TV News LIES

The brief exchange of fire between Iran and Israel was a truer statement of the balance of power that now exists between these two countries than the many spurious claims by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about having “smashed”, “destroyed” or “obliterated” the armed forces of the Islamic Republic.

In firing up to 30 missiles towards Israel in retaliation against its renewed bombing of Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Iran broke the model that Israel had imposed on the two other ceasefires in Lebanon and Gaza: namely that you cease, and we keep on firing.

Furthermore, it showed that it would target northern Israel to protect a third country, Lebanon, which is also something of a first.

In announcing that it would halt fire, Iran’s military command said that if Israel resumed its attacks anywhere, including southern Lebanon, “much more severe and crushing measures than before will follow”.

It has taken time for the Islamic Republic to respond to Israel’s campaigns on Gaza, Lebanon and itself as one war - which is what it is - but at last, it is being forced to do so.

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In the southern Lebanese village of Habboush, the sound that cut through the stillness of the night was not an air strike. It was the sound of a child screaming for help.

Hashem, a paramedic in the village, heard the cries coming from an Israeli quadcopter hovering overhead. 

Speaking to Middle East Eye, he said this was not an isolated incident, but part of a pattern that has become increasingly familiar to residents who remain in southern villages.

“This is not the first time these drones have flown over us and broadcast different sounds,” Hashem said.

“Yesterday, it was the sound of children screaming and pleading for help. Before that, they broadcast the sound of an ambulance. Another time it was the Quran. Another time, it was the voice of a woman calling for help. We are living through this almost every day.”

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Russian investigative media outlet The Insider confirmed that the victim of a car bombing on Tuesday was Damir Davydov, a Russian military official responsible for supplying missile and artillery ammunition to the front.

Davydov, the Defense Ministry’s head of missile and artillery command, was reportedly killed when his BMW X3 was blown up near a high-rise building in the Moscow suburb of Balashikha at around 5:30 a.m.

Earlier, Russian authorities confirmed the explosion and opened a criminal case, but had not yet disclosed the victim’s identity, leaving multiple Telegram channels to speculate whether the victim was a senior officer in Russia’s Aerospace Forces, Alexander Maksimtsev.

Early reports suggest the blast, which had a power equivalent to about 400 grams of TNT, occurred less than a kilometer from where Lieutenant General Yaroslav Moskalik was killed in a nearly identical car bombing in the same military residential district just over a year ago. This is the fourth killing of a Russian officer at the rank of lieutenant general inside Russia since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

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A new report from the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) finds hard-right groups have increasingly expanded their influence across the US government, which is pursuing a federal fraud case into the civil rights organization.

Tuesday’s report – which identified 1,263 hate and anti-government groups in operation throughout 2025 – comes less than two months after it was indicted by the government it says the hard right has infiltrated.

According to the SPLC’s annual Year in Hate and Extremism report, Donald Trump’s administration has “radically transformed government policy in favor of far-right interests and individuals” since the start of his second presidency in early 2025.

In addition to the administration’s “full, complete and unconditional” presidential pardons of approximately 1,500 people involved in the January 6 Capitol attack in 2021, the report cited the administration’s shifting the focus of federal law enforcement from combating violent crime to conducting immigration raids against marginalized communities.

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A federal judge on Tuesday permanently blocked Alabama from executing a man with nitrogen gas after declaring the method violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Alabama became the first state in the nation to use the execution method in January 2024, but has faced repeated legal challenges to its use.

Emily C Marks, a US district judge, permanently enjoined the state from executing Jeffery Lee by nitrogen gas. Lee was scheduled to be executed Thursday at an Alabama prison.

A spokesman for Alabama attorney general Steve Marshall said the state is appealing the decision. The case will likely end up before the US supreme court, which has previously let nitrogen executions proceed.

In 2000, a jury sentenced Lee to life without parole for the 1998 murders of Jimmy Ellis and Elaine Thompson. A judge later declined to follow the jury’s recommendation and sentenced Lee to death. In 2017, Kay Ivey, an Alabama governor, signed a bill to ban such cases of judicial override, but the law only applied to future – and not past – cases. Lee’s attorneys have since asked Ivey to grant him clemency and end judicial override retroactively.

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A provision in last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act blocked Planned Parenthood’s health centers from billing Medicaid for the other services they provide, like contraception and cancer screenings. Medicaid is their primary source of funding, and the legislation meant they lost out on more than $700 million annually.

That provision expires July 4, setting Planned Parenthood up to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicaid funding. Anti-abortion groups are pressing Republicans hard to extend it.

Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) and regional affiliates brought more than 250 supporters for a Capitol Hill lobbying day, including patient storytellers. 

Democrats “are doing all that they can. I think one of the most powerful weapons at their disposal right now is to use patient stories, and that’s where we come in,” said Jess Clem, a patient advocate from Minnesota, who spoke to lawmakers Tuesday.

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Graham Platner, a progressive oyster farmer and political newcomer whose campaign has been wrought with controversies, will face off this fall against Republican Sen. Susan Collins in Maine, Decision Desk HQ projects.

Collins, who is seeking a sixth term, was unchallenged on Tuesday, while Platner easily advanced from the Democratic primary despite questions about whether he’s become a liability for the party in the must-win race.

Democrats are eyeing a rare pickup opportunity in the Pine Tree State, where Collins has held onto her Senate seat despite its blue leanings. It’s one of just a handful of races in the upper chamber considered toss-ups this cycle, and it could be pivotal to Democrats’ hopes of taking back the Senate in the midterms.

Platner’s campaign, however, has faced growing scrutiny that sparked Democratic anxieties about his candidacy ahead of Tuesday’s primary.

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The U.S. military launched airstrikes Wednesday on Iran following the crash of an Army helicopter near the Strait of Hormuz that U.S. President Donald Trump blamed on the Islamic Republic.

Tehran vowed to respond, again throwing into question efforts to reach a permanent ceasefire in the Iran war that’s seen the Strait of Hormuz effectively choked off and global energy prices spike. Missile alert sirens sounded in the island kingdom of Bahrain, home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, which Tehran said it targeted for retaliation.

Fighter jets from the U.S. Air Force and Navy conducted the strikes, the U.S. military’s Central Command said, targeting “air defense, ground control stations, and surveillance radar sites.” Iran acknowledged strikes around Bandar Abbas and Qeshm Island, but gave no details on the damage.

“The operation was a proportional response to recent attacks on U.S. forces and international commercial ships transiting regional waters,” Central Command said.

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