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  • Wall Street guru struck speechless by Trump insider stock trades

    Wall Street guru struck speechless by Trump insider stock trades

    On a live Monday broadcast of CNBC’s Squawk on the Street, one of Wall Street’s most high-profile media personalities, Jim Cramer, was left visibly stunned and speechless for 10 full seconds when a co-host brought up the staggering wave of stock trading executed by former President and current U.S. President Donald Trump in the first quarter of 2026. After Cramer’s prolonged incoherent mumbling left viewers confused, fellow co-host David Faber stepped in to clarify that the program was not experiencing any technical glitches — Cramer, it turned out, had simply been rendered speechless by the revelation of Trump’s controversial trading activity.

    The scope of Trump’s trading first came to light last week, when ethics disclosures published by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics confirmed that Trump completed more than 3,700 separate stock transactions between January and March 2026. Among these trades, more than 30 individual purchases each exceeded $1 million in value. The Financial Times first highlighted a striking connection: many of the top stocks Trump traded are owned by major corporations whose chief executives accompanied Trump on his official diplomatic trip to China just one week before the disclosures were released, including industry giants Tesla, Nvidia, Apple, Meta, Visa, Citi, Boeing, Qualcomm, and GE Aerospace.

    Independent journalists and ethics watchdogs have since uncovered multiple clear patterns that raise urgent red flags for potential illegal insider trading. In a detailed analysis published Monday, reporter Judd Legum documented multiple instances where Trump purchased shares in a company either immediately before or on the exact same day that he publicly praised the firm to move its share price. For example, Trump bought tens of thousands of dollars in stock of biotech manufacturer Thermo Fisher Scientific on the exact same day he toured one of the company’s production facilities. He acquired hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of Apple shares the same day he delivered a public speech lauding the firm as “a great company” and praising then-CEO Tim Cook. Just one day after purchasing a large stake in Micron Technology, Trump called the company “one of the hottest companies” during a national Fox News interview. Nine days after acquiring millions of dollars in Dell stock, Trump urged a crowd of supporters at a Georgia rally to “go out and buy a Dell computer.”

    Legum’s analysis emphasized that Trump has systematically dismantled every remaining ethical guardrail designed to prevent sitting U.S. presidents from using their public office for personal financial gain. Unlike previous presidents who have placed their assets in qualified blind trusts to remove themselves from active investment decision-making, Trump transferred his holdings to a trust controlled directly by his son, Donald Trump Jr., after returning to the White House. This structure leaves no legal or practical barriers to Trump directing trading activity based on non-public information he accesses as president.

    Investigative journalist Ryan Grim argued that Cramer’s stunned on-air reaction was entirely understandable, noting that many of the companies whose stock Trump traded have already directly profited from Trump’s controversial foreign policy decisions, including the ongoing military conflict with Iran that the Trump administration initiated. “Cramer here is having what should be the normal reaction to Trump actively insider trading on his own decisions,” Grim noted. “Just sputtering speechlessness.”

    New York Representative Dan Goldman, a Democrat, has already sounded the alarm over the trading activity, calling it “blatant and criminal insider trading.” In a social media post, Goldman warned all parties involved that records of the trades will eventually be subject to congressional investigation, noting that congressional Republicans have signaled they will ignore the scandal. “Anyone involved in these trades should preserve their records for my investigation in January 2027,” Goldman added.

    The stock trading scandal is not the only ethics controversy engulfing the Trump administration this week. On the same day Cramer’s viral on-air reaction made headlines, 93 House Democrats filed an official legal challenge to block a $1.77 billion taxpayer-funded settlement between the Trump administration and the Internal Revenue Service that critics say is a blatant grift to create a slush fund for Trump’s political allies.

    The settlement grew out of a $10 billion lawsuit Trump filed against the IRS after his personal tax returns were leaked during the 2024 campaign. As part of a deal to dismiss the lawsuit, the Trump administration created what it calls an “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” which the acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche has framed as a mechanism to compensate what the administration calls “victims of lawfare” allegedly carried out by the Department of Justice during the prior Biden administration.

    But Democrats and ethics watchdogs have condemned the deal as an unprecedented abuse of power, noting that Trump is currently the head of the executive branch that oversees the IRS — meaning he is effectively both the plaintiff and the defendant in the lawsuit he arranged to “settle.” “No president can concoct a fake case for $10 billion in damages against the government so he can be plaintiff and defendant and then ‘settle’ his bogus case against himself as a judge,” said Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, calling the deal “pure fraud and highway robbery.” Raskin added that the fund is nothing more than a racket to divert taxpayer money to Trump’s most loyal supporters, including those convicted of violent felonies during the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol insurrection.

    The amicus brief filed by Democrats with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, where the case is being heard by Judge Kathleen Williams, seeks to have the entire settlement thrown out. The filing notes that the fund could be used to compensate roughly 1,600 individuals already charged or convicted of crimes connected to the Capitol attack, including seditious conspiracy, assault on law enforcement, and other violent felonies.

    Richard Neal, Ranking Member of the House Ways and Means Committee, called the entire scheme “another self-enrichment scheme on the backs of hard-working taxpayers.” “Reporting detailing Trump’s interest in a billion-dollar slush fund for the J6 criminals and permanent immunity from any further IRS scrutiny only deepens the stench of corruption,” Neal added. Lawyers for the Democrats, Matt Platkin and Norm Eisen, noted that “it’s against the law for the president to in effect sue himself — and then settle for a huge sum. The court has the power to put a stop to these shenanigans and should do so.”

    This latest controversy follows a pattern of ethics violations from Trump since his return to the White House, where he issued blanket pardons to hundreds of January 6 rioters on his first day in office. According to the nonpartisan watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, dozens of those pardoned rioters have since been charged or convicted of additional serious crimes, including child sex offenses, rape, grand theft, burglary, illegal weapons possession, and threats against public officials.

    Progressive advocacy groups and legal ethics experts have joined Democrats in condemning both the stock trading scandal and the IRS settlement. “Donald Trump and his compromised Department of Justice have created a slush fund to make payouts to Trump supporters and cronies,” said Lisa Gilbert and Robert Weissman, co-presidents of the public interest group Public Citizen. “This scheme amounts to the creation of a January 6 payment fund.”

    Brett Edkins, managing director of policy and public affairs at the advocacy group Stand Up America, argued that the scandal lays bare the true nature of the Trump administration’s priorities at a time when many U.S. households are struggling with economic instability. “While Americans struggle with rising costs fueled by his economic mismanagement and war with Iran, Donald Trump is teaching a masterclass in grift,” Edkins said. “He’s negotiated with himself to create a $1.7 billion tax-dollar slush fund with no oversight, no transparency, and no accountability. In simple terms, Trump is stealing $1.7 billion in taxpayer dollars to hand out to himself, his cronies, his donors, or anyone he deems sufficiently loyal—including supporters who were convicted by juries of assaulting police officers on January 6, 2021. This is truly unprecedented corruption, and American taxpayers will foot the bill.”

  • British Steel crisis derails China’s tariff-bypass strategy

    British Steel crisis derails China’s tariff-bypass strategy

    A cross-border industrial acquisition that began as a strategic expansion move has erupted into a full-blown political dispute between China and the United Kingdom, after the British government tabled a formal nationalization bill to take permanent public control of the formerly Chinese-owned British Steel, based in eastern England.

    The story traces back to 2020, when Hebei-based private Chinese steel manufacturer Jingye Group stepped in to acquire the insolvent British steelmaker for £70 million (approximately $91 million). At the time, the deal was framed as a win-win: it rescued a failing historic British industrial asset, saved thousands of local jobs, and gave Jingye a much-needed production foothold in Europe. A core strategic motivation for the acquisition was to bypass steep 25% U.S. tariffs on Chinese steel that the Trump administration first imposed in 2018 under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, citing national security grounds.

    Despite injecting a total of £1.2 billion into British Steel over the following years, Jingye failed to reverse the company’s persistent annual losses, which were estimated to hit roughly £250 million per year. Industry analysts cite two key structural headwinds: the UK’s sky-high industrial energy costs, and persistent market pressure from the flood of low-cost Chinese steel already flowing into European markets. The final blow came in March 2025, when the Trump administration expanded its tariff regime to impose 25% levies on all global steel and aluminum imports — including those from the UK — after detecting that Chinese steel producers were using foreign acquisitions to evade U.S. trade barriers.

    Shortly after the new tariffs took effect, Jingye announced that its flagship Scunthorpe steelworks was losing £700,000 per day and was no longer financially viable. The firm rejected a proposed £500 million UK government rescue package, prompting Parliament to rush through emergency legislation on April 12 that allowed the government to seize temporary control of the plant’s blast furnaces to prevent an immediate shutdown and protect 2,700 local jobs. On May 14, the government took the next step by introducing the formal Steel Industry (Nationalization) Bill, which grants ministers the authority to nationalize steel assets like British Steel if they meet a public interest test. The bill held its first parliamentary reading the same day, establishing a legal pathway for permanent public ownership when deemed necessary.

    “Revitalizing our steel sector is a top priority for this country, and this is an important first step to safeguard our steelmaking capability,” said UK Industry Minister Chris McDonald. “It will allow us to secure the future of British Steel and explore possible options to modernize the industry.” McDonald added that the fast tracking of the bill through Parliament demonstrates the current government’s unwavering commitment to protecting Britain’s domestic steel production capacity.

    The nationalization plan has drawn sharp pushback from China. “The British government should uphold fairness, impartiality and non-discrimination, act cautiously in its decisions, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises,” a spokesperson for China’s Ministry of Commerce said in an official statement. The spokesperson noted that the UK government has already controlled British Steel for more than a year since taking over from Jingye, and any permanent action must fully account for the substantial investment the Chinese firm has made in the UK’s steel industry, as well as its broader contributions to the British economy and local communities. Beijing has called on London to respect both Jingye’s position and fundamental market principles to negotiate “a fair, just solution acceptable to both sides,” and warned that China will take all necessary firm measures to protect the legal rights of Chinese firms.

    The dispute has also sparked debate among industry analysts in China about the risks of Chinese corporate expansion in strategic Western sectors. A Jiangxi-based industrial columnist, writing under the pen name Ganjiang Top List, noted that the British acquisition fit into a broader strategy Chinese steel firms adopted after 2018 to build “non-dollar channels” for global exports, positioning European steel assets as natural springboards for Chinese industrial chains going global, given the region’s advanced manufacturing expertise and lack of domestic capital for industrial upgrades. “British Steel was not acquired by Jingye for production alone, but for connection,” he explained, noting the acquisition created a local export hub for Chinese parts and engineering services serving Europe’s automotive, rail, and energy equipment sectors. While Jingye attempted to cut costs by transferring its digital production management platform to British Steel, those efforts ultimately could not overcome the sector’s headwinds. The columnist argued that Chinese firms must adjust their overseas expansion strategies: instead of pursuing controlling stakes in strategically sensitive key sectors, they should rely on technical service partnerships, short-term leasing, and non-controlling cooperation models to maintain market access while reducing political exposure. He added that beyond the direct capital loss, the failed acquisition has damaged the broader reputation of Chinese firms investing in Western markets.

    To understand the significance of British Steel to British national identity, one must look back at its long and turbulent history. As the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, Britain built its 19th-century global empire on the back of its iron and steel industry, which powered the construction of railways, ships, bridges, machinery and military hardware, making the sector a core symbol of British industrial power. By the 1980s and 1990s, China’s rapid industrial expansion began to challenge Britain’s position, and after China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, it pulled far ahead to become the world’s largest steel producer. Decades of rapid domestic infrastructure and manufacturing growth left China with massive chronic overcapacity, flooding global markets with low-cost steel that added intense pressure to already struggling British producers, which already grappled with high labor costs, expensive energy, aging production facilities, and repeated cycles of nationalization and privatization.

    British Steel itself was originally founded as a nationalized entity in 1967, when the UK government consolidated the country’s major steel producers into public ownership. It grew to become one of Europe’s largest steelmakers, but by the late 20th century it was struggling with falling demand, labor unrest, aging infrastructure and rising foreign competition. It was privatized in 1988, changed hands multiple times, and collapsed into insolvency in 2019 before Jingye’s rescue a year later. Even under Chinese ownership, losses continued: the firm posted a £227 million post-tax loss in 2023, down from £367 million in 2022, and losses deepened through 2024.

    The nationalization move has been supported by hardline British political figures, who have raised suspicions about Chinese influence in the strategically critical sector. Gary Smith, general secretary of the UK’s GMB trade union, raised concerns last April about what he called “industrial vandalism” at the site, while senior Conservative Party figure Iain Duncan Smith has openly accused Beijing of inappropriate interference. Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds has gone as far as to argue that Chinese firms should be entirely excluded from “very sensitive” UK industries.

    In response, the Chinese Embassy in the UK has pushed back against what it calls the politicization of a purely commercial transaction. “At a time when the United States is using tariffs against countries including Britain and pursuing unilateralist and protectionist trade bullying, some British politicians are attacking China’s government and Chinese companies instead of criticizing Washington,” the embassy’s spokesperson said. “What exactly are they trying to achieve?” The spokesperson emphasized that British Steel was already insolvent and facing years of losses before Jingye’s 2020 acquisition, and that the Chinese firm’s investment kept the plant operational and protected thousands of British jobs. “Any words or actions that politicize commercial issues and engage in malicious hype will damage Chinese enterprises’ confidence in investing in the UK and harm China-UK economic and trade cooperation,” the spokesperson warned.

    A major sticking point in ongoing tensions is the question of compensation. Earlier this year, reports indicate Jingye is seeking roughly £1 billion in compensation from the UK government, matching its claimed £1.2 billion total investment since 2020. British local media, however, reports that the UK government has proposed a settlement valued at less than £100 million. The scale of Jingye’s investment itself is also disputed: public filings show that as of 2023, Jingye and its affiliates had provided £735.7 million in loans to British Steel, and charged tens of millions of pounds in interest on those loans. A Jingye spokesperson has defended the £1.2 billion figure, explaining that it includes both equity investment and low- or zero-interest loans issued to support ongoing operations.

    One Chinese industrial columnist based in Henan has argued that the UK’s move risks long-term damage to bilateral trade for short-term domestic political gain, noting that seizing foreign assets via legislation will erode Britain’s reputation as a safe destination for foreign direct investment. She warned that “Today’s China is not the China of 1840,” referencing the First Opium War when Britain defeated Qing China and forced it to pay heavy reparations, adding that modern Chinese firms hold strong legal, financial and moral leverage in the dispute.

  • Pakistan deployed 8,000 troops, a Chinese air defence system and warplanes to Saudi Arabia: Report

    Pakistan deployed 8,000 troops, a Chinese air defence system and warplanes to Saudi Arabia: Report

    In a significant reinforcement of its long-standing security alliance with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan has deployed 8,000 troops, a full fighter jet squadron, and a advanced Chinese-built air defense system to the Gulf nation, according to a exclusive Reuters report published on Monday. This incremental buildup of Pakistani military personnel and hardware in the kingdom began in early April, marking one of the most tangible commitments to the bilateral mutual defense accord signed just months prior.

  • US: At least three dead in attack at San Diego mosque

    US: At least three dead in attack at San Diego mosque

    On a Monday afternoon in Southern California, emergency dispatchers flooded with calls of an active shooter at the Islamic Centre of San Diego triggered a massive law enforcement response, leaving three people dead – including an on-site security guard – and sending shockwaves through the local Muslim community. Dozens of patrol cars and emergency vehicles descended on the mosque complex, which is formally recognized as the largest Muslim place of worship across San Diego County, according to the institution’s official website.

    Local officials quickly confirmed the unfolding situation via social media. “I am aware of the active shooter situation at the Islamic Center of San Diego,” Todd Gloria, mayor of San Diego, posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, adding that first responders had already deployed to the site to secure the area and safeguard local residents.

    Within hours of the initial response, San Diego Police Chief confirmed during a formal press briefing that two teen suspects were located dead inside a vehicle parked just a few blocks from the mosque. The chief noted that preliminary evidence indicates both suspects died from self-inflicted gunshot wounds, and that law enforcement is officially treating the attack as a bias-driven hate crime. Shortly after clearing the scene, the San Diego Police Department announced the active threat had been fully neutralized, with no further danger to community members remaining in the area.

    California Governor Gavin Newsom received full briefings on the developing incident from state and local law enforcement, according to his press office. “We are grateful to the first responders on the scene working to protect the community and urge everyone to follow guidance from local authorities,” the governor’s office shared in a post on X.

    Federal law enforcement resources have also been mobilized to support the investigation: CNN confirmed Monday that the FBI is assisting local authorities with the probe into the deadly attack.

    This shooting comes amid a documented sharp upward trend in anti-Muslim violence across the United States. A report released last month by the Muslim Public Affairs Committee (MPAC) revealed that Islamophobic attacks across the country surged to a 15-month high in April of this year. The organization linked this surge in targeted violence to shifting U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, specifically pointing to the Trump administration’s military strike on Iran that began in late February. Khuram Zaman, founding director of the Center for Security, Technology and Policy at MPAC, previously told Middle East Eye that the strike marked a clear turning point in hate crime statistics: “The one factor we can identify in March is that at the end of February, the war in Iran started, and that is what we think is the delineation between what we saw before in 2025 versus what we’re seeing here.”

  • Trump says Gulf leaders asked him to ‘hold off’ on resuming Iran war

    Trump says Gulf leaders asked him to ‘hold off’ on resuming Iran war

    In a sudden announcement that has reshaped the trajectory of escalating tensions across the Persian Gulf, former US President Donald Trump revealed on Monday that Washington has scrapped plans to launch a full, large-scale military offensive against Iran, set to begin Tuesday. The decision came following a formal request from the top leaders of three key Gulf Arab allies to delay the attack amid ongoing diplomatic negotiations.

    Trump made the announcement via his TruthSocial platform, stating that the Emir of Qatar Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, and United Arab Emirates President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan all urged the US to hold off on its planned military strike. The leaders argued that serious diplomatic talks were already underway, and their assessment as close US allies was that a mutually acceptable negotiated agreement could be reached, according to Trump’s post.

    The outgoing president added that any prospective final deal would be very favorable to US interests, with one critical non-negotiable provision: Iran will permanently be barred from developing nuclear weapons. Trump emphasized that his deep respect for the three Gulf leaders guided his choice to accommodate their request, but made clear that the pause on military action is not permanent. He warned that US military forces remain fully postured to launch the full-scale large-scale assault against Iran at a moment’s notice if a viable, acceptable agreement fails to materialize through negotiations.

    This latest development comes on the heels of nearly two months of open conflict across the region, triggered by a joint US-Israeli strike on Iran on February 28. Iran retaliated immediately, launching thousands of missiles and drones targeting Gulf Arab states, with the UAE bearing the brunt of the attack after normalizing relations with Israel in 2020 under the Abraham Accords. Almost 3,000 Iranian projectiles struck UAE territory, according to regional reports.

    In mid-April, Pakistan brokered a fragile ceasefire that has paused large-scale open fighting, though low-level tensions and limited military action have continued. On Friday, Bloomberg reported that the UAE had recently attempted to rally Saudi Arabia and Qatar to back a coordinated joint military offensive against Iran in response to Tehran’s attacks, but the bid ultimately failed.

    Shortly after the February 28 US-Israeli strike, Mohamed bin Zayed held a series of urgent calls with fellow Gulf leaders to push for the coordinated military response. But Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and other Gulf leaders rejected the proposal, sources confirmed. Despite the rebuff of the joint offensive plan, both Saudi Arabia and the UAE have launched independent retaliatory strikes against Iranian targets, recent reporting confirms.

    The Wall Street Journal reported that the UAE targeted key Iranian energy infrastructure, carrying out a strike on Iran’s Lavan Island, a major Persian Gulf oil export hub, in early April around the time the ceasefire was announced. Saudi Arabia, by contrast, carried out limited, measured retaliatory strikes before quickly shifting its focus to supporting Pakistan’s mediation efforts, regional analysts note.

    Last week, the Financial Times reported that Saudi Arabia has also circulated a proposal for a region-wide non-aggression pact between Iran and other Middle Eastern states, modeled on the 1970s Helsinki Accords that de-escalated Cold War tensions in Europe. The Saudi initiative has already earned backing from major European capitals and EU institutions, though it remains unclear whether the US and Israel will support the proposed framework.

    Parallel to shifting regional diplomatic efforts, the conflict has drawn Israel and the UAE even closer strategically. Middle East Eye reported on Monday that the two countries have launched a joint defense acquisition fund to jointly purchase and develop next-generation weapons systems, deepening their security cooperation amid rising regional tensions.

  • AFL 2026: Hawthorn star Will Day will make his long-awaited return this weekend

    AFL 2026: Hawthorn star Will Day will make his long-awaited return this weekend

    After months of sidelined frustration and a years-long streak of cruel injury setbacks, the wait for Hawthorn Football Club and its star Will Day is finally drawing to a close. The talented 24-year-old is set to make his first competitive appearance of 2026 this Friday, stepping onto the field for the Box Hill Hawks in the Victorian Football League (VFL) as part of a carefully structured comeback plan, putting him in line for a potential return to the top-tier AFL squad as early as next week.

    Day’s path back to competitive football has been marked by repeated heartbreak. The young star has not seen a single minute of senior action in 2026, after damaging his shoulder during the club’s pre-season training camp. This latest injury blow follows a 2025 campaign cut short by a persistent foot injury, which itself came after a collarbone issue ended his 2024 season prematurely. Three straight years of season-interrupting injuries have kept one of the club’s most exciting prospects off the field far more than he has been on it, leaving fans hungry for his return.

    Hawthorn head coach Sam Mitchell confirmed the comeback news in an upbeat briefing this week, noting that Day has passed every fitness benchmark after two full weeks of full training with the senior squad. “He’ll play this week, he’ll play some limited minutes on Friday night with Box Hill,” Mitchell said. “It’s pretty exciting, pretty exciting for Will and I think for all of us. He’s obviously a very high-profile player to be getting back and playing some VFL time.”

    To protect Day from re-injury as he regains match sharpness, the club will manage his minutes very carefully in Friday’s outing. Mitchell outlined that the 24-year-old will start on the bench for each quarter to ease him back into the physical intensity of competitive play, and made clear that Day is not yet expected to be ready for full AFL-level action this weekend. “He certainly won’t be ready for AFL footy at this stage,” Mitchell added.

    The coach did, however, hint that Day could be recalled to the senior side much faster than most injured players, thanks to the nature of his recovery. Unlike lower-body injuries that force athletes to spend weeks building back cardiovascular fitness, a shoulder injury allowed Day to maintain his conditioning throughout his recovery. “He’s obviously coming back from a shoulder which means he’s fitter, you can get a lot more physical work in, your physical profile, they can work pretty hard. So he’s going to be ready for AFL footy at a high level straight away. Sometimes when you get back from a foot or a lower leg injury, it’s hard to get the fitness base needed,” Mitchell explained.

    Day’s potential comeback comes at a key juncture for Hawthorn, who are currently in the middle of their fixture run in Tasmania, with a match against Adelaide kicking off in Launceston this Thursday night, one of the club’s final seven scheduled games at the Apple Isle. Fans have long remembered Day’s standout performance in last year’s opening round, where he led the Hawks to a victory over Sydney at the Sydney Cricket Ground, a display that cemented his status as one of the club’s most promising young talents.

    Mitchell said the club will not push Day to replicate that electric form straight away, but he is confident the young star will be able to contribute from his first minutes back on the field. The timeline for his senior return will depend on how Day pulls up after Friday’s VFL outing, with assessments of his movement, fitness and confidence set to dictate next steps. “To be determined, we’ll see how he goes this week, see how his movement is, how his confidence is,” Mitchell said. “When he gets back, stay back. That’s the aim, it could be as early as next week or it could be longer than that.”

    For long-suffering Hawthorn fans who have followed Day’s injury battle over the past three seasons, Friday’s limited appearance will mark a small but incredibly exciting step forward for one of the club’s brightest stars.

  • IEA chief: Only weeks of oil inventories left thanks to Iran war

    IEA chief: Only weeks of oil inventories left thanks to Iran war

    As the ongoing crisis in the Strait of Hormuz—sparked by the United States’ conflict with Iran—shows no sign of de-escalation, top energy and economic officials are sounding the alarm over imminent threats to global energy security, spiraling inflation, and a potential worldwide recession.

    Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of this week’s G7 summit in Paris on Monday, International Energy Agency (IEA) Executive Director Fatih Birol warned that global oil reserves are dwindling at a dangerous pace, with only weeks of strategic and commercial inventories remaining to offset the current supply disruption. Birol noted that oil stockpiles are “declining rapidly,” and highlighted a critical misalignment between physical and financial energy markets: futures prices have not yet adjusted to reflect the impending supply crunch, leaving markets underprepared for sudden volatility.

    The supply disruption extends far beyond oil, Birol added, with fertilizer shortages—also rooted in the conflict—set to drive a fresh wave of food price hikes that will push global inflation even higher. “That might give a big push to inflation numbers,” he warned.

    His warnings echo a recent analysis from the *Financial Times*, which reported Sunday that global energy markets are nearing a critical “tipping point” that could trigger another sudden price surge, tipping the already fragile global economy into recession. Paul Diggle, chief economist at asset management firm Aberdeen, told the outlet his team is modeling the economic fallout of oil prices spiking to $180 per barrel—a scenario that would ignite a full-blown global inflation crisis. “We are taking that outcome very seriously,” Diggle said. “We are living on borrowed time.”

    The current standoff stems from Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a critical chokepoint through which roughly 20% of global oil supplies pass, implemented in retaliation for US-Israeli military strikes on the country. A temporary ceasefire announced between Washington and Tehran last month briefly pulled oil prices lower, but the strait has remained closed throughout the truce, and tensions are now rapidly escalating as President Donald Trump has threatened to resume offensive operations if no deal to reopen the waterway is reached quickly.

    In a Sunday post on his Truth Social platform, Trump issued a stark new threat to Iran, promising the country would be completely destroyed if it did not meet his demands. “For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them,” Trump wrote. “TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!”

    Last week, Trump rejected Iran’s latest peace proposal. Tehran has offered major concessions on uranium enrichment, but has demanded that broader nuclear negotiations be delayed until after a peace deal is reached and the Strait of Hormuz is reopened. Since the start of the conflict, Trump has demanded Iran fully dismantle both its missile program and its nuclear activities— which Iran insists are entirely peaceful—and cut all diplomatic and military ties to its regional allies. In a report Sunday, Iran’s state-owned Mehr News Agency argued that Washington has offered “no tangible concessions” in return for Iran’s proposed compromises, leaving negotiations deadlocked. “The United States wants to obtain concessions that it failed to obtain during the war, which will lead to an impasse in the negotiations,” the outlet noted.

    Speaking to Fox News during a visit to Beijing over the weekend, Trump defended his rejection of the proposal, claiming “the Iranians are crazy, and you know what? Because of that, they cannot have a nuclear weapon.” He added that he finds it unacceptable to delay nuclear talks until after a peace deal is finalized.

    Multiple reports confirm Trump spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday about resuming offensive strikes on Iran, a move that would end the month-long ceasefire. Security analysts say the only path to a diplomatic breakthrough requires Washington to compromise on Tehran’s core priorities. “Iran’s priorities remain consistent: ending what it views as economic siege conditions, reopening maritime access and reducing pressure in the Gulf, negotiating an end to the broader conflict, and only afterward addressing the nuclear issue,” explained Danny Citrinowicz, a senior researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies. “At the present moment, it is difficult to see the Iranian leadership agreeing to any framework that does not meaningfully engage with those core demands.”

    Iranian officials have pushed back hard against Trump’s latest threats, which come after he previously declared in April that he would destroy Iran’s entire entire civilization “never to be brought back again,” and recently posted an image of himself on a military ship with the caption “It was the calm before the storm.” Abolfazl Shakarchi, a spokesperson for Iran’s armed forces, told Mehr that any new aggression to compensate for the US’s failure in the conflict will only result in harsher retaliation. “Repeating any folly to compensate for America’s disgrace in the Third Imposed War against Iran will result in nothing but receiving more crushing and severe blows,” he said.

    Almigdad Alruhaid, a correspondent for Al Jazeera reporting from Tehran, noted that Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric has only galvanized Iranian public defiance, even as observers acknowledge the window for diplomatic resolution is rapidly closing. “The kind of language displayed by Trump on Sunday is not acceptable here in Tehran. They are projecting defiance rather than [giving] an immediate response to this kind of rhetoric,” Alruhaid said. “Behind all of this rhetoric, there is awareness that the diplomatic window right now is narrowing.”

    Not all US voices are pushing for escalation. Senior Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has publicly urged Trump to follow through on his threats to bomb Iran’s energy infrastructure, but foreign policy experts warn such a move would trigger catastrophic global consequences. Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, explained why Trump has so far refrained from launching such strikes: “Tehran would retaliate and take out the energy infrastructure in the [Gulf Cooperation Council] states. This would lead to a far worse oil crisis—one rooted in production problems, not just a bottleneck in the Persian Gulf. The global economy would be thrown into a deep recession. Fuel shortages would lead to food shortages worldwide. Trump’s presidency would be destroyed,” Parsi said. “None of this matters to Lindsey. He’ll burn the entire planet as long as he gets his war. Trump’s biggest mistake has been to listen to Lindsey and his allies.”

  • As bee population collapses, US apiarists fear research cuts

    As bee population collapses, US apiarists fear research cuts

    Nestled in a lot behind an abandoned gas station at the foot of Appalachia’s rolling mountains in West Virginia, a dozen apiarists gather around veteran commercial beekeeper Roy Funkhouser, the air thick with the low buzz of thousands of honeybees. What began as a regular monthly meeting for the group — a mix of casual hobbyists and full-time commercial operators — has shifted from a skill-sharing workshop to a forum for growing anxiety: as U.S. bee populations collapse to historic levels, a looming federal funding cut threatens to shutter the nation’s oldest bee research lab, a 100-year-old institution that has led global efforts to combat the threats facing honeybees.

    For Funkhouser, the crisis is not an abstract policy debate — it is a devastating collapse of the livelihood he has built over decades. Where he once tended roughly 1,200 hives, fewer than 200 remain active this year. “It’s a real struggle,” he told Agence France-Presse. “The parasites that we’ve got now, the mites and everything — more viruses and more pesticide exposures, more chemical exposures — everything is just more of a struggle today than what it was in the past.”

    Funkhouser’s experience is far from unique. The latest data from Apiary Inspectors of America shows that U.S. beekeepers lost more than half of all their managed colonies in the 12-month period ending April 2025, marking the worst annual loss rate since the organization began tracking colony health decades ago.

    At the top of the list of threats facing colonies is *Varroa destructor*, a tiny 1.5-millimeter parasitic mite that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recognizes as the single most damaging honeybee pest in the country, inflicting higher economic damage than all other apicultural diseases combined. The crab-like parasites feed on honeybee tissue and fat stores, and spread a debilitating, wing-deforming virus that can wipe out entire colonies in months. Beyond threatening apiculture, the mites put critical agricultural pollination at risk: commercial beekeepers like Funkhouser truck their colonies across the country to pollinate high-value crops, from California’s vast almond orchards to fruit farms across the Midwest. Without sufficient healthy bee populations, crop yields drop sharply, threatening food supplies and raising prices for consumers.

    For years, Funkhouser and his fellow beekeepers have turned to researchers at the USDA’s Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC) — home to the nation’s oldest bee lab — for evidence-based guidance to fight the mite crisis. Zac Lamas, one of the lead entomologists at the BARC bee lab, has worked directly with West Virginia beekeepers to sample colonies, test for genetic markers of disease and pesticide exposure, and develop tailored mitigation strategies.

    “It’s not that we’re working with one beekeeper,” Lamas explained during a field training session with beekeepers. “We might be working with several million dollars’ worth of colonies, or several million dollars’ worth of pollination services that won’t exist because these colonies are at risk.”

    But that support is now at risk of disappearing entirely. As part of a cost-cutting plan driven by congressional funding cuts that reduced USDA agricultural research budgets by more than $32 million in key priority areas, the agency is moving forward with plans to close the entire BARC facility. While some research programs will be redistributed to other federal facilities across the country, the fate of the iconic bee lab remains unclear, and the USDA has not responded to questions about where or if bee research operations will be reestablished.

    Lamas, who has already accepted a new position at a local university after facing layoff from the lab, argues that the closure is a short-sighted decision that undermines decades of progress. The entire bee lab program costs just $3.2 million annually, he says, a tiny fraction of the $600 million in annual economic losses that bee colony collapse currently inflicts on U.S. agriculture. “The idea that we’re redundant and expensive isn’t a good way to generalize the value of this lab or the cost of this lab,” he noted.

    Beyond the direct funding gap, Lamas warns that breaking up the lab will erase irreplaceable institutional knowledge. For a century, BARC has assembled a team of specialists with overlapping skills focused entirely on protecting bee health and supporting national food security. “When we have a new problem, multiple people with complementary skills can work on it quickly,” he said. That collaborative capacity will be lost if the team is scattered, he added.

    For beekeepers already grappling with record losses, the impending closure comes as a devastating blow. Just as researchers are beginning to untangle the complex mix of parasites, viruses, and environmental stressors driving colony collapse, the cut threatens to halt progress. “We’ve got results from a lot of our testing and figured out a lot of the things that are going wrong,” Funkhouser said. “The unfortunate thing is, it seems like when you figure out one thing the next year, it’s something else. Without the lab, we’ll be flying blind.”

  • Three killed in suspected hate crime at San Diego mosque

    Three killed in suspected hate crime at San Diego mosque

    On a Monday morning in San Diego, California, a brutal shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego left three people dead, in what federal authorities are investigating as a targeted hate crime. The two attackers, a 17-year-old and an 18-year-old, died from self-inflicted gunshot wounds shortly after the assault, law enforcement officials confirmed.

    The tragic sequence of events unfolded nearly two hours before the mosque attack, when the mother of one of the teens placed an emergency call to local police. She reported that her son had fled home, taken multiple of her firearms and her car, and left behind a handwritten note filled with generalized hate rhetoric. She added that her son was accompanied by another young person, and both were wearing full camouflage clothing. Initially dispatched to follow up on a report of a potentially suicidal runaway, investigators quickly noted the teen’s behavior did not align with the profile of a person in acute suicidal crisis, and began searching local sites including the high school where one of the suspects was enrolled and a shopping mall where the vehicle had last been spotted.

    At 11:43 a.m. local time, as responding officers were still interviewing the suspect’s mother just blocks from the Islamic Center, dispatch received a new call reporting an active shooting at the mosque. Arriving officers found three fatally shot victims lying outside the building’s entrance. Among the deceased was an on-site security guard who law enforcement credits with heroic action that prevented a higher death toll, though no additional details on his intervention have been released at this time. No officers fired their weapons during the response, and no active shooter was found on the premises when police swept the building per active shooter protocol.

    Minutes after officers secured the mosque, a second report of gunfire came in from a nearby location. The two suspects had opened fire from their vehicle on a local landscaper working in the area. Miraculously, the landscaper escaped without injury; law enforcement says preliminary reports suggest a bullet aimed at his head was deflected by his protective hard hat, though this detail is still under verification. When officers arrived at the second scene, they found both suspects already dead from self-inflicted gunshot wounds.

    The Islamic Center of San Diego campus is also home to the Al Rashid School, which offers religious and language instruction, meaning children were present on the grounds when the attack began. Aerial footage captured by local news outlets shows children being escorted hand-in-hand out of the campus by emergency personnel through the center’s parking lot, while all nearby schools were immediately placed on full lockdown as a safety precaution.

    The Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed it is treating the incident as a hate crime, after the handwritten note left by one suspect was recovered. San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl told reporters that while the note contained no explicit threat targeting the mosque or any other specific site or individual, the targeting of a major Islamic place of worship, combined with the hate-filled content of the note, leads investigators to presume the attack was motivated by bias.

    One retired local witness, who was eating lunch at his home near the mosque when the shooting began, told reporters he counted roughly 30 shots total from what he described as a semi-automatic weapon, split between two bursts of around a dozen shots separated by a short pause. He noted that the mosque is far more crowded on Fridays and during major religious holidays, saying “It’s a good thing it didn’t happen on a Friday, because the streets would be full of people.”

    The attack comes just days before Eid al-Adha, the “Festival of Sacrifice,” one of the two holiest major holidays in the Islamic faith, when Muslim communities gather with family to commemorate the prophet Ibrahim’s obedience to God. Imam Taha Hassane, director of the Islamic Center of San Diego, called the attack on a house of worship “extremely outrageous” in a press conference, emphasizing “this facility is a house of worship, not a battlefield.”

    California Governor Gavin Newsom released a statement condemning the violence, saying he was horrified by the attack on a space where “families and children gather, and neighbors worship in peace and fellowship.” He added that the state of California “will not tolerate acts of terror or intimidation against communities of faith.” At an unrelated White House event Monday, US President Donald Trump called the shooting a “terrible situation,” saying he had received early briefings and that authorities would conduct a full, thorough review of the incident.

    As of Monday, the investigation remains ongoing, and the FBI has issued a public call for any member of the community with relevant information, including photos or video from the area taken that morning, to contact investigators to assist with the case.

  • UAE and Israel established fund for joint defence acquisition, sources say

    UAE and Israel established fund for joint defence acquisition, sources say

    Amid ongoing regional volatility sparked by the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Israel have established a joint investment fund dedicated to the co-acquisition and development of advanced defense systems, multiple current and former U.S. officials confirmed to Middle East Eye in exclusive reporting. This new initiative marks the deepest level of defense cooperation between Israel and an Arab nation to date, cemented during a visit to Abu Dhabi by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu amid active hostilities against Iran.

    The current U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the arrangements, outlined that the partnership will center on joint weapons procurement, with the UAE poised to inject capital into the advancement of Israeli air defense technologies. Specific areas of focus include Counter-Unmanned Aircraft Systems (C-UAS) and other integrated air defense platforms, and the former U.S. official added that a substantial sum of capital has already been committed to the fund, with future purchases expected to expand beyond air defense into other defense sectors.

    Notably, Netanyahu’s office publicly confirmed the visit, but Abu Dhabi issued a rare denial of the trip, and as of publication, neither the UAE nor Israeli embassies in Washington had responded to requests for comment from Middle East Eye.

    The new fund builds on already unprecedented security coordination between the two countries that unfolded after Iran launched a massive wave of drone and missile strikes across the Gulf in response to the February U.S.-Israeli attack on Iranian targets. The UAE bore the brunt of this retaliation, with nearly 3,000 Iranian projectiles targeting its territory, and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee confirmed in May that Israel deployed Iron Dome air defense batteries and operating personnel to the UAE during the conflict to bolster its defensive capabilities.

    Regional security analysts describe the joint defense fund as a natural next step in the deepening bilateral relationship, which was normalized under the 2020 Abraham Accords — a deal whose supporters long cited expanded defense cooperation as a core strategic benefit. “Israel will need UAE money. We have the technology, but we lack the resources. The UAE has the resources, but lacks the technology,” explained Yoel Guzansky, a senior Gulf-focused fellow at Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security Studies.

    Unlike multi-national defense procurement projects in Europe that have faced significant bureaucratic and political headwinds in efforts to coordinate spending against Russian threats, funding is far more straightforward for the UAE, an absolute monarchy that does not publicly disclose its full defense budget. Independent estimates place the UAE’s 2026 defense spending at approximately $27 billion, equal to 5% of its total gross domestic product, and diplomats and defense industry sources expect all Gulf Cooperation Council states to ramp up defense outlays in the wake of Iran’s large-scale strikes. Abu Dhabi, the UAE’s wealthiest and most powerful emirate, alone controls nearly $2 trillion in assets through its sovereign wealth funds and holds the majority of the country’s oil reserves, giving it vast capital to deploy for defense investment.

    The joint initiative also follows a string of already growing defense-industry ties between the two nations: in June 2025, UAE defense conglomerate Edge Group acquired a 30% stake in Israel’s Thirdeye Systems, an AI-powered drone technology firm. Princeton University Near Eastern studies professor Bernard Haykel called the new fund a logical continuation of existing defense cooperation, noting that it addresses shifting strategic financial realities for Israel. For decades, Israel has relied heavily on U.S. military financing, receiving roughly $3 billion in annual foreign military aid plus an additional $21 billion in defense funding through September 2025, according to Brown University’s Costs of War Project. But support for unrestricted U.S. military aid to Israel has plummeted among American voters, particularly younger generations across the political spectrum, and Netanyahu himself has publicly acknowledged Israel may need to phase out U.S. aid over time.

    “The UAE has money. This is a time when US money is being threatened, so why not switch to the UAE? [Israel] needs to diversify,” Haykel told Middle East Eye.

    The closer defense alignment between Abu Dhabi and Jerusalem comes amid divergent post-conflict strategies among Gulf nations, even as all three major Gulf states — the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar — initially opposed the U.S. war on Iran. After hostilities began, Saudi Arabia and the UAE both granted expanded basing and overflight access to U.S. forces and joined in limited strikes against Iran, per Reuters reporting. But Saudi Arabia has since pivoted to backing Pakistani-led mediation efforts to end the conflict, while the UAE has actively worked to derail peace talks and lobbied heavily for the U.S. to continue its military campaign against Iran.

    Firas Maksad, Middle East and North Africa managing director at Eurasia Group, explained that Abu Dhabi fears any nuclear-focused peace deal struck by the Trump administration with Tehran will leave Gulf states facing an emboldened Iran without addressing the core threats the UAE prioritizes: Iran’s regional proxy networks, ballistic missile program, and long-range drone capabilities. “The Gulf states believe they are going to be left holding the bag on any deal the Trump administration strikes with Iran, which is focused on the nuclear file and Strait of Hormuz. The Gulf states need to address Iran’s proxies, ballistic missiles and drones,” Maksad said.

    Unlike Saudi Arabia, which has responded to growing uncertainty over the long-term reliability of the U.S. security umbrella by deepening security ties with Pakistan, Turkey, and Egypt — a move that included Pakistan deploying 8,000 troops, a fighter jet squadron, and a Chinese-built air defense system to the kingdom in recent weeks — the UAE has taken a vastly different approach.

    “The Emiratis will not be part of that construct,” Maksad said. “Their means of leverage with the Iranians is their relationship with Israel. The more adversarial the relationship is with Iran, the closer the UAE will draw to Israel and develop those security ties.”