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President Donald Trump claimed last week that Ukraine and Russia had agreed to avoid striking energy infrastructure targets, but on Sunday morning, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy proudly boasted about striking “one of Russia’s key oil industry facilities,” leading critics to condemn Trump for “just another lie to manipulate markets.”BBC reported that Ukraine launched its “largest” drone attack on the Moscow region since Russia's 2022 invasion, killing at least two people and injuring 20 others. Moscow’s "main oil refinery" was among the targets struck.“It appears that Trump’s claim last week that he negotiated a deal between Putin and Zelenskyy to stop bombing energy infrastructure was just another lie to manipulate markets,” wrote MeidasTouch Editor-in-Chief Ron Filipkowski Sunday morning in a social media post on X. “Every hour of every day, Trump lies about everything.”As global oil prices skyrocket amid the U.S. war against Iran, Trump has attempted to dispel claims that the war he launched in February was to blame for the spike in energy costs.“The World’s Diesel price rise is mostly caused by the Russia/Ukraine War, not Iran,” Trump wrote last week.Trump reiterated his request to Zelenskyy last week in Ireland, telling reporters that the Ukrainian president “has to stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia… because he’s causing a shortage.”With Zelenskyy boasting about an attack on a Russian oil refinery just days later, Trump was swiftly mocked by critics.“Yeesh,” wrote military historian Phillips O’Brien, head of the School of International Relations at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, in a social media post on X. “Trump promised us there was an agreement that this would not happen!”It appears that Trump’s claim last week that he negotiated a deal between Putin and Zelenskyy to stop bombing energy infrastructure was just another lie to manipulate markets. Every hour of every day, Trump lies about everything. pic.twitter.com/laEAhpK8hi— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) September 20, 2026

Beijing believes slowdown calls aim to lock in US advantage, and is pursuing a different balance between safety and paceChina bogeyman looms large over American firms’ AI doomsday scenarioAbout two years ago, education entrepreneur Boris But had what he calls a “penny-drop moment” – that, like countless others in China, his company needed to embrace AI before it was made obsolete by it.His clients, well-off parents looking to send their children to study overseas, had begun arriving in his office reeling off information and opinions gleaned not from rival firms, but from chatbots. Continue reading...

The Trump administration warned U.S. allies that shipments of key weapons could be delayed by as much as five years as the United States faces a “shortfall in ammunition” amid its war against Iran, Bloomberg reported on Saturday, leading international law scholar Alonso Gurmendi to float a jarring theory.According to Bloomberg, “multiple European nations” have been informed that deliveries of key weapons, including “missile and air defense capabilities,” will face severe delays. Japan was also told by the United States that a shipment of Tomahawk missiles would be “delayed by as much as two years.”Gurmendi, a London School of Economics Fellow in Human Rights, argued that the development represented the end to US “military superiority” on the world stage, and blamed two key figures for the fallout: Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who’s been increasingly accused of having “dragged” Trump into the deeply unpopular U.S. war against Iran.“Netanyahu and Trump have ended US military superiority,” Gurmendi wrote in a statement published on social media. “It’s frankly a jarring level of incompetence driven by religious/ideological fundamentalism and male fragility, respectively.”Trump has been scrutinized for years regarding what countless critics have described as his “fragile male ego,” with male fragility playing an outsized role in his first bid for the White House, according to social psychologists Eric Knowles and Sarah DiMuccio.“The Pentagon’s decision to prioritize its own stockpiles is also straining Ukraine’s push for the U.S. to send it more Patriot air defense interceptors ahead of what is expected to be a difficult winter for the war-torn nation,” Bloomberg’s report reads. “The issue of Ukraine’s badly needed air defense will be a key topic at next week’s United Nations meetings in New York.”Netanyahu and Trump have ended US military superiority. It’s frankly a jarring level of incompetence driven by religious/ideological fundamentalism and male fragility, respectively. https://t.co/qMCNcJ5HbO— Alonso Gurmendi (@Alonso_GD) September 19, 2026

President Donald Trump abruptly cut short his weekend at Camp David and is returning to the White House for reasons that remain “unclear,” multiple journalists reported Saturday evening, sparking fears the sudden change could signal an impending "major escalation" in the Middle East.Trump’s schedule change came shortly after the U.S. Embassy in Israel issued a security alert instructing Americans in the Middle East to “exercise heightened vigilance and be aware of potential flight cancellations, airspace closures, and travel disruptions.” Also on Saturday, Israeli news network i24NEWS reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cut his scheduled U.S. visit short.“There’s a TON of very obvious signaling taking place right now for imminent massive escalation against Iran. President Trump, just after Camp David, is returning early to the White House. Bibi Netanyahu is cutting his U.S. Tour a day early, cancelling the Texas leg, and flying directly back to Tel Aviv from New York,” warned geopolitical expert Brett Erickson on Saturday.“All Middle East US embassies have issued STEP alert warning to Americans in the region. This could certainly be a legitimate escalation… but this is a LOT of very public signaling that is textbook TACO Trump. That said… if it’s not, we’re looking at a MAJOR escalation inbound.”Sophie Mokoena, a veteran South African journalist, came to a similar conclusion, warning of an “imminent attack.”INSIGHTS: There’s a TON of very obvious signaling taking place right now for imminent massive escalation against Iran.President Trump, just after Camp David, is returning early to the White House (and reported on by Barak…).Bibi Netanyahu is cutting his U.S. Tour a day… https://t.co/ntsZHwJj00— Brett Erickson (@BrettErickson28) September 19, 2026

A senior Iranian figure proclaimed Thursday that the Strait of Hormuz would remain closed until “criminal” President Donald Trump is removed from power — and a number of critics voiced support for the demand.Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, a political adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, said that the strait would remain closed until both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were removed from office, a demand that comes as traffic through the critical shipping waterway hit its “lowest level yet” and surging global oil prices break records.“Our fighters will not open the Strait of Hormuz until they bring the criminal Trump and the bloodthirsty Netanyahu down from the seat of power,” Zolqadr said, CBS News reported Thursday.With gas prices in the United States reaching unprecedented heights due to Trump’s deeply unpopular war against Iran — with “the worst still to come,” per The Washington Post — a number of Trump’s critics appeared to embrace Iran’s demands.“Honestly, I'm down with this. F--- it,” wrote Ian Smith, a former GOP congressional candidate from New Jersey and fitness entrepreneur, in a social media post on X.Dash Dobrofsky, a political commentator and writer, also embraced Iran’s terms for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, writing in a social media post on X to his nearly 200,000 followers: “Not gonna lie, this sounds like a great deal to me.”Others flagged how Iran’s new demand was directly at odds with Trump’s oft-repeated insistence that Iran was “begging” to make a deal with his administration.“Trump has said for (how many months now) that Iran is begging for a deal. Doesn't seem like it, by their actions, or their words,” wrote Chris Rossini, a senior fellow and media host at the Ron Paul Institute.And Laura Robinson, a religious podcaster and scholar, quipped that it was “kinda cool” that Iran "believed" in Americans enough to remove Trump from power to make such a demand.Iran just came out and said the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until both Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are removed from power.Not gonna lie, this sounds like a great deal to mehttps://t.co/nyuc7GSa3e— Dash Dobrofsky (@DashDobrofsky) September 17, 2026

The Iran-backed militia that once triggered one of the most damaging scandals of President Donald Trump's second term is back — and the president is trying to avoid a fight he already walked away from once, according to a new report.American diplomats met with Houthi representatives at the U.S. Embassy in Oman over the weekend in an effort to cool tensions and keep Red Sea shipping lanes open, a source briefed on the discussions told MS NOW. Both sides reaffirmed a ceasefire reached last year, under which the Houthis agreed not to strike U.S. targets in exchange for the U.S. standing down.That truce was born out of Trump's frustration with his military campaign that spawned Signalgate. In spring 2025, the U.S. launched a seven-week, more than $1 billion military operation against the Houthis — one that top officials, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, discussed on the Signal messaging app.The chats became public after then-national security adviser Mike Waltz mistakenly added a journalist to the thread, setting off months of controversy and staff turnover.Frustrated by the campaign's lack of progress, Trump halted it in May 2025 and struck the ceasefire instead.Now that decision has narrowed his options, reported MS NOW's Felicia Schwartz. With the U.S.-Iran war ongoing and Tehran controlling the Strait of Hormuz, Saudi Arabia had rerouted oil exports through the Red Sea to avoid the chokepoint.The Houthis have responded by seizing the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, threatening that backup route too and helping push gas prices higher just weeks before the U.S. midterms.Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman personally asked Trump last week to strike the Houthis after they took control of the strait, according to a person familiar with the call.Trump declined, telling the crown prince that Riyadh should take the lead on what the White House considers a regional security matter. Asked about the call while in Ireland, Trump called the crown prince "a good friend of mine" and predicted "everything's going to work out fine and dandy."A senior administration official said the U.S. expects the Houthis to keep honoring the ceasefire, noting the group has signaled it doesn't want to fight the U.S.But David Schenker, a former top State Department Middle East official now at the Washington Institute, said the president's rationale is both strategic and political. "Trump doesn't want to start another campaign, certainly not before the elections. We're short of munitions and already stretched."Trump's reluctance is frustrating to Saudi Arabia and Washington’s other Middle East partners who never wanted the Iran war in the first place but are now tasked with containing the fallout.“The war with Iran really exposed the vulnerabilities of a lot of our partners in the Gulf,” Schenker said. “It raises all sorts of questions about what a U.S. security commitment to the Gulf looks like.”

A United Nations investigation found "reasonable grounds” that the United States had likely committed war crimes in its war against Iran, and the report is scheduled to be submitted to the international body on Monday — just one day before President Donald Trump is expected to address the UN and its “deeply skeptical audience” in New York, Reuters reported Friday.The report is expected to be submitted to the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, and found that the United States had acted “recklessly” in its strikes on the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ school on the first day of the conflict, an attack that killed more than 150 civilians, including around 120 children. Investigators came to a “similar conclusion” regarding a U.S. strike on an Iranian sports hall that damaged a nearby school and killed 22 civilians, Reuters reported.In response to the probe’s findings, the White House attacked the UN Human Rights Council, accusing the body of having “accomplished nothing for human rights,” according to Reuters.The timing of the report puts its submission to the UN on a collision course with Trump’s address to the international body, where Reuters noted the president will “face a deeply skeptical audience increasingly rattled by six months of war between US forces and an emboldened Iran.”Aaron David Miller, who previously advised secretaries of state in both Republican and Democratic-led administrations, said that Trump had only himself to blame for what may be a sour reception at the UN gathering on Tuesday.“We are seeing what happens when a president launches a war of choice without anticipating the unintended consequences,” Miller told Reuters.Jonathan Panikoff, a Middle East expert and former deputy national intelligence officer, argued that Trump’s dilemma was only likely to get worse.“The US clearly has (military) capacity challenges but even so the cost of inaction here is likely to intensify tensions among Gulf allies,” Panikoff told Reuters.

President Donald Trump hurled furious threats in the middle of the night and insisted his MAGA base read a three-week old column from a conservative Washington Post pundit.The president took to Truth Social at approximately 12:15 a.m. Friday to share a column by Marc Thiessen entitled "What the disloyal leaks about Iran prove about Trump," published on Aug. 27."Keep on leaking you dirty dogs!" he wrote. "When we find you, you will pay a big price!!!"Thiessen's column chastised "disloyalists" who have grown concerned about the ongoing war in Iran — and have spoken out about it."The message of the leakers is clear: Had Trump only listened to us, we would not be in this mess," Thiessen wrote. "These self-serving leaks actually show the opposite — by demonstrating what a courageous decision Trump made. Virtually alone, surrounded by naysayers, Trump acted to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon."Those words got a nod from Trump in the wee hours of Friday morning where he wrote on Truth Social, “Very interesting. A must read!"