TFI Daily News

The world added nearly a million new millionaires in 2025 (Quartz) Global personal wealth grew by 10.8% in 2025, with nearly one million new U.S. dollar millionaires created over the course of the year, according to the UBS Global Wealth Report 2026. UBS built its findings from data spanning 56 markets that together account for an estimated 92% or more of all global wealth. More than 440,000 of those new millionaires were American—a pace exceeding 1,200 per day—making the U.S. responsible for close to half of the worldwide increase. The United Kingdom added more than 43,000 new millionaires, while France, Spain, Japan, and India each added more than 30,000. The world’s total millionaire population now stands at roughly 57.5 million. The report also counted 3,302 U.S. dollar billionaires, an increase of 383 people, or about 13.1%, over the prior year. UBS reported that median wealth—a figure more representative of typical adults than the mean—dropped across the majority of countries it tracked, even as averages climbed, a pattern the bank described as evidence of widening inequality.

The US, Canada and Mexico begin bumpy negotiations to renew North American trade pact (AP) Tourists from Chattanooga check into beach resorts in Cancun. Canadian auto parts feed factories in the American Midwest—and vice versa. Happy hour revelers raise glasses of Mexican tequila and mezcal at bars in Seattle. It adds up. The United States trades $1.9 trillion a year—$5 billion a day—worth of goods and services with its neighbors, Canada and Mexico. They have supplanted China to become America’s top two trading partners. So the stakes are high when it comes to fiddling with the rules that govern trade between the three countries. And after a year of President Donald Trump’s chaotic tariff policies, many U.S., Canadian and Mexican businesses would welcome the return of stability across North America. They are not likely to get it. The regional trade pact—the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement or USMCA—that Trump negotiated and boasted about came up for renewal Wednesday, starting a process that is likely to last months, maybe longer. Trump, characteristically, has added to the tension by threatening to pull out of his own agreement altogether.

ICE’s arrest of nun heading to church fuels bipartisan backlash in South Texas (Washington Post) Sister Leticia “Letty” Ugboaja was walking to Sunday Mass in McAllen, Texas, when federal immigration officers stopped her, confiscated her rosary and put her in handcuffs. The Catholic nun from Nigeria was released hours later after Democratic and Republican lawmakers intervened. Diocesan officials said she is a nurse who entered the country legally and was a certified nursing assistant at health center in Edinburg, Texas, for 10 years. Ugboaja’s arrest was the latest to trigger anger from both sides of the political aisle in South Texas. Rep. Monica De La Cruz (R) wrote on Facebook: “As I have repeatedly said, our immigration enforcement should target violent criminals. A Catholic nun on her way to church is not a threat to our community.” Bishop Daniel E. Flores condemned the arrest. “Sister Letty is a well-known source of goodness and hope in our community, and I am grateful she has been released. It is clear that Homeland Security enforcement protocols that make it possible for a religious sister, or anyone, to be detained and handcuffed while peacefully walking to Church on a Sunday morning are wildly disturbing and need to be reformed.”

After quakes trap Venezuelans, the government impedes rescuers and aid (Washington Post) On the earthquake-cracked streets of La Guaira, near a bridge in partial collapse, two bald men argued. One was a search-and-rescue worker from Fairfax, Virginia, sent by the U.S. government to try to reach people buried beneath the rubble left by the back-to-back temblors last week that killed more than 1,700 people. The other was Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello. The commander of much of Venezuela’s security apparatus, both official and unofficial, he’s been indicted by the United States on charges of narco-terrorism and remains under U.S. sanctions. In a video of the weekend encounter, Cabello appears to be blocking traffic. The American points behind him. “There’s somebody right over there that we’re trying to help,” he says, in English. “You don’t want us to help the person right over there?” Cabello, in Spanish, tells him to “push” his vehicle out of the way. The interaction laid bare one of the greatest challenges complicating the international race to save survivors trapped in the rubble: the Venezuelan government. A regime that has held onto power not through competence and electoral support but repression, censorship and fear is failing to facilitate rescue efforts that could save more lives, said survivors, first responders and former U.S. officials in interviews and on social media. An emergency medical team organized by ISAR Germany complained online that it had been “denied entry clearance despite Venezuela’s previously reported need.” Spanish rescuers said they were also thwarted: “We’re extremely saddened to not have been able to help.” The Chilean rescue group Topos Chile said Venezuelan authorities repeatedly interrupted their work to solicit documentation on suspicion that they were spies. Others have complained of arduous bureaucratic hurdles, blocked roads, checkpoints, demands for payments that appeared to be bribes and restrictions on journalists—all while thousands of Venezuelans remain missing.

Venezuelan medics fear earthquake aftermath will trigger widening medical crisis (AP) Doctors said Wednesday they feared the aftermath of Venezuela’s devastating twin earthquakes could trigger a widening medical crisis marked by untreated injuries, infectious diseases and a healthcare system already on the brink. Thousands of displaced Venezuelans are sleeping in crowded shelters or outside without access to clean water amid dismal sanitary conditions following the June 24 earthquakes which officials say killed at least 2,295 and left more than 11,000 injured. Aid workers said the aftermath of the quakes has become a major medical crisis that, unless quickly controlled, would take more lives in the days and weeks ahead. The emergency has laid bare Venezuela’s chronic shortage of doctors, the result of years of economic crisis, underfunding and emigration.

Ireland Is Becoming a French Military Protectorate (Foreign Policy) Ireland has long been a free rider in security and defense. Officially neutral and spending an infinitesimal 0.22 percent of GDP on its military in 2025, the country is literally defenseless. With only four naval vessels available on a rotational basis, patrol ships that lack technicians to operate weapons, and zero fighter jets, Ireland is incapable of protecting itself, its waters, and the undersea infrastructure that surrounds the island and on which trans-Atlantic communications depend. Since it has little hope of handling security on its own, Dublin recently announced that it was seeking to engage the French Navy to provide temporary air defense during important European Council meetings. In January, Dublin and Paris signed a joint strategic framework that will run until 2030. In February, there followed a military cooperation agreement covering joint training, intelligence sharing, and other areas. Most significantly, Ireland has outsourced its military procurement, including legal, administrative, and logistical control, almost entirely to France. France’s Direction Générale de l’Armement (DGA), whose official stated purpose is to equip the French military and promote French arms exports, is now managing Ireland’s rearmament.

Facing barbs and pressure from Trump, Europe’s leaders close ranks (AP) U.S. President Donald Trump’s attacks on Italy’s premier have had an unintended consequence. After Trump questioned Italy’s reliability as a wartime ally and claimed Giorgia Meloni had groveled for his attention, European leaders rallied to Meloni’s side, thawing what had been a frosty relationship over her hard-right political roots. It is the latest example of how the often divisive American president is helping to draw Europe closer together. European leaders are finding more reasons to coordinate on defense, tariffs and foreign policy as they confront wars in Ukraine and Iran, a ballooning trade deficit with China, and threats from Russia. That leaves Trump, who has often preferred to negotiate with European countries individually, with less ability to do so, analysts say.

A Dispute Over Opening Hormuz Drives a Wedge Into U.S.-Saudi Relations (WSJ) More than 100 U.S. military aircraft were taking off from bases and warships across the Middle East as part of an effort to crack open the Strait of Hormuz this past spring when they hit a glitch: Saudi Arabia, whose bases and airspace were critical to the mission, was saying no. The pushback forced the U.S. to abort Project Freedom, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter, ending the military operation to guarantee safe passage for ships that President Trump had launched hours earlier. Incensed, the White House threatened to hold back delivery of interceptors that Saudi Arabia needs to shoot down Iranian missiles and drones, if the kingdom didn’t reverse course, U.S. and Arab officials familiar with the discussions said. Saudi Arabia ultimately backed down, but U.S. officials said at the time that the damage wouldn’t easily be undone. Now, the U.S. is considering reducing its military footprint in the kingdom, according to U.S. officials familiar with the planning process. Saudi officials told the White House that any attempt to topple the Iranian regime would close the Strait of Hormuz, rattle oil markets, and hurt the U.S. economy, as well as damage their and the region’s stability, the Arab officials said. The kingdom and other Gulf states said publicly they wouldn’t allow their bases or airspace to be used to attack Iran. The U.S. started the war alongside Israel anyway, exacerbating Saudi concerns that its investment in the relationship wasn’t paying off in actual influence, according to the Arab officials. Iran responded by launching missile and drone attacks against Gulf population centers, energy infrastructure and airports in an effort to raise the economic and political costs of the conflict.

Palestinians face uncertain future as Gaza marks 1,000 days of war (AP) It’s the 1,000th day of war since a Hamas-led attack on Israel that sparked the war in Gaza. Other conflicts have emerged in the region, and fragile ceasefires show scars of persistent attacks. Both Israelis and Palestinians are weary of the strain. The fate of over 2 million Palestinians in Gaza, largely displaced and living amid ruins, remains uncertain. Israeli forces controlled over half of the territory under the ceasefire that took effect on Oct. 10, but Israel’s government has expanded that and says it aims to hold 70%. Few people can get in or out. Further ceasefire steps, including Hamas’ disarmament and the immense task of reconstruction, have stalled. “Much more needs to be done so that even a semblance of normality can come back, and we are far, far away from this,” the International Committee of the Red Cross regional director, Nicolas von Arx, said this week.

Trump filing shows he took in about $1.2 billion from crypto businesses last year (AP) President Donald Trump took in nearly $1.2 billion dollars from his crypto businesses last year, a federal filing released Tuesday shows, locking in profits while his investors were socked with losses. Mere startups when he took the oath of office, the new ventures have now eclipsed in revenue much of his vast property portfolio that took him decades to accumulate. Fueling their rise were billionaire investors and Trump’s own move to quash a federal crackdown on the industry. Trump also took in millions last year from selling Trump-branded bibles, sneakers and other small items in another unprecedented move for the presidency. The sale of Trump-branded watches alone brought in $4.7 million. The 927-page disclosure form paints a stark, if incomplete picture of the massive growth of the president’s wealth since taking office last January through a web of business interests—many that have benefited from the policy moves of Trump’s own government. Trump has insisted that his sons direct his finances but the arrangement rejects the conflict of interest protections that his recent predecessors in office had instituted.

In San Francisco, Even $180,000 Tech Salaries Are No Longer Enough (NYT) Katrine Razniak, 27, arrived in San Francisco in 2022 as a recruiter at LinkedIn, earning $70,000 a year. Her annual salary soared to $180,000 when she joined the software company Rippling to lead a team of account managers. Her partner, Adam Woodbury, 39, moved to the city in 2021 and earns $185,000 as a software engineer. These days, even those six-figure salaries are no longer enough in San Francisco. When Ms. Razniak and Mr. Woodbury tried to find a one-bedroom apartment for under $5,000 a month this spring, they struck out. They looked at around 30 properties over three months, but all were too expensive and too in demand. At one listing for $5,200 a month, they found 30 people had added their names to a sign-up sheet within an hour of the open house. They ended the search. But even if they had found a place, a question lingered: whether a city where groceries and dinner with friends had become sources of financial concern was somewhere they could build a future. “I don’t feel completely hopeless, but I don’t think I can stay in S.F.,” Ms. Razniak said. As a wave of artificial intelligence wealth is set to deluge San Francisco, even young tech workers who came to the city chasing the Silicon Valley dream have started to say an affordable future feels increasingly out of reach.

The New ‘Bootstrap’ to the American Dream: Deep Cleaning Cars (WSJ) Benjamin Scheets was halfway through his junior year in college when he decided to turn his side hustle into a full-time job. It involves rags and a lot of dirty water. He dropped out of Kent State University in May. The 22-year-old now runs his own business scrubbing every sheet metal curve and interior corner of a vehicle until there isn’t a smudge or crumb left. He runs his car detailing operation out of his parents’ garage, and brings in $5,000 a month in profits. “There’s a real feeling of satisfaction doing this work,” said Scheets, who started detailing cars for spare cash in high school and now charges $180 on the low end to detail a sedan and as much as $2,000 to add full protective coating. He has booked out two months in advance and is looking to hire an assistant. A customer might pay hundreds of dollars to have someone come to their driveway and fully detail their car, giving it a deep clean both inside and out. Additional services, such as paint correction and ceramic coating intended to help protect the car’s finish and give it extra shine, can cost still more. “We’re seeing an influx of young people,” says Nicholas Vacco, who runs a $1,995, three-day training course in Pittsburgh for car detailers. He said inquiries from students around the country have risen more than 50% in the past four years.

Cuban official says talks with the US are at a standstill (AP) Talks between Cuba and the U.S. are at a standstill, despite the island recently approving a series of free-market reforms, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez announced Tuesday. He noted that the newly unveiled reforms were neither mentioned nor discussed in earlier talks between the two nations. But he said it was striking that they “were met with a new package of unilateral coercive measures ... against Cuba.” Earlier this month, the U.S. slapped new sanctions on Cuban President Miguel Díaz Canel and other officials, as well as on companies key to the island’s crumbling economy. Rodriguez added that while the conduct of U.S. government officials was “generally respectful” during earlier talks, he said it is accompanied by “constant aggressive statements against Cuba, threats of military aggression, and the imposition of additional coercive measures.”

Aid Workers Fear Disease Outbreaks in Venezuela After Quakes (NYT) As the window of opportunity shrank in the search for earthquake survivors trapped under rubble in Venezuela, relief efforts on Tuesday began to focus on the longer-term ripple effects of disaster that are often less reported. One of the most pressing consequences is the destruction of what little infrastructure for clean water existed in affected areas, raising the risk of contamination and the spread of illnesses like cholera and typhoid fever. “The water distribution system collapsed as a result of the earthquake,” said Susana Arroyo, a spokeswoman for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital. Ms. Arroyo confirmed in a WhatsApp message on Tuesday that in parts of La Guaira, one of the states hit hardest, bottled water remained the only option for bathing, brushing teeth, washing hands, cooking and everything else. Many in La Guaira state lacked access to running water before the earthquakes, relying on mobile water tankers for basic needs, Ms. Arroyo said.

Hospitals in Europe are gearing up for the next heat wave armed with lessons from this one (AP) Ice. Urgently and in large quantities. At a Paris-region hospital, emergency medics needed it to plunge patients into cold-water baths to speedily bring down their temperatures so they wouldn’t join the growing tally of dead from a record-smashing heat wave. But lacking an ice-making machine, where to get it? A fast-food restaurant helped out last week. The Paris-Saclay Hospital has now ordered its own ice machine, eagerly awaited in the emergency department for a future attack of sizzling heat. Just as doctors brace for the annual flu season, they know that fighting heat waves is becoming their new normal. The World Health Organization on Tuesday described the heat wave as “a dress rehearsal” for summers that “will be harder.” “Europe is warming at more than twice the global average. Heat waves are no longer one-off freak events,” it said. “Every summer we fail to prepare for them is a summer we pay for in lives.”

Whatever You Do in Russia, Don’t Talk About the War (NYT) The war in Ukraine is a “Special Military Operation,” even though it’s the biggest conflict in Europe since World War II. Across Russia, officials blame fuel shortages on “unscheduled maintenance at refineries” without noting a cause, as Ukrainian drones attack fuel refining facilities in the country. And Russia’s central bank governor has talked of the “structural transformation of the economy,” as code for military spending that has spiraled and reoriented the economy around the military-industrial complex. For years, President Vladimir V. Putin has insulated Russian society from the consequences of his war in Ukraine, using euphemisms as a psychological shield. But as the war increasingly comes home, the mismatch between rhetoric and reality is becoming a source of frustration for ordinary Russians.

Russian attack kills at least 13, injures scores and causes damage across Ukraine capital (AP) Russia launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine’s capital overnight into Thursday that killed at least 13 people and injured scores as loud explosions shook Kyiv for hours. The attack with ballistic and cruise missiles and drones damaged buildings and civilian infrastructure across the city. The attack killed 13 people in Kyiv and injured 86 more, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko. Damage was recorded in 30 locations across the city, mainly residential buildings and civilian infrastructure.

Xi touts Chinese wisdom and solutions as a model for developing nations (AP) China’s leader held up his country’s rapid industrialization as a new pathway for developing nations in a speech Wednesday that projected a growing confidence both at home and on the world stage. Xi Jinping, now in his 14th year in power, noted that China achieved in a few decades what it took centuries for rich countries to do. “We advocate the building of a community with a shared future for humanity, providing Chinese wisdom, Chinese solutions and Chinese strength for addressing major issues facing humanity,” he said at an event marking the 105th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Communist Party. China, which has long bristled at U.S. dominance of the international system, has said it doesn’t want to replace the global order but change it to better represent the interests of developing countries.

Israel has bombed and bulldozed €150m of EU-funded buildings in Gaza and West Bank (EU Observer) Israel has damaged at least €150m of European taxpayer-funded structures in Gaza and the West Bank, but not paid back one euro, amid concern its impunity will cause further destruction. The European Gaza Hospital in Khan Younis (€50.5m) and the Southern Gaza Seawater Desalination Plant in Deir al-Balah, plus its 18km pipeline (€30m), were the most expensive EU-funded structures hit by Israeli airstrikes since 7 October 2023, when the current war began. European taxpayers had funded an average of €10m a year in other Gaza infrastructure in the 2014 to 2020 period, according to figures from the EU foreign service and the UN, putting another €60m of items in harm’s way. And individual member states added to the tally.

After U.S.-Iran War, Oman Said to Propose Hormuz Fee Plan (NYT) Iran and U.S.-allied Oman are moving forward with plans to collect payment for ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz, despite public American objections, according to an Iranian official and four diplomats with knowledge of the matter. If enacted, the plans would be a significant change from the prewar status in the strategic waterway, underscoring how the American-Israeli decision to attack Iran on Feb. 28 has changed the Middle East in far-reaching and unanticipated ways.

36 students and 3 teachers missing after gunmen raided a school in northeastern Nigeria (AP) Thirty-six students are missing after gunmen raided a school in northeastern Nigeria, authorities said Tuesday. The attack, which happened Monday at the Lassa Day Secondary School in the Askira-Uba area of Borno state, left at least one teacher dead. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but an insurgency from armed groups in the region has killed thousands and displaced millions.

Supreme Court Justices Reject Trump’s Effort to End Birthright Citizenship (NYT) The Supreme Court rejected President Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship, and the justices reaffirmed the long-held principle that nearly all children who are born on U.S. soil are American citizens. Mr. Trump’s executive order had aimed to prevent babies born to undocumented immigrants and temporary foreign residents from automatically becoming Americans. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the majority, explained that Mr. Trump’s executive order violated the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. “Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights—to freely participate in our political community,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “The framers of the 14th Amendment extended that promise to ‘every free-born person in this land.’” He added: “We keep that promise today.” The 6-3 decision capped a more than decade-long effort by Mr. Trump to use the issue as a political tool.

The Force Hollowing Out the Economy (NYT) We are witnessing one of the largest peacetime mobilizations of capital in modern American history. Topping $1 trillion annually by next year, the artificial intelligence buildout is expected to rival or surpass previous technological booms at their peaks—rail, electrification and the internet revolution. Many economists believe that at a time of rising inflation, a weakening job market and global unrest, this boom is keeping the U.S. economy afloat. Look more closely, however, and the picture changes. A.I. is vacuuming up so much of our land, talent, semiconductor chips, building materials—and, above all, so much of our money, that it is beginning to crowd out the rest of the economy. In other words, A.I. isn’t merely compensating for the weakness in the rest of the economy. It is, at least in part, causing it. Researchers, economists and other market analysts are ringing the same alarm. They are particularly worried that the deluge of investment, much of which is plowed into data centers, is beginning to starve the rest of the economy of the money it needs (to say nothing of the talent and physical materials).

‘No One’s Coming to Save Us but Us’: Gen Z Runs for Office (NYT) Melat Kiros was fresh out of Notre Dame Law School in 2023 when she was fired by her New York law firm after publishing a lengthy letter sharply criticizing Israel’s government, raising questions about its historical legitimacy and challenging the firm’s response to law students engaging in pro-Palestinian activism. In Tuesday’s Democratic primary in Colorado, under the banner of the Democratic Socialists of America, Ms. Kiros, 29, is again challenging the establishment. This time, she hopes to defeat Representative Diana DeGette, 68, a liberal Democrat who was elected to her Denver-area seat a year before Ms. Kiros was born. The showdown is the latest between the mainstream Democratic Party and its ascendant, youthful left wing, but Ms. Kiros represents more than the D.S.A. She is one of several Gen Z candidates this year fueled by the generational frustrations of their pandemic-marred youth, social media-fueled isolation, artificial intelligence and the war in Gaza. “We’re seeing just how broken the system is, and we’re seeing that no one’s coming to save us but us,” Ms. Kiros said.

Efforts to Rescue Venezuela Quake Victims Grow More Desperate (NYT) Rescuers on Monday pulled a 21-year-old man out of the rubble of a collapsed building in La Guaira, the hardest-hit state in earthquake-shattered Venezuela, where he had been trapped for 106 hours. The rescue operation lasted 43 hours, President Delcy Rodríguez said on social media, where she shared video of workers hoisting the man, Aaron Levi Cantillo, onto a stretcher. Onlookers erupted in cheers. The possibility of finding more survivors continued to fuel rescuers digging through collapsed buildings in northern Venezuela on Monday, even as the search was growing increasingly desperate with every passing hour. The death toll from Wednesday’s 7.2- and 7.5-magnitude quakes rose to 1,719 people, with more than 5,000 injured and 15,800 displaced, the Venezuelan government said on Monday. But the official numbers are probably a vast undercount. Doctors have said that in La Guaira officials have been processing about 750 bodies each day.

Peru’s Presidential Vote Gives the Right in Latin America Another Win (NYT) After three failed presidential campaigns, years of legal troubles and over a decade as a polarizing opposition leader, Keiko Fujimori has finally won the nation’s highest office by becoming Peru’s first woman elected president. Her victory brings the political movement founded by her late father back to power a quarter century after the collapse of his authoritarian government. According to a final vote count published by the electoral authorities on Monday, Ms. Fujimori, 51, defeated her leftist opponent, Roberto Sánchez, by 49,641 votes, ending one of the closest elections in the country’s history. When Ms. Fujimori takes office on July 28, she will join a growing bloc of conservative Latin American leaders, reinforcing a rightward shift across the region and potentially bolstering President Trump’s efforts to expand U.S. influence in the hemisphere.

6 Are Killed During a Rare Mass Shooting in Germany (NYT) A 45-year-old man killed six adults and wounded several others in a shooting attack at a child welfare facility in northern Germany on Monday, in what the local authorities described as a dispute over the custody of the man’s daughter. The daytime assault in the small city of Stade, roughly 30 miles west of Hamburg, killed six employees of the facility and a neighboring youth center, and it shocked a country where strict gun laws have made mass shootings a rarity.

Zelenskyy condemns ‘horrific attacks’ as Russian strikes kill 12 and wound 40 in Ukraine (AP) Russian missiles and drones killed at least 12 civilians and injured 40 others in Ukraine on Monday in what President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described as “horrific attacks.” Since Russia launched its all-out invasion of its neighbor more than four years ago, its forces have conducted bombing in an effort to destroy Ukraine’s infrastructure and sap morale. More than 16,000 Ukrainian civilians have been killed, according to the U.N. A Russian missile targeting infrastructure struck the central city of Dnipro, killing six people and wounding 29, Dnipropetrovsk regional head Oleksandr Hanzha said. Russian drones also hit a passenger minibus in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, killing three and wounding six, including a child, Zelenskyy said on social media.

Ukraine’s expensive attacks on Russia (Foreign Policy) Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is beginning to have serious ramifications domestically within Russia, as new Ukrainian tech that can destroy Russian infrastructure even in Moscow has led to economic and psychological ramifications, capped off by a mid-June attack that disabled the largest oil refinery in the capital through 2027. Ukraine’s efforts have reduced refining capacity by an estimated 700,000 barrels per day, and over half of Russia’s regions are rationing fuel. This has caused other issues: high inflation, a labor shortage for the first time in modern history, inevitable government spending cuts and residential construction down 40 percent in Q1. It’s all warning signs for economic trouble that has rattled many among Russia’s elite. Complicating matters further is that ending the war might not actually solve this problem, as the economic shock of cutting all the government money that had been pouring into defense industries might cause an even larger problem.

Iran says this. The US says that. (AP) The United States and Iran have less than 60 days to negotiate a permanent end to the war, but they still seem to be at odds over the interim deal they reached this month. It’s not even clear when the two sides will meet again. “The situation is sensitive and complex,” a senior Iranian negotiator, Kazem Gharibabadi, posted Monday on X. Talks are just one of the pressing questions. Others include the Strait of Hormuz, which the U.S. says is open while Iran insists on a measure of control. The issue led both sides to carry out days of military strikes that appeared on Monday to have ended.

Israeli troops push into a town in Syria (AP) As Israeli troops and vehicles entered the town of Abdin in southern Syria, residents blocked the roads with rocks, and some young men and boys threw stones to push back the military patrol. Tensions in this part of the country created by a buffer zone occupied by Israeli forces have flared into violence in recent days, leaving residents anxious that more escalation is coming. Residents of Abdin, located near a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone now controlled by Israeli troops, tried to resist against a military incursion Sunday. Residents said Israeli troops fired warnings shots at walls and between the angry protesters, before firing artillery rounds at the village. No one was harmed in the exchange, but most residents fled, and most were still too afraid to return on Monday. Many fear that there will now be more intense incursions and raids following the skirmish. “They come into the village regularly, every few days,” said resident Mohammad al-Hassan, standing not far from a group of children looking at an exploded shell. “They come in armored 4x4 vehicles, they roam around the village and search some houses, they knock on doors and if people don’t answer the door they break it down and enter the houses. Women and children start screaming, it’s a terrifying thing, them coming here.”

Anti-immigration sentiment in South Africa reaches a fever pitch (The Week) South Africa is a melting pot of culture, with “Zimbabweans trained as doctors but driving Ubers, Ethiopians running bustling restaurants and Congolese selling colorful wax print fabrics,” said NPR. “All of them are now under threat” as a result of continued pressure from anti-migrant groups. For several months, “anti-immigrant protesters, many brandishing sticks, have been marching through the streets.” Many of them chant “Mabahambe,” a Zulu phrase meaning “they must go.” The protests have also “sparked attacks against foreigners” throughout South Africa, said The Associated Press. As the violence and attacks continue, several of the most notable anti-immigration groups have “set what they are calling a June 30 deadline for people in the country illegally to leave and the government to take action” against undocumented migrants. The flash point of xenophobia is largely because of the country’s large number of immigrants. As “one of Africa’s richer countries, South Africa has long attracted migrants from elsewhere in Africa seeking a better life,” said the AP.

Repair Backlog Plagues Federal Buildings (NYT) Rain has been seeping into an Internal Revenue Service building in Atlanta through leaks in the roof that have gone on for years. The mold in Veterans Affairs work spaces in Hilo, Hawaii, got so bad that visitors complained. And on any given day, people in an Oakland, Calif., federal building are at risk of getting stuck in one of its outdated elevators. Across the federal government, employees are working in buildings that have persistent health and safety problems, in part the result of decades of backlogged maintenance that totals as much as $50 billion, according to one recent estimate by an oversight board. In several years, the cost is set to exceed the entire value of the federal government’s real estate portfolio, the Public Buildings Reform Board said earlier this year. Unlocking money for repairs is a lengthy and bureaucratic process. Under federal law, Congress must approve major improvements to buildings run by the General Services Administration that total more than $3.96 million—an amount that would cover the cost of replacing just three elevators at a time when the government needs to replace dozens. The approval process takes an average of 435 days, the G.S.A. said, and in many cases even longer, meaning costs balloon as problems fester.

As nation turns 250, many Americans say the Stars and Stripes is now a red flag (NBC News) To fly or not to fly an American flag? That was never a question for Bruce Watson, who has put his national pride on display for years—and nudges neighbors in his small New England town to do the same. “I’m very proud of our flag,” the writer said. “It’s the symbol of ‘We, the People.’” But as the polarized nation marks its 250th birthday, Watson, 72, worries his Stars and Stripes may now need an asterisk. “If we do fly the flag, we will also put out signs to make it clear that we are not MAGA,” he said. The American flag is a symbol striped with many meanings, whether it’s hung on front porches, waved in parades, protests and World Cup matches, or stamped on lapel pins and boxing trunks. Like so much else in American life, it has also been tangled up in politics and the policies of President Donald Trump.

European Soccer Fans Marvel at America’s Suburbs (WSJ) Frank Everink hadn’t even heard of Kansas City. But when the Dutch soccer fanatic saw his team would be playing along the border of Missouri and Kansas, he made a detour in his worldwide road trip. Everink got into his camper van and drove south from Toronto, making stops in Detroit, Chicago and Indianapolis. Along the way, he—and other European fans who flocked to Kansas City for the World Cup—beheld the fruits of the American economy from a vantage point few foreign tourists typically see: suburban superstores, hulking plates of food, quiet streets. He marveled at the sprawling houses, a contrast from the tightly packed homes of the Netherlands. “It’s spacious,” he said. “You go here for your shopping, and there for your dentist. People are so rich here.” The throngs of Dutch fans that flooded Kansas City and its suburbs this past week got a taste of day-to-day life in the U.S., reigniting a long-running trans-Atlantic debate: Who lives better, Americans or Europeans? The data sheds some light: The average American home is about 1,800 square feet, with new single-family homes measuring well over 2,000 square feet, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Europeans’ homes are about 1,100 square feet on average. Such measures of wealth offer only a partial view of what it is like to live on these two continents. Europeans might earn less and own less stuff, but they also work less hours and, many argue, benefit from stronger social safety nets. According to American economist and former New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, “It’s misleading to conclude that Europeans have a clearly lower standard of living than Americans when they have essentially just made different choices.”

A Community Comes Together to Search for Survivors (NYT) A single jackhammer. A pair of pickaxes. Men swinging with all their might to break through multiple stories of concrete to try to reach the living. The scene on Saturday night in San Bernardino, a middle class neighborhood in Caracas, showcased both the severe shortage of heavy machinery needed to rescue survivors following Wednesday’s double earthquakes and the massive community mobilization that has taken place to try to fill that gap. At the Residencia Rita, an apartment building that crumbled when the quakes hit, finding anyone alive three days later would have been a miracle. And yet, hundreds of people gathered to help locate survivors on Saturday. They lined up like firefighters, passing buckets of rubble down the line to try to clear the way. “We will always have hope,” said María Alejandra Navarro, 25, a journalist with rescue training who said she had brought a team of 14 volunteers to the scene.

Andy Burnham says he’d hand more power to local governments if he becomes UK leader (AP) Andy Burnham, likely the next U.K. prime minister, pledged Monday to give away a chunk of his power by handing greater autonomy to local leaders in a “circuit-breaker” for the sclerotic British state. The former mayor of Greater Manchester also said he would move part of the prime minister’s office from London’s 10 Downing St. to northwest England as part of “the biggest rebalancing of power our country has seen.” Burnham set out a 10-year plan to get “good growth in every postcode,” in a country where wealth and power are concentrated in London and the south of England.

Europe’s record heat has overwhelmed Paris mortuaries and left families in distress (AP) Every few minutes, the mortuary owner’s phone rings. Since a record-smashing heat wave started taking lives and storage space for bodies in Paris and beyond, the funeral directors and mourning families calling him mostly have the same question: Do you have room for one more? With all 32 places in his cold room taken, Zouhaeir Hertelli reluctantly has to gently say “Non,” over and over and over again. “We’re facing a really catastrophic situation,” he said. “I’m getting hundreds of calls.” As the historic heat wave shifted its deadly temperatures eastward this weekend to other parts of Europe, France began counting the human cost it left in its wake. The statistical and public health work of tallying heat-related deaths could take weeks or months. But it’s already apparent that the toll exacted by the intense, unrelenting extreme temperatures was terrible in France, the first country hit from mid-June, particularly among older people who died at home.

Ukrainian drones set another Russian oil refinery ablaze as Putin admits fuel shortages (AP) Ukraine kept up its heavy drone assault on Russia, setting fire to a major oil refinery in the south, as President Vladimir Putin acknowledged for the first time on Sunday that the country was facing a “certain deficit” of fuel and vowed to strengthen protection of oil facilities and boost fuel output. Ukraine has markedly stepped up its long-range attacks on Russian military industries and energy facilities in recent months, aiming to cut Moscow’s revenue for its invasion—now in its fifth year—and make Russians feel the consequences. The campaign has choked Russian fuel supplies, causing widespread shortages and long lines at gas stations across the country and prompting authorities in many regions to introduce fuel rationing.

Pakistani airstrikes kill 36 civilians in Afghanistan and wound 160, officials say (AP) Overnight ground operations and strikes by Pakistani forces have killed at least 36 civilians and injured more than 160 others, Afghan officials said Monday, as tensions between the neighbors further escalated. One Afghan official said the attacks would be met with retaliation. Pakistani security forces carried out a ground operation along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border late Sunday, followed by strikes against militant hideouts and safe havens, killing 29 fighters, Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said. Pakistan said the operations were launched in response to multiple militant attacks across Pakistan.

In Beirut’s Southern Outskirts, Life Slowly Returns Amid Ruins (NYT) In Dahiya, a maze of neighborhoods south of Beirut where the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah holds sway, traffic jams are back. Bakeries again pull trays of Lebanese flatbread from ovens. Cafes, draped in the flags of the nations competing in the World Cup, are filled with men and women watching the matches and lingering late into the night. For more than three months, the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah brought airstrikes, evacuation warnings and an exodus of tens of thousands of people from these densely populated commercial and residential neighborhoods. Now, after a series of stop-and-start cease-fires, and the signing of a U.S.-brokered preliminary deal between Israel and Lebanon, life is returning almost as quickly as it vanished, even as mounds of rubble remain between buildings blown open to the sky. “We are back,” said Mohamed Trad, 45, who manages a coffee and hookah shop. “This is the best place in Lebanon.”

US and Iran pause strikes but disagree over next steps on talks (AP) The United States and Iran on Monday separately announced they will send delegations to Qatar this week, though Tehran insisted it has not agreed to meet with the U.S. “at any level” after attacks across the Persian Gulf over the weekend challenged negotiations to end the war. The U.S. president has tried to preserve a fragile interim deal, but hostilities mounted in recent days in the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil had been shipped before war began. After four days of trading strikes, both sides appeared to pause their attacks Monday.

Dry, windy conditions fuel explosive wildfire growth across western US (AP) Three firefighters died and two were injured while tackling fires on the Colorado-Utah border, the U.S. Wildland Fire Service reported Sunday. Wildfire activity has intensified across the western United States, as consecutive days of hot, dry and windy weather have fueled flames in Utah, Arizona and elsewhere as new fires popped up across the region. The largest blaze, the Cottonwood Fire, was burning in rugged terrain in southwest Utah. It ballooned Saturday to more than 144 square miles (373 square kilometers) after marching through canyons and mountainsides, destroying part of a ski resort and other summer cabins along the way.

Mexican Officials Have Become Informants for the Trump Administration (NYT) As the Trump administration ramps up its investigations into Mexico’s government, elected officials in the country’s governing party have been quietly offering themselves to U.S. authorities as informants against fellow party members, according to eight people involved in the conversations. The discussions have come in the weeks since the United States indicted 10 current and former Mexican officials, charging them with colluding with one of the nation’s most powerful drug cartels. In turn, President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico has made challenging those investigations a rallying cry for her leftist political party, Morena, denouncing the indictments as foreign interference. At least a dozen elected officials in Mexico—including governors and members of Congress, many from the governing party—have reached out to discuss sharing information about fellow politicians, multiple people said, and several have already begun talks with the United States. Many of the officials are seeking to get ahead of investigations that they fear could soon focus on them, the people said.

Venezuela Was on the Cusp of Rebirth. Then Disaster Struck, Again. (NYT) The blows just keep coming. Venezuela’s economy began crumbling so badly more than a decade ago that hospitals were hollowed out, blackouts were everywhere and even the most basic goods disappeared from store shelves. Soon, millions of Venezuelans fled the country. Faced with the nation’s steep decline, Venezuela’s already repressive government clamped down even harder, stealing an election and people’s hopes for change. Next came American military strikes on boats off the nation’s coasts, a partial blockade of its oil and a stunning intervention: The Trump administration raided the capital, seized Venezuela’s authoritarian leader and declared that the United States would run the country, effectively turning it into a vassal state. After all the head-spinning crises, Venezuela finally appeared to be on the cusp of an economic rebirth this year. Oil was flowing again, its leaders were mending ties with global lenders and energy executives were flocking to Caracas, the capital, to explore potential deals. Then, the twin earthquakes this week upended everything. The cash-strapped Venezuelan government, already struggling to tame the world’s highest inflation rate, must now somehow muster an enormous disaster response: clearing vast amounts of rubble; finding and caring for countless, newly-homeless survivors; and restoring basic services to a nation in crisis. “This is a country that already had massive reconstruction needs,” said Francisco Rodríguez, a prominent Venezuelan economist. “Now, on top of that, they need to rebuild without having ready access to resources.”

Venezuelans sleep in cars and under trees as they question where they’ll live after the earthquakes (AP) The Quintero family crowded around their new home this week after two deadly earthquakes forced them to flee their apartment building in Caracas. Francisco Quintero reserved the seats of his small, beat-up car for his children, while the trunk is now home to Paquito, their green-and-red parakeet, and a handful of pet turtles. Quintero, a musician, said he and other adults in the family search nightly for a place to sleep near the car “until we get an answer about what they might do with us.” Thousands of Venezuelans left suddenly homeless have since poured into parks, plazas and even the shoulders of blocked highways, looking for a place to lay their heads. The latest crisis in this nation of roughly 30 million comes after decades of economic struggle. More than half of the population lives in extreme poverty and nearly 8 million were already in need of humanitarian aid before the quakes struck.

Thousands of Vespas swarm Rome’s historic center to mark iconic scooter’s 80th anniversary (AP) More than 10,000 Vespas putt-putt-putted around the Colosseum and past the Roman Forum on Saturday, marking the 80th anniversary of the iconic scooter. Enthusiasts came from all over; the AP spoke to people from across continental Europe, northern England, San Francisco, Australia’s Gold Coast, the Philippines and more. Vespa-borne visitors converged on the Eternal City’s cobblestone streets to celebrate a brand they likewise view as timeless. If for only a day, Ferrari and Ducati were forgotten as the little Vespa left them in its dust. “The passion for Vespa is for the Italian style, freedom, the ‘60s,” said Natalie Dunand, a retiree from France who was celebrating her own 61st birthday, too. “I love it.” With curved lines evoking a bygone era, plus an ability to produce smiles among onlookers, Vespa—which means “wasp” in Italian—is to two-wheeled transport what the Volkswagen Beetle is to cars.

Central Europe sizzles as heat records are smashed in Switzerland, Denmark and Czech Republic (AP) Temperatures soared to record highs from Switzerland to the Czech Republic and Denmark on Saturday, as a heat wave that baked western European countries this week moved to central and eastern parts of the continent. Unusually high temperatures were recorded even in the Nordic countries not known for sweltering summers. Denmark’s Meteorological Institute reported a record 37 degrees Celsius (98.6 degrees Fahrenheit) in Ødum north of Aarhus—the warmest day since records there began in 1874. In Switzerland, a record 38.8 C (101.8 F) was set in the city of Basel. Germany’s famous Autobahn was overwhelmed, too, as temperatures were expected to hit 40 C (104 F). In two places outside Berlin, the concrete of the A2 burst due to the high temperatures and the highway had to be closed. Other highway damage was reported across the country, according to the German daily Bild.

The U.S. is losing ground to China in university research (NPR) The U.S. was once the leading force in the world's research engine, but it is now losing ground to China. The country may be taking the dominant role due to significant investments and a disruptive year for American universities under the Trump administration. This year, Harvard University lost its top position in a global ranking measuring academic output to a Chinese university. In fact, seven out of the top 10 institutions on the list, compiled by Leiden University in the Netherlands, are located in China.

A Mayor Is Taking Maternity Leave in Japan. Some Men Are Furious. (NYT) The news traveled fast in Yawata, a spiritual oasis of 68,000 people in western Japan known for its traditional tea culture and cherry blossoms. Shoko Kawata, the city’s mayor, was pregnant with her first child—and she was planning to take maternity leave, the first mayor in Japan to do so. Many residents of Yawata celebrated Ms. Kawata, 35, and her decision, which she announced in May. They offered gifts like crocheted baby shoes and auspicious ceremonial rocks. But in Japan’s patriarchal society, some people—especially men—responded with anger, calling her irresponsible, and accusing her of placing her personal life above her constituents. Ms. Kawata’s decision has prompted a national debate about the hurdles that working women still face—on the factory floor, in corporate suites and in government. Discrimination against young mothers is still so common that there is a Japanese word for it: matahara, or maternity harassment.

African migrants fear a surge in xenophobic violence in South Africa (NPR) Johannesburg has always been a melting pot. Traverse South Africa’s economic capital and you’ll come across Zimbabweans trained as doctors but driving Ubers, Ethiopians running bustling restaurants, and Congolese selling colorful wax print fabrics. Some of these immigrants have lived here for years. Others have recently arrived, seeking a better life in one of the continent’s richest and most stable democracies. Some are here legally, others not. But all of them are now under threat as South Africa is engulfed by a rising tide of xenophobia. For months now, mobs of anti-immigrant protesters, many brandishing sticks, have been marching through the streets. Foreign-owned businesses have been attacked, people chased from their homes, and several migrants have been killed. In Durban, it’s a tinder keg, and thousands of Malawians who have fled their homes to escape the violence have camped out in the open, in winter, begging their country to send buses to rescue them. Nigeria, Ghana and Mozambique weren’t waiting—they’ve already repatriated those citizens who wanted to leave.

Deal With Israel Divides Lebanese, Fueling Protests in Beirut (NYT) After Israel and Lebanon signed a preliminary agreement in Washington on Friday aimed at establishing a lasting peace between them, the reaction in Lebanon was immediate and sharply divided. Supporters of the U.S.-brokered deal said it was a move to curtail Iranian influence in Lebanon, setting out a pathway for the disarmament of the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, which Israel is at war with. They also said it asserts Lebanese sovereignty over the country’s internal security. Others, not least Hezbollah, rejected the framework, calling it a capitulation to Israeli and American demands. Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem said his group will keep fighting until Israel is forced to leave Lebanon. At the core of the deal is a phased security arrangement in which the Lebanese Armed Forces would gradually assume control over all Lebanese territory as nonstate armed groups, like Hezbollah, are disarmed and their military infrastructure is dismantled.

Iran and the U.S. exchange attacks (Politico) Iran launched a fresh round of attacks against Bahrain and Kuwait, responding to U.S. airstrikes this weekend in a back-and-forth that is rattling the shaky ceasefire and threatening to derail negotiations, AP’s Jon Gambrell And Melanie Lidman report. Trump accused Iran of violating the agreement and threatened to “complete the job.” But Iran is saber-rattling over the Strait of Hormuz, as it looks to gain complete control over the international waterway. Complicating the peace deal further are tensions over Hezbollah in Lebanon, with Trump now pushing Syria to take the lead in combatting Hezbollah. Trump has suggested that the battle-hardened and Islamist-led insurgents who overthrew Syria’s autocratic President Bashar Assad a year and a half ago and formed a new government would do a better job of rooting out Hezbollah than the Israeli army. Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa has said he has no interest in doing so, and has asserted that Trump’s comments were misconstrued. But Trump has doubled down on the idea. The prospect of a Syrian invasion has raised alarms in Lebanon—and also in Israel, which regards al-Sharaa’s Islamist-led government with suspicion and has seized control of a strip of southern Syria since he took power.

Nursing homes, factory owners and immigrants brace for fallout from Supreme Court ruling (Washington Post) Immigrants began making plans to sell or rent their homes, secure bank accounts and figure out thorny issues like child custody arrangements. Business owners started calculating how many days they can continue to employ workers whose legal status is set to expire. And nursing home leaders warned they would have fewer beds to offer if health aides are forced to leave the country. Panic rippled through communities from Florida to Ohio and beyond in the hours after the Supreme Court cleared the Trump administration Thursday to strip humanitarian protections from Haitians and Syrians—and potentially all 1.3 million immigrants from over a dozen countries who had been previously shielded from deportation. Some of those immigrants have lived in the United States for decades and said they feared being sent back to conflict-ridden homelands that they barely know and whose languages some do not speak.

Trump Threatens to Impose 100% Tariff on European Countries Over Tech Taxes (NYT) President Trump threatened to scrap a just-finalized trade deal with the European Union on Friday, saying that any country that levies a digital services tax would be hit immediately with a 100 percent tariff on all exports to the United States. Mr. Trump seized on the fact that several European countries are discussing imposing such taxes. Those taxes would apply to the revenue that major U.S. tech firms earn in Europe. If they choose to proceed, the United States would “immediately” impose a 100 percent tariff on them, he said.

Vance dismisses Watergate scandal, says ‘deep state’ went after Nixon (Washington Post) Vice President JD Vance on Thursday expressed sympathy for former president Richard M. Nixon, suggesting that Nixon was wrongly forced out as president in 1974 and comparing his political travails decades ago to those facing President Donald Trump now. “As I joked … backstage, if Watergate happened tomorrow, it would be like a 12-hour news story,” Vance said in remarks at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in California. “The idea that it would have taken down a presidency is crazy.” The Watergate scandal, which began in 1972 with a botched attempt to bug the Democratic National Committee’s offices at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, mushroomed into a wide-ranging investigation by reporters and lawmakers that revealed Nixon was aware of the break-in and directed secret White House payments in an effort to cover it up. He resigned as president two years after the scandal broke, with Nixon blaming The Washington Post for its central role in exposing his involvement in the break-in and other abuses. The scandal also prompted a series of reforms intended to rein in presidential authority, including more independence for government watchdogs such as inspectors general, which Trump has steadily rolled back.

Victories by Pro-Palestinian Democrats Show the Party’s Shift on Israel (NYT) Three Democrats who made criticism of Israel central to their political identities swept to victory in House primary races in New York City on Tuesday, signaling a new era of skepticism in their party toward the Jewish state and its actions. The striking results reflected a fast-moving shift in liberal politics. Democratic voters are now more likely to be critical of Israel and its government than they are to be supportive, according to several recent polls, a monumental change in American sentiment. And while many Democratic officials remain supportive of Israel, next year’s class of congressional Democrats is on track to be more wary about America’s relationship with Israel than at any other moment since the Jewish state was established after World War II.

Utah declares state of emergency as nation’s largest wildfire grows (AP) Hot, dry and windy conditions are fueling a fast-moving wildfire in Utah, forcing the governor to declare an emergency and restrict fireworks as critical weather across the West gives way to mounting concerns that anything could cause a spark. Firefighters are facing more challenges on the ground from what fire managers and experts call unprecedented conditions. Air tankers and helicopters were grounded Friday as winds picked up on the Cottonwood Fire, the largest blaze currently burning in the U.S. Gusts were clocked at 45 miles per hour (72 km/h) and humidity levels were in the single digits, leaving crews with few options for slowing the flames, especially as they raced through the treetops.

Window Narrowing to Find Survivors as Quake Death Toll Surpasses 1,400 (NYT) With loved ones trapped under ruins for nearly three days, Venezuelans raced against the clock on Saturday to save survivors of the earthquakes that struck Venezuela this week and devastated a country that had hoped a new U.S. alliance could lead it out of crisis. The death toll rose to 1,430 people, according to Jorge Rodríguez, the leader of Venezuela’s National Assembly. Speaking in a televised address, he said that more than 3,200 people had been injured and more than 3,000 left homeless by the 7.2- and 7.5-magnitude quakes. Many more people are believed to be missing, and hundreds of rescue workers from around the world were joining in the search for them. But they are landing in damaged airports, traveling down congested, splintered roads and finding little help from Venezuela’s hollowed-out emergency services. Many feared that time was running out. Aid groups say that the first 72 hours after a disaster are the most critical for finding survivors. The quakes exposed the fragility of Venezuela’s infrastructure. There are only three functioning ambulances serving greater Caracas, one doctor said. Firefighters are relying on cellphone lights. A hospital in the disaster zone is operating without running water.

Older buildings and substandard construction left Venezuela vulnerable to earthquakes (AP) Older buildings, substandard construction and geography left many neighborhoods in Venezuela vulnerable to strong earthquakes like the ones that struck the country this week. Engineers and other experts said the back-to-back earthquakes on Wednesday were among the most intense to hit the country in more than a century, leveling buildings and leaving more than 900 dead with the number expected to rise. Videos and satellite imagery from the disaster zone reviewed by The Associated Press reveal scores of multistory buildings had collapsed. David Cocke, a structural engineer in California and former president of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute, said that a combination of soft soils, tall towers and older concrete structures contributed to the widespread damage, particularly when buildings pancaked, or collapsed floor-by-floor.

Europe’s Trains, Nuclear Plants and Factories Can’t Take the Heat Either (NYT) This sweltering week, the signs of a breakdown have been everywhere. Train networks across Western Europe were snarled by heat that threatened to buckle tracks. Several nuclear reactors in France shuttered or slowed because the cooling water they were discharging into rivers was getting too hot. Museums curtailed hours because they couldn’t control the heat. At a French auto plant, union leaders called for a strike, saying conditions on the factory floor had become excruciating. And electricity outages knocked out power for hundreds of thousands in France and Italy. The heat seeped through thick-walled apartments and turned cities into hotboxes that couldn’t cool at night. Sleep-deprived Europeans staggered into parks after midnight, or joined in frenzies to buy portable air-conditioning units, or even sought refuge in hotels. The world’s fastest-warming continent is filled with buildings and infrastructure designed for a climate that no longer exists.

Ukrainian Attacks Spur State of Emergency Declaration in Crimea (NYT) The authorities in Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula controlled by Russia, declared a state of emergency on Friday after weeks of intense air attacks by Ukraine, including a wave of drone strikes overnight that appears to have been one of the largest since the war began. Over the past several months, Ukraine has carried out increasingly heavy air attacks on Crimea and parts of Russia, puncturing the peace that Russian civilians had largely enjoyed during the four-year-old war. Ukraine’s assaults on Crimea, meant to isolate the strategic Black Sea peninsula, have rattled everyday life there to an extent unseen since Russia illegally annexed the region in 2014. Gas stations in Crimea have run out of fuel, with local officials banning sales last Sunday. Summer camps have been canceled and children have been evacuated. Rolling power outages have crippled the territory, disrupting water supplies that rely on electric pumps.

Iran Devastated an American Naval Base (WSJ) When the Iranian missiles and drones came for the nerve center of America’s naval operations in the Middle East, some of them hit their mark. The U.S. Navy base in Bahrain was repeatedly targeted between late February and June. Strikes that got through caused extensive damage, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of satellite imagery, social-media footage and interviews with current and former servicemembers—damage that the Pentagon hasn’t publicly acknowledged. Hit hard were the command headquarters and at least a dozen other buildings, along with two satellite communications terminals.

US strikes Iran to respond to attack on ship that Trump says violated ceasefire (AP) The U.S. struck Iran on Friday in response to a drone attack a day earlier on a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz. It's the most significant test yet to an interim understanding reached a week ago by the two countries to begin working to end their months-long war and reopen the pivotal waterway. U.S. President Donald Trump said the drone attack violated the ceasefire. U.S. Central Command said the military struck missile and drone locations and coastal radar sites in Iran.

Is the World Cup reviving America’s international reputation? (The Week) Many international soccer fans were worried about “visa access, high costs, gun violence” and other issues ahead of this year’s World Cup, said Reuters. Visiting teams and their fans have instead “flooded” social media with posts revealing a “warm welcome from Americans” as well as a “distinctive culture” awash in “free soda refills” and “chicken wings dipped in ranch dressing.” Host cities across the United States have witnessed an “unlikely romance between everyday Americans and squads from around the world,” said The New York Times. While polls show the U.S. global reputation “has dipped in recent years,” the visitors are discovering American communities have “all kinds of estimable traits.” “Welcome to the World Cup of U.S. hospitality,” Jack Butler said at The Wall Street Journal. There is a “long tradition” of foreign visitors being “deeply affected” by their visits to the United States. Now international soccer fans are “showing America’s greatness in real time.” They are “also amazed by America’s material abundance.” Buc-ee’s and Bass Pro Shops have been featured in viral videos and so has Chicago deep-dish pizza. America’s vastness “contains multitudes.” U.S. residents are welcoming the world “even when their government has failed to do so,” Juliette Kayyem said at Early Warning. “Americans are proving better diplomats than their administration.”

The Data-Center Boom Is Sparking a Third Wave of Inflation (WSJ) President Trump’s trade wars have waned. The price of gas is finally falling. But inflation has a new catalyst: America’s massive artificial-intelligence build-out is beginning to push up prices on everything from smartphones to electricity. The question now is how widely that build-out might ripple through the economy, and how long it could keep inflation elevated. The answers will have big consequences for the economy. The data centers used for AI require sophisticated computing equipment, cooling systems to keep that equipment from overheating, electric and fiber-optic cables and backup generators to prevent power disruptions. Based on announced and planned developments, Columbia University economist Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh estimates that spending on the AI build-out through 2032 could come to about $8 trillion—nearly five times the market value of the entire New York City property market. With so much demand, prices are rising for many of the things that go into the AI build-out. And because those things are used for more than just AI, those price increases are spilling over into the broader economy.

California Will Vote on a Billionaire Tax. Billionaires Aren’t Happy. (NYT) Californians will vote in November on a groundbreaking plan to impose a one-time tax on the wealth of billionaires, with most of the money going to health care programs, according to the union pushing the measure. The billionaires are already fighting back. Several wealthy Californians financed a campaign to also get two competing measures onto the ballot that could nullify the tax before it’s even collected. The proposed tax has divided Democrats in California, a deep-blue state where progressive ideals often collide with support for a tech-driven economy that has created vast wealth. The ballot battle also reflects a broader tension in American politics. President Trump and congressional Republicans passed big tax cuts for the wealthy last year while cutting food and health care benefits for many of the nation’s poor. Progressive Democrats like New York City’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, and a Los Angeles mayoral candidate, Nithya Raman, have risen to prominence amid public discontent over the rising gap between America’s richest people and everyone else.

Record profits, terrible service: something’s got to give for consumers (Guardian) When Delta Airlines charged Marie Duggan, an economic historian visiting Oaxaca, Mexico, $1,200 to change a scheduled flight to the United States, she was so angry she cancelled. Instead, she took a $250 flight on Aeromexico to Hermosillo, in the north-western state of Sonora, and then a $59 bus across the Mexico border. She was “exhausted” after the trip. But she was also pleased not to have to pay Delta the money. A Delta spokesman said that, like the rest of the industry, it relies on “dynamic ticket prices” with “clear rules that determine pricing based on objective details”. Decades of mergers have limited consumer options. Companies are so big they can push industry-friendly regulation and charge what they want, safe in the knowledge that disgruntled customers have nowhere to go. No wonder consumers feel so squeezed, disrespected and preyed upon. As a result, they are becoming “reactive”, said Alexander DePaoli, a Northeastern University marketing professor who studies consumer anger. They’re starting to see brands as “a rival or an adversary” and are trying to beat them at their own game. “Asking why [companies] went ‘bad’ is like asking why a company that sells reasonably priced goods on the near side of the TSA checkpoint is charging $15 for water on the far side of the TSA checkpoint,” at an airport, said Cory Doctorow, author of Enshitification: Why everything suddenly got worse and what to do about it. “It’s not because they’re evil, it’s because you can’t go anywhere else to buy your water.”

Search for Venezuela Quake Survivors Grows More Urgent (NYT) Rescue crews and residents dug through rubble in an increasingly desperate search for survivors on Thursday evening, more than 24 hours after the worst earthquakes to hit Venezuela in nearly six decades. At least 235 people were killed, and hundreds more were trapped in the rubble or missing, according to the government. More than 4,300 people were injured in the back-to-back quakes on Wednesday, and the number of dead and injured was virtually certain to rise. The president of Venezuela’s national assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, said on Thursday afternoon that more than 200 people were trapped in the rubble of destroyed buildings, and another 157 were missing. Videos posted on social media show collapsed residential towers in the capital, Caracas, and in the nearby port cities of La Guaira and Catia La Mar. Anguished survivors mourned lost loved ones in those port cities, popular beach destinations near the country’s main international airport. In some places, bodies lay in the streets. Residents of La Guaira said they had seen few rescue workers and minimal government presence on Thursday. Although Venezuela is rich in oil, it is still trying to emerge from a decade-long depression that hollowed out its rescue services, left its infrastructure deteriorating, and sent inflation to record highs—all factors likely to compound the challenges of recovery.

Newspaper sets up Belgian Prime Minister's residence on Airbnb (Belgian News Agency) Belgian newspaper De Standaard has revealed serious weaknesses in Airbnb’s identity verification system after successfully creating a fake host profile in the name of prime minister Bart De Wever. As part of an investigation into Airbnb listings in Belgium, journalists created an Airbnb account using the prime minister’s name and photo. They then listed 16 Rue de la Loi (Wetstraat 16), the official residence and office address of the prime minister in Brussels, as a holiday rental for 150 euros per night. The property, advertised as the “Law Street Lodge”, remained online for nearly two months and received several booking requests.

Ukraine unleashes one of its heaviest drone bombardments (AP) Ukraine launched a major nighttime attack on a dozen Russian regions, Russian-held Crimea and the surrounding seas, Moscow's Defense Ministry said Friday, in what appeared to be one of Kyiv's biggest drone assaults since the Kremlin's full-scale invasion more than four years ago. Russian air defenses intercepted 660 Ukrainian drones, Russia's Defense Ministry said. In an effort to turn the tables on Russia's grinding war of attrition, Ukrainian long-range drones have been battering oil production and energy facilities behind the front line and deep inside Russia. The campaign has choked Russian fuel supplies and military deliveries, stalling Moscow's efforts on the battlefield, Western officials and analysts say, and has heaped pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Delayed rains bring water shortages to cities and uncertainty to farms across India (AP) The late arrival of India’s monsoon season and below-average rainfall have caused problems ranging from planting delays for farmers to water restrictions for construction sites in its largest business hub, Mumbai. Water shortages have been reported around the country due to the late start of the rainy season, which typically begins in June but has grown erratic in recent years. Climate experts said the El Nino, a warming of the Pacific that affects weather around the globe, combined with an already heating planet, will likely result in weak, scattered rainfall across the country.

Small Plane Crashes Into Tallest Building in Beijing (NYT) A small aircraft flew into the tallest building in Beijing on Friday, sending huge hunks of debris and plane parts plummeting onto the streets below and prompting crowds to flee. Video shared on social media and verified by The New York Times showed debris falling from the skyscraper, as people ran to safety. The footage showed broken windows and debris, including what appeared to be the tail of a small aircraft, falling dozens of stories into the street below. The building is in the capital’s busy central business district, which was clogged with cars at evening rush hour. It was not immediately clear how many people were injured, if any were. The whereabouts and identity of the pilot were also unknown. Photos posted to social media from the site showed parts of an aircraft that appeared to be a lightweight model with only a few seats, registered to the airline Shuangyue General Aviation, a regional flight training provider.

The US military footprint in Australia (The Week) The US military will include Australia in a global pre-positioning programme for weapons, ammunition and vehicles for the first time, according to reports. There is a “growing US footprint in Australia”, said Defence Minister Richard Marles, which is “important in terms of building our own military capability” but critics have asked if Australia is “acting like America’s 51st state”. Although Australia does not permit foreign military bases on its soil, it hosts US Marines for exercises for six months of the year in the northern city of Darwin, and a “rotating force” of US-commanded submarines will arrive in Western Australia next year, reported France 24. If the US and China “come to blows over Taiwan”, the naval base in Western Australia “offers a berth” that would bring American nuclear-powered submarines “close to the fight”—and provide a “haven if things go wrong”, said The Wall Street Journal.

America’s data-centre backlash (Economist) The mammoth data centres of the future, capable of training frontier ai models in 2030, will not be in the urban clusters in Virginia or California that currently house most of America’s server farms, but in the emerging “Silicon Heartland” of Michigan, Wisconsin and Ohio, or in southern states like Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. Vast sums of capital—as much as $750bn by Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle, plus billions more by data-centre specialists—are being ploughed into investments in these places. An estimated $3trn will go into AI data centres globally between 2026 and 2030, according to Moody’s, an information provider. Much of that is earmarked for America. And almost everywhere across the country, people of all political stripes are furious about it. There is plenty to dislike: the ugliness of the buildings; the roar of generators and cooling systems; the skeleton army of new transmission towers crisscrossing the landscape; the fear of contaminated water. Surveys suggest that Americans would sooner live next to a nuclear plant than a data centre. At least 20 data-centre projects worth $42bn, which would have used 3.5GW of power, were cancelled in the first three months of 2026 after local pushback.

Americans are inundated with suspected scams (AP) Most Americans are inundated with scam attempts on a daily basis—and about 3 in 10 have personally lost money or personal information to scams, according to a new AP-NORC survey. A separate survey conducted by Gallup and the Stop Scams Alliance that was provided exclusively to the AP found that last year alone, about 1 in 10 U.S. adults said they or someone else from their household was deceived by a scammer into losing money or providing access to a financial account, with nearly half saying they lost more than $500. That leaves many Americans feeling like they’re constantly at risk of falling for a scam, often without a sense of recourse. In both surveys, few victims said they reported the scam to the federal government or local law enforcement. Many victims didn’t report the scam, Gallup found, because they didn’t think it would make a difference in getting money back.

Supreme Court rules in favor of Trump administration on 2 immigration cases (AP) The Supreme Court voted 6-3 on Thursday to allow the Trump administration to end legal protections for migrants fleeing violence and natural disaster in Haiti and Syria, exposing hundreds of thousands more people to potential deportation. The Department of Homeland Security can now end temporary protected status, a program that protects a total of 1.3 million people from 17 countries. The Supreme Court also voted 6-3 to clear the way for the Trump administration to potentially revive an immigration policy once used to turn back migrants seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border. The court overturned a lower court order blocking the practice that limited the number of people who could apply for asylum each day.

Visitors Look at the Reflecting Pool and Disagree on What They See (NYT) Wednesday morning in Washington began with a typical mix of visitors along the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool: joggers, bikers, school groups, foreign tourists, a dancing majorette troupe from Carbondale, Pa. The Washington Monument, skinny and straight as six o’clock, was shimmering in the water. But that was not what people were looking at, not today. After 104 years of alluring visitors with its reflections of some of America’s most majestic buildings, the attraction of the Reflecting Pool now is the pool itself. The water is no longer the color of a putting green, but what color it was exactly—what the different shades might mean, whether there were cracks on the basin floor, how much this all cost—these were the things people were reflecting on. Over the past few weeks, the Reflecting Pool has truly lived up to its name, as the president, a good portion of the Washington press corps and large swaths of social media have reflected on it relentlessly. Some see “an expensive fiasco.” Others see “fake news.”

Venezuela: Rescuers Search for Survivors After Worst Quakes in Decades (NYT) Rescue crews and residents dug through the rubble of buildings on Thursday searching for survivors after the worst earthquakes to hit Venezuela in nearly six decades. At least 235 people were killed and more than 4,300 injured in back-to-back quakes on Wednesday. The toll from the quakes, which struck the country’s populous northern states, was virtually certain to rise as rescuers began to reach the hardest-hit areas. Videos posted on social media show collapsed residential towers in the capital, Caracas, and in the nearby port city of La Guaira, where more than 100 buildings were destroyed, according to the United Nations’ main humanitarian agency. There were growing fears about the toll in nearby shantytowns, where many people live in precarious homes built on hillsides. Venezuela is rich in oil, but is still trying to emerge from a decade-long depression that wiped out most of its economic production and prompted millions to leave the country. Its rescue services have been hollowed out, infrastructure has deteriorated and inflation has reached record highs, which is likely to compound the challenges of recovery. Ms. Rodríguez said that rescuers from other countries would start arriving in Venezuela early Thursday, including teams from the United States, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mexico and Qatar. China, Brazil and several Caribbean nations have also offered support, she added.

Trump-endorsed de la Espriella declared winner of Colombia’s presidential runoff election (AP) Conservative outsider Abelardo de la Espriella, a millionaire political neophyte, will be Colombia’s next president after electoral authorities on Wednesday declared him the winner of Sunday’s runoff election. The businessman and lawyer, whose ventures include a clothing line, wine and rum brands, and a restaurant, earned U.S. President Donald Trump’s endorsement despite never having run for office. He defeated progressive lawmaker Iván Cepeda by 1 percentage point, or more than 251,000 votes. De la Espriella’s win adds Colombia to a growing list of countries that have turned to political outsiders in search for solutions to complex social, security and economic challenges.

To Escape Record Heat, the French Are Taking to Water. Both Have Been Deadly. (NYT) Perched on the cobblestone bank of the Canal Saint-Martin in Paris, watching his children whoop and shout as they splashed in the murky water, Stéphane Guillaume looked like a rare Parisian who’d beaten the heat. But in the new normal of scorching-hot Paris summers, he said, any victory would be fleeting. “It’s going to get worse every year,” said Mr. Guillaume, a 44-year-old computer engineer. “It’s very worrying because we’re already at the limit of what’s bearable.” With temperatures across France soaring to the highest levels ever recorded in June—more than 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 degrees Fahrenheit—thousands of people are turning to extreme measures: jumping into canals, rivers and other waterways for relief. It can be a deadly choice. Forty people have drowned in heat wave-related accidents between June 18 and June 23, according to the French government. Many in France still recall the summer of 2003, when nearly 15,000 people in the country, most of them older, died in a freak heat wave. That prompted recurring debates about how to weatherproof French society. The Ecologists, a green party, is proposing paid time off for those most exposed to climate disruptions, while decades of cultural resistance to air conditioning seems finally to be on the wane.

Greetings from sweltering Switzerland (NPR) When I stepped outside, it looked like Switzerland, but it didn't feel like it. In the distance, the white-capped Alps stood, majestic, reflected in the turquoise waters of Lake Lucerne as I strolled along the waterfront. But the air was scorching and thick with humidity, and walking through it was like wading through cotton dipped in boiling water. In front of me was beautiful Lucerne, but the air felt like I was in Luzon (Philippines). Along the waterfront, red-and-white-clad soccer fans clustered together to watch jumbo TV screens showing a FIFA World Cup match played an ocean away in the U.S.; Switzerland versus Bosnia-Herzegovina. Each time the Swiss team scored, a deafening roar cut through the thick tropical air. At the end of the evening, Switzerland won its World Cup match, but it continues to lose its battle against a warming climate.

Ukraine’s latest long-range strikes on Russia hit a major natural gas plant and satellite centers (AP) Ukrainian forces struck a major natural gas processing plant and two key satellite communications centers in their latest nighttime attacks on Russia, Ukraine’s General Staff said Wednesday. The operation was part of Ukraine’s aerial campaign targeting energy facilities and military industries that has intensified as Kyiv builds bigger and better long-range weapons to ward off Russia’s full-scale invasion, now in its fifth year.

Powerful 7.2-magnitude earthquake strikes off northern Japan (AP) A powerful earthquake struck off Japan’s northern coast on Thursday. The quake had a magnitude of 7.2 and occurred off the eastern coast of Iwate, an area where strong earthquakes have repeatedly been reported in recent months, including one that triggered a weeklong mega-quake caution advisory in December. The quake, which struck Japan’s northeastern region during Thursday’s morning rush hour, also mildly shook Tokyo. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.

As reports of anti-Christian incidents in Israel increase, advocates press police to act (Religion News Service) This past spring, a case of a Jewish man assaulting a Catholic nun in Jerusalem made international headlines. And earlier this month, the Religious Freedom Data Center reported 88 incidents of anti-Christian harassment in Israel so far in 2026—63 of them between April and June. The Israeli nongovernmental organization, which runs a hotline documenting such incidents targeting Christians, recorded 180 incidents in all of 2025—up from 107 in 2024, putting this year on track for a continued spike in anti-Christian harassment. The majority of cases recorded involved vandalism and graffiti at Christian cemeteries, crosses and statues, as well as spitting and verbal abuse against Christians in Jerusalem, especially in the Old City. For Christians living in the country who spoke with RNS, these types of incidents, almost always perpetrated by young Jewish extremists, are becoming increasingly normalized. While Christian clergy and the Israeli activists who track such harassment said the vast majority of Israelis consider such behavior abhorrent, they also accused law enforcement of largely ignoring victims’ complaints until they turn into an international scandal.

U.S. and Iran Offer Conflicting Accounts of Nuclear Discussions (NYT) President Trump and Iranian officials sharply disagreed on Tuesday about whether Tehran had agreed to open its nuclear sites to U.N. inspectors, one of several disputes between the two countries that reflected the morass of details still to be resolved. As peace talks were underway in Switzerland, a United Nations maritime agency said on Tuesday that it had started an effort to free hundreds of ships and thousands of mariners that have been trapped in the Persian Gulf during the war, moving them through the Strait of Hormuz along a route near Oman’s coastline. After Vice President JD Vance said on Monday that Iran had agreed to let inspectors back into its nuclear sites, Iranian officials said on Tuesday that their country did not make any such commitment. In fact, they said, the matter was barely discussed. Esmail Baghaei, spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry, said there was no plan to invite inspectors to nuclear sites that were hit by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes in June 2025.

Federal judge bars Trump from implementing proof of citizenship requirement to vote (AP) A federal judge on Wednesday permanently barred President Donald Trump's administration from implementing most of his first executive order on elections, part of which sought to require people to show documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote. The ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Denise Casper in Boston effectively converts a preliminary injunction she issued a year ago, in which she temporarily blocked many of Trump's efforts to overhaul elections, into a permanent ban. She wrote that the Constitution "does not grant the President any specific powers over elections." Among other proposed changes, Trump's order would have required people to provide documentary proof of citizenship when registering to vote, prevented mail ballots from being counted if they arrive after Election Day, even if they were postmarked by then, and punished states that failed to comply by withholding certain federal money.

Mexico’s president seeks to restart oil shipments to Cuba as island’s crises deepen (AP) Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Monday that her country seeks to restart oil shipments to Cuba soon, a move that could provide much-needed relief as the island’s crises deepen given a lack of petroleum. Sheinbaum said her administration would seek to send the oil via commercial and privately owned firms instead of state-owned companies as it has done in the past. Mexico became a key fuel supplier to Cuba after the U.S. attacked Venezuela in early January and halted critical oil shipments. But those shipments, which had already been reduced, were completely suspended after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened tariffs on any country that provides or sells oil to the island. The lack of fuel has worsened an energy crisis on the island that produces only 40% of the petroleum it needs, leading to severe power outages, reduced work hours, water shortages, suspended surgeries and spoiled food.

Venezuela reeling after powerful twin earthquakes kill at least 32 people (AP) Powerful earthquakes that struck Venezuela in quick succession Wednesday evening killed at least 32 people and injured 700, the nation’s acting president said, as communities across the South American country sustained damage. Acting President Delcy Rodríguez warned the toll was expected to rise as rescuers search collapsed buildings and emergency crews reach devastated areas after the 7.2 and 7.5 magnitude earthquakes that struck shortly after 6 p.m. Rodríguez declared a state of emergency in an address to the nation late Wednesday and said the quakes caused damage in several states. The casualty figures released early Thursday excluded the state of La Guaira, which Rodríguez described as a “disaster zone” and the area hardest hit. “Dozens of buildings have collapsed there, about 30 kilometers (19 miles) north of Caracas, and we are currently carrying out intensive rescue operations to save lives,” she said.

He Has Outlasted 5 Prime Ministers: Meet ‘Hot Podium Guy.’ (NYT) In England, over the last few years, when a lectern has appeared outside the black door of 10 Downing Street, the office and official residence of the prime minister in London, it has typically been an indicator of one of four things. It could be that the prime minister is about to resign, call a general election or address the nation. Or it means the internet is likely to be reacquainted with the so-called hot podium guy, a dashing sound engineer who has been tasked with setting up the lectern and microphones for these momentous events. In Britain’s political merry-go-round of the last decade, the mysterious heartthrob has been a welcome distraction and an enduring presence. He appeared again on Monday, when Keir Starmer resigned from his post. The man, Tobias Gough, a 42-year-old sound engineer with MGi London, first caught the public’s attention in 2019, while setting up the lectern when Theresa May, then the prime minister, stepped down. Almost overnight, he became a social media sensation. In the years since, prime ministers have come and gone, while Gough, in his uniform black T-shirt, has outlasted them all. Pictures and videos of him carrying the lectern and testing its microphones have become something of a harbinger of significant political news.

As Europe Warms, Scientists Ask: How Much Hotter Could Summers Get? (NYT) Millions of people seeking refuge from the dangerous heat in France this week have found little relief with the setting sun, as temperatures shatter both daytime and nighttime records. Highs in Britain could reach triple digits on Wednesday and Thursday, beating the country’s previous June temperature record of 96 degrees. Heat warnings are in place from Spain to Germany. Summer is just getting started, but Western Europe is already sweating through its second severe heat wave of the year. That’s prompting scientists to confront an urgent question: How hot can a heat wave actually get? Not in future decades, but today. Maybe even this summer. “We do know that heat waves are becoming more severe and more frequent, and they’re lasting longer,” said Rebecca Emerton, a senior scientist at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts in Reading, England. What’s striking now, Dr. Emerton said, is the big margins by which temperature records are being broken. In Western Europe, heat records are being smashed this week for the second time in a month. Tuesday was France’s hottest day ever recorded, the national weather agency said, with the mercury climbing as high as 111.7 degrees Fahrenheit in the country’s southwest.

Russia Considers Diesel Export Ban after Ukraine Refinery Attacks (Bloomberg) Ukraine’s recent, dramatic counter-assault on Russia, and particularly its use of drones to hobble the invading nation’s energy industry, appears to be bearing fruit. The Kremlin is weighing a ban on exports of diesel to avoid domestic shortages after Ukraine intensified attacks on its refineries. Russia is second only to the US in global export rankings for diesel, with Turkey and Brazil making the bulk of the purchases. The move could potentially put extra pressure on international fuel supplies, which are already under strain due to the disruption caused by the Iran war.

Myanmar: The War Forgotten by the World (NYT) On a forgotten front line, the rebels fight deep in the jungle. The military’s bombs keep falling, as they have for five years now. Civilians try to rebuild their lives, but death keeps finding them. This is Myanmar’s civil war, fought in the shadows. Far from the spotlight fixed on Iran, Ukraine, Lebanon and other global conflicts, Myanmar, a Southeast Asian nation of about 50 million people, has quietly collapsed.

Japan’s billion-dollar quest to help a sleep-starved nation rest (Washington Post) The Japanese get the least sleep of all major countries, so much so that there’s a flourishing market to help people in this sleep-deprived nation fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer. On average, the Japanese sleep almost an hour and half less than Americans, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Researchers attribute this to long commute times, long work hours and a culture that does not emphasize the importance of sleep. Sleep has now become a billion-dollar industry in Japan, catering to those looking for help improving their quality of sleep, even if they still don’t get as many hours as they’d like. The latest “sleep tech” products here go beyond the usual aids like eye masks or comfortable pillows—think smart beds, for example. The newest smart beds use built-in airflow systems to reduce humidity, helping users stay comfortable through Japan’s hot and humid summer nights. Others gently vibrate, to help you relax and fall asleep. Japan’s leading furniture manufacturer, Nitori, started selling a new smart bed this year that uses sensors to monitor the sleeper’s condition and automatically adjust to a comfortable sleep angle throughout the night.

Philippine devotees honor St. John the Baptist with a mud-covered display of faith (AP) Hundreds of Catholic devotees wrapped themselves in dried banana leaves and covered their bodies with mud on Wednesday in the Philippine village of Bibiclat, taking part in a display of faith honoring St. John the Baptist. The Taong Putik, or Mud People, festival is held annually in this village in Asia’s largest Catholic nation as devotees thank the local patron saint for miracles and fulfill vows made in prayer. Melencio Nenuda, a 39-year-old construction worker, said the mud-covered parishioners frightened him as a child and he used to hide when they passed by. But that changed when when he fell seriously ill in the sixth grade and his mother prayed to St. John the Baptist, vowing that he would join the tradition if he recovered. Local church leaders say the practice began in the 1800s, when farmers smeared themselves with mud as an expression of humility, and covered themselves with the leaves to conceal their identities due to discrimination against the poor during that time.

Lebanese on the edge of Israel’s occupation live with fear and rising tensions (AP) Looking out from a friend’s balcony, Milia el-Cheikh struggled to find her own home in the ruins of her now-deserted village, its entrances strung with barbed wire. Her village of Dibbine is one of several Shiite-majority communities across southern Lebanon destroyed by Israeli forces battling the Iran-backed Shiite Hezbollah. Israel has occupied vast areas and fighting has raged through declared ceasefires. The latest truce—part of the interim peace deal between the United States and Iran—appears to be holding. Jdeidat Marjayoun is one of a string of towns and villages visited by The Associated Press on the blurry edge of the Israeli-occupied zone of southern Lebanon. The military has pushed out the mostly Shiite population, believing they harbor Hezbollah, and many towns have been demolished. Residents of neighboring Christian, Sunni and Druze communities have been allowed to stay, but the conflict has transformed their lives. Their homes have been struck, road closures have isolated them from the rest of Lebanon, and nighttime raids by Israeli troops have terrified residents. Israeli warnings against hosting Hezbollah fighters have effectively barred them from taking in displaced Shiites, driving a wedge between longtime neighbors and stoking political and sectarian tensions.