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The first European troops have arrived in Greenland ahead of exercises that are intended to show the willingness of Denmark and its allies to defend the strategically important island. Greenland is currently the object of intense interest, as President Donald Trump continues to stress its critical role in the defense of the United States. Increasingly, the White House is arguing that U.S. ownership of Greenland is the only alternative to eventual domination by China or Russia. For now, the number of European troops involved is very small and largely symbolic, but that could change in the future.

Late last night, local time, a Royal Danish Air Force C-130J transport landed at Nuuk Airport, where it disembarked an undisclosed number of Danish military personnel, as seen at the top of this story. This advance party will soon be followed by small numbers of troops from France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. They will not be deployed under NATO auspices.

France has said it will deploy around 15 “mountain specialists” to Greenland.

🇫🇷🇬🇱🇩🇰
Every year, French Army mountain commandos deploy to #Greenland for Operation Uppick.
Extreme cold training, long-range raids, autonomy in polar warfare, and scientific research prepare them to operate and fight in one of the world’s harshest environments. pic.twitter.com/INXrCHhTOS

— Tom Antonov (@Tom_Antonov) January 14, 2026

The German Armed Forces is deploying a reconnaissance team of 13 personnel, initially to Copenhagen, before moving on to Greenland alongside Danish personnel.

At 🇩🇰’s invitation, 🇩🇪 will participate in an assessment mission in Greenland, together with other European nations. The aim is to explore the framework conditions for possible military contributions to support 🇩🇰 in ensuring security in the region. 1/2
©️ dpa/imagebroker/elov pic.twitter.com/H6zYnVsVIn

— Germany at NATO (@GermanyNATO) January 14, 2026

Norway and Sweden will send two and three officers, respectively.

Finally, a single British officer will be embedded in the group.

More European military personnel could follow, with the Dutch foreign minister having said that the country is willing to send staff. A decision is due before the end of the week.

Together, the European troops will establish the groundwork for larger-scale exercises that are primarily meant to send a signal to Washington that it is ready and able to defend Greenland.

“The Danish Armed Forces, together with a number of Arctic and European allies, will explore in the coming weeks how an increased presence and exercise activity in the Arctic can be implemented in practice,” the Danish Ministry of Defense said of the upcoming maneuvers.

While the deployment is meant to show strength and resolve, its tiny size, at least initially, could lead Washington to come to the opposite conclusion.

The military security of the island is at the center of Trump’s rhetoric surrounding it.

Greenland and Denmark — of which the island is an autonomous territory — have both repeatedly said the island is not for sale and have expressed alarm about threats of the potential use of U.S. force to acquire Greenland.

Trump’s interest in Greenland is far from new. Back in 2019, TWZ reported on Trump’s claim that his administration was considering attempting to purchase Greenland from Denmark, the U.S. leader noting at the time that the idea was “strategically interesting.”

The topic came back to the forefront at the beginning of the second Trump administration. In early 2025, Trump said he wouldn’t categorically rule out using the U.S. military to take control of Greenland, saying that America needs it — as well as the Panama Canal — for “economic security.”

“The American ambition to take over Greenland is intact,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said today, in comments to Reuters. Frederiksen talked of a “fundamental disagreement,” as he reflected on the meeting of officials from Denmark, Greenland, and the United States at the White House yesterday.

Those talks apparently ended with no solution in sight.

“That is, of course, serious, and therefore we continue our efforts to prevent this scenario from becoming a reality,” Frederiksen added.

Increasingly, Trump is now stating that the future of the island is threatened by China’s and Russia’s ambitions on it. The U.S. president has not ruled out any options to secure it, while stating that, as it stands, Denmark is not strong enough to dissuade Chinese or Russian aggression in the High North.

While China and especially Russia are increasingly projecting their power in the Arctic region, there is little evidence of particular activity around Greenland.

“Two senior Nordic diplomats with access to NATO intelligence briefings told the FT there is no evidence of Russian or Chinese ships or submarines operating around Greenland in recent years, directly contradicting Trump’s justification for U.S. control of the Arctic territory.” pic.twitter.com/ayJZ6xEI31

— Adam Federman (@adamfederman) January 12, 2026

There’s no other way to describe it – Trump is insane.

Greenland’s defense literally consists of two dog sleds. Do you understand? Do you know what their defense is like? Two dog sleds—Trump.

„Meanwhile, you have Russian and Chinese destroyers and submarines scattered across… pic.twitter.com/8O0QRIIJ7W

— Jürgen Nauditt 🇩🇪🇺🇦 (@jurgen_nauditt) January 12, 2026

Having said that, as well as its strategic location, the island is also rich in natural resources, with extensive mineral reserves.

For its part, Russia has said that attempts to identify it as a threat to Greenland are part of anti-Kremlin hysteria and has warned of escalating confrontation in the wider region.

Regardless, there are growing fears in Europe that the standoff over Greenland could threaten the fabric of the NATO alliance.

Several European NATO members have already stated that NATO could be at risk if the United States were to make any kind of effort to seize Greenland.

The U.S. troop presence on the island is currently also fairly small.

Around 200 U.S. troops are stationed in Greenland as of now, according to Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen.

Aside from this, the United States also operates one of its most strategic military outposts in Greenland. This is spearheaded by Pituffik Space Base, the U.S. military’s northernmost installation, a critical node in the U.S. ballistic missile early warning system, and also the world’s northernmost deep-water seaport. You can read in more detail about the U.S. military presence on the island here.

Under a 1951 agreement, the United States can establish military bases in Greenland, something that has also made sense for Denmark, since it benefits from the U.S. capability to defend the island.

The USA already has a defence agreement with Denmark that gives them exclusive and full military access to Greenland. But they are not using it. They have downgraded their presence by 99%.

Now, apparently, they are telling their base that they need to invade and annex Greenland… pic.twitter.com/3b6d5HkuTZ

— Rasmus Jarlov (@RasmusJarlov) January 7, 2026

The new European military presence on the island is even smaller, at least for now, but with larger maneuvers planned there later this year, it could be set to grow. Denmark has said that it plans to increase the number of its own troops permanently based on the island, with these potentially being boosted by rotational deployments by other allies, as in similar initiatives in the Baltic region.

The symbolic value of the initial European troop deployments should not be discounted entirely, however.

It seems clear that the upcoming maneuvers are intended to deliver two messages.

First, that Europe, even outside of the NATO framework, intends to defend Greenland against any kind of military aggression.

Second, Denmark, in particular, is showing the United States that it is responding to its criticism about its limited capacity to protect the island.

Exactly what kinds of maneuvers are going to take place, and on what scale, and what will come after, will depend heavily on the fallout of yesterday’s meeting at the White House.

One outcome of that meeting, which involved U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Vice President JD Vance, Rasmussen, and Greenland’s Foreign Minister Vivian Motzfeldt, was a plan to establish a working group to discuss issues relating to the island.

For now, Greenland remains insistent that it has no wish to be governed by, or owned by, the United States. Its future, the government says, remains with Denmark and NATO.

Statement from Greenland’s leader today:

“There is one thing everybody must understand:

• Greenland does not want to be owned by the USA.
• Greenland does not want to be governed by the USA.
• Greenland does not want to be part of the USA.”
—-
Is that clear enough now? pic.twitter.com/iyPHVZtcD2

— Rasmus Jarlov (@RasmusJarlov) January 13, 2026

But as long as the United States continues to eye the territory, the more likely it becomes that Denmark and its regional allies will move to beef up their military presence there. Exactly how much military might will be needed to show the capability to effectively defend the island, at least in the eyes of the White House, is unknown.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

A South ‍Korean court ‍has sentenced former president Yoon Suk Yeol to five years in jail after finding him ⁠guilty on charges stemming from his declaration of martial law ‍in ⁠December 2024. Al Jazeera’s Jack Barton is outside the court in Seoul.

Venezuela’s oil industry has long been a site of struggle—between national sovereignty and foreign control, between social development and extraction for profit.

In a wide-ranging conversation with theAnalysis.News, Venezuelanalysis founder and contributing editor Gregory Wilpert situates today’s crisis in that longer history, from the Chávez government’s effort to reclaim PDVSA for Venezuelans to the current US strategy of tying sanctions relief to oil exports.

As Washington pushes Caracas to increase production and redirect crude away from China, Wilpert examines whether interim leadership in Venezuela is navigating an impossible economic bind—or whether the country’s oil and sovereignty are once again being bargained under coercion.

Gaza City – Peace, in both the physical and mental sense, feels far away in Gaza.

A ceasefire may have officially been in place since October 10, but Israel continues to conduct occasional attacks, with more than 442 Palestinians killed in the three months since.

It is not just the attacks – daily life in Gaza is also shaped by siege and displacement, and a sense that living conditions will not improve any time soon.

Amid this exhaustion came the announcement on Wednesday by the United States of the beginning of the ceasefire’s “second phase”. This phase is about “moving from ceasefire to demilitarization, technocratic governance, and reconstruction”, said US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff in a social media post.

The new phase includes a new Palestinian technocratic administration, overseen by an international “Board of Peace”, chaired by US President Donald Trump.

But while everything may sound workable on paper, the reaction from Palestinians in Gaza – one that mixes cautious hope and deep scepticism – is shaped by their lived experience since the beginning of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023.

“A lot of political decisions are distant from the reality faced in Gaza… our daily life that is filled with blockades, fear, loss, tents, and a terrible humanitarian situation,” said Arwa Ashour, a freelance journalist and writer based in Gaza City. “Even when decisions are made to ease the suffering, they are obstructed by the Israeli occupation authorities.”

“People want everything back like it was before the war: schools, hospitals, travel,” Ashour said. “If the Board of Peace is going to resolve all these crises, then we welcome it. But if it’s unable to do so, then what is its benefit?”

Palestinians excluded?

Ashour explained that after two years of war and more than 18 years of governance in the Palestinian enclave by Hamas, there is a desire for change in Gaza.

“People want to be part of the process of creating the future, not only to accept the implementation of decisions that have already been made,” she said.

The governance model envisaged in the second phase of the ceasefire plan does have a Palestinian component.

Ali Shaath, a former Palestinian Authority (PA) deputy minister, will head the Palestinian technocratic committee that will manage daily life. But that committee will be overseen by the Board of Peace, to be led by Bulgaria’s former foreign and defence minister, Nickolay Mladenov.

Mladenov – who has worked as a United Nations diplomat in the Middle East – is seen as an administrator, but one who may not be capable of pushing back against Israel and representing Palestinians in Gaza.

“Decisions made without the meaningful participation of those most affected reproduce the same power structures that enabled this occupation and genocide,” Maha Hussaini, head of media and public engagement at Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, told Al Jazeera. “Excluding Palestinians in Gaza from shaping their future strips them of agency and turns reconstruction and governance into tools of control rather than recovery.”

For Hussaini, justice after a war in which Israel has killed at least 71,400 Palestinians and destroyed vast swathes of the territory cannot be ignored.

“Peace does not mean silence after bombardment, nor a pause between wars,” she said. “For Gaza, peace means safety, dignity, and freedom from collective punishment. It also means justice: recognising the harm suffered, restoring the rights of victims, and holding perpetrators accountable. Without justice, what is called ‘peace’ becomes only a temporary arrangement that leaves the genocide intact.”

Palestinian political analyst Ahmed Fayyad said that ultimately, Palestinians have little choice but to go along with Mladenov and the Board of Peace model, even if there is a sense that they are handing over the administration of Gaza to foreigners.

“Palestinians don’t have the luxury of choice to accept or refuse Mladenov,” Fayyad said. “No one – the Palestinian Authority and the Arab [countries] – wants to disrupt the agreement.”

But Fayyad described several potential stumbling blocks, including internal Palestinian divisions between the Palestinian Authority, based in Ramallah, and its longtime rival Hamas.

The analyst also believes that the demilitarisation of Hamas – which the US and Israel insist upon, but which Hamas says is an internal Palestinian matter – will also likely cause problems.

“Israel might attach the demilitarisation to the reconstruction or the opening of [border] crossings, and investments in the education and health sectors,” Fayyad said.

“It is complicated, and it is all subject to Israeli security conditions,” he continued, adding that the formation of a new Palestinian security force that met Israel’s onerous requirements would take a long time because the process was not spelled out in Trump’s ceasefire plan.

“This will reflect negatively on the civilians who yearn for an improvement to their daily harsh reality and suffering in tents, amid outbreaks of disease and the collapse of all economic and social life,” Fayyad said.

Israeli spoiler

The announcement of the second phase of the ceasefire – a move that should have been seen as a sign of positive improvement – seems disconnected to the reality on the ground for Palestinians in Gaza.

“There is more fear than hope,” said Hussaini, from the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor. “Not because people in Gaza lack resilience or imagination, but because experience has taught them that moments labelled as ‘turning points’ rarely translate into real protection or accountability. Hope exists, but it is fragile and constantly undermined by the absence of justice and by decisions imposed from outside.”

And the most influential outside force is Israel – the power that has bombarded Gaza not just in the last two years but in several previous wars, and controls access to Gaza, and the air and sea that surrounds it.

“I think Israel tries its best to distance Gaza from any political solutions, which would end with Palestine’s right to self-determination,” said the analyst Fayyad. “Israel wants Gaza to be a disarmed zone; its people’s biggest concerns are the daily struggles of life, without caring about any political solutions.”

“Israel doesn’t want any future political solutions for Gaza. These are the concerns of the Authority and the Palestinians. Israel doesn’t want independence in decision-making in Palestine,” he concluded.

Reality of life in Gaza

The daily struggle of life is all Sami Balousha, a 30-year-old computer programmer from Gaza City, can think about.

Balousha described peace not as a political agreement, conducted in far-off meeting rooms, but as physical safety and a routine.

“It is simply to sleep at night assured that I wake up the next morning, not dead, or I won’t get up in the middle of the night because of the sound of bombing,” Balousha said. “It is getting up the next morning and going to work, and being sure that I will be able to get home safely, not suspiciously turning around all the time, afraid of a strike.”

Balousha said that he had been displaced with his family 17 times – moving from place to place to escape Israeli attacks. The mental turmoil of the past two years means he no longer looks to the future, and instead focuses on the here and now.

“Tomorrow is far away, and I have no control over it,” Balousha said. “We can’t imagine the near future and plan it. We’ve been stuck in this loop for two years. The reality has always been strangely hard and unexpected.”

Like many others, Balousha feels disconnected from international decision-making.

“They don’t have a deep understanding of the Palestinians’ needs in Gaza. I don’t think that we are being listened to seriously,” he said.

It is why he ultimately does not have much faith in any solutions being cooked up for Gaza, and is instead fearful that his current horror will become a permanent reality.

“I am afraid that the coming generations accept the new reality of living in an open grave, to accept the tent as a home, to grow up not knowing the great days of Gaza,” Balousha said. “People only want an end to this all, no matter what the solution is, no matter who makes it, all that matters is the end of this misery at any cost. People are tired, so tired of this all, but want to live.”

Israeli forces killed at least 10 Palestinians after the United States announced the launch of the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire agreement.

Jan. 15 (UPI) — President Donald Trump on Thursday greeted Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado at the White House where she presented him with her Nobel Peace Prize medal, which he accepted.

Machado, leader of the Venezuela’s center-right Vente Venezuela party, was awarded the medal, which Trump heavily campaigned for, last year for her work to promote democratic rights in her South American nation.

“It was a Great Honor to meet Maria Corina Machado, of Venezuela, today,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform. “She is a wonderful woman who has been through so much. Maria presented me with her Nobel Peace Prize for the work I have done. Such a wonderful gesture of mutual respect.”

In presenting the medal to Trump, she said it is a symbol of the unity of their two peoples on the ideals of freedom, sovereignty and democratic dignity.

“It is also a profound expression of gratitude for the invaluable support of President Trump and the United States for the Venezuelan people in this decisive struggle for our independence and the restoration of popular sovereignty,” she said, according to a statement from her Vente Venezuela party.

The American president has long sought to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Machado first publicly offered to give her medal to Trump earlier this month for the U.S. military operation that resulted in the seizure of Venezuela’s authoritarian president, Nicolas Maduro.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee and the Norwegian Nobel Institute responded to the situation with a statement that “Once a Nobel Prize is announced, it cannot be revoked, shared or transferred to others. The decision is final and stands for all time” — a statement it reiterated on Thursday.

“A medal can change owners, but the title of a Nobel Peace Prize laureate cannot,” it said.

During her visit to Washington, Machado also visited with Republican and Democrat lawmakers at the Capitol.

“I want to assure you that we are going to turn Venezuela into a free and safe country, and into the strongest ally the United States has ever had in this region — when Venezuela is free,” she said.

Ahead of Venezuela’s 2024 election, Machado won her primary bid to oppose Maduro, but was banned from running. Candidate Edmundo Gonzalez was widely seen as having won the election, but the state-run election agency named Maduro the winner.

Machado then left the country.

Despite the removal of Maduro, Maduro’s government remains in power, with Delcy Rodriguez, former vice president of Venezuela, serving as the country’s interim leader.

“If one day, as acting president, I have to go to Washington, I will do so with my head held high, not on my knees,” Rodriguez told lawmakers Thursday in a jab at Machado.

The U.S. military is looking at replacing all of the different versions of the famous Minigun in service today with a new standardized type that would be designated the GAU-24/A. The iconic six-barrel Gatling-type 7.62x51mm machine gun, capable of firing thousands of rounds per minute, first entered service in the 1960s, and America’s armed forces now have an array of variants spread across their arsenals.

The Program Executive Office for Unmanned Aviation and Strike Weapons (PEO U&W) within the U.S. Navy’s Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) put out a request for information contracting notice regarding the GAU-24/A plan this week.

“NAVAIR is seeking to identify sources that can manufacture the GAU-24/A machine gun in accordance with a Government-owned Technical Data Package (TDP),” the notice explains. “The GAU-24/A machine gun is intended to serve as the common replacement for all other M134-based weapons, currently being used, throughout the Department of War.”

“Responses to this notice will be used by the Government to determine the appropriate acquisition strategy,” it adds.

A tentative schedule is laid out, which would see the delivery of an initial five GAU-24/As to the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (NSWC Crane) in Indiana for testing within 12 months of a contract award. The Navy is currently eyeing the Fiscal Year 2027 timeframe for the start of that work, which could then run for anywhere between 36 and 60 months afterward, at least.

The notice does not include details about the features being sought for this new common Minigun variant or whether existing types could be converted to that standard as part of the replacement process. TWZ has reached out to NAVAIR for more information.

US Marines Firing The Powerful GAU-21 Machine Gun & M134 Minigun – Close Air Support Trainings

There are thousands of Miniguns in the U.S. military’s inventory today, and standardizing them around a common pattern would make sense. Though the different variants that have been developed over the years all look roughly the same externally, there are notable differences between various types, which means that not all components are always interchangeable. This, in turn, creates various logistical and supply chain complexities.

General Electric developed the original Minigun in the early 1960s, leveraging more than a decade of work already at that point on larger caliber Gatling-type guns like the equally famous 20mm Vulcan cannon. The U.S. Air Force and U.S. Army subsequently adopted versions under the designations GAU-2/A and M134, respectively.

The original version of the Minigun had an overall length of around 31 and a half inches and weighed 35 pounds. However, the gun also needed an electrically-driven motor to fire. That motor, along with the different ammunition feeding systems and other components required when the gun was installed in various pods and mounts, added additional weight and bulk. Using external electric power did make it easier to set the gun’s rate of fire for specific applications and allowed for selectable fire rates in certain cases. Typical firing rates for Miniguns, even today, are generally between 3,000 and 6,000 rounds per minute, or 50 and 100 shots every second.

It is worth noting that the Army also experimented in the 1960s with a Minigun powered by propellant gas produced during firing, like many other traditional machine guns. The service did not adopt that version, which was designated the XM133.

The Minigun’s first real combat outing was during the Vietnam War, where the guns were extensively used in armament packages for helicopters, such as UH-1 Huey gunships and early versions of the AH-1 Cobra attack helicopter, as well as in podded form on fixed-wing aircraft. The Minigun was a key feature in the genesis of the AC-47 and later side-firing gunships converted from cargo planes, as well. The A-37 Dragonfly light attack jet also featured a single built-in GAU-2/A. The weapons saw more limited and often non-standard use during that conflict on various ground vehicles and maritime platforms.

Douglas AC-47D Spooky aka “Puff, the Magic Dragon”

Various improvements were subsequently made to the baseline GAU-2/B/M134 design, particularly to the ammunition feed and drive components to improve reliability. General Electric eventually stopped producing Miniguns, and several manufacturers have built them since then.

Dillon Aero Range Day

Specialized lighter-weight versions, some with titanium components, as well as ones optimized for use in maritime environments, especially when it comes to saltwater exposure, have since been developed and fielded by U.S. and foreign forces. Over the years, a maze of designations for different Minigun variants, including GAU-17/A and Mk 49 Mod 0, compounded by related nomenclature for the complete weapon systems many of them are associated with, has emerged. This all underscores why the U.S. military would be interested now in standardizing around a common model.

Minigun variants remain in widespread service today across the U.S. military in a host of aerial, ground-based, and maritime forms. Though they can burn through a large amount of ammunition quickly, the guns offer a valuable way to suppress enemy forces or help break up sudden ambushes, or just saturate an entire area. Miniguns are heavily used on special operations helicopters, watercraft, and ground vehicles, where the benefits they offer are particularly relevant for raids and other shorter-duration direct action missions.

US Navy Special Forces Unleash Awesome Minigun Fire

M134 Minigun fun in Afghanistan

They continue to see widespread use by conventional forces, including in the context of airmobile assaults and combat search and rescue operations, as well. Last year, the Army notably tested a new Minigun mount for the M1 Abrams tank, giving it a boost in firepower for use against targets on the ground and potentially certain aerial threats like small drones.

The Minigun has the additional benefit of firing the same 7.62x51mm ammunition as various machine guns and rifles in U.S. inventory. There has been talk in the past about potentially converting them to fire other rounds, such as new 6.8mm cartridges developed as part of the Army’s Next Generation Squad Weapon (NGSW) program that led to the M7 rifle and M250 light machine gun.

Miniguns look set to remain in service in the U.S. military for the foreseeable future, but the total number of variants in America’s arsenal may start to shrink down to just one in the coming years.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

No casualties reported as huge fire breaks out in village of makeshift homes located on fringe of Seoul’s upmarket Gangnam district.

Hundreds of South Korean firefighters are battling a major fire in a deprived area located on the fringe of the upmarket Gangnam district in the capital, Seoul.

The blaze broke out at about 5am local time (20:00 GMT) on Friday, and authorities raised the fire alert to the second-highest level, with some 300 firefighters deployed to fight the blaze amid fears it might spread to a nearby mountain, the country’s official Yonhap News Agency reports.

There were no initial reports of casualties as dozens of residents in Guryong Village, which was described by Yonhap as “one of the last remaining shanty towns in Seoul”, were forced to flee their homes, according to fire officials.

Photographs from the scene showed ‍a towering column of black smoke hanging over the area, as elderly residents wearing face masks evacuated.

Yonhap reported that 85 fire trucks were sent to tackle the fire, and a firefighting helicopter was prevented from participating due to poor visibility.

“I was asleep until a neighbour called saying there was a fire. I ran out and saw the flames already spreading,” Kim Ok-im, 69, who said she had lived in the area for nearly 30 years, told the Reuters news agency.

Guryong Village is situated on the fringe of the upmarket Gangnam district, which is known as Seoul’s wealthiest area and commands some of the highest prices paid for real estate in South Korea.

The ramshackle housing in the village formed in the 1970s and 1980s, when low-income residents in the area were forced to move as the capital underwent major redevelopment, including during the Asian Games and the Seoul Olympics.

At that time, locals settled on the edge of Gangnam without permits, according to a Seoul city planning report.

The makeshift homes found in the village are ‌often densely packed together and built with highly flammable materials such as vinyl sheets, plywood and styrofoam, making the area particularly vulnerable to fires, according to an assessment by the fire department after a blaze in 2023.

Most residents have moved out of Guryong, but about 336 households remain, according to the Gangnam District city planning department.

US forces say another Venezuela-linked tanker seized as Trump continues moves to take control of nation’s oil reserves.

United States forces have seized an oil tanker in the Caribbean that the Trump administration said had links to Venezuela, the sixth tanker vessel detained as Washington moves to take full control of Venezuelan oil resources.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the US Coast Guard had boarded the tanker Veronica early on Thursday.

Noem said the vessel had previously passed through Venezuelan waters and was operating in defiance of President Donald Trump’s “established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean”.

US Marines and sailors stationed on board the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R Ford took part in the operation alongside a coastguard tactical team, which Noem said conducted the boarding.

The US military said the ship was seized “without incident”.

The Veronica is the sixth sanctioned tanker seized by US forces as part of President Trump’s promise to take indefinite control of the production, refining and global distribution of Venezuela’s oil products. It was also the fourth ship seized since the US abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in a military operation in Caracas almost two weeks ago.

The latest seizure came as Venezuela’s interim president, Delcy Rodriguez, told parliament on Thursday that there would be reforms to legislation governing Venezuela’s oil sector. The Hydrocarbons Law, among other provisions, limits the involvement of foreign entities in exploiting the country’s national resources.

Without providing details, Rodriguez told parliament the reforms would touch on Venezuela’s so-called anti-blockade law, which provides the government with tools to counteract US sanctions in place since 2019.

Rodriguez said the envisioned legal reform would result in money for “new fields, to fields where there has never been investment, and to fields where there is no infrastructure”.

Rodriguez also said funds from oil would go to workers and public services.

Oil exports are Venezuela’s main source of revenue.

Since Maduro’s abduction, Trump has claimed the US now controls Venezuela’s oil sector and has made clear that the takeover of the country’s vast oil reserves was a key goal of his military onslaught against the nation and its leader.

Addressing oil executives last week, Trump said: “You’re dealing with us directly and not dealing with Venezuela at all. We don’t want you to deal with Venezuela.”

Venezuela sits on about a fifth of the world’s oil reserves and was once a major crude supplier to the US.

But Venezuela only produced about 1 percent of the world’s total crude output in 2024, according to OPEC, having been hampered by years of underinvestment, US sanctions and embargoes.

Caracas, January 15, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuela’s Acting President Delcy Rodríguez announced a “partial reform” of the country’s hydrocarbon legislation during the annual “Memoria y Cuenta” speech before the National Assembly on Thursday.

Rodríguez justified the reform with the need to attract investment for Venezuela’s oil industry.

“We have brought a draft of a bill that aims to incorporate the productive models of the Anti-Blockade Law into the Hydrocarbon Law,” she told deputies. “The new investments will be directed to areas where there was no prior investment or no infrastructure.”

The Acting President went on to vow that the government would prioritize social spending and infrastructure works with energy revenues, though she did not offer further details. The legislative project will now be discussed by the National Assembly before being brought up for a vote. 

The 2001 Hydrocarbon Law was one of the major early projects in former President Hugo Chávez’s tenure. The legislation reasserted the Venezuelan state’s sovereignty over the oil industry, significantly raising royalties and taxes and mandating that state oil company PDVSA retain majority stakes in joint ventures. The law was a catalyst for the failed 2002 US-backed coup against Chávez.

Venezuela’s National Constituent Assembly (2017-2020) approved the Anti-Blockade Law in 2020 in an effort to skirt US-led economic sanctions. The bill spurred the creation of several business models favoring private investors, including concession-type deals in the oil industry whereby private partners collect a majority of the crude produced.

The oil reform announcement comes amid repeated claims by Washington to take control of Venezuelan crude dealings. Since the January 3 US military strikes and kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the Trump administration has vowed to administer the OPEC member’s oil sales for an “indefinite” period.

On Wednesday, senior Trump officials unveiled the first sales worth US $500 million, with the funds deposited in accounts controlled by the US government. Multiple outlets reported that the main account holding the proceeds is located in Qatar.

One US official described Qatar as a “neutral location where money can flow freely with US approval and without risk of seizure.” On January 9, the White House issued an executive order to shield Venezuelan oil revenues administered by Washington from creditors looking to collect on debts owed by Venezuela.

Democrat politicians quoted by Semafor raised questions about the deal’s transparency and lack of accountability. For its part, the Trump administration has courted oil companies about investing in Venezuela, claiming that they will only “deal” with Washington rather than Venezuelan authorities.

The scope of US control over Venezuelan oil sales, as well as the mechanisms to return proceeds to Caracas, remains unclear, however. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced upcoming sanctions withdrawals or waivers to facilitate transactions.

Commodities traders Vitol and Trafigura have reportedly begun moving a combined 4.8 million barrels of Venezuelan crude to storage hubs in the Caribbean after receiving licenses from the US Treasury Department.

Economics outlet Bitácora Económica reported on Thursday, citing “unofficial sources,” that the Venezuelan Central Bank (BCV) had an account opened in the Qatar National Bank (QNB) where oil proceeds were deposited. According to the same report, the BCV will receive a license to five Venezuelan private banks that will offer US $330 million through foreign currency exchange tables. Healthcare and infrastructure imports will reportedly be given priority. US officials have claimed that only imports from US manufacturers will be allowed.

Venezuela’s Central Bank has been under US Treasury sanctions since 2019. Similarly, Washington has levied wide-reaching unilateral coercive measures against the oil industry, including financial sanctions, an export embargo, and secondary sanctions.

With its military operation and moves to wrest control of Venezuela’s oil sector, the Trump administration has also broadcast its intention to clamp down on bilateral Venezuelan deals with geopolitical rivals such as China. The US Navy has imposed a naval blockade and seized multiple tankers since December in an effort to strong-arm Caracas.

Washington’s unilateral actions saw two Chinese-flagged supertankers turn back amid trips to load Venezuelan oil. In recent years, China has been the main destination for Venezuelan crude and fuel oil exports, with shipments partly used to offset debt from longstanding oil-for-loan deals.

According to Bloomberg, Beijing has sought assurances from Venezuelan and US officials over its loans to the Caribbean nation. The Chinese government reiterated its condemnation of the January 3 US attacks and pledged to “take all necessary measures to protect its legitimate rights and interests in Venezuela.”

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has travelled to Washington, DC, to meet with United States President Donald Trump at the White House, following the abduction of her political adversary, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Thursday’s meeting was the first time the two leaders encountered one another face-to-face.

But the visit was an unusually subdued one for Trump, who normally welcomes foreign leaders to the Oval Office for a news conference with reporters.

This time, however, Trump kept his meeting with Machado private, away from clicking camera shutters and shouted questions from reporters.

Trump has backed Maduro’s former vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, as interim leader of the South American country, despite Machado’s claims that the opposition has a mandate to govern.

Rodriguez’s inaugural state of the union address as president coincided with Machado’s arrival at the White House, a fact that could have contributed to the low-key nature of the meeting.

“We are used to seeing the president ushering in the cameras, making comments, talking away,” Al Jazeera correspondent Mike Hanna reported as evening fell in the capital.

“But on this particular occasion, [the meeting] was held behind closed doors. In fact, we haven’t even had a formal readout from the White House of that meeting with Machado.”

Still, Machado struck an upbeat tone as she exited the White House and strolled onto Pennsylvania Avenue, where she was thronged by reporters and supporters seeking selfies.

She and Trump spent only a few hours together in the White House, as they discussed Venezuela’s future over lunch.

Machado confirmed to the media that she followed through with her plans to give Trump her Nobel Peace Prize, an honour the US president has long coveted for himself.

“I presented the president of the United States the medal, the Nobel Peace Prize,” Machado told reporters.

As she offered Trump the prize, Machado said she recounted a historical anecdote, about an interaction between Simon Bolivar – the Venezuelan military officer who helped liberate much of South America from colonial rule – and the Marquis de Lafayette, a Revolutionary War hero in the US.

“I told him this. Listen to this. Two hundred years ago, General Lafayette gave Simon Bolivar a medal with George Washington’s face,” Machado said. “Bolivar since then kept that medal for the rest of his life.”

The Nobel Committee, however, has clarified that the prize is non-transferable and cannot be shared.

Machado was announced as the recipient of the prize in October, in recognition of her efforts to advance Venezuelan democracy.

“I dedicate this prize to the suffering people of Venezuela and to President Trump for his decisive support of our cause,” Machado wrote on October 10. She secretly left Venezuela, where she had been living in hiding, in December to travel to Norway and collect the medal.

‘Willing to serve’

Machado remains a popular figure within Venezuela’s opposition movement, which has faced oppression and violence under Maduro’s presidency.

Human rights organisations have accused Maduro of systematically suppressing dissent and arresting opposition leaders.

As of January 11, the human rights group Foro Penal estimated there were 804 political prisoners in Venezuela, though some estimates put their population in the thousands.

Machado was formerly a member of Venezuela’s National Assembly, but Maduro’s government had her removed for allegedly conspiring against the presidency.

She was considered a leading candidate for the 2024 presidential race, and during the October 2023 opposition primary, she earned more than 92 percent support.

But in January 2024, she was again disqualified from holding office, and former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez ultimately ran on behalf of the opposition coalition.

After polls closed in July 2024, the government did not publish the usual breakdown of the voting tallies, leading to widespread outcry over a lack of transparency. The opposition obtained voting tallies that appeared to show Gonzalez winning in a landslide, further fuelling the outrage.

But Maduro’s government backed his claim to a third six-year term as president.

After the US military abducted Maduro from Venezuela on January 3, it transported him to the US to face charges of narcotics trafficking.

Machado has since appeared on US television to advance the Venezuelan opposition’s claim that it has a “mandate” to take over the presidency after Maduro’s removal.

“We have a president-elect who is Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, and we are ready and willing to serve our people as we have been mandated,” she told CBS News on January 7.

Dismissing Machado?

But Trump has thrown his support behind Rodriguez, whom he has described as cooperative.

“ She’s somebody that we’ve worked with very well,” Trump said at a news conference on Thursday. “I think we’re getting along very well with Venezuela.”

The US president has previously said that the US will “run” Venezuela. Last week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also told reporters that the Venezuelan government’s “decisions are going to continue to be dictated by the United States of America”.

Still, Rodriguez has denounced the January 3 attack on Venezuela as a violation of international law, and in Thursday’s state of the union speech, she continued to express continued allegiance to “Chavismo”, the political movement Maduro followed.

She has also criticised US threats to her country’s sovereignty.

“We know the US is a lethal nuclear power. We have seen their record in history of humanity. We know and we are not afraid to face them diplomatically through political dialogue as appropriate and resolve once and for all this historical contradiction,” Rodriguez said on Thursday.

“Brothers and sisters, deputies, regardless of political affiliation, it doesn’t matter. We have to go together as Venezuelans to defend our sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity, and also defend our dignity and our honour.”

She nevertheless indicated she planned to revisit Venezuela’s hydrocarbon law to allow for greater foreign investment.

Renata Segura, the director of the Latin America and Caribbean programme at the nonprofit International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera that Rodriguez and her government have consistently maintained that Maduro remains the rightful leader of Venezuela.

“We should not forget that Rodriguez and many other members of the government in Caracas have been very adamant about the fact that the intervention against Maduro was illegitimate. They’ve actually demanded that he be liberated,” Segura said.

“So they haven’t done a 180-degree shift in the tone of their declarations. But it’s not like they have a lot of manoeuvring room. So they are really trying to appease Trump at this moment.”

Still, Trump has long dismissed Machado’s prospects as a replacement for Maduro or Rodriguez, saying on January 3 that she “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country”.

Segura believes the Trump administration’s choice to reject Machado as the leader of Venezuela is understandable, in the name of stability.

But, she added, Machado is the clear leader of the opposition, and her coalition therefore needs to be part of the country’s government moving forward.

“It would be very illegitimate if we just had a conversation between the regime of Chavismo, now without Maduro, and the Trump administration, without those people that really represent the Venezuelan people’s feelings,” Segura said.

We have an incredible set of images to share today from our friend Russell Hill (@Sabian404), an aviation photographer out of the Portland, Oregon area. In fact, I would go so far as say this is the most incredible photo of the U.S. Air Force’s new F-15EX Eagle II in existence.

The image was taken at Portland International Airport (PDX), which also hosts Portland Air National Guard (PANG) Base, whose prominent tenant is the 142nd Fighter Wing/123rd Fighter Squadron, better known as the Redhawks. This celebrated unit was chosen as the first F-15EX operator, rapidly transitioning the Eagle II from testing to operational status. In the process, the Redhawks would give up their 40-year-old F-15C/Ds.

You can read all about the Redhawks and their transition to the F-15EX in this past exclusive feature of ours.

The main image in question, seen at the top of this post, shows an F-15EX, part of RAMBO flight, blasting out of PDX in full afterburner and executing a hard pull-up for a fast climb at the end of Runway 10R. According to Hill, this was a ‘fini-flight’ for one of the 142nd’s pilots. These are usually lively affairs marking the end of a pilot’s military flying career.

It’s worth noting that the use of afterburner by PANG-based F-15s is not a daily occurrence. This is largely due to sound abatement and fuel conservation, as well as the airport’s long runways. But for some missions, like when the alert birds launch, or a functional test flight occurs, or for a special occasion, like this fini-flight, the F-15s rocket down the runway in full reheat, often executing a ‘gate climb’ (a vertical climb roughly over the airport’s grounds) at the end of the runway. This is really something to see, and especially hear, inside the terminal where throngs of weary travelers get a sudden wakeup call as the ruckus literally rattles the windows.

With the 142nd FW still in transition, part of Rambo flight included F-15Cs, which also went out with their cans blazing, one giving a deep wingtip drop to those standing on the base’s apron:

Hill was able to capture the departure on video, too. Check it out below:

Jan. 15 (UPI) — Eleven Senate and House Democrats on Thursday said T1 Mobile LLC dba Trump Mobile has not delivered phones as promised and made deceptive claims about its origin.

They said the Trump Mobile T1 phone is not made in the United States and want the Federal Trade Commission to investigate potential violations of federal consumer protection laws.

The Trump Organization launched Trump Mobile in June and said the T1 phone is made in the United States on a website promoting the service, the lawmakers said in a jointly written letter to FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson.

Trump Mobile in June said consumers could reserve a T1 phone by placing a $100 deposit, but as of January, no phones have been delivered, according to the lawmakers.

On Dec. 31, Fortune reported that Trump Mobile staff said the 43-day shutdown of the federal government caused Trump Mobile to “pause everything on the [Federal Communications Commission] side of things,” thus further delaying delivery of the mobile phone.

The claim that the phone is made in the United States also is deceptive, according to the lawmakers.

“Trump Mobile initially advertised the T1 phone as ‘made in the USA’ on its website,” the lawmakers said.

“These claims were quietly removed from the website in late June 2025, days after the phone was announced,” they said.

A review of a Trump Mobile announcement for the phone shows it is described as a “sleek, gold smartphone engineered for performance and proudly designed and built in the United States for customers who expect the best from their mobile carrier.”

The Trump Mobile website does not include any claims that the phone is made in the United States.

The website also shows T1 Mobile LLC dba Trump Mobile secured a licensing agreement to use the Trump name and trademark.

A Trump Mobile staffer earlier this week said the phone will be manufactured in the United States, NBC News reported.

The lawmakers, though, told the FTC chairman that the United States does not have any facilities capable of manufacturing the cellphone.

The letter is signed by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey of Massachusetts, Chris Van Hollen of Maryland and Edward Markey and Adam Schiff of California.

Also signing are Reps. Doris Matsui and Robert Garcia of California, Greg Cesar of Texas, Summer Lee of Pennsylvania, Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Maxwell Frost of Florida.

Trump Mobile did not immediately respond to an email request for comment made early Thursday evening.

These are the key developments from day 1,422 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is where things stand on Friday, January 16:

Fighting

• A Ukrainian drone attack killed two workers from a state-owned pharmacy as they were transporting medicines to Polohy in a Russian-occupied area of Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region, Russia’s state news agency TASS reports.
• A Ukrainian drone strike injured three people in Russia’s front-line Belgorod region, the regional task force reported, according to TASS.
• Russian forces dropped a guided bomb on Bilopillia, in Ukraine’s Sumy region, killing one person and injuring at least four others, the regional prosecutor’s office said on the Telegram messaging app.
• Ukraine’s Ministry of Energy said that new power outages were affecting customers in the Zhytomyr and Kharkiv regions following an overnight Russian attack. Network restrictions remained in place in the capital Kyiv, the Kyiv region, and the Odesa region, the ministry added in a statement.
• Ihor Terekhov, the mayor of Ukraine’s second-biggest city, Kharkiv, said on Telegram that Russian forces destroyed a large facility of “critical energy infrastructure”, without specifying which type of facility was struck.
• Kateryna Pop, spokeswoman for the Kyiv City Military Administration, said that 287 residential buildings remain without heating in Kyiv more than a week after a massive Russian attack damaged infrastructure there, and as temperatures continue to fall to -17 degrees Celsius (1.4 Fahrenheit) overnight.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the national government would take over responsibility for Kyiv’s energy as the city had not responded quickly enough to the current crisis, according to the Ukrinform news site.
• A Ukrainian attack left close to 87,000 people without electricity in Russian-occupied Zaporizhia, Russian-appointed official Yevhen Balitsky wrote on Telegram.
• Oleksandr Kovalenko, the spokesman for the Zaporizhia Regional Military Administration, said that more than 500 people will need to be evacuated from two districts of Ukraine’s embattled Zaporizhia region by early February, according to Ukrinform. More than 700 people have already been evacuated since the beginning of January, including 480 children, he added.

Politics and diplomacy

• President Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address that “Ukraine has never been and will never be a stumbling block to peace”, appearing to refute comments made by United States President Donald Trump a day earlier.
• “When Russian strikes are aimed at breaking our energy system and our people, it is Russia that must be put under pressure,” Zelenskyy added.
• Trump told the Reuters news agency on Wednesday that he believed Russian President Vladimir Putin was “ready to make a deal. I think Ukraine is less ready to make a deal”.
• International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief Kristalina Georgieva told the Reuters news agency during a visit to Kyiv that she expects to ask the fund’s executive board to approve a new $8.1bn lending programme for Ukraine within weeks.

• NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said in a post on X that he had spoken to Zelenskyy “about the energy situation in Ukraine, with Russia’s attacks causing terrible human suffering, as well as on the ongoing efforts to bring an end to the war”.

• “We’re committed to ensuring that Ukraine continues to get the crucial support needed to defend today and ultimately secure a lasting peace,” Rutte said.
• French President Emmanuel Macron said that France is now providing two-thirds of intelligence information to Ukraine, largely replacing the US, which until last year had delivered the majority of those services.

Oil and gas

• Greece’s shipping ministry warned its ships to “take the highest possible security measures” in the Black Sea region, following recent drone attacks on oil tankers there, which Russia has blamed on Ukraine, according to Reuters.
• Russia’s federal budget revenues from oil and gas dropped by 24 percent in 2025 to the lowest level since 2020, according to Finance Ministry data, as oil prices fell while the rouble appreciated.

Jan. 15 (Asia Today) — Unification Minister Chung Dong-young on Thursday called for “proactive and creative” diplomacy to help restart North Korea-U.S. talks, saying progress in South Korea’s ties with China and Japan should feed into planned U.S.-China talks in April and, in turn, encourage dialogue between Washington and Pyongyang.

Chung made the remarks at the second meeting of the Korean Peninsula Peace Strategy Advisory Group, a consultative body of inter-Korean relations experts, held at the Inter-Korean Talks Headquarters, the Ministry of Unification said.

“To make this year the first year of peaceful coexistence on the Korean Peninsula, we must build on the outcomes of the South Korea-China and South Korea-Japan summits to drive a North Korea-U.S. summit by connecting them to the U.S.-China summit in April,” Chung said, according to the ministry.

Chung also said the government would continue efforts to ease tensions and build trust between the two Koreas, citing what he described as a swift response to a recent drone incident.

Participants at the meeting suggested expanding high-level communication with neighboring countries to support peace on the Korean Peninsula. They also discussed ways to use the current situation, in which indirect communication with North Korea has been established following the drone incident, to help restore inter-Korean channels, the ministry said.

The meeting included 16 experts, including former Unification Minister Chung Sye-hyun and Kim Yeon-chul, chair of the Korea Peace Forum, the ministry said.

— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

EPA

Secret discussions

Jeff Overs/BBC

The leak

The sacking

Defection decision

Palestinians in Gaza have told Al Jazeera the second phase of the ceasefire won’t improve their lives. They say little will change until Israel stops bombing the Strip and allows in more aid. On Wednesday, the US announced it was launching phase two of the ceasefire.

Israel killed at least 10 Palestinians across Gaza, just as the United States announced that the two sides had progressed to the second phase of a 20-point ceasefire deal with Hamas to end the conflict.

The Wafa news agency reported that the Israeli military bombed two houses belonging to the al-Hawli and the al-Jarou families in the central town of Deir el-Balah on Thursday evening, with health officials confirming a 16-year-old minor was among six killed.

The Israeli military announced that one of the victims, Muhammad al-Hawli, was a commander in the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas.

Reporting from Gaza City, Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim al-Khalili confirmed that a “senior figure of the Qassam Brigades” had been killed and that the attack underscored Israel’s message that it would be defining phase two of the ceasefire “on its terms”.

Israel, he said, had set the terms of the next phase of the ceasefire, which will see the establishment of a Palestinian technocratic administration overseen by an international “Board of Peace”, with the option of “escalation” remaining very much “on the table”.

Elsewhere in the war-torn enclave, at least one person was shot dead by Israeli forces near Al-Alam roundabout, west of Rafah city, another person was killed in an Israeli attack on a police post near Al-Nablusi Junction, southwest of Gaza City and two more people were killed in an Israeli air attack on the Al-Khatib family home in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

‘Despicable crime’

Hamas condemned the targeting of the al-Hawli home as a “despicable crime”, saying that it revealed the “contempt” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the October ceasefire, but did not confirm the death of one of its commanders.

At least 451 Palestinians, including more than 100 children, have been reported killed since the ceasefire took effect, with Israel ordering residents out of more than half of Gaza, where its troops remain behind an apparently mobile “yellow line“.

Three Israeli soldiers have been killed over the same period.

US special envoy Steve Witkoff announced in a post on X on Wednesday that the second phase of Trump’s 20-point plan to end the conflict had been launched, “moving from ceasefire to demilitarization, technocratic governance, and reconstruction”.

The next phase would bring “the full demilitarization and reconstruction of Gaza, primarily the disarmament of all unauthorized personnel”, he said, with reference to Hamas, which has so far refused to publicly commit to full disarmament.

The plan also calls for the deployment of an International Stabilisation Force to help secure Gaza and train vetted Palestinian police units.

The 15-member technocratic committee, named the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, will manage day-to-day governance, but leaves unresolved broader political and security issues, including the question of Israel’s post-war withdrawal from the enclave.

Ali Shaath, a former deputy minister in the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, has been appointed to lead the committee, which is now meeting in Egypt to begin preparations for entering the territory, according to the AFP news agency report citing Egyptian state television.

In a recent interview, Shaath said the committee would rely on “brains rather than weapons” and would not coordinate with armed groups.

‘A step in the right direction’

Nevertheless, senior Hamas official Bassem Naim welcomed the establishment of the committee on Thursday, calling it “a step in the right direction” and signalling the armed group was ready to hand over administration of Gaza.

“This is crucial for consolidating the ceasefire, preventing a return to war, addressing the catastrophic humanitarian crisis and preparing for comprehensive reconstruction,” he said.

“The ball is now in the court of the mediators, the American guarantor and the international community to empower the committee,” he added.

The US-proposed Board of Peace is expected to be led on the ground by Bulgarian diplomat and politician Nickolay Mladenov.

The Reuters news agency reported that invitations were sent out on Wednesday to potential Board of Peace members personally selected by Trump.

‘Human remains’ in the rubble

The first phase of Trump’s plan began on October 10 and included a complete ceasefire, the exchange of Israeli captives for Palestinian prisoners, and a surge of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

However, with Israel having maintained a chokehold on supplies entering the enclave, nearly all of the territory’s more than 2 million people are now struggling to survive winter in makeshift homes or damaged buildings.

As Al Jazeera’s al-Khalili put it, “the situation is going from bad to worse for hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians who heard about the announcement of the second phase of the ceasefire, [with] nothing implemented on the ground”.

Jorge Moreira da Silva, head of the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) said that conditions were “inhumane” and called for an acceleration of reconstruction work. “We can’t wait, we can’t procrastinate,” he said on Thursday after a visit to the territory.

Da Silva said the launch of phase two of the Gaza truce plan marked a “historical” opportunity to kick-start reconstruction efforts, which he said would require $52bn, according to an assessment conducted by the World Bank, the UN and the European Commission.

In phase two, Shaath said that the committee would focus on providing urgent relief for Gaza, announcing that he would bring in bulldozers to “push the rubble into the sea, and make new islands, new land”.

According to Shaath, Israel’s full-scale onslaught on Gaza has left about 60 million tonnes of rubble scattered across the enclave, “with unexploded ordnance in the rubble, dangerous waste, and unfortunately also human remains”.

Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has killed at least 71,441 Palestinians since it erupted on October 7, 2023.

Jan. 15 (UPI) — The driver of a private passenger vehicle died after colliding head-on with a school bus Thursday morning in Manhattan, Ill.

The crash happened at 8:32 a.m. CST as the bus was carrying 10 students and a driver, all of whom were taken to a nearby hospital out of precaution.

Manhattan Fire Protection District personnel responded to the accident scene near the intersection of Manhattan Monee Road and Kankakee Road and medically evaluated all students and the driver at the scene.

No bus passengers sustained major injuries, but the driver of the private vehicle was pronounced dead at the scene.

Reports do not indicate if the passenger vehicle carried anyone other than the driver.

The bus belongs to the Manhattan School District, and all students and the driver were released from a local hospital by 1 p.m., school district officials said.

“Our hearts are with everyone impacted by this tragic incident,” MSD Superintendent Damien Aherne said.

“We are grateful for the swift response of our first responders and our school staff, whose priority was ensuring the safety and well-being of our students,” Aherne said.

“We will continue to provide support to our students and their families during this difficult time,” he added.

An investigation into the crash and its cause was underway.

Manhattan is about 45 miles southeast of Chicago.

The Navy’s top admiral said a recent walk through a Virginia class submarine Command and Control Systems Module (CCSM) under construction offered a vivid glimpse into how the Navy can speed building out the future FF(X) frigate. Having companies, both domestic and potentially foreign, construct modules that can later be plugged into hulls by major shipyards can dramatically increase efficiency, Adm. Daryl Caudle, the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) said. His observations come as the U.S. is struggling to get anywhere nearing catching up to China in the number of naval vessels it is pumping out per year.

The process is called distributed shipbuilding. While not a new concept, it is used on more complex vessels, like SSNs, SSBNs, DDGs and LPDs. Now the Navy is looking to use this concept for its rebooted FF(X) frigate program, Caudle said. He pointed to the construction of Virginia class fast-attack submarines as a prime example of how that works.

“I was just down on the Gulf Coast to see how they build three modules there for Virginia class and they’re going to start building for Columbia as well,”  Caudle told a small group of reporters, including from The War Zone, of his recent visit to the Austal USA shipyard in Mobile, Alabama. The company is building and outfitting CCSMs for three future Virginia class boats and Electronic Deck Modules (EDM) for the Virginia– and Columbia-class nuclear ballistic missile submarine programs.

“One of the main modules they build is the entire Command and Control suite for Virginia class,” he explained during a media panel at the Surface Navy Association (SNA) annual symposium on Wednesday. “And when you see that module… they had one that was almost ready to be shipped up to Quonset Point. It’s like walking into a Virginia class submarine control room. The thing is completely done, built, and the only thing that’s missing is really the computers that we put in for the sonar and fire control system.”

Austal construction of the modules “offloaded hundreds of thousands of man-hours off Electric Boat and utilized additional capacity of that yard to do that,” Caudle said. “So without those types of changes and how we actually optimize all the yards to go do this, it will be challenging.” 

While distributed shipbuilding is being eyed for the FF(X) program, the first ship in the class won’t be built that way. The U.S. has a lot of work to do to make that happen for the rest of the class, Caudle posited.

“…there’s going to have to be some paradigm shifts with things like modularity,” the CNO said. “We are, I think, at just the tip of the iceberg on how we’re starting to utilize modularity more effectively.” 

In December, the Navy announced it would acquire the frigates, to be built on a design based on the U.S. Coast Guard’s Legend class National Security Cutter. The new warships, the first of which is set to be launched in 2028, are intended to fill the gap left by the cancellation of the abortive Constellation class frigate program.

The FF(X) was launched to provide a quick way to replace the Constellation class, however, the design is controversial because it lacks a vertical launch system for missiles, drastically reducing its firepower, as well as other features. You can read more about that in our story here.

The first FF(X) was awarded to HII/Ingalls on a sole-source basis and scheduled to be launched by 2028. After that, the procurement process will be opened up to competitors.

Caudle says that the distributed shipbuilding approach could spread out the workload from major yards to smaller ones, which are more plentiful. That will help the Navy speed up construction of additional ships in this class, he proffered. This will also help to keep these yards working and decrease the political vulnerability of the program by spreading out the work across different Congressional districts.

“So let’s say that one of the yards down on the Gulf Coast starts building the frigate and they’re the main contract that the Navy goes with for that,” the CNO said. “Nothing prevents other Gulf Coast shipyards—which there are many, I want to say there’s probably 20 plus—from being in the business of building some part or whole of a module for that frigate. And when you bring in the ability of the yard to utilize some of its additional capacity to be part of the modularity design of that, then what you end up with the lead yard is more in an assembly process than having to build it all from scratch.”

Foreign shipbuilders are further along in the process, the CNO noted.

“A lot of the foreign partners that we work with and discuss how they do shipbuilding are really all-in on modularity, and we traditionally have not built ships that way until recently,” he added. “And so I think the actual methodology of the workflow within a shipyard is not completely tuned for a modular approach yet in all of our yards. Until you get there, then the fungibility of the yard to support each other won’t be there. So I’m not completely optimized.”

Foreign shipyards could potentially build modules for the frigate and other ships as well, Caudle postulated. That would be in line with President Donald Trump’s interest in buying ships made abroad to help to make up a yawning gap with China, which has been assessed to have a whopping 200-times larger shipbuilding capacity than the United States. 

As we have explained in past reporting, both South Korea and Japan are building vessels now that are related to the Arleigh Burke class, which currently serves as the backbone of the U.S. Navy. This puts both countries in a unique position to build U.S.-spec Burke destroyers, or at least substantial parts of them. They also have other models that are unlike those currently in the fleet, including smaller warships. Logistics ships and sea bases are also well within their capabilities.

“Certainly I do think there’s a role for foreign yards to play in our shipbuilding initiatives to add capacity,” Caudle explained. “I think the capacity that foreign builders could bring to bear is extremely important to think about.”

“That might look like some auxiliary ships that we could get approval to do in totality,” Caudle stated. “And it could be combat ships that can be done in part.”

While foreign shipyards could help the U.S. speed up construction, there are challenges to making that happen.

“When you work with a foreign partner, they either had to have exquisite access to our supply system, and that’s the IT system and the infrastructure to order parts and tap our supply system, or they’re going to use their own indigenous system,” the CNO noted. 

A foreign shipbuilder using their own systems, especially those from non-English-speaking countries, adds another layer of complexity, Caudle said.

“So all that needs to be worked out. But I do think that there is it needs to be explored, and I view it as a bridging strategy till we get our industrial base where it needs to be to do it organically.”

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

United States President Donald Trump announced a healthcare plan that would replace government subsidies for insurance with direct payments into health savings accounts for consumers, an idea that some experts have said would hurt lower-income Americans.

The Trump administration on Thursday called on Congress to pass legislation to codify Trump’s most-favoured-nation drug price deals and to make more medicines available for over-the-counter purchase.

“This will lower healthcare costs and increase consumer choice by strengthening price transparency, increasing competition, and reducing the need for costly and time-consuming doctor’s visits,” the White House said in a release outlining the order.

Trump’s framework, dubbed “The Great Healthcare Plan” and outlined in a White House fact sheet, includes an insurance cost-sharing reduction programme that could reduce the most common Obamacare plan premiums by more than 10 percent and replaces government subsidies for insurance with direct payments to Americans.

The White House did not provide details on how much money it planned to send to consumers to buy insurance, or whether the funds would be available to all “Obamacare” enrollees or only those with lower-tier bronze and catastrophic plans.

The idea mirrors one floated among Republican senators last year. Democrats largely rejected it, saying the accounts would not be enough to cover costs for most consumers. Currently, such accounts are used disproportionately by the wealthiest Americans, who have more income to fund them and a bigger incentive to lower their tax rate.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked at her briefing on Thursday whether the president could guarantee that, under his plan, people would be able to cover their healthcare costs.

“If this plan is put in place, every single American who has healthcare in the United States will see lower costs as a result,” she said without elaborating.

“These are common-sense actions that make up President Trump’s great healthcare plan, and they represent the most comprehensive and bold agenda to lower healthcare costs to have ever been considered by the federal government,” Leavitt also said.

The White House said that the plan would not affect people with pre-existing conditions.

The plan also targets pharmacy benefit managers and requires insurance companies to disclose the profits they take from premiums and the frequency of denials.

Companies would publish their rate and coverage comparisons on their websites in “plain English” as well as the percentage of revenues paid out to claims compared with overhead costs and profits. They would also be required to publish the percentage of claims they reject and the average wait times for routine care.

“Instead of just papering over the problems, we have gotten into this great healthcare plan, a framework that we believe will help Congress create legislation that will address the challenges that the American people have been craving,” US Centres for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz told reporters on a White House briefing call.

The White House also did not provide a timeline for implementation, and a deeply divided Congress is unlikely to pass major healthcare legislation quickly.

Providers and insurers who accept Medicare or Medicaid money would also have to post their pricing and fees.

Obamacare looms

The announcement comes as millions of Americans face higher healthcare costs this year, with open enrolment for most federally subsidised Obamacare plans closing on Thursday.

On average, premium costs will increase to $1,904 in 2026 from $888 in 2025, according to health policy firm KFF, a far greater jump than the savings promised in the Trump plan.

Congress remains divided on whether and how to reinstate generous COVID-era tax credits that expired at the end of last year.

Retroactive expanded federal subsidies are still possible, and there is a group of bipartisan lawmakers negotiating a potential extension, but Republicans remain divided on whether they should do so.

The Trump administration wants funding to go directly to consumers using health savings accounts, Oz said, rather than to insurers, a position also adopted by Congressional Republicans who oppose extending the Obamacare subsidies.

Trump has said he may veto any legislation to extend the subsidies, and the plan makes no mention of them.

“This does not specifically address those bipartisan congressional negotiations that are going on. It does say that we have a preference that money goes to people, as opposed to insurance companies,” the White House official said.

Trump has long been dogged by his lack of a comprehensive healthcare plan as he and Republicans have sought to unwind former President Barack Obama’s signature legislation, the Affordable Care Act. Trump was thwarted during his first term in trying to repeal and replace the law.

When he ran for president in 2024, Trump said he had only “concepts of a plan” to address healthcare. His new proposal, short on many specifics, appeared to be the concept of a plan.

On Wall Street, healthcare insurance provider stocks surged on the news of the looming plan. UnitedHealthcare is up 0.8 percent in midday trading. Humana is up higher at 3.5 percent than the market open, and Oscar Health is up 6.4 percent.

Pharmaceutical stocks, on the other hand, are trending lower. Eli Lilly is down by about 3.7 percent, AbbVie tumbling 1.9 percent below the market open, and Bristol Myers -Squibb is down by 0.9 percent. Johnson and Johnson, on the other hand, does remain in positive territory at about 0.3 percent higher than the market open.