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President Donald Trump just revealed how unseriously he takes national security. During a joint press conference Tuesday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Ankara, Trump appeared dumbfounded when pressed about his terms for potentially selling F-35 fighter jets to Turkey despite a congressional ban. A reporter asked Trump whether the sale of F-35 jets would require the country’s Russian-made S-400 missile defense system to be sold to a “third party.”“Third party? What is the third—with respect to what?” Trump asked. “There are concerns about the Russian missile defense system. Do you have those concerns about this system?” the reporter asked. “I have no concerns at all about anything,” Trump replied. “I mean,” he continued, “he’s a leader of a country that he’s made a much better country, a much more powerful country. You see it, I mean, it’s beautiful. You get off the roads are beautiful, it’s an amazing thing. No, I have no concerns with anything having to do with Turkey. The relationship, I would say the relationship with Turkey right now is better probably than it’s ever been. It was good in my first four years, but I think now it’s probably even better than that, if that’s possible.”a confused Trump has difficulty understanding a question from a reporter:Q: There are concerns about the Russian missile defense system. Do you have those concerns about this system?TRUMP: I have no concerns about anything pic.twitter.com/HtuaeLp7WH— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 7, 2026One can only imagine the right-wing reaction if former President Joe Biden had delivered such an unintelligible response.Turkey was barred from America’s F-35 program in 2020 after it purchased an advanced missile defense system from Russia. The sale sparked concerns in Washington that Turkey would train the system on newly provided F-35 jets, allowing Russia to learn how to respond to U.S. military capabilities. In order to move forward with the sale, Turkey could potentially hand off its missile defense system to a third party, one Trump administration official told The New York Times. But on Tuesday, Trump was evidently unbothered by Turkey’s Russian-made missile defense system, and even suggested he would lift sanctions preventing the sale of the F-35. “We’re going to be taking the sanctions off,” Trump told reporters. “We don’t want to sanction friends.”One little problem: The sanctions were put into law by Congress, so in order to approve the sale, Trump would have to convince lawmakers to back him up. The president is going to have to come up with a better argument than I don’t care about the Russian military threat because the roads in Turkey are so beautiful.

President Trump said in a meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Tuesday that he plans to lift sanctions to allow the country to buy F-35 fighter jets. “We’re going to be taking the sanctions off, OK? I don’t want him to waste his time answering that question,” Trump said to reporters while gesturing to Erdoğan at a NATO summit in the country’s capital, Ankara.BREAKING: Trump says he’ll remove CAATSA sanctions on Türkiye. pic.twitter.com/uPH3hjTBeP— Clash Report (@clashreport) July 7, 2026The move would end a ban that was imposed on Turkey in Trump’s first term after the country accepted a Russian S-400 air and missile defense system against U.S. warnings. Congress passed the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act in 2017 to punish any country that does business with Russia’s defense and intelligence agencies, and reinforced that restriction in the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act.  That bill contains a prohibition on transferring the fighter jets to Turkey unless it “no longer possesses” the Russian missile system, its materials, or anything associated with it. Trump didn’t make clear whether the sanctions would be lifted only on Turkey, or on all countries that possess Russian military articles.Regardless, Trump’s plan faces opposition from Democrats and Republicans in Congress. Last week, six Republican and four Democratic members of Congress wrote a letter to Trump opposing the sale of F-35s to Turkey. “With President Erdoğan’s continued aggression toward our greatest partners along with his troubling defense partnerships with our adversaries, it is not in the best interest of our country to sell them F-35s,” wrote Republican Representatives Mike Lawler, Nicole Malliotakis, Gus Bilirakis, Jeff Hurd, Max Miller, and Young Kim, in addition to Democratic Representatives Stephen Lynch, Gabe Amo, Jared Moskowitz, and Brad Sherman.Israel also opposes the sale of F-35s to Turkey amid worsening ties with the country and Turkish criticism of Israel following its massacre of Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Fox News on Monday that he didn’t think Turkey should get the jets or F110 jet engines “because that’ll upset the power balance in the Middle East, which is ultimately guaranteed by Israeli air superiority, and also by, I think … America’s posture in the Middle East.”Under Trump, the U.S. has already said it would allow the sale of F110 fighter jet engines to Turkey for use in developing its own fighter jet. The administration also wrapped up a lawsuit against Turkish bank Halkbank for failing to comply with U.S. sanctions against Iran, weakening punishments against the financial institution. Now it seems that Trump wants to appease the country and Erdoğan at the expense of U.S. national security. 

Is President Donald Trump a sports jinx or just a corrupt fool? Trump is once again an international laughingstock after the U.S. Men’s National Team crashed out of the World Cup despite the president’s meddling. Trump had urged FIFA president Gianni Infantino over the weekend to overturn a red card that would’ve kept the U.S. team’s top scorer from playing against Belgium Monday night. For the first time in half a century, FIFA overturned the decision, but even that couldn’t save the U.S. Men’s Soccer team from being handily defeated 4-1. (And the player in question, Folarin Balogun, didn’t even score America’s lone goal of the night.)“Overturn this,” the Belgian Red Devils, Belgium’s national team, wrote in a post on X after the game. As if losing wasn’t humiliating enough, a handful of players on the Belgian team were spotted doing Trump’s iconic dance to celebrate one of their goals.Belgium’s team celebrated their victory over the US by mocking Trump’s signature double jerk off dance move. pic.twitter.com/emvy5tK6Xr— Anonymous (@YourAnonCentral) July 7, 2026Online, people speculated that Trump might even be a sports curse. Last month, Trump made an appearance at Madison Square Garden for the NBA Finals. The president was loudly booed, fell asleep—and the Knicks broke their winning steak. In 2025, Trump attended the Super Bowl, fled the stadium during a very political halftime performance by Kendrick Lamar, and backed the Kansas City Chiefs—who lost. Trump skipped this year’s Super Bowl after being warned that he’d be drowned in a sea of 69,000 boos, and the New England Patriots, his friend Robert Kraft’s team, still lost. Trump also attended the 2025 Ryder Cup, where team Europe beat the United States.

As part of the U.S.-backed “Board of Peace” 20-point plan to end Israel’s military assault on Gaza, Hamas is dissolving its civilian governing body in the Gaza Strip. Hamas’s head of administration, Mohammed al-Farra, resigned from his position on Monday. Hamas, which has controlled the territory for nearly two decades, has said that its ministries and staff will stay in place, and that it will still oversee security and policing in parts of Gaza left under its control. The National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, NCAG, was formed in January 2026 and is meant to take transitional control. “In practice,” says Amjad Iraqi, senior Israel-Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group, “Hamas is still the de facto governing authority on the Palestinian-populated side of Gaza. The NCAG, the Palestinian technocratic committee that’s supposed to take over those governing duties, is still basically stuck in Cairo and not allowed to enter into Gaza to assume those duties.” Since the deal was signed in October, Israel has continued to uphold its blockade of Gaza, preventing people and aid from traveling through its heavily policed borders. It has also violated the deal’s ceasefire provisions on a near-daily basis, killing nearly 1,100 Palestinians, including women, children and other unarmed civilians. “Very little of this, if any, is actually being called out either by [Board of Peace High Representative for Gaza Nickolay Mladenov] or by the U.S. officials, and what they’re actually doing is allowing Israel to keep bending the terms of the ceasefire, if not openly violating it,” says Iraqi.