Rebel group says strikes, aimed at underground facilities and missile launchers, killed and wounded civilians
A joint US and UK air raid on Houthi missile launchers in Yemen has killed 16 people and injured more than 40, according to the Houthi health ministry.
There is no independent way of confirming the death toll, but if accurate it would represent the single largest loss of life since the US and UK started their campaign to degrade the Houthi military in January.
Continue reading...Crucial supply line for aid deliveries to starving Palestinians cut off and will take at least a week to repair, Pentagon says
US aid efforts for Gaza have suffered an embarrassing setback after the temporary pier built by the military broke apart in heavy seas, the Pentagon said on Tuesday.
The $320m pier was intended to provide a crucial supply line for aid deliveries by sea to reach starving Palestinians and alleviate a humanitarian catastrophe. Now the effort is on hold for at least a week.
Continue reading...In divergent messages, president pays tribute to fallen heroes, while Trump fulminates on social media against opponents
Joe Biden and Donald Trump marked the Memorial Day national holiday honoring America’s war dead with jarringly divergent messages that promised to foretell the forthcoming US presidential election campaign as a contest of sharply contrasting characters.
In a ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, Biden paid tribute to the fallen as heroes who sacrificed themselves in the service of American democracy and ideals. Meanwhile, Trump, taking to his Truth Social site, took a very different tack – bestowing holiday wishes on those he branded “human scum” and accused them of trying to destroy the country.
Continue reading...President entreats graduates at commencement to ‘hold fast’ to oath to US constitution in veiled reference to Trump’s threat to democracy
Joe Biden has called newly graduating US military officers the “guardians of American democracy” at a commencement speech in New York state, where the US president, without mentioning Donald Trump by name, gave strong warnings of unprecedented threats to US freedom.
Biden told the West Point military academy graduating class of 2024 that it is being called upon to tackle threats across the globe as well as preserve America’s ideals at home.
Continue reading...Aid agencies poised to receive supplies and distribute to territory where people face imminent starvation
The US military has said the installation of a floating pier for the delivery of humanitarian aid off Gaza has been completed, with officials ready to begin ferrying supplies into the territory, where much of the population faces imminent starvation owing to the continuing Israel-Hamas war.
Ordered two months ago by the president, Joe Biden, the US military transported the system overnight from the Israeli port of Ashdod, about 20 miles north of Gaza.
Continue reading...Harrison Mann, who resigned from Defense Intelligence Agency in November, said he kept quiet about motives out of fear
A former US military intelligence official released a letter on Monday that explained to his colleagues at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) that his November resignation was in fact due to “moral injury” stemming from US support for Israel’s war in Gaza and the harm caused to Palestinians.
Harrison Mann, an army major, would be the first known DIA official to quit over US support to Israel. A US airman fatally set himself on fire in February outside Israel’s embassy in Washington and other military personnel have protested.
Continue reading...The decision to place a weapons shipment on hold sends a message to Netanyahu that the US dog is beginning to regain control of its tail
In placing a hold on a shipment of US-made bombs to Israel, and warning there could be more restrictions to come, Joe Biden is sending a message to Benjamin Netanyahu that his administration is no longer prepared to be a dog wagged by its own tail.
Netanyahu’s repeated defiance of US warnings not to pursue an offensive on Rafah had been based on an assumption that curbing the US weapons supply could inflict more political damage on Biden than on the Israeli prime minister, and that Netanyahu could cause havoc for the president at home at the height of an election year.
Continue reading...Officials say Staff Sgt Gordon Black, 34, was stationed in South Korea and was in the process of returning home to Texas
An American soldier has been arrested in Russia and accused of stealing, according to two US officials.
US officials said the soldier, Staff Sgt Gordon Black, 34, was stationed in South Korea and was in the process of returning home to Fort Cavazos in Texas. Instead, officials said, he traveled to Russia.
Continue reading...Russians in separate compound and do not have access to US forces or equipment, says defence secretary
The US secretary of defence, Lloyd Austin, has confirmed Russian security forces have been deployed to the same airbase as American troops in the Nigerien capital, Niamey.
It remains unclear when the Russian troops, who have been in Niger for weeks, were deployed to Airbase 101, which is next to Diori Hamani international airport in Niamey. It is also unclear how many troops are on the ground.
Continue reading...Move comes after west African country’s military government had told US to withdraw its troops
Russian military personnel have entered an airbase in Niger that is hosting American troops, after a decision by Niger’s junta to expel US forces from the country.
The military officers ruling the west African country have told the US to withdraw its nearly 1,000 military personnel, which until a coup last year had been a key partner for Washington’s fight against insurgents who have killed thousands of people and displaced millions more.
Continue reading...Malian state forces confirm death of Abu Huzeifa, who was believed to have helped carry out 2017 attack
A senior Islamic State group commander, wanted in connection with the deaths of US forces in Niger, has been killed in an operation by Malian state forces, the country’s army said.
Abu Huzeifa, known by the alias Higgo, was a commander in the group known as the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara. The state department had announced a reward of up to $5m for information about him.
Continue reading...Pictures released by US central command come after satellite photos showed US navy ship offshore with floating platform being built alongside it
The US military has released pictures it says show that a pier to help bring more aid into the besieged Gaza Strip is now under construction.
The images show what appears to be a large metal construction with workers in military uniform dotted along the floating platforms.
Continue reading...Risk-filled mission to escort aid from US-built floating pier into combat zone under consideration in defence ministry
Britain’s defence ministry is considering sending troops into Gaza to escort trucks of aid being driven off a giant floating pier built by the US military, a UK defence source has said.
The pier is due to be completed next month in the eastern Mediterranean, and then it will be pushed towards the Gaza shore. But the US president, Joe Biden, has pledged that American forces managing the project will not set foot on land there.
Continue reading...Biden administration to rethink counter-terrorism strategy after breakdown of pact allowing US forces on soil to fight jihadists
The US will withdraw more than 1,000 military personnel from Niger in a move that will force the Biden administration to rethink its counter-terrorism strategy and amounts to a strategic victory for Russia.
The decision comes a month after the west African country’s ruling military junta revoked a security pact with Washington that had allowed American forces on its soil to help fight jihadist terrorism.
Continue reading...Tehran said it informed regional neighbours of strike several days before firing over 300 drones and missiles at Israel
Tehran has warned it will strike again with greater force if Israel or the US retaliate for the Iranian strike on Israel that used more than 300 drones and missiles on Saturday night.
The air raids, the country’s first ever direct attack on the Israeli state, brought a years-long shadow war into the open and threatened to draw the region into a broader conflagration as Israel said it was considering its response.
Continue reading...Joe Biden is believed to have urged restraint, and Tehran deems the matter ‘concluded’ but ultimately Israel’s response lies in the hands of three prickly rivals in its war cabinet
The prospect of a major regional war in the Middle East hangs in the balance on Sunday morning, when Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet is due to meet to decide Israel’s response to Iran’s drone and missile attack.
Netanyahu’s ministers voted in the middle of the night to delegate that decision to the tiny war cabinet, comprising Netanyahu, defence minister Yoav Gallant and Benny Gantz, a Netanyahu opponent who joined the government as minister without portfolio after the Hamas 7 October attack, which began the spiral of violence that has brought Israel and Iran to the brink of war.
Continue reading...Three rescued in the Pacific after making message in the sand with palm fronds, just as another group had done four years prior
Three fishermen stranded on a remote Pacific atoll for more than a week were rescued after spelling out the word “Help” in the sand using giant palm fronds.
A crew from the US Coast Guard cutter Oliver Henry plucked the men, in their 40s, from Pikelot atoll, part of the Federated States of Micronesia, to safety on Tuesday after their message was spotted from the air.
Continue reading...US prosecutors say the WikiLeaks founder encouraged and helped Chelsea Manning steal classified files before publishing them
Joe Biden said on Wednesday that he is considering a request from Australia to drop the decade-long US push to prosecute the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for publishing a trove of American classified documents.
For years, Australia has called on the US to drop its prosecution against Assange, an Australian citizen who has fought American extradition efforts from prison in the UK. Asked about the request on Wednesday, as he hosted the Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, for an official visit, Biden said: “We’re considering it.”
Continue reading...Stephanie Cosme, 32, was killed last year when she inadvertently walked into the rotating propeller of an aircraft in California
A US air force civilian contractor had become disoriented recording data at an airport in California last year when she walked into a jet’s rotating propeller and was killed, officials said Friday.
In a statement outlining the findings of a report into the contractor’s death, the air force materiel command said that 32-year-old Stephanie Cosme was mortally injured on 7 September when she inadvertently walked into the rotating propeller of an MQ-9A that was parked at Gray Butte airfield.
Continue reading...Lou Conter, who was a quartermaster on battleship that exploded and sank during bombing, died following congestive heart failure
The last living survivor of the USS Arizona battleship that exploded and sank during the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor has died. Lou Conter was 102.
Conter passed away on Monday at his home in Grass Valley, California, following congestive heart failure, his daughter, Louann Daley, said, adding she was beside him along with two of her brothers, James and Jeff.
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