The "Middle East and Terrorism" Blog was created in order to supply information about the implication of Arab countries and Iran in terrorism all over the world. Most of the articles in the blog are the result of objective scientific research or articles written by senior journalists.
From the Ethics of the Fathers: "He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it."
CENTCOM chief to supervise Lebanese Army deployment in two cities, in line with pilot program to determine whether Lebanon can thwart Hezbollah from regaining its strength.
According
to Arab media reports, the Lebanese Army will deploy to two towns from
which the IDF is set to withdraw as part of the pilot phase for
implementing the agreement.
According to the Saudi Asharq Al-Awsat,
the Lebanese Army will deploy to the towns of Zawtar al-Sharqiya and
Yohmor al-Shaqif under the supervision of US Central Command (CENTCOM)
Commander Gen. Brad Cooper, who is expected to arrive in Lebanon.
Cooper
will work alongside a team of observers tasked with ensuring that the
Lebanese Army's deployment prevents Hezbollah from reestablishing
control over the area.
On Sunday, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir commented publicly for the first time on the agreement between Israel and Lebanon.
"The
agreement signed with the Lebanese government is historic and
significant - the operational strength and military achievements the IDF
has secured in recent months created the conditions that made it
possible," he said. "We will honor the agreement and work to ensure its
success. The test now is the actions of both sides, and the coming
period will shape the future."
'The
Northern Command region is now the IDF’s main operational focus. We are
prepared to rapidly resume offensive operations in both Lebanon and
Iran if required.
"I want
to emphasize that the security of our troops is of the highest
importance. Troops from the 36th Division and our Commando Brigade
maintain operational control of the Beaufort Ridge area and are equipped
with all the tools and capabilities needed to degrade the enemy. All
IDF capabilities are here to continue supporting you in accomplishing
the mission."
Zamir
stressed, "Hezbollah has been severely weakened, and its operatives are
confined underground. The IDF maintains operational control of the area
and remains on high alert to deliver swift and decisive strikes should
the ceasefire be violated."
"I
would like to express my deep appreciation to the brigades, the
division, and the Northern Command region for their achievements and for
leading the efforts that brought about this agreement."
Responding to continued Hezbollah attacks on IDF soldiers, IDF takes out Hezbollah launcher, command centers.
The IDF on Sunday night struck three Hezbollah command centers in
southern Lebanon, in response to Hezbollah's violations of the ceasefire
agreement.
According to a statement from the IDF, the attacks
were carried out following repeated attacks on IDF soldiers in the
security zone. In the strikes, the IDF targeted Hezbollah command
centers in the Nabatieh and Mayfadoun areas in southern Lebanon.
Earlier on Sunday, IDF soldiers struck and dismantled a launcher that Hezbollah continued using to direct attacks at them.
"The
IDF will continue to operate to remove any threat posed to IDF soldiers
and will not allow the Hezbollah terrorist organization to harm Israeli
civilians and IDF soldiers," a military statement warned.
Having relearned the power of maritime chokepoints in the Gulf, the United States must now pivot its naval focus from Iran to the far greater challenge of the Taiwan Strait and China.
Due to the Iranian regime’s
institution of a “toll booth” in the Strait of Hormuz, international
commercial tanker and cargo traffic dropped from its prewar levels of
135 ships a day to levels near zero. As a result, Americans have
relearned the importance of maritime chokepoints. Since the start of
U.S. military operations against Iran on February 28, 2026, Americans
are also relearning the importance of having a large U.S. Navy fleet
that ensures these strategic maritime chokepoints remain free and open.
Despite the successful destruction of the majority
of Iran’s conventional military forces, especially its navy, President
Trump demonstrated the importance of maritime chokepoints. He did this
by implementing a blockade against all shipping going in and out of
Iran, as well as by implementing Project Freedom. According to Secretary
of War Pete Hegseth, Project Freedom brought out 125 million barrels of oil from the Persian Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz.
For much of the past 47 years, the Strait of Hormuz
has been a never-ending demand signal for U.S. naval forces. Among
missions that drew American focus and forces are Operation Praying
Mantis in the late 1980s, escorting commercial tankers from Iranian and
Iraqi attacks; supporting combat in Operation Desert Storm in 1991,
Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, and the current conflict with Iran.
For now, at least, major U.S. combat operations
appear to be over. The U.S. and Iran have signed a Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU), the vice president has traveled to Switzerland to
further the diplomatic discussions with Iran, and the secretary of state
has gone to the Middle East to shore up regional support. It is time
for Americans and the U.S. Navy to finally shift their undivided
attention to the Asia-Pacific region and the existential threat posed by
the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
The prospect of ending this conflict with Iran
should be a strategic inflection point in the outlook of America’s
national security strategy. Times have changed, and so should our focus
of attention. For instance, when the Iranian revolution occurred in
1979, and the Islamic revolutionaries stormed the U.S. embassy in
Tehran, the PLA Navy was one of the smallest, least modern navies in
Asia, if not the world, for a nation of that size. Since that time—a
period of American strategic blindness—the PRC built the largest navy on
the planet. Inconceivably, this occurred as successive U.S.
administrations gutted the U.S. Navy—from having just under 600 warships
in 1986, during the Reagan presidency, to today, where the U.S. Navy
has just under 300 warships. Fortunately, the Trump administration is
working to reverse this trend through massively increased budgets to
rebuild those numbers with programs like the Golden Fleet.
Given this strategic environment, there is another
strait in the Western Pacific that merits the same level of attention
from Americans and the U.S. Navy—the Taiwan Strait.
This unprecedented statement was articulated by PRC
state media and essentially established a new “coastal governance model”
for Beijing’s jurisdiction. In other words, the Chinese Communist Party
has made the same public declaration of sovereignty over the Taiwan
Strait as the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary regime in Tehran. What’s
different is that, unlike the Iranian Islamic regime, which has no navy,
the PLA Navy and other Chinese maritime forces have expanded their
presence in and around the Taiwan Strait and are now the dominant naval
force in the Western Pacific.
As recently noted by the Wall Street Journal, “for years, a lone Chinese warship was tasked with sailing up and down the Taiwan Strait.” However,
beginning in 2020, the PRC increased its naval presence in the Taiwan
Strait, as well as around the island. U.S. naval intelligence analysts
have observed that today “five or six Chinese warships surround Taiwan
at almost all times, with the count frequently higher as other naval
ships make intermittent visits.” Since 2022, the PLA has conducted a
series of military rehearsals, such as Justice Mission and Strait Thunder,
surrounding Taiwan with warships, jet fighters, bombers, drones, and
more, with the highest concentration of forces in the Taiwan Strait.
So what is to be done?
While continuing to make statements like “the United
States military flies, sails, and operates anywhere international law
allows” or our support for a free and open Indo-Pacific, the fact
remains that the CCP has not been deterred one iota from these words
alone. Likewise, sending U.S. Navy guided missile destroyers through the
Taiwan Strait on a quarterly basis, as has been done by successive
administrations from G. W. Bush through Trump 2.0, as part of our
“Freedom of Navigation” program, has had no impact on Xi and the CCP’s
intentions or the operations of the PLA naval and air forces.
What needs to be done is for the president to make a statement similar to the one he and Secretary of State Rubio have made about the Strait of Hormuz being an international waterway.
They should then immediately follow that up by sending one of our
Carrier Strike Groups (CSG) through the Taiwan Strait—something the U.S.
Navy has not done since 2007, when the USS Kitty Hawk made an emergency
northbound sortie through the Taiwan Strait to avoid a typhoon. The
next best possible candidate to make such a transit would be the Abraham
Lincoln CSG, which has been deployed for over seven months to the
waters south of the Strait of Hormuz, enforcing America’s blockade
against Iran and supporting Project Freedom.
In other words, it is time for the United States to
remind Beijing and the world that the Taiwan Strait does not belong to
any one nation and certainly is not the PRC’s—but is instead everyone’s
strait.
* * *
James E. Fanell served as a career naval
intelligence officer whose positions included senior intelligence
officer for China at the Office of Naval Intelligence and chief of
intelligence for CTF-70, Seventh Fleet, and the U.S. Pacific Fleet. He
is the co-author of the book Embracing Communist China: America’s
Greatest Strategic Failure.
"Hardly a day goes by that Erdogan doesn't call for the destruction of the State of Israel... we will also draw the attention of our American friends to these statements," Netanyahu said.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Turkish President Tayyip
Erdogan gesture as they pose for a photo, at a world leaders' summit on
ending the Gaza war, amid a U.S.-brokered prisoner-hostage swap and
ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt,
October 13, 2025. (photo credit: REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett/Pool)
A
bipartisan group of US House lawmakers is urging the Trump
administration not to approve the sale of F-35 stealth fighter jets to
Turkey, warning that Ankara's continued possession of the Russian-made
S-400 air defense system poses a serious threat to US military
technology.
In a letter sent to Secretary of State Marco Rubio
and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, the lawmakers argued that moving
forward with the sale would jeopardize American national security,
weaken trust among key regional allies, and reward Turkey despite
longstanding concerns over its defense ties with Moscow.
@SecRubio these terrorists when caught are forgiven and reintegrated into the society to cause further suffering and destruction. The Nigerian government can’t deny this
The
letter from congressional representatives further warned that the
Russian defense system "poses a direct threat to US military aircraft,
including the F-16 and the F-35, by enabling Russian intelligence to
gain insights into sensitive US technologies if these systems are
operated alongside one another."
The
lawmakers also cautioned that approving the sale would undermine US
credibility with allies that have consistently supported Washington's
strategic interests in the Eastern Mediterranean.
"Such
a decision would also send the wrong message to America's allies and
partners. Key US partners in the Eastern Mediterranean, including
Greece, Cyprus, and Israel, have consistently aligned with and supported
US security interests.
"Granting
Ankara access to advanced American fighter aircraft despite its conduct
would undermine these partnerships and embolden Turkey to intensify its
aggressive behavior in the region, thereby jeopardizing the regional
stability that we have worked so hard to preserve."
Netanyahu says Trump must remember Erdogan's anti-Israel statements
The
lawmakers also highlighted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's
repeated threats against Israel, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
mentioned during this week's cabinet meeting.
"Hardly a day goes by that Erdogan doesn't call for the destruction of the State of Israel," Netanyahu said Sunday.
"We
take these words very seriously, because if we have learned one thing
in the history of our people, when someone says he intends to destroy
you, take him seriously. We take things seriously, and we will also draw
the attention of our American friends to these statements. We do not
ignore them."
Later
on Sunday, MK Amit Halevi (Likud) called for the Turkish Consulate in
Jerusalem to be shut down. He claimed that it had become a de facto
embassy for Hamas.
"The
Turkish Consulate must be expelled from Jerusalem," he said. "This
extremist Islamist dictator (Erdogan), who hosts senior Hamas officials
in Ankara and Istanbul both before and after the October 7th massacres,
cannot be permitted to facilitate their agenda here.
"What
is happening inside this consulate is the direct, daily promotion and
support of Hamas. We are dealing not only with historical atrocities
from a century ago, but with a genocidal agenda against the Jewish state
today that Turkey, under Erdogan’s leadership, fully and completely
supports. This must end."
Like Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah believes that its weapons are sacred because they serve what it calls the "resistance" — or for Iran's regime, their survival. Diplomatic agreements signed by governments mean little to organizations that define themselves through permanent armed struggle.
Unfortunately, like the Gaza
initiative before it, the Lebanon agreement risks becoming another
document that looks impressive on paper but proves impossible to
implement because it rests on a false assumption: that terrorist
organizations honor agreements and voluntarily disarm.
[Hamas's] leaders openly reject demands to disarm while insisting that the group's weapons are "non-negotiable."
The same reality now confronts Lebanon and Iran.
The problem is that Hezbollah, like Iran, has already made clear that it has no intention of allowing the agreement to succeed.
Like Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah believes that its weapons
are sacred because they serve what it calls the "resistance" — or for
Iran's regime, their survival. Diplomatic agreements signed by
governments mean little to organizations that define themselves through
permanent armed struggle.
The contradiction in current American policy further complicates
matters. Within less than two weeks, the Trump administration helped
produce two agreements that appear to move in opposite strategic
directions.
This inconsistency cannot be ignored. One agreement attempts to
close Hezbollah's financial pipeline. The other opens the financial
pipeline of Hezbollah's primary patron.
One cannot realistically expect Lebanon to dry up Hezbollah's
finances while simultaneously allowing Iran to refill them. Nor should
anyone expect the Lebanese government to accomplish what it has
repeatedly failed to do for many years — defeat a terrorist group such
as Hezbollah.
Similarly, the Palestinian Authority has long claimed that it
could eventually govern Gaza and replace Hamas. That claim has always
lacked credibility. The Palestinian Authority is too weak to confront
Hamas militarily, just as the Lebanese government lacks both the
political consensus and military strength to disarm Hezbollah.
Words alone will not disarm Hezbollah. They have not disarmed
Hamas or Iran. The failed experience of Gaza should serve as a warning
rather than a model.
The lesson from all three — Gaza, Lebanon and Iran — is that
terrorist organizations do not surrender their weapons because diplomats
ask them to. They do not abandon their weapons because agreements are
signed in Washington, Geneva, or elsewhere. Terrorist organizations
survive through ideology, intimidation, military force, and financial
support.
Until those realities are addressed, diplomatic agreements will
remain little more than signatures on paper while Iran and its proxies
continue rebuilding, rearming, and preparing for the next war.
Like the Gaza initiative before it, the agreement Washington
has brokered between Israel and Lebanon risks becoming another document
that looks impressive on paper but proves impossible to implement
because it rests on a false assumption: that terrorist organizations
honor agreements and voluntarily disarm. Pictured: US Secretary of State
Marco Rubio (C, back) looks on as (L/R, front row) Israeli Ambassador
to the US Yechiel Leiter, State Department Chief of Staff Daniel Holler,
and Lebanese Ambassador to the US Nada Hamadeh sign the framework
agreement in Washington, DC, on June 26, 2026. (Photo by Saul Loeb/AFP
via Getty Images)
For decades, Western diplomats and decision-makers have clung to one
of the most dangerous illusions in the Middle East: the belief that
Islamist terrorist organizations can be persuaded through negotiations
and diplomatic agreements to surrender their weapons and abandon their
jihad (holy war) against Israel.
Reality continues to prove that persuading terrorist regimes to give
up their weapons is not the walk in the park they might have hoped.
More than seven months after US President Donald Trump unveiled his
peace plan for the Gaza Strip, the Iran-backed terrorist group Hamas
remains armed, entrenched, and firmly in control of large parts of the
territory. Despite months of negotiations conducted by Trump's "Board of
Peace," Hamas has refused to lay down its weapons or relinquish power.
Instead, it continues to attach impossible conditions to any discussion
of disarmament, foremost among them a complete Israeli withdrawal from
the Gaza Strip. Similarly, in Iran's negotiations with the US, the
ruling Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps regime demands a complete
Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon.
Under the current circumstances, such moves on the part of Israel would pave the way for endless deadly massacres of Israelis.
Now Washington has brokered another ambitious agreement -- this time
between Israel and Lebanon -- that seeks to restore Lebanese sovereignty
by eventually disarming Hezbollah and dismantling its military
infrastructure.
The agreement contains several welcome provisions and offers a
potentially historic opportunity to end decades of hostility between
Israel and Lebanon.
Unfortunately, like the Gaza initiative before it, the Lebanon
agreement risks becoming another document that looks impressive on paper
but proves impossible to implement because it rests on a false
assumption: that terrorist organizations honor agreements and
voluntarily disarm.
Hamas has already demonstrated the failure of that assumption. Hezbollah appears determined to prove it once again.
The failure of Trump's Gaza initiative should have served as an
important lesson. Instead, Washington continues to negotiate as if Hamas
were a rational political movement rather than a jihadist organization
whose declared objective is Israel's destruction.
Seven months of diplomacy have produced no meaningful results. Hamas
remains in power. It continues to recruit fighters, rebuild its military
infrastructure, and prepare for future attacks against Israel. Its
leaders openly reject demands to disarm while insisting that the group's
weapons are "non-negotiable."
Hamas has even demonstrated that it retains sufficient control over
the Gaza Strip to suppress internal opposition. On June 26, Hamas
succeeded in foiling an uprising that was being organized against its
rule. The organizers, Hamas opponents and critics living abroad, were
hoping that tens of thousands of Palestinians would take to the streets
that day to protest
the terrorist group's continued rule. This uprising did not take place
for a number of reasons, including tough Hamas security measures and
ongoing support for the terrorist group.
If Hamas can still intimidate Gaza's population nearly three years
after the October 7 massacre and more than seven months after Trump's
peace initiative, it is difficult to argue that diplomatic pressure has
significantly weakened the group.
The same reality now confronts Lebanon and Iran.
The framework agreement signed in Washington between Israel and
Lebanon deserves recognition for several positive elements. It formally
commits both countries to pursue peaceful relations, seeks to restore
the authority of the Lebanese state, provides for a process aimed at
dismantling Hezbollah's military infrastructure, and includes an
important provision designed to prevent reconstruction funds from
reaching Hezbollah and other non-state armed groups.
If implemented, these measures could help strengthen Lebanese sovereignty while reducing Iran's influence inside Lebanon.
The problem is that Hezbollah, like Iran, has already made clear that it has no intention of allowing the agreement to succeed.
Within hours of its signing, Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem denounced the framework agreement as "humiliation and disgrace," declared
it "null and void," and accused the Lebanese government of surrendering
Lebanon's sovereignty. He rejected any linkage between Israel's
withdrawal from southern Lebanon and Hezbollah's disarmament, and
described such demands as crossing "red lines."
Instead, Qassem insisted
that Lebanon adhere to the separate Memorandum of Understanding signed
between the United States and Iran – a document that does not require
Hezbollah to surrender its weapons.
Hezbollah's political representatives and allies quickly joined the campaign against the agreement.
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri warned that the deal represented "incitement to civil war."
Hezbollah parliamentarian Mohammed Raad accused the Lebanese government of "complete submission to America and the Zionist enemy."
Even the Iran-backed Houthi militia in Yemen entered the debate.
While calling on the Lebanese people to overthrow their government, it
warned that the agreement would either trigger civil war in Lebanon or
lead to Israeli occupation.
These reactions expose the central weakness of the agreement.
Hezbollah does not recognize the authority of the Lebanese government
to determine its military future. Like Hamas in the Gaza Strip,
Hezbollah believes
that its weapons are sacred because they serve what it calls the
"resistance" — or for Iran's regime, their survival. Diplomatic
agreements signed by governments mean little to organizations that
define themselves through permanent armed struggle.
The contradiction in current American policy further complicates
matters. Within less than two weeks, the Trump administration helped
produce two agreements that appear to move in opposite strategic
directions.
The agreement with Lebanon seeks to weaken Hezbollah by restoring
Lebanese sovereignty, dismantling the terrorist organization's military
infrastructure, and preventing reconstruction funds from reaching it.
The Memorandum of Understanding with Iran, however, provides
extensive economic relief to the Iranian regime. It allows renewed
Iranian oil exports, eases banking restrictions, and grants access to
frozen Iranian assets. These measures may stabilize relations between
Washington and Tehran, but they also strengthen the principal sponsor of
Hezbollah.
This inconsistency cannot be ignored. One agreement attempts to close
Hezbollah's financial pipeline. The other opens the financial pipeline
of Hezbollah's primary patron.
According to the US Treasury Department, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force transferred
more than $1 billion to Hezbollah since January 2025, through Lebanese
financial networks and exchange houses. American officials have also identified smuggling and financing routes involving Turkey, Iraq, Dubai, and other regional hubs.
Without cutting off Iranian funding, Hezbollah will simply rebuild.
Money finances salaries, recruitment, weapons procurement, tunnel
construction, propaganda, political patronage, and military
infrastructure. Destroying weapons depots accomplishes little if Tehran
continues replenishing Hezbollah's resources.
One cannot realistically expect Lebanon to dry up Hezbollah's
finances while simultaneously allowing Iran to refill them. Nor should
anyone expect the Lebanese government to accomplish what it has
repeatedly failed to do for many years — defeat a terrorist group such
as Hezbollah.
Successive Lebanese governments have promised to assert state
authority throughout the country. Yet Hezbollah has remained a state
within a state, maintaining its own army, intelligence apparatus,
communications network, financial system, and foreign policy.
Likewise, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has long claimed
that it could eventually govern Gaza and replace Hamas. That claim has
always lacked credibility. The PA is too weak to confront Hamas
militarily, just as the Lebanese government lacks both the political
consensus and military strength to disarm Hezbollah.
This disparity does not mean that the Israel-Lebanon agreement should
be dismissed. On the contrary, it offers an opportunity to strengthen
Lebanon's sovereignty, improve Israeli-Lebanese relations, and reduce
the risk of another devastating war.
The agreement will succeed only if it is enforced. This
condition means sustained American pressure on the Lebanese government
to fulfill its obligations, strict monitoring of Hezbollah's activities,
aggressive efforts to block Iranian financing, and clear consequences
if Hezbollah continues to rebuild its military capabilities.
Words alone will not disarm Hezbollah. They have not disarmed Hamas
or Iran. The failed experience of Gaza should serve as a warning rather
than a model.
The lesson from all three — Gaza, Lebanon and Iran — is that
terrorist organizations do not surrender their weapons because diplomats
ask them to. They do not abandon their weapons because agreements are
signed in Washington, Geneva, or elsewhere. Terrorist organizations
survive through ideology, intimidation, military force, and financial
support.
Until those realities are addressed, diplomatic agreements will
remain little more than signatures on paper while Iran and its proxies
continue rebuilding, rearming, and preparing for the next war.
"I think that we are going to print more than 3% growth for the year, and importantly, the energy-generated inflation, crude oil prices today are lower than they were on February 27," Bessent says
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is confident the United States will
weather the Iran conflict and a temporary spike in gas prices and finish
2026 with economic growth above 3% while hitting the Federal Reserve's
2% inflation target.
Bessent told Just the News that the recent revision upwards of the Gross Domestic Product is one of many signs the economy is still strong.
"The president rightly believed that Iran was an existential danger,
and had to be dealt with. It was a 90-day intervention there, but the
economy, our economy, did the best in the world in terms of any major
economy that pushed back on the naysayers, and first quarter, just got
revised up to 2.1%," Bessent said during an interview Friday on the Just the News No Noise TV program.
"I think that we are going to print more than 3% growth for the year,
and importantly, the energy-generated inflation, crude oil prices today
are lower than they were on February 27," he added.
Bessent also predicted that gasoline prices would "continue coming down" for the summer driving season.
"We will be back towards the Fed's 2% inflation target, and the
message is job growth has been substantial. Moving into April, until
April, we had seen real wage growth for working Americans," he said.
"We're going to get back on that track to try to help the American
people recoup some of their big affordability losses under the Biden
administration, where it was the worst inflation in 48 years," he added.
After months of debate in Europe on how to limit AI, Anthropic's limits on its highest level systems is shining a light on Europe's lack of large AI companies.
Anthropic’s decision to shut off access to its most advanced
artificial intelligence models raised alarm bells for European leaders
already worried about over-dependence on foreign partners.
Earlier this month, the White House ordered Anthropic — owner of
artificial intelligence assistant Claude — to cut off access to its
highest level systems for “any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States, over security issues. Anthropic responded by cutting off access to the models for everyone.
Fable 5 is the consumer version of Anthropic’s AI agent, while Mythos 5,
known for its ability to detect cybersecurity vulnerabilities, is the
version that was accessible only to a select network of digital
infrastructure companies.
“It is no longer reasonable to assume that we can totally rely on our
American partner,” Matthias Ecke, a German member of the European
Parliament said last year. It also comes amid debate within Europe over
the landmark AI Act designed to regulate artificial intelligence.
"Preventing AI from dominating humanity," Vatican says
“Artificial intelligence now demands to be disarmed,
freed from logic that turns it into an instrument of domination,
exclusion, and death,” Leo said. “To disarm does not mean rejecting
technology but preventing it from dominating humanity.”
But European tech startups and their advocates have called for the implementation of the AI Act to be delayed
or for the act itself to be weakened, arguing that it makes it too hard
for them to compete against rivals in the U.S. and China.
“The EU’s AI Act risks creating a fragmented, unpredictable
regulatory environment that will undermine innovation, discourage
investment, and ultimately leave Europe behind in the global AI race,”
read a 2025 letter signed by dozens of European AI founders and
investors. Rules are necessary, the letter said, “but don’t regulate us
into the ground.”
A new fictionalized scenario called Europe 2031 earning headlines in European mediapoints to a future where “over-regulation and a lack of ambition” mean that Europe is “left powerless as AI denominates defense, cybersecurity, and geopolitics."
The Iran-backed terror group is using the current "calm" period to improve both the range and the accuracy of their missiles, the sources told the Post.
Houthi supporters watch a televised address by the Houthi
leader, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, as they rally to commemorate the Ashura
day, marking the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet
Muhammad, in Sanaa, Yemen June 25, 2026. (photo credit: REUTERS/KHALED ABDULLAH)
The Houthis
are using the current ceasefire between Israel, the US, and Iran to
improve their missile capabilities, two Western intelligence sources
told The Jerusalem Post on Monday.
According
to the sources, the Iran-backed group has recently been conducting
missile tests aimed at enhancing its capabilities, with the objective of
improving both the range and the accuracy of its attacks.
Unlike
Hezbollah, and despite being an Iranian proxy, the Houthis have
launched relatively few attacks against Israel since the start of
Operation Rising Lion, Israel's military campaign against Iran.
Since resuming attacks on Israel on March 28, the group fired around six missiles and five drones toward Israeli territory. Previously, the Houthis announced they had suspended all attacks when the Gaza ceasefire agreement was reached in October 2025.
Houthis say they will attack if war in Gaza resumes
Last
week, Houthi leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi warned that the group would
intervene militarily in support of Hamas if the IDF launched a new
military operation in the Gaza Strip.
HOUTHI
TERRORISTS carry weapons as they stand near the site of Israeli
airstrikes in Sanaa, Yemen, in September. Iran has reportedly lost
control of the Houthis, the writer notes. (credit: KHALED
ABDULLAH/REUTERS)
"We
are in continuous coordination with our brothers across the resistance
fronts, and we will not hesitate to fulfill our duty in response to any
new escalation of aggression against any front, especially Gaza," he
said.
Al-Houthi also said that the group is closely monitoring developments in Somaliland and what he described as Israeli efforts to establish control over the Gulf of Aden, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, and the Red Sea.
"We
will not stand idly by in the face of an Israeli presence in
Somaliland. We will act whenever necessary to strike any concentration
of the Israeli enemy in Somaliland," he said.
Israel
has not carried out strikes in Yemen since its operation there on
September 25, 2025, including during the conflict with Iran, despite
continued Houthi attacks. However, several days ago, Defense Minister
Israel Katz warned that the Houthi leadership is "not immune."
"Israel's
account with the Houthis remains open - they will pay a price," he
said. "If their leader comes into our sights, we will eliminate him."
The State Department and USAID funded nearly $1.2 billion across 470 projects to counter Chinese influence worldwide, but there is no readily available or reliable data to track the projects or their effectiveness.
The inter-agency body managing the U.S. government’s only fund
dedicated to countering Chinese influence does not keep records of what
it funds, has never measured whether any of it worked, and has frozen
the one effort that would have tracked it, a report has found.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently published a report
finding that between fiscal year 2020 and 2023, the State Department
and USAID funded nearly $1.2 billion across 470 projects to counter
Chinese influence worldwide. But there is no readily available or
reliable data to track the projects.
Incomplete data and errors
“In response to GAO’s request, officials stated they had to ask the
bureaus and overseas posts managing the projects to compile data from
various sources, resulting in incomplete data and errors,” the GAO
report found. “For example, of the estimated 470 projects, officials did
not provide data on time frames for 129 and lines of effort for 38.
Officials also lacked data on the specific projects funded from nearly a
third of the approved proposals. As a result, working group officials
lack critical information to track how funds were used and determine
whether the funding ultimately supports the activities described in
approved proposals.”
The working group tasked with evaluating the spending didn’t even
have a framework to do so, and began developing one in 2023. Two years
later, in January 2025, an executive order paused foreign assistance
funds. GAO found that State Department officials won’t commit to
restarting the development of the framework.
In addition to not having the data, the inter-agency working group
officials did not review information about the results from prior
projects when deciding whether to fund new proposals. In other words,
the working group officials do not know what worked and what hasn’t when
determining whether to fund new or existing projects.
No measurement of effectiveness
Effectiveness has also never been measured across the portfolio.
Proposal guidance asks applicants to describe project-level monitoring,
but it has never required common indicators or planned evaluations that
could measure results across all projects against the goal of countering
Chinese influence. After five years and more than a billion dollars, no
one in the government has determined whether any of the money has
effectively countered Chinese influence.
Part of the problem comes from annual guidance that does not require
State Department foreign service officers with China expertise stations
in the region to review proposals for effectiveness or possible success.
This was done, according to the GAO, “to avoid the perception that RCOs
have a role in approving or rejecting proposals, which could ultimately
impede [the expert’s] working relationships with posts.”
This represents a striking choice by the institution: The people most
qualified to assess counter-China projects were left out of required
review to protect office relationships and avoid the appearance of
gatekeeping.
It took 58 teams from the State Department and 55 from USAID nearly
five months to provide the data requested by the GAO, meaning it took
more than 100 government teams nearly half a year to answer GAO’s basic
question about how taxpayer money was spent. Even after those teams
managed to find the information, what they provided was insufficient. Of
the 470 estimated projects funded since fiscal year 2020, the
government officials “could not provide data on award numbers for about
one-fifth, start and end dates for about one-quarter, and obligations
data for about one-third of projects.”
Further, the officials did not receive data on the specific projects
funded from nearly one-third of the approved proposals, meaning that
officials could not provide GAO with the names, award numbers, or
implementing teams of the projects.
The discovery is not all GAO has found. The GAO stated that
it is a pattern at the State Department. “We have previously reported
that State has not tracked key program data, leading to challenges in
providing readily available and accurate data on the status of
programming.”
As media outlets shut down their climate desks, corporations retreat from climate targets, and polls of voters show they rate climate change lowest on their priorities, critics of the “climate crisis” narrative are saying it may be time to move on.
American climatologist Dr. Judith Curry on Tuesday announced that she would no longer maintain her influential blog, “Climate Etc.”
“It’s time to declare victory against climate stupidity and move on,” said in her final post.
The reelection of President Donald Trump came with an overall shift in
the political landscape regarding climate and energy issues. Since then,
major media outlets shut down their climate desks, corporations are
easing back on emission-reduction targets, and polls consistently show
the public rates climate change low on their list of priorities.
Some figures like Curry who disputed the “climate crisis”
narrative — often in the face of vitriol from those who support it — are
now saying their efforts paid off and an era of climate hysteria is
coming to an end.
End of an era
Curry became a controversial figure
in the climate debate early on when her research conclusions failed to
align with the alarmist narrative. She was labeled a “climate denier,” a
slur critics direct at those who don’t support the belief that climate
change is not just a risk to be managed but an existential crisis
demanding the rapid elimination of fossil fuels.
Curry eventually left what she called the “craziness” of
academia to go to work in the private sector. She started her blog in
2010, and it’s been a resource for research and perspectives disputing
the dominant narrative ever since.
She explained on Tuesday that she was shutting it down over
the high cost of maintaining it — she spent $16,000 over the last four
years — but also because the political landscape has changed. She said
while the leaders of climate alarmism haven’t conceded defeat, there are
many signs that the world isn’t buying into it anymore.
“The whole issue has lost its political relevance,” Curry wrote.
Research shows less climate coverage
Media outlets are spending less time trumpeting stories
about climate change, and multiple analyses are finding outlets are
responding to a shift in audience interest.
In February, a report from the University of
Colorado-Boulder’s Media and Climate Change Observatory found that
global media coverage of climate change decreased 14%
in 2025 over the previous year. The lead author of the report
attributed the drop in coverage to financial changes in the media
business and the Trump administration commanding too much attention.
“Ongoing political economic headwinds and newsroom
consolidation and reductions have contributed to this diminished
coverage. Moreover, there is finite news space for competing stories,
with the Trump administration flooding the public sphere with news
stories across several domains,” University of Colorado professor Max
Boykoff said.
An analysis by the liberal advocacy group, Media Matters,
found that television coverage of climate change and global warming is
dropping precipitously. Combined, ABC, CBS and NBC had a drop in coverage of 35% in 2025 over the previous year, based on segment hours.
Another analysis by progressive media watchdog Fairness and Accuracy in Media found that there was nearly 32% less coverage of climate change
in 2025 than there was in 2024, based on searches of online outlets.
The study also found that the trend was continuing this year, with a 42%
decrease in the first three months of 2026 over the same period in
2021.
Newsrooms reorganize
Media outlets are also downsizing their climate desks. The Washington Post in February announced it was laying off 300 journalists, which included at least 14 climate journalists, according to anti-fossil fuel activist Sammy Roth,
citing unnamed sources. Roth estimates that, following the layoffs, the
Post will have five reporters remaining on its climate desk.
In May, NPR laid off its chief climate editor, Neela Banerjee, and it folded its 10-person climate desk into national coverage. This month, Politico announced that it was folding E&E News and related brands into Politco’s energy and environment coverage.
Writing in The Western Journal, Dr. Sterling Burnett
of the Heartland Institute points out that the Trump administration’s
decision to cut federal government subscriptions, including $8 million
to Politico, likely played a role in the decisions at Politico and NPR as much as waning audience interest has. But he also argues outlets are responding to audience analytics.
“By any measure, climate change just isn’t the draw it once
was, which is good news for the public whom the media has misinformed
and harangued on the need to change their dining, shopping, and travel
habits for far too long with false claims that climate change is dooming
the planet. That was never true!” Burnett wrote.
Last gasps or regrouping?
In her final post, Curry said that the “leaders of the
climate alarmism movement have not conceded defeat” and they continue
“whining” about the Trump administration and developments in climate
science that have retreated from more extreme outlooks on the impacts of
climate change.
There are also journalists at left-leaning publications who
remain committed to the narrative as if nothing has changed. This week,
a deadly heat wave hit Europe, and outlets like The Guardian are reporting that it is “impossible” without climate change.
The The Guardian cites the World Weather Attribution, an organization founded by anti-fossil fuel
activists and that produces controversial research in service to
climate advocacy and plaintiffs suing oil companies for climate change. One climate researcher compared its methodology to the ancient pseudo-scientific practice of alchemy.
Earlier this month, the Heartland Institute asked
Anthropic’s AI model Claude for help brainstorming ways for the
organization to brand its climate conferences website. Claude refused, saying that it couldn’t enhance branding of something that “misrepresents climate science.”
“The Heartland Institute is an organization known for its
work promoting climate change denial and disputing the scientific
consensus on human-caused climate change,” the AI response stated.
Artificial intelligence models often rely heavily on Wikipedia, which has received criticism for having a bias toward left-wing views on topics including climate change.
In some pockets, it appears the legacy alarmist narrative
remains heavily entrenched and may cling to life for years to come. Or
these items could be indications of a movement that is merely regrouping
for when the political environment is more accommodating of its
demands.
With people who have their finger on the pulse of the
climate debate like Curry declaring victory, it’s unlikely that
alarmists will ever regain the influence they once enjoyed.
