exposes

Tenerife has long been an extremely popular destination for holidaymakers from the UK. Not only is it just a few hours away by plane – but there are plenty of deals on package holidays too

Tenerife is one of the most popular holiday destinations for Brits, with around 2.3 million people from the UK flocking to the sun-drenched island every single year. Just a few hours away by plane, the Spanish island is famous for its beautiful beaches, hot temperatures, and cloudless skies.

But, according to one Brit living in the Canary Islands destination, there’s one thing about the holiday hotspot lots of people don’t know. Andrew Knight, known on social media as The Knightsrider, runs a bar and a car hire business in Tenerife, and frequently shares looks into life on the island with his followers on social media.

In a recent clip on TikTok, Andrew revealed something he claimed “the internet isn’t telling you”. “That is the fact that this weather, the gorgeous ocean, the boat trips, the excursions, and everything, all run all year round,” he said.

What is Tenerife like in the winter?

Andrew said: “So many people message, or they call me up, or they ask me on the live streams, ‘Is this running in the winter?’, ‘Is this running in November?’, ‘What is open in December?’ Remember, Tenerife is 365 days a year.”

He continued: “So whether it’s winter, November, January, Christmas Day – everything is running. You’re gonna have average temperatures in the winter months of like 23 degrees in the daytime.”

Andrew added “the sea temperature doesn’t change much”, and the beaches remain busy in the winter. “We have a big rush and a big influx in the summer, but the winter months are actually our most solid months for me,” he said.

“That’s our busiest with the cars. We’re mad busy with the excursions then as well. So bear that in mind.

“It’s not spoken about enough, it’s not made clear enough online when you’re booking holidays and things. The Canary Islands, and Tenerife in particular, especially the south, is fantastic in the winter months, and we are an all-year-round amazing place to visit.

“So have a look, get it booked. You can find some great winter sunshine. Four hour flight from the UK, five hours from Germany, Sweden, etc, and you’ll be here in the sunshine rather than freezing, miserable, raining at home.”

Concluding, he said: “You can get some great deals, have a look at it. But Tenerife is an all-year-round destination. Ignore what the internet says.”

Why is Tenerife such a popular holiday destination for Brits?

Tenerife has long been an extremely popular destination for holidaymakers from the UK. Not only is it relatively nearby – just a few hours away by plane – but there are plenty of deals on package holidays to the island available too.

The south of the island is known for its stunning beaches, luxury resorts, and vibrant nightlife, as well as a wealth of places to eat and drink, but there’s more to see and do too. Tenerife is also home to the Mount Teide National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site filled with volcanic rock formations surrounding an active volcano, while the north of the island offers a more authentic local experience, with beautiful architecture and incredible food and drink.

Siam Park, a huge Thailand-themed water park, and Loro Parque, an animal and conservation park home to wildlife including lions, dolphins, penguins, gorillas, hippos, and much more, are also popular with visitors of all ages.

Direct flights to Tenerife are available from most UK airports.

The Let’s Marry Harry star has addressed speculation about his marriage to Amber Mozo

Fans aren’t buying his explanation.

Netflix’s latest reality TV sensation follows 20 women competing for Harry Jowsey’s heart. You may recognise the famed bachelor from other hit programmes like Perfect Match and Too Hot to Handle, and this new series tracks his hunt for a wife.

After weeks of living with his “fiancées,” Harry finally narrowed it down to Dannelle Davidson and Amber Mozo. He ultimately tied the knot with Amber in the season finale, admitting that he loves her “confidence and how she thinks about the world“.

Despite exchanging vows in a sweet ceremony, viewers were quick to point out that the couple didn’t legally get married. This has only fuelled rumours that they split up before the show aired.

Australian star Harry has now set the record straight, revealing that their wedding involved real marriage certificates but they haven’t been submitted yet.

He told Entertainment Tonight: “When we filmed the show, there were certificates, but they weren’t submitted, because it would have ruined the show. They’re out there. I just don’t know where they are, when they’re getting submitted.”

Reality TV fans have been known to dig up marriage certificates for their favourite shows, including Love Is Blind, which sometimes spoils the outcome of the series.

While Harry claims the certificates have been kept private to prevent spoiler leaks, viewers are convinced this is further proof he is no longer with Amber.

Commenting under Entertainment Tonight’s interview clip, one fan said: “They not together anymore that’s why.”

Someone else shared the same opinion, adding: “They broke up! See y’all for season two same time next year.”

Yet another fan chimed in with: “You’d think they’d both share pics and videos together on their timeline now that we know who he chose and…nothing.”

Amber and Harry didn’t post loved-up snaps on their social media pages after their marriage was confirmed, which has naturally left fans suspicious.

But other viewers believe the reality stars are just trying to ramp up anticipation for the upcoming reunion episode.

“I just LOVE how all these ppl know the outcome already and how they THINK they know Harry personally. y’all c’mon they gotta make it suspenseful and keep u interested,” commented one.

Harry and Amber’s current relationship status will be revealed in Netflix’s forthcoming reunion special, streaming on Wednesday, August 26.

Let’s Marry Harry is streaming on Netflix.

Japan’s protest over Putin’s visit to the Kuril Islands is loud because its response is capped: Tokyo cannot meaningfully sanction the one Russian energy relationship — Sakhalin-2 LNG — it now depends on more than ever, after the Strait of Hormuz closure gutted its Gulf oil access and made that supply a load-bearing pillar of its energy security through at least December 2026.

On August 13th, Vladimir Putin toured a fish-processing plant on Iturup Island, the largest of the four southern Kuril Islands Japan calls its Northern Territories, with Sakhalin’s regional governor at his side. It was his first visit there in twenty-six years in power. He called the islands’ status “enshrined” as a permanent outcome of the Second World War and pointedly invoked the late Shinzo Abe, who spent years personally courting him toward a peace treaty that never materialised. Tokyo’s response was immediate: Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called the visit “absolutely unacceptable,” and her Foreign Ministry says an “additional sanctions package” is under consideration. What went unmentioned is that this same government told Washington, in writing, ten months earlier that a full ban on Russian LNG would be “difficult.” That contradiction, not the visit itself, is the story.

The dispute is old: the Soviet Union seized the four islands in the war’s final days, and the missing peace treaty has been Tokyo and Moscow’s unfinished business for eighty years. What is new is the energy math surrounding it. Sakhalin-2, the LNG project sitting directly across the strait from where Putin stood, supplied Japan roughly 3.6–3.9 million tonnes last year — about 9% of its total LNG imports, and enough to make Japan the project’s largest single buyer. The US Treasury sanctions waiver permitting those imports, along with the Gazprombank clearing that finances them, was just extended to December 18th, 2026, pushed back from an original June deadline. Washington’s stated reason was blunt: global supply is “constrained amid the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz.”

BEHIND THE VISIT

That closure is the piece most coverage of the Kuril visit leaves out. Since February 28th, when the US and Israel launched their air campaign against Iran, the Strait of Hormuz has been effectively shut, with roughly 20,000 mariners and 2,000 ships stranded and Brent crude spiking to $126 a barrel at its peak. Around 90% of Japan’s crude oil and 11% of its LNG normally transit Hormuz. Tokyo has spent 2026 losing its largest energy artery to a war in the Gulf, which means Sakhalin-2 has quietly gone from “one Russian supplier among several” to one of the few pillars still standing under Japan’s winter power grid. Putin picked this year, not an arbitrary one, to make his sovereignty claim visible on the ground.

The waiver renewal is the tell. Washington and Tokyo did not merely tolerate the Sakhalin-2 exemption through the Ukraine-sanctions years — they actively rebuilt it in 2026, in the middle of the Hormuz crisis, explicitly carving out maritime transport, financial clearing, and joint-operations funding through the end of the year. Putin then chose that same window, with that same regional government’s leadership standing next to him, to plant a public flag on the neighbouring islands. He is not testing whether Japan objects. He knows it will. He is testing whether the general logic of sanctioning Russia survives contact with the specific, recently-renewed exemption that keeps Japanese lights on. Compare that to 2010, when Dmitry Medvedev made the first-ever Russian presidential visit to the same islands: Tokyo protested loudly, recalled its ambassador briefly, and moved on within weeks, because no comparable energy dependency was on the table at the time. The script is recognisable. The stakes underneath it are not.

Takaichi’s own words undercut her “absolutely unacceptable” framing before she said it. In October 2025, briefing President Trump on the LNG relationship, she told him directly that a total ban on Russian gas “would be difficult” — an unusually candid admission from a leader now weighing a fresh sanctions package over the same relationship’s home islands. A prime minister who has already told Washington, on the record, that cutting the energy tie is impractical cannot now credibly threaten it without the threat being understood, in Moscow as much as in Tokyo, as theatre. What remains available is a narrow band of symbolic measures — travel restrictions, asset freezes on individuals connected to the visit or the regional administration — that let Tokyo be seen to act without touching a single LNG cargo.

The standard objection is that Japan has options: JERA, its largest buyer, points to a 30–35 million tonne portfolio and spot-market access, and Tokyo Electric-linked utilities cite early-stage interest in the $44 billion Alaska LNG project as a long-term alternative. That is capability, not near-term relief. Japanese firms remain openly cautious about Alaska LNG’s cost and logistics, with no binding offtake timeline in sight, and the global spot market Japan would lean on is the same market already absorbing cargoes redirected from Hormuz-blocked routes — tighter, not looser, than in a normal year. Sanctioning the actual molecules, rather than a list of names, risks the electricity-price and blackout warnings Japanese officials themselves used to justify keeping the Sakhalin-2 waiver alive in the first place.

THE SCENARIOS

Base case (~55%): Japan announces a narrow, largely symbolic sanctions package — individual travel bans and targeted asset freezes tied to the Far East regional government — while explicitly leaving Sakhalin-2 supply and Gazprombank clearing untouched, repeating the 2010 script almost exactly. The December 18th waiver renewal proceeds quietly, folded into the broader Hormuz-driven energy calculus, and Moscow reads the episode as confirmation that its Pacific energy leverage over Japan is durable regardless of who occupies the Kremlin’s chair on any given August.

Downside case: domestic backlash — the same “hardened public sentiment” Takaichi herself warned the visit would produce — pushes her government into a genuine review of the Sakhalin-2 exemption as its December deadline approaches, right as Hormuz remains tight heading into winter and Asian spot LNG prices stay elevated from redirected Gulf cargoes. The result is Japan’s first real taste of sanctions-driven energy pain from the Ukraine-era regime, a burden that has so far landed almost entirely on European households rather than Japanese ones, arriving in the worst possible month of the heating season and forcing utilities into the kind of emergency rationing talk Tokyo has avoided since 2022.

Upside case: Tokyo treats the compounding shock — Hormuz plus the Kuril visit landing in the same year — as the forcing function it has lacked for three years, converting Minister Yoji Muto’s long-stated goal of “steadily reducing dependence” on Russian LNG into actual contracted volume rather than a talking point: accelerated Alaska LNG offtake commitments, expanded US Gulf Coast term deals, and a public timeline for winding down Sakhalin-2 purchases that uses the December waiver deadline as a hard exit ramp instead of an automatic renewal. Even here, the earliest realistic substitution volumes arrive on a multi-year timeline, not by next winter.

THE AFTERMATH

Putin’s flag on Iturup was never really a test of Japan’s territorial resolve — Tokyo’s position on the Northern Territories has not moved in eighty years and was never going to move now. It was a test of whether that resolve has any economic weight behind it at the one moment Japan’s alternatives are thinnest.

Watch for: what actually happens to the Sakhalin-2 waiver around December 18th, not the sanctions package announced this week. A quiet renewal, carved out exactly as before, will tell you Japan’s outrage and Japan’s energy security are now permanently on separate tracks — and that Moscow understands the gap between them better than Tokyo would like to admit.

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s choice for attorney general is facing a tight vote for confirmation in a Republican-controlled Senate nearly halfway through his second term, reflecting mounting doubts about his leadership of the Justice Department as bipartisan concerns over the weaponization of justice intensify.

The confirmation of Todd Blanche hangs on the support of two Republicans who have repeatedly criticized Trump’s stewardship of the department, where Blanche has served as deputy and acting attorney general, roles he assumed after working as the president’s personal lawyer for nearly two years.

Republican senators resisted Trump’s approach to the Justice Department from the start of the presidential transition, rejecting his first choice to lead it, Matt Gaetz, amid concerns he would use the department to pursue political retribution. But after Gaetz withdrew, Trump’s replacement, Pam Bondi, won bipartisan confirmation with the support of the entire Republican caucus.

Blanche is already guaranteed a narrower margin, with Sen. Susan Collins of Maine announcing she will vote to reject his confirmation, and with Sen. Mitch McConnell absent for health reasons. Democrats are expected to be united in opposition against him.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a figure the president has referred to as a “terrible,” “Trump-deranged” “loser” who “should never be elected,” has refused to comment on her plans.

Her staff has said she is reviewing a commitment Blanche made in writing to formally rescind a controversial, $1.8-billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” announced in May to compensate Trump’s political allies, including those who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Blanche also said he would limit immunity offered to Trump and his family for future tax audits, although his wording left the door open to negotiating a future deal along similar terms.

“I think certainly the fact that he has signed this order, basically disbanding [the Anti-Weaponization Fund] — that’s a pretty good step,” Murkowski said , adding that she would “like to find out a little bit more about the negotiations.”

Blanche has taken steps to curry Murkowski’s favor in recent months, visiting Alaska and announcing a $400-million settlement benefiting Alaska natives’ healthcare in July.

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, the other uncommitted lawmaker in the chamber, said he had concerns that Blanche was still effectively working as Trump’s personal attorney under the guise of public service.

“I am very concerned about so-called lawfare — people being prosecuted not for a valid reason beyond somebody in high office being angry at them,” Cassidy said.

“So, I’ve not made a decision regarding Mr. Blanche,” he added. “I’ve got to be convinced that he is an attorney general who just happens to have once been President Trump’s personal attorney, as opposed to President Trump’s personal attorney who is now the attorney general. I think there’s a big difference between the two.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota said that he was still working to secure the votes needed for Blanche’s confirmation.

“I’m hoping we’ll get there eventually,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Blanche became the acting attorney general in April after Bondi was fired. Blanche had previously served as deputy attorney general and has been linked to some of the most controversial policies of the Trump administration.

His connection to the settlement between Trump and the Internal Revenue Service took center stage during his confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Blanche said during the hearing that the controversial fund created as part of the IRS settlement was dead.

But Republican Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina refused to vote for Blanche until he issued a more explicit order that killed the fund, which was designed to provide payouts to allies of Trump.

Cornyn and Tillis also demanded that the Justice Department provide constraints to tax audit immunity that was granted to Trump, two of his sons and their business as part of the lawsuit settlement.

The federal judge who presided over the IRS case blasted the proceedings and the agreement as “improper” saying that the two sides — Trump and the IRS — were not truly independent of each other.

The written assurances provided by Blanche were enough to win support from Cornyn and Tillis, though Democrats pointed out that they did not foreclose the possibility that a similar fund could be resurrected in the future.

“The president himself has largely telegraphed that’s his plan,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the top Democrat on the committee, said Tuesday before the vote.

Blanche has been the face of the administration’s release of files related to deceased sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein. Bondi told the House Oversight Committee in May that Blanche had overseen the process, which included delays in the release of files and major redaction issues.

Blanche also faced criticism for a July 2025 prison interview he conducted with Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of facilitating Epstein’s abuse.

Shortly after the interview, she was moved from her Florida prison to a low-security prison in Texas where she has reportedly gotten favorable treatment.

Paris and Chamonix, France – Ibrahim Doukanthi prepares to plunge into the Canal Saint-Denis. It is almost noon, and the temperature in the Paris region is nearing 30 degrees Celsius (86F).

He grew up just north of Saint-Denis, one of France’s poorest municipalities, and now lives in La Plaine, hundreds of metres from the Stade de France, the country’s national stadium.

“The water here is completely normal,” he said. “It’s just that it’s green, so you don’t know what’s in it – that’s what makes it a bit scary.”

He has been jumping into the canal – technically not open to swimmers – to cool off during the recent heatwaves.

Like many residents of Paris’s sprawling, historically disinvested suburbs, Doukanthi had to be creative to beat the heat while living in an apartment building without air conditioning.

“What I do is take the spray bottles – I call them ‘pshit-pshit’ – fill them with water, spray myself down, then sit in front of the fan,” he said. “It cools you off like crazy.”

Sitting in the shade at a flea market in Saint-Denis, Natifa Segli, a municipal employee, criticised the government’s response to the heatwave.

“I don’t feel like we learned the lesson from the 2003 heatwave. Here we are in 2026, and this heatwave was horrible,” she said. “Even at work, we weren’t sheltered. The temperatures in the offices were very, very hot.”

For Segli, the only consistent solution is to avoid the sun. “We’re going to stay in the shade,” she said of an upcoming heatwave, expected later this week.

‘We really have nothing to cool off with’

In areas like Saint-Denis, access to cooling infrastructure is unevenly spread, Louiza Ammari, a childcare worker who lives in social housing, told Al Jazeera.

In her building, police banned residents from setting up an inflatable pool for children. As renters, her family is not allowed to install air conditioning. Though one municipal pool opened free swimming hours, she could not go because it does not allow burkinis.

“We really have nothing to cool off with,” she said.

In France, there were 2,025 additional deaths during the last heatwave, the week of June 22 – a week-over-week increase of 30 percent nationwide and 62 percent in the Paris region, according to the national public health agency.

Extreme heat highlights existing inequalities, according to Bruno Villalba, a political science professor at AgroParisTech Paris-Saclay, specialising in political ecology and environmental policy.

“The heatwave is merely a symptom of social vulnerability, particularly in terms of housing,” Villalba told Al Jazeera.

Wealthier people can insulate their homes, afford a portable air-conditioning unit, eat fresh produce, or even leave the city for vacation when it gets too hot, options that are unavailable to many others.

“It’s up to the government to step in,” Villalba said.

“They tell us, ‘Stay hydrated, don’t stay in the sun, drink water,’” he said. “The French government did not sufficiently anticipate the acceleration of climate change.”

‘We are not all equally exposed’

There is a pervasive misconception of “universality” when it comes to climate deregulation, noted Mael Ginsburger, a lecturer at Universite Paris Cite focused on inequalities linked to the ecological transition.

Although experienced by everyone, more vulnerable populations have limited resources to mitigate heatwave conditions.

“We are not all equally exposed, just as we are not all equally responsible. There are significant inequalities in carbon emissions,” Ginsburger said. “Not everyone is equally capable of adapting, and there are certain groups that face multiple vulnerabilities linked to poor health, for example.”

Among wealthy households in France, 70 percent consider their homes properly insulated to combat heat, compared with 46 percent of lower-income households, according to Ginsburger’s research. More people report now suffering from heat in the summer – 66 percent – than cold in the winter, 46 percent.

“Overcrowded housing is much more likely to be in poor condition and have extremely poor insulation,” Ginsburger said. “These are populations facing a combination of overcrowding in dilapidated housing located in areas like Marseille and Lyon that are particularly vulnerable to heat.

“We’re sticking with this same approach of small steps rather than a structural approach that would actually require a more far-reaching overhaul of [building] infrastructure.”

For the homeless, the ramifications of heatwaves can be even worse.

“People who are outside don’t have a moment’s respite. They are suffocating in a concrete jungle where there is no simple, effective way to escape the intense heat. On asphalt, the perceived temperature can often rise to 45-50 degrees,” Paul Alauzy, at NGO Medecins du Monde, or Doctors of the World, told Al Jazeera.

He is a member of Le Revers, an activist group that formed during the 2024 Paris Olympics to bring awareness to the conditions faced by unhoused people in the Paris region.

“We’re asking for long-term policies designed to protect as many people as possible and reduce the number of people living on the streets, precisely to shield them from the harsh weather,” Alauzy said. “Once again, the authorities are stubbornly resorting to reactive, weather-dependent management.”

During heatwaves and cold snaps, French officials usually add a few emergency shelters and install temporary water stations.

“This is obviously not nearly enough,” Alauzy said.

Not all parks and natural spaces, essential for cooling down, are accessible to all.

“Trees, which are natural tools for regulating temperatures, have been effectively pushed out of our cities,” Villalba said, especially in deprived areas.

In places like Saint-Denis, schools and other public infrastructure are insufficiently equipped, said Ammari, the childcare worker.

‘Definitely an advantage to be at an altitude’

Even in the mountains, temperatures rose above 30C during the last heatwave, about 10C (18F) above normal end-of-June temperatures.

In Chamonix, the Bossons Glacier above town visibly shrank and conditions along popular routes up Mont Blanc and neighbouring peaks are becoming dangerous due to rockfall risks.

But nights are not stifling, and locals and visitors in the Alps sleep comfortably.

There are forested trails and a river fed by glacial melt that cools the surrounding area.

“In Chamonix, like in many mountain towns, it’s definitely an advantage to be at an altitude of 1,000 metres [3,280 feet] and to have the forest a few minutes from home,” Jean-Michel Bouteille, who recently retired from his role as director of municipal services in Chamonix, told Al Jazeera. “We’re a town of 9,000 people, but we still have nearby green spaces that are free and easily accessible.”

Although the mountain weather is not oppressive, climate change is felt in Chamonix.

“We have temperatures much higher than in previous years, which is leading to significant consequences. The Bossons Glacier is a disaster,” said Bouteille, who has lived in the valley for 26 years.

Emmerdale’s Charity Dingle has confessed all about her baby lie, Dr Todd’s blackmail and sexual assault to partner Mackenzie Boyd in dramatic scenes on the ITV soap

Emmerdale’s Charity Dingle confessed all to Mackenzie Boyd in the latest episode of the ITV soap. The Woolpack landlady, who has been played by Emma Atkins, certainly has had a lot to deal with in recent weeks and finally told her partner everything after weeks of hiding away and suffering a breakdown.

Last year, Charity tried become a surrogate for her granddaughter Sarah only to find out that she was naturally pregnant by Ross Barton. Still, she kept this all a secret and Sarah believed that all had gone to plan with the surrogacy.

Unfortunately, Dr Caitlin Todd, who had relentlessly bullied Sarah’s partner Jacob when she was in charge of him at the hospital, found out the truth and used it to blackmail Charity into handing over money. This all culminated in harrowing scenes where she sexually assaulted a drunken Charity.

Earlier this week, newcomer Serena Sugden, played by former Wicked star Casey Al-Shaqsy, made Charity see that she needed to expose Todd, even if that meant revealing everything to her family and on Thursday night’s episode, Charity bravely faced the music.

Having candidly informed Mack that Sarah’s baby was the product of a one night stand she had with Ross, Mack stormed out and looked set to tell all to Charity’s granddaughter. But when he returned home, he told Charity that he couldn’t do it.

It was then that Charity told Mack about Dr Todd’s blackmail against her after she discovered the truth about the child in question, and then disclosed that she had been the victim of rape at the hands of the retired medic.

Clearly taken aback by the shock revelation, on top of everything else he had heard that day, Mack (Lawrence Robb) calmly told Charity that the only thing they could do now was to go to the police – even after it seemed that Todd had got away with it all when she previously claimed that everything was consensual.

Charity told Mack: “The only way through this is telling the truth and facing the consequences of what I have done. No matter what.”

“I tell Sarah. And then I go back to the police. If I tell the police about the blackmail, it’s going to open a can of worms and that’s gonna drag Sarah into it. I think that girl Serena was right. I have to see this through.”

However, Mack told Charity that telling Sarah that she is not the mother of her baby might not be the best idea just yet, meaning that the secret could stay secret a little while longer – but he was absolutely convinced that she had to “fight” for justice above all else.

He said: “It’s gonna be a lot for everyone to deal with it, so maybe we cross that bridge when we come to it. What matters right now is that you go to the police.”

“I can be angry with you and still be there for you when you need me the most. Charity, I need you to listen to me for a second here because – Dr Todd is not karma. She’s a rapist who took advantage of you when you were vulnerable. So I need you to get out of that way of thinking because it lets her off the hook.

“You’re gonna fight back, you’re gonna go to the police, you’re gonna get them down here and you’re going to tell them absolutely everything.”

Emmerdale airs weeknights at 8pm on ITV1 and ITVX. * Follow Mirror Celebs and TV on TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Threads .