Politics & environs 2023

[umbertino]

Pope Leo rejects claim he supports nuclear weapons after Trump tirade

 

Pontiff responds after US president accuses him of ‘endangering a lot of Catholics’ with stance on Iran war

 

Angela Giuffrida in Rome

Wed 6 May 2026 13.58 BST

 

Pope Leo has said he has never supported nuclear weapons and that those who criticise him need to speak the truth, in response Donald Trump’s latest tirade accusing him of “endangering a lot of Catholics” with his stance on the Iran war.

 

Speaking to journalists on Tuesday night after leaving the papal retreat in Castel Gandolfo, near Rome, the first US-born pontiff said: “The mission of the church is to preach the gospel, to preach peace.”

 

Leo, who is to meet the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, in the Vatican on Thursday in an effort to ease tensions sparked by previous Trump broadsides, made a plea for honesty in political debate.

 

“If anyone wants to criticise me for proclaiming the gospel, let them do so with the truth: the church has spoken out against all nuclear weapons for years, there is no doubt about that,” the pope said. “I simply hope to be listened to because of the value of God’s word.”

 

Earlier in the day, Trump told Hugh Hewitt, a prominent conservative radio talkshow host: “The pope would rather talk about the fact that it’s OK for Iran to have a nuclear weapon, and I don’t think that’s very good.

 

“I think he’s endangering a lot of Catholics and a lot of people. But I guess if it’s up to the pope, he thinks it’s just fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

 

In April, the US president lashed out at Leo in response to the pope’s criticisms of the war on Iran, calling Leo “weak on crime” and “terrible on foreign policy” and saying he had only been elected pontiff because Trump himself was in the White House. Trump then shared an AI-generated image of himself depicted as a Christ-like figure before deleting it.

 

Leo, who marks his first year as pope on Friday, often goes to Castel Gandolfo at the start of the week, leaving on a Tuesday night and on some occasions stopping to chat to journalists. But until Trump’s latest tirade against him, he had not been planning to speak this week.

 

“We were told yesterday that there would be no papal chat,” said Andrea Vreede, a Vatican correspondent for the Dutch public radio and TV network NOS. “But there was, because he thought it was necessary and it was necessary.”

 

Vreede added: “Things have become really tense because Trump isn’t talking about the church or Vatican, but Leo; he has made it personal. We’re back to the middle ages when holy Roman emperors and popes did this kind of [thing], used this kind of language.”

 

The Rubio meeting will be the first known private audience Leo has had with a member of Trump’s cabinet since the secretary of state and the US vice-president, JD Vance, met the pope a day after his papal inauguration mass in May last year.

 

A “frank” conversation is expected, the US ambassador to the Holy See, Brian Burch, said, although Rubio has played down the rift between Trump administration and the Vatican, saying “obviously we had some stuff that happened” but there was “a lot to talk about with the Vatican”.

 

On Friday, Rubio will also meet the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, whom Trump berated in April after she criticised his remarks against Leo. The president lambasted the Meloni government for not supporting the strikes on Iran and threatening to withdraw US troops from Italy as a result.

 

But Rubio’s meeting with the pope, which the US secretary of state has been seeking for weeks, could have an ulterior motive, said Vreede.

 

“For Leo, it’s important to have a photo moment with Rubio and then release a short statement saying they are continuing their dialogue and all want world peace,” she said. “Privately, it won’t be a nice talk, it cannot be a nice talk … but Rubio needs to keep the diplomatic channels with the Vatican open as he’s thinking about himself [ahead of the US presidential elections] in 2028.”

 

Trump’s rivalry with Rubio possibly triggered his latest outburst, Vreede added: “He believes in rivalry, in winning … perhaps he’s trying to interfere with Rubio because Rubio is being a bit too diplomatic.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/06/pope-leo-rejects-claim-he-supports-nuclear-weapons-trump-tirade-iran-war

 

[umbertino]

‘Putin only cares about parades’: fury as Russia rains missiles on Ukraine during 24-hour truce

 

Dozens killed despite ceasefire announced by Zelenskyy, after Moscow asked for Saturday truce for its annual military parade

 

Luke Harding and agencies

Wed 6 May 2026 10.32 BST

 

Kyiv has criticised Russia for attacking several Ukrainian cities overnight with more than 100 combat drones and three missiles, in spite of a unilateral 24-hour ceasefire called by Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

 

Ukraine’s president had announced the truce after the Kremlin said it wanted a ceasefire on Saturday during its annual military parade in Red Square – but he said he would reciprocate if Vladimir Putin broke Ukraine’s ceasefire, which ends at midnight on Wednesday.

 

Instead of pausing operations, Moscow has intensified them, with a series of devastating bombings on busy urban areas. On Tuesday, 28 civilians were killed in bomb and missile strikes in the Donetsk, Poltava and Dnipro regions and dozens were injured.

 

The latest strikes on Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia showed that Russia rejected peace, Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andriy Sybiga, said. “This shows fake calls for a ceasefire on May 9th have nothing to do with diplomacy. Putin only cares about military parades, not human lives,” he wrote on social media.

 

Sybiga added: “Such attitude necessitates strong and increased pressure on the Russian regime, including new rounds of sanctions, isolation, accountability for Russian crimes, and enhanced support for Ukraine in all areas.”

 

Moscow’s drone and bomb attacks on Tuesday were the most deadly in Ukraine for weeks. They came at a time when Russia’s advances on the battlefield have practically stopped, with its armed forces losing more territory in April that they gained – for the first time since 2024.

 

The Kremlin has taken widespread measures to protect Saturday’s parade – which celebrates the allies’ victory over Nazi Germany in the second world war – after recent long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on a range of targets. For the first time in nearly 20 years the event will take place without a display of tanks and ballistic missiles.

 

Air defence systems have been transferred to the Russian capital from other areas, and the mobile internet network has been shut down, apparently as a security precaution. It is unclear if Ukraine will seek to disrupt the event, or instead target Russia’s oil infrastructure and military-industrial sites.

 

Moscow’s defence ministry said it downed 53 Ukrainian drones between 21.00 and 07.00 (1800-0400 GMT) – far fewer than in previous days. It did not say whether any of the drones attacked after Kyiv’s unilateral truce was supposed to come into effect at midnight.

 

Talks on ending Europe’s worst conflict since the second world war have shown little progress. Putin has refused to moderate demands first made during his 2022 full-scale invasion, including the handover of swathes of Ukrainian territory and the removal of its pro-western government.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/06/russia-ukraine-missiles-24-hour-ceasefire-military-parade

 

[umbertino]

Professor’s speech praising pro-Palestinian students sparks backlash at University of Michigan

 

By  JAKE OFFENHARTZ

Updated 11:49 PM CEST, May 5, 2026

 

 

 

The University of Michigan has issued a formal apology after a history professor lauded pro-Palestinian student protesters in a commencement speech over the weekend.

 

The remarks — and the ensuing apology — have set off cascading recriminations, with pro-Israel advocates calling to slash the school’s funding as others accuse university officials of bowing to political and donor pressure.

 

In a speech on Saturday at the universitywide commencement ceremony, Derek R. Peterson, a professor of East African history and outgoing chair of the faculty senate, credited “pro-Palestinian student activists who have over these past two years opened our hearts to the injustice and inhumanity of Israel’s war in Gaza.”

 

The comments followed Peterson’s praise for Moritz Levi, the first Jewish professor at the University of Michigan, among others who he said had advanced causes of justice through the school’s history.

 

Within hours, video of the pro-Palestinian portion of Peterson’s speech had widely circulated online, drawing condemnations from Jewish groups, who allege that campus protests against Israel created a hostile environment for some students.

 

The same day, the university’s president, Domenico Grasso, issued a public apology, saying the comments were “inappropriate and do not represent our institutional position.”

 

“We regret the pain this has caused on a day devoted to celebration and accomplishment,” Grasso said, adding that Peterson’s speech “deviated from the remarks he had shared before the ceremony.”

 

The swift apology did not stop some Republican officials, including Florida Sen. Rick Scott, from calling for the school to be stripped of federal funding. A Republican member of the Board of Regents, which governs the public university, also hinted at possible discipline for the professor. The prominent Israeli-American investor Adam Milstein urged Jewish people to halt any donations to the school.

 

Peterson said he stood by the comments, calling it “ridiculous” to expect that graduations be apolitical.

 

“Michigan is not a finishing school for polite young men and women,” he said in a statement. “They do not need sentimental, cloying nostalgia. They need encouragement to face a flawed and unjust world head on, using the tools we’ve given them: critical reasoning, careful research, sympathy for the oppressed.”

 

Peterson also accused the administration of scrubbing the speech from the internet. A university spokesperson said it had been temporarily removed by YouTube over a music copyright issue and was back online.

 

In a joint letter published Tuesday, a coalition of academic labor groups — including the American Association of University Professors and the American Federation of Teachers — condemned the university’s statement.

 

“Institutional leaders have an obligation not only to tolerate faculty speech, but to defend it — especially in the face of external political pressure,” the letter read.

 

The speech came two years after protests against the war in Gaza erupted across college campuses, leading to canceled speeches and other disruptions to the springtime commencement ritual. Michigan’s campus saw students form a campground and walk out from classes in protest of the war.

 

A handful of students at U.S. universities also faced discipline in 2025 for seeking to highlight pro-Palestinian issues at graduation ceremonies, including a graduate of New York University whose diploma was withheld for criticizing Israel in a speech.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://apnews.com/article/university-of-michigan-palestinian-protesters-professor-speech-11087e565ad7f6fd9f1413507f2c1857

[umbertino]

Ted Turner, CNN founder who reshaped global news, dies aged 87

 

The death of the media mogul who transformed TV news was confirmed by his family and reported by CNN

 

Anna Betts

Wed 6 May 2026 15.51 BST


 

Ted Turner, the media mogul who founded CNN, has died aged 87, CNN reported on Wednesday, citing a news release from Turner Enterprises.

 

In a statement, Mark Thompson, the chair and CEO of CNN Worldwide, said that “Ted was an intensely involved and committed leader, intrepid, fearless, and always willing to back a hunch and trust his own judgment.”

 

“He was and always will be the presiding spirit of CNN,” Thompson said. “Ted is the giant on whose shoulders we stand, and we will all take a moment today to recognize him and his impact on our lives and the world.”

 

Turner transformed television news by launching CNN, and went on to also become a prolific philanthropist, founding the United Nations Foundation in 1998 and donating a record $1bn to the UN.

 

According to the foundation, “Ted’s goals in establishing the foundation were to demonstrate the value of investing in the UN, encourage new partners to work with the UN and promote strong US leadership at the UN.”

 

He also founded the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a non-profit advocacy organization that describes itself as “a global security organization working to reduce threats from nuclear, biological and emerging technology threats imperiling humanity”.

 

In 1991, Turner was named Time magazine’s Man of the Year for “influencing the dynamic of events and turning viewers in 150 countries into instant witnesses of history”.

 

Turner sold his media company, Turner Broadcasting System, which included CNN, to Time Warner Inc in the 1990s.

 

In 2018, he announced that he had Lewy body dementia, a progressive brain disorder. Turner was briefly hospitalized in 2025 with a mild case of pneumonia.

 

According to CNN, Turner is survived by his five children, 14 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

 

The death was also confirmed by a spokesperson for the family to the New York Times.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/06/ted-turner-dead

[umbertino]

More Americans say US is no longer welcoming to immigrants, survey finds

 

Almost two-thirds of respondents said US used to be a great place for immigrants but no longer is

 

Richard Luscombe and agency

Wed 6 May 2026 18.43 BST
 

• Donald Trump’s aggressive and wide-reaching immigration-enforcement agenda has convinced increasing numbers of adults that the US is no longer a welcoming country for outsiders, a new poll has found.

•  

About six in 10 respondents to the Associated Press-NORC poll, conducted last month, say the country used to be a great place for immigrants, but no longer is.

 

Another one-third said they or somebody they knew personally had been affected by the Trump administration’s crackdown in the previous 12 months, rising to about 60% of Hispanic adults.

 

Almost half of the Hispanic adults who responded said they had started carrying proof of their US citizenship or permanent residence for fear of being detained or deported by federal immigration agencies.

 

The wide-ranging poll paints a damning portrait of how opinions have changed in the 14 months since Trump returned to the White House and embarked on his long-threatened “largest deportation operation in US history”.

 

Trump surged thousands of immigration agents, sometimes backed by the US military, into several cities and states to round up and detain those in the country illegally, often with violent results.

 

In separate incidents in Minneapolis in January, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two unarmed US citizens protesting against the government’s actions, were shot and killed by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers.

 

“It’s just plain wrong,” Reid Gibson, 72, a retiree in Missouri, said in his response to the poll. “This is not a good country for immigrants any more.”

 

The survey found that only a quarter of adults still believed the US was welcoming to immigrants, while about one in 10 believed it never was.

 

A question about birthright citizenship, which Trump has attempted to remove by an executive order blocked by federal courts and currently under deliberation by the justices of the US supreme court, brought a mixed response.

 

Overall, 65% believe that all children born in the US should be entitled to citizenship regardless of their parents’ status, and 75% believe the same for children whose non-citizen parents are legally present in the US on work visas.

 

But only 49% think that should be the case for children born in the US to parents in the country illegally. Trump’s executive order seeks to limit US citizenship to those who have at least one parent who is already a citizen.

 

The AP said it found that Democrats were more likely than independents or Republicans to know someone affected by the Trump crackdown, and those with a personal connection are more likely to say the US is no longer a great place for immigrants.

 

Kathy Bailey, a 79-year-old Illinois Democrat, said she had seen the administration’s immigration policies seep into the small-town swim class she regularly attends. She said two women in the class, both naturalized US citizens, had started carrying their passports when they left home.

 

Bailey said one of the women, from Latin America, was especially worried about sticking out in an overwhelmingly white community.

 

“She’s an American citizen now, but she’s so scared that she has to carry her passport,” Bailey said. “She’s just another sweet old grandmother swimming at five in the morning.”

 

Nick Grivas, 40, said his grandfather’s immigration from Greece two generations ago made him more conscious of Trump’s policies, and that he believed the US stopped being a promising place for people seeking a new life.

 

“We can see how we’re treating children and the children of the immigrants, and we’re not viewing them as potential future Americans,” Grivas, a resident of Massachusetts, said.

 

He said he thought new arrivals would be deterred from investing in their local communities if they feared deportation.

 

“You’re less willing to commit to the project if you don’t think that you’re gonna be able to stay,” he said.

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/06/trump-administration-immigration-poll

 

 

•  

 

[umbertino]

Spain awards UN legal expert Francesca Albanese one of its highest civilian honours

 

Honour recognises Albanese’s work ‘documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza’

Sam Jones in Madrid

Thu 7 May 2026 15.17 BST


 

The Spanish government awarded the UN legal expert Francesca Albanese one of its highest civilian honours in recognition of what it termed her “extensive work in documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza”.

 

Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer who serves as the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, has been vocal in her criticisms of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, which she has described as genocide.

 

She has also called out the international community over its failure to prevent and punish acts of torture, genocide and other serious human rights violations.

 

Albanese has faced the prospect of arrest in Germany over her use of language and has been hit with sanctions by the US government for urging the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate American and Israeli companies and individuals over their alleged complicity in gross human rights violations.

 

In a ceremony in Madrid on Thursday, Pedro Sánchez, Spain’s prime minister, awarded Albanese the Order of Civil Merit. Sánchez is one of the most vociferous European critics of Israel’s conduct in Gaza.

 

“Public responsibility also brings with it a moral obligation not to look the other way,” he said. “It is an honour to bestow the Order of Civil Merit on a voice that upholds the conscience of the world.”

 

Sánchez has also written to the EU to ask it to block the US sanctions against Albanese, arguing they “represent a very worrying precedent that compromises the independent workings of institutions that are essential to international justice”.

 

A day earlier, Albanese had visited the Reina Sofía museum in Madrid to see Picasso’s Guernica. Standing in front of the Spanish artist’s fierce condemnation of the Nazi bombing of the Basque town in 1937, she said the destruction it reflected was “reminiscent of what we have seen” in Gaza.

 

She also said the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip was meaningless, adding: “Those in power are pushing for the world to take its eye off Gaza and for it to be forgotten about. And that’s what most of the world has done.”

 

The lawyer, who is promoting her book, When the World Sleeps: Stories, Words and Wounds of Palestine, renewed her criticism of Israel and the lack of international action to protect Palestinians at another event in the Spanish capital on Wednesday evening.

 

In an echo of the controversial slogan “From the river to the sea”, Albanese said: “There is a genocide against the entire Palestinian people from the river to the sea: the aim is destruction and the result is also destruction.”

 

She praised the Spanish government for its stance on Gaza and its attempts to help fight the US sanctions. The rapporteur also warned that Israel’s actions had set a dangerous precedent when it came to eroding international law.

 

“The moment we’re in is an apocalypse,” she said in remarks reported by elDiario.es. “A lot of people have woken up but it’s not enough. In March 2024, I said that if we didn’t stop Israel, there would be a change in the rules of war. And then six months later, that was happening in Lebanon and it’s now happening in Iran, and they call it the Gaza doctrine.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/07/spain-awards-un-legal-expert-francesca-albanese-one-of-highest-civilian-honours

 

 

Good

[umbertino]

Another day, another pivot as Trump flails in an Iran trap of his own making

 

Latest proposal, derided by Tehran as a ‘wishlist’, could yet be a way out – but with 5,000 dead, it comes at an awful price

 

Wed 6 May 2026 16.51 BST

Julian Borger in Jerusalem

 

 

 

Another day, another hairpin turn in the world of Donald Trump’s foreign policy.

 

The weekend was all about war, and Trump insisting Iran had not yet “paid a big enough price”. Tuesday was Project Freedom, styled as a grand “humanitarian gesture” to allow trapped ships and their crews to escape the Gulf, but also aimed at weakening Iran’s chokehold on the strait of Hormuz.

 

By the early hours of Wednesday we were back to peace. The president announced: “Great Progress has been made toward a Complete and Final Agreement” so Project Freedom would be paused to give negotiations a chance.

 

The three approaches on three consecutive days do have something in common. They are all attempts to wrestle with the same set of hard facts: the regime in Iran is unlikely to collapse or surrender the right to enrich uranium no matter how many bombs are dropped on it, Tehran has shown its capacity to close the strait of Hormuz, and a total blockade of the Gulf hurts the US economy as well as Iran.

 

Together these hard facts make up the sides of a steel box in which the Trump administration, largely through its own actions, finds itself trapped. The repeated policy changes in recent days show him flailing around inside this trap, pinging off the walls and looking for an exit other than humiliation or a forever war.

 

It remains too early to say whether Trump has now found a way out. His accompanying threat of bombardment “at a much higher level and intensity” if Iran does not accept the initial terms betrays his nervousness it will not work.

 

The terms on the table became clearer over the course of Wednesday. The Axios news site, and then Reuters news agency, reported that the US, Iran and their Pakistani mediators were getting close to an agreement on a one-page “memorandum of understanding” to declare an end to the war and begin a 30-day negotiating period for resolving disputes over Iran’s nuclear programme, US sanctions and Iran’s frozen assets. Both sides would lift their parallel blockades of the strait of Hormuz over the course of this month of talks.

 

Trump’s announcement brought down the oil price and boosted stock markets, as the president’s upbeat messages are designed to do. But it all remained tenuous.

 

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said the reopening of the strait of Hormuz could be possible, but did not give a straight reply on the reported proposal. Tehran has said it wants the blockade to end first, before talking about anything else.

 

The foreign ministry said the proposal was under review, while Ebrahim Rezaei, the spokesperson for the Iranian parliament’s national security and foreign policy commission, rejected it as an “American wishlist, not a reality”.

 

There has been much speculation over whether the various centres of power in Iran will be able to agree on a shared position when it comes to serious talks. This proposal could put that conjecture to the test.

 

Even if the parties make it to the negotiating table, 30 days is a very short time to resolve such entrenched disputes as Iran’s nuclear programme and US-led sanctions, all while unravelling the dual blockade.

 

Before the war, Iran was offering a moratorium on uranium enrichment of five years, and the US was demanding 20. The reported new proposal suggests a compromise of 12 or 15 years.

 

Iran’s prewar offer involved doing something about its stockpile of highly enriched uranium (HEU, potential fuel for nuclear weapons) – either diluting or exporting it, or both. The reported proposal for a new negotiating framework points towards export, possibly even to the US.

 

Under the deal, Iran would also accept the permanent return of inspectors from the UN watchdog body, the IAEA, which would be essential for international confidence that any deal would stick.

 

In return, Iran’s billions of frozen assets would be released in stages (a concession for which Trump spent years lambasting his predecessors) and sanctions would be lifted progressively.

 

It is a very ambitious agenda. There are countless ways it could fall apart, and while neither side wants to go back to war, both parties apparently believe that more fighting could improve their position at the negotiating table – an unstable set of circumstances in which to hammer out a peace agreement.

 

Israel would also be expected to oppose any settlement that does not address Iran’s arsenal of missiles or the actions of its regional proxies.

 

In the best-case scenario for the US, the terms agreed would be somewhat better than those on the table in Geneva on 26 February, two days before the war started with a surprise US-Israeli attack.

 

The enrichment moratorium would be longer, and there would be greater certainty HEU would be shipped out of the country. We will never know, however, if the same improvements could have been achieved by more rounds of negotiations in place of bombing.

 

Any agreement should ultimately be assessed against the benchmark of the 2015 multilateral nuclear deal that Trump torpedoed in 2018. Under its terms, Iran had no HEU but would have held on to a closely monitored and strictly limited nuclear programme.

 

If he wants to declare victory, Trump could point to the fact that even the 2015 deal lacked the lengthy moratorium on enrichment that his will provide.

 

But any such gains will have come at an awful price. There are more than 5,000 people dead, including the 120 primary school children killed on the first day in Minab, and counting the casualties in Lebanon.

 

Then there are all the indirect global costs – economic and environmental – that will take years to play out. The UN estimates that 32 million people could be plunged into poverty as a result of the war, largely through its impact on energy and fertiliser supplies.

 

The UN humanitarian chief, Tom Fletcher, has said that the $2bn (£1.5bn) a day spent on the war could have saved about 87 million people’s lives if the money had been spent on humanitarian relief.

 

Harder to calculate is whether the relentless bombing has shortened or lengthened the life of Iran’s regime. For now, it appears to have entrenched the military and the hardliners.

 

As things stand, there are more unknowns than knowns surrounding this possible breakthrough, and any progress will remain extremely fragile.

 

But even if the war is ended and Trump gets the peace plan sketched out in the latest reports, this war seems certain to rank right up there on the list of history’s most pointless conflicts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/06/another-day-another-pivot-as-trump-flails-in-an-iran-trap-of-his-own-making

 

[umbertino]

Revealed: Russia’s top secret spy school teaching hacking and election meddling

 

Exclusive: Documents obtained by consortium of journalists show role of Moscow university in training operatives in military intelligence

 

Pjotr Sauer and Shaun Walker

Thu 7 May 2026 05.00 BST



 

Last April, Vladimir Putin visited the campus of Bauman Moscow state technical university, set on the banks of the Yauza River in the east of the city and home to some of the country’s brightest scientific minds.

 

He toured the campus, met undergraduates and boasted about Moscow’s ambitious plans for space missions to the moon and Mars. “You have everything it takes to be competitive,” Putin told the students.

 

What the Kremlin readout of Putin’s visit did not mention was a secret faculty inside the university, known simply as Department 4, or “Special Training”.

 

Here, a select group of students are quietly prepared for careers in the GRU – Russia’s military intelligence directorate, whose operatives have hacked western parliaments, poisoned dissidents on foreign soil and interfered in elections across Europe and the US.

 

Until now its role in preparing future intelligence operatives has remained largely secret, save among a select group of insiders.

 

“Sometimes you are first scouted from school, then go to Bauman and join the services … it is part of a pipeline,” said a former senior Russian defence official.

 

The existence of this path, from one of Russia’s most prestigious institutions directly into its military intelligence apparatus, is revealed for the first time in more than 2,000 internal documents from Bauman, obtained by a consortium of journalists from six outlets: the Guardian, Der Spiegel, Le Monde, the Insider, Delfi and VSquare.

 

The files, covering several years of activity up to 2025, include course syllabuses, exam records, staff contracts and the career assignments of individual graduates, tracing their path from classroom exercises in hacking and disinformation to postings in some of the most notorious cyber-units in the Russian military intelligence apparatus.

 

Bauman, one of Russia’s leading technical universities, has never hidden its ties to the military. Founded in 1830, it later trained the engineers and scientists who built Soviet rockets, tanks and weapons systems and continues to do so today.

 

In a 2013 internal letter seen by the Guardian and addressed to the then defence minister Sergei Shoigu, the university’s rector wrote it carries out more research and development than any other higher education institution in Russia, with more than 40% conducted in the interests of the ministry of defence.

 

Embedded within the university’s military training centre, Department 4 is divided into three specialist streams, the documents suggest. The most prominent, bearing the code 093400, is titled the “Special Reconnaissance Service”.

 

The documents indicate that the GRU exerts direct control over the recruitment and grading process – sending its own officers to conduct exams, approve candidates and oversee placements. The picture that emerges is of a programme where the distinction between professor and handler and between teaching and recruitment is blurred.

 

The department is led by lieutenant colonel Lt Col Kirill Stupakov, a signals intelligence officer who, according to the documents, signed a three-year contract in 2022 with GRU Unit 45807, one of the agency’s key units. It is not clear if he is still in active service.

 

At Bauman, Stupakov’s subjects include training students to master electronic eavesdropping and covert surveillance. PowerPoint slides, apparently designed to accompany his lectures and viewed by the consortium, amount to a catalogue of deception: a smoke detector that is in fact a camera, a device that sits undetected between a keyboard and a computer logging every keystroke, a monitor cable that is also a silent screenshot machine storing its captures on a hidden flash drive.

 

Another teacher mentioned in the documents is Viktor Netyksho, a western-sanctioned major general who commanded Unit 26165 – a hacking group known as Fancy Bear – whose officers were indicted by the US Department of Justice for interfering in the 2016 presidential election.

 

Among the core courses is one titled “Defence against technical reconnaissance”. Over 144 hours across two semesters, students are taught the full toolkit of modern hacking, including password attacks, software vulnerabilities and so called trojans – malicious programs disguised as legitimate software that can grant unauthorised access to a system.

 

To pass the course, students are required to carry out “practical penetration tests”, while one module is devoted entirely to computer viruses. As part of the assessment, they must develop one themselves.

 

Students are also taught the structure and organisation of US and British military intelligence agencies. Separate sessions cover the use of western intelligence in the war in Ukraine, and the development of enemy reconnaissance and strike drones on the Ukrainian battlefield.

 

Apart from hacking tasks, the curriculum also covers information warfare. Advanced students must complete a seminar on developing a disinformation campaign, the documents suggest, tasked with creating a social media video using “manipulation, pressure and hidden propaganda”.

 

Students are taught the mechanics of psychological manipulation and how to impose a “correct” perception of information on an audience.

 

The teaching materials, meanwhile, saturate students with Kremlin orthodoxy: the war in Ukraine was “inevitable”; “nationalists and neo-Nazis” are in power there; Russians in the Donbas face “genocide”, backed by European countries.

 

Western intelligence services have grown increasingly vocal about the scale of Russian cyber-activity in recent years.

 

In a report published in February, the Dutch intelligence services warned that Russia was increasing hybrid activities across Europe, combining cyber-attacks, sabotage and influence operations targeting critical infrastructure.

 

On 15 April, Sweden’s minister for civil defence, Carl-Oskar Bohlin, publicly accused Russia of regularly carrying out destructive cyber-attacks against EU institutions.

 

The documents suggest that among the 69 students who graduated from Department 4 in spring 2024 was Daniil Porshin, who had spent six years at Bauman maintaining near-perfect grades while playing for the faculty football team. Upon graduation, he was assigned to Fancy Bear.

 

Not every student makes the cut: the files show that dozens have been dismissed or failed to graduate, and the assessments of some students, written by the senior GRU officers who oversee the programme can be withering. “Insufficient understanding of how to carry out a remote network attack,” reads one evaluation.

 

Many are deemed worthy of work inside the GRU, however: 15 others from Porshin’s cohort were similarly directed into GRU units.

 

Among them was a student who took up his first posting that summer, 900 miles (1,500km) from Moscow at Unit 74455 in the Black Sea town of Anapa – one of Russia’s most popular holiday resorts, and home to the hacker unit known as Sandworm by western governments.

 

Sandworm has been accused by western intelligence agencies of unleashing some of the most destructive cyber-attacks of the past decade including targeting Ukraine’s power grid in 2015, Emmanuel Macron’s French presidential campaign in 2017, the South Korean Winter Olympics in 2018, and the British investigation into the Salisbury nerve agent poisoning.

 

The consortium sent requests to comment on the allegations to Bauman University, and to Netyksho, Stupakov and Porshin, but had not received a response at the time of publishing.

 

As the war in Ukraine continues, intelligence experts suggest that Russia is ramping up its “hybrid” attacks on European allies of Ukraine, attempting a broad campaign of interference and sabotage to cause havoc in the west while remaining deniable and not crossing the threshold that could trigger a military response.

 

Hacking and cyber-attacks have been a key part of this strategy and the documents suggest the Bauman programme shows no signs of slowing. The latest cohort of trainees will not graduate until the end of the 2027 academic year.

 

While the trove of documents represent an unprecedented insight into the secretive and systematic training programme for Russia’s cyber-agents, insiders said it was only one part of the picture. Another Russian university, Mirea, was even more crucial in training hackers, according to the former defence official.

 

“Bauman is one of a handful of elite universities used to identify gifted students for recruitment into military and intelligence structures,” said the source.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/07/revealed-russia-top-secret-spy-school-hacking-western-electoral-interference

 

[umbertino]

Vatican stresses need for peace as Rubio meets pope amid strained relations

 

US secretary of state speaks with Leo and officials after tensions following attacks by Trump over Iran war

 

Lorenzo Tondo in Palermo

Thu 7 May 2026 16.59 BST

 

The Vatican has said it raised the “need to work tirelessly in favour of peace” in talks with the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, who is in Rome on a trip widely regarded as an effort to ease tensions after Donald Trump’s repeated criticisms of Pope Leo.

 

Amid unprecedented strain on relations between the Holy See and Washington, Rubio was received by the pope on Thursday at the Apostolic Palace, before holding a series of meetings with Vatican officials

 

Vatican video showed the first north American pope shaking hands with his guest and addressing him formally as “Mr Secretary”, to which Rubio, a Catholic, responded: “Great to see you.”

 

Rubio was seen giving the pope a small crystal American football. He joked that he knew Leo – originally from Chicago and known as a fan of the White Sox – ‌was more ⁠of a “baseball guy”.

 

After his 45-minutes long papal audience, Rubio also met with Vatican secretary of state, and de facto chief diplomat, Pietro Parolin, who on the eve of his visit had strongly defended Leo and criticised Trump’s recent attacks as “rather strange”.

 

In a statement, the Vatican said the two sides had exchanged views on current events “with particular attention to countries marked by war, political tensions, and difficult humanitarian situations, as well as on the need to work tirelessly in favour of peace.”

 

A US official briefed reporters that the conversations were “friendly and constructive.” A spokesperson for the US state department said Rubio met Leo “to discuss the situation in the Middle East and issues of mutual interest in the western hemisphere”.

 

“The meeting underscored the strong relationship between the United States and the Holy See, as well as their shared commitment to promoting peace and human dignity,” he added.

 

It was unclear to what extent the meetings would help patch up the ties between Washington DC and the Vatican.

 

On Tuesday, Trump launched a fresh verbal attack on the pope, accusing him of supporting nuclear weapons and “endangering a lot of Catholics” with his stance against the Iran war.

 

On Wednesday, Leo responded: “If anyone wants to criticise me for proclaiming the gospel, let them do so with the truth: the church has spoken out against all nuclear weapons for years, there is no doubt about that. I simply hope to be listened to because of the value of God’s word.”

 

Relations between the Vatican and Washington have never been so fraught. In April, the US president lashed out at Leo over the pope’s criticism of the war in Iran, branding him “weak on crime” and “terrible on foreign policy”, and claiming he had only been elected pontiff because Trump himself occupied the White House. Trump later shared – before deleting – an AI-generated image depicting himself as a Christ-like figure.

 

Rubio’s meeting appeared aimed at trying to smooth over Trump’s insults and repair the increasingly damaged ties between the US and the Vatican. According to several analysts, the secretary of state was expected to have defended Washington’s rationale for launching the war in Iran, while carefully avoiding a direct clash with the church’s position.

 

Asked whether he placed greater trust in Rubio or Trump, Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, told reporters on Tuesday: “I count on no one. I count only on our Lord Jesus Christ.” He added that Trump attacking Leo “in this way, or reproaching him for what he does, seems rather strange, to say the least”.

 

Rubio will meet the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, on Friday as relations between Rome and Washington have also deteriorated.

 

Lorenzo Castellani, a political historian at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome, said Trump’s attacks on the pope, which have provoked widespread outrage in Italy where the papacy plays a crucial role in the political and cultural imagination, “has effectively forced Meloni to distance herself from the US president”, despite, earlier this year, saying she hoped Trump would one day receive the Nobel peace prize.

 

According to some Italian newspapers, Rubio’s goal in talks with Italy will not necessarily be to mend relations, but rather to reassert Trump’s position after the US president lashed out at Meloni in April, accusing her of lacking courage for refusing to join the US campaign against Iran.

 

According to Castellani, Meloni’s shift from being a staunch Trump ally to adopting a more critical stance towards the US president is driven by political and electoral considerations.

 

“For the first time since the second world war, foreign policy has become a central concern for Italian public opinion,” Castellani said. “This shift had already begun with the war in Ukraine, but the current crisis represents a decisive escalation. The reason is simple: this is a conflict with direct geopolitical and economic consequences for Italy and for Europe as a whole.”

 

“For this reason”, he added, “Meloni can no longer maintain a clear separation between foreign and domestic policy. In the past, she has taken positions that ran counter to segments of her own electorate. But now, recent polling suggests that across both the right and the left there is broad agreement in condemning the position of Trump. The same sentiments now cut across a vast portion of the electorate – arguably as much as 80 to 90%.”

 

Also expected to feature prominently in the talks is the future of the roughly 13,000 US military personnel stationed across seven naval bases in Italy.

 

Asked last week whether he would consider pulling US troops out of Italy, Trump told reporters: “Probably … Italy has not been of any help to us.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/07/marco-rubio-to-meet-pope-at-the-vatican-after-trump-attacks-on-pontiff

 

[umbertino]

Professors sue Atlanta’s Emory University over handling of Israel-Gaza protests

 

Students and faculty have also protested against surveillance cameras on campus and handling of racist posts by a student

 

Timothy http://iqd.me/l/11 in Atlanta

Thu 7 May 2026 13.00 BST

 

Atlanta’s Emory University is facing a lawsuit from three tenured professors over its handling of 2024 protests against Israel’s assault on Gaza, capping off a tumultuous end to the spring semester.

 

In recent months faculty and students have also demanded the removal of Flock surveillance cameras on campus, and Black law school students and others protested the school’s response to a student’s social media posts and emails that were filled with the N-word.

 

Emory is one of the richest private schools in the US, with the nation’s 12th-largest endowment. It is also the Atlanta metro area’s second-largest employer.

 

Noëlle McAfee, chair of the philosophy department and one of three plaintiffs in the civil complaint, sees the recent events at the school as connected. They reflect what is happening “mostly at public universities, but is creeping into private ones … a very dark, authoritarian turn happening around the country”, McAfee said.

 

The lawsuit alleges the three professors sustained wrongful arrests and prosecution after the school’s administration called Atlanta police and state troopers onto campus two years ago, brutally shutting down a protest encampment less than an hour after it began. The suit also alleges the school violated its own open expression policy.

 

The Guardian’s reporting on a conservative group that later targeted those who were arrested that day is named in the lawsuit.

 

McAfee hopes to draw attention to the school’s behavior with the complaint and help ensure the school never calls police onto the campus to quash a protest again. She says some faculty and students have never recovered from the incident. “The trauma of that day, the violence of it, are so massive and so disruptive – and the administration has taken no ownership for what they did, and provided no apology.”

 

Meanwhile, Emory law school expelled a student named Milano Wayne on 23 April, after months of social media posts and emails to a faculty member containing racist, misogynistic and transphobic messages – including, in an email, his intention to “stomp on n****s”.

 

This decision followed seven months of escalating concerns, according to Kylie Doyle, past president of the Student Bar Association. Doyle compared the school’s swift response to the April 2024 protest seeking the school’s divestment from Israel with its months long reaction to Wayne’s communications, which earlier this year had students fearing he would commit violence against members of the groups he targeted.

 

“When the university had students and faculty protests on campus, they were immediately arrested and shot with rubber bullets and tear gas,” Doyle said. “But when a student talks about Black people this way, it takes months for the school to respond.”

 

As a member of Emory’s Black Law Students Association, Greear Webb was one of about 10 students who met on 13 April with law school dean Richard Freer and other members of the school’s administration.

 

In the meeting, Freer expressed concerns “about the current political climate, and that the university didn’t want to do anything to put Emory on the administration’s college hit list”, Webb told the Guardian.

 

Webb noted that Milano was allowed to stay enrolled and take classes remotely for months while the school investigated his behavior. “It seemed like they were giving privileges to someone with racist, violent ideologies,” he said.

 

After the 13 April meeting, he said, the students felt “disappointed and frustrated”.

 

They would like to see the student code of conduct be revised to name hate speech and related threats. Also, echoing McAfee, he said, “We’re asking for an apology, a specific acknowledgment that [Milano’s] behavior impacted Black, women and LGBTQ+ students.”

 

As for Atlanta-based surveillance tech company Flock Safety, a group of students says it has gathered more than a thousand student and faculty signatures opposing the company’s license plate reader cameras on campus. They cite concerns such as a lack of transparent communication from the school about their use and ways in which information from the cameras can wind up in the hands of federal agencies such as ICE.

 

Under the name DeFlock Emory Coalition, the group published an editorial on 29 April in the Emory Wheel, a student newspaper, calling on the school to “prepare for a mass mobilization should Emory ignore our demands”.

 

“We demand that our university be the institution it claims to be: one that defends inquiry, dissent and the people who make this community possible,” the editorial concludes.

 

Laura Diamond, spokesperson for Emory, declined to answer questions from the Guardian about faculty and students seeking apologies and the school’s concerns about being targeted by the Trump administration – and instead sent previously-released statements.

 

One statement said the lawsuit is “without merit” and that “Emory acts appropriately and responsibly to keep our community safe from threats of harm”. Another said “[t]here is no place in our university for harassment, threats, and bullying. We condemn the vile and hateful language used by the individual in the emails and social media posts.” A third said the school is “taking additional steps to further review how data is shared” from Flock cameras.

 

Emil’ Keme, an Indigenous K’iche’ Maya scholar, is also a plaintiff on the complaint over the 2024 protest. As with the DeFlock students, he noted the school’s behavior differs from its promoted image.

 

The swift clampdown on protest and brutal arrests, he said, “went against the principles the school defends: search for knowledge, dialogue and so on”. Since then, he said, “students are afraid” to protest. “This ties into what’s happening nationally,” he said. “It’s a bleak climate.”

 

McAfee said students now “have to weigh whether it’s safe to demonstrate about something they believe in. There’s a loss of trust.” One student told her: “I don’t want to go to jail – I want to go to med school,” in a conversation about the subject.

 

Stefano Harvey, a professor at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne, Germany, who has studied higher education in the US, said that universities under the Trump administration have been emboldened “to act more like corporations”.

 

“It’s capitalism trying to get universities in order … [they’re] selling study, learning and community – advertisements that suck you in,” he said. “But then, in each of these cases [at Emory], unfortunately people have to be disabused of these ideas. It’s a very sobering moment.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/07/emory-university-professor-lawsuit-israel-gaza-protests

 

[umbertino]

Gaza Faces Public Health Collapse Amid Rat Infestation & Disease as Israel Blocks Reconstruction

 

May 07, 2026

 

 

Gaza is facing an “environmental and biological apocalypse” under Israeli bombardment and blockade, reports Palestinian aid worker Eyad Amawi of the Gaza Relief Committee. Israel’s destruction of infrastructure has become a “generator for disease,” with sewage contamination and rodent infestation now an everyday hazard for refugees living in tent camps.

 

“[It’s] no longer just bombardment or physical destruction. It is the collapse of every essential condition required for human survival: water, food, health, dignity, shelter, safety, everything.” Amawi also comments on the extended detention of two international activists with the Global Sumud Flotilla. Thiago Ávila and Saif Abukeshek will not be released before this weekend, according to the latest update from the Israeli military. Neither has been charged with any crime.........

 

 

 

 

 

Watch / read

 

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/5/7/gaza_apocalypse

[umbertino]

Democratic senators press US military on Israel’s evacuation zones, warning of legal risks

 

By  BASSEM MROUE

Updated 5:24 PM CEST, May 7, 2026

 

 

 

BEIRUT (AP) — A group of Democratic U.S. senators have called for the U.S. Central Command to answer questions about American coordination with Israel in declaring broad “ evacuation zones ” in Lebanon and Iran, alleging that the practice may violate international law.

 

The letter underlines how the Democratic Party — both its leaders and the base — has grown increasingly critical of Israel.

 

Since the beginning of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran and the latest Israel-Hezbollah war in Lebanon, the Israeli military has regularly issued maps covering large areas of territory along with warnings telling all residents of the zones to flee. Israel had previously used a similar approach in Gaza.

 

The senators said the sweeping warnings have “been used to permanently displace people and destroy homes and towns” and that some civilians who refused to leave their homes in the areas have been killed by subsequent strikes.

 

The 12 senators led by Vermont Sen. Peter Welch, in a letter dated May 4 to CENTCOM chief Adm. Brad Cooper that was provided to The Associated Press, state that Israel’s practice of unilaterally declaring mass evacuation warnings in Lebanon and Iran “likely contravene international laws the United States has helped develop around humane warfare.”

 

The other signatories include senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin.

 

The letter asked the CENTCOM chief whether U.S. forces have coordinated military targets with Israeli forces during the recent war with Iran, whether they provided assistance or intelligence helping Israel’s military to impose the evacuation zones in Lebanon and Iran, and whether CENTCOM signed off on U.S. military support for the targeting of people or infrastructure in the evacuation zones. It also asked whether the U.S. military has reviewed the legality of the practice.

 

The Israeli military declined to comment when asked about the letter. CENTCOM did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

In the past, Israel has said the evacuation maps aim to keep civilians out of harm’s way. It says Hezbollah has positioned fighters, tunnels and weapons in civilian areas across southern Lebanon, from which it has launched hundreds of drones and missiles — without warning — into northern Israel.

 

International law experts say Israel’s warnings are inconsistent and often overly broad and open-ended. In Lebanon, residents say the warnings sometimes come with short notice or in the middle of the night, causing chaos and confusion, while in some cases, the warnings prompt evacuations but are never followed by a strike. In other cases, strikes in residential areas come with no warning.

 

Observers said the move is part of a larger shift in the stance of Democratic Party leaders on U.S. military assistance to Israel. Democrats have also been critical of the Trump administration’s entry into the war on Iran alongside Israel.

 

The letter came nearly three weeks after more than three dozen Democrats supported an effort by Sanders to block arms sales to Israel, signaling a growing discontent in the party with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the wars in Gaza and Iran.

 

The two resolutions to block U.S. sales of bulldozers and bombs to Israel were opposed by all Republicans and rejected 40-59 and 36-63.

 

Jon Finer, former deputy national security adviser under President Joe Biden, said the recent steps by Democratic senators reflect a “growing concern about Israeli conduct of various wars that cause civilian harm and U.S. complicity in that” across the spectrum within the Democratic Party.

 

Asked why the Democratic Party is taking these steps now and not at the time when the war in Gaza and the Israel-Hezbollah war broke out — when the Democratic Biden administration was in power — Finer said: “our operational integration with Israel appears to be growing, which is part of it, but the truth is the Democratic base has been moving in this direction for some time and Washington has been catching up.”

 

Andrew Miller, a former senior official on Israel and Palestinian Affairs at the State Department, said the letter “represents a shift among congressional Democrats moving from questions of the legality of Israeli military operations to concerns about the complicity of the U.S. military.”

 

“It demonstrates that Democrats are taking international law very seriously and that is a welcome development,” Miller said.

 

Israel has issued dozens of evacuation warnings in Lebanon since the latest Israel-Hezbollah war began on March 2. Over 1 million people in Lebanon have fled their homes during the war.

 

Israel has also issued similar warnings for Iranians, both during the 12-day Israel-Iran war last year and during the U.S.-Israeli war launched on Iran on Feb. 28. In one case last year they warned 300,000 people in Tehran, Iran’s capital, to evacuate.

 

On Wednesday, the Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesperson Avichay Adraee issued an evacuation warning to residents of 12 villages in southern Lebanon saying Hezbollah is using them to launch attacks. The warnings came despite a ceasefire that has been nominally in place since April 17, although Israel and Hezbollah have been carrying daily attacks since then.

 

The senators said the declaration of evacuation zones does not absolve Israeli and U.S. forces “from the absolute legal responsibility to determine that each individual person or civilian facility targeted by drones, jets, and gunfire is, in fact, a military target.” It said the use of the zones has been linked to “the deaths of thousands of civilians,” describing them as “kill zones.”

 

In response to questions by the AP last month, the Israeli military said it issues warnings by phone, text, radio broadcast, social media and leaflets dropped from the air, in accordance with the “principles of distinction, proportionality and feasible precautions” under international law.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://apnews.com/article/lebanon-iran-israel-evacuation-warnings-us-military-c6381874a5e11e04b7119d1fee341a17

[umbertino]

Marco Rubio’s campaign-style video sparks presidential run speculation

 

Comments with optimistic tone went viral on social media, with some calling it an unofficial start of his 2028 campaign

 

David Smith in Washington

Thu 7 May 2026 16.31 BST

 

Marco Rubio, the top US diplomat, has stoked speculation about a potential run for president in 2028 by releasing a campaign-style video that articulates a hopeful vision of America.

 

The minute-long vertical video features images of Rubio, Donald Trump, jets flying over the White House, Americans of different races, former US president Ronald Reagan, and the Stars and Stripes being hoisted against a blue sky.

 

The soundtrack is drawn from a White House press briefing earlier this week in which the US secretary of state stood in for the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, who is on maternity leave.

 

A reporter asked Rubio: “I’ve got to ask you, what is your hope for America at a time such as this?”

 

The secretary replied: “My hope for America is what it’s always been. I think it’s the hope I hope we all share. We want it to continue to be the place where anyone from anywhere can achieve anything, where you’re not limited by the circumstances of your birth, by the color of your skin, by your ethnicity, but frankly, it’s a place where you are able to overcome challenges and achieve your full potential.

 

“I think that should be the goal of every country in the world, frankly, but I think in the US – we’re not perfect. Our history is not one of perfection, but it’s still better than anybody else’s history. And ours is a story of perpetual improvement. Each generation has left the next generation of Americans freer, more prosperous, safer, and that is our goal as well.”

 

Rubio added: “But it is a unique and exceptional country and, as we come upon this 250-year anniversary, I think we have a lot to learn and be proud of in our history. It is one of perpetual and continuous improvement, where each generation has done its part to bring us closer to fulfilling the vision that the founders of this country had upon its founding.”

 

The comments, notable for striking a more optimistic tone than Trump or Vice-President JD Vance, went viral on social media with some users framing it as the unofficial start of Rubio’s White House campaign.

 

Laura Loomer, a rightwing activist close to the president, tweeted: “Wow! This looks like it could be a launch video for a Presidential campaign. Amazing production quality and vibes.”

 

Elon Musk, the billionaire tech entrepreneur who headed Trump’s controversial government efficiency drive last year, posted a clip of Rubio’s briefing remarks on his X social media platform without comment. Rob Schneider, an actor and comedian, replied: “THIS should be the NEXT President of these United States.”

 

Influencer Kaizen D Asiedu wrote on X: “Marco Rubio is looking more presidential every day.” Neil Stone, an infectious diseases doctor, commented: “Marco Rubio is extremely eloquent I think he’s going to be the next President JD Vance isn’t in the same league.” Kevin Sorbo, an actor, director and producer, wrote: “It’s so refreshing to hear a politician who has hope for our future.”

 

Even some Trump sceptics were impressed. Ashish Jha, a doctor and academic who served as the White House Covid-19 response coordinator under Joe Biden, tweeted: “An extraordinary response from @SecRubio. This should be everyone’s hope and vision for America.”

 

Rubio, a former senator for Florida, ran for president in 2016 only to be humiliated by Trump with the disparaging nickname “Little Marco”. But his star has risen over the past decade, and he is now seen as a leading contender to succeed the president.

 

In March a straw poll of attenders at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Grapevine, Texas, for the 2028 Republican presidential primary put Vance at 53% and Rubio at 35%. But Vance is now torn between loyalty to Trump and his doubts about the war in Iran, for which he undertook a failed diplomatic mission to Islamabad.

 

Rubio, meanwhile, has gained meme status because of the multiple hats he wears in the administration. On Thursday he was in action again, meeting Pope Leo at the Vatican to ease tensions after Trump’s repeated attacks on the Catholic leader over the Iran war.

 

Critics, however, were not impressed by the hope soliloquy he delivered at the press briefing. Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman, tweeted: “Rubio sold his soul to support & work for a President who is the utter antithesis of everything Rubio so ‘eloquently’ expresses here. Trump’s America is the exact opposite of what Rubio says here. What does that say about Rubio?”

 

Garry Kasparov, a pro-democracy activist and chess grandmaster, admitted that Rubio “is a professional”, but added that “being the only member of the Trump admin who can complete a thought and a full sentence only highlights his fall from grace. The White House he serves has attacked the laws, norms, and dreams for America that Rubio eloquently expresses.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/07/marco-rubio-video-presidential-run-speculation

 

[umbertino]

The Guardian view on ceasefires that aren’t: Israel never stopped killing in Gaza – allies must reject any escalation

 

The US is unlikely to pressure Benjamin Netanyahu to comply with truce terms. Europe must take action

 

Thu 7 May 2026 18.36 BST

Editorial

 

 

 

The meaning of the term “ceasefire” should be self‑evident. Yet Israel’s strikes have killed scores of people in Lebanon since it agreed a truce with Hezbollah under pressure from the US, with the two sides trading fire. There was a strike on Beirut on Wednesday. Benjamin Netanyahu’s government would be delighted to resume war with Iran. But it is wary of Donald Trump’s wrath as he seeks an exit from the conflict.

 

In Gaza, the Israeli military has killed more than 800 people since the truce there was declared in October, striking almost every day. This, too, is not a true ceasefire but a de-escalation, however necessary. Lethal Israeli attacks on an engineer and drivers transporting water have intensified the water crisis that is fuelling the spread of infectious diseases; Médecins Sans Frontières has called the weaponisation of water supplies a campaign of collective punishment. Never mind the estimated $70bn cost of reconstruction; homes are still being flattened. Families in tents face a rat infestation. Essential medicines are unavailable. Hospitals and schools lie in ruins. An analysis of the war’s impact on education described children feeling “like the living dead”.

 

Israel agreed to end attacks, massively increase the aid allowed into the territory and withdraw its forces to within a “yellow line” – still accounting for 53% of the territory. Yet strikes have continued, aid flows yo-yo and essential items are blocked on the claim that they are “dual use”. The military has expanded its zone of control substantially – and the unmarked surrounding area in which Palestinians are considered legitimate targets. Israel’s Army Radio has said that military leaders are pushing to resume the war.

 

Yet far from pressing Mr Netanyahu’s government to uphold its phase one commitments, the US-led Board of Peace has made it clear that it will not hold Israel to them unless Hamas agrees to the phase two framework for disarmament set out by the panel, according to a document obtained by the Times of Israel. The newspaper reported that the letter from the high representative for Gaza, Nickolay Mladenov, and a senior US official, Aryeh Lightstone, says that if Hamas does not accept the plans, Israel will not be expected to stop attacks or allow in aid. It was sent to the Palestinian technocrats meant to run Gaza in Hamas’s stead. Israeli support for anti-Hamas armed militias in Gaza is, in any case, hardly conducive to disarmament.

 

The world has turned away from the horrors of the genocidal war unleashed following the Hamas atrocities of 7 October 2023. There is a bizarre and chilling contrast between Israel’s swift investigation and punishment of soldiers who showed disrespect to statues of Jesus in Lebanon and the lack of even basic accountability – never mind justice – when Palestinians are abused, killed or disappear. Where is the outrage?

 

Mr Trump is fixated only on Iran and its impact on his domestic support. He is unlikely to act on Gaza unless he thinks a renewed Israeli offensive could derail his attempts to find a way out of his conflict with Tehran. But Europe too has real leverage – yet it has failed to use it. As anger grows, governments must translate condemnation into action. Trade agreements should not survive the continued flouting of Israel’s commitments, never mind the threat of return to an unchecked campaign of annihilation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/may/07/the-guardian-view-on-ceasefires-that-arent-israel-never-stopped-killing-in-gaza-allies-must-reject-any-escalation

[umbertino]

Future of UK lies in the EU after Brexit ‘failure’, say European Greens

 

Exclusive: Co-chair Vula Tsetsi says it is time to trigger debate, as statement is agreed at annual leadership meeting in Brussels

 

Jennifer Rankin in Brussels

Fri 8 May 2026 11.46 BST

 

The European Green party has urged the UK to consider rejoining the EU and draw a line under the “political and economic failure” of Brexit.

 

A text declaring that “the United Kingdom’s future lies in the European Union” was adopted by a large majority of European green parties at the movement’s annual leadership meeting on Friday, the day before Europe Day.

 

Insiders said it was the first time a European political party had officially invited the UK to rejoin the EU. “Somebody has to trigger the debate,” Vula Tsetsi, the European Green party cochair, said in an interview.

 

“The main discussion belongs first and foremost to the democratic debate in the United Kingdom and we don’t want to take that place, but we would like to trigger that debate as a European political family. Maybe other political families will join, but for us the moment is now.”

 

The intervention came after Keir Starmer’s Labour party suffered heavy losses in local elections at the expense of Nigel Farage’s Reform party gains, while the Greens appeared to be struggling to convert increased votes into seats.

 

The text on reversing Brexit was part of a broader declaration by European Green party leaders calling for energy independence and action to counter the far-right.

 

It states: “Brexit has been a political and economic failure with lasting negative consequences for people in the United Kingdom and across Europe.

 

“The European Green family is clear: the United Kingdom’s future lies in the European Union. We stand ready to welcome the UK back alongside other countries when it chooses this path.”

 

The declaration means that green parties across Europe, such as Die Grünen in Germany or Les Écologistes in France, to use their short names, should reflect this position in national debates and policy positions.

 

Delegates from 30 European green parties gathered in Brussels on Friday to approve the text, including those from non-EU member states. Representatives from the British green parties were not present because of the local and parliamentary elections, but were entitled to take a position on the paper remotely.

 

The Green party leader for England and Wales, Zack Polanski, has described Brexit as “a sledgehammer to an already weak economy” and told ITV’s Peston show that he was “firmly, very much in favour” of rejoining the EU eventually. He discussed the rejoin declaration with Tsetsi and the fellow European Greens cochair Ciarán Cuffe at a meeting in Manchester on 1 May.

 

A spokesperson for the Green party of England and Wales said: “Brexit has been a disaster and we have always said we should rejoin the EU when the political circumstances are right.”

 

The intervention could intensify the debate inside the UK about closer economic ties with the EU, amid a looming downturn caused by the US-Israeli war on Iran, Donald Trump’s criticisms of Keir Starmer, and heightened awareness of Russia as a security threat.

 

However, the Greens are represented in few EU governments, and no other European political parties are expected to follow suit.

 

The influence of green parties across Europe has diminish in recent years, highlighted by losses in the 2024 European parliament elections and their ejection from Germany’s governing coalition.

 

Tsetsi insisted the Greens fortunes were rising again, pointing to recent election results in Denmark, votes in the UK and mayoral contests across Europe – Greens and affiliated parties picked up mayoralties in Riga and Copenhagen in 2025. “This is a moment where Greens are picking up … and they are able to influence the political debate,” she argued.

 

The veteran Greek politician brushed aside suggestions that the UK had been a difficult member state, saying times had changed. “History shows that Brexit was a mistake and both sides lost a lot. And I am very confident that we will be able to learn from the mistakes and to build a stronger European Union together.”

 

The political situation, she stressed, had evolved since the Brexit referendum in 2016: “This is a historical moment again … Ten years after Brexit took place, Europe needs to be reinforced.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/08/future-of-uk-lies-eu-brexit-failure-european-greens-vula-tsetsi

 

[umbertino]

British leader Keir Starmer under pressure after heavy election losses

 

Labour party loses more than 1,400 English council seats and crashes out in Welsh and Scottish parliament votes

 

Peter Walker Senior political correspondent

Sat 9 May 2026 11.15 BST

 

Keir Starmer, the British prime minister, is facing increasing pressure to set a date for his departure after elections across much of the country resulted in massive losses for his ruling Labour party.

 

With the bulk of results now counted after voting on Thursday, Labour had lost more than 1,400 representatives from English councils, the local government structures that deliver many neighbourhood services.

 

Starmer’s party also crashed to defeat in the election for the devolved parliament of Wales, where it had dominated the country’s politics for a century, and went backwards in representation in the Scottish parliament.

 

Adding to the panic in Labour, the party lost to a series of challengers, including the righting populist Reform UK party, the leftwing Greens, and pro-independence nationalists in Wales and Scotland.

 

The elections, the biggest since Starmer won power in mid-2024, showed how the UK’s traditional two-party system of Labour and the Conservatives has been smashed, with Reform taking the most votes, and the Greens, Conservatives, Labour and the centrist Liberal Democrats bunched up behind.

 

While Starmer does not have to face an election to the national parliament in Westminster for three years, increasing numbers of his MPs want him to announce a timetable for his departure, believing he is too politically damaged to turn things around.

 

Speaking on Saturday morning, one MP, Debbie Abrahams, who represents an area in the north of England which used to be solidly Labour but has increasingly turned to Reform, said Starmer must “put the country first”.

 

She said: “We have to recognise the dangers that we’re in now, that on this trajectory it doesn’t look good.” Asked how quickly Starmer should go, she said: “I think it is a matter of months.”

 

For now, however, Starmer has the backing of his senior ministers, at least in public, including the two routinely named as likely challengers: Wes Streeting, the health minister, and Angela Rayner, who was deputy prime minister until last year.

 

Complicating matters for any plotters is that the person viewed by many in Labour as the best potential replacement for Starmer, Andy Burnham, is not in parliament. He is the mayor of Greater Manchester and could only return to the House of Commons if another MP stood down and he fought the election to replace them.

 

Starmer has vowed to fight on. In an opinion article for the Guardian on Saturday, the prime minister said he accepted the results were “very tough”, and that lessons needed to be learned.

 

But he rejected the argument from some MPs that to recover, Labour must do more to bring back left-leaning voters who have shifted their allegiance to the Greens.

 

He wrote: “While we must respond to the message that voters have sent us, that doesn’t mean tacking right or left. It means bringing together a broad political movement.”

 

There is a consensus, even among his closest allies, that while Starmer has had some policy successes, and has dealt adeptly with Donald Trump and the wider international situation, his government has made too many mis-steps and U-turns.

 

More broadly, many in Labour worry that Starmer is unable to properly challenge either Reform UK, led by Nigel Farage, the politician best known for pushing the UK to vote to leave the European Union in 2016, or the Greens, who have surged in the polls under the leadership of the self-styled “eco-populist” Zack Polanski.

 

However others in the party argue that changing prime ministers mid-government annoys voters just as much. From 2016 to 2022, the then-ruling Conservatives switched prime ministers four times, and were heavily punished by the electorate at the next election.

 

Under their new leader, Kemi Badenoch, the Conservatives fared badly in Thursday’s voting, losing more than 500 councillors and giving ground in Scotland and Wales.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/09/british-leader-keir-starmer-under-pressure-after-heavy-election-losses

 

[umbertino]

‘They have screwed each other pretty badly’: tensions emerge in Netanyahu-Trump alliance

 

Israeli PM says he has ‘full coordination’ with US president amid reports that Washington no longer consults him

 

Sat 9 May 2026 07.00 BST

Julian Borger in Jerusalem

 

 

 

 

 

Benjamin Netanyahu interrupted an uncharacteristically long silence over the Iran conflict this week with a video commentary insisting he had “full coordination” with Donald Trump, with whom he spoke “almost daily”.

 

The insistence that all was rosy in the US-Israeli relationship followed weeks of reports in the domestic press that Israel was no longer being consulted over the Iran conflict, and even less over Pakistani-brokered peace talks. Such is the scepticism over Netanyahu’s trustworthiness among the general public and independent press that the immediate reaction among observers to his video statement was speculation that the reality could be even worse than they had imagined.

 

“He is doing so much talking about how great the relationship is that it makes me rather concerned about how much tension there is,” said Dahlia Scheindlin, an American-Israeli political consultant and pollster. “I wouldn’t be surprised, as the war is clearly going very poorly from all perspectives related to the original goals.”

 

The US president and the Israeli prime minister have long presented mirror images of each other. They have both pioneered populist methods to dominate domestic politics, cutting away at the constitutional underpinning of the very systems that brought them to power, with little regard for past norms or constraints.

 

Since 28 February, when they brought the Gulf to a standstill with a devastating US-Israeli assault on Iran, they have bound their fate together so tightly that it will be very hard for either of them to unstick themselves from its legacy.

 

Netanyahu spent decades trying to persuade a succession of US presidents to join Israel in a war against the Islamic Republic. He went to unprecedented lengths for a foreign leader wading into US domestic politics, in particular when it came to undermining the multilateral nuclear deal with Iran of 2015, which had been Barack Obama’s flagship foreign policy achievement.

 

Netanyahu helped coax Trump to walk out of that deal in 2018, which in turn led to a ramping up of Iran’s nuclear programme and accumulation of a stockpile of highly enriched uranium sufficient for a dozen nuclear warheads. And in February this year, according to extensive reporting in the US press, Netanyahu was instrumental in convincing Trump that war was the only solution to the threat, and one that would be easily won.

 

By then, the Israeli leader was pushing at a door that was already ajar. The month before, US forces had pulled off an extraordinary coup, swooping into Caracas in a surprise raid and whisking away the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro.

 

“Netanyahu, being the conman that he is, used Venezuela as an example,” Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli diplomat, said. “He said to him: ‘Look what you did in Venezuela. It was painless. It was effortless. It was beautiful. You changed the regime.’

 

“Then he begins bombarding Trump with intelligence data showing that Iran had expanded its missile production and its missile-launching capabilities, and still has 450kg of highly enriched uranium,” Pinkas said.

 

With the help of the Mossad director, David Barnea, Netanyahu portrayed the Tehran regime as an overripe fruit ready to drop from the branch.

 

“He told Trump: ‘The Iranian economy is in shambles. The people are on the precipice of revolt. The Revolutionary Guards are losing control. Life in Iran is intolerable. This is our time,’” Pinkas said. “‘What we could do together is bring down the regime … think that together, jointly, we can win the war in three, four days.’”

 

According to multiple reports, US intelligence and military officials stressed the risk that Iran could attack US allies in the Gulf and close the strait of Hormuz. But Netanyahu – and US administration hawks including the defence secretary, Pete Hegseth – prevailed, arguing that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards were overrated and would not have the strength to hit back.

 

They were proved wrong on every count. The Iranian people did not rise up, the regime did not fall, the Kurds did not attack from the north-west and the Revolutionary Guards were able to inflict withering damage on US bases and Gulf monarchies, close the Hormuz strait and trigger a global economic crisis.

 

“Some 30 days into the war, by the end of March there were signs that Trump was very disappointed with Netanyahu,” Pinkas said.

 

The president stopped mentioning Israel and Netanyahu in his relentlessly upbeat public statements about the war. When US negotiators started talking to their Iranian counterparts and Pakistani mediators in the run up to a ceasefire announcement on 8 April, Israel was left out of the loop. Israeli officials complained to the press that they had to use their intelligence assets to try to find out what was going on.

 

There are varying accounts of what is on the table in the peace talks, but there has been no mention of Iran’s missile arsenal or its use of regional proxies, both of which are Israeli priorities.

 

When Trump did mention Netanyahu, it was mostly to tell him off. After Israel bombed Iran’s South Pars gasfield, for example, Trump said he had told Netanyahu “not to do that”.

 

“On occasion, he’ll do something, and if I don’t like it … we’re not doing that any more,” the president said.

 

When the ceasefire was agreed, Trump initially sided with Netanyahu’s interpretation that Lebanon was excluded and then, with the truce in jeopardy, swiftly reversed himself and made Israel follow suit.

 

“Israel will not be bombing Lebanon any longer. They are PROHIBITED from doing so by the U.S.A. Enough is enough!!!” he said in a social media post on 17 April, in an unprecedented public rebuke to Netanyahu.

 

Since this nadir, Israeli government officials have been briefing reporters that the ceasefire cannot last and that a return to hostilities was inevitable. Last weekend, there was a flurry of reporting in Israeli newspapers that intensive US-Israeli military coordination had resumed at their earlier tempo, in anticipation of further joint strikes.

 

Those strikes have yet to materialise, however, and the Trump administration has sought to downplay the significance of recent exchanges of fire around the strait of Hormuz.

 

Daniel Shapiro, a former US ambassador to Israel, said Trump is already looking beyond Iran to his next major challenge: a 14 May trip to China and a critical meeting with President Xi Jinping.

 

“President Trump is going to want to have this war more or less behind him by the time he goes to Beijing,” Shapiro said. “Otherwise, he will be in the position of a supplicant seeking Xi Jinping’s help to get them to convince Iran to accept his terms or to make concessions they haven’t made. And that’s a very weak position to be in when he would rather focus on getting some of the Chinese-US economic relations on a more stable ground.”

 

From prior experience in the Gaza and Lebanon conflicts, Netanyahu can draw some confidence that even if he is forced to accept a temporary peace deal that runs counter to his own interests, Trump’s attention will inevitably be diverted elsewhere, and Israel’s hands will be freed again.

 

“If Trump reaches a deal, the Israelis will have to accept it for the time being, and then perhaps they will revisit it to ‘mow the grass’, as they say, on the missile programme or on the nuclear programme at some later time,” Shapiro said.

 

Netanyahu also knows there are limits to the extent Trump can free himself from their geopolitical embrace. As Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, points out, Netanyahu can always make waves in US politics.

 

“I think Trump’s jealous of Netanyahu because Netanyahu is one of the few people who can generate more press than he does,” Bolton said, pointing out that despite Trump’s imposition of a ceasefire, “he’s still giving Netanyahu a pretty free hand in Lebanon.”

 

Pinkas, who served as adviser to prime ministers Ehud Barak and Shimon Peres, argues that strategic failure in the Iran war will also prove to be too powerful a glue for Trump to dissolve quickly.

 

“The problem Trump has is that if he lashes out at Netanyahu, if he expresses his disillusionment or desperation, he basically admits he was led into this war,” Pinkas said, adding that the conflict looks certain to hurt both men at the ballot box.

 

Netanyahu must hold an election by October, which by current polling would finally end his premiership. The elections in the US are congressional, but they could still render Trump a lame duck, at least in domestic politics.

 

“This affects Netanyahu politically and this affects Trump politically,” Pinkas said. “In other words, they have screwed each other pretty badly.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/09/tensions-emerge-bejamin-netanyahu-donald-trump-alliance

[umbertino]

Guardian reporter and colleagues detained and beaten by Somali police

 

Mohamed Bulbul arrested in Mogadishu after covering case of woman allegedly being tortured in prison

 

Sarah Johnson

Sat 9 May 2026 13.27 BST

 

A journalist who covered the case of a woman who said she was being tortured in prison was detained and beaten with pistols by Somali authorities, along with two others, for his reporting for the Guardian.

 

Mohamed Bulbul was arrested with the journalists Abdihafid Nor Barre and Abdishakur Mohamed Mohamud on Friday evening while in a restaurant in the centre of the Somali capital, Mogadishu. They said they were assaulted by members of Somalia’s US-trained counter-terrorism police unit and taken to be questioned by police. All three were released in the early hours of Saturday morning.

 

Media outlets and MPs said the arrests were unlawful and politically motivated. They come amid an intensifying crackdown as public anger grows with the ruling establishment, and the presidential term is due to end on 15 May.

 

Abdirahman Abdishakur, an MP and leader of the opposition Wadajir party, condemned the arrests of the journalists. He wrote in a post on X that the president of Somalia’s administration “appears consumed by fear, confusion as the end of its mandate approaches”.

 

He added: “Instead of addressing the growing public anger over forced displacement, land grabbing, and pursuing an inclusive political settlement to guide the country through this fragile transitional period, the administration has intensified repression against journalists, activists and outspoken young people.”

 

It is believed Bulbul’s detention was linked to reporting on the case of Sadia Moalim Ali, a 27-year-old rickshaw driver who is in prison for peaceful protest and her activism on social media. He has also been speaking out about security forces’ violations and forced evictions in Mogadishu.

 

On Thursday, the Guardian published a story by Bulbul, where Ali spoke about being tortured in Mogadishu central prison. She said she was stripped naked by two male guards in a room monitored by CCTV, kicked, beaten with a baton and left for two days in a small cell without food. The article was shared widely across Somali media, Facebook and X.

 

He and the two other journalists had been facing sustained threats and intimidation in recent weeks. Their detention happened at a time of heightened political pressure surrounding planned protests expected to take place on Sunday.

 

At the police headquarters, the three reporters said they were threatened by Mahdi Omar Mumin, Mogadishu police chief, should they continue to report on the protests.

 

In a statement released by Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS), the journalists said that Mumin told them he was “tired of arresting journalists” and that if they did not remain silent about the protests and other developments in Mogadishu, including the case of Ali, the only option remaining for them would be “death”.

 

Somali Stream, the media organisation which Mohamud works for, condemned the arrests as “an illegal and politically motivated attack on independent journalism”.

 

AbdiKani Hamud Abokor, the outlet’s managing director, said, “Somali Stream strongly condemns the unlawful detention of Abdishakur [Mohamed] Mohamud, Abdihafid Nor [Barre], and Mohamed Bulbul. This is a deliberate attempt to terrorise journalists, suppress independent reporting and instil fear across Somalia’s media community.”

 

The news follows the arrest of several journalists earlier this week. On 6 May, at least five local journalists were arrested and had their equipment confiscated, according to SJS. Two other broadcast journalists, Ja’far Mohamed Jim’ale and cameraman Nur Hasan Ali remain in detention – their whereabouts are unknown, the organisation added.

 

According to the World Press Freedom Index, Somalia ranks 126 out of 180 countries. Journalists in the country work in an environment of great insecurity, according to Reporters Without Borders, which runs the index. With more than 50 media professionals killed since 2010, Somalia is one of the most dangerous countries for journalists in Africa.

 

The Somalian authorities have been approached for a response.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2026/may/09/guardian-reporter-and-colleagues-detained-and-beaten-by-somali-police

 

[umbertino]

This land is not your land

 

May 8, 2026 12:21 PM CDT

By Mark Gruenberg And John Wojcik

 

 

 

Woodie Guthrie wrote the famous song that cried out, “This land is your land, this land is my land, this land was made for you and me.” He did not subscribe to the idea that the air we breathe, the water we drink, the forests, the hills, and the plains we traverse are all here to enrich powerful corporations, billionaires, and people like President Trump and his family. 

 

Trump is moving the business of preserving national forests from Washington, D.C., to Utah. The expectation is that those who would privatize public lands will be better able to rake in profits from the privatization. How dare working people think that public forests and national parks belong to them? Not when they are just waiting to be grabbed by privatizers aiming to turn them into profit machines.

 

The Trump regime’s plan to chop down not just a bunch of trees but to chop down the entire U.S. Forest Service is “reckless, illegal” and a prelude to giving away public lands to private hands, says the United States Forest Service workers’ union president, Randy Erwin.

 

And Erwin, who heads the National Federation of Federal Employees/IAM, wants Congress to step in, assert its constitutional authority over federal spending, launch investigations, and refer appropriate Trump officials to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution.

 

“The bottom line is that Congress must do their jobs,” said Erwin. “We view this as not just a policy disagreement that will result in the collapse of the Forest Service as we know it, but also a breach of the Constitution.” 

 

“President Trump is blatantly attempting to ignore the laws his own party passed. Congress must stand up for their authority and protect the public lands of the American people.”

 

In this period, when workers are crushed by an economy increasingly geared to making the wealthy richer and the bulk of the population poorer, one of the very few remaining things for workers to enjoy—public lands—is being eyed by billionaires. The land, the air, the water, and all their natural wealth are seen by many as the only remaining taste of a good life that millions have left. And now they are being told to move over and give up even that.

 

 In a May 7 letter, Irwin listed his demands and the negative impacts of the attacks on the Forest Service, while reminding Congress of both its authority and its duty. It’s his second move to try to stop the destruction of the Forest Service. 

 

Trump and his Agriculture Secretary, Brooke Rollins, first revealed their intentions a month ago when they issued a “move or quit” order to the 6,500 Forest Service headquarters staffers. They’d get only a few months to decide whether or not to sell their houses at a loss, uproot their lives, and move to Salt Lake City. Now, says Erwin, Trump and Rollins are taking an ax to the rest of the agency.

 

If the past is prologue, data from two prior Trump “move or quit” edicts to USDA agency staffers during his first term show most would quit, taking years of institutional knowledge and expertise with them. The same thing would occur with this forced relocation, Erwin’s letter said.

 

Though Erwin didn’t say so, the “move or quit” order can be seen as part of Trump’s continuing crusade to both shrink and denigrate the federal workforce, leaving private interests freer to run rampant without congressional or agency oversight. At least 200,000 federal workers have quit or been fired—most for no reason at all—since Trump returned to the presidency.

 

And the rest, including those NFFE represents, had their union contracts terminated.

 

Rollins’s edict to the USFS, which is part of the Agriculture Department, would yank the headquarters workers out of a classic neo-Gothic building near the White House and transfer them—Rollins says—closer to their “customers,” including loggers and ranchers. Others would lose jobs as offices close.

 

Not said is that the move is a way of rewarding areas that backed Trump with additional business and activity generated by operating in the area in question. Being in Salt Lake City, however, would make the staffers more vulnerable to private interests seeking to profit from the millions of acres of public lands, especially since Trump and Rollins would replace top non-partisan career officials with “political appointees.”

 

The Forest Service, unlike the National Park Service, allows logging, ranching, and even oil drilling on the public lands it owns. Most of its acreage is in the Great Plains and the Mountain States, but there are large forests in and around Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and northern Wisconsin, too.

 

The USDA money bill for this fiscal year “explicitly prohibited using appropriated funds for reorganization without prior notice and approval,” Erwin wrote to Congress. “Yet this sweeping overhaul—eliminating regional offices, consolidating research infrastructure, and replacing career expertise with political appointees—was announced unilaterally, without the transparency, notice, or authorization required by law.”

 

And in practical terms, he added, the move and closure of regional USFS offices and 57 research centers would make fighting western wildfires harder, because of a lack of coordination. It would also decimate research on forest conditions, ecosystems, wildlife, climate, and habitat, and reduce the opportunity for the general public to hunt or fish in the forests, too.

 

Already, due to past firings by Trump and his minions, 20% of USFS researchers with PhDs in the fields the Forest Service covers have quit, Erwin informed lawmakers. 

 

“This [reorganization] is a direct challenge to Congress’s constitutional… power of the purse. If Congress does not act now, it will be conceding its laws, appropriations, and oversight responsibilities can be ignored at will. This Is Not Reform. It Is Irreversible Damage to our Country’s Greatest Resources,” Erwin declared. The capitalization, for emphasis, is his.

 

“This is not efficiency. It is the destruction of institutional knowledge, scientific capacity, and operational readiness,” Erwin said. But even more, it’s “a direct threat and theft of public lands and public access.”

 

“This dismantling creates a clear pathway for transferring federal lands to state and private control without the consent of Congress or the American people.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/this-land-is-not-your-land/

[umbertino]

‘My ambition is to change the country,’ AOC says when asked about seeking higher office in 2028

 

New York’s Democratic representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez brushed off question about run for presidency

 

Edward Helmore

Sat 9 May 2026 14.52 BST


 

The New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez answered a question about potentially running for higher office in 2028 by declaring: “My ambition is to change the country.”

 

The Democrat delivered that remark at a political forum in Chicago on Friday amid widespread belief that she is positioning herself to run for the White House in 2028 or challenge her party’s leader in the US Senate, fellow New Yorker Chuck Schumer.

 

Democratic strategist David Axelrod directly asked Ocasio-Cortez whether she planned to run for either while he hosted a conversation at the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics.

 

“What’s funny is they assume my ambition is a title or a seat,” the Bronx US House representative replied. “My ambition is to change this country. Presidents come and go. Senate, House seats, elected officials come and go.

 

“But single-payer healthcare is forever,” she added, in reference to the kind of national healthcare platform she has long supported over the private system entrenched in the US.

 

Ocasio-Cortez then ran through a litany of her other signature policy positions, saying: “A living wage is forever, workers’ rights are forever, women’s rights, all of that, and so anyways … to a finer point to your question is that when you aren’t attached, when you haven’t been like fantasizing about being this or that since the time you were seven years old, it is tremendously liberating.”

 

Later in the exchange, Ocasio-Cortez said she wanted to “make decisions from a place of how are we going to change the country”.

 

Ocasio-Cortez’s evocative response to Axelrod – once an adviser to the former Democratic president Barack Obama – comes amid early jockeying among her party for its 2028 presidential nomination. That is bound to kick into a higher gear after the midterm elections in November determine the lay of the political land for the rest of Donald Trump’s second presidency.

 

A Harvard CAPS/Harris poll taken in April showed support among Democratic voters for former vice-president Kamala Harris at 24%; California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, at 12%; and ex-transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg and Ocasio-Cortez each at 9%.

 

Ocasio-Cortez said that instead of aiming for higher office, “I get to wake up every day and say, ‘How am I going to meet the moment?’

 

“And conditions change radically all the time. So I make my response less to an attachment to some positional title or position and working backwards from there.”

 

She added: “I make decisions by waking up in the morning, looking out the window and observing the conditions of this country. And saying what move or what decision can I make today that is going to get us closer to that future, stronger, faster, better than yesterday.”

 

Ocasio-Cortez’s remarks come days after she appeared on a podcast with comedian Ilana Glazer. In that exchange, the progressive congresswoman spoke of entrenched economic, racial and social inequalities.

 

“When you have these systems, when you have corporations, when you have an economic elite … there’s a certain level of wealth and accumulation that is unearned, right?” Ocasio-Cortez remarked.

 

She added that under the US system, “You can’t earn a billion dollars.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/09/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-presidential-run

 

[umbertino]

Pardoned January 6 rioter sentenced to seven years for Virginia burglary

 

Zachary Alam spent four years in jail for his role in the Capitol attack before Trump pardoned him in 2025

 

Ramon Antonio Vargas

Sun 10 May 2026 11.00 BST

 

A convicted participant in the 6 January 2021 US Capitol attack who was pardoned at the start of Donald Trump’s second presidency has been ordered to serve seven years in prison after a jury found him guilty of committing a burglary in Virginia in May 2025.

 

Zachary Alam, 34, had previously drawn one of the stiffest prison sentences – eight years – for his hand in the violence carried out at the US Capitol in Washington DC by supporters of Trump after his first presidency ended in defeat to Joe Biden after the 2020 White House election.

 

The judge who sentenced Alam after he was declared guilty in that case mentioned how officers regarded him as “by far the loudest, the most combative and the most violent of the rioters” at the Capitol that day.

 

He went on to spend nearly four years in prison. But he was unconditionally pardoned along with 1,500 others of his fellow Trump supporters on the first day the Republican president retook office in January 2025, after winning the previous November’s election against his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris.

 

Henrico county, Virginia, officers alleged that Alam broke into a home just outside the state capital of Richmond on 8 May 2025. After the family living there encountered him, he claimed to be at the home to fix its internet service, and he fled with electronics and jewelry, prosecutors later said, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch newspaper.

 

Police called out to investigate the break-in then found Alam in an adjacent neighborhood, identified him as the intruder and arrested him the next day.

 

A Henrico jury subsequently found Alam guilty in October of charges of breaking and entering into an occupied home as well as grand larceny. And on Thursday, the county circuit court judge Randall G Johnson sentenced him to two decades in prison on each charge, though he suspended the entirety of the grand larceny punishment and 13 years of the breaking and entering sentence, case records show.

 

Alam was also told to serve 20 years’ probation on each conviction upon his release from prison.

 

Local television news outlet WRIC reported that prosecutors presented a recorded telephone call in which Alam expressed his belief that he had done “the right thing” on the day of the Capitol attack. That echoed comments he delivered at his US Capitol attack sentencing hearing: “I believed in my heart I was doing the right thing. Sometimes you have to break the rules to do what’s right.”

 

Alam was convicted in federal court of eight felonies – including assaulting law enforcement – and three misdemeanors for his role in the attack.

 

Witnesses said he broke the glass of a door through which insurrectionist Ashli Babbit climbed before she was shot dead by an officer defending the US House chambers.

 

The Trump administration later reached a $5m settlement to settle a wrongful death lawsuit filed by his slain supporter’s family.

 

At Alam’s US Capitol attack trial, prosecutors outlined how he was among the first of a mob that entered the building from its west lawn and hurled items at police from a balcony.

 

He also used a helmet to shatter three glass panes in the door through which Babbitt was fatally shot before leaving while urging others to come back later with guns.

 

A statement from Henrico county’s top prosecutor, the Democratic congressional candidate Shannon Taylor, to WRIC contended that the pardon which Trump afforded Alam “emboldened him to believe the law does not apply to him”. However, Taylor’s statement alluded to how the president’s clemency was powerless with respect to the Virginia state charges for which Alam was convicted in October.

 

The arrest in Henrico which culminated in Alam’s sentencing on Thursday was believed to the be first post-clemency incidence of charges in connection with a new crime for a pardoned US Capitol attacker.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/10/pardoned-january-6-rioter-sentenced-virginia-burglary

 

[umbertino]

Mahmoud Khalil’s lawyer calls immigration case a ‘sham’ after revelation it was fast-tracked by DoJ

 

Palestinian activist is awaiting another legal decision on a separate track in a narrowing effort to stay in the US

Maanvi Singh

Mon 11 May 2026 21.53 BST


 

A lawyer for Mahmoud Khalil, the first noncitizen activist arrested in the Trump administration crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech, called his client’s immigration proceedings “preordained and a complete sham” after it was revealed that the case was prioritized to be fast-tracked.

 

“These revelations make clear that this case has been controlled from day one by higher-ups in the administration,” said Marc Van Der Hout, an attorney on Khalil’s legal team, in a statement. “The immigration judge was hand-picked and the Board of Immigration Appeals decision was predetermined. We will continue to fight for Mahmoud in every court we can.”

 

In April, the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) issued a “final” administrative removal order for Khalil in an abnormally quick decision after multiple judges reportedly recused themselves from the case. The BIA is a part of the US justice department but is required by law to consider cases independently. However, internal board documents obtained by The New York Times indicated that the case had been flagged as a high priority and expedited – leading to accusations from Khalil’s team that the Trump administration put its thumb on the scale to make an example of him.

 

Khalil’s removal order came within nine days of final briefing; such appeals decisions typically take years.

 

“This story proves that the Trump administration’s treatment of my case has always been corrupt and retaliatory,” Khalil said on X after the New York Times report. “They put me through a sham immigration process while guaranteeing the outcome in advance.”

 

On a separate legal track, in January, a split panel of the third circuit court of appeals overturned the district court ruling that freed Khalil from detention last year. That lower court decision found that Khalil’s detention and attempts to deport him, on grounds that his activism while a student at Columbia University posed a threat to US foreign policy interests, were likely unconstitutional.

 

The appeals court ruling did not weigh in on constitutional issues, but held that the district court did not have jurisdiction over the case. Khali’s attorneys asked the full appeals court to reconsider the decision, and are awaiting a ruling.

 

Depending on the outcome of the third circuit case, Khalil could be expelled from the US, even if his attorneys ask the supreme court to weigh in.

 

Khalil, who was raised in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria, is a legal US permanent resident married to a US citizen. He was arrested in New York in March 2025 for his advocacy at Columbia for Palestinian rights and swiftly sent to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Louisiana, where he was held for 104 days. During that time, his wife gave birth to their first child – who is now one year old.

 

He was released in June last year, after a federal judge ruled his detention unconstitutional, finding that Khalil was neither a flight risk nor a community threat. Donald Trump called Khalil a “Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student” and a “terrorist sympathizer” and Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, said that Khalil’s presence in the US would have “adverse foreign policy consequences”. After his detention and amid public outcry, the Trump administration also claimed that his green card application contained ommisions. Earlier this year, the administration claimed he would be deported to Algeria.

 

In another lawsuit that scrutinized the administration’s policy to deport pro-Palestinian scholars for their views, a federal judge last year accused the government of “an unconstitutional conspiracy to pick off certain people” that violated the first amendment to the US constitution.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/11/mahmoud-khalil-doj-case-fast-tracked

[umbertino]

Starmer tells cabinet he will not quit without leadership challenge

 

Ministers rally around embattled leader, who says he will ‘get on with governing’ unless process for challenge is triggered

 

Jessica Elgot and Pippa Crerar

Tue 12 May 2026 12.12 BST
 

Keir Starmer has told his cabinet he will fight on as prime minister, saying the threshold for a leadership challenge has not been met, as ministers began to rally around the embattled leader.

 

The Guardian understands Starmer did not give cabinet critics time to respond, before moving the conversation on to the Middle East, and none called directly on him to resign during Tuesday’s meeting.

 

Sources said the prime minister did not have any one-on-one meetings before or after cabinet, apart from with his close ally Richard Hermer, despite several ministers previously suggesting he should consider his position.

 

In comments that in effect dared the health secretary, Wes Streeting, to launch a challenge against him, Starmer told ministers that he intended to get on with governing. One source said Streeting had tried to speak to the prime minister privately after – but been rebuffed.

 

Shortly after cabinet, one of Streeting’s closest allies, the Home Office minister Jess Phillips, resigned from the government, citing the prime minister’s failure to “grasp this rare opportunity with gusto”, and adding to speculation that it was part of an orchestrated move.

 

“I want a Labour government to work and I will strive as I always have for its success and popularity, but I’m not seeing the change I think I, and the country expect, and so cannot continue to serve as a minister under the current leadership,” she wrote.

 

Allies said Starmer’s comments were also aimed at Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester mayor, whose backers have urged the prime minister to go.

 

“As I said yesterday, I take responsibility for these election results and I take responsibility for delivering the change we promised,” Starmer told the cabinet meeting.

 

“The past 48 hours have been destabilising for government and that has a real economic cost for our country and for families. The Labour party has a process for challenging a leader and that has not been triggered.

 

“The country expects us to get on with governing. That is what I am doing and what we must do as a cabinet.”

 

There was anger within cabinet ranks over what they regarded as Streeting’s attempts to destabilise the prime minister, after several of his closest allies called for Starmer to go. The health secretary has said he will not initiate a contest, but would join one if it was already taking place.

 

“Wes has got a brass neck,” one minister said. “He came into the room as though nothing had happened and acted entirely normally. Clearly some colleagues are absolutely furious with him. There were evil looks in his direction.”

 

Another added: “Wes is showing that for all his ‘planning not plotting’ there is no plan. He said nothing in the room. The PM also made it clear, rightly, that it was not the forum for it. You can see from who is backing the PM straight afterwards that [Streeting] does not have cabinet support for a challenge.”

 

Starmer convened the cabinet as at least 10 more MPs called on him to set a timetable to depart, taking the total to more than 80. The communities minister Miatta Fahnbulleh became the first minister to quit, on Tuesday morning, with more resignations expected.

 

Cabinet ministers rallied round Starmer publicly after the meeting. The work and pensions secretary, Pat McFadden, said nobody had challenged Starmer in the meeting and that the government should “carry on” with its business.

 

The technology secretary, Liz Kendall, told reporters in Downing Street: “The prime minister talked about the challenges we faced as a country, the crisis in the Middle East and the impact on the cost of living here. This government will do what we were elected to do, which is serve the British people. The prime minister has my full support in this.

 

“Let me just say this: there is a process to challenge the leader, nobody has made that challenge and what people would expect me to do is to focus on how we can grow the economy, tackle the cost of living and give them a better life.”

 

The business secretary, Peter Kyle, said: “We had a very purposeful cabinet meeting talking about the big issues facing our economy and society. Nothing has been triggered.”

 

John Healey, the defence secretary, posted on X: “People are worried about current conflicts and looming global crises. They expect their government to lead the country through, as the PM is doing.

 

“More instability is not in Britain’s interest. Our full focus now must be on dealing with immediate economic and security challenges.”

 

Another cabinet minister said they believed there was relief among the “silent majority” of MPs who had not called for Starmer to go. “They had their heads in their hands yesterday. Now they feel rallied by Keir’s words and the cabinet rallying round.”

 

Earlier on Tuesday, Darren Jones, Starmer’s chief secretary, said the prime minister was “listening to colleagues” who were asking him to set out a timetable for departure but would make his own decisions about the way forward.

 

He warned the prime minister’s rivals that it was a “gruelling” job. “Anybody who thinks that they can just walk into the job of prime minister and, like the second coming of the Messiah, fix all of our problems probably hasn’t really thought carefully enough about how difficult it is,” he said.

 

Fahnbulleh, who is close to the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, said she would “urge the prime minister to do the right thing for the country and the party and set a timetable for an orderly transition”. The MP for Peckham said the message on the doorsteps at local elections was that the prime minister had “lost the trust and the confidence of the public”.

 

The Guardian understands that four senior cabinet ministers – Healey; Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary; Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary; and the deputy prime minister, David Lammy – were among those who spoke to Starmer on Monday.

 

Some told the prime minister he should oversee an orderly transition of power after crushing election defeats risked ringing the death knell on his leadership.

 

Others discussed with Starmer how they should take a “responsible, dignified, orderly” approach to what may follow. Several others, including Hermer and Steve Reed, urged him to fight on.

 

Overnight, some Labour MPs began to voice public support for the prime minister. One, Neil Coyle, said he was “horrified at the elephant trap colleagues are falling into. Those who claimed council elections were about Keir had nothing to offer local communities”.

 

Another, Nick Smith, said. “A global security crisis and its economic impact on our country means we need political stability. Unity is strength.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vid in link

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/12/starmer-cabinet-labour-leadership

 

[umbertino]

How Hezbollah’s $300 drones are challenging Israeli military

 

Non-state group learns from Ukrainian warfare to develop cabled drones that evade hi-tech defences of state army

 

William Christou in Beirut and Julian Borger in Jerusalem

Tue 12 May 2026 13.42 BST

 

The three Israeli soldiers clustered by a tank heard the noise before they saw its source. By the time they spotted the drone, it was too late. The video feed goes black as the small fibre-optic first-person-view (FPV) drone explodes next to them, killing one soldier and injuring six more.

 

Footage of the drones hitting Israeli tanks, soldiers and bulldozers in south Lebanon has become increasingly common as Hezbollah puts the weapon at the centre of its guerrilla war against Israel’s occupation of south Lebanon.

 

They are cheap, disposable and hard to evade. Unlike radio-controlled drones, they are connected to their operators by a kilometres-long fibre optic cable that cannot be jammed by electronic warfare defences. And they are a serious challenge for the Israeli military.

 

Hezbollah has killed a bulldozer driver, evaded the trophy defence system on the Israeli Merkava tank and continually targeted soldiers with the drones. Their FPV capabilities, in common with FPV radio-controlled craft, allow an operator to pilot the small, explosive-equipped drones directly from their video feeds and detonate them on impact.

 

An Israeli military official said Israel “recognised the UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] threat” and that it was working to develop “capabilities for the detection and interception of weapons”. A senior officer was last week tapped to find a solution for Israel, which has also used FPV drones in Lebanon.

 

For Hezbollah, the drones have proven to be an effective way for the non-state group to inflict harm on a better equipped, better funded army and to raise the cost of Israel’s continued military presence in south Lebanon.

 

The increasing reliance on the drones, the use of which has increased since the 17 April Lebanon-Israel ceasefire, reflects not only new battlefield tactics, but the new shape of Hezbollah. The group can no longer rely on weapons being transferred from Iran via a land corridor in Syria, and instead must manufacture its own weapons and munitions on a much smaller budget, a source in Hezbollah explained.

 

“The development is viewed as part of efforts to overcome supply challenges following the disruption of the Syrian supply route after the fall of Bashar al-Assad in late 2024,” the Hezbollah source said.

 

The group has increasingly turned towards low-cost, locally manufactured drones. Each drone costs about $300-$400 (£220-£295) to manufacture, and is produced using 3D-printing and “commercially available electronic components that can be adapted for dual civilian and military use”, the source said.

 

The use of the FPV drone also befits Hezbollah’s return to its guerrilla roots, raising the cost of occupation after it failed to stop the Israeli military entering its southern Lebanese heartland in the last war.

 

The long range of the drones, which are estimated to stretch dozens of kilometres, is forcing Israel to re-evaluate the depth of its buffer zone in south Lebanon. Previous Israeli assessments wanted it to be at least 11km deep, based on the range of guided anti-tank munitions used by Hezbollah, hard-to-intercept weapons that Hezbollah relied on in the last war to harass soldiers and cities in northern Israel.

 

Israel’s multi-billion dollar Iron Dome defence system has so far proven ineffective at stopping the small drones, and in recent videos, Israeli soldiers have resorted to trying to shoot the aircraft down with their service weapons.

 

The Israeli military source said intelligence bodies across military branches were conducting research to develop “more effective alert models” and that advanced weapons research and development was being conducted to find a way to counter the new threat.

 

“Fibre optic cable FPVs can’t be jammed with electronic warfare and it is more difficult to detect them,” explained Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia programme.

 

The Israeli military was not alone in its struggle to stop the drones, he said. Countries around the world had made it a priority to develop systems to counter the “Ukraine-style” use of drones that has expanded across global conflicts.

 

Videos released by Hezbollah show the group becoming more skilled in its use of drones. Footage released earlier in the war showed the UAVs being caught by Israeli tanks’ projectile defence systems, or hitting targets without casualties, but coverage from Hezbollah last week showed one FPV drone heading leisurely towards a tank in Qantara, south Lebanon, while another films from a distance away in order to confirm it hit its target – a tactic borrowed from Ukraine.

 

Fibre optic drones first began appearing in the Ukraine war in late 2024, used by both sides as an experimental response to radio jamming. Their grim effectiveness quickly became clear, and Russia, having better access to the cabling, made particularly effective use of the weapons. The Hezbollah source acknowledged that the group had watched how fibre-optic drones were used to devastating effect in the Ukraine war.

 

Armed groups and states across the world are now using cheap offensive drones of all kinds in conflict, including in the recent US-Israeli war against Iran.

 

Footage from FPV drones acts as effective propaganda. Videos of soldiers running terrified in the last moments of their lives in Lebanon have started to proliferate, as they did in Ukraine years earlier. Israel has frequently published footage of FPV drone footage in Lebanon, in one instance showing a lone, exhausted Hezbollah fighter in the southern city of Bint Jbeil covering his face in resignation the moment before a drone killed him.

 

Hezbollah military media this week released FPV footage spliced between clips of a golden eagle hunting its prey, with inspirational music in the background under the title We Will Hunt You Down.

 

“The goal in guerilla warfare is not a quick victor, but rather the gradual attrition of the enemy,” explained the retired Lebanese Brig Gen Mounir Shehadeh, a former Lebanese government coordinator to Unifil, the UN interim force in Lebanon.

 

“If used intelligently, [FPV drones] are capable of altering the balance of power on the battlefield, especially in asymmetric conflict environments,” Shehadeh said.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/12/how-hezbollah-3d-printed-drones-challenging-israeli-military

 

[umbertino]

EU announces sanctions against violent Israeli settlers

 

Bloc breaks its lengthy deadlock on the issue but falls short of imposing full-scale trade sanctions

 

Jennifer Rankin in Brussels

Mon 11 May 2026 18.54 BST

 

The EU has agreed sanctions on violent Israeli settlers, ending a years-long deadlock over the issue but still taking only a “baby step” according to one MEP.

 

Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, said on Monday: “Violence and extremism carry consequences.”

 

But there was still no consensus among the 27 member states on more hard-hitting trade sanctions.

 

France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said the EU was “sanctioning the main Israeli organisations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank, as well as their leaders”.

 

“These most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay,” he wrote on social media.

 

The full list of names has not been published following Monday’s agreement in principle but is understood not to include two extremist Israeli ministers, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich. The pair were put under UK sanctions last June for their “repeated incitements of violence against Palestinian communities”.

 

The deadlock was broken after Hungary’s new pro-EU government lifted its veto on the sanctions, which had been blocked by the previous prime minister, Viktor Orbán. The EU would also sanction leading Hamas figures, Kallas said.

 

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, said the EU had chosen in “an arbitrary and political manner, to impose sanctions on Israeli citizens and entities because of their political views and without any basis”.

 

The measures against a small number of settlers fall short of what some member states wanted. France and Sweden have called for tariffs on imported products from illegal settlements. “We believe that the EU urgently needs to increase the pressure on Israel to halt its settlement policy and practices,” the two countries wrote in a joint paper.

 

Sweden’s foreign minister, Maria Malmer Stenergard, said putting tariffs on products from illegal settlements was “the most realistic proposal”.

 

Banning products requires unanimity among the 27 member states, whereas tariffs can be imposed by a majority vote.

 

Under the EU-Israel association agreement, goods from the occupied territories miss out on preferential terms but trade is not prohibited.

 

Kallas, who is also a vice-president of the European Commission, said she could not issue a draft law to impose tariffs on goods from illegal settlements: “I raised this issue that member states wanted this proposal. I asked [for] this, but the proposal is not there. And I can’t draft it.”

 

Barry Andrews, an Irish centrist MEP, who chairs the European parliament’s development committee, said EU foreign ministers had taken a “welcome (baby) step”. Writing on X he called for enforcement of labelling and banning of settler products, as well as ending research cooperation with Israel. He added: “Ultimately, only a review of the EU-Israel association agreement, with view to suspension, will have a major impact.”

 

Amid surging violence in the West Bank and the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, the EU is under renewed pressure to use its leverage to push Israel’s government to change course.

 

Former senior EU diplomats and officials called last week for sanctions against all individuals and entities engaged in illegal settlements, including planners, lawyers, banks and other professionals involved in the proposed E1 settlement.

 

The signatories say this illegal settlement of 3,400 illegal homes would cut the West Bank in two “and so wreck any prospects of a viable Palestinian state”. The declaration was signed by 452 former senior EU politicians, diplomats and officials, including two former prime ministers, Guy Verhofstadt of Belgium and Stefan Löfven of Sweden.

 

Since the 7 October attacks by Hamas, Israeli settlers have pursued a growing campaign of violent intimidation against Palestinians in the West Bank with the aim of driving them from their land. According to UN figures, 230 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces and settlers last year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/11/eu-announces-sanctions-against-violent-israel-settlers