"Won't Forget": China Thanks India For Rescuing Crew From Fire-Stricken Tanker

07/22/26 8:36 AM

Chinese Defence Attache You Jian thanked India's military for rescuing 12 crew members from a burning cargo ship off Kerala last year

$37.5bn cost of Iran war revealed as senator warns of ‘another forever war’ | First Thing

07/22/26 11:50 AM

Pete Hegseth reveals costs so far as Trump administration seeks more funding. Plus, rediscovered plane wreck that changed flying for everGood morning.The US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has told the Senate that the US-Israel war on Iran has cost $37.5bn so far, as he faced lawmakers furious over the conflict’s soaring price tag and the deaths last week of three American service members. He defended the Trump administration’s roughly $88bn supplemental funding request, calling it “urgent, necessary”.What is happening in Iran? The Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has described how he was pulled from the rubble of a leadership compound after the US-Israeli airstrike that killed the country’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, on the first day of the war, and has survived since by constantly moving around Tehran by car. Deepa Parent, meanwhile, has reports from the ground with ordinary Iranians, who say “it’s truly hell here” as airstrikes, repression and water shortages become the “new normal”.What other developments have affected the region? Zohran Mamdani, New York’s mayor, has acknowledged he does not have the authority to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu, but urged US federal authorities to do so if the Israeli prime minister visits the US later this year. The White House has announced that American airline carriers will be able to resume direct flights to Lebanon more than 40 years after the US suspended the route.What is uranium enrichment? It is the process of increasing the presence of isotope uranium-235 so the substance can sustain a nuclear chain reaction. Enrichment is not an automatic path to a nuclear weapon, but could open the door to a Saudi Arabia weapons programme, something its de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has not ruled out if Iran obtains an atomic bomb. Continue reading...

'Due to Trump’s illegal war': U.S. service members' deaths met with despair and rage

07/18/26 6:27 PM

News that two service members had been killed by direct Iranian fire rocked the nation on Saturday. U.S. Central Command announced the two service member's death, a third's disappearance and four medical evacuations one day after a base was attacked in Jordon. "Out of respect for the families, CENTCOM will withhold additional information, including the identities of the fallen warriors, until 24 hours after the next of kin have been notified," the statement read.Sixteen U.S. service members have been killed and more than 430 wounded since the war began, the Associated Press reported. "The battle over the Strait of Hormuz has intensified in a conflict increasingly focused on control of the essential waterway that previously carried a fifth of the world’s crude oil," the Associated Press reported. "The strikes threaten civilians and infrastructure, including desalination plants for drinking water, while the global economy again is on alert."Americans responded to the news with words of outrage and despair. "Really awful, dark, foreboding developments in the Middle East over the last 24 hours," wrote MS NOW analyst Sam Stein. "Hard to see how you deescalate from here."Political strategist Mike Nellis condemned President Donald Trump for mounting an attack on Iran without approval from Congress."I will ask again: for what?" Nellis wrote. "Trump has no plan, no clear mission, and he’s getting our sons and daughters killed for his own vanity." Nellis later added, "I’ll tell you what: if Barack Obama had launched an illegal war, 16 U.S. service members were dead, and another was missing in action, the MAGA media machine would be frothing at the mouth. Right now? Quiet as a church mouse. F---ing cowards."Political podcaster Shaykh Sulaiman said simply, "Due to Trump’s illegal war."