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Nate Bear Do Not Panic This morning The Guardian had a story about Israel’s ongoing efforts to illegally annex the West Bank. Can you pick your way through this headline? Firstly, the presentation of “settler figures” is a subtle way to shift responsibility away from the political arrangement in Israel and conjure up images of […]

Ramzy Baroud Z Network The mountain of evidence that cannot be shouted away about Israel’s systemic use of sexual violence. And other abuses against Palestinians. Whether Israelis will ever comprehend the irreparable damage inflicted upon their country’s reputation by their U.N. ambassador, Danny Danon, is a moot point. The damage Israel has done to itself […]

Joshua Scheer Before the bombs fell, many Western officials and commentators predicted that the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, would fracture the Islamic Republic from within. Instead, images emerging from Tehran this week have presented a very different picture. According to estimates cited during funeral coverage, millions of mourners filled the streets over […]

The plant, built by Chinese companies Jiuling and Canmax, will process 3 million metric tons of lithium ore per year.

The Iran deal is dead, according to the U.S. president.Donald Trump bitterly referred to Iran’s leadership as “scum” during a NATO summit presser in Ankara, Turkey, on Wednesday, telling reporters that he believes peace negotiations—and the regional ceasefire—are “over.”“I don’t want to deal with them anymore. They’re scum. Do you know what scum is?” Trump said. “They’re scum. They’re sick people. They’re led by sick people, and they’re vicious, violent people, and if they had a nuclear weapon, they’d use it.“As far as I’m concerned, it’s over. I’ll speak to our negotiators, they’ll want to negotiate, they’re good people. Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, but they’ll have to come back to me. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just a waste of time dealing with them.“They’re liars. We make a deal—if I make a deal with him, we have a deal, and it goes out and he talks,” Trump said, briefly gesturing to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. “We make a deal, everyone’s agreed, no nuclear weapons. We make a deal. They go outside, talk to the press, they say we never even talked about it. “There’s something wrong with them, they’re cuckoo,” he added.Q: Is the ceasefire over? Is the MOU dead?TRUMP: I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum. Do you know what scum is? They're led by sick people. They're vicious, violent people. They're liars. They're cuckoo pic.twitter.com/fGlomtlSrz— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 8, 2026The White House and Tehran preemptively signed a drafted memorandum of understanding, or MOU, in June, initiating a 60-day negotiation process. The mutual willingness to draw up a peace plan spurred hopes that the violence and economic barricades could soon come to an end, but the two nations began exchanging strikes again this week.U.S. Central Command confirmed on Tuesday that the military had “completed” a new round of strikes on Iran, hitting “over 80 targets with precision munitions” over a four-hour period. The strikes were “in response to Iranian attacks on three commercial vessels that were transiting the Strait of Hormuz,” CENTCOM said in a statement. Washington has also reimposed sanctions on Iranian oil sales. In retaliation, Tehran said it had launched strikes on 85 U.S. military targets in Bahrain and Kuwait, reported Al Jazeera. Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly condemned the “aggressive attacks and gross violation” of the MOU.The office added that Iran’s armed forces “will not hesitate in defending Iran’s territorial integrity, national sovereignty, and national security against U.S. military aggression in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, and will target the source and origin of the aggression.”Oil prices surged as a result, with the price of Brent crude—the international oil benchmark—rising more than 3 percent on Wednesday.Trump, meanwhile, is planning to extend the violence.“We’ll probably hit them hard again tonight,” he told reporters.

A new investigation has uncovered how the United Arab Emirates (UAE) supports a secret network of military training camps for the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that enables them to continue their deadly war in Sudan. “This war, which is often categorized in international media as a civil war, is really a proxy war,” says award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker Julia Steers. “We’re talking about a really extensive network of logistics and training and financial backing from the UAE.” The investigation is a collaboration between Lighthouse Reports, Evident and Sudan War Monitor. Meanwhile, as the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warns another humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding the North Kordofan state capital of El Obeid, where the RSF and the Sudanese army are fighting for control. “There’s no question that the RSF would not be able to have gotten as far as they have, to have claimed nearly as much territory as they have, without the really robust support of the UAE,” says Steers.

Abu Dhabi is pushing to meet its own deadline to automate at least half of the public sector's work using AI agents.

The kingdom’s debt levels could reach 60% of GDP by 2030, which could push up borrowing costs and put pressure to tighten spending, one consultancy forecast.