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President Donald Trump’s decision to launch his unpopular war against Iran earlier this year has already sparked a global “shift,” renowned economic professor Richard Wolff argued recently, one that also set the president on an imminent path toward total irrelevancy in “only a few months.”A professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and former professor at Yale, Wolff pointed to the recent progressive sweep last week in New York as evidence of his theory, and compared it directly with the civil unrest sparked during the Vietnam War that ultimately helped – at least, in part – bring about the U.S. withdrawal.“We're beginning to see a significant self-defined socialist presence in our political life, and because it is coming at the time of the Iran war – and at the time of heightened focus on Israel and Palestine – it's very important to understand that there's a shift going on,” Wolff said in a recent appearance on the podcast “Dialogue Works,” adding that the “shift” had extended to “international affairs.”“Not everywhere in the same way, but, in a number of districts where that was the issue, the vote of the people has clearly been in the direction of criticism of Trump, the war in Iran [and] Israel.”Wolff, whose Jewish parents fled Nazi Germany for the United States, has been a fierce critic of Trump, the U.S. war against Iran and Israel. However, it’s been only after the Trump administration’s continued failures in achieving its stated war objectives in Iran that his views have gained enough traction to drive a major “shift,” he argued, one that would also result in Trump becoming largely irrelevant – and soon.“People should also be aware that there's really only a few months left for Mr. Trump,” Wolff predicted. “Once those elections happen in November – if, indeed they happen – he will then be a lame-duck president. And, given how badly his situation has developed over the first part of this year, we are looking at a man who is facing political pressures that include losing support and moving ever-closer to a day after which his relevance will be sharply reduced.”

Iranian state media has reportedly declared that the country now has "no choice but to obtain the atomic bomb," according to a post circulating online — a statement that, if accurate, would mark a dramatic escalation amid the ongoing exchange of strikes between the U.S. and Iran.The claim was relayed by the account The Hormuz Letter, which posted what it described as a breaking statement from Iranian state media. According to that post, Iranian state media argued the country must "absolutely reach nuclear deterrence" before current negotiations can be conducted, framing the pursuit of a weapon as necessary to remove what it called "the military option for the occupation and partitioning of Iran" from the table.The reported statement seized the attention of David Pyne, an America First conservative who posts under @AmericaFirstCon and who has been sharply critical of the administration's handling of Iran. Pyne argued the development vindicated his earlier warnings about the consequences of President Donald Trump's approach."Iran is responding to Trump's continued nuclear threats against it by building more nuclear missiles just as I predicted they would do," Pyne wrote. He contended that "Trump's war on Iran hasn't reduced Iran's nuclear threat in any way" but had instead "served to greatly magnify and expand Iran's nuclear threat against the US and Israel."Pyne went further, delivering a stinging assessment of the president's broader record."Trump's disastrous foreign policy and endless unwinnable wars make Jimmy Carter look like a veritable foreign policy genius by comparison," he wrote.The reported statement also caught the attention of Michael McFaul, the former U.S. ambassador to Russia, who reacted with unease. "Ugh. Hope it's just bluster; fear it is not," McFaul wrote, sharing the same post.The reported declaration comes against the backdrop of a rapidly deteriorating ceasefire, with the U.S. carrying out repeated strikes on Iranian targets in recent days and Trump himself warning that "the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist" if forced to "militarily complete the job." Trump has also continued to insist that "Iran will never have a Nuclear Weapon."The Iranian framing — that only a nuclear deterrent can forestall foreign intervention — runs directly counter to the administration's stated goal of ending Tehran's weapons ambitions, and underscores the risk that the military campaign could harden rather than halt Iran's nuclear drive.

Document appears to have been subject to conflicting interpretations on key issues of Lebanon ceasefire and strait of HormuzThe sudden eruption of fresh hostilities in the Gulf – just 10 days after Iran and the US signed a memorandum of understanding to end the conflict – threatens to put the two countries back on the path to war.It appears the deliberately opaque wording in the memorandum has been unable to withstand the pressure of conflicting interpretations, and as a result supporters of the deal inside Tehran are on the back foot. Statements to the effect that Iran’s government should never have agreed to reopen the strait of Hormuz are proliferating – and not just among the country’s hardliners. Continue reading...

Iran attacked Bahrain and Kuwait after US strikes, and threatened a ‘complete halt’ to talksUS and Iran trade strikes as both sides accuse the other of endangering ceasefireWe will soon be closing this liveblog, but you’ll be able to stay up-to-date with our ongoing coverage of the Middle East here.Here is a summary of today’s events:Iran launched drone and missile attacks Sunday targeting Bahrain and Kuwait in response to US airstrikes that hit the Islamic Republic, and threatened a “complete halt” in negotiations to end the war if Washington continues its attacks.US president Donald Trump accused Iran of violating the ceasefire agreement in a post of social media and said the US may be “forced to militarily complete the job”. Iran also accused the US of violating the ceasefire agreement.JD Vance continued to reiterate the administration’s triumphant line on the war with Iran hours before the latest round of strikes were exchanged. “America wins either way,” he said.Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi was in Baghdad for a meeting with his Iraqi counterpart. He called for a security framework to be established with the Gulf nations after it struck US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain in retaliation to US strikes.The Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps IRCG has said on state-run SNN TV that it will respond with more force if there are any more blow-for-blow attacks from the US.Countries including Jordan, the UAE and Italy all condemned Iran’s attacks. Continue reading...

Reacting to reports that Michael Boulos, who is married to Donald Trump’s daughter Tiffany, is being included in meetings with Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the Middle East, MS NOW Host Stephanie Ruhle blurted, “Are you kidding me!?” and suggested something didn’t smell right.Bloomberg Opinion columnist and former Trump biographer Tim O’Brien agreed.“Michael Boulos, yes, I know you don't know this guy's name,” she began. “Rubio said he was just there to see me and to catch up. He also said that Boulos did not participate in any policy discussions. Are you kidding me? Okay, like, seriously? We are talking about a war, we're talking about peace negotiations, we're talking about meeting with international leaders and Donald Trump's son-in-law, Michael, just needed to catch on up with Marco Rubio? And this was the place to do it? How did he fly there? Who paid for that ticket?”“Let's put that meeting in context to the meeting with sheikhs,” O’Brien offered. “The UAE spymaster, a UAE power broker, a very wealthy man who invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the Trump family's crypto operations --.” "World Liberty Financial,” Ruhle helpfully pointed out. “The Trump White House lifted the sale of highly classified semiconductor chips to the UAE that the Biden administration had forbidden to be exported on national security grounds, because chips now are the stuff of military dominance, AI dominance and technology dominance, and they're valuable things to monitor,” he continued.“Marco Rubio is in this meeting with the same sheikh and he has Michael Boulos sitting there like a potted plant who has no foreign policy experience? I don't think has a security clearance,” he added. “Okay, he has been doing rather shifty things, according to the New York Times reporting around deals in the Middle East, also something hinky with a yacht sale to Jared Kushner, et cetera et cetera.”"The only thing Michael Boulos appears to bring to the table is a hunger to cut deals, some of which appear skeevy,” he claimed. “Why is he at the table? And then, when Michael Rubio was asked about it, he said I just thought it would be good for him to attend so he could watch me and hang out. — this is like Animal House.”“Animal House, was a silly movie about boys in a fraternity; this is a war,” Ruhle exclaimed. “This is our national freaking security.” - YouTube youtu.be

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner's secret resort deal on Albania's only island has sparked a mass revolt that now threatens to bring down the country's entire government.Kushner's private equity firm, Affinity Partners, quietly secured rights to build a $1.6 billion luxury resort on Sazan Island — a protected Adriatic nature preserve — and a $4 billion coastal development on a nearby wildlife reserve.The Albanian government granted the project special investor status, bypassed public tenders, and stripped the land of its protected status — all without disclosing the deal to parliament or the public, WIRED reported.Heavy machinery rolled in without permits, private security guards dragged away environmental protesters on video, and what critics describe as an alleged "land grab" went viral overnight, the report said.Hundreds of thousands of Albanians have since flooded the capital, Tirana, under signs reading "Albania is not a Gucci bag on sale," according to WIRED. The movement calls itself the Flamingo Revolution, named after the birds whose protected habitat is under threat of destruction.Now protesters aren't just demanding the resort be stopped, they want Prime Minister Edi Rama's resignation, a caretaker government, and early elections — a full governmental reset that would put every elected official's job on the line.Ivanka Trump told a podcaster she and Kushner stumbled onto Sazan by accident during a 2021 yacht trip. "We were on a friend's boat, and we stopped for a swim. Effectively, that's how we found it," she said, according to PBS NewsHour. Dea Dervishi, an Albanian student, had a pointed response: "She said she discovered the island, but the island belongs to us."A U.S. Senate investigation found Affinity has pocketed roughly $157 million in fees from foreign governments — including $87 million from Saudi Arabia — while generating zero return for investors.Kushner simultaneously serves as the president's Middle East envoy. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) called it "a glaring and incurable conflict of interest."Albania's special anti-corruption prosecutors have opened a formal probe and frozen developer assets. It's a pattern critics recognize: Kushner ran the same play in Serbia, where four government officials were charged with corruption to enable his resort deal. He withdrew from that project in December 2025.Protesters are organizing a nationwide mobilization on Saturday and are demanding early elections that would put every elected official's job on the line.

Fears hard-won gains in reducing child mortality over 20 years are at risk after end of USAID funding for nutrition programmesChild malnutrition in Nepal has reached “alarming” levels, according to the largest ever survey of under-fives in the country.The new figures came just over a year after USAID, the former US flagship agency closed by the Trump administration in 2025, stopped funding work on child nutrition in Nepal. Continue reading...

Iran has discussed plans with its neighbors to extract billions from the global economy by setting up permanent tolls in the Strait of Hormuz—a direct result of President Trump's disastrous war that handed Tehran unprecedented leverage over the world's most critical oil artery.According to the Wall Street Journal reporting, Iranian officials are boasting to Middle Eastern neighbors that a lucrative new revenue stream is imminent. The Islamic Republic estimated that charging for "security, safety, and environmental services" in the strait could generate $40 billion annually for "participating states."The scheme would represent a dramatic reversal of pre-war conditions. Iran has positioned itself to control and monetize the "global shipping chokepoint" it effectively seized when the war began, causing worldwide pain.To gain regional buy-in, Tehran pitched the toll arrangement throughout the Middle East and to Beijing, proposing that Persian Gulf neighbors share in the revenue, with the Journal noting the model "mirrors" Turkey's system in the Dardanelles, where ships pay a tax known as the gold franc for passage."Everyone needs to know that management of the strait will never return to the way it was before," declared Iran's chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, during a visit to Oman on Tuesday to discuss the arrangements, the Journal reported.According to the report, "The number of ships crossing the strait on Wednesday reached its highest since the war began, with around 70 crossings, according to ship trackers, whose estimates vary. On average, before the war, 130 oil tankers went through the neck of the Persian Gulf each day."Secretary of State Marco Rubio attempted to push back during a Middle East trip this week, insisting that tolls or fees represent an unacceptable precedent that would "spread like a contagion and cause chaos.""No country on earth has the right to charge for the use of international waterways, and that will never be an acceptable condition of any deal," Rubio said in Bahrain, claiming Persian Gulf countries have rejected the toll idea.However, the Journal reported Rubio's objections may prove toothless, noting, "The 60-day deal to end the fighting and reopen the waterway puts Iran in charge of demining it and insists on toll-free passage for ships in that time. But the document also gives Iran, which doesn’t recognize maritime law governing the strait, a say in the future management of the shipping chokepoint."