For more than a century, South Los Angeles has been an anchor for Black art, activism and commerce — from the 1920s when Central Avenue was the epicenter of the West Coast jazz scene to recent years as artists and entrepreneurs reinvigorate the area with new developments such as Destination Crenshaw.
Now, the region’s legacy is receiving formal recognition as a Black cultural district, a landmark move that aims to preserve South L.A.’s rich history and stimulate economic growth. State Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D-Los Angeles), who led the effort, helped secure $5.5 million in state funding to support the project, and last December the state agency California Arts Council voted unanimously to approve the designation. The district, formally known as the Historic South Los Angeles Black Cultural District, is now one of 24 state-designated cultural districts, which also includes the newly added Black Arts Movement and Business District in Oakland.
Prior to this vote, there were no state designations that recognized the Black community — a realization that made Smallwood-Cuevas jump into action.
“It was very frustrating for me to learn that Black culture was not included,” said Smallwood-Cuevas, who represents South L.A. Other cultural districts include L.A.’s Little Tokyo and San Diego’s Barrio Logan Cultural District, which is rooted in Chicano history. Given all of the economic and cultural contributions that South L.A. has made over the years through events like the Leimert Park and Central Avenue jazz festivals and beloved businesses like Dulan’s on Crenshaw and the Lula Washington Dance Theatre, Smallwood-Cuevas believed the community deserved to be recognized. She worked on this project alongside LA Commons, a non-profit devoted to community-arts programs.
Beyond mere recognition, Smallwood-Cuevas said the designation serves as “an anti-displacement strategy,” especially as the demographics of South L.A. continue to change.
“Black people have experienced quite a level of erasure in South L.A.,” added Karen Mack, founder and executive director of LA Commons. “A lot of people can’t afford to live in areas that were once populated by us, so to really affirm our history, to affirm that we matter in the story of Los Angeles, I think is important.”
The Historic South L.A. Cultural District spans roughly 25 square miles, situated between Adams Boulevard to the north, Manchester Boulevard to the south, Central Avenue to the east and La Brea Avenue to the west.
Now that the designation has been approved, Smallwood-Cuevas and LA Commons have turned their attention to the monument — the physical landmark that will serve as the district’s entrance or focal point — trying to determine whether it should be a gateway, bridge, sculpture or something else. And then there’s the bigger question: Where should it be placed? After meeting with organizations like the Black Planners of Los Angeles and community leaders, they’ve narrowed their search down to eight potential locations including Exposition Park, Central Avenue and Leimert Park, which received the most votes in a recent public poll that closed earlier this month.
As organizers work to finalize the location for the cultural district’s monument by this summer, we’ve broken down the potential sites and have highlighted their historical relevance. (Please note: Although some of the sites are described as specific intersections, such as Jefferson and Crenshaw boulevards, organizers think of them more as general areas.)
Few places in Ukraine have been spared from the impact of the Ukraine war, including the radioactive exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Al Jazeera’s Nils Adler has been seeing how the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster has been affected by the war.
A new United Nations Human Rights Office report says Israel’s military campaign and blockade of Gaza have created living conditions “increasingly incompatible with Palestinians’ continued existence as a group in Gaza” as it presses its genocidal war on the enclave.
The report released on Thursday states that “intensified attacks, the methodical destruction of entire neighbourhoods and the denial of humanitarian assistance appeared to aim at a permanent demographic shift in Gaza”.
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“This, together with forcible transfers, which appear to aim at a permanent displacement, raise concerns over ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank.”
Covering the period from November 1, 2024 to October 31, 2025, the report documents Israel’s security forces’ “systematic use of unlawful force” in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem.
It highlights “widespread” arbitrary detention and the “extensive unlawful demolition” of Palestinian homes, stating that the measures seek to “systematically discriminate, oppress, control and dominate the Palestinian people”.
These policies are altering “the character, status and demographic composition of the occupied West Bank, raising serious concerns of ethnic cleansing”.
In Gaza, the report condemns the killing and maiming of “unprecedented numbers of civilians”, the spread of famine and the destruction of the “remaining civilian infrastructure”.
At least 463 Palestinians, including 157 children, starved to death during the 12-month period, according to the findings.
“Palestinians faced the inhumane choice of either starving to death or risking being killed while trying to get food,” it says, adding that the famine and “foreseeable and repeatedly foretold” deaths directly resulted from actions taken by the Israeli government.
Israel’s ongoing attacks on Gaza
Israeli forces launched new air strikes and artillery attacks across the Gaza Strip, as families in the besieged enclave woke to begin their Ramadan fast under bombardment.
Shelling struck areas east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza at dawn on Thursday, where Israeli troops remain deployed. Warplanes also hit Rafah and areas east of Gaza City, according to Al Jazeera’s correspondent.
A day earlier, medical officials at Nasser Medical Complex confirmed that two Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire near the so-called “yellow line” in Bani Suheila, east of Khan Younis.
Israeli forces continue to demolish homes and infrastructure in areas they control, flattening entire neighbourhoods and entrenching displacement.
The attacks form part of Israel’s repeated breaches of the ceasefire that began on October 10, 2025.
Gaza’s Ministry of Health says those violations have killed 603 Palestinians and wounded 1,618 others as of Monday.
‘Partnership between settlers and the occupation forces’
Violence has also intensified in the occupied West Bank.
On Wednesday evening, the Palestinian Ministry of Health announced the death of 19-year-old Nasrallah Mohammad Jamal Abu Siam, who succumbed to wounds sustained during a settler assault on Mukhmas, northeast of occupied East Jerusalem.
Settlers, operating under the protection of Israeli forces, opened fire and stole dozens of sheep from Palestinian farmers. Three of the wounded were shot with live ammunition.
With Abu Siam’s killing, the number of Palestinians shot dead by settlers alone since October 7, 2023 has risen to 37, according to the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission.
Moayad Shaaban, head of the commission, described events in Mukhmas as a “dangerous escalation in organised settler terrorism”, citing a “full partnership between settlers and the occupation forces”.
Israeli troops also raided the town of Arraba, south of Jenin, wounding two young men with live fire, one critically. Soldiers detained several others during the incursion.
In Jerusalem, Ramadan has brought further restrictions at Al-Aqsa Mosque. The mosque’s imam, Sheikh Akrama Sabri, said Israeli authorities are “imposing a reality by force” by limiting worshippers while allowing extremist Jewish incursions into the compound.
Occupation authorities have issued more than 100 deportation orders barring young Jerusalemites from entering the mosque and restricted West Bank worshippers to 10,000 permits under strict age and security conditions. Al-Aqsa can hold up to half a million people.
Sheikh Sabri said Israeli forces question worshippers during tarawih prayers in what he described as “provocation upon provocation”.
Kelvin Washington: Welcome to The Envelope. I’m Kelvin Washington, alongside the usuals, Yvonne Villarreal, we got Mark Olsen as well. Everybody doing well?
Yvonne Villarreal: Doing good!
Mark Olsen: Terrific!
Washington: Good, good. Last time we discussed Oscar nominations. Obviously a big deal. Folks were excited. Certain films, certain directors, actors as well. We went over that a little bit. But I also want to talk about something you, my friend, brought up. You mentioned the Oscar nominee luncheon last episode. I want to hear more about this, you know, [as] someone who’s never been. So I have to live vicariously through you two. Tell me more about it.
Olsen: Well, exactly as it sounds, it is a luncheon for all of the Oscar nominees. So from the biggest stars down to, you know, relatively unknown craftspeople, all get invited to this luncheon at the Beverly Hilton hotel. And it’s really one of those kind of, like, secret highlights of award season. It’s not televised, and so everyone’s feeling loose and there are drinks in the afternoon and also, at this point, everyone is a winner. Nobody’s lost anything yet. And so everybody’s kind of on equal footing, even in their categories, and people seem to really enjoy it.
We were not actually in the room for the luncheon. Our esteemed colleague, Josh Rottenberg, was there and wrote about it. We were in a press area in a ballroom, sort of backstage-ish to do the interviews that we did, but even there — I always get such a kick out of the fact that publicists are coming by with all this talent — other outlets will do much shorter interviews than we do — and kind of like, “Hey, do you want to talk to so-and-so?” And it just is so funny to me to see them kind of being showcased in this way. Yvonne, what stood out this year for you?
Villarreal: So it takes place at the Beverly Hilton, and I was there a few weeks back for the Golden Globes. And so in some ways it felt like a more subdued — like it was the luncheon version of that. The star power was as insane, but they’re maybe a little more casual in the vibe. At one point I’m walking down the corridor and you have Emma Stone or people walking by looking at the security guard dogs. It is interesting thing because they’re all sort of coming together and loose and talking with each other, taking the selfies. You’re seeing, like, Elle Fanning reuniting with Timothée Chalamet — they starred in a movie last year together. It was interesting to have everyone come together, but also do these interviews in a much rowdier setting than we were last year, and having to concentrate on our guests while a lot of commotion is happening. But I think we did well.
Washington: Well, I tell you what, I know how that is. It can be trying to do an interview when it’s loud in the background. Our producer, Matt, was saying that it was chaotic. Said he was a few feet away from you and couldn’t even hear you. But you all are pros. So you got it done. And speaking of, we get a chance to hear your conversation you had with Amy Madigan. Tell me a little bit more about this role, Aunt Gladys, and, of course, “Weapons.” I was terrified. And it’s in a complimentary way. She played the heck out of that role.
Olsen: She’s obviously a veteran actress. She was nominated for an Oscar once before, for the film “Twice in a Lifetime.” It came out in 1985. She was nominated in 1986. And so that 40-year gap actually is the longest gap ever for an actress in between nominations. And it’s just exciting to see how she’s really enjoying this moment. She’s really enjoyed the attention that the character of Aunt Gladys has brought. So in “Weapons” — spoiler alert — she plays this kind of eccentric witch, essentially, who comes to this town, creates all this mischief, but there is still something kind of, like, rambunctious and almost weirdly lovable about her. She is somehow — and we talked about this in the interview — she’s somehow both the funniest and the scariest thing in “Weapons.” She has this very outrageous look. She has this specific kind of form of witchcraft that she performs to sort of take control of people’s minds and bodies. It was really exciting to see Amy as someone who’s just like taking in this moment, really enjoying it. And it was just a really fun conversation. And also she gave a little bit of the backstory of a moment I’ve always been curious about. In 1999, at the Oscars, Elia Kazan was given a lifetime achievement award, and Amy and her husband, Ed Harris, did not stand, did not applaud during the standing ovation. And she actually spoke quite a bit about what was behind that moment, and it was something I’d never heard her talk about before.
Washington: You got to get it firsthand. All right, here’s Mark’s conversation with Amy Madigan, take a look.
Amy Madigan in Los Angeles last fall.
(Ian Spanier / For The Times)
Mark Olsen: For the Los Angeles Times and The Envelope, I’m Mark Olsen. I’m here today with Amy Madigan, an Oscar nominee for her role in “Weapons.” Thank you so much for joining us.
Amy Madigan: I’m very happy to be here, thanks.
Olsen: And now we’re here this afternoon at the Oscar nominees luncheon. You just stepped out of the event. What was it like? I always want to ask, who was at your table?
Madigan: Wagner Moura. Because we’re traveling around together, when you’re on the awards circuit, we became friends, which is just so nice. Miles Caton from “Sinners,” the wonderful Sandra Chang, who is my manager and fighter for me, I brought her with me today. So it was just just really nice. Jerry Bruckheimer was there, who I’ve known for a while. They don’t want everybody from the same films together, so they mix everybody up. So it was really nice. A woman who is in charge of the Telluride Film Festival, which is a fantastic festival. So yeah, it was really nice.
Olsen: That’s terrific. I have to say, I noticed on a streaming site, a little portrait of Aunt Gladys is the image they use to sell “Weapons.” And to start talking about the movie, did you expect for this character to take off in the way that it has?
Madigan: Not at all. The best thing about it is that I know people really dig the film. It’s just a really smart, cool film and very well written, very well directed. And I thought people would really have a good time with Aunt Gladys. But the night that we opened it was, “Boom.” So this was all a surprise to me.
Olsen: What was it like for you watching the movie for the first time? Spoiler alert for anyone who hasn’t seen the movie, what is it like to see yourself torn limb from limb?
Madigan: I was actually looking forward to that, because we had this group of kids who traveled around with us for the whole film, working, and I got to know them very well, and I made sure that they weren’t frightened about tearing the dummy apart. So it was great. But seeing it in the movie theater — and there were a lot of horror fans there — was kind of an overwhelming experience for me. I didn’t really know what to expect and, boy, I was kind of shocked and very happy, very happy.
Olsen: I’ve heard you say how when Zach Cregger first came to you with the project, he spoke about it in very personal terms, the grief he had over the loss of a friend, the specter of alcoholism in his childhood.
Madigan: Very much so.
Olsen: What was it about that pitch that made you want to take part in this movie? The two don’t necessarily intuitively sync up.
Madigan: I think grief is a weapon. I think alcoholism is a weapon. And I think that he took all those things and put it in the film. And I could just tell how sincere he was about this movie. He knew how to make this movie. And I had seen “Barbarian,” which is his first film, which really scared me. And it’s quite amazing that he made that kind of on a shoestring. So I knew this man could just do it. And we just kind of clicked.
Olsen: One of the things I really appreciate about the movie is the way that it sort of dares to be enigmatic. It doesn’t try to explain everything to you.
Madigan: I’m so happy of that. I don’t want to explain things to you. People, of course, they have to ask me questions, you know, “Where is Gladys from?” or “How old is she?” I said, “I don’t have answers for those things.” I have my own answers. I like that there’s no big montage explanation of who she is and what she is. She’s just there.
Olsen: But I have to ask, what is your interpretation of the floating machine gun?
Madigan: Every single person I’ve talked to, on the street, here, I’m just holding it in of what I think about it, because it means so much to so many people. It is a weapon, as we know, and it’s such a giant thing to have floating in the sky. I would really like people to just take what they do from it. It really hits people in the heart and the guts, and jolts people, and I think that’s a good thing.
Olsen: And now, as an actor, do you have to answer those questions for yourself, for your performance, or can you live with the uncertainty?
Madigan: Well, the millions of questions I have for myself interpreting Gladys, some I answer, some I kind of answer, some as I’m working through it I go, “Well, I kind [of] thought that, but I think it could be this.” Gladys is very malleable. If Plan A is not working, she’s got Plan B. And if that doesn’t work, she can improvise and she will kill you with Plan C. So I kind of like to take that with me.
Olsen: Because one of the things I find so remarkable about the character and your performance is she is somehow both the funniest and the scariest person in the movie. What was it like for you finding that balance? How did you kind of get that alchemy right that she could be both those things at once?
Madigan: Well, I have to go back to the script, because when I read it I knew that there was a lot of humor. Aunt Gladys, she’s funny. She’s lethal and dangerous, so it’s a fine edge that you have to walk. You have to be really careful. Gladys can be animated and kind of cutesy, and when she wants to drill you down she will do that. So I felt very free to kind of play both those things, when I’m by myself or when I am with little Cary Christopher, when I am manipulating him, as opposed to when I was out in the world with the police or the principal. So the scenes really led me, which is really nice.
Olsen: What did you learn about her, I don’t know what to call it, her practice? I’m so curious with the twig and the hair and the blood and the bell — Is that a thing? What is all that?
Madigan: Well, I can’t say that I’ve read 1,500 books about alchemy and quote-unquote witchcraft and things like that. I have my own ideas. I think Zach had his own ideas, but there are certain things like salt on the ground or a bell, but we didn’t want to make it derivative. The whole thing with dropping it in a bowl of water, it’s like, what is that? But it doesn’t have to be explained. It works. It works.
Olsen: The scene at Benedict Wong’s house, you get this sense that she has this kind of routine that she does, this little show she puts on.
Madigan: I gotta get in that house. That is my mission. Every actor will tell you, what is my intention? My intention is to get in that house, get off the front stoop, bring them into the house, and then I got them. Then I got them. I know if I can wander around the house. Oh, it’s the kitchen. Let’s go in there.
Olsen: But you do get the sense that she’s done this a lot before. She knows what she’s doing.
Madigan: She knows what she’s doing, but she’s dealing with a different set of characters and in a different milieu and a different problem. So the foundation might be the same, but she has got to kind of play the game for a while and she’s got to find out information from them first. Like, “Did you do this? Did you tell people about this?” Oh, you didn’t. OK, well this is going to be a breeze now.
Olsen: I think that’s why people are so taken with the idea of a Gladys prequel movie. There is something about the character you just do want to know more.
Madigan: Yes, I understand that and I’m hoping that we get to somehow continue something with Gladys. And Zach and I have talked about it, and certainly Zach has been very open about it to the press. What that will be, I don’t know. I like mystery in things, and Gladys is a mystery, but I trust Zach implicitly. So I’m very curious if we get to make it and what will happen.
Olsen: Her look is so specific and so outrageous. Do you often find that costume and the look of a character is a way that you like to enter a working on a character?
Madigan: Well, definitely for Gladys, my entree into the film is when I come to Benedict Wong’s principal’s office and the shot is on his face where he goes like that, pushes his head back. Her look is very, very calculated. She loves the way she looks. She loves her jewelry, she loves her big giant handbag. She thinks she looks fantastic. So that was very freeing for me. I mean, it took us a while, you know, with special effects and our hair and makeup and wig and costumes. It was a real team effort to do that, Zach overseeing it all. So that just made me feel so free, just so relaxed in being Gladys.
Olsen: Do you think that’s another aspect of the character people are responding to? She doesn’t tone down for anybody.
Madigan: Oh no, why would she? She doesn’t care what that person thinks. She doesn’t care what you think. She’s just in her whole being, which is a nice feeling.
Olsen: Tell me a little bit about the finale of the movie, the sort of chase scene where the kids are running after you.
Madigan: That was so much fun to shoot!
Olsen: As I understand, for the most part, that’s you.
Madigan: I did all the running myself, which I talked to Zach and I said, “No, I can do it, I really want to do it.” I did have a wonderful stuntwoman, and at the very end when I get tackled, I did not get tackled because I probably would have broken my nose, let’s face it. And then I flipped over and then it’s me. But I really wanted to do it, and Gladys has a physical-humor side of her. So the way I would run would be different than the way somebody else would run, and Zach was totally down for it.
Olsen: You’ve been pretty open about the fact that in the period before you got offered “Weapons,” you hadn’t been getting a lot of offers. Roles don’t come to you as much as they used to.
Madigan: That’s the ups and downs of being in this business. I’ve been in it a long time. I’ve always continued working. I’ve done three different independent films, and often they don’t get the love or the recognition that some of the larger films do, and that’s just part of it. Listen, you’ve talked to a lot of actresses. You know what it’s like for women in this business, it’s still very unequal, [especially] for women of a certain age. You’re gonna hear no a lot of the time. And I still am myself. I love acting, I love my work. So that’s just who I am. Not totally; I have a family and I have friends, but that’s who I just am. So this was a real chance [and] I’m just grabbing it by the throat.
Olsen: Do you feel like there was just something about this role that made you really kind of go for it?
Madigan: Zach provided that ground for it. He wrote it. He knew she had to be this and this and scary and funny, and yet she still had to talk to the little boy, Alex, and get him to do what she wanted him to. It was very delicate in that sense. But I knew as soon as I read this, I said, “Oh, I know who this is.” I really like this person. I’m not that person, but I have those sides in me. Everybody’s got that stuff in them where they manipulate, where they’re nice and they’re pretending, where they are horrible. So I was like, “Yeah, I can do that.”
Olsen: I think it’s never been easy to be an actor, but have you found that the business of being an actor, the career aspect of it, has it gotten harder over the years?
Madigan: The business has changed. We just have to read any of the trades and it’s become centralized by corporations and giant entities. So certainly that’s changed, but people still are making movies and want to make movies. Something that’s very original and creative people will go see. They want that. I know everybody, myself included, watches a lot of things [on] streaming. But the theater is still a place to see a lot of films. The independent market struggles to find enough money to get their films out, but they’re still being made. So I’m guardedly hopeful. But the business is not very fair. You know that. It’s just not. So when you’re younger, you have to grind a lot more. The opportunities are difficult, I think, for young people coming up. And I try to really foster that with any young creative person, because I’m not going to be around — they are. I want to see what their dreams are, I want [to] see what their movies are.
Olsen: You were nominated for an Oscar once before for “Twice in a Lifetime.” What do you remember about that night?
Madigan: My husband and I, Ed [Harris], we just went, you know what I mean? I was so surprised with “Twice in a Lifetime.” This is a family drama, I was surprised that I got a nomination. And then it was not like it is now. There was no social media, there was no TikTok, there were no podcasts. People weren’t saying, “Gee, I’d really like to talk to Madigan.” No, that didn’t exist. So it was a much calmer type of situation. And I was a lot younger, so I was kind of looking around and seeing people that I really admired. And it was fun. This is a completely different personality of this.
Olsen: That year you were up against Oprah Winfrey and Margaret Avery for “The Color Purple,” Meg Tilly for “Agnes of God,” and Anjelica Huston, who won for “Prizzi’s Honor.” That is quite a lineup to be a part of.
Madigan: Yes, it is. That’s why I was very surprised. As I am in this lineup this year. The performances are stunning. This is the best of women in film, I think, for the actresses in both categories. And that’s a great feeling. They’re all different. They’re all unique. How somebody votes is like — I don’t know how you do it. I don’t know how you compare. And finally, one is asked to compare. So that’s a little difficult, I think, for a lot of actors to kind of wrap their head around, but we know that’s what it is.
Olsen: And there’s another Oscar moment that you’re sort of were a part of —
Madigan: [Crosses arms] This?
Olsen: Exactly. Tell me about it. So in 1999, Elia Kazan was given a lifetime achievement award. You and your husband, Ed Harris, kind of pointedly did not stand or applaud during a standing ovation. Now, was that something that the two of you had talked about before?
Madigan: No, not at all.
Olsen: Did you go in knowing that was going to be your response?
Madigan: I knew he was going to get this special award from the academy, which I did not agree with. My dad was a newspaperman, a journalist, a political analyst, and he, as a very young man, covered the McCarthy hearings, and it really affected him, and he didn’t talk about it too much, and I have pictures from it, and I’m very familiar with that period of time and what happened during that period of time, especially to people in my industry. So I had very definite feelings about it, and I thought it was wrongheaded and really somewhat shameful of the academy to do that. And I think somehow Ed’s picture and mine, because we’re together, got really prominently displayed. But there were other people in the audience who felt that way too. And fair enough if someone wanted to look at the work, but I could not disassociate him naming from his work. That’s me personally.
Olsen: That’s maybe something of an extreme example, but do you see the life of an artist as a political act? Can you unravel your own personal politics from your work?
Madigan: I think if you look at things I have done, yes, I’ve done some political things. I worked on a television event, it was in the 1980s, called “Roe v. Wade,” which now that right has been repealed. And it was on network television. No one would advertise it, nobody bought it. ABC had the guts to put it on. That piece was very important to me. Holly Hunter, who’s a dear friend of mine, we were in that together. I worked on “The Laramie Project.” I think there are certain things that have come to me that I opened myself to. … Everything doesn’t have to be that. Gladys isn’t political. But if there’s an opportunity, I don’t think I would do something that really went against my own moral code. I think a lot of people are that way. I hope they are.
Olsen: Because I think it’s a question a lot of people are asking themselves today. “What would I do when my back’s against the wall?” Or, “What would I do when I’m in a situation where I feel like I have to make a real decision?”
Madigan: Well, let’s say you were in the joint. You would probably do, I would do, whatever it took to survive being there. I really would. I don’t know what that would be for me. I think human beings are good, but they’re really horribly bad. So I think that we can tap into those things. It’s a survival mechanism. You have to look at “One Battle After Another,” it’s an appropriate political film for right now. You look at “Secret Agent.” It’s very appropriate political film for now. As is “Sinners,” as is a lot of things. So that’s why I think it’s kind of a good year for the films. Aside from the ones that are great, like “KPop Demon Hunters” and the funny ones. There’s room for all of them. “Avatar,” there’s room for that. I mean, “Avatar’s” about the environment. It’s the most political statement Mr. Cameron and people can make right now.
Olsen: Do you mind if I ask you about your relationship with Ed, with your husband? The two of you have been together for more than 40 years, and it seems like you’re both just so dedicated to the craft of acting, the life of the artist. What has it meant to you for the two of you to be going through this together?
Madigan: I mean, Ed, he’s been through this [nominated for an Oscar] four different times, so he’s just thrilled for me. He’s just got my back, he’s just happy for me. We both still continue to work. We met working on a play in a theater that was just a little bigger than this. You really get to know somebody when you’re on the boards with them, when you are acting with them. So we’ve been able to work a lot together, and I hope to continue that. We just carry that with us. It’s very important to us. And our daughter, her name is Lily Harris, she’s a young actress coming up. So we’ll see what happens for her.
Olsen: And then you mentioned that you lost your house last year in the fires.
Madigan: January 7th.
Olsen: What has it been like to have the low of that contrast with the high of what you’ve been going through with “Weapons”? That just seems like a lot to happen all at once.
Madigan: When the anniversary was coming up, that really triggered me. Especially around Thanksgiving, because our house was where everybody came. Sometimes there’d be 15 people, sometimes there’d be 30, and it was just a really small, funky little house. I don’t have that anymore, and my friends don’t. I don’t have pictures like when I was on the road. So those are the hard things. I’m displaced now — not to compare myself with the millions of people internationally displaced. I mean just emotionally I am. People have been very kind. People really saved us. We stayed at one place, then another friend gave us the keys to a house he has. That was a very humbling experience. But it’s difficult. We’re leasing a place right now, we’re trying to rebuild, we’re trying to wait for a permit, we’re trying to maneuver red tape, and that’s going to be years. It’s truly just taking it a day at a time, which is hard. So it’s been kind of crazy making. And then Gladys! All the joy of that, and the worry about it. It’s been a weird juxtaposition.
Olsen: How do you think you’ve been handling award season?
Madigan: Well, with the help of the people I’m working with, I think I’m doing pretty well. But it’s still overwhelming to me. But people like yourself, they’ve been very generous and they’re interested in cinema and they don’t call everything “content” and people have good questions, and I’ve met a lot of great actors that I didn’t know before. So that’s been [a] total upside. But the rigor of it, you have all these things to go to, and you have to have an outfit, and you to have your hair done, you have your makeup done. I’m not that person in my life. So, it’s been a challenge, let me put it that way.
Olsen: At this point in your career, it’s probably unpredictable for you which of your previous movies people are gonna ask you about. Like, “Oh, are they gonna ask me a ‘Field of Dreams’ question?”
Madigan: Everybody always asks me about it. Because “Field of Dreams” turned into this iconic thing. I’ll be in an airport and some man will come up to me and just say, “That scene when Kevin Costner’s with his dad,” they start getting choked up, “My dad, we were estranged” and this and that. So it’s touched people. And then I’ll have the man say, “I’d love to have a wife like Annie Kinsella.” I said, “I would too, that’d be great. But this is a fantasy.” But that movie, people love that movie. That’s a nice compliment.
Olsen: But also I would imagine that maybe it’s unpredictable what people are going to mention, like last summer I saw the movie “Streets of Fire” that you were in, and I know that film did not do well when it…
Madigan: It was a bomb and now it is a cult classic.
Olsen: Because I saw it at a packed house at the Academy Theater here in Los Angeles. What are your recollections of making that movie?
Madigan: Well, first of all, I love Walter Hill. I saw all of his films, so I was excited to work with him and that I got this part. It was written for a guy, and I kind of convinced him that McCoy could be me. And you know, it was Willem Dafoe’s first film, I believe … Rick Moranis was there. It was wild. We shot 58 nights in a row or something insane. And I worked with all the dudes, Stoney and all those guys, and Diane Lane, who was, I don’t know, 19 years old or something. But we had a great time making it, and then it went thunk, but now I still get fan mail about it. It’s crazy.
Olsen: Now, before I let you go, in one interview that you did, you mentioned how every day you read three newspapers, you read the Washington Post.
Madigan: I feel stricken by what’s happening with the Washington Post, stricken.
Olsen: But then also the New York Times, and then only for the sports section, you read the Los Angeles Times.
Madigan: Well, I read the California section because I’m very interested in local politics, but unfortunately, the L.A. Times is not what it used to be. And because I am an avid sports person, they go to bed so early with the print that everything’s a half-a-day behind. So I’m like, “I know this. I watched the game.” So it’s a little nutty, but I do go to the sports section.
Olsen: What can we do to win you over to reading our arts and culture coverage of the town that you live in?
Madigan: I always read the entertainment section, always, every single day. And I also love the comics. I’ve been reading the comics since I’ve been that big. And I read them every day. So please don’t misunderstand. I think I’m talking more about the front page.
Olsen: OK, that’s a relief.
Madigan: Not you guys!
Olsen: Well, Amy Madigan, congratulations again and thank you so much for joining us today.
Madigan: Thank you. This was really nice. I appreciate it. I really am interested in writers and interested in people’s beat to treasure cinema. So this has been really nice. Thank you.
An employee enters the Samsung C&T construction division headquarters in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. Samsung C&T plans to invest up to $6.5 billion during the next three years to foster future growth engines. File Photo by Yonhap.
SEOUL, Feb. 19 (UPI) — South Korea’s Samsung C&T said Thursday it would invest up to $6.5 billion during the next three years to nurture future growth engines.
Samsung C&T is a diversified Samsung affiliate that builds major infrastructure, trades global materials and energy, and operates fashion and resort businesses.
Through 2028, the Seoul-based company is scheduled to allocate between $4.5 billion and $5.2 billion to next-generation growth areas, including energy and bio. However, it did not disclose further details.
In addition, Samsung C&T plans to spend a maximum of $1.3 billion to beef up competitiveness in its existing operations by shifting toward a high-margin business model and expanding into overseas markets.
The firm also unveiled a three-year plan to raise its dividend per share by 25%.
“Over the next three years, we will focus on delivering results from growth businesses centered on energy and bio while strengthening our existing portfolio,” Samsung C&T said in a regulatory filing.
“On the back of a stable financial structure, we strive to pursue investments in future growth areas alongside shareholder returns,” it added.
The construction unit is one of the country’s leading contractors. It was lead builder of Dubai’s Burj Khalifa in the United Arab Emirates, the world’s tallest skyscraper.
The company saw its 2025 operating profit rise 10.4% to $2.27 billion, while annual sales edged down 3.2% to $28 billion year-on-year.
The share price of Samsung C&T climbed 0.47% on the Seoul bourse Thursday.
Real Madrid’s Brazilian forward Vinicius Jr alleges he was racially abused by Benfica’s Gianluca Prestianni.
Published On 19 Feb 202619 Feb 2026
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Real Madrid has sent UEFA, football’s governing body in Europe, “all available evidence” of an alleged racist insult against Vinicius Jr in a Champions League match against Benfica.
“Our club has actively collaborated with the investigation opened by UEFA following the unacceptable episodes of racism experienced during that match,” the Spanish club said on Thursday without elaborating on the evidence.
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UEFA appointed a special investigator on Wednesday to gather evidence about what happened in Lisbon on Tuesday in Madrid’s 1-0 win at Benfica in the first leg of the knockout round of the Champions League.
Vinicius accused Benfica player Gianluca Prestianni of calling him “monkey” after the Brazilian scored the only goal. Prestianni was among the Benfica players upset with Vinícius after the forward celebrated by the Benfica corner flag.
Prestianni covered his mouth with his shirt when he allegedly spoke to the Brazilian player and denied racially abusing Vinicius, who is Black and has been subjected to repeated racist insults in Spain.
“Real Madrid appreciates the unanimous support, backing, and affection that our player Vinicius Jr. has received from all areas of the global football community,” the club said. “Real Madrid will continue working, in collaboration with all institutions, to eradicate racism, violence, and hate in sports and society.”
Benfica said Prestianni was the victim of a “defamation campaign” and welcomed the investigation opened by UEFA, saying it “fully supports and believes the version presented” by Prestianni.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday he was “shocked and saddened to see the incident of alleged racism” and praised the referee for activating the antiracism protocol during the match, which was halted for nearly 10 minutes at the Stadium of Light.
A Sidemen star has opened up about potentially launching a spin-off version of the group’s hit reality show, Inside
The YouTube group has considered starting a new series centred around fans (Image: Netflix )
Sidemen star Ethan Payne has told fans to ‘start a petition’ as he teased a wild gameshow that would be open to the YouTube group’s viewers.
Best known as Behzinga, the 30-year-old co-founded the content creation group, which features KSI, Simon Minter, Vikram Singh Barn, Joshua Bradley, Harry Lewis, and Tobi Brown.
Along with their collective YouTube channels, the Sidemen also host a reality show called Inside, which was picked up by Netflix last year. The high-stakes series follows a group of influencers living under one roof and competing for a huge prize pot of up to £1 million. They face daily challenges and every decision can deduct money from the final cash prize.
While the show has traditionally featured famous faces, Ethan has confirmed that there is hope for a fresh series centred on everyday contestants.
He spoke to the Mirror ahead of the Formula E EVO Sessions, which took place last Sunday (February 16) at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit in Saudi Arabia.
The star competed against the world’s biggest content creators, getting behind the wheel of the cutting-edge GEN3 Evo race car. You can stream all the action now on Formula E’s YouTube channel.
When asked about opening up the Inside competition to their fanbase, Ethan said: “Me and JJ [KSI] have definitely said it would be insane to watch with people from the public.
“Because the amount of care for the prize money would be insane and I feel like you’d get a lot more drama. It might be too much drama.”
For the latest showbiz, TV, movie and streaming news, go to the new **Everything Gossip** website.
The father-of-one continued: “I definitely think there’d be a bit more of a real edge to it and people’s decisions would definitely have way more of a knock-on [effect] throughout the whole thing.” He went on to joke: “Start a petition!”
Sidemen fans should probably get a petition rolling if they want the show to become a reality, though we have to warn that Ethan set the bar at 100,000 viewers co-signing the idea. But it should be an easy feat considering group collectively boasts over 100 million subscribers.
Inside is available to stream on Netflix and Formula E’s 2026 EVO Sessions are available to stream now on YouTube.
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Israeli forces carried out violent raids across the occupied West Bank, detaining Palestinians and demolishing homes. A young man was killed by settlers in Mukhmas, Jerusalem, while restrictions on West Bank worshippers at Al-Aqsa added to tensions during Ramadan.
Since October 2023, UNRWA has faced attacks by Israel’s government, funding cuts from the US, and legal cases questioning the organisation’s neutrality. During that time, Israeli forces have killed more than 380 UNRWA staff in Gaza.
In this episode of Centre Stage, Al Jazeera’s Mohamed Hassan speaks with UNRWA’s commissioner general, Philippe Lazzarini, about Israel’s ban on the agency and what he calls a turning point for international law and the global order.
A FORMER Pussycat Doll has taken a scathing fresh swipe at Nicole Scherzinger, Ashley Roberts and Kimberly Wyatt after it was revealed the three of them are reuniting for a world tour.
Ashley Roberts, Kimberly Wyatt, Melody Thornton, Nicole Scherzinger, Carmit Bachar, and Jessica Sutta of The Pussycat Dolls posed up in 2006 as they won Best Dance Video for ‘Buttons’Credit: GettyCarmit Bachar now seems to having taken a scathing swipe at her former girl groupCredit: GettyThe star reposted a video to the song I’m Letting Go Of The B******t by Nick HustlesCredit: Instagram
But, one of the original members of the hit girl group, who isn’t returning for the tour, doesn’t seem to be taking the news well.
Taking to Instagram, Carmit Bachar, 51, appeared to take a harsh swipe at her former group.
Carmit reposted a clip of a woman singing along to the song I’m Letting Go Of The B******t by Nick Hustles.
In the video, the woman can be seen saying the lyrics, ” F*** anything that don’t help me grow, fake friends, shiesty h**s letting all that b******t go.”
But it’s full steam ahead now for Nicole, Ashley and Kimberley who were seen at dinner together in London’s Mayfair a few weeks ago.
They were said to be ironing out the final details of the tour deal as they enjoyed a lavish meal.
Nicole, Ashley and Kimberly met up in Mayfair a few weeks ago to iron out their tour plansCredit: SMART PICTURES
When the Pussycat Dolls tour was first announced, Carmit seemed to take a cryptic swipe at the trio on social media as she celebrated one of the group’s most iconic hits reaching 100 million streams on Spotify.
She shared a clip from the Beep music video, seemingly making clear she will always be part of the Pussycat Dolls’ legacy.
Carmit wrote: “20 years of BEEP music video and here we are, still feeling the love.
“100 millions streams on @spotify is a reminder that music really does live beyond the moment it’s created. Thank you to every @pussycatdolls fan who’s listened, danced, remembered and shared!”
Fans were quick to share the disappointment over the iconic singer not being part of the new plans for the group.
One wrote: “Sad you aren’t going on tour, but I totally get it.”
And another said: “If you’re not returning with the band I will not be there to support.”
Nicole, Ashley and Kimberly quietly signed to top touring agency CAA in December to help guide their huge comeback.
At the end of last year, Nicole hinted at plans for 2026 as she shared an old video of the group.
A source told The Sun: “Nicole and the girls have been talking about gettingPussycat Dollsback together for months now.
“Covid scuppered the original plan and then disagreements behind the scenes meant it all fell apart.
“But Nicole, Ashley and Kimberly are a solid unit and they’re raring to go.”
The Pussycat Dolls burst onto the music scene in April 2005 with their single Don’t Cha.
The legendary girl group burst onto the music scene with their hit Don’t ChaCredit: Getty
Microsoft founder Bill Gates has cancelled his keynote speech at India’s flagship AI summit just hours before he was due to take the stage on Thursday.
Gates, who has faced renewed scrutiny over his past ties to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, withdrew to “ensure the focus remains on the AI Summit’s key priorities”, the Gates Foundation said in a statement.
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The five-day India AI Impact Summit 2026 was meant to showcase India’s ambitions in the booming sector, with the country expecting to attract more than $200bn in investment over the next two years.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had billed the summit as an opportunity for India to shape the future of AI, drawing high-profile attendees, including French President Emmanuel Macron and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Instead, it has been dogged by controversy, from Gates’s abrupt exit to an incident in which an Indian university tried to pass off a Chinese-made robotic dog as its own innovation.
So, what exactly went wrong at India’s flagship AI gathering and why has it drawn such intense scrutiny?
Why Gates’s appearance became an issue
Bill Gates was due to deliver a short but high-profile speech highlighting the opportunities and risks posed by artificial intelligence.
However, in recent weeks, several opposition figures and commentators in Indian media weighed in after emails featuring his name were released in the Epstein files in late January, questioning whether his presence was appropriate.
Despite the discussion, all appeared to be proceeding as planned earlier in the week. On Tuesday, the Gates Foundation’s India office posted on X that Gates would attend the summit and “deliver his keynote as scheduled”.
Then, on Thursday, hours before the scheduled speech, it released a statement saying that “After careful consideration, and to ensure the focus remains on the AI Summit’s key priorities, Mr Gates will not be delivering his keynote address.”
It added that Ankur Vora, president of the Gates Foundation’s Africa and India offices, would deliver the speech instead.
What are the alleged links between Epstein and Gates?
Bill Gates was named in documents related to Epstein released in January by the US Department of Justice.
In a draft email included among the documents, Epstein alleged Gates had engaged in extramarital affairs and sought his help in procuring drugs “to deal with consequences of sex with Russian girls”.
It was unclear whether Epstein actually sent the email, and Gates denies any wrongdoing.
The Gates Foundation, in a statement to The New York Times, called the allegations “absolutely absurd and completely false”.
What has India’s government said?
Very little.
Despite criticism and calls from opposition figures to explain the invitation to Gates, the Indian government has not directly addressed the controversy that culminated in Gates’s withdrawal.
While unnamed government sources told local media he would not attend the summit, officials stopped short of explaining why.
Asked about Gates’s participation, Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw declined to give a clear answer to reporters, while Modi made no reference to the issue in his public remarks.
Why are the Epstein files a sensitive subject for India?
The controversy surrounding Gates’s planned participation comes close on the heels of a series of disclosures in the Epstein files that have forced the Modi government on the backfoot.
In one email to an unidentified individual he referred to only as “Jabor Y”, Epstein referred to Modi’s historic visit – the first by an Indian prime minister – to Israel in July 2017.
Epstein wrote: “The Indian Prime minister modi took advice. and danced and sang in israel for the benefit of the US president. they had met a few weeks ago.. IT WORKED. !”
Modi’s visit to Israel – and his subsequent embrace of the Benjamin Netanyahu government, with military, intelligence and other ties strengthened over the past decade – had already drawn criticism from the opposition Congress party and others, who have accused him of reversing decades of Indian support for the Palestinian cause. India was the first non-Arab nation to recognise the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1974, and did not establish full diplomatic relations with Israel until 1992.
But the Epstein email turbocharged the opposition criticism of Modi’s Israel policy – with questions now also asked about whether it was influenced by Washington.
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs dismissed the Epstein email in an unusually sharply worded statement.
“Beyond the fact of the prime minister’s official visit to Israel in July 2017, the rest of the allusions in the email are little more than trashy ruminations by a convicted criminal, which deserve to be dismissed with the utmost contempt,” spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said.
But the Epstein cloud continues to hover over India.
The files also show that India’s current oil minister, Hardeep Singh Puri, exchanged dozens of emails with Epstein after he joined Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014.
In many of them, Puti appears to be taking Epstein’s help in getting US investors, such as LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman, to visit India. In others, he appears to suggest that he had a fairly comfortable personal relationship with Epstein.
“Please let me know when you are back from your exotic island,” Puri wrote in December 2014, for instance, asking to set up a meeting in which Puri could give Epstein some books to “excite an interest in India”.
Puri, in a new conference, has claimed that he only met Epstein “three or four times”, but the Congress party has argued that the emails suggest a much closer relationship.
Gates’s work in India
The Gates Foundation has long been a key partner in India’s public health and development sectors, backing major vaccination drives, disease prevention campaigns and sanitation programmes.
At the same time, he has had vocal critics, including environmental activist Vandana Shiva, who has argued that Gates’s brand of “philanthro-imperialism” uses wealth to control global food systems.
Gates also faced heavy criticism after a 2024 podcast in which he said India was “a kind of laboratory to try things … that then, when you prove them out in India, you can take to other places” when discussing development programmes and the foundation’s work there.
‘Orion’ the robodog and other controversies
Beyond the fallout over Bill Gates’s cancelled keynote, the AI Impact Summit has faced several controversies.
One incident involved a robotic dog named “Orion”, which Galgotias University, based in the New Delhi suburban town of Greater Noida, presented as its own innovation.
Online users quickly identified the machine as a commercially available Chinese-made model, prompting organisers to ask the institution to vacate its stall.
The event also drew criticism on its opening day after facing logistical issues, including long queues and confusion over entry procedures, according to local media.
On Wednesday, large crowds were seen walking for miles after police cordoned off roads for VIP access.
Dhananjay Yadav, the CEO of a company exhibiting high-tech wearables, made headlines after he reported on social media that devices had been stolen from the company’s stand.
The Times of India later reported that two maintenance workers at the event had been arrested for allegedly stealing the wearables.
Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, the former UK prince and younger brother of King Charles, has been arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office as police investigate claims he shared confidential material with convicted sex-offender Jeffrey Epstein.
California may be losing two of the state’s most famed residents and generous political donors.
Filmmaker Steven Spielberg recently moved to New York and Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg is eyeing purchasing a new property in Florida, stirring speculation about whether their decisions are tied to a proposed new tax on California billionaires to fund healthcare for the state’s most vulnerable residents.
Although a handful of prominent conservatives who bolted out of California noisily blamed their departure on the controversial wealth tax measure, as well as the state’s liberal ways and what they describe as cumbersome business regulations, neither Zuckerberg nor Spielberg has given any indication that the tax proposal is the reason for their moves.
A spokesperson for Spielberg, who has owned homes on both the East and West coasts since at least the mid-1990s, said the sole motivation for Spielberg and his wife, actor Kate Capshaw, decamping to Manhattan was to be near family.
“Steven’s move to the East Coast is both long-planned and driven purely by his and Kate Capshaw’s desire to be closer to their New York based children and grandchildren,” said Terry Press, a spokesperson for the prodigious filmmaker. She declined to answer questions about his position on the proposed ballot measure.
Director Steven Spielberg presents president Bill Clinton with the Ambassadors Humanity award at the 5th Annual Ambassadors for Humanity Dinner Honoring former President Bill Clinton to support the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation held at the Amblin theatre Universal Studios on February 17, 2005 in Los Angeles, California.
(Frazer Harrison / Getty Images)
On Jan. 1, Spielberg and Capshaw officially became residents of New York City, settling in the historic San Remo co-op in Central Park West. The storied building is among the most exclusive in Manhattan, having been home to Bono, Mick Jagger, Warren Beatty, Tiger Woods and many other celebrities. On the same day, Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment opened an office in New York City.
Zuckerberg and his wife, pediatrician Priscilla Chan, are considering buying a $200-million waterfront mansion in South Florida, the Wall Street Journal first reported this month. The property is located in Miami’s Indian Creek, a gated barrier island that is an alcove of the wealthy and the influential, including Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner.
Representatives for Zuckerberg declined to comment.
The billionaires’ moves raised eyebrows because they take place as supporters of the proposed 5% one-time tax on the assets of California billionaires and trusts are gathering signatures to qualify the initiative for the November ballot. Led by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, they must gather the signatures of nearly 875,000 registered voters and submit them to county elections officials by June 24.
If approved, the tax would raise roughly $100 billion that would largely pay for healthcare services, as well as some education programs. Critics say it would drive the wealthy and their companies out of the state. On Dec. 31, venture capitalist David Sacks announced that he was opening an office in Austin, Texas, the same day PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel publicized that his firm had opened a new office in Miami.
The proposed ballot measure, if it qualifies for the ballot and is approved by voters, would apply to Californians who are residents of the state as of 2026. But residency requirements are murky. Among the factors considered by the state’s Franchise Tax Board are where someone is registered to vote, the location of their principle residence, how much time they spend in California, where their driver’s license was issued and their cars registered, where their spouse and children live, the location of their doctors, dentists, accountants and attorneys, and their “social ties,” such as the site of their house of worship or county club.
It’s unclear whether the proposal will qualify for the November ballot, and if it does, whether voters will approve it. However, a mass exodus of a number of the state’s billionaires — more than 200 people — would have a notable effect on state revenue, regardless. The state’s budget volatility is caused by its heavy reliance on taxes paid by the state’s wealthiest residents, including from levies on capital gains and stock-based compensation.
“The highest-income Californians pay the largest share of the state’s personal income tax,” according to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2026-27 budget summary that was published in January. “The significant share of personal income taxes — by far the state’s largest General Fund revenue source — paid by a small percentage of taxpayers increases the difficulty of forecasting personal income tax revenue.”
This reliance on wealthy Californians is among the reasons the proposed billionaires tax has created a schism among Democrats and is a source of discord in the 2026 governor’s race to replace Newsom, who cannot seek another term and is weighing a presidential bid. He opposes the proposal; Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT.) campaigned for it Wednesday evening at the Wiltern in Los Angeles.
“I am not only supportive of what they’re trying to do in California, but we’re going to introduce a wealth tax for the whole country. We have got to deal with the greed, the extraordinary greed, of the billionaire class,” Sanders told reporters Feb. 11.
Zuckerberg and Spielberg are both prolific political donors, though it is difficult to fully account for their contributions to candidates, campaigns and other entities because of how they or their affiliates donate to them as well as the intricacies of campaign finance reporting.
Spielberg, 79, a Hollywood legend, is worth more than $7 billion, according to Forbes. He and his wife have donated almost universally to Democratic candidates and causes, according to Open Secrets, a nonprofit, nonpartisan tracker of federal campaign contributions, and the California secretary of state’s office.
The prolific filmmaker, who won acclaim for movies such as “Schindler’s List,” “Jaws,” “Jurassic Park” and the “Indiana Jones” trilogy, was born in Ohio and lived with his family in several states before moving to California. He attended Cal State Long Beach but dropped out after Universal Studios gave him a contract to direct television shows.
Zuckerberg, 41, launched Facebook while in college and is worth more than $219 billion, making him among the world’s richest people, according to Forbes.
His largest personal federal political donation appears to be $1 million to FWD.us, a group focused on criminal justice and immigration reform nationwide, according to Open Secrets.
Zuckerberg, who is currently a registered Democrat in Santa Clara County, has donated to politicians across the partisan spectrum, including Democrats such as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and current Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to Republicans such as President Trump’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio when he ran for the White House and Chris Christie during his New Jersey gubernatorial campaign.
Both men’s personal donations don’t include their other effects on campaign finances — Spielberg has helped countless Democratic politicians raise money in Hollywood; Zuckerberg’s company has made other contributions. Meta — the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp — donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration committee in December 2024. Zuckerberg later attended the president’s swearing in at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.
Zuckerberg, born in White Plains, N.Y., created an early prototype of Facebook while at Harvard University and dropped out to move to Silicon Valley to complete the social media platform, as depicted in the award-winning film “The Social Network.”
He still owns multiple properties in California and elsewhere, including a controversial, massive compound on Kauai that includes two mansions, dozens of bedrooms, multiple other buildings and recreational spaces — and an underground bunker that features a metal door filled with concrete, according to a 2023 investigation by Wired. The cost of land acquisition and construction reportedly has topped $300 million.
Meta is based in Menlo Park, Calif., though it has been incorporated in Delaware since Facebook’s founding in 2004.
Times staff writer Queenie Wong contributed to this report.
Trump’s tariffs, Greenland and defence spending are testing US-Europe alliance.
United States President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs on European goods, made a bid to take over Greenland and demanded Europe foot the bill for its own defence. European leaders now fear the era of US-led security protections may be over. They’re accelerating efforts to reduce their military and economic dependence on the US.
At the Munich Security Conference, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio insisted his nation is not walking away from its allies. But few in the room were convinced. Instead, leader after leader took to the podium with the same message: Europe must stand on its own.
Spending on AI is forecast to skyrocket to $2.5 trillion in 2026, dwarfing even the largest scientific and infrastructure projects.
World leaders and tech executives are convening in New Delhi for the India-AI Impact Summit 2026, focusing on the role of artificial intelligence in governance, job disruption and global collaboration.
However, behind these discussions lies the financial reality. Over the past decade, AI has drawn one of the largest waves of private investment in modern history, totalling trillions of dollars.
According to Gartner, a United States-based business and technology insights company, worldwide spending on AI is forecast to total $2.5 trillion in 2026, a 44 percent increase over 2025.
To understand the magnitude of these investments, Al Jazeera visualises the staggering amounts by comparing them with some of the largest projects ever created by humanity. We also highlight which countries are spending the most on AI and provide insights into expenditures on data centres, models, services, and security.
What does $1bn look like?
To help understand a trillion dollars, it is useful to first visualise what millions and billions of dollars look like by using a stack of US dollar bills.
If you break these amounts down using $100 bills, here is how they stack up:
$1,000 would form a stack about 1cm (0.393-inch) high.
$10,000 would form a stack approximately 10cm (3.93-inch) high.
$1m would fit inside a briefcase.
$10m would fit inside a very large suitcase.
$100m would fit on an industrial pallet stacked waist-high.
$1bn would create a building approximately 5.2 metres (17 feet) high, with a width and a length of about 2 metres (6.6 feet) each.
Another way to think of it is if you spent $1 every second, it would take:
11.5 days to spend $1m
31 years to spend $1bn
31,000 years to spend $1 trillion
In more tangible terms, $1bn is roughly equivalent to:
The estimated cost of the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza, one of the largest archaeological museums in the world
The cost of constructing two to three modern football stadiums, depending on size and design
Buying 10 luxury private jets (at $100m each)
Buying 6.3 tonnes of gold (at $5,000 per ounce)
Buying 1 million high-end iPhones at retail price
$1.6 trillion already spent on AI
Over the past decade, AI-related investments have surged nearly 13-fold.
According to the 2025 AI Index Report by Stanford University, between 2013 and 2024, total global corporate investment in AI reached $1.6 trillion. This substantial expenditure dwarfs even the largest scientific and infrastructure projects of the 20th and 21st centuries.
To put the scale of AI investment into perspective, consider how it compares with some of the most ambitious and expensive projects in modern history. All figures are adjusted to 2024 US dollars:
The Manhattan Project (1942-46): $36bn
The International Space Station (1984-2011): $150bn
The Apollo Program (1960-73): $250bn
The US Interstate Highway System (1956-92): $620bn
In just over a decade, investment in AI has surpassed the cost of developing the first atomic bomb, landing humans on the moon and the decades-long effort to build the 75,440km (46,876-mile) US interstate highway network.
Unlike these landmark projects, AI funding has not been driven by a single government or wartime urgency. It has flowed through private markets, venture capital, corporate research and development, and global investors, making it one of the largest privately financed technological waves in history.
Global corporate investments in AI cover a vast array of operations, including mergers and acquisitions, minority stakes, private investments, and public offerings. These monumental expenditures highlight the extensive financial commitment to advance AI.
Which countries are spending the most on AI?
The AI investment surge is concentrated in just a few countries, where private capital has fuelled thousands of startups and shaped global innovation hubs.
The US has dominated AI spending, accounting for roughly 62 percent of total private AI funding since 2013. Between 2013 and 2024, US companies spent $471bn on AI. Chinese companies are the second-largest spenders at $119bn, followed by the United Kingdom at $28bn.
These figures exclude government spending, such as the US CHIPS Act or European national AI subsidies.
Global private investment in AI by country, 2013-24:
US: $471bn, supporting 6,956 newly funded AI companies
China: $119bn, 1,605 startups
UK: $28bn, 885 startups
Canada: $15bn, 481 startups
Israel: $15bn, 492 startups
Germany: $13bn, 394 startups
India: $11bn, 434 startups
France: $11bn, 468 startups
South Korea: $9bn, 270 startups
Singapore: $7bn, 239 startups
Others: $58bn
AI spending to total $2.5 trillion in 2026
AI spending is forecast to skyrocket to $2.5 trillion in 2026, driven by a massive global build-out of data centres and services, according to Gartner.
The bulk of the spending is expected to go towards:
AI infrastructure: $1.37 trillion
AI services: $589bn
AI software: $452bn
AI cybersecurity: $51bn
AI platforms for data science and machine learning: $31bn
AI models: $26bn
AI application development platforms: $8.4bn
AI data: $3bn
By 2027, Gartner is forecasting that AI spending will surpass $3.3 trillion.
POP superstar Lady Gaga is set to release a concert film about her record breaking Mayhem Ball.
The Sun can reveal the Abracadabra hitmaker, 39, has secretly enlisted British director Sam Wrench to help bring her vision to life.
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Lady Gaga is filming a concert special in Los Angles this weekCredit: Getty
The special is set to be filmed over Lady Gaga’s four nights at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles this week.
While no release date is set, the film is expected to be released later this year after being snapped up by streaming bosses following a fierce bidding war.
Sam is no stranger to concert documentaries, having previously worked with Taylor Swift on her 2023 Eras Tour film.
Not only was the film released on Disney+ but it also was rolled out across cinemas – breaking box office records in the process.
It’s not the first time Gaga and Sam have worked together.
They previously teamed up on Gaga’s 2024 Chromaica Ball HBO special which documented her 2022 stadium tour of the same name.
A source said: “Gaga has poured her heart and soul into The Mayhem Ball.
“She is so proud of everyone who has helped make the tour what it is and is keen to give it the full concert film treatment.
“Not only is it arguably her most elaborate show of all time, it’s also reminded the world that almost two decades into her career she is still at the top of her game.”
The insider added: “Gaga and Sam have a close working relationship so bringing him on board was a no brainer.
“The show will be filmed across her four dates in Los Angeles and is pencilled in for release late 2026.”
The Sun understands Sam is joining the creative team headed up by the superstar.
He will sit alongside Gaga’s fiance Michael Polansky, 42, and her choreographer Parris Goebel, 34, who are also helping creatively manage the project.
Michael is now an integral part of the Poker Face singer’s inner circle.
He was listed as an Executive Producer alongside Gaga on Mayhem – as well as landing a number of writing credits including on the record’s lead single Disease.
Gaga previously said: “Michael was in the studio every day with me. “He oversaw the whole process of making the record, completing it, helping me shape the sound of the record creatively.
“It was an amazing thing to do with your partner, because when I start to doubt myself, there is nobody that’s going to call me on it better than he is”.
Kicking off in July last year, The Mayhem Ball is one of Gaga’s biggest ever tours, seeing her play 87 dates across four continents.
Last September and October Gaga played four sold out shows at London’s O2 before a further two dates at Manchester’s Co-op Live.
By the time she takes her final bow at Madison Square Garden in April, she will have played to over 1.3million fans.
The concert film comes off the back of an already packed 2026 for Gaga.
Despite only being weeks into the year the singer has already filmed a concert special for Apple Music, performed at the Grammys and the Super Bowl and wrapped up the Asian leg of The Mayhem Ball.
Next week she will go head to head with some of the biggest artists in the world at the 2026 Brit Awards.
While she is unable to attend the ceremony due to playing a show in Texas on the same date, she is up for two of the biggest gongs of the night.
Gaga is nominated for International Artist of the Year and International Song of the Year thanks to her Bruno Mars collaboration Die With A Smile
It marks the first time in over a decade she has been nominated.
Lady Gaga’s Mayhem Tour is one of the biggest of her careerCredit: GettyLady Gaga is set to release the concert special later this yearCredit: Getty
Newly released satellite images show that Iran has recently built a concrete shield over a new facility at a sensitive military site and covered it in soil, advancing work at a location reportedly bombed by Israel in 2024 amid soaring tensions with the United States and the threat of regional war.
The images also show that Iran has buried tunnel entrances at a nuclear site bombed by Washington during Israel’s 12-day war with Iran last year – which the US joined on Israel’s behalf – fortified tunnel entrances near another, and has repaired missile bases struck in the conflict.
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They offer a rare glimpse of Iranian activities at some of the sites at the centre of tensions with Israel and the US.
Some 30km (20 miles) southeast of Tehran, the Parchin complex is one of Iran’s most sensitive military sites. Western intelligence has suggested Tehran carried out tests relevant to nuclear bomb detonations there more than 20 years ago. Iran has always denied seeking atomic weapons and says its nuclear programme is purely for civilian purposes.
Neither US intelligence nor the UN nuclear watchdog found any evidence last year that Iran was pursuing nuclear weapons.
Israel reportedly struck Parchin in October 2024. Satellite imagery taken before and after that attack shows extensive damage to a rectangular building at Parchin, and apparent reconstruction in images from November 6, 2024. Imagery from October 12, 2025, shows development at the site, with the skeleton of a new structure visible and two smaller structures adjacent to it.
Progress is apparent in imagery from November 14, with what appears to be a metallic roof covering the large structure. By February 16, it cannot be seen at all, hidden by what experts say is a concrete structure.
The Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), in a January 22 analysis of satellite imagery, pointed to progress in the construction of a “concrete sarcophagus” around a newly built facility at the site, which it identified as Taleghan 2.
ISIS founder David Albright wrote on X: “Stalling the negotiations has its benefits: Over the last two to three weeks, Iran has been busy burying the new Taleghan 2 facility … More soil is available and the facility may soon become a fully unrecognizable bunker, providing significant protection from aerial strikes.”
The institute also reported in late January that satellite images showed new efforts to bury two tunnel entrances at the Isfahan complex – one of the three Iranian uranium-enrichment plants bombed by the US in June during the war. By early February, ISIS said all entrances to the tunnel complex were ”completely buried”.
Other images point to ongoing efforts since February 10 to “harden and defensively strengthen” two entrances to a tunnel complex under a mountain some 2km (1.2 miles) from Natanz – the site that holds Iran’s other two uranium enrichment plants.
This comes as Washington seeks to negotiate a deal with Tehran on its nuclear programme while threatening military action if talks fail.
On Tuesday, US and Iranian representatives reached an understanding on main “guiding principles” during a meeting in Geneva, but felt short of achieving any breakthrough. The meeting in the Swiss city came after a first round of talks in Oman on February 6.
Reports suggest that Tehran would make detailed proposals in the next two weeks to close gaps. Among the many hurdles in the negotiations is the US push to widen the scope of the deal to include restrictions on Iran’s ballistic arsenal and support for its allies in the region.
That is fuelled by Israel’s demands and regional narrative, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly pressing US President Donald Trump to shift from nuclear-only parameters.
Tehran has insisted that these provisions are non-negotiable but that it is open to discuss curbs on its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.
A previous negotiating effort collapsed last year when Israel launched attacks on Iran, triggering the 12-day war that Washington joined in by bombing key Iranian nuclear sites.
As diplomacy forges a path, both parties are ramping up military pressure.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) held a series of war games on Monday and Tuesday in the Strait of Hormuz to prepare for “potential security and military threats”.
On Wednesday, Tehran announced new joint naval drills with Russia in the Sea of Oman. Rear Admiral Hassan Maqsoudlou said the exercises were aimed at preventing any unilateral action in the region, and enhancing coordination against threats to maritime security, including risks to commercial vessels and oil tankers.
The US has also escalated its military build-up in the region. Trump has ordered a second aircraft carrier to the region, with the first, the USS Abraham Lincoln and its nearly 80 aircraft, positioned about 700 kilometres (435 miles) from the Iranian coast as of Sunday, according to satellite imagery.
The Trump administration also issued new threats against Tehran with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying on Wednesday that “Iran would be very wise to make a deal” with the US. Trump escalated his rhetoric on social media.
“Should Iran decide not to make a Deal,” the US may need to use an Indian Ocean airbase in the Chagos Islands, “in order to eradicate a potential attack by a highly unstable and dangerous Regime”, he wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Posting on the Truth Social platform on Wednesday, Trump wrote: “I have been telling Prime Minister Keir Starmer, of the United Kingdom, that Leases are no good when it comes to Countries, and that he is making a big mistake by entering a 100 Year Lease…”
Despite Linda Carter and Max Branning sharing a kiss and his claims that he loves her – to his daughter’s disbelief – another woman seems set to become his new love interest
08:52, 19 Feb 2026Updated 08:52, 19 Feb 2026
EastEnders fans ‘work out’ who Max’s bride is – and it’s not Linda(Image: CREDIT LINE:BBC/Kieron McCarron)
The Walford Womaniser has struck again! While Max Branning seems convinced he’s in love with his ex Linda Carter, he’s found himself in another flirty interaction with a different woman has led EastEnders fans to say they know who his next love interest is.
Since he returned, many have thought Max (Jake Wood) might eventually marry his former flame Linda (Kellie Bright) in 2027. In the flashforward to next year, he was about to walk down the aisle to a mystery woman, and Linda was teased to be one of them.
But, during Tuesday’s episode (17 February), Max had a date with Linda that couldn’t be described as anything other than a disaster. For starters, Linda didn’t even know it was a date. When Max turned up with flowers and tried to kiss her, she firmly rejected him, leaving the worst philanderer in Walford to dejectedly lick his wounds.
The devastated Max then gave the flowers to Gina Knight (Francesca Henry), wishing her a happy birthday. The brief interaction had many thinking Gina would be the next woman added to Max’s long list of lovers.
“They’re gonna do max and gina as a couple,” said one fan. Another added: “I do think there’s something in Max giving Gina the flowers.” Others, though convinced that the show was hinting and a Max and Gina romance, were clear that they did not want it to happen.
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“I refuse to be in a reality where Gina and Max have a baby,” a fan said, referring to the pregnant woman seen in Max’s bed during the flashforward.
Another said: “Please for the love of god do not put Gina and Max together – he’s got form for younger women and Gina is already in a complex relationship with Harry after George and Nicola’s baby news. Gina can do better then him and he’s too much baggage for her.”
A third posted a TikTok where they pointed out that Max had previously had a relationship with Gina’s half sister Lucy Beale (Hetti Bywater) just before she died. At the time, Lucy was 21 and Max was not only 45, but her best friend’s father. The TikTok poster said: “Ewww were these scenes foreshadowing Max trying it on with Gina or something?
“Is that why Peter [Beale, Gina and Lucy’s brother] is p***ed off at him in the flashforward and why Cindy [Beale, their mother] didn’t look happy with him? As if getting with Lucy wasn’t bad enough…”
Max has been romantically linked to many women over the years and has a tendency to go for younger women. One of his major storylines in the late 2000s involved an affair with Stacey Slater (Lacey Turner), who was his own son’s wife.
Jake Wood, who plays Max, has previously said that he thinks Stacey is the love of Max’s life. When asked at a press event who Max’s true love is, Jake mentioned Tanya (Jo Joyner), the mother of three of his children, but settled on Stacey.
The actor said: “Obviously, Tanya is very high, but I think probably Stacey as well. I think we saw that when Max came back a couple of months ago. The connection is still really strong between the pair of them; they really understand each other. I think wherever they are in different parts or wherever they are in their lives, they’d always have that connection. So, if you asked Max, he would probably say Stacey.”
Feb. 19 (UPI) — More than 550 commercial driver’s license schools were cited for safety violations, including employing unqualified teachers, using improper vehicles, failing to properly test students, among other violations, according to the Trump administration, which said the “sham” institutions received notice they would be removed from the federal government’s National Training Provider Registry.
The Department of Transportation said Wednesday that more than 300 investigators conducted 1,426 on-site inspections of driver training schools across the country in a five-day sting operation. The Commercial Vehicle Training Association said the inspections took place during the week of Dec. 8.
The DOT said more than 550 schools were found in violation of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s safety standards. Of those, 109 training providers agreed to voluntarily remove themselves from the registry, while an additional 97 schools remain under investigation.
“For too long, the trucking industry has operated like the Wild, Wild, West, where anything goes and nobody asks any questions. The buck stops with me,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a statement.
“American families should have confidence that our school bus and truck drivers are following every letter of the law and that starts with receiving proper training before getting behind the wheel.”
The department said some of the schools lacked qualified instructors, used fake addresses or failed to properly train drivers in the transportation of hazardous materials. One school provided training for school bus drivers, the department said.
Following the inspections, CVTA, the largest association of commercial truck driver training programs, said in a statement that it welcomed the initiative, saying it strengthened “the integrity of commercial driver education and reaffirmed the critical role high-quality training plays in protecting the motoring public.”
The routine of gently but skillfully pushing wooden canoes into the water body at the shores of Kainji Lake each dawn has been part of the lives of generations of fishermen in North-central Nigeria.
The lake was not always calm – vigorously exhaling and flooding the banks, then intermittently receding – but was inevitably connected to the lives that many communities have held firmly to across Kebbi, Niger, and Kwara states.
Today, that ancestral connection between the communities and the lake is evaporating rapidly. And it is not merely ecological. In some villages where government presence is absent, and terrorists have assumed authority, fishermen now wait for permission from non-state actors before casting their nets. In other areas within the Kainji region, they pay informal levies to armed groups operating from the forests. For decades, Nigeria’s national parks were imagined as spaces apart: buffers of nature against human pressure and political failure. Sambisa Forest shattered that illusion long ago when the Boko Haram terror group took control of it, transforming from a conservation zone into the most notorious symbol of jihadist insurgency in the country. Now, further west, a quieter but no less consequential transformation is unfolding.
The Kainji Lake National Park (KLNP), sprawling across three states and bordering Benin, has slipped from a wildlife sanctuary into a strategic corridor where poverty, climate stress, criminal enterprises, violence, jihadist ideology, and Sahelian militancy intersect.
Kainji Lake National Park spans three states in Nigeria’s northern region and borders two countries. Map illustration: Mansir Muhammed/HumAngle.
A corridor
Security analysts increasingly describe Sambisa as a “fortress-base” model of insurgency: entrenched, ideological, territorially assertive. Kainji Lake fits a different and more elusive pattern—a “corridor-node” model.
Here, armed actors do not raise flags or announce governance structures. They pass through, networking, training, recruiting, and trading, before vanishing. The park links Nigeria’s troubled North West to the Middle Belt and, increasingly, to the destabilised Sahel. It connects Kebbi to Benin Republic’s Alibori and Atacora regions, Niger State to Niger Republic’s Tillabéri zone, and local grievances to transnational jihadist ambitions.
This distinction matters. Sambisa attracted relentless military pressure for more than a decade because it became a visible symbol of territorial breach. Kainji Lake did not. It appeared peripheral, quiet, manageable. In that absence of sustained attention, the park matured into something arguably more dangerous: a fluid connector for multiple armed actors rather than a single-group stronghold.
Communities along the lake, from Yauri and Ngaski in Kebbi to Borgu in Niger State and Kaiama in Kwara, depend on a fragile interweaving of fishing, floodplain farming, pastoralism, and cross-border trade. Fishing sustains thousands of households. Smoked and dried fish move through informal networks to Ilorin, Ibadan, southern Niger, and beyond. Seasonal farming follows the lake’s unpredictable pulse: millet, sorghum, maize, rice, and cowpea are cultivated on land that appears and disappears with the water’s rise and fall.
Fishing sustains thousands of households. Map illustration: Mansir Muhammed/HumAngle
Pastoralism runs through it all. Herders move cattle along routes that long predate colonial borders, grazing across Nigeria, Benin Republic, and Niger Republic as if the lines on maps were suggestions rather than laws. Weekly markets in Bagudo, Wawa, Babana, Kaiama, and Borgu draw traders from Benin’s north and Niger’s Tillabéri. Grain, livestock, fuel, kola nuts, dried fish, and cloth circulate through these hubs. Some of it is smuggling.
These networks matter because armed groups do not need to invent new pathways. They insert themselves into existing ones. The same tracks used by herders and traders now carry militants, arms couriers, recruiters, and ideological emissaries.
Climate stress as an accelerant
Climate change has exacerbated existing security vulnerabilities around Kainji Lake.
Erratic rainfall patterns and fluctuating water levels have made fishing yields unpredictable. Floodplains that once reliably supported seasonal farming now vanish early or arrive late. Pasture availability shifts without warning, intensifying competition between herders and farmers. Each shock further compresses livelihoods, forcing households to adapt through debt, migration, or risk-taking.
In this environment, armed groups offer something deceptively valuable: predictability. Access to grazing land. Protection from rivals. Permission to fish or farm. Even informal dispute resolution. Where the state provides uncertainty – sporadic enforcement, unclear rules, delayed response – armed actors provide immediate answers, enforced by violence if necessary.
Climate stress, in this sense, is not just an environmental issue but a governance crisis multiplier.
Fieldwork conducted by HumAngle across several local government areas in Kebbi, Niger, and Kwara states identified at least five active extremist factions operating within and around the park. These include the Mahmudawa (Mahmuda faction), Lakurawa, elements of Ansaru and Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad (JAS) led by Sadiku and Umar Taraba, and a newly emerged cell linked to Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin.
The groups do not operate in isolation. Many originate from northwest Nigeria and southern Niger, with local cover, as they undertake terror attacks in distant locations and return to their various hideouts within the region. What has emerged is a hybrid threat ecosystem where ideology, criminality, climate stress, and grievance reinforce one another.
Brokers, enforcers, and ideologues
The Mahmudawa illustrate the new logic of this ecosystem. Despite sustained air and ground operations by the Federal Government between September and December 2025, the group remains influential. Fragmented into smaller camps, some closer to the Benin border, they act as brokers linking criminal networks of jihadist actors. They facilitate training, arms movement, ransom negotiations and sanctuary for fighters arriving from outside the region.
Official claims regarding the arrest of their leader, Malam Mahmuda, remain unconfirmed in border communities, where continued attacks and coordinated leadership are still attributed to the group.
If the Mahmudawa are brokers, the Lakurawa are enforcers. With an estimated 300 fighters, they have become one of the most active jihadist–terrorist hybrids affecting Kebbi’s border communities. Operating from within and around KLNP, they routinely launch incursions into Bagudo and Suru LGAs, combining attacks on military targets with ideological messaging aimed at delegitimising the Nigerian state.
Their leadership shows signs of Sahelian exposure. Their fighters are drawn from local nomadic tribal networks and northwest terrorist pools. Kebbi, long considered peripheral, is now firmly part of the frontline.
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The relocation of Sadiku and Umar Taraba, both veteran jihadist operatives, to the Kainji axis in 2024 marked a shift. Their presence injected technical expertise into a space previously dominated by loosely organised armed groups.
IED knowledge, structured training, and a sharper focus on high-value targets followed. Collaboration with criminal terrorist groups deepened. The abduction of foreign nationals near Bode Sa’adu illustrated this fusion starkly: JAS elements, Mahmudawa fighters, and allied terrorists executing a single operation where ideology and profit were indistinguishable.
JNIM’s shadow on the lake
The most alarming development emerged in late November 2025: the appearance of a group believed to be affiliated with JNIM along the Kebbi–Benin border corridor.
Witnesses describe predominantly foreign fighters, many believed to be Tuareg, moving at night in disciplined formations, wearing military-style uniforms with turbans on their heads, and engaging communities with a calculated restraint unfamiliar to local armed groups. So far, they have avoided major attacks.
That restraint is likely strategic.
Their presence suggests Kainji Lake could become a staging ground for Sahelian expansion into northwestern Nigeria — a shift that would fundamentally alter the region’s security calculus. Unlike local groups, JNIM brings external financing, battlefield experience, and a long-term vision.
Communities adapting under pressure
Communities in the lake basin are not passive observers. They are recalibrating in real time. Some negotiate access quietly to avoid displacement. Others maintain layered loyalties, sharing information selectively as a survival strategy. Vigilante groups that once patrolled forest edges retreat under sustained pressure. Traditional rulers face coercion or marginalisation. In certain settlements, schools and community buildings are repurposed by armed actors for operational use.
Access to fishing grounds, farmlands, and trade routes increasingly depends on permissions issued by commanders operating from forest camps rather than on decisions by local councils or chiefs. Authority has shifted, not through formal declaration, but through incremental control of movement and livelihoods.
How conservation and governance hollowed the ground
The transformation of Kainji Lake into a security corridor is as much the product of ideology as it is the cumulative outcome of governance failure layered over decades.
The creation of Kainji Lake National Park in 1976 displaced communities and restricted access to land and water without meaningfully integrating residents into conservation planning. Fishing zones were closed, grazing was curtailed, and farming was criminalised in places where alternatives did not exist. Promised livelihoods rarely materialised.
Park rangers – tasked with enforcing vast conservation boundaries – were underpaid, poorly equipped, and often absent. Their presence, when felt, was frequently punitive rather than protective.
Local governments in Bagudo, Suru, Kaiama, Borgu, and Ngaski remain chronically weak.
When armed violence escalated across the northwestern region, security deployments focused on Zamfara, Katsina, and parts of Niger State. Kebbi’s borderlands were treated as peripheral, stable, and low-risk. That assumption proved costly.
Border governance failed as well. Coordination with Benin and the Niger Republics remains distant, reactive, and politicised. Joint patrols are rare. Intelligence sharing is uneven. Communities know this. Armed actors understand it better.
Armed groups arrived first as guests, then as protectors, and finally as power brokers, filling gaps the state created—sometimes violently, sometimes persuasively.
Poverty caused by the absence of authority
In the absence of legitmate sate authority, people seek alternative systems of order. Armed groups exploit this vacuum expertly. They tax, regulate, punish, and reward. In some communities, the question is no longer whether armed groups are legitimate, but whether they are avoidable. Increasingly, they are not.
The Kainji axis experienced seven major attacks between 2025 and Feb. 2026: The Nov. 2025 abduction of 303–315 students from St. Mary’s School in Papiri (Niger State); the market raid in Kasuwan Daji that claimed the lives of about 30-42 people on Jan. 3, 2026; the Jan. 23 park ambush killing six; the Feb. 1 raids in Agwara and Mashegu (dynamiting a police station and church), and the Feb. 4 massacre in Kaiama. Map illustration: Mansir Muhammed/HumAngle.
Once a symbol of Nigeria’s conservation ambition, KLNP has become a largely ungoverned hub exploited by a mix of violent actors: jihadist cells, armed terrorist factions, and transnational militants with roots beyond Nigeria’s borders.
From the northwest’s perspective – particularly Kebbi State – the park functions as a rear operational hub. Armed groups operating in border local governments use it for recruitment, logistics, training, and cross-border movement into the Benin Republic. Its sheer size, rugged terrain, and weak oversight enable a dangerous convergence: criminal armed groups blending with jihadism.
This shift carries national implications
Kainji’s forests and waterways provide mobility, with the lake economy providing revenue streams and border proximity offering escape and reinforcement routes.
While Sambisa became synonymous with territorial insurgency, Kainji signals the maturation of a corridor-based conflict economythat binds Nigeria’s northwest to wider Sahelian instability through forest reserves and lake communities.
When conservation spaces double as conflict connectors, the impact extends beyond biodiversity loss. Human buffers weaken first as communities negotiate survival under parallel authorities. Ecological buffers follow as enforcement fractures and resource exploitation become embedded in armed group financing.
Communities adapt under the rule of local armed terror groups in the absence of state and local government authorities. Density map of settlements in the Kainji axis where terrorists control.
The lake basin lies close to Kainji dam, a critical energy infrastructure, touches sensitive international borders, and anchors trade and livelihood systems that extend deep into the country’s interior.
In 2026, the geographic corridor surrounding the lake and its forest reserves recorded some of the highest levels of mass killings and large-scale abductions in Nigeria. Armed groups operate with increasing confidence, widening their reach across rural settlements and mobility routes connecting Niger State to Kebbi, Zamfara, and beyond toward the Sahelian belt.
The warning signs are not limited to a single park
In April 2025, the Conservator-General of Nigeria’s National Park Service, Ibrahim Musa Goni, told HumAngle that six national parks across the country were overrun by terrorists. Two years earlier, the federal government had created 10 additional parks to prevent further takeovers. However, only four of those new parks are currently operational. In addition to the seven existing parks, only eleven national parks are currently functioning nationwide.
Even where reclamation has occurred, the process is complex. The Conservator General pointed to Kaduna State as an example, describing what he termed a “mutual understanding” between authorities and armed groups.
“They have agreed to resolve their issues,” he said. “[As a result], most of the forest and game reserves, and even the national park in Kaduna State, have today been freed of banditry.” This, he argued, has brought “relative peace” and enabled forest and game guards, including officers in Birnin Gwari, to resume operations.
The National Park Service has also redefined its institutional posture. “The government classified the National Park Service as a paramilitary organisation,” Goni explained. “And as a paramilitary organisation, the act provides that we can bear arms.” Rangers affiliated with the Service have received training from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to address wildlife crime and respond to terror-related takeovers. According to Goni, this training has strengthened Nigeria’s capacity to confront forest-based criminality linked to armed groups and insurgents.
The approach is not solely security-driven. The Service engages surrounding communities through alternative livelihood programmes, skills training, and starter packs intended to reduce dependence on park resources. “This has, in a great deal, diverted the attention of most of them from the resources of the national parks,” Goni said, adding that it has helped contain hunting and wildlife trafficking.
Yet resource limitations remain significant. “Apart from managing wild animal resources and the plants, we also have to manage the human population,” he acknowledged, noting that the Service cannot meet the needs of every community bordering the parks.
A YOUNG rapper signed has died days after releasing a new single, at just 25 years old.
Janarious Mykel Wheeler, known by fans as Lil Poppa, died at 11:23am on Wednesday, according to the medical examiner.
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Lil Poppa began releasing music in 2017, when he was just a teenagerCredit: TikTok / lilpoppaHe had more than 600,000 monthly listeners on SpotifyCredit: Getty
According to his Spotify profile Poppa began releasing music in 2017, when he was just a teenager.
When rumours of his death first circulated, fans flooded his social media begging for answers, however the young rapper’s cause of death is currently unknown.
At the time of his death Lil Poppa had more than 600,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and over 960 thousand followers on Instagram.
In a now-tragic final post shared on his Instagram story Tuesday night, Poppa appeared to be riding in a car as he listened to Letting it go by Rod Wave.
Lil Poppa, was born in Jacksonville, Florida, where he first started rapping at church with a group of friends and his older brother.
And at just 12 years old Poppa built a makeshift studio in the closet of his bedroom and started recording his music using just a laptop and a Radio Shack mic.
His big break came in 2018, when his independently released single Purple Hearts hit 2.3 million views on YouTube.
Since then he has released several albums with his label Collective Music Group, which has signed other industry heavyweights like GloRilla.
What was Lil Poppa’s cause of death?
The Fulton County Medical Examiner in Atlanta,Georgia, announced the tragedy, but didn’t give a cause of death,TMZreported.
According the a medical examiner, the young rapper’s time of death was 11.23am, but his cause of death is currently unknown.
Fans began expressing their concerns about rumours of his death online when the news first started spreading.
A distraught fan wrote: “poppa please say something this can’t be happening.”
What song made Lil Poppa famous?
Lil Poppa wrote songs about relationships, mental health, and love.
The artist was best known for his tracks including “Love & War,” “Mind Over Matter,” and “HAPPY TEARS”.
Just days before his death Poppa released a new single called “Out of Town Bae”.
“And I can’t change how I’m living, I ain’t got no feelings, I pour drank in my kidney, And it’s only for the healing” he sings in his most played song on Spotify, “Eternal Living”.
Lil Poppa wrote songs about relationships, mental health, and loveCredit: GettyJust days before his death Poppa released a new singleCredit: TikTok / lilpoppa
