Israel kills at least five in Lebanon after ‘ceasefire’ extended
At least five people have been killed as Israeli air attacks hit several locations in southern and eastern Lebanon. A series of Israeli air attacks on southern and eastern Lebanon has killed at least five people and injured more than a dozen, according to the Health Ministry. Despite Israel agreeing to a ceasefire extension with Lebanon, the attacks on Sunday included the municipalities of Tayr Felsay, Tayr Debba, Az-Zrariyah and Jebchit. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list According to Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA), at least three people were also killed in a separate Israeli attack on the village of Jouaiya. The Israeli military issued forced displacement orders to residents in the villages of Sohmor, Roumine, al-Qusaibah, Kfar Hounah and Naqoura in southern Lebanon. “It’s been another violent day here in southern Lebanon,” reported Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto, from the southern city of Tyre. “As the ceasefire comes into place, we have seen the exact opposite happening with Israel intensifying its attacks,” he said. At a cabinet meeting on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was “holding territory, clearing territory, protecting Israel’s communities, but also fighting an enemy that is trying to outsmart us”. Since the war resumed on March 2, at least 2,988 people have been killed and 9,210 injured in Israeli attacks across the country, the Lebanese Health Ministry said on Sunday. Talks in Washington Sunday’s attacks followed talks in Washington, DC, where the two countries agreed a 45-day ceasefire extension – even though the original accord which began on April 17 has never been observed. The third round of talks in the US capital concluded after the first direct meeting in decades last month between Lebanon and Israel, which do not have diplomatic relations. Advertisement NNA reported that the ceasefire extension is intended to allow for a US-facilitated security track to begin on May 29, with the next round of talks between the two sides planned for June 2 and 3 in Washington, DC. Hezbollah opposes direct negotiations, especially as Israeli forces continue to bomb southern Lebanon and occupy parts of it since the ceasefire. “The direct negotiations that the authorities in Lebanon have conducted with the Israeli enemy have … led them down a dead-end path that will result in nothing but one concession after another,” Hezbollah legislator Hussein Hajj Hassan said on Sunday. “Neither they nor anyone else will be able to carry out what the enemy wants, especially when it comes to the issue of disarming the resistance,” he said, adding that authorities were creating “very big predicaments” for the country. On Saturday, Hezbollah said it struck a military target in northern Israel, having earlier announced several operations against Israeli forces in southern Lebanon. The war is having a disastrous humanitarian impact. Between March and April, more than 1.2 million people have been forced to leave their homes due to fighting, according to the Danish Refugee Council. The conflict is pushing the economy towards breaking point. Bassem El-Bawab, head of the Lebanese Business Association, said the country has suffered more than $25bn in direct and indirect losses since Israel’s war started in 2024. Around $12bn will be needed for reconstruction, with El-Bawab warning that the total could rise further if the conflict continues. He added that Lebanon is losing about $30m daily in indirect economic damage, alongside the direct destruction of homes, businesses and infrastructure. Adblock test (Why?)
‘Won’t be anything left’: Trump issues threat to Iran amid stalled talks
United States President Donald Trump has reiterated his threats against Iran, as negotiations to end the conflict between the two countries continue to flounder. In a Sunday morning post on his platform Truth Social, Trump warned that time was running short before a fresh wave of US military action might be launched. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list “For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them,” Trump wrote in the short, two-sentence message. “TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!” The post was the latest example of Trump using violent rhetoric against Iran as his administration struggles to achieve its goals in the war. Just a day earlier, Trump had posted an AI-generated image of himself atop a military ship, labelled, “It was the calm before the storm.” The conflict began on February 28, when Israel and the US jointly attacked Iran. Since then, Trump has put forward a range of objectives for the resulting war, including dismantling Iran’s missile arsenal, severing its relations with regional allies, and ending its nuclear enrichment programme. On April 7, Trump coupled those demands with a social media post suggesting wholesale destruction in Iran. Critics have likened the post to a call for genocide. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” Trump wrote. Within hours of the post, the US and Iran agreed to a ceasefire that has been in place ever since, though both sides have accused each other of violations. Advertisement The US president had previously threatened to attack the country’s civilian infrastructure, including its power plants and bridges, which legal experts warn could amount to a violation of the Geneva Convention. Separately, in a May interview with Fox News, Trump said Iranian officials will “be blown off the face of the earth” if they attack US vessels. Iran has denounced such rhetoric and rejected Trump’s demands as excessive. Mehr, a news agency sponsored by the Iranian government, issued a statement on Sunday saying that the US has offered “no tangible concessions” in its latest proposals. It also accused the US of seeking to “obtain concessions that it failed to obtain during the war”, a strategy that “will lead to an impasse in the negotiations”. Separately, a spokesperson for Iran’s armed forces, Abolfazl Shakarchi, was quoted as warning the US against further threats. “Repeating any folly to compensate for America’s disgrace in the Third Imposed War against Iran will result in nothing but receiving more crushing and severe blows,” he told Mehr. Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera correspondent Almigdad Alruhaid said that the Iranian government has indicated that violent rhetoric from the US will not be tolerated. “From what we understand, this kind of language is not acceptable here in Tehran. They are projecting defiance rather than [giving] an immediate response to this kind of rhetoric,” Alruhaid said. He added that the increasingly hostile remarks from both sides signal that the ceasefire could be at imminent risk of shattering. “Behind all of this rhetoric, there is awareness that the diplomatic window right now is narrowing,” Alruhaid said. “We do know that there is hard language, hard messaging from both sides — that the finger’s on the trigger on both sides.” But Adam Clements, a foreign policy analyst, told Al Jazeera there could be a “domestic element” to Trump’s hardline rhetoric, including his latest flurry of messages. “Of course, Iran would have to take it seriously,” Clements said of Sunday’s post. “At the same time as well, President Trump is known for his bombastic tweets, his bombastic statements, perhaps for domestic audiences.” Clements added that it will be critical to watch whether Trump’s statements are echoed by his officials in the coming days, and whether they are also matched by increased military activity. “ The White House press office has been known to post these type of strange memes, or AI-generated memes and cartoons in the past,” he explained. Advertisement “So I think it’s necessary here to sometimes look past some of the political noise, some of the things for show, and really try to pay attention to these clear signals.” Adblock test (Why?)
Trump holds prayer rally to ‘rededicate’ US as ‘one nation under God’
The administration of United States President Donald Trump has hosted a nine-hour prayer event on the National Mall in Washington, DC, as part of its efforts to commemorate the country’s 250th anniversary. Sunday’s event was called “Rededicate 250: A National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise and Thanksgiving”, and it took place from 9am to 6pm Eastern US time (13:00 to 22:00 GMT). On the jubilee’s website, organisers explained that their aim was to mark “rededication of our country as One Nation to God”. The event featured performers, pastors and civil rights leaders, as well as Trump’s Republican allies, among them Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina. “Our rights don’t come from the government,” Scott told the crowd. “No, our rights come from God, the king of kings.” Members of the Trump administration, including the president himself, also recorded video messages that were broadcast from the stage. Trump’s video showed him seated behind the Resolute Desk in the White House, reciting a speech from the Book of Chronicles that God gave to King Solomon, promising protection to his followers and destruction to those who forsake him. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, meanwhile, used his video to describe the US as a country uniquely shaped by the “Christian idea”. “Before the Christian West, most societies – and civilisations, for that matter – thought in stagnant cycles: the flooding of the Nile, the return of the rains, the cycle of the harvest. History for them was a wheel to nowhere,” Rubio said. Advertisement “But our faith calls us outwards into the limitless darkness of the unknown. It tells us to go forth and preach the gospel to the world as a witness unto all nations and to the ends of the earth.” The event was not without controversy, though. Critics pointed out that only one speaker, a rabbi, was non-Christian. Some religious leaders even rejected the event as a political stunt, rather than a sincere testament to faith. Paul Raushenbush, a reverend and president of the Interfaith Alliance, posted on social media that his objections did not stem from an “antipathy towards religion”. Rather, he said his faith compels him to cherish the “rich tapestry of beliefs” that come together in the US. “Rededicate 250 is a betrayal of America’s founding values guaranteed in the First Amendment – which made clear that there shall be no establishment of religion by the government and that each one of us should be free to live out our beliefs in our own way,” Raushenbush wrote. Traditionally, the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution has been interpreted as prohibiting the government from establishing or imposing religious beliefs on its citizens. But critics argue the Trump administration has blurred the separation between church and state, including by having regular prayer services at the Department of Defense. Trump, however, has accused the federal government of “anti-Christian bias“. He launched a task force last year to root out the purported discrimination. Evangelical Christians form a pillar in Trump’s right-wing base of support. The demographic is a powerful force during election seasons in the US, and Trump has sought to rally Christian voters ahead of major votes. Their views could reshape how the US Constitution is interpreted. A survey from the Pew Research Center released last week found a slight uptick in the number of US adults who believe Christianity should be named as the country’s official religion. Seventeen percent now share that view, up from 13 percent in 2024. That said, Pew researchers noted that a majority of Americans, roughly 54 percent, still believe in the separation of church and state. About 52 percent also said that “conservative Christians have gone too far in trying to push their religious values in the government and public schools”. Adblock test (Why?)
Iraq’s new PM Ali al-Zaidi formally takes over
NewsFeed Iraq’s new prime minister Ali al‑Zaidi has formally taken office in Baghdad, pledging sweeping economic and financial reforms. Al-Zaidi only has a partial cabinet as parliament is yet to approve key ministers, including interior and defence. Published On 17 May 202617 May 2026 Click here to share on social media share-nodes Share googleAdd Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Adblock test (Why?)
Tunisians rally amid economic crisis and political arrests
NewsFeed Hundreds of Tunisians have marched through the capital to denounce a worsening economic crisis and what they say is a widening crackdown on dissent. President Kais Saied is accused of undermining the country’s hard-won post-2011 revolution system. Published On 17 May 202617 May 2026 Click here to share on social media share-nodes Share googleAdd Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Adblock test (Why?)
Activists troll far-right UK rally with giant pro-immigration clip
NewsFeed Activist group Led By Donkeys has snuck a big screen streaming pro-immigration messages into a far-right Unite the Kingdom march. The stunt prompted boos from the crowd and attempts to shut the screen down. Tens of thousands of people attended the rally. Published On 17 May 202617 May 2026 Click here to share on social media share-nodes Share googleAdd Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Adblock test (Why?)
Israeli army kills Palestinian man, raids homes in occupied West Bank
Israeli forces killed a 34-year-old man in Jenin Camp, the Palestinian health ministry said. Published On 16 May 202616 May 2026 Israeli forces killed a Palestinian in a targeted attack on the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health says, as the army also storms homes amid settler attacks. The health ministry in Ramallah identified the victim of Saturday’s attack as 34-year-old Nour al-Din Kamal Hassan Fayyad, saying he was “killed by occupation forces’ fire in the Jenin camp”. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list The Israeli military claimed that troops fired after he tried to “infiltrate” the Jenin camp area, wherein “the soldiers are operating, and the entry is prohibited”. Since January last year, Israel has launched major military operations in Palestinian refugee camps in the northern occupied territory. The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, has said that Israeli operations targeting Jenin and Tulkarem camps have displaced 40,000 Palestinians. Separately on Saturday, the Wafa news agency reported that Israeli soldiers arrested a young Palestinian man after assaulting him in the Shu’fat refugee camp, northeast of Jerusalem, and another from the village of Zawata, west of Nablus. Another Palestinian was assaulted by Israeli settlers in the town of Sinjil. Israeli forces also stormed the cities of Tubas and Qalqilya, and the towns of Tammun and Zaatara, east of Bethlehem, and raided the village of Deir Jarir, east of Ramallah, Wafa reported. The Israeli settlers set fire to an agricultural room and wrote racist slogans in the town of Turmus Aya, both northeast of Ramallah. ‘Attacks must stop’ Elsewhere, a senior UN official condemned an arson attack against a mosque and several vehicles in a Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank. Advertisement Ramiz Alakbarov, the deputy special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, said that masked individuals set fire to the site in the village of Jibiya and drew Hebrew graffiti. “Attacks against religious sites and civilian property are unacceptable and undermine stability, human dignity, and freedom of worship,” Alakbarov said. He added that the attack comes against a backdrop of rising settler violence and intensifying attacks in the occupied West Bank that continue to endanger civilians and damage their property. “I call for an immediate and transparent investigation, and for all perpetrators to be held accountable,” he said. “These attacks must stop.” Adblock test (Why?)
Iran warns of readiness for war and economic costs as US talks falter
[unable to retrieve full-text content] Iranian leaders and TV have ramped up pressure on the US with a stream of messaging to domestic and foreign audiences.
How Thomas Massie came to represent Republican dissent in age of Trump
Since Donald Trump’s rise to the White House a decade ago, the United States president has purged his Republican Party of critics and rivals. Many politicians dropped their earlier criticism of him and earned a place in his inner circle. Others never sought re-election or retired in the middle of their term to avoid a fight with the president, who is known for personal insults and lack of tolerance for dissent. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list A few other legislators who chose to fight on were defeated by Trump-backed opponents in Republican primaries. Congressman Thomas Massie, a Kentucky libertarian, is one of the last dissidents standing. He has been a rare Republican thorn in the side of Trump since the US president’s return to power last year. Massie has voted against a key tax bill backed by the president, pushed for the release of government files related to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein against the White House’s wishes and vocally opposed the war on Iran and US aid to Israel. Now Massie is in a fight for his career as he faces a Trump-endorsed Republican opponent – Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL officer – and an avalanche of pro-Israel spending in next week’s congressional primary in Kentucky. The contest, however, goes beyond Trump and could be a litmus test for the faultlines emerging within the Republican base, including over military interventions and support for Israel. For Massie’s supporters, the race on May 19 is a test for everything the congressman purports to stand for: unflinching loyalty to the US Constitution, political integrity and standing up to powerful special interest groups. On Wednesday, influential right-wing commentator Mike Cernovich underscored another aspect of the contest in Kentucky – a showdown gauging the influence of podcasters who support Massie against campaign spending and traditional conservative media outlets. Advertisement “Massie’s primary is an interesting one to watch because it’ll show if podcasters and social media can drive out the vote in a material way. It’s unlimited money on the other end,” Cernovich wrote on X. “If Massie loses, every Congress member will be cowed into fear. If he wins, it’s a new media era.” Who is Massie? So how did a 55-year-old House member come to represent a political movement at an inflection point in the modern history of US politics? An engineer and inventor, Massie was born in a town in the Appalachian hills in West Virginia, near Kentucky and Ohio. He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and then went on to find a company that helped pioneer virtual reality technology and registered dozens of patents. Massie married his high school sweetheart Rhonda, who died of an illness in 2024, with whom he had four children. The family moved to Kentucky in 2003, and Massie sold his firm to subsequently pursue a career in politics. He became the judge-executive of Lewis County in 2011 and successfully ran for Congress a year later to represent Kentucky’s 4th District in the house of representatives, a Republican stronghold that encompasses rural areas as well as suburbs of Cincinnati, Ohio. Massie quickly earned a reputation as a rebel, bucking the bipartisan orthodoxy on foreign policy as well as his own party’s consensus on many issues. In the first vote of his full term, he joined 11 other Republicans to vote against the election of then-Speaker John Boehner and the only one to back his libertarian colleague Justin Amash to take the gavel. Willingness to vote against his own party, did not earn Massie many friends on the Democratic side. In 2021, Massie sparked a huge outcry from Democrats when he posted a Christmas photo of himself and his family members holding semi-automatic rifles at a time when gun violence was on the rise. At times, his uncompromising stances have earned him near universal scorn. In 2022, Massie voted against a bill to make lynching – the extrajudicial execution of African Americans during racial segregation in the south of the US – a federal crime. “This bill expands current federal ‘hate crime’ laws. A crime is a crime, and all victims deserve equal justice. Adding enhanced penalties for ‘hate’ tends to endanger other liberties such as freedom of speech,” he wrote in a social media post explaining his vote at that time. “Lynching a person is already illegal in every state. Passing this legislation falsely implies that lynching someone does not already constitute criminal activity.” Advertisement Backing a largely symbolic vote against something as despicable as lynching, even if he opposed it, may have been the easier option. The congressman has said that he has always had that rebellious streak. “I was simultaneously the teacher’s pet and the teacher’s worst nightmare,” Massie recently told Mother Jones magazine. “I would like to think I’ve become a lot more tactful, but I still won’t tolerate a wrong answer.” Despite advocating for gun rights and small government, Massie has been able to team up with Democrats to push forward specific issues, especially opposition to military campaigns abroad. Most recently, he became a leading figure in the effort to release the Epstein files, forging a strong partnership with Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna to pass a bill to compel the Justice Department to make the records public. CongressmanThomas Massie questions then-Attorney General Pam Bondi during a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing February 11 [File: Tom Brenner/AP Photo] Israel and the race Massie has also sided with Democrats in rejecting the war on Iran, and he has been one of the few Republican critics of unconditional US military aid to Israel. Massie’s opponents – including pro-Israel groups and donors – are flooding the airwaves with ads against the congressman, often portraying him as not conservative enough and highlighting his vote against the tax bill. One commercial that aired earlier this month featured deep fake, artificial intelligence-generated footage of Massie holding hands with progressive Democratic congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar. The ad said Massie was caught in a
Cannes Film Festival 2026: a different carpet roll-out
NewsFeed How big events shape the uprising and how the uprising shapes the big events. Cannes Film Festival 2026 mirrors today’s geopolitical, cultural and technological developments. Published On 15 May 202615 May 2026 Click here to share on social media share-nodes Share googleAdd Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Adblock test (Why?)