On Monday, he has scheduled the first meeting of the new leadership group in baseball operations.
We’ll get to that restructuring, but none of the decisions so far resolve two of the most compelling questions in Anaheim: Who is going to be running the Angels next year? And, with this year’s Angels flirting with the first 100-loss season in franchise history, are the Angels going to be much better next year?
To the latter question: Probably not.
“With the starting pitching we have, if we have the ability to be more consistent with our offense, you can definitely squint and see a better club out there,” Mozeliak told me. “But it’s going to take a few pieces to do that.”
Uh oh. That sounds discouragingly like the Angels of the past decade: We’re undermanned, but we want to be competitive, so we’ll sign a few lower-tier free agents and hope we can sneak into the playoffs with an 83-win season. In the real world, the Angels clinched their 11th consecutive losing season before the calendar turned to September.
Mozeliak has said he did not believe that the Angels need to rebuild, that the resources available to a team in the second-largest market in the majors should preclude outright tanking. In theory, that should mean that Mozeliak could trade José Soriano for shortstop Arjun Nimmala, 20, now the Angels’ top prospect, comfortable that owner Arte Moreno could buy a quality free agent to replace Soriano in the starting rotation.
In reality, Mozeliak cannot rightly tell Moreno that the Angels are one or two free agents from winning. And, as Mozeliak said, “It’s not the most robust free-agent class of all time.”
The Angels rank 26th among the 30 major league teams in runs scored, so Mozeliak might well focus on offensive upgrades. Standout names among free agent hitters this fall: Luis Arraez, Gleyber Torres, Jake Bauers … Taylor Ward, anyone?
With the infusion of talent from the draft and the trade deadline, analyst ratings for the Angels’ minor league system have risen from among the worst in baseball to middle of the pack. It’s a start. If next season is about building, why not just play the kids?
The Angels’ Denzer Guzman hits an RBI single against the Athletics at Angel Stadium on June 27.
(John McCoy / Getty Images)
Rookie Denzer Guzman is batting .218, with a .263 on-base percentage and a .341 slugging percentage.
“We’re starting a 22-year-old at third base,” Mozeliak said. “Most 22-year-olds are finishing their senior year in college. He’s competing. There’s a lot of upside in him, but that requires a little patience.”
Of the 12 prospects Mozeliak acquired at the trade deadline, he said he anticipated two — designated hitter/catcher Moises Ballesteros and infielder Nacho Alvarez Jr. — would have a chance to make next year’s team. The Angels also would prefer not to replace Soriano from a blossoming corps of young arms.
“We don’t want to start reaching down to the minors to try to push someone that might not be ready,” Mozeliak said. “I think we’ve seen that here before.”
As Mozeliak restructures the roster, he is doing the same in the front office. He said he is elevating Matt Swanson — removed as scouting director by former general manager Perry Minasian — to oversee all of the Angels’ scouting operations: amateur, professional and international.
The rest of the leadership core, all from within the organization: Joey Prebynski to oversee player development, including a separate minor league director to be hired; Michael Lord to head research and development; and assistant general manager David Haynes, who will focus on major league personnel. Mozeliak said he will ask those leaders to evaluate their departments and make personnel recommendations.
“I think that exercise is going to happen over the next four weeks,” Mozeliak said.
That timeline could mean that the Angels do not hire a general manager by the end of the season, as the team originally outlined. Mozeliak said he has neither interviewed any candidates nor set up any interviews.
Within the industry, former major league pitcher and current St. Louis Cardinals assistant general manager Randy Flores is considered the favorite, with Mozeliak remaining either as a president of baseball operations or a senior adviser.
Mozeliak insists he has not decided what he wants to do beyond the season, and he said his long working relationship with Flores in St. Louis will not preclude a round of interviews.
“I certainly understand that Molly [Jolly, the Angels’ team president] and Arte would want a very exhausting search,” Mozeliak said, “and one that isn’t just two degrees connected to Mo.”
If the Angels get to the end of the season without a general manager, who would make the call on whether to retain manager Kurt Suzuki and the coaches?
“Based on the timeline today, it would feel like it would be our group now,” Mozeliak said, “but time will tell.”
If the Angels dismiss Suzuki, that would allow a new general manager to hire a new manager. If Mozeliak decides to retain Suzuki, that could set up the awkward prospect of a new general manager inheriting a manager he did not choose, as Minasian did with Joe Maddon. In Minasian’s six seasons as general manager, the Angels had five managers.
The Angels could use a little more time. In 2027, they just might get it, and perhaps no organization could benefit more from it.
If owners lock out major league players for all or part of the season, in a year Mozeliak suggests might be best remembered for the development of minor league players, that might be no great loss for the Angels. Better than 100 losses, certainly.
Leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), including Chinese President Xi Jinping, his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are set to gather in Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek for an annual summit.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is also attending the summit, which marks 25 years of its existence.
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The two-day summit, starting on Monday, comes at a time when the world is grappling with the aftermath of the US-Israel war on Iran, which has upended global energy and financial markets, and the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.
So, what will be the main agenda of the summit, and will the SCO leaders try to use the gathering to push for a multipolar world and Global South cooperation on trade and security issues, as United States President Donald Trump’s unilateral foreign policy has eroded the global rules-based order?
Here’s what we know:
Who is attending the SCO summit and where is it being held?
This year’s summit is taking place in Bishkek under the motto: Together for Sustainable Peace, Development and Prosperity.
Xi, Putin and Modi will be joined by the Iranian president and leaders of Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, among others.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn are also expected to attend the summit.
William Yang, senior analyst for Northeast Asia at the International Crisis Group, noted that the ongoing wars are putting more strain on the rules-based international order, and against this backdrop, the summit serves as an important occasion for several of the world’s rising great powers, including China and India, to elevate their global influence and deepen their engagement and cooperation with other countries in the Global South.
“For years, SCO has been viewed as one of the avenues for China to promote the multipolar world order and form its own bloc with other developing countries. Despite its narrow scope of cooperation at the beginning, SCO member states have sought to expand the scope of their mandate and the number of member states,” Yang told Al Jazeera.
Amid the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Europe, Yang said, “China could use this year’s summit to present itself as a great power that advocates for a peaceful resolution of the conflicts, thereby sharpening the contrast with the US.”
“However, these efforts are likely to be limited to rhetoric rather than any substantive proposal for conflict resolution,” he said.
Alicia Garcia-Herrero, chief economist for Asia Pacific at French investment bank Natixis, said the summit is particularly significant because it marks the grouping’s 25th anniversary and offers the first chance to turn last year’s Tianjin strategy, which called for a multipolar world order that fosters mutually beneficial international cooperation, into action. Last year’s summit took place in China’s Tianjin region.
“Putting Modi, Putin and Xi in the same room, with India-China border talks still live and a scheduled Modi-Putin bilateral, is a visible test of how far the recent thaw goes and how Eurasia wants to organise security, connectivity and trade without defaulting to Western institutions,” she told Al Jazeera, referring to the recent India-China talks amid the warming up of New Delhi-Beijing ties.
What is the SCO?
The SCO started in 1996 as a security bloc, dubbed the “Shanghai Five”. It was formed by China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to settle their border disputes following the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
But in June 2001, the grouping evolved into the SCO, and expanded to include Uzbekistan, with headquarters in Beijing. In 2017, the bloc expanded to include India and Pakistan. Iran and Belarus were also added as full members in 2023 and 2024, respectively.
In addition, the organisation has 14 key dialogue partners, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Turkiye, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Cambodia.
SCO member states account for 43 percent of the world’s population and 23 percent – or almost a quarter – of the global economy.
Analysts have pointed out that while the SCO emerged with a focus on regional security, the expansion of its mandate to include trade and other Global South concerns means it is difficult to understand what sets the grouping apart from other Global South organisations like the BRICS, which is an acronym derived from the initials of the founding member countries, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Alejandro Reyes, adjunct professor in the department of politics and public administration at the University of Hong Kong, said the SCO has grown into a “counterbalance” to the US-led Asia Pacific alliance aimed at countering China’s rise. India is part of both groupings. “Interestingly, India is part of the SCO, and the US appears to have dropped the Indo-Pacific nomenclature,” he said.
Reyes emphasised that “the SCO is not a coherent anti-US, anti-Western alliance”. “It is better understood as a forum in which countries with very different interests can demonstrate that they have alternatives and strategic room for manoeuvre – agency in this more volatile geopolitical order, dominated by China and the US. It is less an anti-American alliance than a venue for countries hedging against and hinging away from American power,” he told Al Jazeera.
“The significance this year is that current US policies, especially with regard to Iran and continuing US tariff and sanctions action, may be making that hedging more attractive and necessary,” he added.
What is on this year’s agenda?
The US-Israel war on Iran, the Russia-Ukraine war and the economic and social situation in Afghanistan are key issues leaders are expected to discuss this year, according to the SCO Secretariat.
Relations between India and China – Asia’s two major economies – are also expected to be discussed. Last year, Beijing and New Delhi began a rapprochement after five years of tensions over a 2020 deadly border skirmish. Trump’s tariff war on Indian goods last year forced New Delhi to mend ties with Beijing. For the first time since 2018, Modi visited China last year for the SCO summit.
Border tensions between India and Pakistan also persist, and the issue is expected to be discussed at this summit.
Manoj Kewalramani, chairperson of Bengaluru-based think tank Takshashila Institution’s Geostrategy Programme, told Al Jazeera that apart from the traditional security agenda, this year’s summit might include any forward movement on issues of economic integration or financial cooperation architecture.
“In Tianjin, we had the agreement on establishing the SCO Development Bank,” Kewalramani said.
“The Kyrgyz leadership has said that its priority will be to move the needle on the bank, the SCO Development Fund and SCO Investment Fund,” he said, adding that while talks have reportedly been taking place in this direction, there is no clarity on whether any agreements will be announced at this year’s summit.
According to the SCO Secretariat, economic connectivity will be a key topic the group will discuss as the US and Israel’s war on Iran continues to paralyse key maritime routes like the Strait of Hormuz, which has upended global supply chains, the energy market and financial markets.
The group is expected to discuss new trade and transport corridors, such as the 7,200km (4,474-mile) International North-South Transport Corridor, which links the Russian port city of St Petersburg with India’s financial capital, Mumbai, through Iran and ports on the Gulf.
Herrero pointed out that with Modi and Putin scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting, discussions on the Northern Sea Route, which runs through the Arctic coast, are also expected. China last month announced a new shipping route through the Arctic Ocean, aimed at easing global trade amid the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and attacks in the Bab al-Mandeb in the Red Sea, which will pass through the Northern Sea Route.
According to Indian media reports, Moscow and New Delhi could negotiate the use of the Northern Sea Route by India as the crisis in West Asia continues to affect trade routes.
The SCO will also seek to establish a network of Silk Road stations to support international freight traffic across Eurasia.
Can the SCO agree on all issues?
The Eurasian grouping has often been unable to agree on global geopolitical issues.
For instance, Russia has been able to get most SCO members to align with its interests when it comes to its war in Ukraine, but India has attempted to play a more balanced role – seeking peace and stronger ties with Ukraine, while also buying record levels of oil from Russia.
But this year, Ukraine is expected to feature in discussions, with Turkiye’s Erdogan and Russia’s Putin holding bilateral talks on the matter, according to a Kremlin aide. Europe’s deadliest war since World War II is in its fifth year.
Yury Ushakov, Putin’s foreign policy adviser, said the meeting would take place on the sidelines of the SCO summit.
“There are many issues to discuss. Of course, these include the situation in the Black Sea and the Ukraine issue in general,” he told reporters, referring to the rise in attacks in the Black Sea.
In this photo provided by Kyrgyzstan’s Prime Minister Press Office, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi stands on the an aircraft boarding stairs upon his arrival at an international airport outside Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on Sunday, August 30, 2026 [Handout/Ergesh Zhusubaiv/Kyrgyzstan’s Presidential Press Office via AP]
The SCO has, however, taken a more collective position on the US-Israel war on Iran and Israel’s genocidal actions in Palestine.
In March, the SCO condemned the US-Israel war on Iran. “The SCO member states considered the use of force as unacceptable and advocate for the resolution of existing differences exclusively by peaceful means, based on dialogue, mutual respect, and taking into account the legitimate interests of all parties, in accordance with the norms of international law and the principles of the UN Charter,” it said in a statement.
India, which has strong ties with Israel, had refused to endorse an SCO joint statement condemning Israel for its attack on Iran in June 2025.
Iranian President Pezeshkian is also scheduled to meet Putin on the sidelines of the summit, according to Iran’s official IRNA news agency. Russia is a close ally of Iran and the two countries cooperate on defence issues. China has emerged as Iran’s biggest economic lifeline as it buys more than 80 percent of its crude oil. Moscow and Beijing have also lent diplomatic cover to Tehran at the UN.
Frictions also exist on how the group views border tensions between India and Pakistan. New Delhi has repeatedly called on the organisation to condemn “cross-border terrorism”, for which it blames Islamabad, a close economic and defence ally of China.
Last July, India demanded that the grouping condemn the April 2025 attack by armed men in Indian-administered Kashmir, in which 26 people were killed. Pakistan has also blamed India for armed attacks inside its territory.
During the Tianjin summit, the bloc condemned “terror” attacks in both India and Pakistan, taking a more balanced position on the issue.
What are Russia, China and India going to gain at the summit?
Reyes from the University of Hong Kong pointed out that all eyes will also be on Russia, China and India.
“For China, the SCO is partly about institution-building. Beijing wants to demonstrate that it can convene a large part of Eurasia around an agenda of security, connectivity, trade and development, while promoting a more multipolar, agentic international order. It also reinforces China’s increasingly important economic position in Central Asia, a strategically key region of the Eurasia landmass,” he said.
“For Russia, the summit is an opportunity to show that it is not isolated internationally. Maintaining strong relationships with China, India, Iran and Central Asia is economically and diplomatically important, given the Ukraine war and Western and other sanctions. But Moscow also has an interest in preserving its own influence in Eurasia rather than simply becoming more and more dependent on China.
“India is in an intriguing position. Modi’s participation is not an indication that India is joining the China-Russia axis, such as it is. India itself describes its SCO priorities as ‘security, connectivity and opportunity’. That is much more consistent with India’s longstanding pursuit of strategic autonomy – its agency amid the great-power rivalry,” Reyes explained.
He added that New Delhi wants “access and influence in Central Asia, continued relations with Russia [from which it buys the bulk of its defence equipment], and a mechanism for managing its difficult but gradually stabilising relationship with China”.
“At the same time, New Delhi maintains important relations with Washington, including through the Quad security arrangement.
“So China and Russia may see the SCO partly as an instrument for building a less US-dominated international order. India, meanwhile, sees it more as one of several overlapping platforms through which it can maximise its own agency.”
What does all this mean to the US?
As part of his unilateral foreign policy vision, Trump has undermined the Western-led international order and lashed out at Global South blocs, such as BRICS, which he sees as a threat to the US’s economic dominance. He has called the grouping “anti-American”.
However, Kewalramani noted that the Trump administration has continued some of its predecessors’ approaches and deepened engagement with countries in the region where this year’s SCO is being hosted, especially with the C5 or Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
“Joe Biden had established a leader-level meeting mechanism with C5 countries in 2023. Trump also hosted them in DC in November 2025. [US Secretary of State] Marco Rubio and subsequently Trump are expected to visit the region later [this] year. Kazakhstan has announced accession to the Abraham Accords, becoming the first Central Asian state to join [the Trump-led diplomatic efforts to cajole Muslim countries to recognise Israel]. The US has been engaged with the region on critical minerals and other business deals,” he said.
“In other words, C5 members are also adopting a diversified diplomatic approach, seeking to balance China and Russia’s dominance,” he noted.
“But the fact that you are witnessing these countries meeting with far more purpose to think about alternative financial and energy architectures is a reflection of the limitations of the US’s disruptive foreign policy,” Kewalramani added.
Herrero said for the US, the SCO summit is a reminder that countries like India will keep practising strategic autonomy: it will sit in the Quad and buy US defence equipment while also talking to Moscow and Beijing in a China-heavy forum.
The Quad or Quadrilateral Security Dialogue was established by India, Japan, Australia and the US in 2007 to counter China’s growing influence in the Asia Pacific region. Over the past quarter-century, India has grown closer to the US and its allies, amid shared concerns over Beijing’s rise.
Reyes warned that Washington should be careful not to read the SCO as a consolidated anti-US coalition, even though China, Russia and Iran are members.
“The differences among China, Russia and India are far too substantial to substantiate that label. The more important message is that American economic and geopolitical pressure can sometimes produce convergence among countries that otherwise might disagree with one another more,” he said.
“The SCO’s criticism of unilateral economic measures is significant in that respect. China and Russia explicitly want a less US-dominated international order. India does not necessarily share that objective, but it does want a world in which Washington cannot dictate its foreign-policy choices.”
In June of last year, 66-year-old Walter and one of his holding companies, TWG Global, purchased a controlling interest in the Lakers for $10 billion, only to sell the franchise to Joshua Kushner and Bob Iger for $12.5 billion this month.
Since then, questions have swirled about whether Walter will put other assets on the market in his fundraising bid, including the Dodgers, which he purchased as chief executive of Chicago investment firm Guggenheim Partners for $2.15 billion in 2012. Sources close to Walter say he’s not likely to sell.
To better understand this tangled story, we spoke with Times sports reporter Steve Henson about why he thinks Walter won’t put the Dodgers up for sale.
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These dealings are “between entities with business or personal ties, including loans, sales and other transactions that can have legitimate reasons but pose potential conflicts of interest and typically require extra scrutiny,” Darmiento wrote.
More than $1 billion in financing to buy the Dodgers in 2012 came from insurance companies managed by Guggenheim Partners. The purchase was later vetted by state insurance regulators.
More on the related-party transactions
Investigators are checking whether billions of dollars’ worth of similar loans made by Walter’s companies were properly disclosed and that insurance companies were not over-leveraged.
Approximately $21 billion in loans not disclosed to state insurance regulators were made by two Delaware insurers Walter owns, according to ratings agency Fitch. The loans reportedly were made to companies with ties to Walter or his TWG Global holdings company.
The issue with these loans is they raise suspicions, according to Bruce Dubinsky, a forensic accountant who spoke with Darmiento. Dubinsky worked on the Enron and Madoff cases.
Dubinsky said that from an audit standpoint, these types of transactions “are always more suspect to fraud” and manipulation since repayments can be delayed indefinitely.
The insurance industry’s tight regulations for money collected from premiums exists so that money is available for future claims. Regulators believe related-party transaction are a threat to that guarantee.
Henson reported that Walter owns a broad series of sports interests: English soccer Premier League team Chelsea, the Los Angeles Sparks WNBA team, the Cadillac Formula 1 racing team; a premier women’s tennis competition, the Billie Jean King Cup, and the entire Professional Women’s Hockey League.
He already sold the Lakers and Henson noted that there have been reports he’s putting his shares of Chelsea on the market.
So, why keep the Dodgers?
“No MLB team has ever been run as boldly as this team,” Henson said. “And the revenue from the Dodgers is relentless, from ticket sales, to international merchandise and including friendly [player] salary deferments that help keep money in-house.”
Since Walter and Co.’s takeover, the Dodgers have won three of the last six World Series and 12 division titles after he and partners rescued the franchise from bankruptcy.
Walter noted that a sale of the Lakers, a franchise he’d barely owned for more than a year, was easier than one he’s already helmed for nearly 15 years.
“His identity is totally wrapped up with the Dodgers and this success saga,” Henson said. “It’s dear to his heart and having them to sell them would just tear him up.”
Amid all of this speculation, the boys in blue are attempting to become the first National League team (and third overall) to win three consecutive World Series titles this year.
The week’s biggest stories
(Carolyn Cole/Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times)
Trump administration policies and pushback
Artist and concert news
A final tribute
Television, advertising entertainment news
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Editor’s pick
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Things to do
(Melody Xu/Los Angeles Times)
Today’s recipe
The San Juan Islands off Washington state has a much-loved clam chowder served at La Conner Brewing Co. in the tiny picturesque town of La Conner, Wash. The dish is spicy enough and not so thick with cream or flour and is a standout in the clam chowder world, according to Times reader Mary Ann Mollenkamp.
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US President Donald Trump has claimed the US and Venezuela have reached the ‘biggest oil deal in world history’, which will give the US control over 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan oil. Critics say it’s predatory. Soraya Lennie explains what we know.
Voters in Guinea-Bissau will decide on August 30 whether to approve a new constitution that would significantly strengthen the presidency and reshape the country’s electoral system.
The vote comes nine months after the military seized power and installed General Horta Inta-A Na Man as transitional president, and just more than three months before presidential and legislative elections scheduled for December 6.
Supporters of the reform say it would provide clearer lines of authority and help address years of political instability and disputes between state institutions. Critics argue that it would concentrate too much power in the presidency and have questioned the process through which the draft was produced.
The African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC), one of Guinea-Bissau’s main opposition parties, has rejected the referendum and called for a boycott.
The referendum will determine whether the constitution approved by the National Transitional Council (CNT) enters into force and provides the framework for the country’s return to elected government.
Why is Guinea-Bissau changing its constitution?
The process began after the November 26, 2025, military coup.
Presidential and legislative elections had been held three days earlier. The military seized power while the electoral process was still under way, one day before the electoral commission was due to announce the presidential results.
Horta, then army chief of staff, became transitional president.
The transition charter established a National Transitional Council (CNT), which was given legislative powers during the transition. The council approved the proposed constitutional text on January 13, 2026.
Guinea-Bissau is a small Portuguese-speaking country on the West African coast, bordered by Senegal to the north and Guinea to the east and south. It gained independence from Portugal in 1974 and has experienced repeated coups and political crises since independence.
Under the existing constitution, Guinea-Bissau operates a semi-presidential system in which executive authority is shared between the president and prime minister.
The proposed constitution would substantially alter Guinea-Bissau’s existing semi-presidential system, giving the president significantly greater executive authority and reducing the prime minister’s role in government.
What would change?
Under the proposed constitution, the president would have greater control over the government, including the appointment and dismissal of the prime minister and members of the government.
The president would also chair the Council of Ministers and have the power to create or abolish ministries.
The proposed constitution would reduce parliament from 102 seats to 65 and cut the number of electoral constituencies from 29 to 12.
It would also introduce new requirements for presidential candidates.
The referendum will determine the constitutional framework under which Guinea-Bissau’s next elected president and parliament will govern [Patrick Meinhardt/AFP]
Candidates would have to have lived permanently in Guinea-Bissau for the five years preceding an election. They would also have to pay a 50 million West African CFA franc deposit, or approximately $90,000.
Political parties sponsoring presidential candidates would need at least 5,000 members, including at least 300 in each region.
The proposed constitution would also establish a Constitutional Court.
Why is a stronger presidency controversial?
Guinea-Bissau’s political system has repeatedly been marked by disputes between presidents, prime ministers and parliament.
Supporters of the reform argue that giving the president clearer authority over the government could reduce institutional conflicts and make decision-making more effective.
Critics fear that concentrating executive authority in the presidency would weaken parliament and other checks on government, significantly altering the balance between the executive and legislature.
Critics have also raised concerns about the proposed reduction in the number of electoral constituencies, arguing that it could affect political representation and weaken parties that rely on strong local support.
The new financial and membership requirements have likewise drawn criticism from those who argue that they could make it harder for smaller political movements to contest presidential elections.
There is a separate dispute over how the constitution was produced.
The draft was prepared during a military-led transition rather than by a restored elected parliament. Opposition parties and civil society groups have criticised the process and questioned whether the drafting process was sufficiently inclusive.
Is the referendum about Horta Inta-A Na Man?
Horta has led the transition since the coup, but the referendum is not simply a vote on his political future.
The transition framework bars the transitional president and prime minister from running in the elections at the end of the transition.
The immediate issue is therefore what powers the next elected president will have.
If the constitution passes, the president elected in December would have considerably greater authority over the government than under the existing constitutional system.
Why does the timing matter?
The referendum comes before the presidential and legislative elections scheduled for December 6.
Voters will therefore decide the proposed constitutional framework before choosing the leaders who are expected to govern under it.
That means the next president and parliament could take office under rules drawn up during the military-led transition.
For the transitional authorities, the referendum is part of the process leading to a return to elected government.
For opponents, the timing raises the question of whether a military-led authority should determine fundamental political rules before elected institutions are restored.
What would a yes or no vote mean?
A yes vote would bring the proposed constitution into force, including stronger presidential powers, a smaller parliament, fewer electoral constituencies and new requirements for presidential candidates.
A no vote would reject the proposed constitution, leaving the question of constitutional reform unresolved.
At stake is not simply whether Guinea-Bissau adopts a new constitution, but how much power the presidency should hold when the country returns to elected government.
The words “Anaheim Angels” are now enshrined in California law.
Whether the baseball team that calls Angel Stadium home reverts to its hometown name remains to be seen. On Thursday, however, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law the “Home Run for Anaheim Act,” a step that elected officials in Orange County consider a significant step in that direction.
The new law, introduced by Assemblyman Avelino Valencia (D-Anaheim), cleared the state legislature without a single vote against it.
The law does not mandate the Angels — playing under a Los Angeles name in Anaheim’s city-owned stadium — revert to the Anaheim Angels name.
For now, in fact, the law does absolutely nothing. On Friday, the Los Angeles Angels play at Angel Stadium.
Instead, the law provides the city with an incentive to dangle before the team. If the Angels — whether under current owner Arte Moreno or a future owner — wish to develop the 150-acre Angel Stadium property, state law would prioritize affordable housing within the site.
In an era where team owners covet the profits from development around stadiums and arenas — including places for fans to eat, drink and shop 365 days a year, not just on game days — the city of Anaheim could seek an exemption from the affordable housing law. That wouldn’t rule out housing on the site, but it would give a team more flexibility to build whatever project might be considered most profitable.
If the city obtains the exemption, the new law says, “then any materials, including, but not limited to, a lease, deed of sale, and promotional or marketing materials, shall refer to that team as the Anaheim Angels.”
Moreno has twice reached deals with the city to develop the land, only to see the city walk away both times. In the last deal, he rejected the city’s request to rename the team the Anaheim Angels.
“We are proud to call Angel Stadium of Anaheim our home,” Angels spokeswoman Marie Garvey said, “and any other comment about the future would be premature.”
Moreno, 80, has shown no public interest in a third negotiation with the city. The Angels’ current stadium lease extends through 2032, and the team has options to extend the lease through 2038.
By year’s end, the city has said it anticipates the release of a long-awaited property assessment, which is expected to show Angel Stadium needs hundreds of millions of dollars in upgrades to remain viable for the long-term. The city and team may not agree on who should pay for them, and real estate development around the stadium could be part of the solution for funding a new or renovated stadium.
The city could use the exemption as leverage in discussions with Moreno or a new owner, although leverage could work both ways.
When Anaheim sued the Angels over the 2005 name change, city-commissioned experts testified in court that the Anaheim name was worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the city over the life of the lease. That could compel an owner to ask the city to contribute to the cost of building a new stadium in exchange for the return of the Anaheim name.
An almost vacant large urban site — an aging stadium surrounded by 130 acres of parking lots, sitting between three freeways and a train station — is rare in Southern California and surely would attract development interest among potential bidders for the Angels.
But any new owner would have one more bit of leverage: Once the Angel Stadium lease expires, the owner would be free to move out of Anaheim.
Weekly insights and analysis on the latest developments in military technology, strategy, and foreign policy.
U.S. Army soldiers used a Bradley Fighting Vehicle as a carrier for FireAnt uncrewed ground vehicles (UGV) during a recent test exercise. The small 4×4 UGVs can be configured as one-way attack munitions, as well as for electronic warfare, surveillance and reconnaissance, and other missions. Bradleys acting as transports and controllers for swarms of UGVs like the FireAnt could open up important new operational possibilities.
A U.S. Army 1st Cavalry Division M2A4 Bradley IFV was spotted carrying five Swarmbotics AI FireAnt anti-armor UGVs on its side storage racks. Weighing around 27 kg, FireAnt is a low-cost attritable robotic system designed for AI-enabled swarm operations, including ISR,… https://t.co/dbikmUtOeypic.twitter.com/WYIRlLJd9A
“The US Army has picked Swarmbotics AI (SBAI) to build swarming, attritable, small unmanned ground vehicles (sUGVs) to advance Transformation in Contact (TiC) with the 1st Cavalry Division,” the company announced in a press release back in February. “The award results from successful participation at last year’s xTech Overwatch competition.”
“During xTech Overwatch evaluations, soldiers from the 1st Cavalry Division assessed several contractor’s autonomous capabilities that spanned from ground, airborne, payload, and mission planning,” Swarmbotics AI’s release added. “This competitive assessment, facilitated by T2COM [the Army’s Transformation and Training Command] and key stakeholders, aimed to accelerate the adoption of autonomous systems in line with the Chief of Staff of the Army’s directive.”
From what is seen in the video from Swarmbotics AI, it is not immediately clear whether or not the FireAnts can be released remotely from within the Bradley, or if personnel have to unload them manually. Where the UGVs are seen stowed on the side is space that is often taken up by explosive reactive armor (ERA) blocks. A Bradley could carry additional FireAnts internally and deploy them via the rear ramp.
A stock picture of a current-generation US Army M2A4 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle with explosive reactive armor (ERA) blocks fitted on the side, as well as on the front of the hull. US Army
How the roughly 70-pound FireAnts were controlled and otherwise employed during Pegasus Charge 3 is also unclear. Swarmbotics AI has said in the past that human operators are responsible for directing groups of the UGVs. In its press release in February, the company said a squad-sized Army unit had operated 10 FireAnts during the xTech Overwatch competition.
Swarmbotics AI has also said that FireAnt has a significant degree of artificial intelligence (AI) driven autonomy to carry out assigned tasks. When networked together in a swarm, the UGVs are capable of “coordinated behavior across mixed teams and missions,” the company said previously, according to a story from Interesting Engineering.
TWZ has reached out for more information.
As already mentioned, FireAnt is designed to be readily reconfigurable for different missions using modular payloads. The anti-armor configuration, which arms the UGV with an explosively formed penetrator (EFP) warhead, has received the most attention to date. In this role, FireAnt has to get close to its target to be effective. Swarming capability would be very beneficial here for overwhelming defenders, as well as just launching attacks on large groups of tanks and other armored vehicles across a broader area.
FireAnt UGVs armed with explosively formed penetrator (EFP) warheads. Swarmbotics AI Screen captures from a previous Swarmbotics AI video showing a FireAnt launching a kamikaze attack on a test target. Swarmbotics AI captures
With sensor and electronic warfare payloads, FireAnts could also help scout ahead, provide added general situational awareness, and even launch non-kinetic attacks. Swarmbotics AI has also raised the possibility of a counter-drone role for its UGVs. FireAnts could also conceivably act as signal relay nodes, which would also be especially useful when employing the UGVs in semi-autonomous swarms and/or for pushing them further forward of the main body of a friendly force.
“Mass is our objective, by employing swarms of heterogeneous small sUGVs [small UGVs] we create multiple dilemmas for our adversaries at fractions of the cost of exquisite platforms,” Stephen Houghton, Swarmbotics AI’s CEO, said in a statement accompanying the company’s February release.
It is worth noting here that the Army has previously demonstrated the ability of the Bradley to serve as a forward control node for UGVs. Bradleys could also bring groups of FireAnts or similarly-sized designs to the front lines and hand off control to other nodes.
Previous Army-sponsored testing has also involved FireAnts deployed from larger UGVs, as seen in the video below. This demonstrates an additional layer of crewed-uncrewed teaming capability that could push the entire chain further forward on the battlefield. This, in turn, would help keep human personnel even further removed from potential threats.
U.S. Army Tests New Robotic ‘Tank Killer’ Swarm Vehicles
UGVs have already become a notable fixture in the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. This includes types in the same general size category as FireAnt configured for kamikaze attacks, as well as large ones armed with various anti-tank guided missiles, automatic grenade launchers, and machine guns. Various UGVs and other uncrewed capabilities were the centerpieces of the annual Independence Day parade in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv just on Monday, as seen in the video below.
On the battlefields of Ukraine, UGVs are generally being employed via links with an operator, either in first-person direct or a third-person semi-autonomous mode, with the help of cameras on the vehicle. In that conflict, uncrewed ground systems face the same electronic warfare threats as their aerial counterparts, and designs with hard-wired fiber-optic control links have been developed in response. TWZ has also previously highlighted the impacts, in general, that the continued development and proliferation of AI-enabled automated target recognition capabilities and new autonomous technologies are already having on aerial one-way-attack drones. This applies, in broad terms, to uncrewed platforms on the ground, as well.
“The key takeaway is that robot swarms are here to stay,” Drew Watson, Swarmbotics AI’s CTO, said in a statement in the February press release. “Working with 1st Cav in 2026 we’ll baseline concepts for hundreds of robots deployed on the X and at the breach.”
It is still to be seen how FireAnt, specifically, may slot into the Army’s future force structure, overall. That being said, the image of the Bradley at Pegasus Charge 3 carrying a load of the UGVs does look to be a sign of things to come.
Special thanks to user @lfx160219 on X for bringing Swarmbotics AI‘s video from Pegasus Charge 3to our attention.
Welcome back to the Times of Troy newsletter, where we’re dedicating the next two editions of Times of Troy to determining a range of outcomes for this make-or-break season of USC football. We’ll save the rose-colored takes for next week, when the Trojans will be on the doorstep of their season opener against San José State. But for today, as we did at this time last year, let’s consider the other, darker side of that same coin — and talk about how it could all go wrong.
Because, rest assured, there will be plenty of landmines to navigate through a gauntlet schedule that includes all three of the top three teams in opponent adjusted efficiency (FEI) from last season (Indiana, Oregon, Ohio State), plus the 14th-ranked team in the same category (Washington). Then there’s a trip to one of the hardest places to play in America (Penn State) to boot.
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USC will need to win at least three of those five games to make the Playoff. Which is borderline cruel to ask.
For the purposes of this exercise, let’s assume that USC opens its season 3-0, with wins over San José State, Fresno State and Louisiana. Anything less, it’s fair to say, would be an unmitigated disaster.
How those three weeks go, though, will be important for the progress of USC’s young players, who need to find their bearings fast in order for USC to fulfill its potential.
It would be an especially unfortunate twist of fate for that process to be interrupted or for the team’s depth to take a hit through that easy, early stretch. But barring injury, those first three weeks should give USC time to get some of its young stars — such as receivers Kayden Dixon-Wyatt and Boobie Feaster, tight end Mark Bowman, cornerback Rock Hill and defensive end Luke Wafle, especially — up to speed.
The slate really begins Sept. 19, when USC opens conference play with its furthest possible trip east, at Rutgers. With Oregon awaiting the next week and the added dynamic of cross-country travel, you could certainly convince me the Trojans could be caught flat-footed in this game, leaving things a bit too close for comfort. But if USC somehow loses to Rutgers in its Big Ten opener, coach Lincoln Riley might not make it much past Halloween.
So let’s say the Trojans are 4-0 when Oregon comes to the Coliseum in late September. Really, it’s this game that will tell us where USC is actually headed this season.
Because the stage will have never been bigger for quarterback Jayden Maiava, who had his worst game of 2025 in Eugene last fall. That performance, according to Pro Football Focus, featured double the turnover-worthy throws (six) of any other game Maiava has started at USC. Any worst-case for USC probably includes some form of unraveling from the quarterback.
But even with Maiava at his best, Oregon is still the deeper and more well-rounded team. The front seven should be as formidable as it’s ever been under coach Dan Lanning. The quarterback might be the NFL’s No. 1 overall pick next spring, and his weapons on offense are as good as any in college football. That firepower proves too much for USC, which gets beat at home for the first time since November 2024.
Losing to Oregon would be a bitter pill for a young team to swallow. And it would also be a particularly bad time to start spiraling. Because the next three weeks are all losable games. Washington has a mobile quarterback (Demond Williams) capable of wreaking havoc on USC’s defense if its front seven can’t keep him contained. And while we don’t know what to expect from new coach Matt Campbell and Penn State, the White Out at Beaver Stadium a week later will be no joke. Even Wisconsin shouldn’t be overlooked two weeks after that. Especially at Camp Randall.
There’s a world in which USC has lost three of four, we’ll spot them a win at Wisconsin, after starting the season 3-0. That slump could be an absolute back-breaker. Because guess who looms after that?
Oh, just Ohio State and Indiana.
Pretty bleak, right?
Suddenly, in this most demoralizing scenario, USC is out of the Playoff picture at the halfway point of the season. The positive vibes around Gary Patterson’s hire are gone, and a significant segment of the fanbase will have resigned themselves to never seeing a good USC defense again in their lifetimes.
The conversation around Riley’s future will have reached a fevered pitch. The seat will have gotten scorching hot. The Trojans would now be playing for their coach’s job. The pressure, on a particularly young team, would be immense.
And then, Ohio State comes to town. The Buckeyes have lost three times on the road in the last two seasons, compared to just once at home. But those three road losses were either in the postseason to a top-two team, at Oregon or the inexplicable 2024 loss to a far inferior Michigan team in The Game. Chalk this up to a loss, as Ohio State tramples over both of USC’s fronts.
Indiana, meanwhile, has yet to lose a home game in two years under Curt Cignetti. I don’t expect that to change this year, either.
So with losses to Ohio State and Indiana — and a presumably smooth win at Maryland — USC would be 6-5 heading into the crosstown rivalry. And I think we can all agree that no scenario would be more of a worse case for USC than UCLA emerging from its first season under Bob Chesney as the better-trending program between the two.
I don’t think that’s where this season is headed. This is an absolute worst-case scenario, after all. The schedule does give USC serious spiral potential. And stranger things have happened in the crosstown rivalry.
But if USC were to end this season at 6-6, with a baffling loss to the Bruins, I think I can say pretty confidently that the whole program will be headed in a new direction after that.
Will Ryon Sayeri remain USC’s kicker this season?
(Kenneth Richmond / Getty Images)
—Is USC’s starting offensive line already set? It’s starting to feel that way. The season-ending injury to center Kilian O’Connor limited USC’s options, with Tobias Raymond now almost assuredly set to step in there. But from what we’ve seen in open periods, there hasn’t been much movement elsewhere. Hayden Treter has been the preferred option at left guard, while Alani Noa has primarily been at right guard. Elijah Paige and Justin Tauanuu have once again been the bookends at tackle. Whether that’ll be the case by the midway point of the season, we’ll see, but USC seems confident with Treter and Noa flanking Raymond on the interior.
—Could USC make a change at kicker? Riley would like us to believe that it’s definitely a possibility, despite the fact that last season’s All-Big Ten third-team kicker Ryon Sayeri has returned. Sayeri wasn’t going to get the job last year until former Nevada Las Vegas kicker and freshman All-American Caden Chittenden got injured and relinquished it with Sayeri’s strong play. “I don’t know that I’ve ever been in a situation as a coach where you have like two guys that you believe in as much as I believe in them,” Riley said. Still, it would be bold to replace a guy who was as consistent as Sayeri was for most of last season.
—USC football got its Class of 2028 quarterback. Trey Wright is currently just the 25th-ranked passer in the class, according to 247 Sports. But Riley, who prefers to offer just one quarterback in each class, clearly sees something in the Frisco, Texas, signal-caller. Wright certainly piled up stats as a sophomore, throwing for over 4,000 yards and 38 touchdowns while rushing for nearly 1,800 yards and 16 touchdowns. The comparisons with Kyler Murray were natural even before the Vikings quarterback, who won a Heisman with Riley, sent Wright a video that he posted on social media. Wright is just 5 feet 10 and 175 pounds. But he looks like a heck of an athlete.
—Most of USC’s starting lineup for next hoops season is injured right now. Which is not exactly … ideal. But only center Eric Reibe is expected to miss real time into the season. Georgetown transfer KJ Lewis’ ankle should be healed by the start of the season in November. He’s expected to start playing live five-on-five in October. Rodney Rice (shoulder) should be good to go before that, while other key contributors have battled through bumps and bruises this summer. Reibe’s situation is especially odd. He sought a second opinion on his foot injury, according to a person familiar with the decision, and was told to sit out the summer to try to avoid surgery. Well, he ended up getting the surgery anyway, losing seven weeks of potential recovery time.
Polling the people
This is obviously a critical season for Riley’s future, and everyone seems to have a number in mind of what it’ll take for Riley to keep his job.
So, what is the fewest number of wins you’d accept from Riley and USC without calling for a change?
You don’t see many female serial killers — estimates historically range around just 8% to 12% — but that premise is a thrilling starting point for Hulu’s new cat-and-mouse crime thriller, “Furious.” Emmy Rossum stars as Alice Black, a female FBI agent who’s tasked with tracking down a sex trafficking survivor who has taken to murdering the men who abused her.
But the show gets much deeper than that, as lines start to blur between what’s right and wrong and who’s the actual villain in the story. Only a few episodes are out so far, but what I’ve seen so far suggests we might be looking back on this show as one of the best of 2026.
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at ryan.kartje@latimes.com, and follow me on X at @Ryan_Kartje. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
When Mark Walter, the Lakers controlling owner, flipped the storied team last week for $12.5 billion amid a federal probe of his businesses, it stunned the sports world but seemed to make financial and legal sense.
The Dodgers majority owner, who had bought his stake in the basketball team last year at a $10-billion valuation, likely netted a big payday from the sale to former Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger and venture capitalist Joshua Kushner.
And that’s money the billionaire can apply to pay down the debts of two troubled Delaware life insurers he owns that are under federal scrutiny.
It’s not at all clear whether the sale of the Lakers will have any effect on the ongoing investigations. Neither Walter nor his companies have been charged with any crimes.
TWG Global, Walter’s holding company, did not respond to a request for comment Friday, but a spokesperson for the company has previously stated that they are cooperating with authorities and expect the matter to be resolved “favorably.”
“Mark Walter and TWG have always acted in good faith, and those who have done business with Mark know him as honest and straightforward,” the statement said.
After receiving federal grand jury subpoenas in February, Delaware Life and Clear Spring Life and Annuity conducted internal investigations. They found that $21 billion in loans they made should have been recorded as extended to “related parties.”
Related parties have business or personal ties and transactions between them can have legitimate reasons, but they also pose potential conflicts of interest and require disclosure and typically extra regulatory scrutiny.
In the case of insurers, which hold premium dollars from policyholders for future claims payouts, regulators want to ensure the money is there when it’s needed. Related-party transactions can threaten that.
Walter, 66, chief executive of Chicago investment firm Guggenheim Partners, led a group that included another Guggenheim executive and Magic Johnson in acquiring the Dodgers for $2.15 billion in 2012. The Times has reported he tapped the insurers he owned for financing, a deal that was later vetted by state insurance regulators.
However, the amount of related-party loans made by the two affiliated life insurers now under federal scrutiny is vastly more, amounting to 40% of the invested assets of Delaware Life as of Dec. 31, according to Fitch Ratings. The credit rating outfit said that is the most of any North American life insurers it reviews.
It’s unclear exactly where all the money went, but the Wall Street Journal reported billions were passed through a third party before being received by entities tied to Walter or his TWG Global holding company.
Company executives also told Fitch that they were unaware they were making related-party loans. Bloomberg reported that investigators are looking at some loans made to multiple companies affiliated with one Chicago firm to see if they were passed along to Walter’s ventures.
In June regulatory filings that disclosed the $21 billion in restatements, each insurer labeled them as “corrections of errors,” which would imply that they were inadvertent.
Jacob Frenkel, a former U.S. attorney, said it appears clear a focus of the investigation into Walter’s businesses is to determine whether the restatements were just errors.
“If there is intentional concealment of related-party transactions or the creation of intermediaries to help with that concealment, that certainly [could] invite criminal and civil enforcement scrutiny,” said Frenkel, who prosecuted financial crimes and also worked for the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Authorities have seized Walter’s cellphone and laptop, according to Bloomberg. Still, investigations by prosecutors and securities regulators can result in no action.
Frenkel said that if criminality is found in complex investigations such as this one, federal prosecutors will typically file mail or wire fraud charges that carry up to 20 years in prison.
It would not matter whether a company that was the victim of fraudulent conduct closed or is able to continue conducting business after being rescued financially.
“The entity’s failure is not a prerequisite for there to be a crime in intentionally misleading conduct,” he said.
The Securities and Exchange Commission is conducting a parallel investigation into both companies, according to their regulatory filings.
Frenkel said its interest could revolve around how Guggenheim Investments, Walter’s asset management firm, booked revenue from its dealings with the insurers and the disclosures of the transactions.
The SEC can seek civil monetary penalties and the return of illegal profits, and bar or suspend an individual from serving as a corporate officer or director, among other remedies.
Delaware Life and Clear Spring are part of TWG’s Group 1001 Life & Annuity.
Delaware Life has started a remediation plan to restructure some of the loans, review others and address its “control deficiencies,” including through TWG purchasing some of the loans, according to ratings outfit S&P Global. It hopes to complete the plan by the end of the year.
However, Fitch in its downgrade of Delaware Life said the plan may prove “insufficient to fully address governance, reporting, and investment oversight issues.”
The Delaware Department of Insurance did not respond to emails for comment.
Rex Frazier, a former deputy commissioner at the California Department of Insurance, said that in the situation that the insurers find themselves, the state regulator will be looking at a company’s capital sufficiency.
“The change from unaffiliated to affiliated transactions can affect the regulator’s view of whether the insurers have adequate capital and, if the regulator thinks not, then the regulator can impose additional capital requirements,” said Frazier, now president of the Personal Insurance Federation of California, a property and casualty industry trade group.
“If the regulator determines that there is inadequate capital to pay for their obligations … there are many serious remedies they can take to protect vulnerable people depending on those income streams,” he said, including seizing a company or forcing its sale.
There is no indication that either insurer is in such dire straits. Since the disclosures, rating agencies Fitch, AM Best and S&P Global have downgraded the companies’ outlook to negative, but they also have said the insurers maintain a high level of financial strength.
Walter is not the only owner of a life insurer to rely on related-party loans to fund its business dealings.
AM Best, in a December report, said affiliated investments among life insurers and annuity companies grew more than 17% annually in 2024 to more than $373 billion, driven by those owned by private equity and asset managers.
It said the growth of such investments — a type of related-party transactions — presents “regulatory risks” that may suggest “a company’s operations are more intertwined with its parent and affiliated investment management with possible negative consequences.”
“Should the parent/affiliate company experience financial stress, negative impacts to the insurer are heightened due to the higher exposure,” it said.
Frenkel said it’s good to keep in mind that at the end of their investigations, neither the Justice Department nor the SEC may take any action.
However, due to the complexity of the case, it may be a while before that point is even reached.
“This is clearly the type of investigation that the ‘where is this going?’ conversation could easily still be continuing in January of 2028,” he said.
Thursday’s defeat – which drops Rangers into a Conference League play-off against Czechs Jablonec – comes on the back of the nightmare news Youssef Chermiti was ruled out with a long-term knee injury just after Rangers rejected a big-money bid for the 22-year-old.
It means Rangers have had to set their sights on recruiting a new striker in addition to the wingers and defenders McInnes had already targeted. He says the club are “working so hard to get the necessary type of players”, with PSV Eindhoven winger Couhaib Driouech set to be the latest arrival.
Halliday thinks the squad “shouldn’t be that imbalanced this late into the transfer window” and reckons they need “three centre-halves, one left-back, two, arguably, three wingers”.
“But the current squad that’s available should be enough to beat Dundee United, it should be enough to beat Hibs and, to be honest, it should be enough to beat Jagiellonia Bialystok,” he said.
Rangers were obviously hoping reuniting McInnes with Lawrence Shankland would be a winning formula after they went so close to wrenching the title away from Celtic while at Hearts last season.
However, former Rangers striker Steven Thompson thinks Shankland is already finding out the extra pressure he faces as the club’s new captain.
“It’s the weight of playing for Rangers, the weight of not having the start that he wanted, and the weight of taking a bad touch,” he said.
“At previous clubs, if you take a bad touch and give it away, you might get a few pelters. Here tonight, when Lawrence Shankland’s link-up play wasn’t that good or he should’ve had a shot when he didn’t, they are on you and it is going to take him a bit to get used to that I think. It’s not physical, it’s mental.”
Iran continues to deny claims by the United States that it controls the Strait of Hormuz as talks aimed at negotiating a peace deal between the two sides falter.
US President Donald Trump repeated his claim that the US is in “total control” of the critical waterway on Wednesday, but was met with angry denials from Iran, which has stated that it will not reopen the strait until demands regarding US aggression, reparations and sanctions are met.
“Claims and repeated posts by US officials that the Strait of Hormuz is no longer blocked do not change the reality,” Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA) posted on X on Wednesday.
“The Strait of Hormuz remains blocked and will not be reopened until Iran’s conditions are accepted,” it added.
Here’s what we know about the latest developments in the strait, through which one-fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies are shipped during peacetime, and the prospects for ongoing talks.
What’s the latest on the US-Iran standoff?
Iranian forces are currently preventing ships that do not have its express approval from navigating through the narrow strait, which passes through territorial waters of Iran and Oman.
Despite Trump’s claim that the US has control over the strait, shipping traffic through the key waterway has dropped to a one-week low as a result of Iran’s blockade.
Meanwhile, the US is operating a naval blockade on Iranian ports both in and around the strait. On Tuesday, US forces targeted a Panama-flagged vessel they said was headed for an Iranian port, in the Gulf of Oman, and which they alleged had failed to respond to warnings.
On Thursday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the US “has long miscalculated due to intelligence failures”, including when launching its war on Iran, which it did alongside Israel with strikes on Tehran on February 28.
In a post on X, Araghchi said Washington’s actions in the Strait of Hormuz were “an even bigger miscalculation”.
“Worse than fake news is fake intelligence,” he said.
Hojjatoleslam Hossein Taeb, the commander of the paramilitary Basij Organisation – an affiliate of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – reiterated that the strait is “under Iran’s control and management”.
“Today you see that the Strait of Hormuz is under the management and control of the Islamic Republic, and our country continues on its path in complete security,” Taeb said on Thursday, according to Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency.
“The Americans saw the power of the Islamic revolution,” he added.
What do we know about Iran-Oman talks?
Iran says it is not talking directly to the US about the strait. Instead, it says it is holding talks with Oman, which it proposes to share in the future management of the strait.
Following the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Iran and the US on June 17, under which Iran undertook to keep the strait open for 60 days, there were soon disagreements about control of the waterway and the routes that ships should take. Iran fired on some ships it said had not followed its permitted route, leading to a renewal of hostilities with the US.
Iran also disagreed with the US over whether it could charge fees to ships passing through the strait. As a result, the strait – which was fully and freely open to all shipping before the US launched its war on Iran – has become the main obstacle to the progression of wider peace talks.
Now, talks between Iran and Oman are aimed at ironing out these issues.
On Tuesday, Qatar said negotiations between Iran and Oman over the strait had reached “an advanced stage”.
“As mediators, we want the Strait of Hormuz reopened as soon as possible,” Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said during a news conference.
Negotiators are trying to reach a compromise that would allow commercial shipping to resume while addressing the security concerns of both Iran and Oman.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman has said talks with Oman are focused on “establishing safe inbound and outbound shipping lanes” that “uphold sovereign rights while also addressing the national security considerations of both Iran and Oman”.
Last week, Iran said it had agreed on the coordinates for these shipping lanes with Oman.
What do we know about broader peace talks between Iran and the US?
Iran says it is not speaking directly to the US because it has violated the June 17 MoU by restarting strikes on Iran in July.
Now, Pakistan is making efforts to mediate peace talks. It said on Tuesday it was working to bring the US and Iran “to the negotiating table”, as Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi held talks with senior Iranian officials in Tehran.
In April, the US and Iran held face-to-face negotiations, with US Vice President JD Vance and Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf attending talks in Islamabad. On June 17, the two sides remotely signed the MoU, which was supposed to kick-start a 60-day negotiation process. However, various disagreements prevented that process from getting off the ground, and talks have stalled since then.
Alan Eyre, a distinguished diplomatic fellow with the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC, told Al Jazeera earlier this month that the only important negotiations taking place right now are Iran-Oman talks over the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran says it is not worth talking directly because it “can’t count on anything the US says”, Eyre said.
Commenting on the possibility of future talks between the longtime foes, Negar Mortazavi, senior fellow at the US-based Center for International Policy, said the key question is whether the escalatory rhetoric from both sides is “opening negotiating positions or actual red lines”.
“If both sides are prepared to compromise, there is still a path towards ending the conflict and reopening the strait,” Mortazavi told Al Jazeera on Wednesday.
“If they are not, Hormuz could remain restricted, and the confrontation risks becoming another prolonged, open-ended conflict in the Middle East.”
What are the latest demands from Iran and the US?
At the end of last week, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council set out new conditions it says the US must meet before the Strait of Hormuz can fully reopen.
The six conditions include an end to US threats against Iran and insults to what Zolghadr described as the country’s national and religious values; a permanent end to attacks against Iran and its allies in Lebanon, Palestine, Yemen and Iraq; the lifting of the US naval blockade and withdrawal of naval and air forces from around Iran; compensation for damage from what he called two “imposed wars”; the lifting of sanctions; and the unconditional release of frozen Iranian assets.
Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that his administration was going to seek payment for “50 years” of damage caused by Iran, framing the move as a direct response to Tehran’s claims.
The payments, he said, would cover deaths among US forces in the region as well as civilian protesters in Iran, claiming that 52,000 people have been killed in Iran in the past four months. Tehran says some 3,117 people died in antigovernment protests that swept the country in January, prior to the launch of the US-Israel war. In February, the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported about 7,000 deaths, including 6,500 protesters.
On Thursday, Al Jazeera’s Tohid Assidi reported, citing observers, that Iran is focused on two primary issues.
“First was the security assurances Iran sought, ensuring that a reached deal could pave the way for a period of stability in the country,” Assidi said.
“Second were economic concerns, primarily articulated in demands for the US naval blockade to be removed and sanctions frozen, which represented the key demands coming from the Iranian side,” he added.
Despite the rhetoric from Trump, analysts have told Al Jazeera that the US may have to concede to some of Iran’s demands as it faces growing pressure domestically to avoid another escalation.
The US media have reported that concerns over dwindling defensive munitions have contributed to Trump’s decision not to carry out his threatened large-scale strikes against Iran.
Pakistan-administered Kashmir is facing its biggest political crisis in years, with deadly protests ahead of a final round of voting in regional elections.
Al Jazeera’s Ava Warriner explains why the wider territory is divided and what’s driving the latest unrest.
SAN DIEGO — Emanuel Lexius’ market in El Cajon is typically bustling.
Not lately.
Lexius is Haitian, and so are most of the shoppers at Miche Caribbean Market. They come to stock up on familiar Haitian staples — Ti Malice vegetable oil spread, long-grain heirloom rice, Cola Couronne soda.
“People don’t want to be out,” he said, and “no one wants to be exposed.”
A wave of fear swept Haitian American communities in San Diego County and nationwide last week after the Trump administration revoked protections for Haitian immigrants living in the U.S. under temporary protected status, or TPS. The program has allowed roughly 350,000 Haitians — including thousands in San Diego and Los Angeles — to live and work in the U.S. because their home country is unsafe.
A federal district judge temporarily blocked the action for nearly five months before the Supreme Court upheld the Trump order in June. The Department of Homeland Security officially moved to remove the protections last Monday.
That has left Haitians in Southern California in a state of anxiety over whether and when they could be deported. Community leaders say the repercussions could be widespread, with people now scared to leave their homes or go to work — or at risk of losing their jobs because they no longer have work authorization.
“People who applied for a program that the U.S. government laid in place … they came to the U.S. in search of safety and protection, only for that to be pulled from under them without any support,” said Guerline Jozef, the executive director of Haitian Bridge Alliance, a local nonprofit that provides legal and social services to Haitians and other immigrant groups.
Along with Haiti, the Trump administration has moved to roll back temporary protected status for people from 13 countries, all of them majority Black or brown.
“Temporary Protected Status is exactly that — temporary,” said a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson. “For too long, TPS has been allowed to function as a de facto amnesty program despite Congress never intending it to be permanent.”
TPS was established for Haiti in 2010, after a catastrophic earthquake killed more than 200,000 people and destabilized the country. The protection was extended in 2021 amid the civil chaos that unfolded after Haiti’s president was assassinated and again in 2024 due to ongoing safety concerns. Today, armed gangs control sections of the country, presidential elections haven’t been held in a decade, and millions of people struggle with daily needs, per a recent United Nations report.
Today, the Trump administration says conditions in Haiti have improved enough for Haitians to return. But Haiti remains under a “Do not travel” advisory from the U.S. State Department, and the country has been under a state of emergency since March 2024.
Since their deportation protections ended Monday, local Haitians say they can’t go back to Haiti, pointing to safety concerns for themselves and their families.
“I had no choice but to leave Haiti,” said Galencha, a Haitian TPS holder who works in San Diego and requested his last name be withheld for fear he might be deported.
The 42-year-old, who is married with two young daughters, has lived in San Diego for seven years. He said his mother and uncle were killed in Haiti; his older brother was shot. His father is still there, but his sisters and close friends have left.
A Homeland Security spokesperson declined to comment on plans for any enforcement operations targeting Haitians but said enforcement actions are happening every day.
“Whenever we go out, it makes me feel bad,” said a 43-year-old Haitian man who lives near El Cajon. He too just lost his temporary protected status.
He arrived in the U.S. two years ago, alone, leaving behind his family. He typically waits in a Home Depot parking lot with the hope of getting picked up for a job, but it hasn’t been easy to find steady work.
Now, he and other local Haitians say they have been keeping their head on a swivel for immigration enforcement.
Even with temporary protected status, immigrants face a host of challenges to find work in the first place, said Maria Chavez, immigration legal director at the Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans. The process to qualify for a work permit and a reauthorization can take over a year with delays, she noted.
Most Haitians who have settled in San Diego since 2010 have found work in the hospitality, healthcare and construction industries — though many arrive with an entrepreneurial mindset forged in their home country, explained Jozef, from the Haitian Bridge Alliance.
“Due to the lack of a formal job market, the majority of the people have to find ways to create small businesses in Haiti,” she said. “So they come with that mindset of creating businesses.”
Right now, Haitian Bridge Alliance is focused on helping former TPS holders create a family plan — including getting their financial documents in order and creating contingency plans in case they’re deported. It’s also helping get basic needs like food to Haitians who are scared to leave home and connecting them with legal representation.
Since going back to Haiti is not an option for many Haitians in the region, now is the time for former TPS holders to pursue alternatives such as asylum or seeing if they qualify to stay in the U.S. through marriage, Chavez said.
“None of these are fast options,” she noted.
PANA and Haitian Bridge Alliance are fighting in court against the Trump administration’s termination of temporary protected status for Somalia. But Chavez says that fighting the termination for Haiti is largely off the table, since the Supreme Court has already upheld that order.
In the meantime, the end of Haitians’ temporary protections has created heartbreak throughout the community.
Husband and wife Martha and Feret Milliem own Caribbean Pleasure, a Point Loma restaurant serving Haitian cuisine in a dining room hung with Haitian flags.
The couple have lived in San Diego for nearly half a century and aren’t personally affected by the end of TPS protections — but it’s been painful to watch their community grow fearful and lose their grip on the American lives they’ve worked to build.
The impact extends to families back in Haiti, too, they add, if relatives in the U.S. who suddenly lose their legal jobs are unable to send money back to them.
“Right now, the Haitians are living under hell,” Martha said.
For California businesses, 2020 will be a year of reckoning.
Sweeping new laws curbing longtime employment practices take effect, aimed at reducing economic inequality and giving workers more power in their jobs.
Under one, companies could be forced to reclassify hundreds of thousands of independent contractors as employees with broad labor law protections. Under another, bosses could no longer force workers into closed-door arbitration proceedings, a tactic which protects businesses from costly lawsuits.
The new laws are about “job quality — what it means to work in a just workplace,” said California Labor Secretary Julie Su. “California leads the way on labor standards and we’re not going to let employers do end runs around those standards. We want to support businesses who look at their role in a holistic and humane sense.”
Many new measures, she added, are “not big splashy things, but day-to-day things.” She cited a law giving working mothers a place to express breast milk besides a bathroom. And a law making it easier for firefighters and other first responders to gain workers’ compensation for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Other new statutes ban discrimination based on hairstyle, such as Afros, braids, cornrows and dreadlocks; grant organ donors additional guaranteed leave; and extend whistleblower protection to patient rights advocates at county mental health centers.
The California Chamber of Commerce, a leading voice for business, picked its fights. It did not list Assembly Bill 5, the independent contractor bill, on its annual “job killer” list, preferring to help negotiate for a slew of professionals, such as doctors and real estate agents, to gain exemptions.
“We felt it was important to participate in the compromise,” said Chamber President and Chief Executive Allan Zaremberg. “This is a work in progress, and it will continue to be.”
But the chamber, along with the National Retail Federation and other business groups, filed suit against Assembly Bill 51, the first-in-the-nation law preventing companies from making workers sign arbitration agreements as a condition of employment. And it helped defeat other bills favored by the Legislature’s labor-friendly majority, including one extending unemployment benefits to striking workers and another curbing the University of California’s ability to hire temporary workers.
“A lot of employers feel the rules are complex and tough to deal with,” Zaremberg said. “Our job is to make sure laws are reasonable and fair … and they can afford to stay in business. From that perspective, it has been a successful year.”
Here are a few of the changes coming to California workplaces in 2020:
Minimum wages
On Jan. 1, the statewide minimum wage steps up to $13 an hour for employers with more than 26 employees, and to $12 an hour for those with 26 or fewer employees. The increases are mandated by a 2016 law that gradually raises the floor to $15 an hour for nearly all workers by 2023.
Several local jurisdictions have higher minimums including the city and county of Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Malibu and Pasadena, all of which will raise them on July 1 to $14.25 an hour for small employers and $15 an hour for large employers.
“People talk about prosperity and GDP growth, but that’s not enough,” Su said. “One in 3 California workers makes less than $15 an hour. That is not how we want to build an economy.”
Some 2.6 million Californians will be due a raise in January under the statewide floor, according to a UC Berkeley study. California will have the nation’s second-highest minimum next year after Washington state’s $13.50.
Meanwhile, several large businesses have already raised their floors to $15 an hour or more, including Costco, Spectrum, Amazon and Disneyland Resort.
Independent contractors
In April 2018, the California Supreme Court dropped a bomb on a vast swath of companies, from Uber and Lyft to yoga studios and hair salons, which have built their businesses on independent contractors. To classify workers as contractors rather than employees subject to minimum wage and overtime laws, companies would have to satisfy a strict three-pronged test.
Under the “ABC test,” a business may only contract with independent contractors who satisfy all three of these conditions: a) they are free from control and direction of the hiring entity; b) they perform work outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business; and c) they are customarily engaged in an independently established business of the same nature as that of the work involved.
The court decision set off a scramble in the Legislature. Backed by labor unions that see an opportunity to organize newly empowered employees, Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez (D-San Diego) authored AB 5 to codify the decision, expanding it to areas such as workers’ compensation and unemployment and disability insurance.
Even under a previous, looser standard, state officials estimated misclassification was costing California some $7 billion a year in payroll taxes. Companies also avoid paying federal Social Security and Medicare taxes for contractors.
“Structural reform was necessary because more and more companies want to reduce their obligations,” Gonzalez said. “We’re playing whack-a-mole trying to protect workers while companies try to get more profit for shareholders.”
A lobbying frenzy led to exemptions for some professions in which workers have more negotiating power or autonomy than in low-wage jobs. Among them: lawyers, accountants, architects, dentists, insurance brokers and engineers.
But the Legislature declined to exempt app-based ride-hailing or food delivery companies, whose workers complain they often earn less than minimum wage and are subject to arbitrary dismissals. Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Postmates and Instacart, arguing that they are technology companies, not transportation employers like taxi businesses, set aside $110 million to mount a ballot initiative exempting them from the law.
Supporters of AB 5, a California law requiring companies to reclassify many independent contractors as employees, rally in August in Sacramento.
(Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)
Trucking associations, freelance writers and photographers filed suits to avoid the new law’s strictures.
“AB 5 fundamentally disrupts the right of Californians to have independent working relationships with their clients or employers,” said Sen. Mike Morrell (R-Rancho Cucamonga). By favoring some industries over others, he added, “Sacramento Democrats embrace a slide towards socialism.”
Gonzalez said she is open to changes in the bill next year, including an exemption for musicians — but not for app-based ride-hailing and delivery giants. “We will continue to clarify this law, but rest assured, it won’t be repealed,” she added.
Arbitration
Former Gov. Jerry Brown twice vetoed bills to curb the exploding practice of mandatory arbitration, which allows companies to make employees resolve disputes in a private, closed-door session rather than in public court proceedings.
Brown argued that a U.S. Supreme Court decision allows the practice. And businesses contend that in conflicts over wages, discrimination, disability, harassment and other issues, arbitration saves them, and workers, the needless expense of class-action lawsuits.
But in the last year, allegations of sexual harassment and assaults by serial perpetrators, many of whom were protected by arbitration agreements, fueled public outrage, as in the cases of Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein and CBS Chief Executive Leslie Moonves. At Google, 20,000 workers staged a global walkout demanding an end to forced arbitration. Other tech workers, including at Los Angeles’ Riot Games, followed suit.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new version of the law, which avoids invalidating existing agreements. “AB 51 just prohibits firing or threatening employees who refuse to sign,” said UC Berkeley law professor Catherine Fisk. “Forced arbitration is clearly used as a device to prevent workers from bringing claims. So it allows companies to violate the law.”
But Zaremberg argues: ”Our employment laws are more complex than those in the rest of the country. People make honest mistakes every day trying to comply with them. With arbitration, they can be resolved through an expedited process.”
An estimated 67% of California workplaces had mandatory arbitration policies in 2018, higher than the national average, and the number may have grown this year as attorneys advised companies to get ahead of the new law.
A new activist strategy this year — filing thousands of individual arbitration claims against Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Postmates — hit companies with millions of dollars in processing fees. Companies used to dealing with employee grievances one by one refused to pay. A new law, Senate Bill 707, imposes stiff penalties on businesses that stall payments, and allows workers to then take their grievances to court.
#MeToo
#MeToo scandals lent impetus to other measures besides the arbitration statute.
Under current law, workers have a year to file complaints of discrimination, harassment and retaliation in court. AB 9 extends the deadline to three years. Brown had vetoed the bill in 2018, saying claims should be filed “while memories and evidence are fresh.” Victim advocates contend a year is often insufficient for workers to come to terms with what happened to them and seek counsel.
Often companies will require a worker who gains a financial settlement for harassment or discrimination to quit his or her job. Assembly Bill 749 prohibits “no re-hire” clauses affecting the “aggrieved employee.”
Assembly Bill 547 requires training for janitors to be conducted by their peers. “We’ve seen reports of rape on the night shift,” Su said. “This law means immigrant women with lived experience will make the training real. So companies can’t just pay lip service to training, letting people go through the motions and check a box.”
Child-care workers
Home-based child-care workers are not covered by federal labor law. Now, some 40,000 private family day-care providers, paid by California to service more than 360,000 low-income children, will gain the right to bargain collectively with the state under Assembly Bill 378.
The new law sets the stage for California’s largest union election since 1997, when home-care workers were granted the right to bargain over wages and working conditions. Child-care workers, who are largely Latino and African American, earn close to minimum wage — pushing many out of the industry. The new law will lead to “creating quality jobs, not poverty jobs,” said Assemblywoman Monique Limón (D-Santa Barbara), the bill’s author.
Corporate diversity
Senate Bill 826, enacted last year, requires publicly traded companies headquartered in California to have at least one woman on their boards of directors by January 2020. By the end of 2021, boards with five directors must include two women, and boards with six or more directors need to include three women.
Noncompliant companies could be fined as much as $100,000.
Several European countries have similar laws. But California’s is the first U.S. board diversity mandate. When the law passed, 188 of 650 affected California companies had all-male boards, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission compiled by Clemson University scholars.
Two conservative groups, the Pacific Legal Foundation and Judicial Watch, have filed lawsuits to overturn the statute, but businesses have largely complied. According to Clemson finance professor Daniel Greene, just 32 companies had failed to add any female directors as of Dec. 26.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has arrived in Washington, DC, and will visit the White House on Tuesday, with the war on Iran topping the agenda.
Netanyahu’s visit is his first for talks with President Donald Trump since the United States and Israel launched their war on Iran with strikes on Tehran on February 28. It also comes amid increasing Israeli raids and arrests in the occupied West Bank and three months before elections in Israel.
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He has visited the White House more times under the Trump administration than under any other US president. Political analysts say Netanyahu is seeking Trump’s support for re-election.
What are the two leaders likely to discuss and what happens next in the US-Israel war on Iran?
Here’s what we know:
Why are Trump and Netanyahu meeting now?
Netanyahu is primarily in the US to attend the funeral ceremony of Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who died on July 11.
Graham was a close Trump ally in the Senate, both on domestic and international matters, including the war on Iran, as well as a staunch supporter of Israel. His funeral ceremony will take place on Tuesday in Washington, DC, beginning at 2pm (19:00 GMT).
Before attending Graham’s memorial, Netanyahu is also expected to meet Trump at 11am (15:00 GMT) in Washington, DC, where protesters have lined the streets in anticipation of his visit.
He is scheduled to fly back to Israel on Wednesday.
What are Trump and Netanyahu likely to discuss?
A White House official told the Reuters news agency that the two leaders were likely to discuss the war on Iran as well as Israeli strikes and occupation of Lebanon, whose president Trump hosted last week. Israel says it is targeting strongholds of the Iran-backed group Hezbollah, which began firing rockets into its north shortly after the war on Iran began. However, Iran says it will not agree to a peace deal unless Israeli forces withdraw from Lebanon.
Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher said many people in Israel believe the US should not make a deal with Iran and should instead resume the war. He said some in the US support this view.
“Now, Trump has expressed his frustration with Netanyahu and has said several times that he feels the Israeli leader is not seeing the big picture. And sometimes you’re not sure whether both men are on the same page or whether they are diametrically opposed to one another. So it will be interesting to see if we get any readout from either side after that meeting,” he said.
Fisher, however, added that the outcome of the meeting between Trump and Netanyahu is currently not expected to be made public.
The White House official also told Reuters that the two leaders would also discuss the Abraham Accords, the series of agreements between Israel and Arab and other nations which Trump began brokering during his first term as US president to normalise diplomatic relations. So far, only the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan and Kazakhstan have agreed to sign.
Netanyahu’s visit to Washington, DC comes amid intensifying pogroms and violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinian communities across the occupied West Bank over the weekend following a deadly shootout in the town of Tal, in which two Israelis and four Palestinians were killed.
Israeli settlers have been making a push to increase the number of illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank since 2022, when Netanyahu formed the most far-right government in the country’s history, including ministers who are leading figures in the settler movement.
Expanding the illegal settlements would help Netanyahu garner the far right’s support in the upcoming elections, political observers say.
However, in a letter published on Tuesday, about 600 former Israeli officials appealed to Trump, saying he is the only one capable of helping to avoid the “calamity” of escalating violence in the West Bank and its implications for Israeli, US and regional security.
“Unless arrested swiftly and decisively, escalating violence in the West Bank is poised to ignite the region and carries severe ramifications for both Israeli security and US regional interests,” the letter, written by lobby group Commanders for Israel’s Security (CIS), stated.
“It is our professional judgment that no one but you, Mr President, can avert this calamity.”
CIS is a movement of more than 550 retired Israeli army colonels and generals, as well as equivalent ranks in the intelligence agency Mossad, the internal security agency Shin Bet, police, the foreign service and other corps.
What do Trump and Netanyahu currently disagree on?
The two leaders once appeared politically inseparable, with Netanyahu describing Trump as the “greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House” last October. Trump returned the praise. During a 2025 appearance in Israel, he joked, “He’s not easy – not the easiest guy to deal with – but that’s what makes him great.”
But Israel’s hostilities with Iran have showcased a crack in Netanyahu and Trump’s alignment.
War on Iran
Last month, Trump reportedly called Netanyahu “f****** crazy” during a phone call and accused him of undermining US diplomatic efforts to end the war on Iran by continuing attacks on Lebanon, among other issues. He warned that Israel’s military escalation risked derailing peace talks with Iran.
“He will have no choice,” Trump told the Financial Times when asked about the likelihood of Netanyahu approving a possible peace agreement with Iran. “I call the shots. I call all the shots. He doesn’t call the shots.”
Political observers say the two leaders are each driven by their own political interests, which are on a collision course. In the US, the war with Iran is deeply unpopular, so Trump needs to reach a deal with Iran to end the war. Netanyahu, on the other hand, could benefit politically at home if it were to continue.
‘Regime change’ in Iran
“Regime change” in Iran appears to be a major sticking point between the two leaders.
Alex Vatanka at the Middle East Institute told Al Jazeera that Netanyahu is likely to try and “sell the idea of regime change again in Tehran” when he meets Trump at the White House on Tuesday.
“I don’t think it will go down well with President Trump because he doesn’t want to do that,” Vatanka said. “Politically, in the US, this war is hugely unpopular, so it remains to be seen what Prime Minister Netanyahu gets out of this meeting.”
He added that previous meetings between Trump and Netanyahu in Washington, DC, have often preceded a flare-up in tensions with Iran, and it remains to be seen whether this one breaks that pattern.
Vatanka said Israelis are still unhappy with the Trump administration about the memorandum of understanding agreed with Tehran, because they “have a different sense of threat perception when it comes to Iran”.
Israeli officials will want Netanyahu to continue to press Trump on Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programmes, he said.
“The Trump administration’s counter to that is there is only so much the US can do militarily unless they decide to go in and occupy Iran, and this is something nobody really takes seriously,” he added.
But in a video statement before departing for Washington, DC, Netanyahu said: “In these complex times, you need to act with both great determination and great wisdom. We will discuss all the issues on the agenda, primarily Iran.”
“Of course, our goal is to protect our security and also to expand the circle of peace around us,” he added.
Lebanon
Israel has also refused to withdraw from Lebanon, insisting that it has the right to bomb the country at any time to respond to “threats”.
According to Axios, in a phone call in early June, Trump told Netanyahu: “Everybody hates you now … everybody hates Israel because of this.”
According to an Israeli official quoted by CNN, Netanyahu told his security cabinet on Sunday that the Trump administration wants Israel to withdraw from Lebanon, Syria and Gaza but he would oppose the idea.
US-Turkiye aircraft deal
Al Jazeera’s Fisher noted that another point of friction between the two leaders is Washington’s sale of F-35 aircraft to Turkiye.
“Netanyahu doesn’t want that to happen. Trump was asked about it in the last few hours, and he said we will sell to whoever he wants. So it could be a very interesting meeting at the White House on Tuesday,” Fisher said.
In July, in an interview with Fox News, Netanyahu said: “I don’t think they [Turkiye] should be given F-35s or the engines for their fighter jets because that’ll upset the power balance in the Middle East, which is ultimately guaranteed by Israeli air superiority, and also by, I think, by America’s posture in the Middle East.”
So, do Trump and Netanyahu agree on anything?
Currently, there are frictions between the two leaders’ policies towards the June 17 MoU between the US and Iran that made provision for a regional ceasefire, including in Lebanon.
In February, a White House official told reporters that the Trump administration also opposes any Israeli annexation of the occupied West Bank.
Netanyahu has, however, brushed off frictions with Trump and said their ties are “fine”.
In an interview with Fox News in early July, Netanyahu heaped praise on the US and Trump.
“America has been a tremendous force for good, and without America, there won’t be any democracy in the world, and there won’t be any freedom in the world,” he said.
Netanyahu said there may be some differences between the US and Israel, but the two countries are “model allies”.
“My relationship with the president is fine, and we have a way of ironing out our differences as allies who respect each other,” he said, adding that he would smooth things over.
But an Israeli official told CNN on Monday that it had taken time to schedule the meeting with Trump, and that Netanyahu got confirmation only once Graham’s funeral had been announced.
Speaking to reporters about the war on Iran on board Air Force One while travelling to Michigan on Monday, Trump said Israel “needs the US”.
“You know who wouldn’t survive without us? Israel. Bibi’s coming, he’ll tell you,” he said.
“If I didn’t get involved, and I didn’t blow up those nuclear, essentially, soon-to-be nuclear weapons to dust, Israel would have been terminated months ago.”
Trump added that he and Netanyahu remain “pretty close”.
What happens next?
Amid frictions, it is unclear whether the meeting will end with Israel and the US continuing their war on Iran and Israel continuing its attacks on southern Lebanon, Gaza and in the occupied West Bank.
Therefore, it is going to be a high-stakes meeting for Netanyahu.
Sources have also told Reuters that Netanyahu would use the meeting to lobby for Trump’s support for his re-election campaign ahead of an October 27 vote.
A meeting with Trump will, he hopes, showcase what has traditionally been a close relationship between the two leaders and could help Netanyahu at home, where he is struggling in opinion polls.
France and Spain have deployed thousands of firefighters, and neighbouring countries have sent help.
Wildfires are ravaging many parts of western and southern Europe, with France and Spain among the hardest hit.
The World Health Organization has warned that climate change is contributing to the frequency and intensity of the fires. This is clear in the record temperatures and successive heatwaves seen across the continent since May. France and Spain have deployed thousands of firefighters, and neighbouring countries have sent assistance. Authorities say the situation is unprecedented.
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So, what will it take to extinguish the flames?
Presenter: Per Nyberg
Guests:
Eduardo Rojas – chairman of the board at the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification
Soraya Fettih – global campaigns coordinator at 350.org, an international environmental organisation focused on addressing the climate crisis
Laurie Laybourn – executive director of Strategic Climate Risks Initiative, a non-partisan think tank
Lawyers for the ICC’s ousted Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan say he is the victim of a political witchhunt, motivated by his decision to go after Israeli leaders for war crimes. Khan was removed from office over sexual assault allegations. Soraya Lennie explains.
In addition to the ongoing attacks, shipping disruptions continue to intensify. Ship tracking data revealed that just one tanker successfully crossed the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, marking the lowest level since May 7.
However, shipping data from London Stock Exchange Group shows that two Chinese supertankers carrying crude oil from Saudi Arabia successfully exited the Bab al-Mandeb strait on Friday. This is despite the naval blockade Yemen’s Houthis announced against Saudi Arabia on Monday.
Here is a recap of what happened on Thursday night and Friday.
Where did the US attack Iran?
The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said that at 01:00 GMT on Friday, it concluded its latest round of strikes against Iran.
CENTCOM said it targeted Iranian military command centres, drone storage facilities, communication networks, coastal surveillance sites and maritime capabilities.
On Friday, Iranian media reported explosions or attacks across multiple Iranian cities. State broadcaster IRIB reported that explosions were reported in Khondab, Khorramabad, Konarak and Jask. Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency reported that two people have been injured following an early morning drone attack on Khorramabad, citing the deputy governor of the western Lorestan province.
Iran’s Mehr news agency reported on Friday that US missile strikes hit the cities of Andimeshk and Omidiyeh in the Khuzestan province. There were no casualties or injuries.
Al Jazeera’s Tohid Assidi reported from the Iranian capital, Tehran, that explosions were heard on Qeshm island, located in the Strait of Hormuz, on Friday.
Attacks on the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas have injured two people, Iranian media reported on Friday.
Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Friday that four people were killed and five others were injured in a US missile attack near the southwestern city of Ahvaz.
Where did Iran strike in the Gulf?
Bahrain: In a statement carried by Iran’s Mehr news agency, the Iranian army said it used drones to target fuel storage tanks, equipment warehouses and troop living quarters at Sheikh Isa Air Base in Bahrain.
Jordan: The military added that aircraft hangars, maintenance facilities and accommodation sites at the Muwaffaq Salti/Al-Azraq base in Jordan were also hit, warning that any actions against Iran’s interests would undermine regional security and economic stability.
What have leaders on either side said?
On Thursday, US President Donald Trump stepped up his rhetoric against Tehran. He told the US news website Axios that he may launch the largest strikes on Iran yet, after Tehran carried out another wave of retaliatory attacks on US allies in the Gulf, including hitting a telecommunications tower in Kuwait.
“I am close to making a decision. We are all set for it,” Trump said.
Separately, Trump threatened, on his Truth Social platform, that if Iran attacked ships, the US would use Tehran’s frozen assets to pay for repairs.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi warned on Friday that using frozen state assets to pay for future claims sets a dangerous global precedent.
“Seizing another nation’s assets to pay for unrelated future claims is an incendiary precedent,” Araghchi wrote on X.
He cautioned that “those who celebrate or profit from such funds should remember: once governments normalise confiscation, no one’s assets are safe. Ensuing chaos will not be pretty or peaceful”.
The first day of the 2026 Commonwealth Games is upon us and it’s a busy enough Friday for various Team Northern Ireland athletes in Glasgow.
It’s an early start Gary Kelly who is in action in the men’s singles against New Zealand’s Shannon McIlroy at 08:30 BST after his win against Niue on Thursday.
Shauna O’Neill and Chloe Wilson will face Niue in the women’s pairs at 11:20 after their victory
At the Tollcross Swimming Centre, it is a morning full of heats from 10:30.
Victoria Catterson will be in the women’s 400m freestyle while Grace Davison and Lottie Cullen will get under way in the women’s 200m backstroke.
Conor Ferguson and Paddy Johnston will be in the 50m backstroke with Alana Burns-Aiken in the 50m butterfly and Adam Bradley in the 100m breaststroke.
Barry McClements will go in the men’s S10 100m butterfly while Team NI will take part in both the men’s and women’s 100m freestyle relay heats.
Should the various swimmers progress through their heats, the semi-finals or finals of all those events will take place that evening from 19:00.
At the SEC Centre, one of Team NI’s boxing contingent will be in action.
Louis Rooney fights in the men’s bantamweight 55kg round of 32 against Mathealira Seholoholo from Lesotho at 11:45.
From 13:00 at the Emirates Arena, Olympic champion Rhys McClenaghan alongside Ewan McAteer and Eamon Montgomery are in qualification action.
In 2025-26, the WSL replaced the Sunday 18:45 kick-off time with more noon matches, but this also proved unpopular.
“For an away day it’s horrible,” explains Arsenal fan Major. “You’ve got fans leaving at three o’clock in the morning or you’re going the night before and having to pay for a hotel.”
The revised time also clashes with grassroots football, played widely on a Sunday morning. It is a barrier for the younger generation to attend games.
Regular breaks throughout the season are an issue too. Earlier this year, former England defender Anita Asante suggested extended gaps between league games hampers momentum and rhythm for fans.
Another complaint from supporters is accessibility.
While Premier League-level grounds like Emirates Stadium and Everton’s Goodison Park are well equipped, smaller venues are less accommodating.
Jones, a wheelchair user, was frustrated by the lack of Blue Badge parking information when trying to attend London City’s away trip to Tottenham Hotspur.
“A lot of the issues I experience are with communication,” she says. “Every club has an accessibility section on their website but for Tottenham it is only for the Tottenham Hotspur stadium, not Brisbane Road [where Tottenham women play].”
Jones told BBC Sport the onus was on her to seek further information via email, to which she received a reply stating Blue Badge parking had sold out. Only after she spoke to Tottenham’s disability co-ordinator did she learn the venue did not have Blue Badge parking as it was in a residential area.
To compound matters, the wheelchair accessible allocation was on the opposite side of the ground to the away section, leaving Jones isolated.
Tottenham Hotspur told BBC Sport information for the venue is available on the website via the ‘Ask Spurs’ chatbot. However, after an internal investigation, they are making improvements.
Brisbane Road-specific guidance has since been added to their event day accessible parking section on ‘Ask Spurs’, while a matchday-specific guide is in the works.
A spokesperson for the club confirmed: “We’re working on a full Brisbane Road matchday guide for the website for next season to give parity with our Tottenham Hotspur Stadium information.”
![The referendum will determine the constitutional framework under which Guinea-Bissau’s next elected president and parliament will govern [PATRICK MEINHARDT / AFP]](https://i0.wp.com/occasionaldigest.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/afp_692748369f11-1764182070.jpg?w=640&ssl=1)
Closer ties would benefit Lebanon and Turkey, with Ankara becoming an important political, economic and security partner in the region.
