Global Pulse

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  • 2030 Winter Olympics boss departs amid turmoil

    2030 Winter Olympics boss departs amid turmoil

    Just 18 months after accepting the top leadership role for the 2030 French Alps Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, two-time Olympic medalist and three-time world champion freestyle skier Edgar Grospiron has officially stepped down from his position as president of the event’s organising committee. His departure was formally confirmed during a scheduled meeting of the committee’s executive board on Thursday, and it marks the latest in a string of high-profile setbacks that have plagued the event’s troubled planning and governance process.

    In an official statement released following the meeting, the organising committee framed Grospiron’s exit as a pre-planned transition aligned with the best interests of the project. “His decision to leave the presidency is part of a deliberate, organised and fully assumed transition, taken in the interests of the project and its governance,” the statement read. “It reflects a shared desire with stakeholders to enable the organisation to quickly enter this new operational phase.”

    Grospiron himself confirmed the news in a public post to professional networking platform LinkedIn, where he openly acknowledged that his decision came after an extended period of internal friction. “I draw the conclusion that the conditions are not met for me to continue this,” he wrote.

    Grospiron’s tenure, which began with his appointment in February 2025, has been consistently marred by internal organisational turmoil and pressing logistical challenges that have delayed and complicated planning efforts. In February 2026, the committee’s chief executive officer Cyril Linette stepped down, publicly citing “insurmountable disagreements” with Grospiron’s leadership. Linette’s departure was far from an isolated incident; it followed the earlier resignations of multiple other senior leaders, including chief operating officer Anne Murac and communications director Arthur Richer.

    Beyond internal leadership strife, the project has also struggled with significant financial constraints. Just months after Linette’s exit, Grospiron admitted in public comments that planning efforts faced a dual crisis of limited resources and tight timelines, noting that the project had “little time, little money.” Even amid those challenges, Grospiron maintained that he remained optimistic about delivering a successful event, stating he could “deliver a Games that will honour our vision and ambition” if the committee provided the “serenity” and “continuity” he needed to move forward.

    Governance and logistical issues have extended far beyond internal leadership turnover. In May 2026, the organising committee was forced to scrap plans for a central ‘ice sports hub’ in the southern French city of Nice, after local mayor Eric Ciotti refused to approve the conversion of OGC Nice’s Allianz Riviera Stadium into a temporary ice rink for the Games. The sudden cancellation required a last-minute reshuffle of event venues: most ice sports will now be hosted in Lyon, while speed skating events will be moved all the way to Heerenveen in the Netherlands.

    By July 2026, the scale of the ongoing governance issues was acknowledged by senior French Olympic leadership. Following a tense executive board meeting that month, French Olympic Committee president Amelie Oudea-Castera told French outlet La Tribune Dimanche that the organising committee was “once again facing governance problems.”

    Despite Grospiron’s high-profile departure, senior French officials have moved quickly to downplay concerns about the future of the 2030 Games. French sports minister Marina Ferrari told reporters that there is “no concern about what comes next.” “The bid is continuing to move forward,” she said. “Our teams are mobilised and working. We are confident about the future of the Alpes project.”

    The International Olympic Committee (IOC) also released a statement praising Grospiron’s contributions to the early stages of the project, noting he had done “crucial work in laying the foundations for the success” of the 2030 Games. “The IOC will continue working in close collaboration with the organising committee to build on the solid foundations that Mr Grospiron has laid,” the statement added.

  • Four killed and 60 injured in Russian strike on shopping centre, Ukraine says

    Four killed and 60 injured in Russian strike on shopping centre, Ukraine says

    Four and a half years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a new wave of cross-border attacks targeting civilian infrastructure has left multiple civilians dead and dozens injured on both sides, marking a sharp escalation of violence that dims faint hopes for an early breakthrough in recent US-backed peace efforts. The deadliest of the latest strikes hit a crowded shopping mall in the central Ukrainian city of Pavlohrad, located in Dnipropetrovsk region, on Thursday. Ukrainian officials confirmed that four people were killed in the assault, with another 60 people wounded – including a child and two emergency service responders. Ukrainian Interior Minister Ivan Vyhivskyi noted the attack unfolded in broad daylight, when public streets surrounding the mall were already packed with local residents going about their daily routines. The strike left damaged storefronts and smoldering vehicles in its wake, with footage released by Ukraine’s State Emergency Service showing firefighters battling thick plumes of smoke rising from burning cars along the city’s streets. In a statement following the attack, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy offered heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims, condemning what he called a deliberate strike on ordinary civilians. “The Russians used drones to kill people who were simply standing near shopping centres,” Zelenskyy said. This assault is only the latest in a string of Russian attacks on Ukrainian commercial hubs across the country this week. Just one day prior, a Russian drone strike on a shopping mall in the northern city of Sumy killed two people and wounded 20. A second Russian aerial bombardment on Sumy on Thursday injured eight more people, three of them children. Earlier this week, a Russian strike on a shopping mall in Zaporizhzhia, a southern Ukrainian city partially occupied by Russian forces, nearly destroyed the entire building, according to its owners. The mall was closed at the time of the attack, however, so no casualties were reported. Last month, an even deadlier assault on a Kryvyi Rih shopping center left at least 16 civilians dead and 130 wounded, Ukrainian officials say. Pavlohrad, a key logistics hub located close to the major central city of Dnipro, has already faced repeated Russian targeting; a strike on local storage facilities there just one month ago killed two people. Attacks have not been limited to Ukrainian government-held territory, either. Russian authorities report that Ukrainian drones have struck civilian sites in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, including a shopping mall in the port city of Mariupol this week and another attack in the city of Donetsk last month. The violence has also spilled across Russia’s internationally recognized borders, with Moscow confirming a new wave of Ukrainian attacks this week that have left casualties among Russian civilians. Overnight Wednesday, Russian officials say multiple Ukrainian seaborne drones targeted the popular Black Sea resort city of Sochi, wounding 28 people – two of them children. On Thursday, Russian authorities reported a Ukrainian drone strike on the town of Novy Oskol in Belgorod Region killed one person and injured six more. In Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia region, Russian officials said a Ukrainian attack on a civilian car Wednesday killed a 15-year-old girl and injured a six-year-old child and two adult women, while a separate strike on a civilian truck in the same region left one male driver dead. This latest surge of bloodshed comes just days after a long-awaited peace mission by envoys of US President Donald Trump, who held separate talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow and Zelenskyy in Kyiv over the weekend. Early assessments indicate the diplomatic push has produced little to no tangible progress toward ending the conflict, leaving civilian populations on both sides to bear the brunt of continued hostilities.

  • Watch: Is the Bayeux Tapestry exhibition worth the hype?

    Watch: Is the Bayeux Tapestry exhibition worth the hype?

    Almost a millennium after its creation, one of Europe’s most iconic medieval artworks is drawing unprecedented crowds to one of London’s most famous cultural institutions. The Bayeux Tapestry, the 70-meter-long embroidered masterpiece chronicling the 1066 Norman Conquest of England, has not been publicly exhibited in the United Kingdom since it was stitched nearly 1,000 years ago – making this landmark showing a once-in-a-generation cultural event.

    Since opening to the public, visitor numbers have surged at the British Museum, with daily queues stretching around the museum’s Bloomsbury complex as history enthusiasts, casual tourists, and art lovers alike rush to secure a glimpse of the one-of-a-kind artifact. For centuries, the tapestry has been housed in the French town of Bayeux, with only rare outings outside its permanent home, making this UK debut a historic moment that has captured the imagination of cultural audiences across the country.

    The long-awaited display has sparked widespread public debate, with many asking whether the massive hype surrounding the exhibition matches the experience of seeing the tapestry in person. As crowds continue to turn out in record numbers, the event has underscored the enduring public fascination with medieval history and iconic cultural artifacts that bridge centuries of shared British and European history.

  • Kosovo needed international law to survive. Now it’s helping Israel bypass it in Gaza

    Kosovo needed international law to survive. Now it’s helping Israel bypass it in Gaza

    On Monday, following Israel’s formal approval, Kosovo officially became the latest member of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s divisive Board of Peace and its accompanying International Stabilisation Force (ISF) for Gaza, a move that has ignited sharp debate over geopolitics, human rights, and legal accountability. The signing ceremony, which saw ISF commander Major General Jasper Jeffers and Kosovo Security Force chief Lieutenant General Bashkim Jashari formalize the accession on September 7, 2026, was framed by the Board of Peace as a historic milestone. In a public statement posted to X, the organization emphasized the move demonstrates Kosovo’s unwavering commitment to the ISF mission and alignment with the core strategic goals laid out in Trump’s 20-Point Peace Plan.

    The Board of Peace also revealed that Kosovo deployed military personnel to the region as early as this past spring, months before the official signing, a deployment that was never disclosed to the public ahead of the announcement. According to the statement, Kosovar troops have already taken on leading roles in logistics planning and civil affairs coordination, in addition to carrying out unexploded ordnance clearance operations on the ground in Gaza.

    The decision has proven deeply divisive within Kosovo, a majority-Muslim nation where widespread public sympathy for Palestinians amid the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza has already spurred large-scale pro-Palestine protests across the country. Despite this widespread public opposition, Kosovo’s ruling political leadership has aligned itself with the Trump administration’s pro-Israel demands, a choice that analysts attribute to a mix of ideological alignment and geopolitical pressure.

    In comments made back in March, Kosovo’s left-leaning Prime Minister Albin Kurti defended his government’s participation, drawing a parallel to the 1999 NATO intervention in Kosovo. “We are ready to participate and help the people of Gaza, because we ourselves have been and are beneficiaries of international forces since 1999,” Kurti said. That 1999 intervention, led by U.S. forces, involved two and a half months of airstrikes against Serbia to halt the ethnic cleansing campaign targeting Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian population. While Kurti’s framing is designed to win over a domestic audience that broadly condemns the violence in Gaza, conflict experts say the comparison is deeply flawed.

    Brunilda Pali, assistant professor of conflict dynamics and resolution at the University of Amsterdam’s Department of Political Science, called the parallel fundamentally unconvincing in an interview with Middle East Eye. “The international intervention in Kosovo followed a genocidal war in which the international community had identified a grave humanitarian catastrophe,” Pali explained. “Gaza presents a fundamentally different problem,” she added, noting that “as a main supporter of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the U.S. is not at all credible as a peacekeeper.”

    This contrast is underscored by ongoing international legal proceedings against Israel: much like Serbia faced global scrutiny for its actions in Kosovo, Israel is currently facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over its military campaign in Gaza. In 2024, the ICJ — a judicial body Kosovo has repeatedly relied on to solidify its own claims to sovereignty — ruled that Israel’s longstanding occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem violates international law. The International Criminal Court has also gone further, issuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Gaza.

    Pali warned that Kosovo’s participation in the ISF carries tangible risks for both the Balkan nation’s government and its deployed troops. Unlike the 1999 intervention in Kosovo, Israel holds full veto power over all entry into Gaza and all participation in the ISF. “Participation could expose both Kosovar soldiers and the Kosovo government to significant legal and reputational risks, particularly if the international deployment were to facilitate forced displacement, consolidate Israeli control over Gaza, or otherwise contribute to internationally wrongful conduct,” Pali said. She also pointed out that Kosovar political leaders have largely ignored explicit public plans from Israeli officials to ethnically cleanse Gaza of its Palestinian population and replace it with Jewish-only settlements.

    While Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian population welcomed international forces in 1999 as protectors from violence, experts emphasize the U.S.- and Israeli-backed ISF serves an entirely different purpose in Gaza. “By participating in the ISF, Kosovo is effectively asking Palestinians to accept an international security architecture in which one of the principal parties responsible for the genocide in Gaza, which is the U.S., retains substantial influence over the security environment, while the Palestinian population has limited control over the institution determining its political future,” Pali explained.

    The Board of Peace itself has already been widely condemned by global and Palestinian rights bodies. Eight independent United Nations experts have labeled the initiative an “illegal and illegitimate manoeuvre by powerful states driven by nostalgia and avarice.” The experts argue the board directly violates the Palestinian people’s fundamental right to self-determination and amounts to a modern colonial administration. Leading Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq has echoed that criticism, describing the Board of Peace and the ISF as a “blueprint for the indefinite alien occupation and de facto annexation of large parts of Gaza.”

    Shpend Kursani, a lecturer in international relations at the University of Tartu’s Johan Skytte Institute of Political Studies in Estonia, noted that Kosovo, alongside Albania and Morocco, was deliberately selected for the initiative as a handpicked group of majority-Muslim nations that had already secured full Israeli approval. The inclusion of these countries, Kursani explained, is intended to “sugarcoat” the deployment, framing it to Gaza’s population as a helping hand from fellow Muslim-majority states. Crucially, Kursani emphasized that the entire initiative is a private project with no legitimate international standing. “This is Trump’s private initiative. The Board of Peace has no international standing whatsoever,” Kursani said. “It is viewed as Trump’s private initiative, actually almost like a parallel initiative to the United Nations efforts and its main mission of peacekeeping.”

    For Kosovo, which has still not secured full United Nations membership due to longstanding opposition from China and Russia, the geopolitical pressures of aligning with the second Trump presidency have left the small Balkan nation with limited room to maneuver. With no other major regional allies to rely on, and a large U.S. military base — Camp Bondsteel, the largest U.S. base in the Balkans, currently hosting around 1,000 U.S. troops — hosted on its soil, Kosovo’s leaders see alignment with U.S. policy as the only way to protect their own hard-won sovereignty against Serb revanchism. The U.S. force is widely viewed as the only meaningful bulwark against attempts by Serbia to reclaim control over the territory.

    Sidita Kushi, assistant professor of politics at U.S.-based Mount Holyoke College, explained that Kosovo’s leadership is prioritizing its alliance with Washington in hopes of shoring up its own security and sovereign status by backing Trump administration foreign policy priorities. But Kushi also noted that even full alignment offers no long-term guarantee of favorable treatment from the Trump White House, pointing to Trump’s erratic approach to global relations, including threats to invade Greenland and revisit the United Kingdom’s claim to the Falklands. Trump has already threatened to upend European security by withdrawing U.S. troops from Germany over Berlin’s reluctance to back the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran.

    “With few other natural allies in the region, both Kosovo and Albania are stuck between a rock and a hard place, and their political elites are choosing to follow perceived geopolitical interests and the status quo over undeniable human rights considerations,” Kushi added. For Kosovo, the cost of that choice may yet prove steep, as experts warn of growing legal and reputational damage from its involvement in a widely condemned initiative.

  • Trump promises to send $500 to nearly 1 million Americans for Obamacare ‘overcharges’

    Trump promises to send $500 to nearly 1 million Americans for Obamacare ‘overcharges’

    More than three years after his first failed attempt to overturn the Affordable Care Act (ACA), widely known as Obamacare, former and returning U.S. President Donald Trump has unveiled a new direct policy move targeting the landmark 2010 health care law: one-time $500 rebate checks totaling close to $500 million to nearly 1 million Americans who purchase unsubsidized health plans through the federal ACA insurance marketplace. The Trump administration says the payments represent refunds for what it labels as excessive “overcharges” levied during Joe Biden’s prior presidential term, with mailed checks set to begin reaching eligible households starting this October.

    Per White House guidance released Thursday, the rebates will only go to consumers in 30 states that rely on the federal government to operate their ACA insurance marketplaces, and exclude any buyers who receive income-based premium subsidies to lower their monthly plan costs. Eligible recipients are consumers who pay 100% of their own plan premiums, which can often climb to several hundred dollars per month for unsubsidized coverage. The administration argues that a so-called “user fee” added to monthly marketplace premiums was over-collected under the Biden administration, amassing a surplus far larger than what is actually required to cover operating costs for the federal exchange.

    Notably, the administration’s public fact sheet does not disclose the total size of the alleged surplus, nor does it lay out any concrete plans to permanently lower user fees or overall premium costs for marketplace consumers moving forward. This new rebate promise comes on top of an earlier Trump pledge to send $5,000 one-time payments to Americans if the Republican Party secures majority control of both chambers of Congress in the upcoming November legislative elections.

    First enacted in 2010 under the Obama administration, the ACA expanded health insurance access to millions of previously uninsured Americans by creating standardized public insurance marketplaces where private health plans can be purchased, and introduced new federal rules requiring minimum coverage standards for most individual market plans. The law also made available income-based tax subsidies that cut monthly premium costs for the majority of marketplace enrollees, and expanded the Medicaid public insurance program for low-income households. State-by-state operation of marketplaces varies, with some running their own state-level exchanges and others opting to let the federal government manage plan enrollment and pricing.

    Most Democratic lawmakers have not yet issued public responses to Trump’s rebate announcement, but the party has long defended the ACA as a critical pillar of affordable health coverage for U.S. households. Trump first made a full repeal of the law a top priority during his first presidential term, coming within one vote of passing repeal legislation in 2017 before the effort collapsed. Since returning to office for his second term, Trump has continued to push for structural changes to the ACA and repeatedly called for a full replacement of the law, though he has yet to release a detailed alternative health care proposal to replace it. This rebate plan marks the most direct, concrete action the Trump administration has taken on the ACA since returning to the White House.

    Official enrollment data shows that total ACA marketplace and Medicaid enrollment tied to the law has dropped by roughly 8 million people since Trump’s return to office. The administration’s broader changes to the ACA, included as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA), have not yet gone into full effect, with the full implementation timeline expected to stretch over multiple years. Eligible rebate recipients are concentrated in key 2026 swing states including Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin, all of which rely on the federal ACA exchange.

  • Bayeux Tapestry unveiled to UK public for first time at British Museum

    Bayeux Tapestry unveiled to UK public for first time at British Museum

    Nearly a millennium after it was stitched by hand, the iconic Bayeux Tapestry has opened to the public in the United Kingdom for the first time in its history, marking a landmark cultural exchange between France and Britain that has been nearly a century in the making.

    Believed to have been originally embroidered in England shortly after the 1066 Norman Conquest, the 70-meter 11th-century artwork has resided in Normandy, France, for centuries. It chronicles the lead-up to the Battle of Hastings and William of Normandy’s decisive invasion of England, breaking down the narrative into 58 vivid sequential scenes. This unprecedented loan comes as Bayeux’s permanent museum undergoes critical renovation work, creating a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for UK audiences to view the treasure in person.

    The British Museum opened its exhibition doors at 10:00 BST on opening day, where costumed re-enactors bearing shields, dressed in period-accurate 1066 garments, greeted thousands of early arriving history lovers who queued for hours for their chance to see the tapestry. When the priceless artifact made its overnight cross-channel journey from Normandy to London this July—echoing William the Conqueror’s original crossing—it was transported in a custom-built protective case under cover of darkness, a carefully planned operation designed to avoid vibration and damage from poor road conditions.

    For many first-time visitors, the experience exceeded all expectations. Adrian Harris, one of the first members of the public to view the exhibition, called the opportunity a “real privilege.” “I’m not a very emotive or expressive person but I was absolutely blown away by it,” he said, describing the shock of seeing the full tapestry stretch out before him at the start of the exhibition gallery. Serena Smith, an enthusiastic tapestry fan, secured her ticket after landing 4,000th in the online queue—despite clicking the booking link moments after the British Museum’s alert went out—and arrived with 24 pages of detailed notes to spot historical details, from the Normans’ distinctive round haircuts to the invasion boats that carried the army across the Channel.

    Italian visitors Cecilia and Fabio Zanini said the scale and detail of the tapestry left them stunned. “I was amazed by the vibrancy of the colours. The detail of the characters,” Cecilia said. “It gave both of us goosebumps.” Fabio praised the embroidery’s dynamic energy, noting: “It feels like you’re in the battlefield. It really allowed you to go back to 1066.” BBC Culture Editor Katie Razzall, who spent months preparing to cover the exhibition, echoed that reaction: after studying texts and photos for months, and even witnessing the careful unfurling of the tapestry after its arrival, nothing prepared her for the impact of seeing the full work stretch the entire length of the British Museum gallery.

    Michael Lewis, one of the four curators organizing the landmark exhibition, framed the cross-Channel loan as a major gesture of international diplomacy. “1066 is, of course, one of the most important events in English history, and the tapestry is the ultimate reflection of that in terms of a visual narrative,” he explained. “Some people see it as akin to a graphic novel or a cartoon or something like that, it’s immediately recognisable.”

    Not all feedback about the event has been positive, however. Some UK residents outside of London have criticized the exhibition as inaccessible to working-class and northern British families, noting that combined costs of entry tickets, train travel, and on-site food put the experience out of reach for many. “London-only cultural events alienate many families north of Watford,” said Angie, a resident of Leeds, who called the historic occasion “out of reach for many, many families in the north.” Other visitors complained of overcrowding and extreme wait times, with one visitor comparing the flow through the exhibition to being moved along a conveyor belt.

    Despite the criticism, public demand for tickets remains overwhelming: all advance tickets for the exhibition are sold out until the next release on 21 October. The tapestry will remain on display at the British Museum until 11 July 2027, giving audiences a limited window to see the historic artwork before it returns to its permanent home in France. Even with the early public debate around accessibility, the exhibition stands as a singular cultural moment, bringing one of the most famous artifacts of medieval European history back to the country where it was first created, nearly 1,000 years later.

  • ‘We never recovered him’: Quest to identify remains from Ground Zero continues

    ‘We never recovered him’: Quest to identify remains from Ground Zero continues

    On the 25th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center, a new forensic technology is slowly bringing long-awaited answers to hundreds of families who have spent decades waiting for confirmation of their loved ones’ fates.

    For Juliette Scauso, that wait has carried on since she was 4 years old, the youngest of four children growing up on Long Island without her father, Dennis Scauso, a 12-year veteran of the New York City Fire Department’s hazmat unit. Dennis was not scheduled to work on September 11, 2001, but he swapped shifts to pick up extra overtime pay. When the South Tower collapsed, he was inside, and only his dented, damaged firefighter helmet, emblazoned with his badge number, was recovered months after the attack.

    A quarter of a century later, Dennis Scauso remains one of more than 1,000 unidentified 9/11 victims from New York, according to the city’s Office of Chief Medical Examiner (OCME). For decades, identifying fragmented remains recovered from Ground Zero has stood as one of the most complex forensic challenges in modern history. The jet-fueled fires that burned at the World Trade Center site destroyed most genetic material, leaving only small, fragmented portions of remains for testing. Complications were amplified by shift changes that left many first responders wearing borrowed gear marked with other firefighters’ names, and the sheer scale of the tragedy, which dwarfed the other 9/11 attack sites. While all 40 victims on United Airlines Flight 93 were identified, and only five remains from the Pentagon attack remain unaccounted for, more than a third of the 2,753 World Trade Center victims are still without formal identification.

    But last month, OCME announced a breakthrough: using Forensic Investigative Genetic Genealogy (FIGG), investigators have identified a previously unknown victim, marking the 1,654th confirmed identification from the attacks. This new technology, which leverages whole genome sequencing to map a victim’s full genetic code, allows investigators to match partial DNA profiles to more distant relatives of victims than older DNA testing methods permitted. Once a distant match is found in genetic genealogy databases, the New York Police Department works to track down closer family members to confirm the match.

    OCME has preserved all unidentified remains in sealed, temperature-controlled packaging for decades, allowing teams to retest samples as new technology emerges. Early identifications relied on fingerprints and dental records, before DNA testing became the standard, and successive generations of DNA technology have allowed teams to extract usable genetic material from samples that were untestable years earlier. This continuous re-evaluation is why new identifications are still being made 25 years after the attacks. Last year alone, three more victims were identified through advanced DNA testing: 26-year-old currency trader Ryan Fitzgerald, 72-year-old Barbara Keating who was aboard American Airlines Flight 11, and a third victim whose family chose to keep their identity private.

    Angela Soler, director of forensic anthropology at OCME, says FIGG opens a new frontier of hope for families still waiting for answers. “There is real promise in using this approach,” she said. “There’s hope for more families to receive answers, and hopefully we’ll be able to test more remains in the future using this technology as well.” The work is deeply personal for Soler and many of her colleagues, who responded to Ground Zero in the immediate aftermath of the attacks. While they acknowledge it is unlikely every victim will ever be identified — in some cases, no recoverable remains exist at all — they have no plans to end their efforts. “As long as there’s families looking for answers, we’ll continue searching for them,” Soler said.

    For families, the news of an identification brings a complex mix of emotions. For many, formal identification closes a lingering, unspoken question that has lingered for decades, bringing a sense of closure that allows them to lay their loved one to rest, either in a private burial or in the repository built into the bedrock of the World Trade Center memorial, where many families choose to leave remains close to where their loved ones died. But for others, the news reopens wounds that have taken decades to heal.

    Juliette Scauso says she has made peace with never having her father’s remains, and has built her life around his memory — remembering him as a handyman with a love of jazz who left only his helmet behind. “I’ve spent essentially my entire life knowing my father died, and learning to live with the fact that we never recovered him,” she said. For her, an identification decades later would not bring her father back, but only reopen a grief she has learned to carry. “At this point, an identification wouldn’t change the reality of his death. It wouldn’t give me back my father, and I don’t necessarily want to reopen something that has become part of the way I’ve learned to live and grieve. Especially 25 years later, it’s going to open up the wounds again.” Even so, she acknowledges the profound importance of the new technology for other families still waiting.

    Soler echoes that complexity, noting that for every family that longs for answers, some choose to opt out of notification, finding the confirmation of their loved one’s death too painful to revisit 25 years on. Still, she says, the work continues: every week, OCME receives calls from family members asking for updates, and investigators will keep testing, matching, and searching, as long as there are questions left to answer.

  • ‘Kahanist’ figure poised to enter Israeli parliament on Ben Gvir’s party list

    ‘Kahanist’ figure poised to enter Israeli parliament on Ben Gvir’s party list

    As Israel prepares for its snap parliamentary elections scheduled for October 27, a radical far-right figure with deep ties to a banned terrorist organization is on the cusp of securing a seat in the Knesset, according to reporting from Israeli outlet Haaretz. Tzachi Eliyahu, an avowed adherent of the Kahanist ideology, has secured the eighth spot on the candidate list of Otzma Yehudit, the far-right party led by current Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.

    Eliyahu’s open alignment with the racist Kach movement is impossible to miss: he carries a tattoo of the movement’s logo on his arm. Kach was founded by Meir Kahane, a radical Jewish supremacist rabbi who was assassinated in New York in 1990. The movement was formally outlawed across Israel and classified as a terrorist organization due to its explicitly racist agenda targeting Palestinians, which included open calls for the forced expulsion of all Palestinians from historic Palestine. The ban came into force in 1994, after Kach supporter Baruch Goldstein carried out a mass shooting that killed 29 Palestinian Muslim worshippers at Hebron’s Ibrahimi Mosque.

    This is not Eliyahu’s first attempt to enter the Knesset. In 2023, when a vacancy opened up following the resignation of Noam party chairman Avi Maoz, Ben Gvir blocked Eliyahu from taking the seat. At the time, Ben Gvir – who has himself been previously convicted on charges of supporting the banned Kach movement – argued that Eliyahu’s visible Kach tattoo would harm the party’s public image, political sources familiar with the decision told Israeli outlet Srugim. A source told Srugim at the time that Eliyahu represented an older, unapologetic strain of Otzma Yehudit’s ideology, describing him as “that kind of Kahanist.”

    Current polling, however, points to a strong performance for Otzma Yehudit, with projections showing the party winning between eight and 10 Knesset seats. If the polls hold, Eliyahu’s eighth place slot on the list will guarantee him a parliamentary seat. After the party formally submitted its full candidate list to Israel’s Central Elections Committee earlier this week, Ben Gvir publicly praised the slate, claiming he was “proud that we have the most diverse list in Israel.” Ben Gvir added that all Otzma Yehudit members carry “a lot of love for the people of Israel in our hearts.”

    Beyond Eliyahu’s Kahanist ties, he has a long record of controversial and extremist actions. He has publicly expressed support for Elor Azaria, a former Israeli soldier convicted of manslaughter for the 2016 extrajudicial killing of an unarmed, wounded Palestinian man lying incapacitated on the ground in Hebron. In a social media post, Eliyahu called Azaria “the child of us all,” and claimed the soldier was right to “eliminate a terrorist at the scene.”

    Eliyahu has also been repeatedly linked to violent clashes with anti-government protesters during Israel’s 2023 mass demonstrations against the Netanyahu government’s controversial judicial overhaul plan, with multiple reports documenting him personally attacking demonstrators. He has also targeted Palestinian journalists: he called for a confrontation with Palestinian Haaretz reporter Hanin Majadli at her home after she expressed support for an Israeli teacher fired for criticizing the Israeli military, writing, “Haaretz won’t fire her, but let’s make sure the police pay her a visit at home.”

    Just months ago, in June 2024, Eliyahu joined other far-right activists to raise Israeli flags at the entrance to Kafr Kanna, a Palestinian-majority town in northern Israel. On social media platform Facebook, he spelled out his core political goal: “Our top mission as a government and as a people is to Judaise the Galilee and ensure the Jewish majority in the Land of Israel.”

    Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit has already placed the so-called “voluntary emigration” of Palestinians from the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip at the top of its election platform, a term widely recognized as a euphemism for forced displacement and mass expulsion of Palestinian people from their land.

  • Iranian press review: Cheers erupt as US warships come under fire

    Iranian press review: Cheers erupt as US warships come under fire

    Tensions between Iran and the United States have spiked sharply following a missile strike launched by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps against a U.S. aircraft carrier and destroyer on Saturday, triggering deep domestic divisions across multiple spheres of Iranian life. While official U.S. statements confirm the assault took place, authorities note the attack was successfully repelled. Even so, hardline ultra-conservative factions across Iran have hailed the strike as a landmark victory for the country’s campaign of confrontation against Washington.

    Leading Iranian state-aligned newspapers have amplified this celebratory narrative, framing the strike as a deliberate escalation that expands the scope of Iranian military pressure in the strategic Strait of Hormuz. Tehran-based daily Hamshahri published an editorial emphasizing the attack was merely a opening warning. The publication warned that if U.S. military and economic pressure on Iran continues, future Iranian missile strikes will successfully target American naval assets. “As tensions deepen across the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. naval fleet is more vulnerable to Iranian missile strikes than at any point in history, raising the risk of a catastrophic blow to U.S. military assets,” Hamshahri argued.

    Another hardline outlet, Qods daily, lauded the operation under the front-page headline “Warships in the Crosshairs of Missiles.” The paper noted that the new phase of military escalation signals a critical shift: Iranian forces will no longer limit their targeting to commercial vessels and oil and gas tankers operating in regional waters. “Iran is making clear it does not consider U.S. military warships enforcing the economic blockade as actors outside the battlefield,” the article read. “If this framework becomes established, the so-called Tanker War will extend far beyond attacks on commercial shipping.”

    Beyond the rhetoric of pro-escalation factions, however, other Iranian media have shone a light on unaddressed crises facing ordinary Iranians in the wake of rising cross-border conflict. Reformist outlet Etemad daily recently focused on the aftermath of a September 1 U.S. missile strike on a wedding in southern Iran that killed multiple civilians, reporting widespread gaps in local medical infrastructure that exacerbated the death toll.

    Ali Taheri, a resident who lost his 43-year-old wife in the strike, told the outlet that the local clinic serving 50,000 to 60,000 local people lacks even basic life-saving resources including oxygen. “If there had been oxygen at the clinic, my wife would not have died,” Taheri said. “She is gone now, no amount of media coverage can bring her back. We need to focus on supporting the survivors who still carry this pain.”

    Behrouz Mallahi, another local resident, added that there was no emergency response infrastructure in place to treat wounded survivors immediately after the strike. Rescue teams had to travel from the neighboring cities of Sirik and Minab to reach the site, forcing local residents to transport the injured to care on their own. The report also highlighted a total lack of mental health support for survivors: Mallahi’s 12-year-old daughter Ayesha, who was wounded in the strike, has been unable to recover psychologically after being discharged from intensive care, and refuses to return to her home in Kuhestak out of fear of another attack. Her younger brother still says he would rather stay in the hospital than return home for the same reason.

    Concurrent to rising military tensions, a Norway-based independent rights group Iran Human Rights has released a new report documenting a sharp surge in executions across Iran in recent months. The group recorded at least 82 executions in August alone, six of which were of women – the highest monthly number of women executed in Iran this year. Three of those put to death in August had been arrested during nationwide anti-government protests that swept the country in January 2026. Through the first eight months of 2026, the group counts at least 528 total executions nationwide. Of those, 29 were detained in connection to the January 2026 protests, two were arrested during the 2022 “Women, Life, Freedom” movement, 13 were executed over alleged ties to banned opposition groups, and 14 were hanged on espionage charges. The remainder were convicted of murder or drug-related offenses.

    Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of Iran Human Rights, emphasized that executed women in Iran face layered harm long before they reach the gallows. “Women who are executed in Iran are not only victims of the inhumane death penalty,” he said. “Many have endured years of structural gender discrimination, gender-based violence, and a complete lack of equal legal protection long before their execution.” Political and human rights activists across Iran have warned in recent months that Iranian authorities are ramping up executions, particularly of political protesters, as a tool to consolidate control amid rising regional military pressure from the U.S. and Israel. The new data from Iran Human Rights appears to validate those warnings.

    The rising tensions and domestic unrest have sparked a major political firestorm after former Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called for a national public referendum to let the Iranian people decide the country’s future strategic course of confrontation with the U.S. Speaking to a gathering of former provincial governors, Rouhani argued that the public should have a direct say in whether the country continues its current path of confrontation. “If we tell the people we plan to continue confronting global major powers for another 20 years, and they accept that, then we will move forward,” he was quoted as saying. “But if the people do not accept that path and demand an alternative, why would we refuse to honor their will?”

    Rouhani’s remarks immediately drew fierce backlash from ultra-conservative factions, who have accused the former president of advocating for surrender to the U.S. Hossein Shariatmadari, editor-in-chief of the hardline Kayhan daily, called for a formal judicial investigation into Rouhani’s comments. Conservative lawmaker Mahmoud Nabavian rejected the idea of a referendum on national defense policy entirely, claiming Rouhani’s proposal advances U.S. interests. “The cowardly opportunists who push a false choice between war and peace in our country are really working to surrender a great, powerful Iran to their American masters,” Nabavian wrote on social platform X.

  • Can Trump really pay $5,000 to every American adult?

    Can Trump really pay $5,000 to every American adult?

    With just two months remaining until the 2026 US midterm elections, former and current President Donald Trump has ignited fierce national debate by announcing a sweeping proposal: if Republicans retain control of Congress in November’s vote, every adult American citizen will receive a one-time $5,000 direct payment from the federal government. The announcement drew raucous cheers from conservative supporters gathered at the Republican Party convention in Texas on Wednesday, but it has immediately faced sharp scrutiny over its unclear funding structure, questionable constitutionality, and enormous fiscal cost that would add to already soaring US national debt.

    Trump offered no concrete details during his speech about how the federal government would cover the projected $1.3 trillion price tag of the plan – a figure calculated based on the nearly 270 million adults currently residing in the United States. Vice President JD Vance later attempted to fill the gap in the proposal, suggesting the payouts would be drawn from existing federal tariff revenue and that the checks would not be distributed to the wealthiest American adults. However, available federal data shows that even cumulative tariff revenue collected since the start of 2025 falls drastically short of the sum needed for the plan. According to the nonpartisan Bipartisan Policy Center, the US has collected roughly $475 billion in combined tariff and excise tax revenue since January 2025, but more than $100 billion of that was returned to taxpayers after the Supreme Court struck down a series of controversial tariffs earlier this year, leaving less than $400 billion total on hand – less than a third of the $1.3 trillion required for the proposal.

    The core point of contention surrounding the plan has been its legal status. Under existing US federal law, it is a criminal offense to offer direct cash payments intended to sway a voter’s choice at the ballot box. But legal experts are divided over whether Trump’s pledge crosses that legal line. Dr. Joan Mahoney, a law lecturer at the University of Southampton, explained that the proposal is structured differently from a direct bribe because the payments would be distributed to all qualifying adults regardless of how they cast their ballots. In her view, the pledge is no different than standard campaign promises of tax cuts that are made by every major political party, which are universally recognized as legal. “Politicians don’t usually do it quite this explicitly, but that does not make it illegal,” Mahoney noted.

    Other analysts argue the pledge represents a departure from standard campaign rhetoric that crosses ethical and legal boundaries. Laurel Rapp, director of the US and North America program at the international affairs think tank Chatham House, characterized Trump’s offer as a “very different, very transactional agreement” that has few parallels in modern US electoral politics. Beyond legal questions, fiscal experts warn the plan would exacerbate the US’s already unsustainable long-term deficit trajectory, which has been worsened in recent years by massive government spending on foreign conflicts including the war in Iran. Erica York, a senior economist at the nonpartisan Tax Foundation based in Washington DC, called the proposal one of the least responsible possible uses of $1.3 trillion in public funds. “We’re on a very unsustainable track, with deficits only projected to grow and grow,” York said, adding that she would be “extremely surprised” if congressional lawmakers from either party approved such a massive expenditure. Under US legislative rules, Congress holds the sole constitutional authority to authorize federal spending, and political observers widely agree Trump could not implement the plan via executive order even if he wanted to.

    Additional questions remain unanswered about the fine print of the proposal: Trump said the $5,000 payments would be required to be spent within the United States, but the administration has offered no explanation of how that requirement would be enforced or monitored. The White House pushed back against criticism in a statement to the BBC, dismissing detractors as “doomers and naysayers” who have consistently underestimated the president. “With the continued support of the American people, President Trump will keep delivering real results,” said White House spokesman Davis Ingle.

    Many political strategists frame the announcement as a calculated last-minute campaign push rather than a serious policy proposal, given Republicans face tightening polling ahead of the midterms. Robert Moran, a former Republican strategist and pollster, noted the extraordinary pledge comes as election day draws near: “It is an extraordinary promise, and I’m not sure where that money is going to come from – but it is campaign season.” Rapp echoed that analysis, arguing Trump is prioritizing short-term electoral gains to help Republicans keep control of Congress during his final two years in office, turning to direct cash appeals because polling has been underperforming for the party. This is not the first time Trump has floated such a large direct payout proposal: during a prior term, he pledged $2,000 checks funded by tariff revenue, a promise that was never implemented. The proposal also echoes past controversies over vote buying: former President Joe Biden faced similar accusations in 2021 when he promised $2,000 Covid stimulus checks to voters if Democrats won two critical US Senate runoffs in Georgia, and in 2024, Trump supporter Elon Musk drew legal scrutiny for offering cash incentives to voters in key swing states who signed a political petition. Democrats have already dismissed Trump’s 2026 pledge as nothing more than an “empty promise” designed to win votes without any intention of following through.