switched off despite severe disruptions to normal traffic and intermittent attacks, Bloomberg reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the shipments.

The de facto closure to normal traffic through the strait due to the US-Iran conflict has affected a strategic waterway that has historically been the route for around a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil trade. The conflict initially sent global oil prices soaring to nearly $120 a barrel. Some energy experts have warned that oil prices could reach $150 over the coming months.

The volumes shipped through the heavily disrupted passage exceed market estimates of 4 million barrels per day, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg on condition of anonymity, without specifying by how much. The UAE, Iraq, Qatar, and Kuwait have reportedly been moving barrels through Hormuz using “dark” tanker transits, with crude later transferred to other vessels in the Gulf of Oman.

The risks remain significant, with ADNOC telling Bloomberg that 23 of its vessels have come under attack since the US-Iran conflict began, leaving one crew member dead and 20 others injured. Last week, ADNOC reported that two of its vessels came under attack in Hormuz, with all crew members reported safe. UAE authorities blamed Iran for the attacks, calling on Tehran to reopen the strait.

Saudi Arabia also appears to be preparing to use the route, with 16 supertankers positioned off Oman’s coast and three more expected in the coming days, the news agency noted, adding that the vessels can carry up to 38 million barrels of oil.

Insurers say they are seeing a steady stream of requests for coverage from Gulf producers despite the dangers. “It’s a dark trade,” Pankaj Khanna, CEO of Heidmar Maritime Holdings, told Bloomberg, describing it as the only option even as many shipowners remain unwilling to take the risk.

A historic Palestinian village widely described as the last entirely Christian community in the occupied West Bank is facing near-daily Israeli settler attacks and growing restrictions, residents and activists have told RT.

RT’s Charlotte Dubenskij visited the Kaa’bneh family, part of a Palestinian Bedouin community living in Taybeh, east of Ramallah, where she witnessed settlers approaching with sheep and goats at sunset, hurling rocks, and trying to breach the fences. The family says such incursions can happen several times a day.

“They come and vandalize our property, cut through the fencing and bring their sheep onto our land,” Naif Kaa’bneh said. “They break the water tanks and cut off the electricity. If someone is filming, they beat them.”

Kaa’bneh said the harassment has continued for years but intensified recently, blaming Israeli military inaction for allowing settlers to act with near-total impunity. He said troops can take hours to respond to attacks and have never detained those responsible.

“They have never once come and arrested a settler. We tell them, ‘There’s the settler.’ The soldier just turns his head, pretends he hasn’t seen anything, and they leave,” he said.

Meanwhile, locals say new settler outposts are appearing on the hills around Taybeh, fueling fears that residents are being steadily hemmed in and pushed from land they have inhabited for generations.

Watch Charlotte Dubenskij’s full report below.

Hundreds of Moroccan migrants have protested in Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta, demanding asylum as thousands remain stranded in the area following mass border crossings last month.

The crisis erupted on July 30-31, when an estimated 72,000 migrants entered Ceuta from neighboring Morocco – equivalent to roughly 70% of the enclave’s population of around 84,000. While most returned shortly afterward, an estimated 7,000 to 9,000 remain, straining reception centers, hospitals, and law enforcement.

The influx has triggered a bitter dispute over the migrants’ fate. Ceuta Mayor-President Juan Jesus Vivas has called for asylum claims linked to the surge to be rejected and migrants returned to Morocco.

Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska backed the hardline approach last week, saying irregular arrivals would not be allowed to remain in Ceuta, reach mainland Spain, or obtain legal status, except in rare cases of extreme vulnerability. Judicial associations have pushed back, insisting claims must be assessed individually and that illegal entry does not forfeit the right to seek asylum.

Amid the row, several hundred migrants staged a sit-in on a popular Ceuta beach on Sunday, urging the Spanish authorities not to return them to Morocco. Footage shows protesters waving Spanish flags and banners while chanting: “We need asylum!”

“We Moroccans are protesting without food or water, we will continue sitting here,” one protester told the Ruptly video agency. Separate footage shows security forces detaining several migrants on the beach, though it is unclear if they were part of the protest.

Another wave of nearly 300 migrants attempted to enter Ceuta on Saturday but was stopped by Moroccan police, according to state broadcaster Medi 1 TV. Another 61 Moroccans accused of facilitating the attempt were arrested, the broadcaster said.

Brussels sticks to sidelines as migrant row deepens

Multiple EU members have pinned the blame for the Ceuta crisis squarely on Madrid and its permissive approach toward migration. Leaders of 22 EU nations accused Spain of undermining the bloc’s security in an August letter, with several calling for its exclusion from the Schengen borderless travel zone. Italy introduced temporary checks on travelers arriving from Spain on August 1, while France tightened border security.

Brussels, meanwhile, has largely sought to sit out the increasingly bitter dispute. The European Commission has refrained from penalizing Spain over the Ceuta crisis and praised Madrid for preventing irregular migrants from reaching mainland Europe, while dismissing calls for Schengen restrictions. However, it has also stopped short of offering Madrid substantial backing, so far limiting its response to sending a team of migration experts to Ceuta to assess what additional financial and operational support may be needed to secure the EU’s external border.

Commenting on the crisis, Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev also blamed EU migration policies, suggesting that “migrants are coming en masse to personally thank Ursula [von der Leyen] and other migration-friendly EU bureaucrats for their great migration incentives.” In a separate post, he warned that the “failure to admit migration mistakes is undermining what is left of Europe.”

Legacy media tries to hide this and calls the stories about Ceuta “Russian propaganda.” Failure to admit migration mistakes is undermining what is left of Europe. https://t.co/4rjJlfNa1S

— Kirill Dmitriev (@kadmitriev) August 17, 2026

Hamas has reaffirmed its commitment to disarm and demilitarize Gaza during direct talks with US President Donald Trump’s adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner, Axios reported on Sunday, citing a source familiar with the matter.

The meeting was aimed at locking in a pledge Hamas first made in late July, when Trump announced that his Board of Peace – an international body he chairs to oversee the implementation of his Gaza peace plan – had reached a “historic agreement” with the Palestinian group on disarmament and the transfer of civilian and security control to a technocratic administration.

In exchange, the Board of Peace would press Israel to make corresponding moves, including initial troop withdrawals, while accelerating humanitarian relief and reconstruction.

During a rare 90-minute in-person meeting in Egypt on Sunday, Kushner reportedly told Hamas political chief Khalil al-Hayya that the group must take “tangible steps on disarmament if they want Israel to take steps of its own.”

Al-Hayya reportedly asked Kushner to tell Trump that Hamas remains committed to relinquishing its weapons, the source claimed.

“We thanked them for the commitment, but we want to see real efforts [from Hamas] and not just words,” the source stated. “It was important for Kushner to lock them into this commitment in person.”

Kushner is expected to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday to discuss reciprocal measures. Last week, Netanyahu rejected the roadmap, insisting that Israeli forces would not withdraw until Hamas was “genuinely disarmed.”

Meanwhile, on Sunday, the foreign ministers of Türkiye, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE issued a joint statement condemning Israel’s rejection of the peace framework and Palestinian statehood.

The eight countries said West Jerusalem bears “direct and full responsibility” for obstructing peace efforts. They urged active US involvement in implementing the plan, which has been endorsed by UN Security Council Resolution 2803.

Tehran will pay out cash rewards to any Iranian citizen who kills or captures a US serviceman, Army Chief Amir Hatami has announced, warning Washington against putting troops on Iranian soil.

Speaking at an event on Sunday in remarks carried by state broadcaster IRIB, Hatami said the initiative had been drawn up after “numerous requests” from Iranians seeking to take part in the nation’s defense.

“Any individual who kills or captures and surrenders an American aggressor will receive a reward of $30,000 or 5 billion Iranian tomans from the Iranian Army,” Hatami said. “Iranian women who successfully carry out this action will receive double the reward.”

Hatami also said weapons used to kill American troops would be purchased by the state for twice their value and displayed in a planned museum, with their owners receiving replacements.

The US has yet to launch a ground operation in Iran. However, Western media have reported that Washington is considering missions that could put large numbers of troops on Iranian territory.

The Pentagon has reportedly examined a major raid to seize Tehran’s stockpile of enriched uranium from heavily fortified nuclear facilities. According to the New York Post, the operation could involve thousands of troops, with elite units retrieving the material while larger forces secure the sites.

Hatami also called on American forces to leave the Middle East, saying they are “no longer permitted to enter the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman, and the Strait of Hormuz.” He added that Tehran would not allow US bases in the region to return to their “previous state.”

The US and Israel launched their military campaign against Iran in late February, accusing Tehran of seeking nuclear weapons. Iran retaliated with strikes on American and Israeli targets across the region.

A temporary ceasefire later collapsed, while indirect negotiations have failed to produce a lasting settlement. Washington has continued military and economic pressure on Tehran, while Iran maintains that its nuclear program is peaceful.

Officials in Washington are allegedly discussing the possible use of nuclear weapons against Iran as the months-long conflict continues to escalate, former US Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has claimed.

Greene, once a prominent MAGA ally, made the allegation in a post on X on Sunday. She said the issue had been raised during strategy meetings, but did not identify those involved or provide evidence.

“They are discussing using nuclear weapons on Iran in strategy meetings,” she wrote. “I’m not speculating, I know. And it’s pure evil.”

Greene claimed Washington is considering lowering the threshold for nuclear use despite US President Donald Trump repeatedly declaring victory in the conflict. She warned that such a move could trigger a “nuclear holocaust” and drag the world into a much wider war.

The White House has not publicly confirmed that any such discussions are taking place.

Greene has increasingly criticized Trump over the US-Israeli war on Iran, putting her at odds with a political movement she was once closely associated with.

The US and Israel launched their unprovoked military campaign against Iran in late February, accusing Tehran of being on the verge of creating a nuclear bomb. That was despite US intelligence and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) stating there was no evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program.

Iran retaliated with strikes on American and Israeli targets across the region and later restricted traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.

Washington and Israel have continued to demand “zero enrichment” and the removal of Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile.

Tehran has rejected the demands, insisting its nuclear program is peaceful and enrichment is a sovereign right. At the same time, it has warned that it could reach weapons-grade levels if attacked again, while noting it has made no decision to build a bomb.

US President Donald Trump has ordered the Pentagon to substantially scale back joint military exercises with South Korea, citing his “very good relationship” with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

In a Truth Social post on Sunday, Trump said he was “not happy” that Washington had agreed to take part in the annual exercises, which are due to begin on Monday.

“These exercises are not only costly, with much of these costs paid for by the United States of America (as usual!), but send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile,” he wrote, describing North Korea as “unthreatening and respectful” during his presidency.

Trump said it was too late to cancel the drills outright and had therefore instructed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to “substantially reduce” them.

The 11-day Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises were scheduled to run through August 27, with around 18,000 South Korean and roughly 5,000 US troops expected to take part.

Trump also took a swipe at Seoul over its refusal to join Washington’s campaign against Iran.

“I recently asked the President of South Korea if they would like to join us in the Denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said, ‘No thanks!’” he wrote.

During his first presidency, Trump sought to improve ties with North Korea after years of strained relations, meeting Kim three times and scaling back some joint exercises with Seoul. In 2019, he became the first sitting US president to enter North Korea during a meeting with Kim at the Demilitarized Zone. 

Pyongyang has long described such drills as rehearsals for an invasion and has responded by expanding its own nuclear arsenal, describing it as necessary to deter a US attack.

On Friday, ahead of the latest Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises, Pyongyang denounced the drills as a “new level of threat” and vowed to respond with a “new level of deterrent.” 

Russia has also backed Pyongyang’s security concerns. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said last month that Moscow no longer supports calls for denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, arguing that expanded US-led military activity has left North Korea to see no alternative to nuclear weapons for safeguarding its sovereignty. 

At least 15 cases of rape have been recorded in the Spanish North African enclave of Ceuta since it was swarmed by the massive influx of migrants in late July, El Mundo reported on Sunday, citing Spain’s national gendarmerie.

The crisis erupted on July 30-31 when an estimated 72,000 migrants entered Ceuta. While many have already reportedly returned, the invasion has put heavy pressure on infrastructure in Ceuta, a small city whose population was around 84,000 as of last year, according to government data.

Multiple media reports and videos have since shown thousands of migrants remaining on the streets and in makeshift camps on Trampolin Beach and elsewhere in the city.

This came after at least four migrant girls under 14 have reportedly been treated for alleged sexual assaults.

The influx has come as immigration has become an increasingly divisive political issue in Spain and elsewhere in Europe, spurred on by high-profile sexual abuse and assault cases involving migrants.

The Ceuta crisis has also fueled tensions within the EU and triggered criticism of Spain’s lax immigration policies from politicians across Europe. The leaders of 22 EU nations signed a letter accusing Madrid of undermining the bloc’s security in early August, while several countries called for Spain to be excluded from the Schengen borderless travel zone.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has rejected criticism, calling the joint EU letter ”selfish, polarizing and unlawful” and insisting that the current crisis was not a consequence of Madrid’s overall migration policies.

Russia has historically protected itself across several fronts by maintaining buffer states along the borders it shared with threatening powers. These states didn’t necessarily have to like Russia, much less become its allies, but their usefulness lay in causing even greater problems for Russia’s potential adversaries.

For a long time, the Crimean Khanate played such a role by consuming Polish resources that might otherwise have been directed against Russia and Poland, in turn, helped shield Russia from the full weight of German pressure, while in the east, the Dzungar Khanate performed a similar function during the 17th and 18th centuries. Its horsemen sometimes burned Russian settlements in Siberia, but they were a much greater scourge for China.

This remains a useful principle of Russian strategy because when Moscow lacks the resources to act decisively in a particular region, it can benefit from independent powers pursuing their own interests there, provided they cause Russia’s adversaries more trouble than they cause Russia itself. The US and Israeli attack on Iran in February 2026 opened a second, southern front in the West’s struggle to preserve its global dominance after the first front opened in Ukraine more than 12 years ago and a third is now taking shape in East Asia, where China will be the principal target.

Hostilities between the US and its allies on one side, and Iran and its direct or indirect supporters on the other, have now entered a protracted phase and Russia must watch these developments closely because its ability to intervene directly in the Middle East remains constrained by the concentration of its forces on the Ukrainian front.

Earlier this month, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Türkiye signed a trilateral collective-defense agreement in Mecca. The document contains something resembling mutual obligations in the event that one of the signatories comes under military attack and some observers immediately described the new grouping as a “Sunni NATO” or “Muslim NATO.”

The agreement will not overturn the geopolitical order of the Middle East and none of the three states has surrendered its independence or committed itself to an integrated military structure, yet the initiative shouldn’t be dismissed. Its members could create as much difficulty for Russia’s Western adversaries as they might for Iran, Russia’s friend.

The appearance of such an agreement also weakens the political order that Washington established in the region after 1991 as major regional powers are beginning to discuss their security among themselves rather than waiting for the US to organize it for them.

It is often claimed that Washington benefits from instability in a region that supplies energy to Europe and China and there’s some truth in this, but the US is deliberately dismantling parts of the globalized system it created during the second half of the 20th century because China now draws at least as much benefit from that system as America does.

None of these countries possesses either the strength or the determination to end US hegemony in the Middle East. So the importance of the Mecca agreement lies elsewhere. Governments in a region long treated as strategically subordinate to Washington are discussing how to provide for their own security and that’s a warning for the US and good news for countries seeking a more just international order.

There is little reason, however, to expect the Mecca grouping to become a functioning military alliance, given the interests shared by its members are primarily political. They can use one another’s influence and regional authority to improve their respective positions, but they have few grounds for fighting a war together. The existing Saudi-Pakistani defense relationship didn’t produce any substantial response from Islamabad when Iranian forces attacked targets in the kingdom and Türkiye, meanwhile, speaks constantly about Palestinian rights but has avoided measures that would inflict serious damage on Israeli interests.

A durable military alliance requires more than declarations of solidarity and history suggests that it also needs a dominant power capable of directing joint defense planning and establishing a common adversary.

The circumstances surrounding NATO’s creation were exceptional. Western European governments had emerged from the Second World War exhausted and financially ruined and they needed an enduring American presence. Washington, for its part, required a secure territorial base from which to contain the Soviet Union. Even the US failed to reproduce this arrangement elsewhere and its attempts to create NATO-style organisations in Southeast Asia through SEATO and in the Middle East through CENTO didn’t survive. Neither region offered the political discipline, accepted hierarchy or common definition of the enemy that made NATO possible.

A successful military alliance also requires a common understanding of domestic political order and NATO has one with controlled oligarchic democracy at home and Russia abroad, with the Soviet Union occupying the role of external enemy during the Cold War.

For Russia, this is reassuring. Each member of the new grouping could create difficulties for Moscow independently, whether in the South Caucasus, Central Asia or the wider Muslim world, but there’s little chance that they will coordinate a sustained attack on Russian interests.

Nor are they likely to form a united front against Iran because their disagreements, ambitions and competing partnerships will prevent that, so the Mecca agreement will therefore contribute more to Russia’s objectives than it will threaten them. It complicates American strategy, encourages regional independence and places further limits on Washington’s ability to impose a single political order across the Middle East.

Russia doesn’t need the members of this new grouping to become friends or allies, it just needs them to occupy the attention and resources of its adversaries while Moscow remains concentrated on Ukraine.

On Russia’s southern flank, that is the only calculation that matters.

This article was first published by Vzglyad.ru, translated and edited by the RT team.

Lebanese families are struggling to make ends meet as the country’s long-running financial crisis deepens amid Israeli attacks that have devastated homes and farmland, RT correspondent Steve Sweeney reports from Beirut.

Gasoline prices soared by around 25% in February, while food and rent costs spiked by around 20% last year, adding pressure in a country where more than a third of the population lives below the poverty line, according to World Bank estimates.

Many Lebanese are also grappling with unpaid wages, Sweeney reports.

“If the economic situation continues as it is, I’m telling you, there will be a social explosion. People will turn against one another because when hunger strikes, boundaries disappear,” a local taxi driver told RT. Lebanon is “living on borrowed time,” dependent on international decisions and aid for basic necessities, added.

IDF have reportedly deliberately ignited wildfires in woodland, farmland, and olive groves in southern Lebanon since the June 17 ceasefire with Hezbollah.

Watch the full RT report below:

Except for the unfortunate victims of Western information blackouts and propaganda, it has long been obvious that Ukraine under its leader-beyond-elections Vladimir Zelensky is not a democracy, even by the real world’s low standards. Zelensky’s regime is extremely corrupt, authoritarian, and lethally vicious.

Critics, for instance, are imprisoned and killed by a combination of torture and neglect, such as the late Gonzalo Lira, or locked away for 15 years for, in effect, the thought crime of calling for unity among Russian and Ukrainian workers, such as the socialist Bogdan Sirotyuk. Other targets of the regime are subject to assassination attempts, including abroad. Precisely because the Zelensky regime is so lawless, scary, and vicious, Ukrainians usually do not speak openly about just how terrible it is.

That’s why a recent YouTube interview with pop star Olya Polyakova has caused national uproar. Famous, outspoken, and uninhibited, Polyakova deplored Ukraine’s oppressive and stifling atmosphere. “Are we in a concentration camp, in a camp for political prisoners?” she asked and predicted that “soon, we will all be terrified, frightened mice that sit in their holes and do not even dare stick out their nose.”

Polyakova also fearlessly pushed the Zelensky regime’s single most painful button: “They’ll grab someone from your family, or anyone, in the street and you’ll just walk past” pretending not to see anything out of fear, just to be left alone. That was not a general point but a very concrete one: The conversation quickly turned to Ukraine’s institutionalized manhunts to feed the meat-grinder war.

Polyakova had watched “scores of videos” of these violent kidnapping operations, she insisted, breaking another taboo: In Ukraine, it is verboten to acknowledge what these very real videos, filmed and shared by Ukrainian witnesses, demonstrate: that, in reality, citizens are helpless, even hunted subjects in a great sordid bargain with the West, trading Kiev’s cannon fodder for Western money, privileges, and sheer ego flattery for a small, rapacious, and ruthless establishment.

The Zelensky regime dishonestly dismisses the videos of press-ganging those sacrificial Ukrainians as unrepresentative or “Russian propaganda,” applying its dull default dodge. But for Polyakova, the videos are not only representative and true – as they are – but evidence of a larger problem: In a country where anyone “can now be snatched in the street,” the fundamental sense of right and wrong, of good and bad, is gone, and principal notions of humane conduct have fallen apart. 

Even according to a Ukrainian official, the rights of Ukrainians are infringed in 90% of all military mobilization procedures. In reality, the videos showing teams of people snatchers beat and kick and drag away their victims are merely the tip of the iceberg. Physical violence at the point of entry, as it were, is only part of a brutal and criminal mix that continues with long forced disappearances, isolation, deprivation of legal counsel, threats, torture, extorted signatures, and, last but not least, the brutalization of those trying to help the victims, including lawyers brave enough to approach the military recruitment centers.

It is these aspects of Polyakova’s surfeit of honesty that explains the massive backlash the most. Ukraine’s de facto propagandists and regime talking heads have come out in force to discredit her and signal to ordinary Ukrainians that hers is a way of thinking and, worse, talking they better not be caught applauding or even emulating. The main line of attack is – drum roll, trumpet blasts, and big surprise confetti – Russia, Russia, Russia. That is, the smear that Polyakova is playing into the hands of Moscow’s propaganda.

Neither the Western proxy war, sacrificing Ukraine – and masses of ordinary Ukrainians – for a perverse and futile Western dream of defeating and demoting Russia, nor the Zelensky regime that would long be gone without that war, can survive the truth. It may be ironic that it takes a pop star combining conventional beats with revealing outfits to state that truth loudly, but then the regime she is up against is led by a low-taste comedian gone very, very dark. Polyakova may stand her ground or she may be forced to recant. The genie is out of the bottle either way: The showman Zelensky can be upstaged.

The US is looking to Russia’s air defense technology as it develops a new generation of mobile radars following losses suffered during the war with Iran, Military Watch has reported. New THAAD radars are reportedly set to gain a mobile sensor platform function similar to those built into Russia’s S-300 and S-400 systems from the outset.

According to a report published earlier this week, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) destroyed more than $3 billion worth of American air defense radars during the first week of the war on the Islamic Republic launched by Israel and the US in late February.

The losses reportedly included lower-value radars such as the AN/TPS-59, valued at around $70 million, as well as an AN/FPS-132 radar and two AN/TPY-2 X-band mobile radar systems from the THAAD anti-ballistic missile system, each valued at more than $1 billion. The destruction of the radars dealt a major blow to the situational awareness of US forces and their allies, the military-focused magazine noted.

The reported approach would potentially move away from the traditional Western concept of a self-contained air defense battery, according to the report. Instead, radars would serve as nodes in broader networks, allowing a mobile sensor to detect a target and relay data to remote launchers while remaining physically separate from the interceptors, the magazine noted.

According to Military Watch, the destruction of the radars reportedly forced the US and Israel to rely more heavily on ship-based sensors and an AN/TPY-2 radar stationed in Turkey. 

Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported that Iranian strikes had caused up to $13 billion in damage to US military assets and facilities in the Middle East. Since the start of the US-Israeli war on the Islamic Republic, Tehran has carried out more than 2,000 air, missile, and drone strikes, damaging at least 20 sites in eight countries used by the US military. Iran has also damaged or destroyed more than 42 US military aircraft, several while parked at air bases.

Israel has spent tens of millions of dollars to boost its image in the US by seeking to influence how AI platforms portray the country, Politico has reported.

US public attitudes toward Israel have deteriorated in recent years, first over its response to the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks and more recently over the US-Israeli war on Iran and its cost to taxpayers. Six in ten US adults now view Israel somewhat or very unfavorably, according to a June Pew Research Center poll, up from 53% last year and 42% in 2022. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is even less popular, with 65% expressing little or no confidence in his policies.

In a report on Friday, Politico detailed a $100,000 Israeli campaign aimed at influencing how large-language models such as ChatGPT answer questions about Gaza and the Israel-Hamas war. The effort centers on the Hanover Institute for Public Policy, a website publishing anonymous reports on anti-Semitism and geopolitical issues. The project was set up through French PR firm Havas Media, which handles much of Israel’s US influence work registered under the US Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), and its subcontractor, ad agency Piro Inc, on behalf of the Israel Government Advertising Agency (LaPam).

The website hosts multiple unattributed reports framed as questions, including “Is Torture of Palestinian Prisoners a War Crime?” and “Who Is the Aggressor in the Israel-Palestine Conflict?”, which Politico said suggests the material was designed to be picked up and cited by LLMs. The outlet also said technical markers linked the website to Res, a Seattle-based AI startup that helps clients get recommended by AI models. The link was confirmed by Res CEO Hai Tran in an email.

While Piro’s FARA filings do not explicitly identify influencing LLMs as a goal, Politico said both ChatGPT and Perplexity cited Hanover Institute material in response to neutral queries about Gaza and Israel.

US frustration with Israel has extended beyond the general public, with politicians also becoming increasingly critical. Last month, more than 100 House Democrats backed an amendment that would have cut $3.3 billion in US aid to Israel. The measure failed due to Republican opposition but highlighted a growing partisan divide: just over two years ago, only 37 House Democrats backed a similar effort.

Germany’s governing CDU/CSU bloc has fallen to its lowest level of support in almost five years, trailing the opposition AfD by eight points, according to an INSA poll published by Bild.

Approval ratings for Merz’s coalition, comprising the Christian Democratic CDU/CSU bloc and the Social Democratic Party, have declined steadily since it took office in May 2025. The government has faced criticism over continued economic stagnation and its failure to deliver on pre-election promises.

The survey, conducted by INSA for Bild am Sonntag and published online by Bild on Saturday, surveyed 1,203 people across Germany between August 10 and 14, with a reported margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.

Support for the CDU/CSU dropped one point from the previous week to 20%, its weakest INSA result since October 2021. The AfD remained unchanged at 28%, making it the most popular party in the poll.

Together, the two governing parties received 32%, only four points more than the AfD alone. Several major reforms remain unresolved following coalition disputes over taxes, welfare, and spending priorities.

The findings also showed that 16% of respondents were satisfied with Merz’s performance, while 78% expressed dissatisfaction. Four in five disapproved of the federal government’s work.

Around 10,000 people demonstrated against the government in Plauen last week, according to Saxony police, demanding snap elections, lower energy costs, and changes to healthcare, migration, and military policy.

While unchanged from the previous week, the AfD’s 28% rating represents a substantial increase from the 20.8% it secured in the February 2025 federal election. The party has continued to rise in national surveys despite efforts by Germany’s mainstream parties to exclude it from governing coalitions.

Its growing support comes ahead of regional elections in eastern Germany, where it is polling at around 41% in Saxony-Anhalt and 36% in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Researchers cited by Reuters have linked the party’s strength there to lower incomes, population decline, labor shortages, and perceptions of political neglect.

Local police are investigating a shooting at Charles Young Park that killed one person and injured four others in Lexington, Kentucky, on Saturday evening.

A four-year-old, a 14-year-old, and two adults were taken to hospital with injuries that were not considered life-threatening, local police chief Lawrence Weathers said. The person who was killed was not immediately identified.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear announced the shooting while speaking at a Democratic Party dinner at a downtown hotel. The Lexington Police Department blocked off several roads around the park, while State Police officers were also at the scene, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.

Authorities have not released information about a suspect or possible motive. Weathers said he did not believe there was an ongoing threat to the public.

Unverified videos posted online appeared to capture the moment the shooting began, with music and conversation stopping abruptly as gunshots rang out and people ran for cover.

WATCH: Moment shooting erupts at Charles Young Park in Lexington, Kentucky; 1 killed, 5 injured pic.twitter.com/myTSSvV8Gg

— Rapid Report (@RapidReport2025) August 16, 2026

At least one person was killed and five others injured (14 and 4 year old) in a mass shooting in Lexington, Kentucky at Charles Young Park. pic.twitter.com/QsPeHqdJtf

— Mr.TeaBagzzzz (@mrteabagzzzz) August 16, 2026

The shooting took place during East End Day, a local community event held at the park. Tents remained at the scene as police investigated.

🇺🇸 Une fusillade s’est produite dans le parc Charles Young à Lexington, dans le Kentucky, faisant un mort et quatre blessés, a rapporté la chaîne de télévision WKYT, citant la police de Lexington.
Selon la police, parmi les blessés figurent un enfant de quatre ans, un adolescent… pic.twitter.com/9HFzXjEAzD

— Pascal Laurent (@Pascal_Laurent_) August 16, 2026

“Gunfire at a peaceful event, in broad daylight, with women and children present is unacceptable,” Carama said.

Luigi Mangione has admitted to fatally shooting UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and pleaded guilty to two federal stalking charges.

The 28-year-old entered the plea before US District Judge Margaret Garnett in Manhattan on Friday, according to the Department of Justice. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole, with sentencing scheduled for December 18.

Federal prosecutors said that Mangione traveled across state lines and tracked Thompson’s movements before the killing. He pleaded guilty to interstate stalking resulting in death and cyberstalking through interstate facilities resulting in death.

“I shot Mr. Thompson in Manhattan and he died,” Mangione told the court. He did not enter into a plea agreement with prosecutors, which can allow defendants to receive reduced charges or a lighter sentence in exchange for pleading guilty.

Mangione still faces eight felony counts in New York, including second-degree murder, six weapons charges, and possession of a forged instrument, with his trial due to begin on Sept. 8. Following his federal plea, his lawyers moved to dismiss the murder and firearms charges, arguing that New York’s double-jeopardy protections bar him from being prosecuted twice for the same crime.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has said it will oppose the motion, which must be resolved before the case can proceed.

The discharged shell casings and bullets found at the scene had the words “deny,” “depose,” and “delay” written on them, apparently in reference to the practice of denying health insurance payouts to clients.

A manifesto attributed to Mangione and published by the media referred to decades of “corruption and greed” in the US healthcare system, describing industry executives as “parasites” and accusing them of abusing the country “for immense profit.”

The case renewed public debate over health-insurance industry practices and access to care. Expressions of support for Mangione on social media have also prompted officials to warn against glorifying the killing or portraying him as a hero.

The DOJ announced in April 2025 that it would seek the death penalty. Garnett dismissed the capital murder and silencer-related charges in January, leaving two federal stalking counts. None of the remaining state charges carries the death penalty, following a 2004 ruling by New York’s highest court that struck down the state’s death penalty statute.

South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on Saturday called on Pyongyang to engage in dialogue to formally end the Korean War, which has remained unresolved for more than 70 years.

The two countries have technically continued to be at war since the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty. Lee, who became South Korean president last year after his predecessor Yoon Suk Yeol was impeached over his attempt to declare martial law, has sought to improve relations with North Korea and its ally China, which had deteriorated under Yoon.

Lee made the proposal in a speech at a ceremony marking the 81st Liberation Day, which commemorates Korea’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule in 1945.

“Let us put aside our intentions to threaten each other and begin discussions to end the long-running war as the directly involved parties,” Lee said, adding that they could also discuss “effective ways to halt the advancement of the North’s nuclear capabilities.”

North Korea has yet to respond to Lee’s proposal.

In April, President Lee Jae Myung apologized to North Korea over drone incursions into the country. South Korean prosecutors indicted three people – a National Intelligence Service employee, a military officer, and a graduate student – for sending unmanned aerial vehicles into North Korea between September 2025 and January 2026. Seoul had previously denied official involvement in the incursions, saying that they were carried out by civilians.

In March, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un described South Korea as the “most hostile state,” vowing to “thoroughly reject and disregard it.” Seoul would “pay the price” for its provocations, he stated.

Saudi Arabia has announced the formal launch of a multinational maritime defense coalition aimed at safeguarding shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, as escalating hostilities with Yemen’s Houthis threaten one of the world’s most important trade routes.

Thirteen countries have completed the procedures required to formally join the alliance, while 15 have signed its joint statement, the Saudi Defense Ministry said on Thursday.

Riyadh described the development as the “actual launch” of the coalition and the beginning of its institutional and operational activation. Saudi Arabia will provide its first commander, while Pakistan is expected to appoint the deputy commander. The alliance is expected to coordinate intelligence sharing, joint exercises and maritime operations aimed at protecting commercial navigation in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

Earlier this month, the Houthis announced coordinated ballistic missile and drone strikes against military camps belonging to Yemen’s Saudi-backed, internationally recognized government. The group said it acted after detecting preparations for an offensive against Houthi-held territory.

Government forces acknowledged casualties, while Reuters cited government sources as saying at least 30 soldiers had been killed.

Tensions have been building since July, when a dispute over direct flights between Houthi-controlled Sanaa and Tehran helped unravel the longstanding truce. After Saudi-backed forces struck Sanaa airport on July 13 to prevent an Iranian aircraft from returning a Houthi delegation from Tehran, the group blamed Riyadh, declared the ceasefire over, and subsequently announced a naval blockade of Saudi Arabia.

The confrontation poses a particular threat to Riyadh because the Red Sea has become an increasingly important outlet for Saudi oil amid the US-Iran conflict and severe disruption to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

Saudi Aramco has redirected crude away from Hormuz through its cross-country pipeline to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. Loadings there have averaged more than four million barrels per day since June, more than four times the level recorded during the same period last year, Reuters reported, citing tanker-tracking data.

With oil and petroleum products accounting for more than three-quarters of Saudi exports, a sustained disruption of Red Sea shipping could therefore threaten a crucial alternative export route.

The coalition’s activation also comes amid reports that Riyadh is preparing for a potentially broader confrontation with the Houthis. The Guardian reported earlier this month, citing Yemeni sources, that Saudi-backed forces were being re-positioned for a possible sea and ground offensive.

US-based tech billionaire Elon Musk and President Donald Trump have rekindled their friendship after falling out last year, with Musk preparing a major donation to Republicans for the midterm elections, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people who accompanied the two to China.

Relations between the two men soured in mid-2025 when Musk attacked Trump’s signature tax-and-spending package, calling the draft “utterly insane and destructive.” The rift came despite Musk’s outsized role in the 2024 election cycle. After Trump’s victory, the billionaire was appointed to head the now-defunct Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Musk’s return to Trump’s inner circle became apparent during their flight to Beijing in May, when he joined the president, Cabinet officials, business executives and family members aboard Air Force One. The two appeared friendly, with Musk discussing plans for new US factories, while Trump talked about a space-launch video and asked about one of Musk’s sons, people aboard the plane told the WSJ.

During the flight, Musk also told Trump he planned to spend at least $100 million on a voter-turnout operation to support Republicans in the November midterm elections and help them retain control of Congress, the newspaper reported, citing people familiar with the strategy.

The rapprochement reportedly followed nearly a year of behind-the-scenes efforts, including private calls, pressure from mutual friends, invitations to Mar-a-Lago and a White House dinner. Trump and Musk briefly spoke at the memorial service for slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who had reportedly sought to reconcile the two.

The two men are unlikely to return to the close relationship they once had, according to Trump’s aides. Still, they have resumed speaking roughly once a month, discussing artificial intelligence, China, and world events, people familiar with the conversations said.

Musk played a major role in Trump’s 2024 election victory, publicly backing the president and reportedly spending at least $288 million to support Trump and other Republican candidates.

The renewed alliance comes as Democrats hold an edge over Republicans in the latest national polls ahead of the November midterms, while Trump’s net approval rating has fallen close to a record low amid growing public dissatisfaction with his presidency, including over his handling of the Iran conflict.

Iran has invoked Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky to accuse Washington of basing its foreign policy toward Tehran and the wider Middle East on “lies,” as efforts to end the months-long conflict remain stalled.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei cited a passage from Dostoevsky’s ‘The Brothers Karamazov’ in a post on X on Saturday, saying it “aptly describes” the predicament in which the US system of governance and its regional foreign policy have found themselves.

“The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him,” Baghaei quoted the Russian writer as saying.

On Friday, US President Donald Trump claimed Iran was being “very badly defeated” and described the Islamic Republic as “a very evil country.” He also urged Americans to accept higher gasoline prices while the conflict continues, arguing that paying “a tiny little bit more for your gasoline” was worth preventing Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The price increases have come amid severe disruption to traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, after Iran restricted the strategic waterway in response to US-Israeli strikes in late February and Washington imposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports. The escalation initially sent global oil prices soaring to as high as $120 a barrel.

The dispute over the Strait of Hormuz remains one of the principal obstacles to a settlement, with Tehran and Washington making competing claims over control of the strategic waterway.

Despite the conspicuous difference in size, speed, and strength between the sexes, a debate is now raging in women’s professional basketball in the United States whether to let men compete alongside the ladies.

Nobody would ever confuse Royce White, 35, with a woman. The man with stands 6 feet 8 inches tall, weighs 260 pounds (118 kg), sports a bushy beard, and is bald. He has an ex-wife and two children. In other words, not exactly somebody you would expect to find in the glossy pages of Playboy magazine. But what would never sell at the newsstands may eventually sell at professional women’s basketball games.

Coming out of college, White was selected by the Houston Rockets in the first round of the 2012 draft, although he never played for the team due to a severe fear of flying. But apparently he has recovered from that condition because now he has said he would welcome the chance to play in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA).

White, who was a Republican candidate in Minnesota’s Senate primary, admitted to Fox News that he’s transgender and identifies as a woman “sometimes … for [the] purpose of basketball, professional basketball.”

“I think I’d be unstoppable,” White candidly admitted with no apparent shame. “I’ll do whatever the coach needs me to do. I’ll do whatever the girls need me to do… I think it’s only fair.”

Yes, you heard that right. White thinks it’s “only fair” that he be allowed to play in a professional female league where the average height of the players is just 6 feet 0.8 inches (184.9 cm), whereas the average height for male players is 6 feet 7 inches (200 cm).

In a lengthy ESPN piece on the WNBA superstar, Cunningham said: “I got a lot of negative feedback about me hating trans. And I’m like, ‘I never once said that,’” she says. “I think that I am here to extend love. But I also think with that love is truth, being honest. And I want to protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”

The comment reverberated through the world of sport like a category 8 earthquake. After all, with over 3 million followers on TikTok, Cunningham carries a lot of clout. When she talks, people listen.

Regrettably, however, Cunningham’s comment has turned a regular evening of basketball into a political circus, with half the audience condemning the woman while the other half declaring its support. A popular T-shirt for Sophie supporters is emblazoned with XX-XY, referring to the female and male chromosome pairs and pointing to the inescapable biological differences between men and women. On the other side of the debate, Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve wore a shirt that carried the caption “Trans Kids belong,” when the conversation involves grown men, not children.

The furor was so loud that the White House even remarked on it. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt defended Cunningham during a press briefing.

“The backlash she is receiving from Democrats and left-wing figures across the country is astonishing. They are clearly very out of touch with the American public on this issue, which again, is an 80/20 issue. It’s common sense,” she said.

Some progress has been made. The US Supreme Court has ruled that states can lawfully ban transgender women and girls from competing in female school and college sports teams. In the 6-3 decision, the court upheld restrictive laws from Idaho and West Virginia, concluding that separate teams based on biological sex do not violate the Constitution or Title IX, the law against sex-based discrimination in education.

Meanwhile, transgender women have been barred from competing in the female categories of the Olympic Games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced an eligibility policy restricting the female category to biological females, verified via a one-time gene screening, starting with the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

The US world of professional sport may wish to take a cue from the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which recently updated its guidelines to restrict participation in women’s sports categories strictly to athletes assigned female at birth. Athletes assigned male at birth may practice with women’s teams or play in the transgender category, but they cannot compete in women’s collegiate events.

It’s time for women to speak up and show solidarity with their fellow athletes in the realm of professional sport, lest the entire feminist movement has been for nothing.

The Strait of Hormuz will remain under Tehran’s control, the Iranian Foreign Ministry has said, calling on Washington to “stop indulging in delusions.” The statement comes in response to President Donald Trump saying he would soon declare the sea passage a “territory of the US.”

US-Israeli strikes on Iran in late February prompted Tehran to close the strait, with Washington responding by imposing a naval blockade of Iranian ports. The blockade disrupted traffic through one of the world’s most important energy corridors, initially sending global oil prices soaring to as high as $120 a barrel.

“Once and for all, accept the reality: up to this point, you have suffered strategic and heavy defeats; the Strait of Hormuz has been Iranian, is Iranian, and will remain Iranian,” Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said in a post on X on Saturday, adding that the waterway “will only be closed and opened under Iran’s command, and as long as you do not accept the reality of defeat and cease your fanciful delusions, Iran will continue to enforce the blockade.”

Speaking on Friday at a police academy in Nassau County, New York, Trump claimed that the Islamic Republic was being “very badly defeated” and said that, once victory was secured, “pretty soon, I’ll be declaring the Strait of Hormuz a territory of the US.”

Earlier this month, Tehran set out a series of conditions for reopening the strait, including compensation for war damage, the lifting of sanctions, and the release of frozen Iranian funds, and a permanent end to hostilities against Iran and its regional allies. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has also said that reopening Hormuz will depend on Washington fully accepting Tehran’s conditions.

Last week, Trump said his administration was in no rush to reach an agreement. In an interview with Axios, he said Washington was “low-keying” the negotiations while allowing economic pressure on Tehran to build.

The Hungarian government broke the law when it seized the servers of Fidesz, the party of former Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the Prosecutor General’s Office has said. The country’s new leader Peter Magyar is meanwhile continuing his quest to purge the remnants of Orban’s 16-year stay in power.

Last month, investigators arrived unannounced at a facility hosting Fidesz’s servers, confiscating all of the party’s communications systems and databases. The raid was carried out as part of a probe into the suspected misuse of some 17 billion forint (€47 million) in funding for the National Cultural Fund by local officials during Orban’s tenure. Fidesz described the actions of Magyar’s cabinet, which came to power after an election win in April, as an “unprecedented” overreach unseen in the country since the fall of Communism in 1989.

On Wednesday, the Prosecutor General’s Office said in a statement that while the order to seize the servers was valid, the way it had been carried out “amounted to a fishing expedition.”

“This approach constitutes an unlawful practice under both EU and Hungarian law,” the statement read.

The General Prosecutor’s Office has ordered the Bács-Kiskun County chief prosecutor in charge of the case to repeat the seizure, but this time to only collect data directly related to the investigation.

Fidesz was left dissatisfied with the ruling, again insisting that the actions of the investigators were “illegal.” 

“We call on the government to immediately put an end to the arbitrary political revenge campaign packaged in the form of an official procedure… and to return our servers,” said one of the party’s senior MPs, Boka Janos.

“You would have to be naive to think that this data has not already been copied… and shared with the relevant people,” Bollobas argued.

Magyar’s Tisza party, which came to power on the promise of “regime change,” has begun to actively dismantle the legal, media, and financial structures set up by Fidesz. The new government changed the constitution to impose a 12-year term limit on MPs, effectively banning Orban from running again. Fidesz has repeatedly labeled Magyar’s conduct “authoritarian.”

A massive 7.7-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Indonesia just before 6 AM local time on Saturday, damaging buildings causing a tsunami. At least five people were killed, according to preliminary reports.

The earthquake’s epicenter hit the seafloor around 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) northeast of Mbay in eastern Indonesia, the country’s Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) said.

Tsunami waves up to 0.94 meters tall were reported in several regions, according to the agency.
Three aftershocks of magnitudes 5.6, 6.1 and 5 followed the initial quake, the US Geological Survey (USGS) reported.

At least five people were killed, Melki Laka Lena, governor of the southeastern province of East Nusa Tenggara, said in a statement cited by the media.

Videos circulating on social media, purportedly capturing the earthquake, show building facades crumbling as terrified people flee.

Other footage shows buildings that had entirely collapsed.

Indonesia, a vast archipelago of thousands of islands, sits at the meeting point of several major tectonic plates and lies along the Pacific Ring of Fire, one of the most seismically active regions on Earth.

The country has faced devastating earthquakes in recent decades, including a devastating 9.1 magnitude event in 2004, which killed more than 220,000 people in the broader region.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has described the UK as the “Islamic Republic of Britain,” as the country’s new Labour government weighs taking measures against Israel.

Speaking on an Israeli Army Radio podcast on Friday, Netanyahu criticized the British media’s coverage of Israel, while comparing it to reporting during the 1967 Six-Day War.

“Go find that in Britain today, which you could call the Islamic Republic of Britain,” he said, as cited by Israeli media.

Netanyahu then echoed a 2024 joke made by US Vice President J.D. Vance, saying Britain could become the first “Islamic republic with nuclear weapons.”

According to the latest census-based figures, Muslims account for around 6% of the UK’s population, while Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, has possessed nuclear weapons since the 1990s.

The board of the Kennedy Center has voted to restore Donald Trump’s name to the Washington arts venue, multiple media outlets report, just two months after it was removed on a federal judge’s orders.

The Trump-aligned board voted to rename the institution after Trump and John F. Kennedy last December, and his name was subsequently added to its facade. However, US District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled in May that the board lacked authority to change the name established by Congress and ordered the Trump signage removed. Workers complied in June.

This time, the board is not formally renaming the Kennedy Center after Trump. According to Axios, an inscription below the Kennedy Center sign will read “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump,” while the physical site will be named “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.”

The board also voted on Thursday to move forward with a two-year closure of the center’s main venue for renovation. The proposed overhaul would refurbish aging infrastructure, polish the building’s marble facade, and renovate its halls and theaters.

“Under President Trump’s bold leadership, the Kennedy Center is on its way to becoming the finest cultural institution anywhere in the world,” White House spokeswoman Liz Huston told Axios.

The naming saga has already inspired legislation in Congress. In January, Senator Bernie Sanders and several Democratic colleagues introduced the Stop Executive Renaming for Vanity and Ego (SERVE) Act, which would prohibit federal buildings, land, and other assets from being named after a sitting president. The bill remains at the committee stage.

Jason Arday, the former University of Cambridge professor who recently resigned amid allegations of plagiarism and misrepresenting his credentials, was found dead in his home on Friday, police said in a statement cited by the media. The death is not being treated as suspicious.

Arday, 41, was recognized as the youngest-ever black professor at the institution when he joined as a professor of sociology of education in 2023. He resigned from that position after he was accused of plagiarizing his 2015 PhD dissertation and questions arose regarding his academic posts and other achievements. Arday denied the plagiarism allegations.

The Metropolitan Police said first responders called officers to the academic’s south London home on Friday afternoon after finding him “unresponsive.” He was pronounced dead at the scene.

“At this time, his death is being treated as unexpected but is not believed to be suspicious,” the police said.

The academic’s resignation came just two days after Cambridge announced that it had launched an investigation into his academic qualifications and honorary appointments, as the wider controversy burst into the spotlight. Liverpool John Moores University, which awarded him his PhD, had carried out its own probe but did not uphold the plagiarism allegations.

“Many passages are lifted with minimal editing, sometimes retaining copy-editing mistakes from the original source,” he wrote, calling Arday a “plagiarist and fabulist.”

According to a detailed investigation by The Guardian, several institutions have disputed Arday’s claims regarding his academic posts and achievements, while police contradicted his account of an investigation into alleged racial abuse.

After being approached by a journalist investigating the alleged plagiarism, Arday allegedly reported him to the authorities. 

UK police have faced several controversies and accusations concerning ‘two-tier’ policing.

The debate reignited in June after bodycam footage was released showing the arrest of Henry Nowak after he had been stabbed by 23-year-old Vickrum Singh Digwa. The 18-year-old lay mortally wounded in handcuffs as officers  dismissed his repeated pleas that he’d been stabbed after his attacker falsely accused him of racism. One officer’s words, “Don’t think you have, mate,” ignited lasting public outrage over the event.

Cases of infectious disease, including gastroenteritis, have been reported among migrants in Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta since the mass influx from neighboring Morocco occurred in late July.

Spain’s National Institute for Health Management (INGESA) confirmed that gastroenteritis has broken out among recently arrived migrants, Spanish media reported on Friday. The agency also confirmed cases of scabies and impetigo, while noting that both conditions were present in Ceuta before the latest influx.

However, INGESA has rejected claims that Ceuta’s healthcare system has collapsed. The agency also refuted reports of a tuberculosis outbreak, saying a suspected case had tested negative.

Gastroenteritis is an inflammation of the stomach and intestines, usually caused by a viral or bacterial infection, with symptoms including diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal cramps. Scabies is a contagious skin infestation caused by microscopic mites that produces intense itching and a rash, while impetigo is a bacterial skin infection characterized by sores that can rupture and develop yellowish crusts.

More than 72,000 migrants entered Ceuta on July 30-31, many by swimming or crossing coastal breakwaters – a figure equivalent to roughly 70% of the enclave’s regular population. The influx has overwhelmed reception centers and put additional pressure on healthcare and law-enforcement resources. Most of those who entered have since been returned to Morocco, but up to 11,000 are estimated to remain in Ceuta, according to local officials.

Once the naked hatred of German journalism prompted Vladimir Zelensky’s most fervent British backers to criticize Ukraine’s “gamification of killing” Russians, things went from bad to worse for Kiev – on the battlefield and in the diplomatic arena.

Russia punishes Ukraine with ‘harsher methods’

Vladimir Zelensky’s long-range strikes against Russia have already provoked a fearsome response from Moscow, but the Ukrainian leader doubled down this week, with his forces killing more than a dozen civilians in drone raids on Tatarstan and Krasnodar. 

Russia responded by wiping out military-industrial and dual-use facilities in Kiev and Zaporozhye and destroying port infrastructure on Ukraine’s Black Sea coast. RT has already covered Russia’s campaign against Ukrainian ports in detail, which Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said will intensify in an interview released on Friday morning.

Zelensky’s moaning, as Lavrov calls it, has been directed at his Western donors, who possess a dwindling supply of Patriot interceptor missiles that could help repel Russia’s missile barrages. However, the US used the bulk of the world’s Patriots in its war on Iran, and the Europeans aren’t in the mood to share. Moreover, as RT explained, Zelensky’s math is fundamentally flawed. Even if he were to get all the missiles he wanted, he’d only have enough interceptors to repel two attacks at best.

With all other options exhausted, Ukraine reportedly asked Russia for a truce with regard to attacks on shipping in the Black Sea. Moscow rejected the proposal, with Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accusing Kiev of “brazen acts of terrorism” against civilian ships and ruling out “half-measures that merely grant the Kiev regime a temporary ​breathing space.”

Zelensky learns how to lose friends and influence

Diplomatic relations between Poland and Ukraine are already strained due to Kiev’s stubborn veneration of Nazi collaborators, and the Polish public’s goodwill toward Ukraine is evaporating. According to a poll published on Wednesday, 67% of Poles support the deportation of unemployed Ukrainian men living in Poland as refugees.

Across the Atlantic, US Vice President JD Vance reportedly gave Zelensky a dressing down for attacking Black Sea shipping. According to the Financial Times, Vance’s patience reached its limit when Ukrainian forces attacked ships bound for a partly US-owned terminal in Russia’s port of Novorossiysk. 

Russia frees US Marine

Diplomacy paid off for the US this week when Russia agreed to release former US Marine Robert Gilman, who was arrested in 2022 after a drunken assault on a policeman in Russia. Gilman was pardoned by Russian President Vladimir Putin and arrived back on US soil on Tuesday.

Welcome home, Robert Gilman! 🇺🇸

After more than four years detained in Russia, American citizen Robert Gilman is finally back on U.S. soil.

Thanks to the Trump Admin, another American is safely home where he belongs.

God bless Robert Gilman, and GOD BLESS AMERICA. 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/Tn8C8h9QBD

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) August 12, 2026

“After my discussions with President Vladimir Putin, Russia has agreed to release him, very much on a humanitarian basis,” US President Donald Trump stated. “We appreciate this decision.” US envoy Steve Witkoff apparently played a central role in the negotiations and thanked Putin for his “personal ​engagement throughout this process.” 

Gilman’s mental health has reportedly deteriorated in incarceration, and he is expected to receive treatment at home in Texas.

Germany’s spy expansion

Under the new legislation tabled by Merz’s Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, the BND will be permitted to carry out offensive cyberattacks on Russia and other foreign adversaries, while the BfV will be allowed to infiltrate Germans’ smartphones and computers. The new powers were described as “a revolution” by Dobrindt. Moscow described them as another example of Germany’s “rabid militarization,” while Germany’s right-wing AfD warned that they will turn the BfV “from an early warning system of democracy into an architect of a totalitarian reality.” We’ve seen this before in Germany, and it did not end well. 

The BfV’s new powers will likely be turned against the AfD, the country’s most popular political party and a poll-topper in Saxony. The agency has already tried to list the party as a “right-wing extremist” group and been granted permission to surveil the AfD’s Bavaria chapter. 

The rise of Islamic NATO

As Europe tears itself apart, the Middle East’s Sunni powers are drawing closer together – with profound implications for the region. Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, and Pakistan signed the ‘Mecca Pact’ this week, agreeing to treat an attack against one member as an attack against all three. However, it remains unclear how the three countries would react to such an attack. The so-called ‘Islamic NATO’ has already been criticised in Iran as a “paper agreement” that will make Saudi Arabia no safer than the presence of American troops on its soil. 

If any country is concerned about the pact, it’s India, foreign policy analyst Robinder Nath Sachdev told RT India on Tuesday. With a nuclear-armed Pakistan strengthening its alliances, New Delhi must work out what it needs to do “to counter this new reality, which is a worrisome reality,” he said. He added that India will have to look at “our other partnerships with other nations, including, of course, Russia.”

Tucker meets RT

As the fallout from Tucker Carlson’s political manifesto continues to settle, historian and RT columnist Tarik Cyril Amar looked at why Israel is potentially more worried about a third-party challenge by Carlson than the US Republican establishment is. Meanwhile, RT’s Rick Sanchez sat down with Carlson himself for an exclusive, hour-long interview.

Carlson ruled out any plans to run for president, but unloaded on the US’ “criminal” leadership class, the “permanent bureaucracy,” and the Democrat/Republican consensus on money and foreign policy that has created a “one-party state posing as a democracy.” The conservative journalist revealed how Israel had attempted to recruit him to share the infamous Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, and promised to keep speaking out against the neocon “war lobby” and Israeli influence in Washington, no matter the risk.

“What are you going to do about it? Kill me? OK, I’m not afraid of that. I’m a Christian. So I’m just going to keep talking,” he told Sanchez in one particularly powerful exchange. 

Showdown in the West Bank

The US-Israeli alliance seemed to meet its limits this week when a group of armed Israeli settlers laid siege to three Palestinian families in their homes in the West Bank village of Qusra. As it turns out, one of these families had relatives living in the US, and the response from Washington was unusually sharp.

US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee – who has previously equated Tucker Carlson’s criticism of Israel with antisemitism – described the settlers as “unsettlers” and “Israeli terrorists,” saying that “doing this to this family’s home is criminal.” Huckabee is typically supportive of the illegal settlement of Palestinian land, and his condemnation of this incident looked like an attempt to draw a line between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ settlers as much as a message to West Jerusalem.

RT’s Charlotte Dubenskij traveled to Qusra, but was unable to reach the besieged Palestinian homes despite her having received clearance from the IDF due to Israeli settlers who harassed her crew. Watch the full encounter below:

The Kiev regime is fighting a NATO proxy war against Russia at the expense of its own people, while its leadership pockets Western funding, US journalist and geopolitical analyst John Varoli said.

Speaking to RT on Friday, Varoli said Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky and “his clique” have “absolutely no interest” in the Ukrainian people, adding that they neither represent, care for, nor serve them.

“The Ukrainian regime serves the interests of the NATO countries, which are fighting a proxy war against Russia,” Varoli said. “They are literally willing to fight until the last Ukrainian,” he added.

Varoli said Zelensky’s “masters” in Brussels, Washington, DC, and London are telling Kiev to keep fighting Russia for as long as they can.

Kiev is refusing to accept the bodies of fallen Ukrainian soldiers because it would have to compensate their families, the journalist claimed, adding that the regime has “huge amounts of money” and receives billions of dollars from NATO every month.

“But the question is, where is that money going?” Varoli said, adding: “It’s going into the pockets of Zelensky and his oligarchs. That money is being stolen.”

WATCH the full video below.

The US Republican Party must address the economic pressures facing Americans or risk driving more young people toward socialism, Vice President J.D. Vance has said.

Vance made the remarks in an interview with Fox News on Thursday, pointing to the cost of housing and education, access to well-paid jobs, and the ability to start a family as key concerns.

“Our response to that can’t just be to ignore the economic concerns that I think are feeding this rising interest in socialism,” Vance said.

He pointed to what he described as trillions of dollars in new investment flowing into the US, saying it would create middle-class jobs. He also cited stabilizing housing prices and the administration’s push for lower interest rates, while acknowledging that the effects of its policies could take time to be felt.

“My warning to my fellow Republicans would be if we don’t get this right, don’t blame young people for being sympathetic to socialism. We’ve got to blame ourselves,” Vance said.

He added that Republicans could not counter the trend simply by defending the free market, saying “You don’t stop socialism by throwing slogans at people about the free market. You stop socialism by making people’s lives better.”

Vance’s comments come ahead of November’s midterm elections, with the cost of living among the main issues worrying voters. A national poll conducted by Marquette University Law School in May showed inflation and living costs were the public’s top concern, cited by 37% of respondents.

Economic pressures have been compounded by higher energy costs fueled by the US-Israeli war on Iran and by Trump’s tariffs, while high home prices have made homeownership more difficult to attain. The median asking price for a US home stood at $430,000 in June, according to data cited by Forbes.

The divide has also become more visible in electoral politics, with progressive candidates making gains in Democratic primaries across the country. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, rose to prominence on an affordability-focused platform.

Republicans have also faced weak ratings on the economy. The Marquette survey put Trump’s approval on the economy at 30% and on inflation and the cost of living at 22%, while respondents favored Democrats over Republicans on handling both issues.

US hospitals have billed tens of millions of dollars for sex-changing interventions on minors, according to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

The ‘Wolves in White Coats’ report, released this week and citing watchdog research, said hospitals and clinics have billed nearly $120 million for more than 5,500 surgeries and 8,500 courses of hormones or puberty blockers for minors since 2019.

Some providers may have used misleading or potentially fraudulent billing codes to get insurers to cover the interventions, according to HHS. The department identified nearly $50 million in claims for puberty blockers given to children aged nine to 17 under a general hormone-disorder code without a gender-related or early-puberty diagnosis on the same claim.

Hospitals and clinics identified in the report have been referred to the Department of Justice and investigators from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for potential violations of federal law. According to HHS, the observed billing patterns require additional investigation.

The report said the procedures offered hospitals a long-term source of revenue, as minors who begin hormone drugs can remain in medical care for years. Citing outside estimates, it put lifetime costs at up to $75,000 without surgery and as much as $170,000 when operations are included.

“The Biden Administration ... contributed to the expansion and normalization of sex-rejecting interventions through nondiscrimination policies ... and other federal programs,” the report stated.

The move is part of a broader rollback of transgender-related policies since Trump returned to office. His administration has moved to restrict medical transition procedures for minors, bar transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports, and restrict people with gender dysphoria from serving in the US military.

At least 27 US states have enacted restrictions on gender-transition procedures for minors, while several major hospitals have stopped offering some services amid legal challenges, funding pressure and changing medical guidance.

The British government is refusing to disclose information on how an Israeli “information warfare” firm targeted Scotland’s pro-Palestine first minister. Nobody’s saying who ordered the operation, but a trail of clues leads through Africa to Tel Aviv.

RT already covered the French plot in our ‘Wired for War’ series, and BlackCore’s activity in Scotland followed a similar playbook. At least 256 accounts were created to spread disparaging information about First Minister John Swinney, a vocal supporter of Palestine who has publicly stated that “a genocide is unfolding in Gaza as a result of Israel’s actions,” banned public funding to Israeli-linked companies, and called on the British government to recognize the State of Palestine.

The British government has refused two separate Freedom of Information requests filed by The National, a Scottish newspaper. In one response, the government said it would not disclose any information it had on BlackCore, as to do so would “prejudice relations between the United Kingdom and any other state,” The National reported on August 11. In a second response, it explained that the request was denied in order to “avoid giving offence to other nations and retain the trust of our international partners.”

Let’s be clear - a genocide is unfolding in Gaza as a result of Israel’s actions.

We all have a moral and legal responsibility to act, and Scotland will play its part.

Today I have set out a range of diplomatic, economic and humanitarian measures. Read below for more. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/suoMbpNu2j

— John Swinney (@JohnSwinney) September 3, 2025

The other state referenced here is evidently Israel.

Is BlackCore an Israeli intelligence cutout?

Little is known about BlackCore. The company scrubbed its online presence immediately after the Viginum report was published, but according to archived material from its website, BlackCore is “an elite influence, cyber, and technology company built for the modern era of information warfare.” It specializes in “shap[ing] narratives” and “influenc[ing] perceptions” for clients in politics and government, and supposedly has been operating for 15 years.

According to an investigation by Israel’s Haaretz newspaper, the company is not registered anywhere in the world, but shares web infrastructure with two companies founded by tech entrepreneur Guy Geyor and lawyer Doron Afik. Both of these firms employ veterans of Israeli intelligence agencies, including one former member of the Israel Defense Forces’ Unit 8200.

French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said France has demanded information on BlackCore from the Israeli government. However, it is unclear whether Israel has responded.

The Africa connection

BlackCore’s operations went beyond the US and Europe. In the course of their investigation, Vigilum agents discovered that some of the same social media accounts used to spread falsehoods about three left-wing candidates in France were used to spread content promoting Angola’s ruling MPLA movement. The accounts switched their usernames from French to Portuguese to reach Angola’s Portuguese-speaking population, but forgot to switch languages in some cases, continuing to post in French.

Investigators found a BlackCore-associated web address – ‘angola-plan.blackcore.online’ – which detailed a four-week training program that the company provided to the Angolan government in February. The program covered “communicating positive government campaigns” and “social media operations.”

BlackCore was also tied to a project called ‘Politizando Angola’ on multiple social media platforms, and a TikTok account called ‘Deep Dive Africa’. Both accounts use the same branding, and are linked by phone number to a fake Islamic charity that BlackCore used in its French and Scottish operations.

‘Deep Dive Africa’ promoted an Israeli medical mission to Togo in February. A humanitarian project of the Sheba Medical Center, the mission was in no way connected with BlackCore’s election operations. However, the Sheba Medical Center is entirely funded by the Israeli state, meaning BlackCore was using the same web infrastructure to carry out ‘information warfare” in some countries, and state-backed soft power operations in others. 

All roads lead to Israel

The hospital post is not a smoking gun. Rather, it is an example of how every detail in the BlackCore story is another thread leading back to Tel Aviv. The same pattern is borne out across the growing sphere of Israeli private intelligence agencies and cyberwarfare companies: ‘former’ Israeli spies working in the private sector, almost exclusively to advance Israeli interests, often with the tacit backing of the Israeli government.

While it is understandable that Israel would seek to wash its hands of any involvement in foreign interference, the fact that the UK would trade political capital to protect Israel’s reputation – after the EU also refused to investigate Israeli election meddling in Slovenia and Cyprus – raises another uncomfortable question: just how much influence does one Middle Eastern state have on the leaders of Europe?

The US is making military support for NATO members contingent on how closely they align with President Donald Trump’s foreign policy, Bloomberg has reported.

Washington has recently sent NATO members a document containing a series of questions aimed at gauging their alignment with the Trump administration, the agency said.

Governments were asked whether they had “been publicly supportive” of US foreign-policy initiatives, including those in the Middle East and Western Hemisphere, the outlet reported, citing a copy it had reviewed. Washington also wanted to know what “restrictions” individual countries have imposed on US forces operating from military bases on their territory.

The apparent loyalty test comes amid widening tensions between Washington and its traditional European allies, with Trump repeatedly accusing NATO members of relying on US protection while failing to contribute enough to their own defense.

Trump has long been a fierce critic of NATO countries’ defense spending, repeatedly accusing European members of underfunding their militaries and effectively relying on Washington to bankroll their defense.

Earlier this summer, he renewed his criticism ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara, arguing that the US “spends more money on NATO than any other country, by far, to protect them, without getting any benefit.” He contrasted nearly $1 trillion in annual US defense spending with significantly smaller expenditures by individual European allies.

Defense spending is not the only source of friction, however. Tensions have intensified further over the US war with Iran, with Trump criticizing European allies for refusing to become more directly involved and complaining that “they were not there for us.”

Several NATO members also refused to allow Washington to use jointly operated military bases for offensive operations against Iran. US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth branded the restrictions “shameful,” arguing that they had put American troops “at risk.”

The growing disagreements have, in turn, fueled debate in Europe about reducing its reliance on Washington for security. European officials have increasingly discussed “strategic autonomy” and the need to develop greater capacity to defend the continent should US priorities diverge from the rest of NATO.

Two developments in recent days offer a revealing picture of how Russian-Syrian relations are evolving after the change of power in Damascus.

On August 9, after roughly 18 months of negotiations, Russia and Syria agreed on a new memorandum defining the future framework for the use of facilities of the Russian military bases in Tartus and Hmeimim. Almost simultaneously, a delegation from Rossotrudnichestvo (the Russian federal agency responsible for foreign humanitarian and cultural cooperation) delegation held talks with Syrian officials and preparations were announced for reopening the Russian House cultural exchange centre in Damascus. Military cooperation is being reformulated rather than dismantled, humanitarian links are being restored, while trade, food supplies, energy and education continue to connect the two countries.

Much of the Western debate assumed that the fall of Bashar Assad’s government would sharply reduce Russia’s position in Syria. Moscow had been one of Assad’s principal political and military partners, while the forces that replaced his government had fought against the old order. Yet foreign policy is rarely governed by symbolism alone, especially in a country emerging from a devastating conflict. Syria’s new authorities are increasingly judging external partners by a more practical measure. What can each of them offer Syria now, when the country needs reconstruction, food, energy, security and political room for maneuver?

The new Damascus authorities have no past Russia relations to remain loyal to, but they do have present problems they need to manage. Syria faces damaged infrastructure, weak fiscal capacity, serious energy shortages, high dependence on imported food and a still incomplete process of restoring effective state authority. Under such conditions, ideological preferences give way to utility. Partners are assessed by the markets, resources, technologies and security assistance they can provide.

This helps explain why the new Syrian leadership is seeking closer relations with the United States, the European Union, Türkiye and the Gulf states while avoiding a rupture with Moscow. That policy only appears contradictory if Syria is expected to choose one geopolitical camp. Damascus needs Western investment and access to international finance, but it also needs functioning supply chains, energy resources and military expertise. A country that has spent years under sanctions and war has little incentive to close channels that still work.

The discussion around Russian oil illustrates this clearly. In early August, Reuters reported that the Syrian side had signalled to Washington its willingness to substantially reduce purchases of Russian oil. Limiting Moscow’s economic presence is part of Washington’s regional strategy, but Russia has become a major supplier of oil to Syria, and replacing those volumes quickly is much harder than declaring an intention to diversify imports.

Damascus may try to reduce dependence on Russian supplies over time, but diversification is not the same as disengagement. The former increases Syria’s autonomy, while the latter would remove one of the few external channels already functioning at scale. Better relations with the West do not require the elimination of ties with Moscow, just as closer cooperation with Moscow does not prevent Damascus from attracting Western or Gulf investment. The more external options Syria has, the harder it becomes for any single partner to dictate the terms of its foreign policy.

Russia’s importance is most evident when bilateral trade is examined not merely by total value, but by its composition. For Syria, what matters is that Russian supplies are concentrated in sectors directly affecting daily life, social stability and the government’s ability to keep the economy functioning – such as food security.

According to Syrian customs data cited by Reuters, around 85% of the wheat imported by Syria in the 2025-2026 season came from Russia, amounting to approximately 2.9 million tonnes. In a country where bread remains a basic element of mass consumption and household budgets have been weakened by years of conflict and inflation, such supplies have significance far beyond ordinary commerce. Grain affects state procurement, consumer prices, subsidies and public sentiment. A disruption in wheat imports can quickly spill over from the economic sphere and become a political problem.

Russia already has the production capacity, commercial interest and logistical experience needed to deliver large quantities. Abandoning such a source without a reliable substitute would be economically reckless.

The same applies to energy. Russia supplied Syria with around 16.8 million barrels of oil in 2025, while in the first months of 2026 deliveries reached roughly 60,000 barrels per day, an increase of about 75% over a relatively short period. Syrian domestic production remains far below pre-war levels and is insufficient to meet national demand. Imported oil is vital for transport, electricity generation, agriculture, industry, public utilities and reconstruction.

In a fragile post-conflict environment, oil shortages can undermine public confidence and deepen social tension. Western and Gulf actors can offer finance, investment and advanced technologies, but many such opportunities require time and political negotiations. Russian food and energy supplies respond to immediate needs, which is crucial for a government trying to stabilise the country now rather than several years from now.

The new memorandum concerning the Russian military bases in Tartus and Hmeimim is a product of the same pragmatism. It can be seen as a reduction of Russia’s military footprint because Syria is regaining control over part of the civilian infrastructure and the old legal model is being revised – but it is still a restructuring, not a full withdrawal. After 18 months of negotiations, Moscow and Damascus managed to avoid the breakdown of military cooperation, instead finding a way to transform it.

According to the information made public, civilian facilities are to pass under Syrian management, while military sites are expected to be transformed into joint Russian-Syrian training and professional development centres. Part of the Russian military presence is also expected to remain. Its importance lies in creating a model the new Syrian leadership can defend politically. The previous framework was closely associated with the Assad era and could be portrayed as an infringement on sovereignty. The new model gives Damascus greater formal control while preserving access to Russian military expertise.

This compromise would make little sense if Syria had already decided to remove Russia from the country. The 18 months of negotiations suggest the opposite. Damascus wanted different terms, not a complete break, while Moscow wanted to preserve a meaningful role without insisting that previous arrangements remain untouched. The result is a framework better suited to the new political reality.

Syria’s armed forces face a long process of reconstruction. Training, command structures, equipment maintenance, border security and territorial control all require resources and external assistance. It is far from certain that the US or the EU are prepared to take responsibility for rebuilding Syrian defence capabilities comprehensively. Their interests in Syria are also fragmented, shaped mostly by counterterrorism, border security and regional competition. Support for a stable Syria does not necessarily mean support for a militarily stronger and more autonomous Damascus.

Russia has decades of experience dealing with Syrian military institutions, familiarity with much of the equipment in service and long-standing knowledge of the country’s defence infrastructure. Moscow is not Syria’s only possible security partner, but replacing its accumulated expertise quickly would be difficult.

The new Syrian leadership is clearly not trying to reproduce Assad’s foreign policy. Damascus wants better relations with Europe and the United States, investment from the Gulf, expanded trade with Türkiye and reintegration into the international economy. Yet none of these goals requires a break with Russia. In fact, the wider Syria’s network of partners becomes, the more useful Russia may be as one of several external poles that help Damascus preserve strategic flexibility.

Value, not ‘values’

Russia remains important not because Syria’s new authorities share the worldview of their predecessors, but because Moscow still offers tangible value in sectors vital to recovery. It supplies food and energy, retains military expertise and possesses established institutional links. For a government trying to stabilise a country after years of war, predictability and practical capacity can matter more than political sympathy.

Western pressure may influence individual areas of Russian-Syrian cooperation, particularly where energy trade, sanctions and security arrangements are concerned. But persuading Damascus to abandon a partner already embedded in critical supply chains and security structures is much more difficult than urging it to diversify. Syria can cooperate with the West without accepting a zero-sum logic in which every gain in relations with Washington or Brussels must be matched by a loss for Moscow.

The USS Abraham Lincoln has been grappling with dismal conditions for months during the US-Israeli war on Iran, amid mounting reports of severe exhaustion, supply shortages, and mental-health problems among crew members. The problems have sparked an uproar among crew members’ families and prompted demands for answers from US lawmakers.

The vessel, a 5,000-person nuclear-powered Nimitz-class aircraft carrier capable of carrying up to 90 aircraft and conducting more than 100 combat sorties a day at peak capacity, left San Diego in late November. It has now been deployed for more than 260 days, including more than 200 consecutive days at sea – an extraordinary stretch by Navy standards.

On top of that, the flattop has spent much of that time in a combat environment, with Iran claiming to have targeted it on numerous occasions. Even as US officials insist the carrier remains operational, the hardships of a prolonged campaign appear to be taking their toll.

Here is what we know about the issues facing the aircraft carrier and its crew.

What are conditions like aboard the Abraham Lincoln?

The complaints from crew members and their families go well beyond the usual discomforts of a long deployment.

They include shortages of toothpaste, deodorant, and soap, problems with hot and potable water, broken toilets, unreliable laundry facilities, disruptions to food supplies, and mail delays so severe that some care packages reportedly disappeared into the system for months. Other reports describe mold, failing plumbing, and holes worn through parts of the flight deck from extensive use without adequate repairs.

Democratic Congressman Mike Levin claimed that the food situation is so bad that crew members’ meals “came down to half a cup of rice and two tortillas.” The meager meals were first reported by USA Today as early as mid-April, although the Pentagon denied that there were food shortages at the time.

The USS Abraham Lincoln has been at sea for more than 250 days, pushing its crew to the limit. Sailors report exhaustion, deteriorating living conditions, shortages of basic supplies and serious food problems: small portions, poor-quality meals and periods of depleted stocks. The… https://t.co/iWYaeKchzU pic.twitter.com/C4cheR4N2M

— Tom Antonov (@Tom_Antonov) August 13, 2026

According to Maritime Executive, the supply problems are partly due to logistics, as the main base of the 5th Fleet is located in Bahrain, deep inside the Persian Gulf, meaning many shipments must pass through the Strait of Hormuz and risk Iranian strikes.

Is the crew burning out?

There are strong indications that it is. One of the most striking episodes confirmed by CENTCOM occurred on August 3, when a sailor went overboard from the Abraham Lincoln and was recovered roughly an hour later.

🚨🇮🇷🇺🇸 Text messages from a sailor aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln reveal no milk in three months and ROTTEN food arriving at sea...

He reportedly wrote that almost nothing fresh makes it out except meat, because only frozen goods survive the supply run, and called it the worst… pic.twitter.com/ylCgsHap26

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) August 13, 2026

Citing US officials, CNN reported that the Navy treated the incident as a mental-health episode, adding that the sailor was medically evaluated and later removed from the ship for further care.

At a meeting with Navy leaders, another spouse said her husband had sent a message saying he hoped he “doesn’t wake up tomorrow,” according to Stars and Stripes.

“The morale is not good,” one family member said, as cited by MS Now. “Apparently, the ship’s doctor or therapist said they need to hit port soon, or people are going to start, you know, losing their minds.”

Could stress on the flattop lead to violence?

Citing an unnamed “informed military source,” Iranian news agency Tasnim reported earlier this month that seven US Navy personnel had been killed and several others wounded in a violent confrontation aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln.

According to the report, an adviser to CENTCOM, commander Adm. Brad Cooper, boarded the carrier to address complaints about the prolonged deployment but was booed and pelted with water bottles before the confrontation escalated into a knife fight.

How much pressure has Iran put on the Abraham Lincoln?

Multiple analyses have suggested that Iran,  which is militarily inferior to the US,  has been relying on attritional warfare to hold its ground and gain concessions from Washington. Kamal Kharrazi, head of Iran’s Strategic Council on Foreign Relations, said Iran was prepared for a “long war” and argued that the longer the conflict continued, the greater the economic pressure on other countries would become.

As the conflict has dragged on, Tehran has claimed to have mounted numerous attacks on the Abraham Lincoln. On March 1, Iran announced it had fired four ballistic missiles at the carrier, with CENTCOM saying the missiles “didn’t even come close.” Later that month, Tehran claimed that missiles and drones had struck the vessel, rendering it inoperable and forcing it to withdraw – an allegation also rejected by Washington.

In early April, Iran said it had launched multiple waves of attack drones toward the Abraham Lincoln group in the northern Indian Ocean, forcing it to withdraw.

While it is unclear whether the Abraham Lincoln sustained any damage during the attacks, it was hardly operating in a benign environment, with CENTCOM reporting roughly 10,000 aircraft flights and the expenditure of about 1.5 million pounds of ordnance during the mission.

What beef do US lawmakers have with the Pentagon?

On Wednesday, a member of the US Senate’s Armed Services Committee, Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal, published an open letter to Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, raising “serious concerns” about the situation aboard the ship and questioning whether it could sustain continued operations.

“The Lincoln is not an isolated case. Recent carrier deployments have repeatedly stretched beyond their originally anticipated durations, suggesting that extended deployments may be becoming a feature rather than an exception of the Navy’s force-generation model,” he added.

Fellow Senator Ruben Gallego has called for a bipartisan congressional oversight visit to the Abraham Lincoln, casting doubt on Pentagon assurances.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has gone further, blaming Hegseth personally and saying sailors are “paying the price” for Pentagon failures. “When Pete Hegseth was nominated, everyone knew he was completely incompetent... Pete Hegseth must be fired immediately,” he insisted.

What does the Pentagon say in response to the accusations?

Hegseth dismissed reports of poor living conditions and food shortages aboard the Abraham Lincoln as “completely misrepresented,” while acknowledging that some deployments could last longer and be tougher than others.

Meanwhile, the AP reported that the USS George Washington is now moving toward the Middle East from Vietnam to replace the Abraham Lincoln. The redeployment is expected to weaken the US footprint in the Pacific amid tensions with China, however.

Bottom Line

While the Pentagon insists that the Abraham Lincoln “remains fully capable of meeting all mission tasking,” and there is no credible evidence that Iran managed to cripple the ship, its crew appears to have come dangerously close to the breaking point.

After more than eight months of deployment, the vessel appears to be struggling with logistics and supplies of basic amenities, amid growing concerns over its crew members’ mental health. While the Abraham Lincoln is expected to be relieved soon, its performance raises questions about Washington’s overall ability to sustain effective long-term operations against even a militarily inferior adversary.