President Trump sought to reassure skeptical Americans that the war in Iran is in the national interest, arguing that the operation was necessary to decimate a regime threatening the U.S. and insisting that economic pain would be short-lived.

In a 20-minute address from the White House, his most direct sales pitch to the nation since the war began a month ago, Trump said the U.S. had succeeded on the battlefield and declared that U.S. military objectives would be completed “very shortly.”

Trump said he still aims for a diplomatic agreement to end the war. But in the meantime, he vowed to hit Iran “extremely hard” in the coming weeks and pummel the country “back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.”

Read it all.

President Trump sought to reassure skeptical Americans that the war in Iran is in the national interest, arguing that the operation was necessary to decimate a regime threatening the U.S. https://t.co/k1db0hosas

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) April 2, 2026

President Trump told aides he’s willing to end the U.S. military campaign against Iran even if the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed, administration officials said, likely extending Tehran’s firm grip on the waterway and leaving a complex operation to reopen it for a later date.

In recent days, Trump and his aides assessed that a mission to pry open the chokepoint would push the conflict beyond his timeline of four to six weeks. He decided that the U.S. should achieve its main goals of hobbling Iran’s navy and its missile stocks and wind down current hostilities while pressuring Tehran diplomatically to resume the free flow of trade. If that fails, Washington would press allies in Europe and the Gulf to take the lead on reopening the strait, the officials said.

There are also military options the president could decide on, but they are not his immediate priority, they said.

Read it all.

My war, your Hormuz problem:

“..: President Trump told aides he’s willing to end the U.S. military campaign against Iran even if the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed, administration officials said…” — @WSJ https://t.co/PkwPlwgPGy

— Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) March 31, 2026

In a statement suggesting the enormity of Canterbury’s failure to be a focus for unity, the former archbishop Rowan Williams recently admitted: “I honestly don’t know whether the communion will survive.” Such a statement from a former leader of the Church of England reflects the gravity of the current crisis. It is not merely a matter of internal disagreement but a question about the very future of Anglicanism.

A significant turning point came in 2023 when the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) issued what became known as the Ash Wednesday Statement. In this declaration, the GSFA announced that it would no longer recognize the archbishop of Canterbury as primus inter pares and the head of the Anglican Communion. This decision marked a historic shift: The symbolic center of Anglican unity was effectively withdrawn by churches representing the majority of Anglicans worldwide.

The roots of this shift are not only historical but also theological and structural. The traditional configuration of the Anglican Communion emerged during the era of the British Empire. During that time, the Church of England functioned naturally as a coordinating center for Anglican churches established through missionary and colonial expansion. However, the global context has changed dramatically. The demographic center of Anglicanism has moved decisively to Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Today, the vast majority of Anglicans live in what is commonly called the Global South.

The departure of several western provinces from the traditional Anglican faith inevitably raises questions about unity, governance, and authority.

Read it all.

Canterbury and the Collapse of Anglican Unity
by Mouneer Anis @bishopmouneer https://t.co/5oNTQIwrz3 pic.twitter.com/LVjAFzbJjP

— First Things (@firstthingsmag) March 31, 2026

 Gulf allies of the United States, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, are urging President Donald Trump to continue prosecuting the war against Iran, arguing that Tehran hasn’t been weakened enough by the monthlong U.S.-led bombing campaign, according to U.S., Gulf and Israeli officials.

After private grumbling at the start of the war that they were not given adequate advance notice of the U.S.-Israeli attack and complaining the U.S. had ignored their warnings that the war would have devastating consequences for the entire region, some of the regional allies are making the case to the White House that the moment offers a historic opportunity to cripple Tehran’s clerical rule once and for all.

Officials from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain have conveyed in private conversations that they do not want the military operation to end until there are significant changes in the Iranian leadership or there’s a dramatic shift in Iranian behavior, according to the officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Read it all.

“Officials from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain have conveyed in private conversations that they do not want the military operation to end until there are significant changes in the Iranian leadership…” https://t.co/WRh4iTIwx5

— Michael Weiss (@michaeldweiss) March 30, 2026

The Israeli military is increasingly sceptical that regime change in Iran will be possible in the coming weeks, casting doubt on one of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s core war aims as the Islamic republic shows its ability to endure intense bombardment.

Two people familiar with the matter said the prevailing view within military intelligence was that the war had not created the conditions for ousting the Islamic regime in the near future. One of them, who is familiar with briefings from the Israel Defense Forces’ intelligence directorate Aman, said it appeared that the aerial campaign had yet to measurably erode the Iranian regime’s hold on power since the US and Israel launched the war on February 28.

Both people spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the evolving thinking within the IDF, rather than an official assessment.

Read it all.

Israeli military doubts war will topple Iranian regime https://t.co/hphrOjqqGv

— Financial Times (@FT) March 26, 2026

Strengthen, O Lord, we beseech thee, the bishops of thy Church in their special calling to be teachers and ministers of the Sacraments, that they, like thy servant Cyril of Jerusalem, may effectively instruct thy people in Christian faith and practice; and that we, taught by them, may enter more fully into celebration of the Paschal mystery; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Bishop, Doctor of the Church (386)

As a simple priest he instructed catechumens during Lent. His teachings are saturated with Holy Scripture, his primary surviving work is a collection of 23 catechetical lectures for Baptism. The Arians exiled him thrice. pic.twitter.com/hryZPQNQyl

— Memento Mori (@TempusFugit4016) March 18, 2026

If a local airfield wasn’t available, a makeshift one would need to be set up to fly equipment in and the material out. And ground forces and aircraft would need to be prepared to head off Iranian drone and missile attacks. A quick response force would need to be on hand in case more troops had to rush to the scene, former military officials said.

Richard Nephew, a former Iran director at the National Security Council, said any operation would be “very large and very complicated.” He said you would need upward of 1,000 personnel to perform the operation at one site.

“I’m worried about the drone strikes, IED and similar traps, contamination risks, and the long time we’d need to have people on-site,” Nephew said. 

Nephew said if time was short, the U.S. could also seek to dilute the material on-site by mixing it with natural uranium or destroy it, although that could cause chemical contaminations in the area.

Eyal Hulata, a former head of Israel’s National Security Council who is a senior international fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said if the war ends without the U.S. taking care of the fissile-material stockpile or an underground tunnel network where Iran could start enriching again, known as Pickaxe, “it’s a serious problem.”

“But the U.S. and Israel will need to figure out a path to deal with them one way or the other.”

Read it all.

President Trump has said preventing Iran from ever developing nuclear weapons is a central aim of the war he is waging. In the absence of regime change that could mean seizing the country’s fissile material.

Here's what it would take: https://t.co/KJlSfnjqYP

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) March 16, 2026

President Donald Trump’s war with Iran threatens to deal a severe blow to a global economy still grappling with the impact of his historic tariff hike.

For Europe, sustained higher energy prices would take the economy to the brink of recession. For the US, they would place the Federal Reserve in an impossible position — stuck between a war that pushes inflation higher and a president demanding that interest rates come down. For China, the end of discounted Iranian oil imports adds to strain from Trump’s tariffs and a real estate collapse.

In the first days of the fighting, the intensity is high and the endgame uncertain. Bloomberg Economics has modeled scenarios for what lies ahead, and what they mean for oil prices, major economies, and the future of Iran.

It is, of course, possible that Washington and Tehran find an off-ramp, oil settles back at its pre-escalation average of $65 a barrel, and the global economy dodges a blow.

The latest signs, though, suggest there’s worse to come….

Read it all.

The war in Iran threatens to unleash a wave of inflation at a time when economies worldwide are already in a tight spot. Read more in the Canada Daily newsletter. https://t.co/iWX5sR3kZB

— Bloomberg (@business) March 4, 2026

Key Takeaways

1. The combined US-Israeli force has designed its campaign to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities before the force depletes its interceptor stockpiles. The destruction of missile launchers mitigates the risk that either the United States or Israel will run out of interceptors by limiting Iran’s ability to launch missiles in the first place.  The decrease in Iranian missile attacks against Israel and the UAE strongly suggests that the effort to destroy ballistic missile launchers has had considerable success.
2. The IDF struck key decision-making institutions on March 3, including the Assembly of Experts building in Tehran, as part of an effort to disrupt senior decision-making. The Assembly of Experts is an 88-member clerical body that is responsible for appointing and supervising the Supreme Leader, according to the Iranian constitution. Strikes that disrupt or prevent the Assembly of Experts from fulfilling its constitutional duty to select the next Supreme Leader would undermine the legitimacy of the regime. The regime is based on the principle of Velayat-e Faqih, in which a jurist, the Supreme Leader, controls Iran. 
3. Iranian leaders have devolved powers to lower-level officials in response to the combined force’s strikes targeting senior officials and central decision-making institutions, likely to ensure continued state functions despite disruptions to central Iranian leadership.
4. The IDF continued to strike sites associated with Iran’s nuclear program, including facilities linked to weaponization research conducted by Iranian nuclear scientists.
5. Iran continued to conduct drone and ballistic missile attacks targeting US forces and sites in Gulf countries, which has prompted two US embassies to close.
6. The United States and Israel continued to strike Iranian-backed Iraqi militias on March 2 and 3 to degrade their ability to conduct retaliatory attacks against US forces and Israel.

Read it all.

NEW: The combined US-Israeli force has designed its campaign to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities before the force depletes its interceptor stockpiles. The destruction of missile launchers mitigates the risk that either the United States or Israel will run out of… pic.twitter.com/btsumD6mAY

— Institute for the Study of War (@TheStudyofWar) March 4, 2026

Three events, three continents, one week. A parliamentary by-election in Greater Manchester, England; a thunderous war and the death of a tyrant in Iran; and a terrorist attack in Austin, Texas. They seem unrelated. They are not. Together, they tell you where political Islam has got to—and more urgently, where its most committed adherents are heading next.

On February 26, the UK’s Green Party won a parliamentary seat in Gorton and Denton that the Labour Party had held for decades. The Green candidate, Hannah Spencer, secured nearly 15,000 votes. Matt Goodwin, the candidate for the conservative populist Reform party, came in second with about 10,500, while the Labour candidate slipped to third. The obvious question is how a party associated with bike lanes, green energy, and rewilding managed to seize a Labour stronghold in Greater Manchester.

The answer has nothing to do with climate policy.

The Greens ran two entirely separate campaigns. To progressive voters, they offered the standard mix of green and anti-austerity policies. To Muslim voters, who make up 30 percent of the Gorton and Denton electorate, they offered something else. Leaflets in Urdu, Bengali, and Arabic told readers that Labour must be punished for its complicity in the Israeli war in Gaza. The translated material framed the vote as a community act—a way for Muslims to speak with one voice. Spencer appeared in a keffiyeh outside a mosque. Green Party leadership gave interviews to 5Pillars, an Islamist-leaning outlet that has been involved in the circulation of antisemitic and homophobic content. The Green Party pulled LGBT-friendly content from its Muslim-facing literature in the campaign.

Observers of the election found that about 12 percent of ballots were cast by people engaged in “family voting,” with multiple adults present in the same booth. Britain banned the practice in 2023, but its frequency in Groton and Denton may reflect a deep-set patriarchal tendency among local Muslims.

After the victory, Green deputy leader Mothin Ali attended a London rally backing Iran’s regime—the same regime whose rhetoric targets Britain and whose operatives have been linked to terrorist plots on UK soil.

Read it all.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Iran Is Collapsing, but Islamism Is Spreading. Where will the baddies go next? To towns with charming names like Gorton and Denton? https://t.co/kjEf7vZCuL

— Ayaan Hirsi Ali (@Ayaan) March 2, 2026

President Donald Trump said the US would keep up its military offensive against Iran for as long as it takes, outlining for the first time a set of four objectives he hopes to accomplish toward reducing the threat he said is posed by Tehran.

“We projected four to five weeks, but we have capability to go far longer than that,” Trump said at a White House event on Monday about the timeline he foresaw for the campaign. “Whatever the time is, it’s OK. Whatever it takes.”

The president has faced mounting pressure to better define the goals of his extraordinary military intervention on Iran, after days of sending mixed signals about what he wanted to achieve.

Trump said that the effort, which launched on Saturday, aims to eliminate Iran’s missile capabilities, destroy the country’s navy, cut off its path to a nuclear weapon and ensure that the government “cannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside of their borders.”

Notably, the president did not mention regime change as one of the campaign’s goals.

Read it all.

President Trump said the US would keep up its military offensive against Iran for as long as it takes, outlining for the first time a set of four objectives he hopes to accomplish towards reducing the threat posed by Tehran. https://t.co/S3SA3Hxjku

— Bloomberg (@business) March 2, 2026

As the United States and Israel pounded Iran from land and sea for a second day, a defiant Iranian regime unleashed deadly retaliatory strikes across the Middle East on Sunday, amid fears of a wider, protracted
conflagration.

Three U.S. troops were killed in Kuwait, the Pentagon said on Sunday, the first Americans to die in President Trump’s high-stakes war with Iran. And at least nine people were killed in a small Israeli city near Jerusalem. Explosions resounded in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates, killing at least four people, as local air defenses sought to repel Iranian drones.

Read it all.

“U.S. troops killed as blasts jolt Mideast,” The New York Times says on Monday’s front page. “Retaliatory strikes widen war with Iran,” the San Francisco Chronicle says.

Read more of today's newspapers here. https://t.co/LINQxUp88K

— The Week (@TheWeek) March 2, 2026

The joint attack brings war to the country for the second time in eight months and risks a wider regional conflict in one of the most economically sensitive parts of the world.

🚨 Breaking: USS Abraham Lincoln strike group is now attacking Iran's navy pic.twitter.com/CD9rTMWucv

— Dr. Eli David (@DrEliDavid) February 28, 2026

Plainclothes police and security forces, many of them armed, have tried to flood Iran’s remaining open universities in an attempt to crush a fourth day of student protests against the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.

Running battles were reported on some campuses, with videos showing fistfights between the Basji state-backed militia and students at the University of Science and Technology in Tehran. Pick-up trucks with machine-guns were photographed parked outside the University of Tehran, with demonstrations also in Mashhad.

Elsewhere, students found themselves barred from entry if they had been identified as being involved in previous protests and university administrators also announced the closure of in-person classes. Nearly 80% of Iran’s universities are already conducting virtual courses, partly to prevent students being given a chance to gather to demonstrate against the government and its brutal crackdown of the January protests.

Read it all.

Armed police flood Iran’s universities to crush student protests | Iran | The Guardian https://t.co/BfRAgBQwCe

— Michael Smith (@MickWSmith) February 25, 2026

Late in the afternoon of Jan. 8, angry Iranians took to the streets in large numbers nationwide—from Tehran to Isfahan to the religious city of Mashhad and dozens of smaller cities and towns—chanting and spray-painting slogans that called for the fall of the Islamic Republic and “Death to the dictator.” 

This time, the regime forces were ready to play a more lethal role in quelling the protests. Paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the voluntary Basij militia in plainclothes were deployed in large numbers across the country, often armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles. In one instance in west Tehran, security forces were seen with a heavy machine gun mounted on a pickup truck, according to footage verified by Storyful,  which is owned by Journal parent News Corp.

From her campus, Aminian headed out with a group of friends to join a protest. The turning point came around 8:30 p.m. That’s when Iranian authorities shut down the internet across the country and escalated the crackdown, according to witnesses, relatives of victims and human rights groups.

“We are pretty confident that a massacre happened starting late Thursday night throughout the country,” said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran. “It was a complete war zone.”

Read it all.

‘A Massacre Happened’: The 24 Hours That Bloodied Iran https://t.co/apuKUyfYYA

— Souad Mekhennet (@smekhennet) January 15, 2026

The Iranian regime views the protests as a proto-revolution that it must crush completely and immediately. Some Iranians are resisting the regime, in some cases violently, which reinforces the regime’s view that the protests retain the potential to transform into a revolution. The regime will likely succeed in quelling this resistance if it can retain the loyalty of security forces and prevent those who are resisting the regime from acquiring the wherewithal to challenge the regime’s ability and willingness to sustain its crackdown. The regime has abandoned any effort it made in the beginning of this protest movement to distinguish between legitimate economic protests and illegitimate anti-regime protests. Iranian media and officials, including those who expressed sympathy for protesters in the beginning of this protest movement, are categorically describing protesters as “terrorists.”[1] Iranian Justice Minister Amir Hossein Rahimi stated on January 14 that any protester who has participated in protests after January 8—which is when the rate and scope of the protests expanded dramatically—is guilty of taking part in an “internal war.”[2] Rahimi’s statement highlights how the regime has stopped showing any tolerance toward protests, as it did to an extent in the beginning of the protest movement, and views any protest as a serious threat to the regime.

The extent and extremity of the regime’s use of violence to quell the protests further demonstrate that the regime views the protests as a proto-revolution. Reports from eyewitnesses and protesters in Iran describe an unprecedented degree of regime brutality toward protesters. Iranians told BBC Persian on January 11 that the scale of deaths and injuries in the current protest movement is “unprecedented and incomparable” to previous protest waves.[3] Amnesty International reported on January 14 that regime security forces have committed “unlawful killings…on an unprecedented scale.”[4] Western media outlets have reported protester death toll estimates between 2,000 and 20,000.[5] These numbers surpass the approximately 1,500 protesters who were killed in 2019 and approximately 550 protesters who were killed during the 2022-2023 Mahsa Amini movement.[6] A US-based human rights organization also estimated that the regime has arrested over 10,000 individuals in the current wave of protests thus far.[7] The regime previously arrested around 7,000 individuals in the 2019 protests and 20,000 individuals during the Mahsa Amini movement. The regime arrested 20,000 individuals over a roughly three-month period, whereas the regime has arrested 10,000 individuals in the past two and a half weeks.

Read it all.

Latest on Iran: The Iranian regime views the protests as a proto-revolution that it must crush completely and immediately. Some Iranians are resisting the regime, in some cases violently, which reinforces the regime’s view that the protests retain the potential to transform into… pic.twitter.com/gY5Ys6hJbB

— Institute for the Study of War (@TheStudyofWar) January 15, 2026

The last time Iran was convulsed by nationwide protests, in 2022, the Arab world was transfixed. The Islamic Republic had spent decades building a network of powerful allies that came to dominate the region. Many Arabs wondered if the prospect of regime change in Tehran offered a chance to throw off Iran’s yoke in their own countries.

Pan-Arab news outlets, often funded by Gulf monarchies, egged on the protests with sympathetic, round-the-clock coverage. Arab diplomats kept their counsel in public but sounded ebullient in private. At one point Hossein Salami, the commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, accused Saudi-backed media outlets of inciting further unrest and demanded that the kingdom rein in their coverage. “Otherwise you will pay the price,” he warned.

The protests in Iran today arguably pose an even greater threat to the regime than those in 2022—yet the reaction in the Arab world has been surprisingly muted. Evening-news broadcasts this month have been led, routinely, by stories other than Iran. Many officials sound nervous when they comment, if they say anything at all. Two things account for the change in tone: Iran’s diminished status, and the Gulf’s growing fear of chaos.

The Israeli wars that followed the massacre of October 7th 2023 have wrecked Iran’s network of proxies. Hizbullah, its once-powerful ally in Lebanon, has been badly weakened and still faces near-daily Israeli air strikes. Bashar al-Assad’s pro-Iranian regime in Syria is no more. Iran itself is reeling from 12 days of Israeli and American bombardment in June. As for Salami, he no longer makes threats: he was killed by an Israeli air strike at the beginning of that war.

All of this makes the fate of the Islamic Republic seem less urgent.

Read it all.

The protests in Iran today arguably pose an even greater threat to the regime than those in 2022—yet the reaction in the Arab world has been surprisingly muted https://t.co/cQUYYF21oh

— The Economist (@TheEconomist) January 14, 2026

here is a difference between a revolution and a counterrevolution. It is a recurrent mistake of the American media to conflate the two. That is because the success of 1776—the 250th anniversary of which we celebrate this year—predisposes us to sympathize with revolutions. I can think of no better explanation for the naivete of much liberal commentary on subsequent revolutions: France in 1789, Russia in 1917, China in 1949, Cuba in 1959, Nicaragua in 1979, Egypt in 2011 and, most relevant to today, Iran in 1979.

Let it never be forgotten that, in The New York Times on February 16, 1979, the Princeton professor Richard Falk confidently asserted: “The depiction of [the Ayatollah Khomeini] as fanatical, reactionary, and the bearer of crude prejudices seems certainly and happily false. What is also encouraging is that his entourage of close advisers is uniformly composed of moderate, progressive individuals.” Moreover, “the key appointees” in the new revolutionary government had “a notable record of concern for human rights and seem eager to achieve economic development that results in a modern society oriented on satisfying the whole population’s basic needs.”

“Having created a new model of popular revolution based, for the most part, on nonviolent tactics,” Falk gushed, “Iran may yet provide us with a desperately needed model of humane governance for a third‐world country.”

Nope….

Read it all.

The West wants a revolution in Iran. What’s actually happening is a counterrevolution—and history shows those are usually doomed to fail, writes Niall Ferguson. https://t.co/WjZRsgcy5R

— The Free Press (@TheFP) January 13, 2026

President Trump vowed on Saturday to retaliate against the Islamic State after an attack in central Syria killed two U.S. Army soldiers and a civilian U.S. interpreter, the first American casualties in the country since the fall of the dictator Bashar al-Assad last year.

“This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria,” Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social. “There will be very serious retaliation.”

The soldiers were supporting counterterrorism operations against the Islamic State group in Palmyra, a city in central Syria, when they came under fire from a lone gunman, according to American officials. Syrian security forces subsequently killed the gunman, American and Syrian officials said.

Read it all.

3 Americans Killed in ISIS Attack in Syria, Trump Says, Vowing to Retaliatehttps://t.co/HfAjRZka0C

— Hussam Hammoud | حسام (@HussamHamoud) December 14, 2025

The arid steppes of northeastern Syria stretch almost uninterrupted to the Iraqi border, the emptiness broken only by the occasional oil derrick, until the road comes to a sprawling prison camp.

A chain-link fence topped with barbed wire surrounds the vast compound, and supply trucks line the route for more than half a mile outside the camp’s gates. This is Al Hol detention camp, where most detainees are family members — wives, sisters, children — of fighters for the terrorist group Islamic State, or ISIS. More than 8,000 fighters themselves are in prisons nearby.

For years, ISIS ruled large parts of Syria and neighboring Iraq, brutally enforcing its strict interpretation of Islamic law. As Kurdish-led Syrian forces backed by the United States battled to reclaim that land, they detained thousands of ISIS fighters and tens of thousands of their relatives.

U.S. forces entrusted their Syrian Kurdish allies with guarding the ISIS detainees and families. But now, the Pentagon is drawing down its troops in Syria, and there are indications that U.S. officials want Syria’s new government to take responsibility for the prisons and detention camps.

Read it all.

Islamic State Camps Pose a Dangerous Problem for Syria’s Leaders

The government faces a dilemma over what to do with civil-war-era prisons and detention camps that hold thousands of ISIS fighters and tens of thousands of their family members.https://t.co/T2y5KLVeaN

— Aaron Y. Zelin (@azelin) December 10, 2025

O Lord, who didst call thy servant Clement of Alexandria from the errors of ancient philosophy that he might learn and teach the saving Gospel of Christ: Turn thy Church from the conceits of worldly wisdom and, by the Spirit of truth, guide it into all truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

OTD 4 December: feast of St Clement of Alexandria. pic.twitter.com/oa582KRS68

— Caroline Murray (@Prof_hedgehog) December 4, 2025

Israel and Hamas on Thursday edged closer to ending their devastating two-year war, agreeing on the initial terms of a deal that could pave the way to an imminent cease-fire and bringing relief to the families of Israeli hostages and to two million Palestinians in Gaza.

The two sides were preparing for an exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners this weekend after reaching an agreement overnight, the culmination of sustained pressure from President Trump and Arab mediators. Mr. Trump suggested that he would travel to the region over the weekend, and Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said he had invited him to address Israel’s Parliament.

Though details were scarce, and the text of the agreement had not been made public, it promised at least a cease-fire if not a permanent end to a conflict that has set off a humanitarian catastrophe and widespread hunger in Gaza, battered Hamas militarily and left Israel exhausted and isolated internationally. 

Read it all.

Israel-Hamas ceasefire | Israel, Hamas agree to ‘first phase’ of peace plan, hostage-release, Trump says
Follow live updates here: https://t.co/fuAdxyAumN

— The Hindu (@the_hindu) October 9, 2025

mages from the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack and its aftermath are forever seared in the mind of Israel Pochtar. 

Pochtar, a pastor at Congregation Beit Hallel in the city of Ashdod, Israel, recalled the early-morning sirens that jolted him awake and sent him peering through the windows of his apartment on the 30th floor. He watched rocket after rocket fire from Gaza, 23 miles to the south. Smoke billowed from buildings in nearby Ashkelon. 

He turned to social media and saw videos of Hamas terrorists killing Israeli police officers. He thought it was fake news. 

Only after seeing news reports of Hamas brutally murdering more than a dozen elderly Israelis who had gathered for a trip to the Dead Sea did he comprehend the unfolding horror: 1,200 dead and 251 taken hostage, with evidence of rape, torture, and entire families burned alive. 

As he drove one of his sons to a nearby military base to report for duty as part of a massive call-up, he saw fear and confusion in the eyes of soldiers. “No one was smiling, and no one was making jokes,” Pochtar noted. He prayed for his son, said goodbye, and burst into tears. 

Then he began identifying ways his church could serve a fearful and broken population. 

Read it all.

Two years after October 7, churches in Israel and Egypt continue to provide food, aid, and a listening ear to those scarred by the Israel-Hamas war.https://t.co/VfDE4T2Zn1

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) October 7, 2025

Netanyahu returned to power in December 2022 after only a year and a half, blind to the fact that he was taking control of the state during the most precarious period in a nation’s life: its eighth decade.

Let me explain. The first generation of a country is the one that fought. It had no time for existential dilemmas because it was preoccupied with surviving. The second generation was too busy with state-building to entertain such questions.

But the third and fourth generations—my generation—are those for whom the state is a birthright, already built, paved, and functioning. All the profound existential dilemmas that our grandparents tucked away in the attic have come knocking on our national door. A nation’s eighth and ninth decades almost invariably mark the moment when it tears itself apart over the ultimate question: identity.

The United States, in its ninth decade of existence in the 1860s, emerged as a wonderland unlike any other ever seen. The pursuit of happiness swept across the country. Then, Americans found themselves confronting an unsettling question. How, Americans pondered, is it possible that Thomas Jefferson, the author of the words “All men are created equal,” also owns more than 600 black slaves?

The answer: It is not possible. In the United States, two values collided with devastating force: the right to liberty and the right to property. The American Civil War resolved this clash of two values through bloodshed, claiming over 600,000 American lives, including that of the president.

But America was lucky; it survived. Countries do not always survive their identity wars. We all know the Soviet Union’s fate in its eighth decade.

Against this backdrop, Israel’s five elections in four years, ending with Netanyahu’s return to power at the end of 2022, suddenly come into focus: This was the Israeli civil war.

Read it all.

October 7 Was Israel’s Midlife Crisis.

Read an exclusive excerpt from my new book, A Call at 4 AM, in @TheFP.

Link to pre-order the book in the reply.https://t.co/v8M1sLoEZB

— Amit Segal (@AmitSegal) October 7, 2025

If there were a Nobel prize for trying to will things to become reality, Donald Trump would already be a shoo-in. Since September 29th, when he offered his plan for ending the Gaza war, both Israel and Hamas have said they accept the plan while rejecting key elements of it. Arab leaders are also keen to stress that the text Mr Trump presented was very different from the one he discussed with them five days earlier at the UN. Yet the American president has glossed over those differences: for now, he insists that “countries from all over the world” are on board with his proposal.

Envoys from Israel and Hamas will hope to narrow those gaps when they start indirect talks in Egypt on October 6th. Their goal is to agree on at least the first phase of the plan, which calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, the release of the 48 remaining Israeli hostages and 1,950 Palestinian prisoners, and a surge of humanitarian aid for the beleaguered territory. Then they will need to discuss the second half of Mr Trump’s proposal, which lays out a vision for how to govern and secure Gaza after the war.

That is easier said than done, though, and not only because there are differences between Israel and Hamas. There are also disputes between the Palestinians themselves, and the Palestinians and their Arab backers: they agree that the Trump plan cannot be implemented without changes, but they disagree on what those changes should look like.

Read it all.

Diplomats need to find language on disarmament that will satisfy both Israel and Hamas. If their proposal is too credible, Hamas may balk. If it is not credible enough, it risks imperilling other parts of the plan https://t.co/y8sh2wsiDW

— The Economist (@TheEconomist) October 6, 2025

We do not judge people. We affirm God’s grace for all who turn to Him. But love does not mean ignoring sin. Unity cannot exist without truth.

This step by the Church in Wales makes it extremely difficult to find a faithful and lasting resolution to the divisions within the Anglican Communion. While many of us are diligently working to discern a way forward in this painful dilemma, continued actions of this nature hinder reconciliation, deepen the fractures, and risk rendering our efforts fruitless.

We continue to pray for the Church, and for strength to remain faithful to the Gospel of Christ.

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Initially, the war appeared to stabilise Iran’s politics. A wave of patriotism pulled rulers and ruled together after years of polarisation. Calls by Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, for Iranians to rise up fell on deaf ears. But since the ceasefire on June 24th the multiplicity of opinions on how to preserve unity has made the country look more fragmented.

Mr Khamenei’s preferred option is cosmetic. To appeal to a population disenchanted with clerical rule, he is dressing his theocracy in nationalist clothes. During celebrations on July 5th for Ashura, the anniversary of the martyrdom of the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson, Hussein, and the republic’s holiest day, Mr Khamenei ordered a muezzin to drop his incantations and instead sing Ey Iran Iran, a rendition of a patriotic anthem that was popular before the Islamic revolution in 1979 and had since been suppressed. He has played Shia saints down and puffed up Iran’s pre-Islamic past. New billboards in city squares give ancient Persian myths modern themes. Mr Khamenei has also turned a blind eye to a new crop of television shows, including a wildly popular Persian version of “Love Island”, where unmarried couples flirt and make out. In parts of Tehran, the capital, headscarves and long coats for women feel like a relic of the past.

But such concessions are designed to reduce the demand for political change, not herald its coming. Earlier this month Mr Khamenei reappointed his crusty Friday-prayer preacher and his 99-year-old head of the Guardian Council, the latter for the 33rd time. After a few brief post-war appearances, the state broadcaster has removed reformists from its airwaves. Executions are up; a widely expected amnesty for political prisoners looks far off.

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His diminishing power makes the country’s future increasingly uncertain https://t.co/E1nUPGW6G5

— The Economist (@TheEconomist) July 30, 2025

Iran’s deeply buried nuclear enrichment plant at Fordo was badly damaged, and potentially destroyed, by the 12 massive bombs that U.S. Air Force B-2 bombers dropped on it last month, according to a new American intelligence assessment.

Two other nuclear sites targeted in the U.S. attacks were not as badly damaged, but facilities at the sites that would be key to fabricating a nuclear weapon were destroyed and could take years to rebuild, U.S. officials said.

A senior Israeli official said last week that the strikes most likely did not eliminate the stockpile of near-bomb-grade fuel that could be used to produce upward of 10 nuclear weapons. But without the facilities to manufacture a weapon, U.S. officials insist, the fuel would be of little use even if the Iranians can dig it out of the rubble.

The new assessment helps create a clearer picture of what the combined Israeli and U.S. strikes on Iran achieved. The bombings deeply damaged Fordo — considered by the Iranians to be their best-protected and most advanced nuclear enrichment site — probably crippling Iran’s ability to make nuclear fuel for years to come.

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New Assessment Finds Site at Focus of U.S. Strikes in Iran Badly Damaged https://t.co/dr2QDpujFD via @NYTimes

— Ali Vaez (@AliVaez) July 17, 2025

An Update from Jeff and Kristin Jacobs

The Rev. Jeff Jacobs, his wife Kristin and their children are adjusting to a significant transition. On July 7 their family moved from Egypt to Tunisia where Jeff will serve as the chaplain to the newly elected Bishop of North Africa, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Ashley Null. In a note to supporters, Jeff asked for prayer, stating, “This is our first time moving somewhere without someone to ‘catch’ us. We’ll be finding our own house, car, schools, and more while learning another language.” Jeff will serve as chaplain to Bishop Ashley, helping build diocesan structures from the ground up: creating a framework for ministry; coordinating churches in four countries, and establishing training, catechesis, and pastoral practices.

If you’d like to support the Jacobs in this transition, please click here.

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The Latest Edition of the #Anglican Diocese of #SouthCarolina Enewsletter https://t.co/QpzssJYyvh #egypt #Missions #anglican #parishministry #lowcountrylife [Jeff and Kristin Jacobs and family] pic.twitter.com/2WXCp76uQK

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) July 15, 2025

The Institute for Science and International Security assessed that US and Israeli strikes on Iran have “effectively destroyed” Iran’s enrichment program. The Institute said it will take a “long time” for Iran to restore its enrichment capabilities to pre-strike levels. This assessment is based on the destruction Iran suffered at Natanz nuclear facility, Fordow nuclear facility, Esfahan Nuclear Technology Center and the elimination of many nuclear scientists

The six entry point craters for the US bunker-buster bombs at Fordow were above two weak points, and the bombs would have detonated within the facility. The Institute for Science and International Security assesses that the bomb blast would have been channeled by the centrifuge cascade hall’s side walls, which would have destroyed all of the installed centrifuges there. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) battle damage assessments indicate that Israeli strikes also likely damaged or destroyed several thousand centrifuges at Natanz.[20]

Israel and the United States conducted airstrikes targeting the Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant above ground and Fuel Enrichment Plant underground at Natanz, respectively. The IAEA added that it was possible that uranium isotopes may have been dispersed within the facility (though not outside), which would make it difficult to access. This means it may be some time before even the Iranians can determine the true extent of the damage.

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NEW Release: Post-Attack Assessment of the First 12 Days of Israeli Strikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities

By @DAVIDHALBRIGHT1 and @SFnuclear

This report covers our damage assessment of several nuclear sites, including Natanz, Fordow, and Esfahan, that have been struck since…

— Inst for Science (@TheGoodISIS) June 24, 2025