Tailoring assessments to suit political prejudices undermines their very function and led us to the Iraq war
In the run-up to the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, journalists covering the preparations for war became familiar with the concept of “stovepiping”.
The term described the tactic of pushing intelligence to key political decision makers, bypassing checks and balances within the system.
Continue reading...Defense chief says US bombings degraded Iran’s nuclear sites, citing AI models over leaked intel doubts
The US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, has defended the US strikes on Iranian nuclear enrichment facilities and said that Donald Trump had “decimated … obliterated” the country’s nuclear program despite initial intelligence assessments that last week’s strikes had failed to destroy key enrichment facilities and they could resume operations within just months.
But he and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Gen Dan Caine, largely based that assessment on AI modeling, showing test videos of the “bunker buster” bombs used in the strikes and referred questions on a battle damage assessment of Fordow to the intelligence community.
Continue reading...Iran’s supreme leader says attack on US base in Qatar was ‘slap to America’s face’
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has threatened to respond to any future US attack by striking American military bases in the Middle East, in his first public comments since a ceasefire with Israel was declared.
The 86-year-old, who has not been seen in public since taking shelter in a secret location after the outbreak of the war on 13 June, said his country had “delivered a slap to America’s face” – a reference to an Iranian missile attack on a US base in Qatar on Monday, which caused no casualties.
Continue reading...Others accuse US president of interfering in Israel’s judicial system after he said case against PM was a ‘witch hunt’
Benjamin Netanyahu has thanked Donald Trump after the US president publicly called for the Israeli prime minister’s long-running corruption trial to be cancelled.
Trump on Wednesday posted a lengthy diatribe against the trial, which could lead to a prison sentence for his ally, describing a “ridiculous witch hunt” that was an “unheard of … horror show” and showering praise on Netanyahu for his leadership of Israel during the short war with Iran that was ended by a ceasefire earlier this week.
Continue reading...Move makes it harder to verify degree of damage inflicted on Iran’s three key nuclear sites by US and Israeli bombing
Iran’s parliament has unanimously agreed to suspend all cooperation with the IAEA, the UN’s nuclear inspectorate, making it harder for an independent expert assessment to be made about the degree of damage inflicted on Iran’s three key nuclear sites by the joint US and Israeli bombing.
It also makes it harder for the location of any highly enriched uranium to be known. The vote is a sign that Iran wants to harden its negotiating position on cooperation with the west in the wake of 12 days of attacks mounted by Israel and the US, but supported by European governments only with varying degrees of enthusiasm.
Continue reading...Pakistani government had credited US president with ‘pivotal leadership’ in its ceasefire negotiations with India
Donald Trump’s intervention into the Iran-Israel war, and brokering then announcing a ceasefire, has drawn a heated debate in Pakistan – where the government had formally nominated the US president for the Nobel peace prize as the US military was making its final preparations for a strike that threatened all-out war in the Middle East.
A statement in the early hours of Saturday local time – shortly before US B-2 bombers left the Whiteman air force base in Missouri and headed to Iran – had credited Trump for a “legacy of pragmatic diplomacy” and “pivotal leadership” for ensuring Pakistan’s ceasefire with India in a conflict that had begun with the killing of tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir in April.
Continue reading...President calls intelligence ‘inconclusive’, while defence secretary describes harm to facilities as ‘moderate to severe’
Donald Trump and the US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, have admitted to some doubt over the scale of the damage inflicted on Iran’s nuclear sites by the US bombing at the weekend, after a leaked Pentagon assessment said the Iranian programme had been set back by only a few months.
“The intelligence was very inconclusive,” Trump told journalists at a Nato summit in The Hague, introducing an element of uncertainty for the first time after several days of emphatic declarations that the destruction had been total. “The intelligence says we don’t know. It could’ve been very severe. That’s what the intelligence suggests.”
Continue reading...Report says program likely set back only a few months; Iran and Israel both say they will honour truce if other side does after US president expresses frustration at violations
Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese has weighed in on Donald Trump cursing after becoming frustrated that Iran and Israel violated a ceasefire brokered by the US president.
Trump attacked both nations for breaching the agreement in the early stages, saying on live television “they don’t know what the fuck they are doing”.
We heard some blunt speak from the president, and I think that just reflects the fact that the stakes are high in the Middle East.
I think those who haven’t used that word privately can cast the first stone.
Now it’s for us to sit down with the Iranians and get to a comprehensive peace agreement, and I am very confident that we are going to achieve that.
Continue reading...Elected representatives of Board of Deputies were among signatories of open letter objecting to actions in Gaza Strip
Five elected representatives to the largest body representing British Jews have been suspended for two years after criticising the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza.
All 36 signatories to an open letter published in April have been found to have breached the Board of Deputies’ code of conduct after a two-month investigation.
Continue reading...Five health workers reportedly among the dead in West Kordofan as paramilitary RSF blames Sudanese military
The head of the World Health Organization has condemned an attack on a hospital in Sudan that he said had killed more than 40 civilians, as the country’s civil war, which has caused the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, rages on.
The attack on al-Mujlad hospital in West Kordofan happened on Saturday close to the frontline between the Sudanese military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The WHO’s local office, which did not assign blame, said six children and five health workers were among the dead and that there were “dozens of injuries”.
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: The US president responds to Iran’s limited retaliation by celebrating the end of the war, with Israel confirming agreement to proposal
Good morning. After the United States attacked Iranian nuclear sites early on Sunday, the question was how Tehran would respond. Last night, we saw the beginnings of the answer – and, at least according to Donald Trump, the end of it.
The retaliation came in the form of ballistic missile attacks on a US base in Qatar. While the Iranian authorities called the operation a “mighty and successful response”, no Americans were harmed – apparently by design. Trump described it as a “very weak response”, suggested that the Iranians had “gotten it all out of their ‘system’”, and added: “CONGRATULATIONS WORLD, IT’S TIME FOR PEACE!”
Protest | UK home secretary Yvette Cooper has vowed to ban Palestine Action under anti-terrorism laws, after activists from the group broke into RAF Brize Norton and spray-painted two military planes. PA’s lawyers said that Cooper’s proposal was an attack on freedom of expression and assembly.
Politics | Labour MPs have launched a significant rebellion against the government’s benefit cuts with an amendment that could kill its welfare bill, spearheaded by senior select committee chairs and which sources say could be signed by up to 100 MPs.
NHS | UK health secretary Wes Streeting has launched a national investigation into “systemic” failures in NHS maternity services in England, saying “maternity units are failing, hospitals are failing, trusts are failing, regulators are failing” and there is “too much passing the buck”.
Ukraine | Volodymyr Zelenskyy described Russia, Iran and North Korea as a “coalition of murderers” during a visit to London, where he held talks with Kier Starmer on how to put further pressure on Moscow to end the war. Ukraine’s president has accused Tehran of being complicit in Russia’s invasion.
Music | U2 guitarist The Edge has officially become an Irish citizen, 62 years after moving from Britain to Ireland, in a step he said was “long overdue”.
Continue reading...Foreign affairs minister Penny Wong said there had been ‘disruptions to flights with temporary airspace closures in the region’
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The Albanese government and airlines are warning passengers in Australia of flight delays and disruptions after Iran’s strike on a US base in Qatar resulted in several countries closing their airspace.
In a post to X on Tuesday morning, the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, said there had been “disruptions to flights with temporary airspace closures in the region”.
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Continue reading...US strikes on Iran are adding to the pressure on carriers, which are having to avoid war-torn regions, lengthening routes and pushing up costs
With barely 48 hours elapsed since the US launched strikes against Iran, the swift resumption of near-normal service circumnavigating the war zone underlines that few crises, short of the global pandemic, have stopped airlines and their passengers flying for long.
British Airways had been planning to restart flights to the Middle East cities of Doha and Dubai again, after cancelling departures from Heathrow at the weekend. However, on Monday evening Qatar temporarily closed its airspace again as Iran launched a missile attack on US bases in the country.
Continue reading...Crude oil prices dropped by 7% on hopes that the conflict would not immediately disrupt region’s oil supplies
Oil prices dropped sharply after Iran’s retaliatory missile strike on a US airbase reduced concern that the country was poised to strain energy markets by closing off a vital trade route.
Crude oil prices sank by 7% on Monday, with West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures dropping to $68.51, as the Iranian action on the Al Udeid base in Qatar raised hopes that the conflict would not immediately disrupt oil supplies from the region.
Continue reading...The emergence of Hawk Trump dismayed some of his Maga base but students of US adventurism were unsurprised
So the military parade that brought tanks to the streets of Washington on Donald Trump’s birthday was more than just an authoritarian ego trip. It was a show of strength and statement of intent.
Exactly a week later, sporting a “Make America great again” (Maga) cap in the situation room, the American president ordered the biggest US military intervention in decades as more than 125 aircraft and 75 weapons – including 14 bunker-busting bombs – struck three Iranian nuclear sites. Trump called it a “spectacular military success” – but it remains unclear how much damage had actually been inflicted.
Continue reading...UK foreign secretary also sidesteps questions on legality of strikes and Donald Trump’s ‘regime change’ post
The UK foreign secretary has repeatedly refused to say if the UK supported the US military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities on Saturday or whether they were legal.
Interviewed on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Monday for the first time since the US launched airstrikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities, David Lammy also sidestepped the question of whether he supported recent social media posts by Donald Trump that seemed to favour regime change in Tehran, saying that in all his discussions in the White House the sole focus had been on military targets.
Continue reading...Trump has warned of broader US involvement in Israel’s war if Iran attempts to strike back against US military sites in the region
Iran had sought to deter Donald Trump from joining Israel’s bombing campaign with dire threats of retaliation, but its options now are limited and fraught with risk.
Iranian officials have said specifically that US ships and military bases would be targeted, but much of the capacity it had relied on as a deterrent has been stripped away over the past few days by Israeli strikes. Those strikes however, have focused on long-range ballistic missile launchers. Iran still has a formidable arsenal of shorter-range missiles and drones.
Continue reading...Scale of death and destruction in Gaza, and the violence of settlers in the West Bank, has shifted public opinion in the EU
In Israel, it can seem like only one other place really matters. Washington DC is on the other side of the world but provides Israel with weapons, the backing of the most powerful military in the world, and a critical diplomatic shield in forums like the United Nations.
Yet the country’s economy is bound far more closely to Europe than to the United States. A third of its trade is with the European Union, key academic work is supported by grants from the EU’s multi-billion dollar Horizon research fund, and it is the top destination for Israelis who want to travel.
Continue reading...Abdullah Ahmed was hit by shrapnel while on a desperate mission to feed his family
Just after midnight on Thursday morning, Abdullah Ahmed left his sleeping wife and children in their small and crowded home in the battered al-Bureij camp in central Gaza and headed north. The 31-year-old vegetable seller had heard that the nearby aid distribution site recently opened by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a secretive Israeli- and US-backed private organisation that began operations in the territory last month, would be handing out food at 2am.
To get there early and maximise his chance of grabbing a box of flour, oil, beans and other basics, Ahmed and some friends set out across the dangerous rubble-strewn roads.
Continue reading...Weakening of ‘axis of resistance’ forces leaves Iran with limited options if it chooses to retaliate
Iran’s proxy militias across the Middle East have yet to retaliate for the overnight strikes against the Islamic Republic and are sending mixed signals about their willingness to strike US targets – or even Israel – in the coming days.
The apparent reluctance or inability of such groups to come to Iran’s aid will limit Tehran’s options if decision-makers there opt to escalate the conflict with the US.
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