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The surprise death of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has opened the door for someone new to whisper in President Donald Trump's ear and possibly alter the arc of the war with Iran.Benjamin Netanyahu is seizing the moment, according to a report from Politico. The Israeli Prime Minister, long frustrated by increasingly limited White House access, has finally secured an invitation following Graham's funeral — a visit months in the making.Netanyahu has been "angling" for an Oval Office since at least April, according to sources familiar with the diplomatic maneuvering. Graham's death provided the opening Netanyahu needed."At first there was no meeting. They arranged it in the last couple of days," one insider told Politico, confirming that Netanyahu capitalized on the funeral to finalize arrangements that stalled for months.As Politico notes, Trump and Netanyahu haven't met "face-to-face" since February, just before the Iran war commenced — a conflict Netanyahu personally lobbied Trump to launch. Nearly five months have elapsed since that encounter.Netanyahu faces a precarious political position. He championed the Iranian military campaign, but the war has dragged far beyond initial projections. Trump predicted a four-to-five-week conflict, but the fighting continues with no resolution in sight.The White House visit allows Netanyahu to discuss escalation strategies with Trump, with Politico reporting, "Trump’s own staff are growing frustrated by the long odds of ending the fighting, and Trump has had harsh words for Netanyahu as the war has dragged on.""Bibi takes a risk coming to the White House. He might get pressed by President Trump with an ask, rather than the other way around," warned Elisa Ewers, a former senior Middle East official now at the Council on Foreign Relations.Netanyahu will likely face demands that Israel accept American policies it has previously resisted — positions on Lebanon, Gaza, and other regional matters where Washington and Jerusalem have diverged, she told Politico."The White House visit in itself is his get," Ewers noted, suggesting the mere invitation represents a victory for Netanyahu after months of diplomatic cold-shoulder treatment.

Wind and record-breaking heat are fuelling the continent’s explosive fire season, with Spain and France among worst hitExplainer: what is a ‘fire cloud’, and how have they worsened wildfires in Europe?Europe wildfires live – latest updatesA combination of an unusually wet winter, very low rainfall since spring and repeated record-breaking summer heatwaves is likely to explain why wildfires have ignited, spread and resisted control so readily across France and Spain in recent days.About 90% of wildfires are started by human activity, typically igniting “fine fuels” such as vegetation grass, pine needles, litter and twigs. And recent weather has almost certainly made ignition far easier. Drought in western Europe has turned this vegetation – which normally dries after only a few hours of heat and low rainfall – into tinder. Continue reading...

Government move follows months of drought and crop failures in Karamoja, with 1.5m people facing malnutritionUganda has launched emergency food relief distribution after at least 19 deaths from hunger were reported in an area of prolonged drought in the east of the country.A crisis has been building in the Karamoja region of Uganda as crops have failed without the season’s expected rains, leaving the region’s 1.5 million people facing acute food shortages and rising malnutrition. Continue reading...

In today’s newsletter: Across ​the country, a ​younger generation is turning private disillusionment into public defiance​ against a government that once felt untouchableGood morning. As flames engulfed parts of France and Spain this weekend, in India, the prime minister, Narendra Modi, was trying to put out a very different kind of fire. Thousands of people arrived in Delhi on Saturday to demand the resignation of his education minister, Dharmendra Pradhan. When he stepped down in the early afternoon, the protests turned into a triumphant block party.But the Cockroach protests that have swept through India this summer are about much more than a single minister. They have humiliated Modi and undermined the indomitable power of his Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) that has ruled India for the past 12 years. They’re also a lesson in using humour to political advantage.Wild fires | Authorities in France battled to contain a huge wildfire near Bordeaux in the south-west as Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, warned Spain and the Iberian peninsula were suffering the effects of the climate emergency.Germany | A man suspected of driving a van into a crowd near Berlin’s Pride festival then going on a knife rampage in an Islamist terror attack has been shot dead by police, German officials have said.Iran | The US has paused strikes on Iran for a second night as top military officials advised Donald Trump to halt his bombing campaign, and diplomatic negotiations have continued to avoid a return to all-out war.UK politics | Britain’s foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, is to indicate he will put the climate crisis and overseas development at the heart of UK international relations by taking up the country’s seat on the board at the World Bank.UK news | Five Palestine Action activists face being sentenced as terrorists for breaking windows and throwing red paint at a branch of Barclays Bank in Lancashire.Monday | Andrew and Tristan Tate are due back in the Florida court where they’re fighting their extradition to the UK, to face rape and sex-trafficking charges.Tuesday | Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy are expected to be among those attending the Washington DC memorial service for the late South Carolina senator and Trump ally Lindsey Graham.Thursday | People will go to the polls to elect the next mayor of Greater Manchester, who will replace Andy Burnham. Continue reading...

An angry Democrat dared the Trump administration to look the children of men killed by immigration officers in the eye — but suggested they might be too scared. Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA) slammed the Trump administration for failing to attend a public hearing on deaths caused by its Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers — and called out his suspected reason why. "They're afraid, he said. "They are scared." Walkinshaw appeared on MS NOW Saturday morning to address what "The Weekend" host Eugene Daniels described as the "lying" and "untruths" about how two fatal ICE shootings "went down." Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero was killed in Maine on July 13 — just days after Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was shot dead in Texas, reports show. The Virginia Democrat had recently returned from Houston, where Araujo, 52, was killed by ICE and falsely accused by the FBI of possessing illegal drugs. As U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX) confirmed Friday, the construction worker had electrolytes to help him keep hydrated. Walkinshaw felt compelled to go to Houston that same day, he said. "I wanted to... be able to look into their eyes and see and feel that that pain that they're experiencing," said Walkinshaw. "And bring it back with me to Washington and try to communicate it to my colleagues, especially our Republican colleagues."But Walkinshaw argued Republicans would rather "pour salt in the wounds" of families whose loved ones have died in ICE's hands, pointing to Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two American citizens shot dead in protests, as proof. "It is disgusting what this administration is doing to families like this," he said. "It's character assassination." Walkinshaw then shared information from a closed-door briefing he held with ICE officials last week. Data show that out of 22,000 ICE officers, just one has faced disciplinary action. "There is no accountability in ICE right now," he said. "And it comes from the very top. In the Oval Office."This is why Walkinshaw professed himself outraged the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI "flat out refused" to send a representative to Friday's public hearing. Walkinshaw argued they didn't have the guts to face the children of the men ICE agents had killed. "They are afraid to to face communities like the community in Houston," he said. "After what has happened, I don't think they want to have to look Lorenzo and Ronaldo in the eye and see what they have done."

The widow of a service member recently killed amid the Iran war was speechless when asked about the Trump administration's response.During an interview with CNN anchor Erin Burnett, Mia Gonzalez-Swinton spoke about her husband, late Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, who was one of four U.S. service members killed last weekend in the ongoing conflict with Iran. Swinton was killed in Iraq, and his name vanished from the Department of Defense casualty list, Burnett noted.Gonzalez-Swinton gave a tearful interview with Burnett where she described her late husband as "goofy" and a father to a baby girl. Burnett asked her about the Trump administration removing her husband's name, along with three others, from the casualty list."Mia, something happened this week that we don't really understand," Burnett said. "The Pentagon, you know, removing Michael and the three soldiers who also died this past weekend from the public casualty count of soldiers and troops who have died during the war."Burnett said that the Pentagon explained the removal was "a glitch." She asked Gonzalez-Swinton, "Has anyone spoken to you about this or told you anything about it?"A silence followed while Gonzalez-Swinton appeared to collect her thoughts and change her expression. After a few seconds, she slowly said, "Nobody has reached out yet."Gonzalez-Swinton took another brief pause while she seemed to think, and again her expression changed to surprise."Wow," she continued. "I kind of don't have words for that."Burnett seemed to struggle too, as she responded, "I can imagine." Gonzalez-Swinton broke into tears as the interview ended.

A military expert's comments about President Donald Trump's next steps on the Iran war stunned a CNN anchor on Friday.Host Kasie Hunt spoke to retired Navy Admiral James Stavridis after Trump addressed the military strategy in the region to get more insights about what the president was suggesting. Stavridis said the president's comments about making it a "heavier dose" against Iran with American military strikes could signal increased and larger-scale attacks."Going big, sending B-1 bombers in, putting up all those new air tanker aircraft that Kristen [Holmes] mentioned coming out of Europe gives you the ability to recycle your strikes," Stavridis said. "I think also going to the Israelis and putting them into the mix, and also talking to the Arab nations. Increasingly, I'm seeing reporting that the Saudis, the Emiratis, lately I've seen the Bahrainis, the Kuwaitis, have potentially participated. So I think what you're hearing is somebody considering going very, very big in order to push things along."Stavridis also noted something else."By the way, on a human level, the president just looks tired to me," Stavridis added. "He looks like he's a man under significant stress. And frankly, I don't envy him the decisions ahead.""A little bit of a warning in your words," Hunt said, surprised by the comment.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly said the main rationale for the Iran war is to stop Tehran from getting a nuclear weapon.But according to The New York Times, everything he has done may have actually made it more likely.New assessments from U.S. intelligence have determined "that Iran’s new supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, is far more interested than his father and predecessor in pursuing a nuclear weapon," said the report. Mojtaba Khamenei assumed command of Iran after his father, the longtime supreme leader, was taken out as part of the U.S. offensives."American officials caution that most of the intelligence on Mojtaba Khamenei’s views comes from before the war," the report noted. The new supreme leader has not made many public appearances since he was injured in the war, out of concern for his own security and public image.U.S. officials believe the Iranian regime has not truly restarted its nuclear program. However, per reports, Israeli intelligence identified that Tehran is moving centrifuges to a secret underground facility U.S. officials call "Pickaxe Mountain," which they believe is more secure from conventional airstrikes than the facilities damaged by U.S. forces at Fordo, Natanz, and Isfahan.Trump has spoken openly about a strike against Pickaxe Mountain in response.After the initial round of airstrikes, Trump had promised that Iran's nuclear capabilities had been "obliterated," even though the stated basis for the war is to stop Iran's nuclear capabilities.