Middle East

Medics report 12 injuries alongside eight deaths in Gaza as Israeli air strikes target civilians and displaced families.

Israeli air strikes have killed at least eight people in Gaza, including two children, aged 10 and 6, Palestinian health officials have said.

Medics said on Wednesday that an Israeli air strike killed one person near a school in Gaza City. Twelve people were wounded in the two incidents. The Israeli military said it struck fighters in Gaza City, but was unaware of casualties.

Another ‌Israeli air strike hit a tent for displaced people in the al-Mawasi area in Khan Younis, in the south of the enclave, killing at least four people, including a 10-year-old child.

Later on Wednesday, Palestinian health officials said a six-year-old boy was killed by Israeli gunfire in the Zeitoun neighbourhood in Gaza City. Another strike hit a ⁠vehicle westward of the city, killing one person, ⁠medics said, taking Wednesday’s death toll to at least seven. An eighth death was later recorded, but more details were not immediately available.

The Israeli military didn’t immediately comment on any of those incidents.

The latest killings come despite Israel and Hamas agreeing to a United States-brokered “ceasefire” in October last year. Although large-scale fighting has largely paused, Israeli attacks on Palestinians in the territory have continued.

According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, Israeli army violations of the “ceasefire” have killed at least 1,084 people and wounded 3,491 others since the truce took effect. The latest casualties bring the overall death toll in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza since October 2023 to at least 73,110, with 173,599 others injured, the ministry said.

Israel has also expanded its control of the enclave to about 11 percent beyond the so-called “Yellow Line” demarcating areas of the Gaza Strip agreed in the truce.

Last week, a group of United Nations agencies and NGO groups warned that the continued expansion of areas under Israeli control endangers civilians and relief efforts. Already dozens of Palestinian families have been forced to leave their homes near the line.

Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation in the Strip remains dire. In its latest report, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said it recorded nearly 9,300 cases of chickenpox across more than 130 health facilities. “The rise in reported chickenpox cases is occurring in a displacement environment already marked by severe overcrowding, deteriorating hygiene conditions, and widespread environmental health hazards,” it said.

France has returned 23 Syrian antique artefacts it’s held since the outbreak of the 2011 civil war. The collection, spanning from prehistory to the Abbasid era, has been restored to the National Museum in Damascus after French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit.

On Tuesday, two tankers were attacked as they transited the Strait of Hormuz via a passage in Omani waters. Gulf countries responded by sharply condemning the attacks and blaming Iran. The United States then launched attacks on Iranian territory, to which Tehran responded by striking Bahrain and Kuwait. US President Donald Trump has now said the memorandum of understanding (MoU) that Iran and the US signed is void.

This latest escalation illustrates how the Strait of Hormuz has become the central issue in the US-Israel war with Iran that began on February 28. Disagreements over the strait’s future have proven to be the hardest to resolve in the US-Iranian negotiations, as questions about Iran’s nuclear programme have been put to the side.

The disruption of traffic in the Strait of Hormuz has an immediate and costly price tag attached, for Iran, for its Gulf neighbours, and for a global economy that has spent four and a half months absorbing the largest oil supply shock in the history of the modern market.

Iran’s leverage is also its liability

For Tehran, the strait is its strongest card – one that is also incredibly costly. Since the war began, Iranian forces have mined the strait, attacked vessels and cut traffic through the passage by roughly 95 percent. This has led to what the International Energy Agency’s Fatih Birol has called “the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market”.

That leverage is real: about a fifth of the world’s oil and a fifth of its liquefied natural gas (LNG) normally move through Hormuz, and no amount of Gulf pipeline capacity can fully replace it.

But Iran has effectively been strangling its own lifeline along with everyone else’s. Iranian crude, once sold for $3 a barrel less than international benchmarks, is now selling at a 20 percent discount. The country’s oil exports collapsed by more than 90 percent in May as US naval enforcement squeezed its shadow fleet.

Even before the war, the World Bank projected that Iran’s economy would contract in 2026. The impact of the collapse of oil sales will be far-reaching because of the closure.

A 60-day US Treasury waiver issued on June 22, permitting Iran to sell oil at full market rates through August 21, but has now been renounced following the attacks on Tuesday.

This is the economic backdrop to Iran’s insistence on asserting joint authority over the strait and floating a system of transit fees or “service charges” for passing ships. Washington has made clear that Iran cannot charge tolls in international waters governed by the right of transit passage under the Law of the Sea.

For Tehran, the dispute is not really about toll revenue, which would be rather modest when compared to its oil income; it is about establishing precedent and sovereignty over a chokepoint that is its only real point of leverage once sanctions relief and frozen-asset release are negotiated.

The latter is itself contested: Iran wants half of an estimated $25bn in frozen assets released immediately, while the US has resisted. A separate $300bn reconstruction fund floated in the MoU has already become a political flashpoint in Washington.

The Gulf is paying for a crisis it didn’t start

For the Gulf states, the Strait of Hormuz crisis has meant improvising around geography. Saudi Arabia has redirected crude through its roughly 1,200km (746-mile) East-West pipeline to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, and the UAE has leaned on the Habshan-to-Fujairah line to the Gulf of Oman.

Together, though, these pipelines carry a fraction of what Hormuz once did, at best 7 million barrels a day of design capacity for the Saudi line and under 1.8 million for the Emirati one, against roughly 20 million barrels a day that transited the strait before the war.

Both alternatives have themselves come under attack: Iranian strikes cut the East-West pipeline’s throughput by an estimated 700,000 barrels a day in April, and drone attacks disrupted loading at Fujairah. Seaborne crude exports from Gulf states excluding Iran fell by roughly half between February and March.

Qatar, host to the talks between Iran and the US, has its own acute stake: its entire LNG export industry depends on the Strait of Hormuz, and it has been pushing the hardest for a settlement.

Oman, drawn into Iran’s sovereignty claim as co-owner of the strait’s territorial waters, is caught between commercial interest in a resolution and a legal position, as a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) that publicly rejects Iranian tolls. Iraq, highly dependent on its Gulf terminals, has quietly explored an export route north through Turkiye.

None of these workarounds are cheap, and all of them are political as well as commercial, tying Gulf capitals’ economic fortunes to a settlement between the US and Iran.

The rest of the world: Insurance bills and inflation

Beyond the region, the crisis has been transmitted mainly through two channels: price and insurance. Higher oil prices are passed on to various consumer goods down supply chains and suppress growth. According to estimates, the global economy can slow down to 2.8 percent in 2026 from 3.4 percent last year due to the closure of the strait.

Insurance for Hormuz transit, which cost roughly 0.25 percent of a vessel’s value before the war, has spiked as high as 8 percent, turning a single large tanker’s coverage into a $3m-to-$8m expense. Shipping lines including CMA CGM and Hapag-Lloyd have layered on conflict surcharges of $1,500 to $2,000 per twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU). Washington’s own International Development Finance Corporation has had to step in as, in effect, an insurer of last resort, offering up to $40bn in reinsurance capacity to keep vessels moving.

China has absorbed the largest share of this pain: It takes close to 40 percent of its crude imports through the Strait of Hormuz and buys more than 80 percent of Iran’s oil exports outright, making it simultaneously Tehran’s most important customer and one of the war’s most exposed bystanders. Japan, which sources 70 percent of its Middle Eastern crude via the strait, has already tapped strategic reserves.

For import-dependent economies across Asia and Europe, the strait’s fate is not an abstraction of Middle East diplomacy; it shows up directly in fuel, freight and fertiliser prices.

Oil and gas dominate the headlines, but roughly 30 percent of the world’s seaborne fertiliser trade also passes through Hormuz.

The World Bank’s fertiliser price index has risen more than 12 percent in the first quarter of 2026 and has since climbed to its highest level since October 2022, driven largely by the closure. The Food and Agriculture Organization has warned that the resulting scarcity of urea and other nitrogen products will show up as lower yields through the 2026–2027 growing season, hitting import-dependent and already food-insecure countries in Africa and Asia the hardest.

Unlike an oil-price spike, which mainly stings at the pump, a fertiliser shortfall reaches into next year’s harvest, meaning an unresolved Hormuz standoff carries a slower-moving but longer tail of economic damage than crude prices alone suggest.

That is the arithmetic weighing on both sides. A deal that reopens the Strait of Hormuz without resolving who controls it risks recreating the same instability that shut it in the first place; one that concedes Iranian toll authority risks a precedent Washington and shipping nations will not accept. Until that circle is squared, the global economy is left pricing in a chokepoint that neither side can fully afford to keep closed, nor fully agree how to reopen.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.

US President Donald Trump says the US will ‘probably’ carry out another round of strikes on Iran on Wednesday night, following overnight strikes he said were launched in response to Iranian attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

The Iranian Striker: Mehdi Taremi offers a rare personal portrait of one of Iran’s most celebrated footballers during the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

Iranian team striker Mehdi Taremi reflects on the journey that shaped him – from growing up in Bushehr, to representing millions of Iranians at the World Cup.

In this Al Jazeera Originals short documentary, Taremi speaks about childhood, compulsory military service, sacrifice, criticism, national identity and why football means far more than the game itself. He also shares what it means to represent Iran before a global audience, and why he hopes football can help people better understand his country.

Egypt head coach Hossam Hassan has called for players and reporters at the World Cup to speak out about the killing of children in Gaza and Palestine. Hassan made the comments after his team’s controversial 3-2 defeat to Argentina in the last 16.

Al Jazeera spoke with Egypt fans at the Obour City Youth Center, where an estimated 15,000 members gathered to watch the FIFA World Cup Round of 16 match against Argentina. Supporters shared their heartbreak after the emotional exit while praising the team’s unforgettable tournament run.

Tehran, Iran – Three weeks after Iran and the United States signed a memorandum of understanding to extend their ceasefire, their truce remains fragile.

Three tankers have been hit in the Strait of Hormuz over the past two days, even as Iran and the US are expected to restart mediated negotiations to end the war next week, after the funeral of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The US military on Wednesday launched large air attacks on Iran’s southern provinces, which prompted the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Iran’s regular army to fire missiles and drones on US interests in Bahrain and Kuwait. Both sides accused each other of violating the understanding signed last month.

But even if a long-term resolution is eventually reached and Western sanctions on Iran are lifted, analysts say that it will take time for the country’s economy to recover.

The economy has been strained by years of local mismanagement and corruption; stringent Western and United Nations sanctions; and, more recently, damage sustained from two wars in a year with the US and Israel, deadly nationwide protests in January, and internet shutdowns.

When numbers tell a story

A falling purchasing power has pushed millions into poverty. Inflation has recently climbed to levels not seen since World War II, when Allied forces occupied Iran, took over railways and food supplies, and contributed to a deadly famine.

The latest report by the Statistical Center of Iran for Khordad, the third month of the Persian calendar that ended on June 21, showed inflation increasing by 88.6 percent compared to the same month of the year before. Inflation was up by nearly 6 percent compared to the second month of the current year.

Food inflation was skyrocketing at almost 134 percent in Khordad compared to the corresponding month a year earlier, with oils and fats surging by more than 278 percent, red meat and poultry by over 178 percent, and bread and cereals by nearly 139 percent.

Unemployment is at 7.5 percent during the current calendar year, according to the latest report by the statistical centre released at the end of June. But labour participation is at just 40 percent, meaning that most working-age people are operating outside the official labour force – including students, retirees, those engaged in irregular informal work, and those not seeking paid work.

The job-quality picture is also grim, as salaries are perennially falling behind expenses, as over 38 percent of officially employed people work more than 49 hours a week, and as youth unemployment is at over 20 percent, the centre reports.

The base monthly minimum wage equals only about $95 using the current open market exchange rate of the US dollar in Tehran. The rate has climbed to 1.75 million rials per greenback over recent days, not far from its all-time low of 1.9 million in May.

The damage — and the road to recovery

Due to a heavy budget crunch, the only relief the government is able to offer amounts to a few dollars’ worth of monthly cash subsidy and electronic coupons for purchasing essential goods.

A late June report by the Central Bank of Iran for the previous calendar year that ended on March 20 showed that gross domestic product (GDP) growth for the year stood at minus 0.7 percent, and gross fixed capital formation, a primary indicator of productive capacity and economic growth, was at nearly minus 12 percent. Imports were down 16.6 percent, as were exports by close to 5 percent.

The damage from nearly 40 days of heavy bombardment during the war, the longest nationwide state-imposed internet shutdown in any country, and a US naval blockade of Iran’s southern ports — the full extent of which remains undisclosed to the public — has only exacerbated Iran’s economic woes. The International Monetary Fund has projected that Iran’s real GDP will shrink by 6.1 percent in 2026.

Still, Mahdi Ghodsi, a senior economist at the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, said that part of the recent job losses could be recoverable if there is a credible halt to military escalation, restoration of transport and logistics links, more predictable access to energy and fuel, and functioning internet and payment systems.

“In that case, some temporary layoffs in services, retail, transport, construction and small businesses could be reversed relatively quickly, because these activities are highly sensitive to uncertainty and disruptions rather than necessarily destroyed productive capacity,” he told Al Jazeera.

Longer-term challenges

But Ghodsi cautioned that part of the damage is likely to be more persistent.

“Where factories have lost machinery, inventories, imported inputs, workers, working capital, or access to energy, reopening is not simply a matter of returning to normal,” he said, adding that in some cases, full recovery may take years and require large investments, including foreign financing.

Last week, leading satellite imaging provider Planet Labs restored access to imagery for nearly 800 sites across Iran impacted during the war, after lifting earlier restrictions it had placed in response to a US government request to delay or suspend access.

Some Iranians on social media highlighted massive damage done to Iran Electronics Industries (SAIran), a state-owned defence industry heavyweight specialising in optics, communications, semiconductors and medical equipment, among other things.

But along with numerous military-linked sites and assets, and nuclear facilities built over decades now reduced to rubble, Iran’s industrial capacity and civilian infrastructure were also extensively targeted by US and Israeli warplanes and vessels during the war.

Oil and gas facilities, petrochemical and steel giants, electricity outposts, as well as maritime ports, airports, roads, bridges and residential units were significantly damaged.

Work on rebuilding facilities and recovering lost capacities has begun during the period of reduced military hostility over recent weeks, with some airports and industrial units restarting operations.

But a full recovery still appears distant and more destruction could still lay ahead. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened extensive attacks against Iran’s electricity grid and infrastructure like bridges if the war resumes.

Economist Ghodsi said the government’s limited fiscal capacity remains one of the central problems, since the state has already faced struggles in financing not only regular expenditures and salaries, but also obligations across public and semi-public sectors. “This fiscal weakness has been one of the drivers of inflation, as budgetary pressures are partly shifted onto the banking system and the central bank through monetary financing,” he said.

Domestic fissures

Speaking at a state-organised event in Tehran last month, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian expressed concerns about another nationwide protest as public discontent remains high.

“Our most important strength is our unity, and the unity of our people. What I fear is that we fail to serve the people right and they are dissatisfied and come to the streets to protest. Then our might collapses,” he said.

Senior officials spearheading the mediated talks with Washington have backed the process as the viable path to delivering a better economy to the suffering Iranian population.

But hardliners within the system, who perceive Iran to have attained a major victory against superior military powers during the war, continue to vociferously reject giving any concessions.

During Khamenei’s funeral procession in Tehran on Monday, Pezeshkian was filmed getting heckled by anti-deal mourners who demanded blood vengeance for the slain supreme leader and shouted “Death to the compromiser” and “Death to the traitorous homeland-seller”.

Brent crude rises above $76 a barrel for the first time in two weeks amid renewed violence in Strait of Hormuz.

Oil prices have surged as renewed hostilities between the United States and Iran threaten to derail a fragile ceasefire that had brought some relief to global energy markets.

Brent crude, the main international benchmark, rose as much as 3 percent on Wednesday, reversing a slide that had seen prices return to pre-war levels.

Brent futures for September stood at $76.07 a barrel as of 04:00 GMT, the highest since June 23.

The jump came after the US launched strikes on Iran and revoked a temporary waiver of sanctions on Iranian oil, following attacks on three commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.

US, Qatari and Saudi officials blamed Iran for the attacks on the vessels.

US Central Command said on X that it had begun “launching a series of powerful strikes against Iran to impose heavy costs for targeting and attacking commercial shipping crewed by innocent civilians in an international waterway”.

Tehran has not directly claimed responsibility for the attacks, but has repeatedly warned vessels against attempting to transit the waterway on routes it has not approved.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said earlier that Tehran would take “decisive actions to safeguard its national interests and security” in response to the revocation of the sanctions waiver, describing the move as a “blatant violation” of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed by Washington and Tehran on June 17.

Tony Sycamore, a senior market analyst at IG Australia, said the MoU’s language was deliberately vague regarding control of the strait and traffic management.

Disagreement between the US and Iran over whether the strait is an international waterway or partly Iran’s territorial waters was never fully resolved, Sycamore said.

“It remains to be seen whether this morning’s US strikes bring a swift end to the latest escalation or Iran elects to continue flexing its leverage over the Strait with actions that fall short of triggering a broader conflict,” Sycamore said in a note to clients on Wednesday.

“At the very least, it will keep markets on edge and does suggest crude oil prices have based for now.”

The US strikes followed a separate move by the US Treasury Department late on Tuesday to revoke its 60-day waiver on sanctions on Iranian oil.

The Treasury Department last month authorised the sale of Iranian oil until August 21 as part of broader negotiations with Tehran, but transactions will now no longer be allowed after 12:01am EDT (04:01 GMT) on July 17, according to a statement on the department’s website.

The new order also rescinds authorisation for any new transactions, including purchases or loading, after Tuesday.

Saul Kavonic, head of energy research at MST Marquee, said he expects oil prices to remain elevated as hazardous conditions persist in the strait and the release of emergency oil stockpiles wind down.

“Iran fully intends to cement its control over the Strait of Hormuz in the coming weeks, which is unacceptable to the US, many Gulf states and global customers, and could result in passage through the strait remaining below 50 percent of pre-war levels for many months with periodic flare-ups in hostilities,” Kavonic told Al Jazeera.

The clamour surrounding the World Cup’s controversy involving US President Donald Trump and FIFA chief Gianni Infantino had barely died down when another arose in the aftermath of Argentina’s controversial 3-2 win over Egypt in the round-of-16 match in Atlanta.

As the defending champions staged a stunning comeback against the Pharaohs in the knockout match on Tuesday, questions were raised about an unusually late VAR call that saw Egypt’s second goal rescinded, followed by a chain of events that led to Argentina’s victory.

A day earlier, Trump had revealed that he had asked FIFA to review, and overturn, USA striker Folarin Balogun’s one-game suspension for a red card, and the governing body controversially obliged. The matter was dusted off by Belgium as they dumped the hosts out of the tournament with a 4-1 win in the match Balogun was initially suspended from but ended up playing – to no avail.

Trump watch on the World Cup

While the anger surrounding FIFA’s red-card decision was directed at both the football governing body and Trump, Egypt’s outburst was solely aimed at the organisation, which, according to Egypt’s manager, had “wanted to keep the world champions in the competition”.

Head coach Hossam Hassan speculated that match officials had been put under pressure to ensure that one of the biggest names, Argentina’s Lionel Messi, stayed in the tournament.

“Perhaps they wanted Messi to stay in the running,” Hassan told beIN Sports after the match.

“In football, there are sometimes external factors that go beyond the technical aspects. The world champions received support at every level.”

While the tournament has been no stranger to the political spotlight of questionable integrity, experts say the lines between sport and politics have been blurred even further.

“After the Balogun affair, who knows which decisions are legitimate and can be trusted, and which can’t?” Simon Chadwick, professor of Afro-Eurasian sport at the Emlyon Business School in Shanghai, told Al Jazeera.

“If the Trump administration is maintaining a watching brief over the tournament, it’s worth remembering: Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, is a staunch Trump supporter.”

Trump and his Argentinian counterpart share a close relationship. Milei is a regular feature at pro-Trump political gatherings in the United States, and Trump has described Argentina’s far-right populist leader as his “favourite president”.

Chadwick also opined that Hassan’s vociferous support for Palestine at the World Cup could have prompted some officials to “have built-in biases when making decisions”.

Hassan dedicated part of his pre-match news conference on Monday to making an impassioned plea for the people of Palestine, especially those in the besieged Gaza Strip.

Advantage, Argentina

Circling back to the VAR call that sliced Egypt’s lead in half and was followed by decisions that conveniently favoured Argentina, Chadwick said the period of play was “unusual”.

He wondered why the referee had not called a foul in real-time that VAR picked up several moments later and only once Egypt scored their second goal.

“There was something distinctly unusual about the goal and VAR decision, something that was amplified when Argentina scored one of its goals,” Chadwick said, questioning refereeing standards in the match.

“In the build-up, an infringement was perpetrated by an Argentina player, which could have been interpreted as a similar offence to that supposedly committed earlier by the Egyptian player. At the very least, refereeing standards during the game were somewhat inconsistent, although critics are clearly making much more serious claims.”

But while many social media commentators and football experts were outraged at the decisions – Portuguese football icon Jose Mourinho reportedly termed the match “daylight robbery” – some football experts said it was a closer call.

“Robbed might be a strong word,” football analyst Ali El Garni said.

“I’d say decisions made by both the referee and VAR could have gone either way, and Argentina benefitted from all the 50/50 incidents.

“The incident leading to the Egyptian disallowed goal was an indisputable foul. The question is how far VAR should go back to check the legitimacy of a goal,” said El Garni, who has extensively reported on European and North African football.

However, he did wonder if VAR would have been involved had the scoreline been 2-0 in Argentina’s favour instead.

“Would the goal have been disallowed had it been scored by Argentina? It’s unlikely,” he said.

“What’s making it worse for Egypt is the fact that a similar incident involving what appeared to be a foul on [Mohamed] Salah took place before Argentina’s third goal, and VAR didn’t intervene,” he said.

Meanwhile, Chadwick questioned why VAR officials had raised the issue if the on-field officials did not call a foul when Egypt‘s Marwan Attia lightly tugged the shirt and stepped on the foot of Lisandro Martinez.

A logical solution to the VAR issue, Chadwick proposed, would be “for fans and viewers to listen to an assessment of the alleged offence, hear the various arguments, and have a clear insight into the basis for a decision”.

Chadwick admitted that although Egyptian players should not have become overwhelmed with emotion, “a sense of injustice was induced by the VAR decision”.

“This technology was supposed to minimise doubt and bring consistency. Instead, its use during this match had significant cognitive and behavioural effects,” he said.

“Indeed, rather than brandishing cards and inflaming the situation even further, the referee should have used his discretion and judgement to defuse the situation.”

While Chadwick dismissed rumours of match-rigging in favour of Messi and Argentina, he acknowledged the pull of the iconic footballer’s star power.

“There is no doubt that Messi is a box office attraction the tournament really can’t afford to be without.”

Air raids come after US revokes a waiver that allowed Iran to sell oil, citing the attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

‘Perhaps they wanted to keep the world champions in the competition,’ Hassan said after his team was knocked out.

Egypt coach Hossam Hassan claims his side was “cheated” out of a place in the World Cup quarterfinals after Argentina staged a stunning late comeback from 2-0 down to win 3-2 in a gripping last-16 match in Atlanta.

The Pharaohs started as underdogs but took the lead against the world champions within 15 minutes, which was doubled in the second half before Argentina walked away with the win on Tuesday.

“I do not want to put it nicely and talk about hard luck. We have been cheated unfairly today; we have suffered injustice,” Hassan said in an explosive post-match news conference.

Egypt had a Mostafa Zico goal ruled out when they were leading 1-0 as the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) intervened to spot a foul on Lisandro Martinez much earlier in the move.

Zico did then put Egypt on the brink of a place in the last eight for the first time by doubling their lead.

However, the defending champions hit back as Cristian Romero reduced the arrears before Lionel Messi, who had a first-half penalty saved, smashed in the equaliser with his eighth goal of the tournament.

The controversy did not end there, though, as in the buildup to Argentina’s winner scored by Enzo Fernandez, Egypt believe they should have instead been awarded a penalty for a pull by Alexis Mac Allister on Hamdy Fathy.

“We haven’t seen respect or fair play. There has not been respect or fair play,” Hassan said.

“A penalty was ruled out, was not even checked by VAR. A second goal was remarkably disallowed. There has not even been a VAR check when we have all seen the image of the [shirt] being pulled back.”

Hassan said he would not watch any more matches of the tournament, such was the injustice he felt.

“I am not going to continue following the matches of this World Cup,” he added.

“This is my own way of speaking up.”

‘They wanted Messi to stay’

After Yasser Ibrahim’s header put Egypt in front, Argentina were awarded a penalty for a trip on Nicolas Tagliafico.

Messi’s problems with World Cup penalties continued as his effort was saved by Mostafa Shobeir.

The eight-time Ballon d’Or winner has now failed to score four of his eight non-shootout spot-kicks at the World Cup, including two misses at this tournament.

Hassan speculated that the officials had been put under pressure to keep one of the biggest names in the competition.

“Perhaps they wanted to keep the world champions in the competition. Perhaps they wanted Messi to stay in the running,” he told BeIN Sports.

“In football, there are sometimes external factors that go beyond the technical aspects. The world champions received support at every level.”

Egypt had been surprisingly attacking early on in the game, a departure from Hassan’s usual tactic of playing with a tight defence and looking for counterattack opportunities.

It helped them take an early lead, but it was the heroics of goalkeeper Mostafa Shobeir that ensured they remained in front by half-time.

“I’m very, very satisfied with the effort they put in. Most of our players come from the Egyptian domestic league, while many players in other national teams are based in Europe and live in that professional environment,” Hassan added.

“Yet with predominantly local players – besides Mohamed Salah and Omar Marmoush – we were able to compete with anyone.”

Hassan also complained about the scheduling of the match for a noon kick-off (16:00 GMT), just four days after both sides had won their round of 32 matches.

“Whoever schedules those matches has never played football. You never schedule a game for 12pm. At noon you go for a walk or to eat brunch; you do not go to play football.

“When are the players supposed to eat? At 7:30am?

“There have been a lot of things to be questioned on and off the pitch.”

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

The US military says it has launched airstrikes against Iran as explosions were reported in several locations in the south of the country.

The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said the strikes began on Tuesday, and are being conducted “in response to Iranian attacks on three commercial vessels that were transiting the Strait of Hormuz”.

Iranian media have reported several explosions in the southern port city of Sirik, as well as Qeshm Island and Bandar Abbas.

“According to state TV, six explosions have been heard on the island of Qeshm which is the largest island in the vicinity of the Strait of Hormuz, with very geostrategic significance when it comes to Iran’s control and authority over the Strait of Hormuz,” Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi reported from Tehran.

“The state TV also says that at least seven explosions have been heard in the areas close to Sirik Port which is very important because it oversees the Strait of Hormuz, another strategic point from which Iran imposes its control and authority over the Strait of Hormuz,” Asadi said.

Starting from the time after the signing of the [memorandum of understanding], we have been witnessing limited confrontation and escalation in this highly escalated situation at the Strait of Hormuz,” he added.

Following the blasts, Iran’s foreign ministry said it held the US government responsible for the consequences of breaching the memorandum of understanding (MoU) agreed between the two countries in June, which was supposed to put to an end to the war the US and Israel began against Iran in late February. The MoU mandated lifting the US naval blockade on Iran in exchange for Tehran reopening the vital Strait of Hormuz.

The US also agreed at the end of June to waive sanctions on Iranian oil for 60 days.

However, the US Treasury Department on Tuesday moved to revoke the temporary suspension of sanctions on Iranian oil, less than 20 days sales after the MoU was signed. The department cancelled a licence announced in June that had allowed Iran to produce, sell and deliver crude oil and related products through August 21.

The move by the Treasury Department comes after tankers in the Strait of Hormuz were attacked. A Qatari tanker caught fire off the coast of Oman Monday after being struck by an “unknown projectile” in the Strait of Hormuz, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO).

Iranian television reported claims that the LNG tanker came under attack after ignoring warnings, but Tehran did not directly claim the assault. Neither the US Central Command (CENTCOM) nor the IRGC commented on the incident.

A second ship, a Saudi-flagged crude oil tanker, was also damaged in the Strait of Hormuz when the IRGC fired missiles, sources told Reuters news agency.

A US ⁠official warned that Iran’s attacks on vessels in the Strait ‌of Hormuz were “wholly unacceptable” and would ‌be ‌met with consequences, Reuters reported Tuesday.

In response, Iran’s foreign ministry said it would take any measure it deemed necessary to safeguard the country’s interests and national security.

“The United States’ action in revoking the waiver for the exemption of sanctions on Iran’s oil sales constitutes a blatant violation of Article 10, and the subsequent military operations of this country against Iran also constitute a serious violation of Articles 1 and 2 of the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding.” Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, said in a post on social media.

Gharibabadi said the US has “repeatedly” violated the MoU, citing Israeli attacks in Lebanon and threatening statements made against Iran.

Dr. Hussam Abu Safia, held in Israeli prisons without charge since December 2024, is being tortured and on the verge of death, according to his lawyer who found him badly beaten on July 2nd.

Two Palestinian mothers believe a viral image of a bound Gaza detainee shows their missing son, leaving them desperate for answers. Israel acknowledges the photo is real but has not revealed the man’s identity.

A NATO summit is being held in Turkiye as US President Donald Trump pressures member states over defence spending. Al Jazeera’s Osama Bin Javaid explains how NATO has changed since Trump was elected.

The United States-Israel war on Iran has inflicted the greatest disruption to merchant shipping since the back-to-back shocks of the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Since the start of the war in late February, shipping lines have faced attacks on their vessels, lengthy delays and steep rises in operating costs.

Yet even after more than four months of turmoil for the industry, the most enduring legacy of the war for shipping may end up being just how little it ultimately changes.

While shipping firms are expected to more explicitly factor risk into their expenses and diversify supply chains where possible in the future, the indispensable nature of seaborne trade means the industry is likely to continue much as before over the long term, analysts say.

That is likely to be especially the case for the container shipping industry, which, unlike the operators of the oil and gas tankers whose dislocation has roiled energy markets, is not heavily reliant on the Strait of Hormuz to transport its cargoes, which range from agricultural produce to apparel and consumer electronics.

While there is no alternative to the strait to access oil-producing Gulf nations by sea, container shipping firms have had the option of redirecting their vessels along longer alternative routes to avoid conflict in the region, including attacks by the Iran-aligned Houthis in the Red Sea.

The global shipping industry has long stood apart for its resilience in the face of crises, bouncing back from major upheaval at remarkable speed.

In 2020, the first year of the COVID pandemic, global container shipping volumes fell by just 1.2 percent compared with the previous year, according to the Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO), one of the world’s largest associations for shipowners.

By January 2021, the volume of cargo handled at ports worldwide had already surpassed pre-pandemic levels, rising 6.4 percent year-on-year, according to data from the Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics.

By contrast, it took more than four years for global air travel to fully recover from the shock of COVID-19.

While the Iran war and Houthi attacks in the Red Sea since 2023 scrambled regional supply chains, shipping companies have been rapidly adding capacity since Washington and Tehran signed their memorandum of understanding on ending the conflict on June 17.

After plummeting from 3.2 million TEU (Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit of cargo) to 74,000 TEU as of mid-June, container capacity in the region has already rebounded to pre-war levels on some routes, according to Xeneta, an ocean and air freight rate market analytics platform.

Capacity between Asia and the United States’ West Coast last week surpassed its pre-conflict record, hitting 350,000 TEU, according to Xeneta.

On Monday, Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, the second- and fifth-largest container shipping firms, respectively, announced that they would begin sailing through the Suez Canal again for the first time since February, following an assessment of the security situation in the Red Sea.

Shipping is indispensable to global trade, in large part because no other mode of transport comes close in terms of capacity and cost-effectiveness.

The world’s largest container ships have capacities exceeding 24,000 TEU – the equivalent of roughly 12,000 trucks, 2,240 cargo planes, or 360 freight trains.

Lacking genuine competition in the transport of goods in huge volumes, shipping facilitates about 90 percent of global trade.

Shipping will look “remarkably familiar” in five years from now because it is an industry driven by demand, said Punit Oza, the head of the consultancy Maritime NXT and the former executive director of the Singapore Chamber of Maritime Arbitration.

Even the most severe conflict cannot change the “physics or the economics” of seaborne trade, he said.

“Ships do not sail because shipowners want them to; they sail because consumers somewhere want grain, iron ore, gas, or televisions,” Oza told Al Jazeera.

“It is the consumers of shipping – the cargo interests, the economies, the households – who ultimately shape the industry, and their demand will endure long after the headlines fade.”

Judah Levine‏, head of research at freight booking company Freightos, said container shipping in the future is likely to look “quite similar” to how it did before the war, with Dubai’s Port of Jebel Ali continuing to serve as the region’s main hub for both Gulf-bound goods and cargoes destined for Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Americas.

But Levine said diversion of cargoes to smaller hubs – such as the UAE’s Port of Fujairah and Khor Fakkan Port, and Port Sultan Qaboos in Oman – during the war offers a preview of the contingencies shipping firms are likely to deploy in future crises.

“All of a sudden, they were handling much larger volumes, and then creating these land bridges, usually to go on to Jebel Ali,” Levine told Al Jazeera.

“Containers find a way,” Levine said.

“It’s kind of like water. They’ll trickle, you know, to where they need to go by other paths.”

Another lasting impact of the war could be greater international cooperation on maritime security and safety.

The International Maritime Organization, the UN body responsible for shipping and seafarers, has listed the protection of shipping lanes as one of its top agenda items for discussion at its biannual meeting taking place from Monday to Friday.

“Seafarers have tragically lost their lives in connection with this conflict, and the impact has been felt well beyond the region, with real consequences for global trade, energy and food security,” IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez said in opening remarks to the session on Monday.

Ruth Banomyong, a professor of logistics and supply chain management at Thammasat Business School in Bangkok, Thailand, said he expects to see international coordination to strengthen trade routes that integrate both land and sea even as shipping networks remain “largely the same”.

“This means ensuring that maritime transport, ports, inland logistics, customs procedures and alternative land transport options work together as an integrated system when disruptions occur,” Banomyong told Al Jazeera.

“Maritime freedom is no longer just about freedom of navigation. It is about ensuring the continuity of global trade.

“The long-term lesson is not to replace the Strait of Hormuz, but to reduce overdependence on any single transport corridor,” Banomyong added.

Oza, the head of Maritime NXT, said the ad hoc naval coalitions deployed to ensure freedom of navigation during times of conflict could ultimately be succeeded by a multilateral security framework with “regional ownership rather than purely external enforcement”.

“Freedom of navigation is too important to be left to improvisation,” Oza said.

“If there is one consistent lesson from shipping’s long history, it is that human ingenuity always finds a way – pipelines get built, reserves get repositioned, technologies emerge, and trade, like water, finds its path. It will do so again,” Oza added.

“The innovations that follow this war will be a tribute to human resilience; the tragedy is that it took a war to summon them.”

NATO leaders are meeting in Ankara, Turkiye on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The summit gets underway as US President Donald Trump renews pressure on member states over defence spending. European nations are expected to respond with billions of dollars in new military contracts.

At the NATO summit last year, members agreed to increase their target to 5 percent of GDP: 3.5 percent on military spending by 2035 and 1.5 percent on security-related needs.

Who is there and what is at stake?

Leaders from all 32 NATO member states are at the summit in Turkiye this week.

Two non-alliance heads of state will also be there: Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy and South Korea’s Lee Jae-myung.

Australia, Japan and New Zealand are sending defence or foreign ministers, as are Gulf countries affected by the US-Israel war on Iran: Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is not expected to attend the summit but is holding a bilateral meeting with Trump in Ankara.

What Trump wants from NATO allies

Trump has questioned NATO’s value since his first presidential campaign. He argued that the US carried an unfair share of the costs. At the time, only five countries spent the agreed two percent GDP on defence.

His questions about shared defence responsibility have produced some results in recent years within the alliance as member states pledged an increased defence budget.

Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, the German Marshall Fund’s regional director for Turkiye, believes NATO this year will focus on implementing its promises from last year. “NATO allies just decided to increase their defence spending to five percent last year at The Hague and European allies took action to upgrade their defence industries,” he said. “This year in Ankara the discussion will be on how to translate spending to capabilities. It is therefore stronger than it was last year.”

But Paolo von Schirach, president of the Global Policy Institute, noted that any capability gains from increased spending are years away, saying that more orders mean more military hardware but only eventually. “You can spend a lot and obtain not too much,” he said.

What Ukraine needs from this summit

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is meeting Trump for a bilateral meeting on Wednesday. Ukraine is not a NATO member.

Zelenskyy will be using his face-to-face with the US president to request additional Patriot air defence systems as Russian attacks are intensifying on Ukrainian cities. A drone attack on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv killed at least 11 people on Monday morning.

Jack Watling, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute said that Ukraine is looking for ongoing political and military technical support from alliance members, to signal to Russia “that this support will be sustained”.

The idea, he said, was “to show Russia that there will be no diminution in its defensive capacity over the next 12-24 months”.

“There is a direct correlation between the number of interceptors supplied to Ukraine and the damage that Russia can inflict with ballistic missiles,” says Watling.

What European nations are trying to solve for

The billions in contracts expected to be announced by European nations at this summit are seen by some analysts as trying to appease the Trump administration.

When European nations didn’t join the war on Iran, Trump stated he didn’t want their money, just their “loyalty”. He added he might not have attended the summit if it wasn’t hosted by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Turkey has in recent years not only increased its defence spending, it also has grown into one of NATO’s largest military exporters.

For now, the tone around defence spending remains sharp. On the eve of the summit, Trump called Germany’s defence spending “ridiculous”. Chancellor Friedrich Merz defended his country’s budget, saying that “this is the greatest effort we have ever made to strengthen our defence capabilities”.

Meanwhile, the US has gone a step beyond rhetoric and announced a phased withdrawal of warplanes, destroyers and submarines from NATO countries. “Less US infantry or armour in Europe has an impact on messaging but little else,” Watling said. But, he added, “the withdrawal of US air power has a more tangible impact”.

Whether the alliance can project unity amid the rhetoric and withdrawals is a key question, said analysts.

“The main value of this summit is political, it shows that the allies are still talking, still meeting, still trying to project unity, even if the underlying disagreements and doubts haven’t disappeared,” von Schirach of the Global Policy Institute said. “Ankara is more about reassurance and signalling than about concrete, immediate changes on the ground.”

Defence spending and support for Ukraine’s military needs are expected to top the agenda of summit in Turkish capital.

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

Iran’s TV claims the tanker ignored warnings, but no direct responsibility for the attack has been declared.

A tanker travelling off the coast of Oman in the Strait of Hormuz has caught fire after being struck by a projectile, according to the United Kingdom’s military.

The attack early on Tuesday was the latest targeting a vessel moving through the Gulf’s critical waterway, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas passed before the US-Israel war on Iran began in late February.

Iranian television said the liquefied natural gas tanker came under attack after ignoring warnings, but Tehran did not directly claim the assault.

Tehran has repeatedly declared that only its approved route through the Strait of Hormuz is safe, and it is suspected of attacking other ships that have used another route close to the Omani shore.

The UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) centre said the tanker had been hit near Limah, Oman, in the strait. The projectile hit the port side of the vessel while it was trying to travel south out of the strait towards the Gulf of Oman, the UKMTO said.

Talks between Iran and the United States on a permanent end to the war appear to be on hold until after the burial of Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed at the beginning of the US-Israel war on Iran on February 28.

Authorities flew Khamenei’s body to the Shia seminary city of Qom overnight, where mourners honoured him on Tuesday.

Hossam Hassan uses his FIFA World Cup news conference to raise awareness about the plight of Palestinians in Gaza.

Egypt coach Hossam Hassan has reiterated his support for Palestine days after dedicating his team’s historic knockout win at the World Cup to the Palestinian people and waving their flag at the biggest sporting event in the world.

Hassan broke away from discussing his team’s upcoming round-of-16 match against Argentina to give an impassioned monologue about the plight of the Palestinian people at his news conference on Monday.

“If there is anyone in the world who does not feel for the Palestinian people, then they are not human — whether they are Arab, European, or American,” Hassan said. He spoke for more than four minutes on the subject and was applauded by many of the assembled media.

Israeli attacks across Gaza have continued to kill Palestinians, despite an ongoing “ceasefire” between Israel and Hamas. Israel has killed at least 73,066 people, including at least 20,179 children, in Gaza since the beginning of its genocidal war on October 7. At least 463 of those have been killed due to starvation, including 157 children.

More than 2million Palestinians in Gaza, largely displaced and living amid ruins, face uncertainty following the Israeli genocide.

Hassan was asked what prompted him to wave the Palestinian flag after his team’s penalty-shootout win over Australia on Friday, and he responded by saying it was “simply a human reaction”.

“Everywhere in the world, including in Europe or America, if someone hurts an animal, we see animal rights being defended and the whole world reacts,” Hassan said. “It has become normal to hear that two or three thousand people die in a single day because of a missile.”

The genocide sparked pro-Palestinian protests around the world, with athletes, including Spain’s Lamine Yamal, showing their support.

While Hassan dealt with questions about Lionel Messi and his team’s chances against the holders, he also spoke at length about Palestinians.

“Regardless of religion… I am a human before being Arab or anything else. My message, through football, is this: Please, just as FIFA’s slogan calls for respect among us, I hope there will be respect for people’s right to live,” Hassan said.

With a win over Argentina, Egypt would reach the quarterfinals for the first time.

“My dreams have no limits. My ambitions have no limits. I promise that we will do everything to live up to the expectations [of fans],” Hassan said. “We’re no underdogs. We’re big in every respect. We are a civilisation that is 7,000 years old, even more than 7,000 years.”

Hassan conceded that his side were not favourites for Tuesday’s clash, but insisted they were far from overawed.

“We know we are playing against the World Cup holders and one of the greatest players ever [Messi], but we do not fear them.

“[The] responsibility makes us focus on ourselves and on what we can produce on the field,” he added.

“We have a responsibility towards Egypt and the Arab world and Africa. We represent all of them.”