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Conflict Events Archive
16,158 documented events · latest Sep 18, 2026 — chronological archive with full summaries and multi-source verification.
US voter opposition to war on Iran grows to new highs: Poll
Poll reveals 71 percent in US believe Trump's team lacks a clear strategy for resolving the conflict.
As Houthis grab Bab al-Mandeb, US appears willing to watch from sidelines
Stretched by its war with Iran, Washington may have little choice but to trust Houthi assurances on shipping.
Futures Flat Ahead Of Massive $7 Trillion Quad-Witching As Yields Resume Rise
Futures Flat Ahead Of Massive $7 Trillion Quad-Witching As Yields Resume Rise US stock futures are little changed on Friday, with big tech stocks rising while sentiment is supported by another modest decline in oil prices; a near-record $7 trillion quad-witching and index rebalances add to Friday's set-up. US tariff-delay hopes, a flattening US curve and softer diesel and WTI prices ease inflation concerns, while AI bulls are back in charge. As of 8:00am ET, S&P 500 futures rose 0.1% to 7,713.25, erasing modest gains, while Nasdaq futures rise 0.3% as the market momentum after the risk-on rally yesterday holding well into today’s session with Tech continuing its leadership. In premarket trading, Mag 7 stocks are mostly higher led by GOOG/L (+2.0%); AMZN is flat after the 5% rally yesterday amid a long-term deal with Generac. Meanwhile, Brent crude traded near $104 a barrel. The dollar climbed 0.2%, while gold rose toward $4,400 an ounce. Treasuries resumed losses after a brief rebound, with the 10-year yield up three basis points to 4.97%. Overnight, the BOJ hiked by 25bps as expected, but the vote split skewed dovish as two Takaichi-appointed members dissented, which sent the yen sharply lower (USDJPY breaking above 157 for first time since early Sept) and Japanese stocks rallying (Tech > Banks). The USD is higher post BOJ decision. Oil is unchanged this morning; both precious and base metals are higher. Today’s macro data focus is on Industrial Production and Leading Index which are not expected to be market moving. In premarket trading, Mag 7 stocks are mostly higher: Alphabet is leading Magnificent 7 peers higher as technology and AI-related stocks boost the US stock futures. Meanwhile, Apple underperforms the cohort (Alphabet +2.4%, Nvidia +0.4%, Apple +0.1%, Tesla +0.5%, Amazon +0.5%, Microsoft -0.1%, Meta +0.7%). Cryptocurrency-linked stocks are rallying in premarket trading, set to extend gains, after US SEC greenlit digital versions of securities to start trading in the US. European telecom stocks sold off on Friday, following US-listed peers lower, amid concerns over competition from satellite operators and disruptive impact from agentic AI tools. Fluence Energy Inc. received another downgrade on Friday, with Jefferies cutting the energy storage company to hold from buy, citing a recent cut to the company’s outlook. Intuit shares are little changed in premarket trading, after the tax-preparation software company hosted an investor day where it gave financial targets and discussed its strategy to deliver higher growth. Analysts say the stock remains a show-me story as the company navigates the AI era. Macom Technology Solutions Holdings Inc. shares are up 2.1% in premarket trading, after BMO Capital Markets upgraded the semiconductor device company to outperform from market perform, seeing an attractive valuation in the wake of recent weakness. Netflix shares drop 2.9% in premarket trading as Wells Fargo Securities downgrades to underweight from equal-weight, citing “worrying” engagement trends. Nvidia Corp. Chief Executive Officer Jensen Huang expects to sell twice as many chips in the coming year, fueled by the spread of artificial intelligence across different industries. Stubhub shares gain 3.5% in premarket trading as Citi upgrades to buy from neutral, citing “robust” third-quarter trends. . Tyson Foods shares are up 1.4% ahead of the bell as JPMorgan upgrades the meat producer to overweight from neutral. Xenon shares tumble 27% in premarket trading Friday after the bio-pharmaceutical firm voluntarily paused enrollment in clinical studies of major depressive disorder (MDD) and bipolar depression (BPD). In other corporate news, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. founder Warren Buffett is stepping down as the company’s chairman to be replaced by his son Howard. SoftBank Group Corp. has increased its margin loan backed by shares of its chip unit Arm Holdings Plc by $5 billion to $25 billion, according to people familiar with the matter. Russia seized control of the local assets of Swiss food giant Nestle SA and French supermarket chain Auchan, placing their stakes in Russian businesses under temporary administration. More than a quarter of Anthropic PBC’s research and development work for artificial intelligence is driven by its Claude chatbot, according to the company. Morgan Stanley and CIBC have won the mandate to advise the Canadian government on selling the operating rights to the country’s four largest airports. Malaysia Airlines’s parent is said to be closing in on an order for Boeing 787 Dreamliners as the carrier seeks to renew its long-haul fleet. Today's quieter tone signals a notable shift for markets that started the week with Brent crude at a four-month high, 10-year Treasury yields at levels seen 19 years ago and chipmakers under pressure on concerns that AI poses an existential risk to humanity. Since then, a US interest-rate hike has helped shore up the Federal Reserve’s inflation-fighting credibility, worries over crude supplies from the Middle East have eased and a persistent supply-demand imbalance in chips continues to underpin robust profit outlooks for semiconductor companies. Friday’s main event saw the Bank of Japan raise its benchmark rate as widely expected, though in a split decision. The yen weakened 1.2% against the dollar after two board members voted against the hike, suggesting the bank may not embark on a series of increases as quickly as initially anticipated. Developments in the Middle East and the outlook for global rates will be the main steer for traders in the coming weeks, said Roberto Scholtes at Singular Bank. The risk of further energy-supply disruptions from the Iran war came back into view Friday as Saudi Aramco told some refining customers in Europe they won’t be allocated crude next month. “Energy prices and monetary policy expectations will remain the main market drivers until the third-quarter earnings season begins,” Scholtes said. “The US midterm elections will gradually move into the spotlight, especially if leading candidates put forward bold policy proposals.” An easing of geopolitical tensions should help both bonds and equities, according to Mohit Kumar at Jefferies. “The first couple of weeks of October could be a sweet spot to get some form of a deal between US and Iran, even if it’s a fudge,” Kumar wrote. “We are at a local peak in geopolitical tensions and see improvement in the coming weeks.” Friday's quad-witching option expiration may remove positioning that has dampened realized moves, Citadel Securities says, with about $7 trillion of options notional value set to expire, one of the largest ever. Meanwhile Bloomberg notes that the equity dispersion trade’s golden age may be ending, with single stock volatility’s premium relative to the VIX plunging since July. With the Fed’s communications blackout ending after Wednesday’s rate decision, focus on the policy outlook will shift back to the views of voting officials. Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman is scheduled to deliver a speech in London on Friday. US equity funds had the biggest weekly inflows in three months at $63.8 billion, according to BofA, citing EPFR data through Sept. 16. Index rebalances after the close tonight include Bloom Energy, Illumina and Everpure into the S&P 500 and SpaceX will get a weighting boost from a Nasdaq 100 rebalance. In poltiics, the US is expected to hold off announcing new tariffs on China and other trading partners until after next week’s summit between Presidents Xi Jinping and Donald Trump. AI is widely expected to be a central topic at the event, with access to advanced US chips and safety standards among key points of contention. And on the subject of AI, SoftBank increased its margin loan backed by shares of its chip unit Arm Holdings by $5 billion to $25 billion, as the conglomerate finds ways to fund its expanding investments in AI. Software’s recovery, having been left for dead earlier by in the year by perceived imminent AI threats, is the focus of today’s Tech Watch. Europe's Stoxx 600 falls 0.4% to 640.2 with Nestlé in the red after a decree from Russia’s President about its operations in the country. The telecom and insurance sectors weigh the most, while technology and healthcare are among the few gainers. Still, the region is set for its first weekly advance in three as oil retreats on optimism about diplomacy between the US and Iran. Here are some of the biggest movers on Friday: Infineon shares rise as much as 3.8% after being upgraded at Oddo BHF, which recommends investors return to the stock following a recent de-rating. Adecco rises as much as 2.1% as Bank of America says its underperform thesis on the company has played out, with the stock having derated ~40% between August 2023 and June 2026 due to two years of negative EPS revisions. Softcat shares fluctuate after the IT reseller raised guidance for FY26 operating profit growth, while announcing an acquisition that was partially funded by an equity raise. Nestlé shares drop as much as 1.9% after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree transferring stakes in the firm’s local unit into temporary administration. Orange shares fall as much as 4.5% after the carrier was downgraded to underweight by analysts at Morgan Stanley, who see multiple headwinds ahead for the carrier. Asian stocks rose, driven by gains in chipmakers as tech sentiment got a lift from declines in oil prices and a bullish outlook from Nvidia. Japanese stocks advanced after the nation’s central bank raised rates, as expected. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index climbed as much as 1% before paring some of the gains, with SK Hynix, Samsung and TSMC among the biggest boosts. A Bloomberg gauge of Asian chipmakers rose 3.5%, though most sectors beyond tech declined. South Korea’s Kospi led advances among regional benchmarks, rising 2.7%, while Taiwan, China and Hong Kong also gained. The tech-driven gains underscore the resilience of the AI trade even as the broader backdrop for Asian equities has become more challenging. The Fed Reserve and BOJ have tightened policy, while still-elevated crude and global bond yields have added pressure on financial conditions. Investors are still optimistic that strong tech earnings will help broader equities markets withstand headwinds. Chinese optical technology stocks rose after Huawei said it’s set to ship its first near-packaged optics modules in the coming quarters. Shares of Chinese robotics component suppliers extended gains after a local media report said that Tesla has begun a new round of audits at local firms to support mass production of its Optimus humanoid robot. Elsewhere, Philippines’ benchmark index was the biggest decliner in Asia and dropped the most in three weeks on expectations of higher local energy cost after rising oil prices. In FX, the yen tumbles to 158 as Bank of Japan Governor Ueda’s comments following a split-vote hike by the central bank failed to meet traders’ hawkish expectations. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index is up by 0.1% and currency moves beyond the yen are relatively muted. In rates, treasuries hold front-end-led losses in early US session, flattening key yield-curve spreads amid similar price action in bunds and gilts. US 2s10s is testing YTD lows reached in June, and 5s30s is lowest since March 2025, extending moves spurred by Wednesday’s Fed meeting.US front-end yields are 4bp-5bp cheaper on the day, flattening 2s10s by 2bp to 24bp, within 1bp of its June low; 5s30s is nearly 4bp flatter near 46bp; the 10-year is higher by 4bp near 4.97% with UK and German counterparts higher by 4.4bp and 2.5bp respectively. IG dollar issuance slate contains a couple of offerings so far; six were priced Thursday totaling $21 billion, with issuer paying about 3bp on deals that were 4.4 times oversubscribed. Dealer expectations for next week’s volume have been in the $35 billion area. Next week’s Treasury auctions include 2-, 5- and 7-year notes commencing Sept. 22. In commodities, WTI crude oil futures are flat at $96, erasing an earlier drop. Gold is rising, nearing $4,400/oz. US economic data slate includes August industrial production (9:15 a.m.) and August Leading Index (10 a.m.). Fed speaker slate includes Governor Bowman (9:30 a.m.) and Kansas City’s Schmid (11:45 a.m.). Market Snapshot Top Overnight News Pakistan’s army chief has urged Iran to try to rein in Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia, referencing their mutual defense agreement with Riyadh. FT China has privately asked Tehran to help rein in Yemen's Houthis after an appeal to Beijing by Saudi Arabia following the Iran-backed group's military blitz in the past week. RTRS The Trump administration has approved visas for top Iranian officials, including the president and foreign minister, to attend next week’s U.N. General Assembly high-level meeting in New York even as the two countries are locked in a stalemated war. AP Amazon said AI models should be released only when “ready and safe,” calling for rigorous testing, safeguards and industry cooperation with government. BBG Cyber researchers broke into OpenAI using its key rival Anthropic’s software, highlighting vulnerabilities in the ChatGPT maker’s security as leading AI companies face mounting scrutiny over safety. FT The BoJ has raised interest rates to a 31-year high, accelerating monetary policy normalization under mounting pressure from Washington but failing to arrest an ongoing slide in the yen. The BoJ’s policy board on Friday voted for a 0.25 percentage point increase by a 7-2 margin, taking its target rate to about 1.25 percent. FT Turkey turned to two major banks to oversee the liquidation of 131 investment funds holding more than $18 billion. The move follows a week of turmoil in Turkey’s fund industry after funds at Tera and Pusula said they were unable to meet some investor redemption requests. BBG Reserve Bank of Australia Gov. Michele Bullock warned Friday that the central bank’s concerns regarding stubborn inflation are materializing. Inflation remains “too high” and recent developments suggest that “some upside risks to inflation appear to be materializing,” Bullock said in a testimony before parliament. WSJ Strategists are the most bullish on European stocks for September since 2018, a Bloomberg survey showed, as strong earnings help cushion the impact of energy prices and rising bond yields. BBG OpenAI CEO Altman, NVIDIA (NVDA) CEO Huang and Qualcomm (QCOM) CEO Amon plan to attend the Trump-Xi dinner next week, with AI expected to be a key focus in the summit on September 24th: Politico The US administration is set to announce that all states will see MFN pricing for certain drugs in Medicaid programmes: Semafor US Department of Agriculture confirmed a case of New World screwworm in a horse in Grant County, New Mexico, marking the state's second case since the parasite entered from Mexico in June. A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of newsquawk APAC stocks were mostly higher as the region took impetus from the gains on Wall Street, where markets reversed the post-FOMC moves amid a Fed credibility boost and lower oil prices. ASX 200 lagged with the index range-bound trade as gains in tech and miners were counterbalanced by weakness in defensives, telecoms, energy and financials, while there were comments from RBA Governor Bullock that lowering inflation is essential and that the key question is whether the tightening in monetary policy to date will be sufficient to bring inflation back to the target in a reasonable time. Nikkei 225 rallied following the BoJ announcement to hike rates by 25bps, as widely expected, with the decision made by a 7-2 vote as Takaichi-appointed board members Asada and Sato dissented. The language from the central bank reaffirmed a hiking bias but didn't signal any major urgency, noting it will conduct monetary policy as appropriate from the perspective of sustainably and stably achieving the inflation target, while the latest inflation data from Japan printed softer-than-expected on all key metrics of the report. KOSPI advanced with tech stocks buoyed following the outperformance in the Nasdaq stateside, while South Korean President Lee ruled out sending troops to the Strait of Hormuz. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp conformed to the broad positive mood, with reports noting that the US is expected to delay announcing excess manufacturing capacity tariffs till after the Trump-Xi summit, while MOFCOM said Chinese and US trade teams remain in close contact over negotiations on mutual tariff reductions covering USD 30bln. In addition, the PBoC conducted 7-day and 14-day reverse repo operations ahead of the National Day holidays in early October. Top Asian News Japanese Finance Minister Katayama said they will work to maintain an orderly FX market and will not hesitate to conduct further coordinated forex intervention. She added that they maintain close communication with financial authorities of other nations on FX and that it is important to maintain order regarding exchange rates and interest rates. Japan Economy Minister Kiuchi expects the BoJ to conduct appropriate monetary policy to sustainably and stably achieve its price target while working closely with the government, adding that details of monetary policy are for the BoJ to decide. European bourses have started the final trading session of the week on the backfoot, despite the constructive risk tone in Asia-Pac equities and the downside seen in energy benchmarks. Optimism in Europe has risen and according to a Bloomberg poll, the STOXX 600 will finish 2026 at 670, implying gains of 5% from Wednesday's close. HSBC analysts highlight the improving macroeconomic data as a driver for the upbeat tone in Europe, while welcoming any downside in energy prices. Sectors point to a negative bias. Telecoms is the sector laggard, followed by Insurance and Retail. On the other hand, Tech is the sector outperformer, with Health Care and Industrials rounding out the sector gainers. Top European News ECB Consumer Expectations Survey (Aug): 1-year 3.0% (prev. 2.9%), 3-year 2.9% (prev. 2.7%), 5-year 2.5% (prev. 2.4%). UK Retail Sales (Aug MM) 0.5% vs. Exp. -0.2% (Prev. -0.5%). UK Retail Sales (Aug YY) 2.4% vs. Exp. 1.9% (Prev. 1.2%). UK Retail Sales ex Fuel (Aug MM) 0.6% vs. Exp. -0.2% (Prev. -0.9%). UK Retail Sales ex Fuel (Aug YY) 2.7% vs. Exp. 1.9% (Prev. 1.8%). German PPI (Aug MM) 1.1% vs. Exp. 0.4% (Prev. 1.1%). German PPI (Aug YY) 4.6% vs. Exp. 4.1% (Prev. 3.0%). FX Snapshot: G10s are mixed against the USD; the Aussie slightly outperforms, whilst the JPY is the clear laggard following the BoJ’s policy announcement. DXY is mildly firmer this morning and currently holds within a fairly narrow 100.19-38 range. The index still remains towards post-FOMC highs, benefiting from higher energy prices and as markets pull forward their calls for further hikes this year. The JPY is the clear underperformer this morning, after the BoJ decided to lift rates by 25bps (as expected), with the decision made by a 7-2 vote split. The two dissenters were PM Takaichi “reflationist” members; Asada noted that the economy was not strong enough, whilst Sato believed that price developments had not substantially accelerated. The announcement itself spurred immediate pressure in the JPY, given the two surprise dissenters and after the BoJ avoided any guidance surrounding a faster pace of rate hikes. Governor Ueda’s presser thereafter saw Ueda also strike a dovish tone, where he highlighted that easy monetary conditions are expected to be maintained, adding that rates have tightened, but bank lending and asset markets remain accommodative. USD/JPY is stronger by c. 1.3% on the session so far, and currently holding at the upper end of a 155.87-158.06 range. No doubt, if the theme of widening differentials between the Fed and BoJ returns, USD/JPY will likely head back towards the 158-160 range. EUR is mildly firmer this morning, amidst a slew of ECB speak, where a number of members are currently in Ireland for an informal meeting of EU ministers. ECB’s Kaasik and Kazaks struck a hawkish tone, with the latter suggesting that a September hike is unlikely to be the last, “unless we find ourselves in a very different scenario than the baseline”. Elsewhere, President Lagarde reiterated that they are not seeing second-round effects. A recent Bloomberg survey showed that economists believe that the Bank will wait until December before delivering a final interest-rate increase to quell inflation triggered by conflict in the Middle East. Fixed Income Global fixed benchmarks are lower this morning. USTs (-3 ticks) are trading on either side of the unchanged mark, whilst Bunds (-30 ticks) and Gilts (-41 ticks) underperform. Pressure today for the latter two is likely an accumulation of factors: 1) BoJ rate hike, 2) elevated energy prices, 3) paring of recent BoE-related strength, 4) hawkish central bank speak from the ECB. JGBs are net firmer today, following the BoJ’s decision to hike rates by 25bps to 1.25%. However, the decision was subject to dovish dissent, which saw PM Takaichi's “reflationist” appointees vote to hold rates; Asada noted that the economy was not strong enough, whilst Sato believed that price developments had not substantially accelerated. The presser thereafter saw Ueda also strike a dovish tone, where he highlighted that easy monetary conditions are expected to be maintained, adding that rates have tightened, but bank lending and asset markets remain accommodative. The JGB curve is steepening this morning (in contrast to global peers which are flattening), with underperformance in the short end given the dovish tone from the meeting/Ueda. USTs are flat, trading on either side of the unchanged mark. Some strength was seen in early morning trade alongside the pressure in energy prices, but this ultimately reversed. Ultimately, USTs are subdued this morning, following global peers with worldwide central banks shifting hawkish – the BoJ the latest to do so. Markets will get clarity out of the Fed later today, with Schmid and Bowman on the docket. It is worth highlighting that yields are bear-flattening this morning; this indicates that elevated energy prices and hawkish repricing are the main themes in traders’ minds. The US 2s10s currently holds around 24bps vs 34bps earlier in the week. Bunds have had a number of hawkish ECB speeches today, namely Kaasik and Kazaks. This may, in part, be weighing on the benchmark this morning. A recent Bloomberg survey showed that economists believe that the Bank will wait until December before delivering a final interest-rate increase to quell inflation triggered by conflict in the Middle East. Bunds will eye the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern state election, particularly in the context of the AfD’s strong showing in Saxony-Anhalt a few weeks ago. Australia sells AUD 1.0bln 1.00% November 2031 bonds: b/c 4.47x, average yield 4.9936%. Commodites Crude benchmarks continue to pull back from its peak seen earlier in the week, with escalatory strikes in the Gulf seemingly slowing down. There were a couple of UKMTO reports, which failed to move markets as traders now focus on next steps over any potential end to the war. Overnight, US President Trump told Axios he is at a "critical juncture" regarding the war in Iran, weighing whether to launch massive new attacks or pursue a different path to end the conflict. Further, this morning, a source close to the Iranian negotiating team said Tehran has informed Washington, via intermediaries, of its conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, with the minimum conditions based on the “Islamabad understanding”, according to Al-Akhbar. WTI Oct'26 rotates in a USD 99.39-101.57/bbl range while Brent Nov'26 trades either side of the USD 103/bbl mark (USD 101.92-104.27/bbl range). Precious metals continue to climb post-Fed, with spot gold currently trading at the upper end of its USD 4,334-4,400/oz range. The narrative behind the recent gold upside seems to come from lower yields and energy prices, tempering worries of inflation. 3M LME Copper regains the USD 14.5k/t handle and rose to levels just shy of USD 14.6k/t, as the red metal prepares for its 4th consecutive day of gains. Supporting copper gains are signs that Chinese demand is re-entering the market. The Yangshan premium, a gauge of copper demand, rose to its highest level since November 2022 while domestic copper production fell slightly in August. Saudi Arabia has sold about 60mln barrels of crude from its Ras Tanura port inside the Strait of Hormuz for loading in September and October, Reuters reported citing sources. Venezuela nears an agreement to move USD 4bln gold reserve to New York which would allow the interim government to access funding, according to FT. Central Banks BoJ hiked rates by 25bps to 1.25%, as expected, with the decision made by a 7-2 vote as board members Asada and Sato dissented and voted to hold. BoJ said it will continue to raise rates in response to economic and price developments as well as financial conditions. BoJ said inflation expectations are heightening moderately, with underlying inflation approaching 2%, and it will conduct monetary policy as appropriate from the perspective of sustainably and stably achieving the inflation target. Furthermore, it said the accommodative financial environment will be sustained after the policy rate change, thereby supporting economic activity, and it is necessary to pay attention to the impact of the Middle East situation on financial and FX markets, the economy and prices. In terms of the dissenters, who are both known reflationists appointed by PM Takaichi, BoJ's Asada considered that with the rate of increase in the core CPI below 2% recently, it could not necessarily be said that the economic situation was strong and it was desirable for the Bank to maintain the guideline for money market operations, while Sato considered current economic and price developments did not appear to have substantially accelerated compared with before, and in this context, it was not appropriate for the Bank to raise the policy interest rate at this time. Overall, Ueda’s press conference did not signal any urgency to accelerate the pace of tightening. He mentioned that easy monetary conditions are expected to be maintained, adding that rates have tightened, but bank lending and asset markets remain accommodative. One hawkish aspect of the presser was that Ueda suggested that the BoJ believes the phase of policy has changed. However, he later clarified that this meant that the objective is now to stabilise underlying inflation at around 2%, essentially removing the initial hawkish remark. Ueda also did not mention anything related to increasing the pace of future rate hikes, which further added to the dovish tone. RBA's Governor Bullock said various indicators continue to suggest labour market conditions remain close to, but a little tighter than full employment, while she added that monetary policy is well placed to respond to developments. Bullock said lowering inflation is essential, and the key question is whether the tightening in monetary policy to date will be sufficient to bring inflation back to the target in a reasonable time. Furthermore, she stated they are in a world of higher-for-longer oil prices and that businesses are now more inclined to pass on cost increases. ECB President Lagarde, speaking on RTE Radio, said growth is a bit more promising than we thought and that they are not seeing second round effects yet. She also reiterated a meeting-by-meeting approach. ECB's Vujcic said market bets on further ECB rate hikes are being largely driven by higher energy prices and will look at a wider set of economic indicators when deciding the next policy move. Vujcic said higher inflation through Autumn will dampen GDP. On the current rate hike pace, he said it is worth keeping for the time being. ECB's Kazaks, speaking to Bloomberg, said the ECB must do everything to avoid second round effects and that all meetings are live meetings. On the neutral rate, he said they are near the upper end of neutral and that quite likely restrictive policy will be needed. Elsewhere, Kazaks told Econostream that the September hike will unlikely to be the last "unless we find ourselves in a very different scenario than the baseline". Kazaks highlighted that an October hike would still be consistent with the September projections. On considering the size of the moves, he said that if the move in inflation is very strong or core inflation is moving up, the ECB can take bigger steps. ECB's Kaasik said more tightening needed if inflation risks materialise but that the exact level of neutral rate is not a big concern now. Geopolitics: Iran Source close to the Iranian negotiating team said Tehran has informed Washington, via intermediaries, of its conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, with the minimum conditions based on the “Islamabad understanding”, according to Al-Akhbar. US State Department said the US will continue to bar Iranian UN mission officials, visiting officials and their dependents from purchasing wholesale club memberships or luxury goods, and urged New York area retailers to avoid complicity in violations. US is reportedly expected to send MQ-9 Reaper drones to South America, CNN reported citing sources. The report added that the plan is part of counternarcotics and counterterror operations and that there are still discussions on whether to send some drones to the Middle East. UKMTO received a report of an incident in the Strait of Hormuz. The CSO of a vessel has reported a tanker being hit by an unknown projectile causing a fire, which was extinguished. IRGC said Togolese-flagged tanker 'Trend' was hit and stopped after a fire, while it stated the tanker violated Hormuz rules and that the US instigated the transit. Houthis are reportedly expanding its minefield in Bab al-Mandab and Dhubab, Al Araby reported. South Korea President Lee said several countries are deploying military assets near the Strait of Hormuz, and added that they won't deploy troops to join conflict but limited actions to safeguard South Korean economic interests and citizens are possible. Geopolitics: Ukraine/Other Turkish President Erdogan and US President Trump may discuss initiatives for negotiations on Ukraine in New York, RIA reported citing sources. US President Trump is making plans for the first-ever meeting with Venezuela's interim President Rodriguez as early as next week, although a meeting is not finalised, according to Axios. North Korea leader Kim's sister said there is no change to the course of strengthening nuclear war deterrence and the US-led multinational drills are the main source of worsening tensions on the peninsula. US Event Calendar 9:15 am: August Industrial Production MoM, est 0.3%, prior 0.2% 9:15 am: August Manufacturing Production MoM, est 0.3%, prior 0.2% 9:15 am: August Capacity Utilization, est 76.4%, prior 76.3% 10 am: August Leading Index, est 0.1%, prior 0.2% DB's Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap Welcome to the end of the week as I hit day 8 of manflu, a variant passed on by my 11-year-old daughter who was ill with it for precisely 18 hours. In other injury news, I've slightly sprained my wrist awkwardly cutting up a mango! I'll add that to the list of ailments my body is currently processing. Distracting me as I try to type through the slight pain, the main story overnight is that the Bank of Japan have delivered another 25bp rate hike, taking their policy rate up to its highest since 1995, at 1.25%. This is the second of the year and the 6th since they started hiking in March 2024. The move follows on from the Fed’s hike on Wednesday, and the ECB’s hike last week, which leaves us in little doubt we’re in a globally synchronised cycle of rate hikes again, with more likely ahead from all three. Having said that, it was a more dovish hike than expected, with Ayano Sato and Toichiro Asada calling for a hold on the grounds that Japan’s economic outlook was uncertain. Both dissenters were appointed by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi to the board. So there is some suggestion that this may infer less political support for the rate hike than has perhaps been indicated by US Treasury Secretary Bessent who has been quite firm on the fact that the US and Japan are aligned. So although the central bank reiterated that it will continue raising rates if economic and inflation conditions evolve as projected, the market has reacted to the two high profile dissenters. The Yen is -0.72% lower at 157.10, having been at around 153.40 at the start of the week and the JGB curve has steepened, with 2yrs -2.2bps and 30yrs +3.2bps. We'll see what the BOJ press conference brings at 7:30am London time. The BOJ decision came just hours after the release of August inflation data, which showed price pressures remaining broadly stable and close to the central bank’s target. Core CPI, which excludes volatile fresh food prices, rose 1.7% year-over-year in August, slightly below market expectations of 1.8% and down marginally from the previous reading. Meanwhile, core-core CPI, a key measure of underlying inflation closely monitored by the BOJ, remained unchanged at 1.9%. Headline CPI also increased 1.9% year-over-year, matching the pace recorded in the previous month and reinforcing the view that inflation remains relatively stable. The Nikkei (+1.67%) has moved higher on the back of the weaker Yen but Asia is stronger anyway following on from the global rally yesterday. The KOSPI (+2.59%) is leading regional gains, with semiconductor stocks extending yesterday’s rally. Meanwhile, mainland Chinese equities are posting solid advances, with the CSI 300 (+1.05%) and Shanghai Composite (+1.04%) both sharply higher, while the Hang Seng (+0.67%) is recording more modest gains. Elsewhere, the S&P/ASX 200 (-0.02%) is little changed and S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures are both +0.14% higher. The yuan has strengthened to its highest level in more than four years as the PBOC continue to guide the currency higher ahead of next week’s planned meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump, where trade relations are expected to be a key focus. The offshore yuan is advancing +0.14% to 6.695 per dollar, marking its strongest level since July 2022. The PBOC also set a firmer daily fixing for the eighth consecutive session, the longest such streak since 2023. Those overnight developments come after a very strong session yesterday, with markets rallying thanks to a clear drop in oil prices and a decent batch of US data. Indeed, the S&P 500 (+1.14%) posted its best day in over a month, whilst the 10yr Treasury yield (-9.2bps) saw its biggest daily decline since June as it ended a run of eight consecutive increases. So even though the first half of September was very weak, living up to the month’s bearish reputation, yesterday brought a clear shift in momentum and more positivity on the near-term outlook. The reality is that although seasonals matter, the oil price probably matters more at the moment. And yesterday the oil price decline was the biggest catalyst, with Brent crude having now fallen by more than 3.5% in the last couple of sessions, closing yesterday at $104.82/bbl, and now another -1.35% lower in Asia. In part, the move was supported by the previous day’s news that Saudi Arabia was working to restore the damaged East-West pipeline. But oil then took a further slide after a Reuters report yesterday that China had privately asked Iran to help rein in the Houthis. So that added to hopes that the supply disruption might fade, and Brent crude came down -0.95% on the day. With inflationary pressures coming down, that helped sovereign bonds to rally on both sides of the Atlantic. That was clearest for US Treasuries, as the Fed’s hike on Wednesday added to hopes that inflation would come down over the months ahead. So the 2yr yield (-7.3bps) was down to 4.66%, the 10yr yield (-9.2bps) fell back to 4.93%, and the 30yr yield (-7.7bps) fell to 5.28%. Interestingly, that now leaves the 2s30s yield curve at its flattest level since March 2025, at 62bps. Remember as well that the Fed’s blackout period around the meeting ends today, so we’ll start to hear from officials again and learn how they’re thinking about future rate hikes in the months ahead. Whilst Treasuries were rallying, it was also a strong day for equities, which recovered from the previous day’s declines after the Fed. That was partly thanks to lower energy prices, but we also had a strong batch of US labour market data which cemented the view that the economy remained in good shape. For instance, the weekly initial jobless claims fell to 196k in the week ending September 12 (vs. 207k expected). Moreover, the continuing claims for the previous week fell to the lowest since January 2024, at just 1.730m (vs. 1.779m expected). So that kept up the optimism around US growth, and the S&P 500 (+1.14%) bounced back after a run of 3 consecutive declines. Chip stocks led the gains, with the Philly semiconductor index (+3.14%) posting one of the biggest outperformances yesterday, but there was strength across the tech space, with the NASDAQ up +1.69%. Earlier in Europe, the main story came from the Bank of England, who kept rates on hold at 3.75%. The decision was in line with consensus, and the vote split of 6-3 to hold rather than hike was also expected, so there wasn’t a direct market reaction to that. However, there was a big rally in long-dated gilts after the BoE announced an adjustment in its QT plan, including an end to sales of longer maturity gilts. So they said that the gilts with redemption dates from 2049-2071 would be held to maturity by the Bank, with the purpose of indirectly backing current and future banknote issuance. Moreover, they said that QT sales would be paused until April 2027 as they worked through the operational details for the rest of the plan. So that meant the 30yr yield (-12.1bps) saw its biggest daily decline since May, coming down to 5.74%, whilst the 50yr yield (-17.9bps) saw its biggest decline since February 2023, coming down to 5.20%. Meanwhile, 10yr gilt yields (-7.4bps to 5.22%) extended their two-day move to -16.6bps, the sharpest such decline since last April. On the rates decision, the BoE statement was clear that the Bank might be edging towards a hike, saying that the risk of second-round effects on inflation “is greater the longer higher energy prices persist or are more volatile.” Moreover, they said that “the risks to the inflation outlook are tilted to the upside, and more so than at the time of the July Monetary Policy Report”. Nevertheless, the fact they held, and the vote split remained at 6-3, suggested there wasn’t immediate momentum for a hike, and market pricing slightly dialled back the chance of a hike by the next meeting in November. So on Wednesday, investors were pricing in a 93% chance of a hike by the time of the November meeting, but that was down to 83% by the close yesterday. In turn, that helped yields at shorter maturities to come down as well, with the 2yr yield (-2.2bps) falling to 4.73%. Elsewhere in Europe, the picture was also one of solid gains, as the respite on energy prices lifted assets across the continent. So that meant equities rebounded, with the STOXX 600 (+0.86%) posting its best daily performance in over two months. And for bonds, we saw 10yr yields on bunds (-2.9bps), OATs (-2.3bps) and BTPs (-2.4bps) all fall back as well. Looking at the day ahead, data releases include US industrial production and capacity utilization for August, along with UK retail sales and German PPI for August. We’ll also hear from ECB President Lagarde, the Fed’s Bowman and Schmid, and we’ll get the ECB’s latest Consumer Expectations Survey. Tyler Durden Fri, 09/18/2026 - 08:38
UN: Yemen violence forces 112,000 from homes, nearly 3,000 flee by sea | The Jerusalem Post
At least 112,000 people have been displaced inside Yemen within the last two weeks as fighting continues along the country's west coast amid a renewed conflict, while nearly 3,000 have fled by sea to Djibouti, the United Nations migration agency said on Friday. Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi terrorists have stepped up attacks on Saudi cities and energy infrastructure while advancing along Yemen's Red Sea coast towards the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a key shipping route. Responding to the Houthi offensive, the Saudi and Yemeni air forces have bombarded Houthi targets. Nearly 3,000 people have crossed the Gulf of Aden to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa in less than a week as escalating violence has forced more families to flee, Sandrine Desamours, the representative for the UN’s refugee agency, UNHCR, told reporters in Geneva via video link from Djibouti. The government of Djibouti is preparing for the arrival of up to 10,000 refugees - which will add acute pressure on the country’s health care and education services, she said. The UN International Organization for Migration said people are fleeing on overcrowded boats and arriving with very limited food and water. Most fleeing are Yemeni families seeking refuge in Djibouti, but IOM is also beginning to see a small number of migrants, mainly from Ethiopia, heading in the same direction. Additionally, authorities in Somaliland and Puntland have also reported increased arrivals from Yemen, including Yemeni refugees and Somali refugee returnees, though numbers remain in the hundreds for now, UNHCR said. UN: Yemen escalation is crisis on top of multiple crises UN agencies described the latest fighting as being a crisis on top of multiple crises, as the country’s health services and economy have been shattered amid a long civil war between forces of the internationally recognized, Saudi-backed administration and the Houthis, creating one of the world's biggest humanitarian crises. The Houthi advance along Yemen's Red Sea coast is bolstering Tehran’s hand in its conflict with the US, as the group tightens its control of the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a strategic chokepoint for global oil and commodities shipping, more than six months after US and Israeli attacks on Iran.
UK government's approach to Houthis may be a cause of economic crisis – Article in The Daily Telegraph - BBC News Arabic
UK government's approach to Houthis may be a cause of economic crisis – Article in The Daily Telegraph - BBC News Arabic (machine-translated headline from a Arabic-language source)
Yemen’s humanitarian crisis growing by the hour amid spike in displacement
Yemen’s humanitarian crisis growing by the hour amid spike in displacement People displaced by the renewed fighting in Yemen have described fleeing for their lives amid shelling and gunfire, aid agencies reported on Friday, while highlighting the dramatic increase in humanitarian needs in the country and in Djibouti, where thousands have sought shelter. “Our resources are very, very, very limited and our stocks will be depleted very soon,” said Abdusattor Esoev, Chief of Mission in Yemen for the UN migration agency, IOM. In just two weeks since clashes erupted between Saudi-backed Yemeni Government forces and Iran-backed Houthi militia, more than 112,000 people have been displaced across Aden, Hudaydah, Abyan and Ta’iz.Taiz. Years of conflict, economic collapse and environmental disaster have already displaced nearly 4.8 million Yemenis, according to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR. The rapidly escalating hostilities along Yemen’s western coast have also forced more than 3,000 people to embark on dangerous boat journeys across the Bab el-Mandeb Strait to safety in Djibouti, where host communities risk being overwhelmed. Saving lives “Yemen civilians are already bearing the consequences of renewed full-scale hostilities and we urge all parties and those with influence over them to act immediately to de-escalate, protect civilians, and facilitate humanitarian access. Preventing further loss of life must take precedence,” said Alessandra Vellucci, Director of the UN Information Service in Geneva. Speaking at a media briefing, Ms. Vellucci warned that the delivery of UN humanitarian assistance in Houthi-controlled areas had become “untenable”, with UN personnel detained and the global body’s premises occupied by representatives of the Yemeni opposition forces. Locked up “As of today, 73 UN personnel remain arbitrarily detained by the Houthi de facto authorities, some of them since 2021. In addition, five former UN personnel and dozens of personnel from non-governmental organizations, civil society organizations, and diplomatic missions remain detained,” Ms. Vellucci continued. Echoing concerns about the humanitarian crisis, IOM chief of mission in Yemen Mr. Esoev urged the international community “to come to Yemen’s aid” with urgently needed support including food, shelter, health, water and sanitation for all those uprooted by the violence. Give me shelter He recounted the testimony of one woman with four small children who had been displaced in Taiz, where she gave birth to a baby in the open, “without shelter, medical care and any other assistance”. For protection, her family found a torn piece of plastic tarpaulin “barely covering their heads. These are the real cases that we are seeing in the field,” the IOM official said. Before the latest escalation in Yemen, nearly half of the country’s 41 million people needed aid, with one in two people in Government-controlled areas in the grip of high levels of hunger, according to UN-backed food insecurity experts, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) platform. Also briefing from Yemen, the UN sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA, highlighted growing concerns for the many women-led households where mothers are the sole breadwinners, such as Aziza, in Ras Al-Arah. “She came from Mocha with her four daughters and she's one of those who had to run away under the shelling, got burned because of the shelling, and did not stop running until she could reach a safe place,” said Francesco Galtieri, Country Representative, UNFPA. “She told to us that she's exhausted, and she really hopes that beyond having kept their lives, there will be something else they can build.” The emergency has increased health needs across Yemen where the UN World Health Organization (WHO) stressed that the country is already facing “multiple concurrent health risks”, including cholera, measles, dengue, diphtheria, malnutrition and trauma injuries. In an assessment carried out before the escalation in fighting, “already out of more than 5,000 health service delivery units, only 60 were fully functioning,” WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic told journalists in Geneva. Dangerous crossing In addition to those displaced in Yemen, thousands more have sought safety in Djibouti, by crossing the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Most arrivals have been reported in Obock, Khor Angar, Moulhoule and Godoria. “At the reception centres, the new arrivals recount fleeing sudden bombardment, shelling, gunfire and having to fear for their lives; mothers quickly gathering their children and whatever they can,” said Sandrine Desamours, Representative in Djibouti, for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR. “We saw them arrive with very little, some arriving without their family members. And others are also arriving for the second time, having already fled Yemen during the 2015 crisis.” The UN refugee agency official noted that many of the men who have arrived had left family members in Yemen but were “hoping to be able to go back to Yemen to retrieve them. Unfortunately…there is a shortage of fuel in Yemen and they are not able to return.” In some cases, the Djibouti Coast Guard has given fuel to some boats left stranded in the open seas and tugged others to safety. “We are discussing with the Government various ways that we can provide assistance so that people can reach the shores and are able to be provided with protection, peace, safety, and assistance,” Ms. Desamours continued. IOM Chief of Mission in Djibouti, Alexandre Coissac, explained that the 3,000 refugee arrivals from Yemen represented a significant challenge to “a generous country that is already hosting a large number of refugees”.
Headlines for September 18, 2026
When we speak with viewers, listeners and readers, the same message always comes through: people are hungrier than ever for Democracy Now!’s independent journalism featuring authentic voices. If you believe uncompromising reporting is essential to a functioning democracy, please donate today. Every dollar makes a difference. Thank you so much! Democracy Now! Amy Goodman When we speak with viewers, listeners and readers, the same message always comes through: people are hungrier than ever for Democracy Now!’s independent journalism featuring authentic voices. If you believe uncompromising reporting is essential to a functioning democracy, please donate today. Every dollar makes a difference. Thank you so much! Democracy Now! Amy Goodman We rely on contributions from you, our viewers and listeners to do our work. If you visit us daily or weekly or even just once a month, now is a great time to make your monthly contribution. Please do your part today. A United Nations fact-finding mission on Iran says it’s found evidence the U.S. committed war crimes in two attacks that killed at least 177 civilians—many of them children. In a report released Thursday, experts commissioned by the U.N.’s Human Rights Council cited U.S. strikes on a school in Minab and a sports complex in Lamerd, writing, “…the mission found reasonable grounds to believe the United States committed the war crime of launching indiscriminate attacks resulting in the loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects.” The White House responded in a statement, “The UN Human Rights Council has accomplished nothing for human rights while spouting unserious nonsense for decades.” Ships continue to come under fire in the Strait of Hormuz. Earlier today, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it struck a Togo-flagged tanker, and several U.S. media outlets are reporting Iranian drones and missiles struck a U.S.-contracted ship near the Strait of Hormuz earlier this week. That attack reportedly injured several crew members, including U.S. personnel. On Thursday, President Trump told Axios he was nearing a decision on whether to “annihilate” Iran. Trump also dismissed surging U.S. gas costs as a small price to pay for his war. Trump was speaking in North Carolina at a rally for Republican Senate candidate Michael Whatley. President Donald Trump: “I have to say, you have a little higher, you have a higher. It’s a very inexpensive price to pay for what we’ve done. Remember that it’s a little more.” In Yemen, the United Nations warns the number of people displaced by fighting between Houthi militias and Saudi-backed Yemeni government forces has soared to 112,000 and is continuing to climb, as both sides trade cross-border strikes. On Thursday, Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi rejected claims by Saudi Arabia and its allies that his forces had targeted the holy city of Mecca in a drone attack, calling the claim “an ugly lie”. He said his fighters were focused on attacking Saudi military sites and oil infrastructure. Meanwhile the Trump administration said Thursday it had approved the sale of Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, at a cost of over $24 billion. The transaction would require congressional approval. A coalition of Palestinian and progressive groups is urging universities, think tanks, elected officials, and others to refuse to hire or collaborate with a group of 20 former Biden officials accused of “promoting, lying about, and covering up the Gaza genocide.” The “Drop the Genocide 20” campaign is targeting several former Biden staffers, including Antony Blinken, who served as secretary of state; Jake Sullivan, former national security advisor; and Lloyd Austin, Biden’s secretary of defense—all of whom were pivotal in backing Israel’s war on Gaza. Others include former White House Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk, former national security advisor John Kirby, and Linda Thomas-Greenfield, who served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Since his time as secretary of state, Blinken was given a book deal with Crown, an imprint of Penguin Random House, and has often participated in public speaking events, including at Harvard’s Kennedy School. The campaign is also demanding the Biden staffers be banned from any future political appointments. The coalition includes Just Foreign Policy, Peace Action, the Palestinian Youth Movement, the Democratic Socialists of America, and About Face, a group representing antiwar veterans. In a statement, it said, “The culture of bipartisan elite immunity is what drives U.S. war crimes and support for war crimes. … This dynamic is a key reason Biden officials knew they could arm, defend, and cover up the genocide in Gaza for 15 months, and simply move back into liberal spaces, nonprofits, and future governments.” Russian strikes on Ukraine’s capital region injured at least 19 people on Thursday, including two children. In Odesa, seven people were injured, including two children; while in Zaporizhzhia a Russian first-person-view drone struck a passenger bus, injuring eight commuters. Separately, a Russian jet-powered drone hit a shopping mall, injuring one person and triggering a massive fire. This is Anna, a 32-year-old Zaporizhzhia resident who was out with her husband when the drone struck nearby. Anna: “We went out for a walk and didn’t hear the jet-powered Shahed drone. It’s hard to hear it now. It’s not like the Shahed drones used to be. … The Russians are starting to threaten us, the ordinary people, in the hope that people will rise up. But that won’t happen. We are strong, we are free, and we will stand firm.” On Thursday, Ukrainian forces struck one of Russia’s largest oil refineries in the city of Yaroslavl north of Moscow. The attack came after President Trump on Sunday told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to halt attacks on Russian diesel infrastructure, and as U.S. diesel prices hit a record high of nearly $6.40 a gallon. Earlier today, Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in a speech to parliament that Moscow is planning hybrid strikes with drones or rockets on Poland and other European countries that support Ukraine. And Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico said Europe is closer than ever to a large-scale war with Russia. The U.S. House of Representatives voted Wednesday to approve new sanctions on Iran and Russia. The legislation passed the Senate last month; it’s named the Lindsey Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, after the late South Carolina Republican Senator who was an outspoken proponent of both arming Ukraine and attacking Iran. The Kremlin said in response that new sanctions would make it harder to reach a peace deal in Ukraine. The White House has withdrawn its nomination of Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper, to lead Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. Schroyer currently serves as an adviser to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and has no previous experience with ICE. In more immigration news, lawyers who spoke to The New York Times say federal agencies — such as U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services — are rejecting and heavily redacting vital documents and records needed by immigrants to prove they have permission to be in the U.S. and fight their deportation. Federal agencies are also claiming these records do not exist. The Guardian reports ICE has stopped tracking data on miscarriages in its custody as the agency detains a record number of pregnant women and teenagers. ICE recorded at least 18 miscarriages during the first nine months of the Trump administration but no data has been recorded since October of last year. Women and girls in ICE custody have repeatedly decried medical neglect. A federal immigration agent charged with shooting a Venezuelan man appeared before a Minnesota judge Thursday following months of evading arrest. ICE officer Christian Castro faces felony assault charges and was initially arrested in Texas, but Trump ally Gov. Greg Abbott refused to extradite Castro to Minnesota. Castro also faces a separate hearing today, Friday, in federal court for charges that he lied and attempted to cover up the January shooting of Venezuelan immigrant Julio Sosa-Celis, who was wounded in the leg. This is Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty. County Attorney Mary Moriarty: “The process of holding Mr. Castro accountable for his firing a weapon through the front door, striking Julio Sosa Solis, endangering the lives of others and lying to law enforcement has begun, despite the best efforts of the Texas governor to ignore both the United States Constitution and crystal clear Supreme Court precedent.” The Trump administration continues deportations to Haiti with a fourth flight arriving at the international airport in Cap-Haïtien last week. This comes as a new report published by the Ohio Immigrant Alliance says the detention of Haitians has surged by 142% at four immigration jails in Ohio since the end of Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, in late July. The group says ICE has accelerated the arrests of Haitians living in Ohio by racial profiling community spaces including near schools and apartment buildings, detaining people at their ICE appointments and placing ankle monitors, and collaborating with state and local police. Amnesty International is calling for the release of two men deported from the U.S. and sent to Equatorial Guinea who have been detained by local police forces and may face torture. One of them is Ahmed Soliman, a 30-year-old gay asylum seeker from Egypt who was living in Arizona when he was detained by ICE despite being granted protections by a U.S. immigration court. The men were reportedly brutally beaten, and Amnesty believes they were arrested for speaking out about the inhumane conditions endured by U.S. deportees while confined in a decommissioned hotel in the city of Malabo. The deportees have also faced threats from armed forces. CNN is reporting that more than 300 workers from South Korea who were swept up in a federal immigration raid at a Hyundai electric-vehicle manufacturing plant in Georgia and deported last year have filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration. Last September, nearly 500 federal, state and local agents descended on the plant and arrested hundreds of workers who say they were held in inhumane conditions, not provided interpreters, and shackled and forced to sign documents they did not understand. The plaintiffs said this resulted in “intentional infliction of emotional distress, humiliation … and lasting psychological trauma.” A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has ordered the Trump administration to give at least 30 days’ notice before making any major changes to the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Thursday’s emergency ruling came after President Trump said he would withhold funding for renovations to the Kennedy Center — essentially condemning it — unless he’s allowed to inscribe his name on the building. On Wednesday, a New York Times photographer captured images of Trump aboard Air Force One looking at a poster board appearing to show a building reduced to rubble, along with the caption “Kennedy Center DEMOLISHED.”
United Nations says US may have committed war crimes in Iran: What it means
UN probe finds US unlawfully struck an Iranian school and sports centre, killing children; White House rejects findings.
‘My children did not attack Iran’: 2bn South Asians suffer from distant war
A quarter of the world’s population faces a surging cost of living crisis because of the wars in the Middle East.
The Great Diesel Crisis - How Policy Choices Made The West Vulnerable
The Great Diesel Crisis - How Policy Choices Made The West Vulnerable Authored by Daniel Lacalle, How taxes, regulation, refinery closures, sanctions and declining domestic production turned a geopolitical shock into a diesel-price crisis Do not blame diesel prices on the Iran war or the disruption of the Strait of Hormuz. The geopolitical risk premium attached to oil prices is relevant, but the market was already weakened by policy choices. Europe has taxed motor fuels heavily, imposed escalating regulatory and carbon costs across the supply chain, closed refining capacity, sanctioned major sources of refined-product supply, and discouraged investment in domestic oil and gas production. Today's refined product system is smaller, less flexible and more import-dependent, and, as such, every geopolitical disruption produces a larger price shock. Diesel prices rise faster than crude because diesel suffers its own supply constraints, and these are politically imposed, not due to a war. In the United States, retail diesel reached an all-time high of $5.85 per gallon on 4 September 2026. At the same time, the U.S. Gulf Coast diesel crack spread, the benchmark measure of diesel relative to crude, surged to multi-year highs. Therefore, the problem was more the availability of middle distillates rather than crude alone. U.S. refineries were operating at about 98% utilisation, leaving little spare capacity to offset another outage. Globally, the impact is significant. Current supply losses include refinery disruption in the Middle East linked to the Iran war and reduced Russian diesel availability following Ukrainian attacks on refining infrastructure and export restrictions. All these elements add to the geopolitical risk premium, but they are magnified by the absence of spare refining capacity and the limits to regional supply. Middle Eastern refinery disruptions have risen to almost 3.0 million barrels per day. Saudi Arabia's Jizan refinery, with a capacity of 400,000 barrels per day, was one of the facilities where exports slumped. Additionally, Russian exports have plummeted. Russia was one of the world's largest diesel exporters, but its seaborne diesel exports in June 2026 fell to 426,000 barrels per day from 827,000 barrels per day a year earlier. Refinery damage, domestic-supply priorities and export restrictions all affected the stability of an already fragile market. However, these disruptions explain the timing of the latest surge, but they do not explain why importing economies entered the shock with so little capacity to absorb it. That is where interventionist policies have created the biggest damage. European motorists do not pay diesel prices driven by crude, refining and logistics costs. The biggest driver is a tax-and-regulation-heavy final price. Direct taxes alone represented an average of 52.1% of the final price of Euro-super 95 petrol in the European Union, with several countries above 55%. Consumers pay more in fuel taxation than for the crude oil, refining and logistical components combined. Diesel taxation varies by country, but the same structural tax burden remains. When we add excise duties and VAT, governments have created a large, rigid fiscal floor to fuel prices. When crude rises, the tax-inclusive base increases the final bill. However, when crude falls, large fixed tax components mean that the price paid by households and businesses does not fall proportionately. The real policy burden is wider than the excise duty displayed at the service station. Costs are accumulated throughout the chain. From royalties and taxes on production; environmental compliance; energy costs and carbon charges at refineries; corporate and local taxes; regulated fees for storage and infrastructure; labour levies; financing costs created by regulatory uncertainty; and compliance costs for distribution and retail, the energy chain is a massive cash machine for governments. Many of these costs are not always shown as "fuel tax," but they are passed through to the final price. Furthermore, the effect is cumulative. Europe has not merely taxed fuels at the point of sale, it has piled fiscal and quasi-fiscal costs from exploration and importation through refining, storage, transport and retail distribution. That makes the retail price structurally less responsive to lower crude prices and more vulnerable to supply shocks. The second structural problem is the loss of refining capacity. The United States did not lose refining flexibility because of one executive order or one EPA rule. It was a cumulative policy tsunami. Obama's air-quality regulations and renewable-fuel mandates added compliance and capital costs, while Biden retained and expanded renewable-fuel obligations, restricted small-refinery relief and reinforced a policy environment in which long-lived petroleum investments faced greater regulatory risk and higher costs. The clearest consequence has appeared in California, where stringent state regulation, expensive compliance and mandated energy-transition policies have coincided with the closure of major refineries. The result is not lower dependence on fuels in the short term, but less domestic capacity to produce them, and greater vulnerability when global diesel supply is disrupted. Fortunately, the United States is not suffering an enormous diesel shortage problem as Europe's, because total U.S. crude-oil refining capacity did not fall between 2008 and 2026, standing at 18.16 million barrels per day. In Europe, on comparable tax-inclusive retail prices, the EU average is about $8.90 per U.S. gallon, versus $5.97 per gallon in the United States, or 49% higher. Several European markets were close to $10.70-$10.90 per gallon as of September 11th, 2026. Between 2020 and 2024, European refining capacity fell from about 15.3 million barrels per day to 14.7 million barrels per day, a reduction of nearly 600,000 barrels per day. Europe has lost more than 20% of its refining capacity since 2009. Refineries have been shut, converted to import terminals or biorefineries, reducing conventional crude-processing capacity just when global diesel supply has become more problematic. A refinery may appear unnecessary during periods of large imports and open trade routes. However, it becomes strategic when imported diesel is disrupted. Closing a refinery does not eliminate domestic demand for diesel. It converts domestic production capacity into an additional need for imported product and foreign refining capacity. The EU's decision to restrict Russian petroleum products did not eliminate Europe's demand for transport, agricultural and industrial fuel. Now diesel must be delivered from more distant suppliers, with longer routes, high freight costs and more exposure to congestion in the Red Sea or the Strait of Hormuz. Sanctions may have created an indirect boomerang effect, making Europe more dependent. In January 2026, the EU also banned imports of petroleum products refined from Russian crude in third countries, closing the so-called refining loophole. That restricted available supply even more. Sanctions are justified as a geopolitical tool. But they became very expensive, especially when the EU's policy framework disincentivizes refining investment at home. Restricting a key supplier while shrinking local refining capacity is a dangerous combination, and governments cannot expect consumers and businesses to be shielded from a global refined-products shock. Thus, the EU has created a suicidal combination instead of a security of supply strategy. Another important aspect is the limits to North Sea production. The North Sea is a mature basin, and its production decline is a reality. UK North Sea oil and gas production fell by 72% between 1999 and 2025. However, natural decline does not make policy irrelevant. High windfall taxation, uncertainty over fiscal terms, restrictions on new licensing and the broader political message that hydrocarbon investment is not desirable reduce incentives to maintain infrastructure, pursue incremental projects, explore and develop viable resources. Such policies may not change next month's global diesel price by themselves, but they have an important impact on supply, investment and infrastructure available. UK government policy confirmed a ban on new licences for new North Sea oil and gas fields, while allowing some exceptions linked to existing fields and infrastructure. The strategic impact is still clear. A country facing declining production and shrinking refining capacity becomes more dependent on imported oil and refined products at the time when global trade routes are closing. Domestic crude is not the same as domestic diesel. However, domestic output is essential, as it reduces import needs, supports regional infrastructure and refining optionality, improves the balance of supply during disruption and limits exposure to external suppliers. Thus, abandoning this capacity without a truly scalable substitute is a policy decision with massive security-of-supply consequences. Europe's policy framework adds more restrictions. Refining is capital-intensive, energy-intensive and emissions-intensive. Carbon taxes, environmental mandates, compliance obligations, high electricity and gas costs, and regulatory risk make investment unviable and closures more likely. Can it get worse? The next step of the EU framework could add another direct challenge. The ETS2 emissions-trading system is scheduled to apply to fuels used in buildings and road transport from 2027, subject to its implementation rules and safeguards. It is designed to place a carbon price on suppliers of those fuels. This makes a market already burdened by high excise duties, VAT and supply constraints will face another structural cost layer. The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism does not directly tax diesel at the forecourt, but it will raise costs for carbon-intensive inputs such as steel, cement, aluminium, fertilisers, hydrogen and imported electricity. Those costs are essential for refinery maintenance, tanks, pipelines, and transport infrastructure. All these political decisions raise the cost of keeping Europe's energy system functioning. Diesel is not a discretionary consumer good. It is the engine of the real economy. Without affordable diesel, freight transport, farming equipment, construction machinery, industrial logistics, emergency services, parts of mining and maritime activity, and parts of distribution are going to add more inflationary pressures. The diesel shock does not end at the service station. Higher diesel costs will raise the cost of moving food from farms to warehouses and supermarkets; carrying inputs to factories; delivering medicines and manufactured goods; and operating machinery at construction sites. Businesses already suffering weak margins will pass those costs into final prices. Policy-created diesel inflation creates an economically disastrous second-round effect. This will hit transport, food, goods and services even after the war ends. A logical energy policy should be focused on affordability, availability, and security of supply. Dismantling the physical capacity that keeps the economy supplied during an energy transition just demolishes the economy and achieves the opposite of what politicians want. The West becomes more dependent and poorer. Europe cannot tax, regulate and limit the energy system across every stage of the value chain, close the industrial assets needed to process fuels, limit investment in production and then act surprised when diesel becomes scarce and expensive. Developed economies should preserve and modernize strategic refining capacity rather than treating it as a disposable legacy asset, eliminate the cumulative tax, carbon and regulatory burdens that destroy energy competitiveness, and support domestic energy production. Tyler Durden Fri, 09/18/2026 - 06:30
Israel is killing the people who could end its wars
From Iran to Gaza and Lebanon, assassinations have repeatedly removed figures capable of negotiating an end to conflict.
Bab el-Mandeb: How did the Houthis reach Saudi Arabia's strategic vulnerability? - BBC News Arabic
Bab el-Mandeb: How did the Houthis reach Saudi Arabia's strategic vulnerability? - BBC News Arabic (machine-translated headline from a Arabic-language source)
Oman oil escape route: How ship-to-ship transfers work — despite big risks
Oman oil escape route: How ship-to-ship transfers work — despite big risks Oman’s Sohar port is becoming a popular spot for ship-to-ship oil transfers amid continued Hormuz blockade. Saudi Arabia’s oil exports have been disrupted after Iran-aligned Houthis damaged its key East-West pipeline, which helped circumvent the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz – a global oil chokepoint. With the strait in effect closed and Bab al-Mandeb falling under Houthi control, Riyadh has been forced to find ways to export its oil. It is now increasingly offering crude to buyers through ship-to-ship transfers off Oman. As commercial ships are increasingly refusing to pass through the strait due to the conflict, Saudi Arabia is transporting the crude to Oman’s Sohar port, located just outside the strait, where the oil is transferred from Saudi tankers to others. Iran closed the strait, through which nearly a fifth of pre-war global energy passed, in response to the United States-Israeli war, and has used the waterway as leverage in the talks. Media reports suggest that the Hormuz closure and rising oil prices have pushed the US and its allies in the region to adopt shadow tactics, much like what Iran has been doing for years to export its own crude. So, what are ship-to-ship transfers, and are they safe? Where are these ports? Two ports that have become central to bypassing the Strait of Hormuz are Sohar and another off the coast of Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates. Sohar is a major deepwater industrial hub that handles substantial bulk cargo, petrochemicals and container traffic. Its strategic position has allowed international shipping lines to bypass the narrow Gulf bottleneck while maintaining direct overland connectivity to Arabian Peninsula markets. The UAE’s Port of Fujairah is situated on the country’s eastern coast and serves as one of the world’s largest bunkering and crude oil storage hubs. Its open-ocean anchorage provides a crucial offshore staging area for ship-to-ship transfers and energy exports outside the Strait of Hormuz. These ports are close to the boundaries drawn by the Persian Gulf Strait Authority, the new Iranian body established to manage the Strait of Hormuz. The Iranian authorities have attacked ships that they say use unauthorised routes – the southern route of the strait, closer to Omani waters – to transit the waterway. The US military has reportedly been assisting scores of these secretive ship-to-ship oil transfers to keep Gulf energy exports flowing, starting from early May this year. What are ship-to-ship transfers and how do they happen? Ship-to-ship (STS) transfers are maritime exchanges where cargo — read crude oil or liquefied natural gas (LNG) here — is transferred directly between two vessels at sea. STS transfers serve as a critical logistical bridge when direct port access is blocked or restricted. The companies need to undertake meticulous coordination amid favourable sea conditions to prevent spills and collisions. One vessel, often the larger ship, maintains a steady course or anchors. The manoeuvring ship approaches slowly, followed by hulls brought parallel, protected by pneumatic rubber fenders deployed along the ship sides to absorb impacts. Their trackers are turned off to maintain secrecy and avoid detection. After some mandatory safety checks, the discharging ship’s pumps move the oil through the connected hoses while monitoring pressure and weather. Who is engaging in ship-to-ship transfers and why? Riyadh relied on the East-West 1,200km (746-mile) pipeline, which connects the kingdom’s main oil-producing fields in the east of the country with Yanbu port on the Red Sea coast in the west, to export oil. With its closure after recent drone attacks, Riyadh’s first option becomes “shipping more crude from its Gulf terminals through the Strait of Hormuz, including ship-to-ship transfers outside the strait, such as Sohar in Oman,” said Rishi Rajanala, research specialist in Oil Americas at LSEG Data & Analytics. “Gulf producers have already been moving part of their exports this way, but volumes depend on tanker availability, insurance and freight costs, and remain well below pre-war levels,” he added. Starting this month, Hormuz-route exports have “edged higher, over 2 mb/d [million barrels per day] in the first two weeks, roughly 1 mb/d above August,” said Rahul Choudhary, VP Upstream Research, Rystad Energy. He added that the uptick is expected to rise further this month as “already evident in Aramco offering additional loadings to Asian refiners out of Sohar”. “Saudi Arabia can lean further on dark tanker activity in the coming days to offset Yanbu losses,” he added, referring to Saudi Arabia losing access to the Red Sea for shipping. But it isn’t only Saudi Arabia. Reports from independent trackers and the media have also identified Kuwait and Qatar as relying on similar tactics at times to transit cargoes past the Strait of Hormuz. Are ship-to-ship transfers safe? Ship-to-ship transfers are relatively dangerous, especially when being taken up in shadows — and also inefficient compared with standard shipping by vessels. Experts note that unregulated STS transfers often rely on ageing vessels with poor hull maintenance, uninspected hoses, and turned-off AIS tracking without insurance coverage. TankerTrackers, a platform that monitors global oil shipments, said last week that ship-to-ship transfers are rising. “Over the past 14 days, there were 7.15 million barrels per day being exchanged,” the monitor said, quoting AIS numbers and satellite imagery. The monitor added that it represents an increase of 56 percent compared with the previous month. What’s the advantage of ship-to-ship transfers? Despite the risks, ship-to-ship transfers also carry an upside in a volatile landscape like the Middle East today. Ships and tankers belonging to major transport companies are unwilling to enter the Strait of Hormuz because of the threat of attacks from either Iran or the US. At the same time, countries in the Gulf need to get as much oil and gas out through the Strait of Hormuz as possible. So these countries, in effect, bear the risk, sending their tankers and ships, often with trackers switched off, just across the Strait of Hormuz, where traditional oil and gas carriers wait in safer waters. These carriers then ferry the oil and gas to markets in China, India, South Korea, Japan and elsewhere. Who provides insurance for such ship-to-ship transfers? For traditional insurers, ship-to-ship transfers can be “particularly complicated”, said Oscar Seikaly, CEO of the NSI Insurance Group. Any loss could involve the physical vessels and their cargo, but also “pollution and collision liabilities, cargo insurance, war-risk cover,” and other factors, he said. “Underwriters may also impose navigational warranties, security conditions, additional war premiums or restrictions,” he told Al Jazeera. However, he pointed out, “most of the oil that is being moved belongs to the national oil companies of the respective country”. Therefore, Seikaly said, many rely on sovereign-backed self-insurance arrangements and private insurance markets. “During wartime or other high-risk disruptions, insurers are unlikely to provide broad cover to include ship-to-ship transfers,” he said. “As a result, a significant share of the risk may ultimately remain with the producing country rather than being transferred fully to commercial insurers.”
Iran claims it struck oil tanker in Strait of Hormuz
Iran's Revolutionary Guards have said they struck an oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, according to state news agency IRNA, as a British maritime agency also reported an attack. Iran has maintained its stranglehold on the strategic strait as Washington continues pressing its counter-blockade of Iranian ports during the Middle East war. The Islamic republic wants to charge ships for passage, attacking vessels it accuses of attempting to circumvent its preferred route. "The Togo-flagged oil tanker 'Trend' had been targeted and detained after a fire broke out on board" late yesterday, the statement said, calling it an attempted "illegal passage". Early today, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said a ship was hit by an "unknown projectile", causing a fire that was extinguished. The monitoring agency had also reported a "security incident" in Hormuz late last night, without giving details. It was unclear if the IRGC and UKMTO reports referred to the same incident. Pakistan vows to defend ally Saudi 'to any extent' Meanwhile, Pakistan's military spokesman said his country will "go to any extent" to defend ally Saudi Arabia, as the kingdom comes under increased attack from Yemen's Houthi forces. Houthi forces reported fresh Saudi airstrikes this week, as Riyadh accused the group of launching a "cowardly" attack targeting Islam's holy city of Mecca, prompting a wave of outrage from around the Muslim world. In an interview yesterday with Arab News, Pakistan's military spokesman Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said his country would back Saudi Arabia "both diplomatically and physically". "We will go to any extent for the security of (the two holy sanctuaries) and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia," he said. Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey last month signed the so-called Mecca Joint Defence Agreement, committing the three countries to mutual defence in the event of any of them being attacked. The pact came against a backdrop of war between the United States and Iran and attacks in the region from Tehran-backed Houthi rebels. "Pakistan fully stands with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, both diplomatically and physically," Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry told Arab News in an interview yesterday.
A Pivotal Moment in Uniting Post-Assad Syria
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which long enjoyed de facto autonomy in north-eastern Syria, have dissolved. But tensions in the region remain high as talks about integration with the central state proceed. Further compromise would set a useful precedent for other parts of the country.
The Houthis’ Advance to Bab al-Mandab: Has Yemen’s War Returned?
Tuesday, 22 September 202610am Washington, DC | 4pm Brussels | 5pm SanaaPlease register here if you would like to attend this online event.
Will Yemen become Saudi Arabia's Vietnam?
Iran's Yemeni ally Ansar Allah—widely known as the Houthis—has once again stunned the world with its intensified strikes on Saudi Arabia and lightning offensives against rival forces on the ground, putting the Axis of Resistance in control of yet another global energy trade chokepoint. Ansar Allah, having already demonstrated the capability to disrupt international shipping through past attacks on vessels in the Red Sea and nearby waters, now presides over the Bab el-Mandeb, a vital corridor to the Suez Canal whose strategic importance is magnified by dueling Iranian and U.S. blockades of the Strait of Hormuz. That's already bad news for both Saudi Arabia, now dealing with a suspected strike from another Iran-aligned faction in Iraq that damaged its East-West pipeline, and U.S. consumers, who are set to feel a new hit in the form of surging fuel costs as the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran continues to sow chaos in the oil and gas market. But there's an even more dire scenario that limits the options of Washington and Riyadh, particularly the prospect of a full-scale invasion or intervention to rescue Yemen's internationally recognized yet increasingly embattled government. "Neither country is eager to send their forces to die en masse and instead prefer to rely on superior air power, which has proven repeatedly inadequate as a means of holding territory in Yemen and elsewhere," Annelle Sheline, a former U.S. State Department official serving as research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft's Middle East program, told Newsweek. "In the event that Saudi Arabia convinced the U.S. to lead a multinational coalition to conduct a ground offensive in Yemen, it would quickly face similar dynamics as Iraq and especially Afghanistan, where the terrain allows for insurgency to operate, while the foreign occupier will eventually give up and leave," Sheline said. Parallels with Vietnam and Afghanistan It certainly would not be the first time that a foreign power failed to achieve its goals in Yemen. Saudi Arabia led a coalition to intervene in the country in March 2015 following Ansar Allah's takeover of Sanaa, allowing government forces to regroup in the south but failing to displace the insurgent group from presiding over around a third of the country and 80 percent of its population. A U.N.-mediated ceasefire in April 2022 largely froze the civil war's frontlines until the latest conflagration, sparked by a Saudi airstrike against Sanaa's airport in July, followed by retaliatory strikes by Ansar Allah and the group's rapid advance against Yemeni government forces along the west coast. Decades earlier, Egypt, then led by Arab nationalist President Gamal Abdel Nasser, also sought to influence events in Yemen when he sent troops to aid a revolutionary uprising against a Saudi-backed kingdom during a 1960s civil war in what is now the country's north. The campaign proved disastrous, with the stalemated Cairo-backed forces undergoing a coup that eventually resulted in Riyadh recognizing a more moderate republican government. More than 10,000 Egyptian soldiers were killed in North Yemen between 1962 and 1967, and the strain of the conflict has been attributed as a factor in Egypt's lack of preparedness in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. Nasser himself in 1967 would refer to the experience in Yemen as his "Vietnam," where U.S. troops were then attempting to take on communist forces in what became one of the deadliest confrontations of the Cold War. The U.S. withdrew in 1973 after suffering more than 58,000 dead over the course of eight years, leaving North Vietnam and its Viet Cong guerrilla allies to dominate and unite the divided Southeast Asian nation by 1975. Sheline pointed out that, "certainly the Saudi-backed Yemeni government has parallels to the U.S.-backed government of South Vietnam." And she highlighted an even more recent analogy of the limits of superpower might against a deeply entrenched foe, that of "the collapse of the U.S.-backed government in Afghanistan in the face of the Taliban's advance following the U.S. withdrawal" in August 2021. The exit put an end to a 20-year intervention—the longest war in U.S. history—that resulted in the deaths of nearly 2,500 U.S. personnel. "In many ways, I see the Taliban as similar to the Houthis, in their repression of women and minorities, but also that they have tapped into the population's sense of nationalism as the defenders of Yemen's sovereignty in the face of foreign military intervention and occupation," Sheline said. Escalations on the Horizon While war would prove costly, the price of inaction is also high. Thus far, Saudi Arabia has limited its role to airstrikes against Ansar Allah targets, though no coordinated efforts have emerged toward achieving the Yemeni government's goal of retaking Sanaa. Meanwhile, over the past week since the new clashes in Yemen began, multiple outlets have cited sources saying that President Donald Trump denied a request for air support from Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Trump confirmed having spoken with the Saudi leader last week, telling reporters that Saudi officials were "on the balls of their feet" after the East-West pipeline attack. He also alleged that his administration was in direct contact with Ansar Allah. "The Houthis called us and they don't wanna fight with us. They let us know they don't want to fight with us. They don't want me to go after—they don't want us to go after them," Trump said. "But they've called and they've talked to us and they don't want us to—they would much prefer not having us involved. And they're letting most ships go through." "There's just one country that they're not too happy with and we'll get that straightened out," the president added. "But I have to say, we've done a great job. We control—as you know, we really very powerfully control the Hormuz Strait, and nobody saw that happening." Tanker traffic in the Strait of Hormuz remains far below pre-war levels, however, as threats of Iranian attacks persist. Should Ansar Allah opt to blockade the Bab el-Mandeb, the impact on global trade would be amplified dramatically, as would the consequences for the Saudi economy as Crown Prince Mohammed's Vision 2030 development initiative hangs in the balance. That's why Saudi geopolitical analyst Salman Al-Ansari argues that "the Yemeni government, with Saudi support, may have no option but to launch an all-out war against the Houthis on multiple fronts." "The Bab al-Mandeb Strait and, more importantly, the people of Yemen cannot be held hostage by this malign, radical, Iranian-backed Houthi militia," Al-Ansari told Newsweek. "There was indeed a Yemeni military setback in Al Mokha and along the Red Sea coast," Al-Ansari said. "However, this should serve as a lesson learned. The Yemeni government needs a more rigorous vetting process for its military commanders, greater unity within its ranks, and no tolerance for divided loyalties." As tensions brew, he stated, "I believe the next three months could be among the most consequential in Yemen’s modern history." And he saw a role for foreign powers to step up as well. "Riyadh will put the international community face-to-face with its responsibilities," Al-Ansari said. "The question will no longer be what Saudi Arabia and Yemen are prepared to do, but what the international community is prepared to do. Riyadh may well lead from the front to safeguard Yemen and protect the security of international maritime routes." But Ansar Allah also views itself as preparing for a major confrontation. A source within the group told Newsweek that the Yemeni faction's capabilities go "beyond the comparison" of the Vietnam War. "We are not only prepared to thwart any escalation or invasion, but, by the grace of God and with reliance upon Him, we are ready and prepared to achieve progress and decisive victory on any front that contemplates action against us," the Ansar Allah source said. The Crown Prince's Dilemma The situation sets a dangerous conundrum before Crown Prince Mohammed, who oversaw the initial intervention in Yemen while serving as minister of defense from the beginning of the campaign in 2015 until months after the ceasefire in 2022. "Currently, Saudi Arabia faces a dilemma: it seeks to avoid an all-out war with the Houthis—especially given that it now stands alone, unlike in 2015—yet it cannot simply ignore Houthi attacks and their territorial expansion within Yemen," Yemeni writer Abdulnaser Almuwadea told Newsweek. But he felt it unlikely that Riyadh would commit its own ground forces to the battle. Rather, he envisioned several other scenarios for a Saudi response, including "intensifying support for allied Yemeni forces, particularly in the Marib region," where a major Ansar Allah offensive is predicted to soon manifest. And while Almuwadea also saw little desire from the White House to deploy troops, he said U.S. air support, intelligence-sharing and special forces capabilities could prove decisive in aiding Saudi-backed forces stage a counteroffensive on the Bab al-Mandeb-Mokha port axis, which holds strategic significance and lacks the kind of mountainous terrain that would provide the group cover from enemy air power. The U.S. has a history of airstrikes and special forces operations in Yemen, though its record in taking on Ansar Allah is mixed. Trump accelerated U.S. operations targeting Ansar Allah in mid-March 2025 but paused less than two months later in early May citing a peace agreement with the group that would protect U.S. flagged and military vessels. Saudi Arabia is now set to receive another type of air support from the U.S. in the form of an F-35 fighter jet sale announced Thursday by the State Department. Trump is also expected to soon meet with Crown Prince Mohammed and other Gulf Cooperation Council leaders at the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly. Beyond military measures, Almuwadea viewed the potential for Saudi Arabia to escalate the very blockade of Ansar Allah-controlled territory that the group is aiming to break, though he noted that the maneuver would carry risks of Riyadh's foe answering in kind. "While this measure would be significant and effective, it carries risks," Almuwadea said. "The Houthis might retaliate by expanding their attacks or imposing a blockade on ports held by their adversaries in Aden, Mukalla, and elsewhere." The Kingdom could also go the diplomatic route, granting Ansar Allah a degree of the legitimacy it desires as the self-proclaimed true government of Yemen, cutting off aid to the internationally recognized government and providing financial incentives to halt the attacks. But Almuwadea predicted that Riyadh was not yet prepared to grant such sweeping concessions while other options remained on the table. "At present, however, such a deal appears highly unlikely for the Saudis," he said, "particularly given that they have not yet exhausted all their strategic options against the Houthis." Sheline, for her part, argued that offering these terms nonetheless would prove "a much quicker way to resolve the conflict" than the pursuit of new military escalations. And she saw potential signs that Trump might be more amenable to talks at a time when he has signaled a desire to extract the U.S. from the ongoing conflict with Iran sooner than later. "I hope that by the Trump administration refusing to intervene militarily at MBS' request, he will choose to negotiate with the Houthis rather than return to war, which was ineffective against the Houthis for seven years and merely devastated Yemen," Sheline said. "The quickest way to get Saudi oil through the Bab el-Mandeb would be for the Saudis to lift the blockade on the Houthis' territory," she added, "and Trump seems, for the moment, to understand that."
Israel would rather not watch NAZA
The backlash against the Gaza documentary is part of a broader refusal to confront the reality of the genocide.
Iranians rally by the hundreds of thousands in biggest show of defiance since war began
CAIRO (AP) — Hundreds of thousands of Iranians rallied Friday in a government-organized show of defiance after months of war, pledging their readiness to take up arms in the biggest such demonstration since the United States and Israel attacked in February. Iran's government has sought to rally the people and stress national unity, even as the economy worsens under a U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports and new U.S. sanctions meant to increase Tehran's economic pain. Estimates varied of the number of people volunteering to receive limited military training and defend the country in an effort described as “Janfaday-e Iran,” or the “ones who sacrifice their lives for Iran." They marched through downtown Tehran in combat uniform, carrying flags, as onlookers cheered. For days, state media have encouraged Iranians to join the campaign, saying training with assault rifles would begin soon. The volunteers would be an additional layer of security to the powerful Revolutionary Guard paramilitary and its all-volunteer arm, the Basij. Tehran’s Guard chief, Gen. Hassan Hassanzadeh, told the state broadcaster that over 600,000 people had registered to participate, with over 1 million expected to take part in the training. On Friday morning, the broadcaster estimated over 300,000 people were on the streets. The new head of the Basij, Hossein Taeb, declared in a speech as the rally began that the volunteers will be ready for “full-fledged defense” and similar rallies will take place in other cities soon. The new trainees will make a “nightmare” for Iran's enemies, Taeb added, as President Masoud Pezeshkian, military commanders and other senior officials watched the march. Some participants trampled flags of the U.S. and Israel. Others chanted “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.” “I am here to tell (U.S. President Donald) Trump that we Iranians have no fear about his threats against our homeland,” said Marzieh Afaghi, 24, who attended the rally with her toddler and husband. “No one in history could invade Iran and remain there.” The rally was also a chance for Iran to show off military hardware. Anti-aircraft batteries were on display, while female Guard members in black headscarves sat with truck-mounted machine guns. The Guard displayed drones that have been widely used against ships in the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran has asserted control since the war began, severely affecting the Gulf region’s shipments of oil and natural gas to the rest of the world. The volunteers could help suppress future dissent Friday's events also suggested that hardliners like Taeb among Iran's leadership will be more prepared to suppress any future demonstration against the theocracy. In January, shortly before the war, Iran saw some of its largest nationwide protests in history, which began over the struggling economy and turned to wider grievances. Activists have said a crackdown killed over 7,000 people and saw tens of thousands detained. In May, government officials said more than 30 million people in Iran — home to a population of some 90 million — had volunteered via an online form or at public gatherings to lay down their lives for the theocracy. The Associated Press could not independently confirm that. ___ Karimi reported from Tehran, Iran, and Anna from Jerusalem.
‘Outrageous lies’: How Israeli voters are shrugging off Western sanctions
New sanctions highlight Israel's isolation, yet analysts say they won't sway voters before October's elections.