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  • United, American say fuel cost surge may mean capacity cuts

    United, American say fuel cost surge may mean capacity cuts

    United Airlines Holdings Inc. and American Airlines Group Inc. said they may need to cut more capacity in the fourth quarter as the aviation industry continues to contend with high fuel prices.

    “If fuel prices remain as high as they are right now, I think that that’s going to require some adjustments in terms of our capacity planning as we take a look out into the future,” American chief executive officer Robert Isom said at a Morgan Stanley conference in California on Wednesday.

    Speaking after Isom at the same event, United chief financial officer Mike Leskinen said that if fuel remains high, the company will “make some adjustments into the first quarter and beyond into 2027.”

    “We are not flying to maximize market share, we’re flying to maximize profitability and free cash generation, so we’ll make those adjustments,” Leskinen said.

    American stock briefly jumped as much as 4%, and was trading 0.3% higher at 12:24 p.m. in New York. United also rose as much as 2.7%, before paring gains and was down 0.9% at 12:21 p.m. United’s shares have declined 5% this year, while American is down 16%.

    American estimates fuel will add $1 billion in extra costs in the last three months of the year. At the same time, the airline is seeing benefits of its focus on premium products, with more revenue coming from the front of the aircraft. At this point, the company continues to feel “really good” about its guidance, he said. American is the largest carrier out of Philadelphia International Airport by passenger volume.

    United earlier this year forecast adjusted third-quarter earnings of $2.50 to $3.50 a share and sees about $6 billion in added fuel costs for 2026, which it plans to offset by the end of the year.

    The Chicago-based airline, which has been able to stay nimble amid high costs alongside Delta Air Lines Inc. with its industry-leading premium strategy, moved quickly and aggressively on capacity. The carrier earlier this year announced a 5% reduction in scheduled flights for the second and third quarters, targeting weaker off-peak routes — midweek and overnight flights — and trimming operations at Chicago O’Hare.

    “As you look into the fourth quarter, there’ll be some flights in December that we won’t fly, that we thought we were going to fly,” Leskinen said.

    With the U.S.-Iran war showing no signs of abating, analysts expect energy prices to remain elevated. President Donald Trump has said the fighting would only end after the November midterm elections. Brent is up almost 70% this year, and refined products such as diesel have posted even steeper gains, reflecting supply risks from the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.

    The surging costs are significantly squeezing airline margins. New York-based JetBlue Airways Corp. last week cut its capacity outlook, expecting it to rise between 1.5% and 3.5% from a year earlier, down from its previous forecast for growth between 3% and 6%.

    American Airlines has faced the most acute pressure among its major rivals, having cut guidance twice so far this year. In April, it guided to a full-year range of a $0.40 loss to $1.10 profit — down from its original $1.10–$2.70 profit target — after absorbing an estimated $4 billion in incremental fuel costs from the Iran war.

    In July, it cut guidance again to a range of a $0.65 loss to $0.65 profit, as fuel expense surged over $2.2 billion or 83% year-over-year in the second quarter alone. American was able to offset only roughly 50% of that fuel headwind through higher fares.

    One penny of extra fuel cost equals about $10 million, chief financial officer Devon May said at the conference, adding that the airline will guide to the fourth quarter when reporting earnings next month.

    “That’s $1 billion dollar run up we’re seeing in the fourth quarter,” May said. “The great thing is we’re coming in with a stronger balance sheet or a less debt than we’ve had in more than a decade. The company is sitting on a lot of liquidity, so we feel really good about the positioning we have right now.”

  • Battle with Trump is sending Canada into the arms of the EU

    Battle with Trump is sending Canada into the arms of the EU

    BRUSSELS — Locked in a trade war with President Donald Trump and pivoting away from the United States, Canada is seeking stronger ties in Europe and Asia as a shield against Washington’s volatility.

    On Wednesday, sitting as a guest of honor inside the European Parliament, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney received an unprecedented offer: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she wants to make Canada the first “associate member” of the 27-nation bloc.

    “We want to bring the relationship with Canada to the highest level possible,” she said in her annual State of the Union address.

    The declaration at the Parliament in Strasbourg, France, received a standing ovation from European lawmakers and from Carney.

    The offer, which would see two longtime U.S. partners expand their alliance from trade to security, highlights the extent to which Trump is redefining alliances.

    The president’s foreign policy gyrations, including threats to take Greenland from NATO ally Denmark, have triggered a reckoning among Washington’s traditional friends about their relationship with the United States.

    Amid the standoff with Trump on tariffs, Canada has pursued a thaw in ties with China including new trade deals. Beijing has praised Ottawa for walking away from talks rather than caving to Trump’s demands, and this month, China and Canada revived a dialogue on military issues after an eight-year break.

    Ahead of his trip to Europe this week, Carney said he wanted a “unique alliance” with the EU, including on energy and critical minerals, to help safeguard Canada against economic coercion. “The world’s more dangerous and divided, and friends need to stick together in these times,” he said.

    European leaders have echoed Canada’s bid to strengthen ties.

    “Dear Mark, I said we must urgently reimagine our partnerships,” von der Leyen said in her speech. “So, I would like to work with you on opening the door for Canada to be the first associate member of the European Union.”

    Von der Leyen described the move as “not against anyone else, but for our common strength.”

    Yet America’s jilted allies are having once-unthinkable conversations about whether Washington could abandon or even turn against them, and are working to limit their dependence.

    European leaders have vowed to take responsibility for their defenses as the U.S. shifts resources away and have rushed to close ranks with allies including Britain and Canada.

    A new arrangement with Canada could involve visa-free work for Canadians in the 27 nations of the EU, said two European diplomats, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy. Talks could include further reducing trade barriers and boosting joint arms production, they said.

    Carney said Tuesday that visa-free opportunities are “one aspect of the discussion.”

    In facing Trump’s tariffs and rhetoric about annexing Canada, Carney has cast himself as a leader who can rally together “middle powers” to protect their interests.

    Trump has leveled personal attacks against Carney since trade talks between the North American neighbors collapsed last month. Carney retaliated against U.S. tariffs after rejecting U.S. demands that he said would undermine Canada’s sovereignty.

    “What Carney has been saying to Europe, to Latin America, to Asia, is that now’s the time to stand up to Donald Trump,” said Fen Hampson, a professor of international affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa. “That’s his message: We’re going to stand up, and if you guys have any guts, you’ll do the same thing.”

    Carney, who has described Canada as “the most European non-European country,” has found a receptive audience in Europe. He is scheduled to give a speech at the European Parliament today.

    But while European nations similarly stared down the barrel of Trump’s threats, EU leaders ultimately tabled retaliatory measures and agreed to a trade deal with higher tariffs to prevent a spiraling confrontation.

    Valérie Hayer, a French lawmaker who leads a centrist faction in the European Parliament, told Carney on Wednesday that he has “shown what to do in the face of Trump: Refuse to compromise … speak the language of power.”

    “Canada is welcome in the European Union because we share the same values and our interests align,” Hayer added. “So let’s go further.”

    Von der Leyen, who heads the EU executive branch, did not offer details on how associate membership for Canada would work or when it might occur.

    Instead, she used her speech to tout plans for a deeper partnership on economic security, energy, and technology, as well as in the Arctic. “We see the world with the same eyes,” von der Leyen said.

    She said the two would build on their existing free trade agreement and “integrate” their defense industries.

    Canada last year sent some 70% of its exports to the United States, which is also the E.U.’s largest export market for goods. Canada and Europe have sought access to new markets via deals with other trade partners, including in Latin America and Asia, amid Chinese competition and U.S. pressure.

    Trade between the EU and Canada stood around $150 billion last year, while the U.S. and Canada traded more than $850 billion.

    The EU and Canada, which have long sheltered under U.S. military guarantees, have pledged to ramp up their defenses and collaborate on upgrading their weapons industries. Like Canada, most EU countries are also members of the U.S.-led NATO alliance.

    Canada this year became the first non-European country to join the E.U.’s 150-billion-euro loan program for joint weapons procurement, giving Canadian arms manufacturers access.

    In a separate announcement this week, the European Parliament also said it plans to open a satellite office in Ottawa.

    The status of associate member, proposed by von der Leyen, does not exist in the European Union, which oversees trade policy for its 27 member states and operates a single economic market based on the free movement of goods and people.

    Creating such a category could complicate the EU setup with other nations such as Britain or Norway, and also potentially the membership bids of countries eager to join, such as Ukraine.

    Joining the EU can be a yearslong ordeal that requires thorny negotiations and legislative changes. Several nations on the continent have long been waiting in line, and the EU typically has not been flexible about membership rules.

    Earlier this week, commenting on a Wall Street Journal report about EU associate membership, Carney said that Canada was “not looking to become a member” of the EU but was seeking an enhanced alliance.

    “We share the same values,” Carney told ​reporters in Toronto. “We have the same priorities and we have very ⁠complementary strengths.”

    Hampson said the key question is how the new relationship “is actually defined” and whether “it is just a new bow tied around existing agreements.”

    “But if it does involve a much deeper and broader relationship than what we have now,” he added, “it will be significant.”

  • Centenarians living in Japan exceed 100,000 for the first time

    Centenarians living in Japan exceed 100,000 for the first time

    TOKYO — The number of people aged 100 or older in Japan surpassed a record 100,000 this year, the latest government figures show, underscoring the country’s rapidly aging and declining population.

    The Health and Welfare Ministry statistics released Tuesday show Japan now has 107,677 centenarians, up 7,914 from the previous year and exceeding the 100,000 mark for the first time. Nearly 88% of them are women.

    Kyoto resident Fuyo Kishimoto was recently recognized as the oldest Japanese woman at age 114. Japan’s oldest male is 112-year-old Hikaru Kato from Kumamoto in southern Japan.

    The figures were released to mark this year’s Sept. 15 Respect the Aged day, when healthy and active centenarians are honored by the government with a letter from Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and a silver sake cup.

    “I’m very pleased that many people are living a long, healthy and active lives,” Health Minister Kenichiro Ueno told reporters Tuesday, citing progress in medical technology, healthy lifestyle, and diet as contributing factors.

    Ueno noted the importance of maintaining a sustainable social security system as the population continues to age and decline.

    Many younger people, however, are not optimistic about their future.

    The National Institute of Population and Social Security Research last week released the results of a survey indicating more than 20% of both men and women who are single and aged between 18 and 34 have no intention of ever marrying, with nearly half saying they see no benefit in marriage.

    Ueno acknowledged the reasons for marriage reluctance among young people include the high costs of raising and educating children and the mental and physical burden on working parents. He said the government will continue addressing their concerns and attempt to turn around problems related to Japan’s aging population and dwindling births.

    Japan’s drastic population decline is inevitable, experts say, noting the country’s total fertility rate dropped to a record low 1.14 in 2025, far below the 2.1 children needed to be born to each Japanese woman to maintain the current population.

    Japan’s total population during the 2020 census stood at 126 million, almost 30% of which were 65 or older. Experts estimate there will be a decline to 87 million by 2070 with nearly 40% aged 65 or older, according to the national institute.

    There were 153 people aged 100 or older in Japan when centenarian surveys began in 1963. They exceeded 1,000 in 1981 and surpassed 10,000 in 1998, according to the Health and Welfare Ministry.

  • This type of compassion brings us the most benefit, new study shows

    This type of compassion brings us the most benefit, new study shows

    Studies have long suggested that helping others can make us feel happier, and this extends to caring about animals too — as anyone who volunteers can attest.

    But a new study about compassion offers a window into how it relates to mental health, and it turns out that one type of compassion has more impact than you might think: How we care about and treat ourselves.

    “What came out of the study is that if someone reported high compassion for others but low compassion for themselves, they tended to have anxiety, depression and low well-being,” said Bassam Khoury, lead researcher in the study and clinical psychologist and professor at McGill University in Canada.

    People who struggle with self-compassion, Khoury said, tend to describe themselves in harsh terms.

    “I have many patients saying, ‘I hate myself,’” he said.

    He offered an example of a daughter who takes her aging parent to every appointment but tells herself she’s not doing enough. Or a nurse who covers others’ shifts but misses her own doctor’s appointment.

    “It’s inhuman to care for everyone and not yourself,” Khoury said. “It will fail at some point.”

    Khoury said he sees this pattern often in his practice — and his latest study suggests that having compassion for others while having low compassion for yourself can harm your mental health.

    In the study, published last month in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, Khoury and colleagues surveyed more than 1,200 Canadians online. Participants answered detailed questionnaires about their sense of compassion — how considerate and caring they are toward themselves, toward others and toward animals — as well as their stress, anxiety and depression, emotional regulation, and overall well-being.

    A group of about 200 participants repeated the self-reported survey a few months later, so researchers could determine whether people’s compassion levels remained consistent over time.

    Khoury said self-compassion has four main components: thinking about yourself without judgment, actively taking care of yourself, feeling love and respect for yourself, and accepting comfort or help from others when you need it.

    Paul Gilbert, a clinical psychologist who created the Compassion Focused Therapy method, said compassion is about being considerate of someone’s suffering — including your own — and hoping to ease it. Gilbert was not a part of Khoury’s study.

    “Compassion really is the courage and wisdom to address suffering, whether it’s within you or other people,” Gilbert said. “Compassion is the way we deal with the mutual suffering of all of us.”

    On difficult days, Khoury said, someone with low self-compassion is far more likely to do something harmful to themselves than something kind.

    “This is a population that is much more at risk for mental health challenges,” he said.

    In Khoury’s study, the researchers sorted respondents into six groups based on their answers. Some groups had high compassion for people and animals, or only for animals, but also had low self-compassion. Despite their kindness and consideration toward others, these two groups reported more stress, anxiety and depression than the other groups.

    “If you do things for others but you still don’t take care of yourself, it doesn’t protect you,” Khoury said, noting that those who don’t practice self-compassion are more susceptible to compassion fatigue or burnout. “You can be the best caregiver, but at the end of the day, if you don’t love yourself, you will start resenting others.”

    Another group that had both high self-compassion and high compassion for others and animals reported the least anxiety and depression and the highest sense of well-being of any of the six groups.

    “It’s about balancing; being able to have self-compassion while having compassion for others,” Khoury said.

    Christopher Germer, a clinical psychologist and lecturer at Harvard Medical School who was not involved in Khoury’s study, said the pattern Khoury found is in line with other research on self-compassion. Germer, who studies self-compassion, recently wrote the book Self-Compassion for Shame.

    “Self-compassion is associated with just about every measure of psychological well-being that’s been studied so far,” Germer said. “To grow our compassion for others, it’s important to grow our compassion for ourselves.”

    Khoury cautioned that his study has several limitations, including that the sample skewed heavily female, and most participants were English-speaking Canadians. Khoury said he hopes to expand his research to larger, more diverse samples across different countries. Still, he said he’s confident the core findings will remain.

    One obstacle to self-compassion, he said, is the misconception that it is selfish or self-indulgent.

    “It’s actually the opposite,” he said. “There’s no ego in it. You’re taking care of yourself so you can be an even more loving person.”

    Germer said the simplest way to practice self-compassion is to actually put a hand over your heart (some research suggests it may help reduce the stress hormone cortisol) “as a reminder that we, too, matter; we, too, are in the room; and we, too are suffering,” he said.

    He recommended asking yourself: “What do I need right now? That could be physically, emotionally, relationally, spiritually,” he said. “Then do it for yourself.”

    For those looking to build self-compassion, Khoury suggested a few starting points:

    Carve out time each day that belongs to only you. Take a walk, watch television, have a bath — anything that is done for you and not for someone else.

    Try meditation. Khoury said loving-kindness meditation is one of the most effective tools for cultivating self-compassion.

    Accept help from others. This is what people struggle with the most, Khoury said, but letting others take care of you is part of taking care of yourself.

    Consider therapy. If someone is holding negative beliefs about themselves, talking things through with a professional, Khoury said, is itself an act of self-compassion.

    “Anyone can get better at it,” Khoury said. “You just need to put some work in.”

    Building self-compassion doesn’t require you to sacrifice compassion for others. If anything, Khoury said, they are connected.

    “If you take more time for yourself, you are also helping others in a way,” he said.

    But self-compassion isn’t a quick fix. It takes practice.

    “We are all like a flower,” Khoury said. “If you water it every day, it will be much better than if you do nothing and hope it survives.”

  • Maduro ally Alex Saab pleads guilty in a $195M money laundering case, agrees to cooperate

    Maduro ally Alex Saab pleads guilty in a $195M money laundering case, agrees to cooperate

    MIAMI — A close ally of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro long described by U.S. officials as the ousted leader’s frontman pleaded guilty Tuesday to a single count of money laundering tied to an alleged bribery conspiracy to win lucrative government contracts in the South American country.

    As part of the plea deal, Alex Saab agreed to cooperate in continuing federal investigations, paving the way for his eventual cooperation against his former protector. He also agreed to forfeit $195 million in criminal proceeds from the corruption scheme.

    Saab, 54, was deported in May by Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodriguez to the U.S., which has been targeting the Colombian-born business owner for more than a decade.

    The money laundering offense carries a maximum 20-year penalty but prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence at the low end of the recommended range and seek additional reductions should his cooperation prove substantial.

    Saab was previously charged during the first Trump administration in 2019 and then arrested during a refueling stop in Cape Verde on what the Venezuelan government described as a high-level humanitarian mission to Iran.

    But President Joe Biden pardoned Saab in 2023 in exchange for the release of several imprisoned Americans in Venezuela. The deal, part of a failed effort by the Biden White House to lure Maduro into holding a free presidential election, was harshly criticized by Republicans and federal law enforcement officials, who immediately began investigating Saab for other alleged crimes not covered by the narrowly tailored pardon.

    “This case sends a clear message: Political connections, wealth, and proximity to a corrupt regime will not put anyone beyond the reach of American justice,” said Jason A. Reding Quiñones, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida, who attended Tuesday’s proceedings along with more than a dozen federal agents.

    The new indictment centers on contracts for the so-called CLAP program set up by Maduro to provide staples — rice, corn flour, cooking oil — to poor Venezuelans at a time of rampant hyperinflation and a crumbling currency.

    High-level protection offered in exchange for bribes

    In an eight-page statement of facts submitted as part of the plea deal, Saab admitted to skimming at least $195 million from at least six contracts awarded to companies he controlled to import food and medicine.

    The scheme “had the approval, participation, and protection of some of the Venezuelan government’s highest ranking public authorities,” including from an individual described only as “Government Official 1A,” who designated a surrogate — one of four unnamed co-defendants — to receive bribe payments on their behalf.

    Also receiving $17 million in kickbacks was former Gov. Jose Gregorio Vielma Mora, a Maduro ally who with Government Official 1A’s support secretly awarded a Saab-controlled company a contract in 2016 to deliver 10 million boxes of food rations in Tachira state, prosecutors allege. Vielma Mora was previously charged in the conspiracy in 2021.

    To conceal the criminal activity and hide the payments, Saab said, he and his associates falsified shipping records and set up a network of shell companies and bank accounts in countries including Antigua, Bulgaria, Liechtenstein, the Marshall Islands, Montenegro, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United Arab Emirates.

    Over time, as U.S. sanctions deepened the country’s financial woes, Saab and his associates received payment in the form of Venezuelan oil, gold, and other natural resources.

    In court Tuesday, Saab told Judge Kathleen Williams that he takes the antidepressant Zoloft and other medicines daily for what he described as “post-traumatic stress disorder” following his 2020 arrest.

    Saab could become a witness against Maduro

    U.S. officials have long described Saab as Maduro’s “bag man” and could ask him to serve as a character witness against the former president, who is awaiting trial on drug charges in Manhattan after being captured in a raid by the U.S. military in January.

    The new U.S. prosecution of Saab and Maduro is taking place as the Trump administration overhauls relations with Venezuela, focusing its attention on tapping into Venezuela’s vast oil reserves. This month, Trump announced a partnership with Venezuelan oil entrepreneur Alejandro Betancourt in which the U.S. government will gain a stake in and access to at-cost crude shipments from oil fields with a potential to produce 65 billion barrels.

    Saab was little known even in Venezuela until after his first arrest, in 2020, when Maduro’s government invested huge resources rallying public support for his release.

    Rodríguez, then serving as Maduro’s vice president, helped mount an international campaign in which she referred to Saab as an “innocent Venezuelan diplomat” who had been illegally “kidnapped” by the U.S.

    But after Maduro’s capture, Rodríguez distanced herself from Saab, firing him from her cabinet and stripping him of his role as the main conduit for foreign companies looking to invest in Venezuela.

    Saab amassed a fortune through Venezuelan government contracts but became even more valuable to Maduro as U.S. sanctions forced Venezuela to conduct much of its oil sales and foreign trade outside of Western financial institutions.

  • Gulf Arab states explore new options as U.S. bases fail to deter Iran

    Gulf Arab states explore new options as U.S. bases fail to deter Iran

    RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Gulf Arab countries have long relied for their security on the U.S. military bases that they host.

    But after six months of war, the repeated pummeling of those countries by Iranian missiles and drones has made the limitations of U.S. security guarantees abundantly clear.

    Iran and its allies have nearly destroyed some of the U.S. bases, set luxury hotels ablaze, and, most recently, knocked offline one of the most critical pieces of energy infrastructure in the world, an oil pipeline that stretches across Saudi Arabia.

    Their backs against a wall, Gulf Arab officials are now trying to cobble together different ways to avoid attacks by Iran and its allies, including direct diplomacy with the Islamic Republic.

    Even that option faces challenges. On Sunday night, a meeting that was scheduled for Monday between Iran and the Gulf Arab states was abruptly postponed. The delay came after Saudi Arabia and Iran reached an impasse in discussions about the Strait of Hormuz — a crucial route for Gulf energy exporters — according to a senior Gulf official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy.

    Analysts say the region’s leaders have no choice but to seek different security options after the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran exposed the vulnerabilities of the Gulf Arab countries and emboldened the Islamic Republic.

    “We’re stuck in this position of trying to build something new while maintaining some of the old,” said Bader Al-Saif, an assistant professor of history at Kuwait University. “We need to snap out of this external protector syndrome.”

    The island nation of Bahrain, for example, has been host to a major U.S. naval base for decades in the hopes of protecting itself from Iran. But as in other Gulf countries, the base became a target instead.

    The base was nearly destroyed in February, on the first day of Iran’s retaliatory attacks against the assault launched by the United States and Israel. Most of the sailors stationed there were evacuated to Florida, leaving a skeleton crew, according to a U.S. military official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters.

    Some sailors in Bahrain were evacuated so rapidly that the U.S. Navy is still trying to reunite them with their belongings, Adm. Daryl Caudle, chief of naval operations, said at a recent town hall meeting. It is unclear when they will return, he said.

    For the United States and its allies in the Middle East, the war has incurred steep costs. Iran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz represents a major strategic failure and an economic setback for Gulf energy exporters. The inability of U.S. forces to fend off attacks by Iran is another strategic failure, which could have significant consequences for those countries and for the United States’ projection of power.

    Yet Bahrain and the other Gulf countries, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait, have no clear, single alternative to the United States as the guarantor of their security.

    Their militaries are smaller and weaker than Iran’s, despite spending hundreds of billions of dollars on advanced weaponry in recent decades, including American F-15 fighter jets and Patriot missile defense systems.

    China and Russia have not stepped in to defend the Gulf countries, despite close ties with many of them.

    Many Gulf officials are calling for greater regional self-sufficiency in defense. But efforts to bolster regional security — like a new defense pact among Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Turkey — are unproven. It remains unclear whether any of these countries will be willing and able to come to each other’s aid.

    The most realistic option for Gulf countries is to build defense partnerships that will “supplement, rather than replace, the U.S. security umbrella,” said Yasmine Farouk, Gulf and Arabian Peninsula project director at the International Crisis Group.

    Gulf analysts and officials say that without U.S. assistance and American weaponry, such as air defenses, the damage to the Gulf states would have been far worse. Dozens of people were killed in the Iranian attacks, instead of hundreds or thousands. Flights carrying tourists and businesspeople were canceled and delayed but have started to resume.

    Still, Iran’s campaign wreaked havoc on the energy-rich economies of the Gulf countries, cracking their images as safe havens in a volatile region.

    The war proved that the Gulf’s advanced defense systems are not “leak proof,” and that Iran can “impose major costs” on the countries by using large numbers of relatively cheap drones, said Kristian Alexander, a senior fellow at the Rabdan Security & Defence Institute, a government-linked research institution in the UAE.

    Facing fierce counterattacks from Iran, the United States “prioritized protecting its personnel and defending Israel,” Alexander added. “These priorities did not always coincide with the Gulf’s needs to protect airports, ports, desalination plants.”

    The short supply of U.S. missile interceptors globally also posed a challenge for the Gulf Arab states in the early weeks of the war, and they have tried to fill the gap by turning to Ukraine and other European countries. But even enhanced air defenses against relatively inexpensive Iranian drones cannot provide complete protection.

    Anna Kelly, a White House spokesperson, said President Donald Trump is “in constant communication” with regional partners and that the United States “maintains stronger bonds with these countries than ever before.”

    She dismissed the idea that U.S. military protection for the Gulf countries has been insufficient, saying that analysts who assert that “are not privy to sensitive diplomatic conversations and have no idea what they are talking about.”

    This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

  • Pollution spikes after Trump halted global air-monitoring efforts, report says

    Pollution spikes after Trump halted global air-monitoring efforts, report says

    Air pollution in dozens of cities around the world rose after U.S. embassies and consulates stopped monitoring air quality readings last year, according to a study published Monday.

    The Trump administration halted the program that published independent air quality data at more than 80 U.S. diplomatic sites in March 2025, citing budget constraints.

    Later that year, local air pollution levels increased by between 24% and 33% in 46 of those cities, according to Monday’s study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

    “This is such a big loss,” said Zoey Zhou, an assistant professor of climate at Columbia University and one of the study’s authors. “Not only for the data, but also for the health impacts and also for accountability.”

    The State Department’s program had been linked in a previous study to lower air pollution levels in the cities where it was active. Its pullback came amid other moves the administration has made to curtail climate change research and regulations on air quality. The Environmental Protection Agency repealed limits on greenhouse gas emissions for coal and natural gas power plants on Monday.

    The State Department did not respond to a request for comment on the recent findings and on whether the monitoring program will resume.

    The program originated in 2008 when the U.S. Embassy in Beijing began to share air quality information from a monitor installed on its roof. The readings, which sometimes topped the Chinese government’s reported levels, drew local anger and pressured Chinese officials to act.

    A 2022 study of 50 cities where U.S. embassies began monitoring air quality found that it led to significantly lower air pollution and increased local Google searches for terms like “air quality.”

    “The US Embassy monitoring program provided high quality and credible information to the public about the state of their air, often where there were no other sources of such information,” Andrea La Nauze, an associate professor of economics at Deakin University in Australia and one of the authors of the 2022 study, wrote to the Washington Post. (La Nauze was not involved in the most recent report.)

    Experts said the monitoring was valuable in cities and countries where local governments did not provide air quality information or offered inaccurate reports.

    “This has been very valuable to the citizens of those countries to be able to understand what are the levels of air pollution, and how much trust should they place in the numbers that are published by the national government or by the city or region,” said Kristie Ebi, a professor at the Center for Health and the Global Environment at the University of Washington. “And that has been useful then for people to take action.”

    Monday’s study investigated whether air quality gains would continue when that information disappeared, the authors wrote. They used satellite imagery to estimate air pollution levels in 46 cities where U.S. embassies and consulates halted monitoring in March 2025.

    By September that year, the aerosol optical depth — a measure of particles in the air derived from satellite imagery that is correlated with levels of PM 2.5, pollutants small enough to enter the bloodstream — around those cities had increased by about 33%. By November 2025, pollution levels had decreased but were still around 24% higher than before monitoring stopped.

    A 33% increase in aerosol optical depth corresponds to an increase of about 2 micrograms per cubic meter of PM 2.5, according to the study. The World Health Organization’s global air quality guidelines recommend that average PM 2.5 levels not exceed 5 micrograms per cubic meter each year.

    Grouped by region, the largest average increases in aerosol optical depth appeared at sites in Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Asia, according to Zhou, the study co-author. She cautioned that the number of sites in each region was small and that the study was not designed to isolate particular countries or cities, where readings could have been affected by other local factors.

    Zhou wrote that the reduction in air pollution between September and November 2025 could suggest that other sources of air pollution information gradually filled the gap after U.S. embassies stopped their monitoring. But she said the pullback by American diplomatic missions, which issued highly visible and trusted air quality reports, was still a large loss.

    Zhou added that her study did not perform a full cost-benefit analysis of the air quality monitoring program for the U.S. embassies involved.

    Ebi of the University of Washington, who was not involved in the new study, said that the U.S. embassies’ data was also invaluable to researchers investigating other climate trends affected by air pollution, such as the spread of wildfire smoke and heat waves.

    “As a scientist, I don’t understand why there is such a strong focus on removing information,” Ebi said. “Of moving to a situation where people are more ignorant, less knowledgeable about the harms they may be facing … and what actions to take to help reduce those harms.”

  • Trump’s planned sale of controversial bombs to Israel is largest in years

    Trump’s planned sale of controversial bombs to Israel is largest in years

    The Trump administration is preparing a multibillion-dollar sale of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel in the largest single sale of the controversial munition in recent years, a U.S. official told the Washington Post.

    The $2.8 billion package, which would be purchased with U.S. taxpayer dollars, includes 40,000 bombs that weigh 2,000 pounds each, including 20,000 MK-84s and 20,000 BLU-117s, said the official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss military matters. The sale also includes 20,000 I-2000 Penetrator warheads.

    Among the most destructive munitions in Western military arsenals, an MK-84 explosion sends metal fragments in every direction for thousands of feet, can rip through metal and thick concrete, and often creates large craters in the earth.

    The pending transaction has been informally notified to congressional committees, setting up a potential litmus test for Democrats as frustrations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have created unprecedented strain in the U.S.-Israel relationship.

    Though described as a sale, the transaction is financed through a mechanism known as Foreign Military Financing, in which the United States provides the money that Israel uses to buy the weapons.

    When asked about the humanitarian concerns, a senior administration official said: “All foreign arms sales are moving through the appropriate process. We do not comment on pending sales.”

    The Israeli Embassy did not respond to a request for comment.

    The size of the package eclipses previous sales of 2,000-pound munitions to Israel during the Biden administration and the Trump administration, including a controversial $2.04 billion sale in 2025 that bypassed the normal congressional review process.

    The 2,000-pound bombs have been employed by Israel on hundreds of occasions in Gaza and Lebanon, playing a significant role in the death toll of those conflicts. Israel has drawn criticism for routinely dropping MK-84s in zones it designated as safe for civilians in Gaza.

    “They do like to use them a lot when they’re trying to target any building,” said Trevor Ball, a former explosive-ordnance-disposal technician for the U.S. Army. “If Hezbollah or whoever is in a building, an MK-84 will bring down the whole building.”

    Nicknamed the “hammer” by U.S. pilots in the first Gulf War, it is the only munition that President Joe Biden’s administration stopped sending to Israel during the Gaza war out of concern about the killing of Palestinian civilians. That involved suspending a single shipment of the munitions in the spring of 2024. The policy was immediately reversed by President Donald Trump in January 2025, his first month back in office.

    “Given the way Israel conducted its air war in Gaza and, to some extent, in southern Lebanon, there are real concerns about how such weapons would be used in densely populated areas,” said Brian Finucane, a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group. “That’s assuming that you have valid military targets to start with because there are concerns about what Israel deems to be valid military targets.”

    U.S. support for the sale comes despite several areas of tension between Israel and the Trump administration, including over the violent attacks on Palestinians by Israeli settlers in the West Bank, and ongoing concerns about Israeli military operations in Lebanon and Syria. Israelis also have spurned Trump’s peace plan for Gaza, which involves Hamas disarming in exchange for a withdrawal of Israeli forces.

    When the Trump administration struck a short-lived deal with Iran aimed at ending the war there, allies of Netanyahu harshly criticized the agreement and attacked Vice President JD Vance for negotiating it.

    As the conflict has dragged on ahead of the midterm elections, Trump and his aides have grown increasingly frustrated with Netanyahu, who pushed for the war on the promise of a quick and decisive victory.

    Though the delivery time for such orders can be multiple years, approving such sales sends a broader signal about the bilateral relationship.

    “If the Trump administration’s goal is to calm things down in the Middle East, the timing of this is unusual,” Finucane said. “Whether they intend to or not, it sends a vote of confidence to Israel.”

    The Trump administration is pressing the leaders of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee to approve the sale.

    Republican and Democratic leaders historically have backed such sales, but they are starting to face resistance from rank-and-file members regarding U.S. support for Israel stemming from the unpopularity of the wars in Gaza and Iran.

    Polls consistently show most Americans oppose the war in Iran, which has raised energy costs and increased inflation. In July, more than 100 House Democrats voted to end all U.S. aid to Israel, signaling a historic shift in the party’s opposition to the country.

    Republicans are more unified in their support for Israel, but a growing number of conservative commentators, including Megyn Kelly, Tucker Carlson, and Candace Owens, have questioned Washington’s steadfast backing and the $3.8 billion of aid the U.S. sends to Israel every year.

    Besides the MK-84, the sale includes I-2000s, a penetrating bomb body used to attack hardened structures, and BLU-117s, a variant of the MK-84 that has thermal protective coating to make it safer for naval storage.

  • Democrats gain edge as Trump drags down GOP, new poll finds

    Democrats gain edge as Trump drags down GOP, new poll finds

    With fewer than 50 days until the midterms, Democrats have developed a clear advantage over Republicans as the president has lost the public’s trust on the economy, according to a new national poll from the New York Times and Siena University.

    President Donald Trump’s lingering unpopularity and intense frustration over his management of cost-of-living issues, in particular, have deepened Republican vulnerabilities as Democrats push to win control of both the House and Senate.

    Likely voters favored Democratic candidates over Republicans by close to 9 percentage points in their congressional district — a metric that is closely watched by both parties as a leading indicator of political momentum.

    Trump’s approval rating continued to languish at 38% among likely voters, essentially unchanged from the lows it sank to after he went to war with Iran. A majority of voters disapproved of Trump’s handling of every major issue included in the poll: the economy, immigration, tariffs, the war, and, especially, the cost of living.

    And voters said they trusted Democrats more than Republicans on not just healthcare and foreign wars but also on the two issues that powered Trump’s 2024 victory: immigration and the economy.

    The political conditions found by the poll suggest the makings of a potential Democratic wave in November. But that outcome is far from assured. Thanks in part to gerrymandering, relatively few House seats are truly competitive, and in the run-up to the midterms, Republicans drew new House maps in several states favorable to their candidates. And even a nearly 9-point advantage would not guarantee flipping some of the Senate seats Democrats are counting on in 2026 — Texas, Ohio, Alaska, Iowa — which Trump won by double digits in 2024.

    Still, independent voters have especially soured on Trump. Just 10% of them said the economy was better today than a year ago and only 27% approve of Trump’s job performance overall. And in the fight for Congress, 57% of independent voters said they planned to vote for a Democrat compared with only 34% for a Republican.

    The cost of living is dragging down Republicans more than any other issue, as even some Republican voters lose faith in Trump’s economy. Only 28% of voters said they approved of how Trump has managed matters related to affordability.

    Even Trump’s most loyal and durable demographic base — white voters without college degrees — disapproved of the president’s handling of the cost of living by a wide 21-percentage point margin.

    And opposition to Trump is intensifying. The survey was the first Times/Siena poll in his second term to find a majority of voters, 52%, saying that they “strongly” disapproved of him.

    The war in Iran, which has driven gas prices above $4 a gallon, is also weighing down the president. More than three-quarters of independent voters said they disapproved of his handling of the conflict, and so did nearly a quarter of Trump’s own 2024 voters.

    Yet the survey found that the GOP’s vulnerabilities extend beyond Trump.

    Voters see Republicans broadly as more extreme, more elitist, and more corrupt than Democrats, according to the poll. And while voters continue to have doubts about both parties, they aligned more with the Democratic Party on both cultural and economic matters than the Republican Party in the survey.

    One glimmer of good news for Republicans is that the political situation has not deteriorated further since the spring. Yes, Trump is unpopular. But he is not more so than he was five months ago. The Democratic Party is viewed as too far left. And Republicans are generally outpolling Trump — including on how they would handle particular issues.

    Still, by an 11-point margin, voters said they would prefer for Democrats to control Congress after the November election.

    “All I know is right now, the Republicans are in power and I’m not really seeing the change I wanted to see,” said Elizabeth Gloden, 21, an independent college student in Arizona who voted for Trump in 2024 but is planning to vote Democratic this year. “I’m Gen Z. I am in the area where we want to move out of our parents’ houses, but we can’t because everything costs a million dollars,” she added. “I think it’d be a good idea to just see the other side what they can do.”

    There were indications that the Democrats were winning back groups they had lost ground with in the 2024 presidential race. The current Democratic strength in the battle for Congress was being driven heavily in the poll by younger voters (those under 30 favored Democrats by 35 percentage points), Hispanic voters (43 points) and independent voters (23 points) — all groups the party had seen sagging support from two years ago.

    Trump’s approval rating among voters under 30 stands at an abysmal 18%.

    The economy ranked as the top issue for voters. Only 14% of voters said the economy was better than it was a year ago — down from 31% who said so in January.

    The erosion among Republicans is especially stark. While 72% of Republicans said in January that the economy was better than it had been the prior year, only 29% of Republicans said so now.

    Trump has tried to wave off those concerns. “This has been the most successful two years financially and every other way in the history of the presidency,” Trump claimed in his address last week at a convention in Dallas.

    Voters are not buying it.

    “I actually feel really gaslit because I’m constantly hearing from Republicans, from conservatives just in the media in general, that ‘don’t believe your lying eyes, everything’s great, wages have increased,’ all of these different things,” said Meghan Demetrios, 40, an independent voter in South Carolina.

    “I feel like I’m super poor in America,” she continued. “I got a new career job about nine months ago, and I was so proud of myself and so excited. And I thought everything was going to get a little bit better. And I turn around, and I find that every single bill I have has gone up.”

    She plans to vote Democratic this year.

    All told, 71% of voters disapprove of how Trump is handling the cost of living while 28% approve — a net disapproval of 43 percentage points, which is 13 points worse than it was January.

    Economic hardship appears to be especially hampering the GOP among lower-wage earners.

    Those earning less than $50,000 were more than twice as likely to say they would vote for a Democratic congressional candidate this fall rather than a Republican, 63% to 31%.

    That would represent a dramatic shift from 2024, when Trump narrowly carried that group, according to exit polling.

    More than half of voters said they worry more about Republicans in Congress allowing Trump to go too far, while 39% said that they worry about Democrats trying to move the country too far to the left.

    Adding to the party’s problems, Republicans face an enthusiasm gap: 61% of Democrats said they were almost certain to vote, compared with 56% of Republicans.

    One of the Democratic Party’s potential vulnerabilities is being seen as outside the mainstream. The share of voters who see Democrats as too far left has grown to 50%, up from 47% earlier this year. (But likely voters were more likely to describe the Republican Party as “extreme” than the Democratic Party.)

    And a 51% majority of voters had an unfavorable view of socialism — one reason Trump’s convention in Dallas repeatedly used that label.

    “The Democrats have always done a horrible job of supporting their own cause because they can’t get out of their own way,” said Thomas Lappin, 48, a Democrat who lives in Austin, Texas, and who wished his party would move strategically to the center. “I feel like they’re just doing this again and every time they get their act together, they just somehow screw it up again.”

    About a tenth of all voters, including Democrats, Republicans, and independents, say they disagree with both parties when it comes to economic issues. This year, Democrats seem to be winning them over, at least for now.

    James Witherington, 41, left the Army after two decades last year and is now a real estate investor in Colorado Springs. He called his voter registration — he’s a Republican — a “loaded question” these days, considering his frustrations with Trump, whom he called “an egomaniac.”

    “This is an unnecessary war,” he said. “Do I hate Iran? Yes. Should we destroy them? Yes. But now is not the time.”

    But Witherington said he is still planning to vote for his local Republican congressman, Jeff Crank, whom he knew by name. “He emails me about veterans problems,” he said.

    “The extreme left has gone too far,” he said. “The extreme right is like the high school jock bully. But most people are in the middle. Most people are just walking down the hall.”

    This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

  • Iranian strikes have damaged hundreds of structures at U.S. bases, watchdog says

    Iranian strikes have damaged hundreds of structures at U.S. bases, watchdog says

    Iranian strikes have damaged or destroyed hundreds of buildings and other structures at U.S. bases across the Middle East, and caused about $184 million worth of damage at U.S. diplomatic facilities, according to a Pentagon watchdog report.

    The inspector general’s report to Congress on Operation Epic Fury — the Trump administration’s name for the war with Iran — also details the extent of U.S. munitions shortages, in the first comprehensive public accounting of the war, which is now in its seventh month.

    The report, released Monday, covers operations through June 30. It contains input from the departments of Defense and State and other agencies to provide the most complete picture yet of the cost and military impact of the ongoing conflict.

    Buildings and other structures at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, and Jordan were damaged or destroyed in the war, the report stated, adding that U.S. diplomatic facilities in Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates also sustained damage.

    The mounting costs of the war and impact on U.S. munitions stockpiles has already come under scrutiny. In July, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told a Senate hearing that the war has cost $37.5 billion and defended the administration’s request for a further $67 billion to restock the Pentagon’s arsenal and avoid looming budget shortfalls.

    The latest report details how the war has “resulted in strategic inventory shortfalls” of munitions and “revealed industrial base bottlenecks for munitions resupply.”

    It said the Defense Department is working to “streamline” procurement and production processes, as well as stockpile critical materials, components, and munitions to mitigate the shortage. But while these efforts have begun, the defense industrial base requires “significant lead time” to expand production.

    “The most persistent bottlenecks remain in the production of solid rocket motors, the availability of high-grade explosives and propellants, and the recruitment of skilled manufacturing labor,” it states.

    The expenditure of U.S. munitions is increasingly worrying U.S. allies and Pentagon officials in the Indo-Pacific region who fear the war in Iran could undermine readiness for a potential conflict with China. The weapons drain has become a source of tension between President Donald Trump and Hegseth, though Trump has denied U.S. weapons are running low.

    On Monday, Trump touted U.S. weapons stockpiles in a post on Truth Social, saying he had received a report noting the U.S. is producing “more Exquisite and Elite Weapons than at any time in our History” that were being delivered to U.S. forces.

    “A primary focus of this production has been Patriots, THAAD Systems, Tomahawks, and other Standard Missile Systems, of which we already have large numbers in stock,” he said.

    The Pentagon and the White House did not immediately reply to requests for comment early Tuesday.

    The Washington Post reported in May that the U.S. had depleted much of its inventory of advanced missile-defense interceptors, using up roughly half of the Pentagon’s total inventory of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, interceptors. The U.S. military also fired more than 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles in the first four weeks of war, a rate that has alarmed some Pentagon officials.

    The extent of the munitions the U.S. has used during Operation Epic Fury illustrates the “magnitude and complexity” of the challenge posed by Iran, the report said, noting Iran’s large armed forces, extensive underground facilities, and decades of building a domestic defense industry.

    The U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury on Feb. 28 in joint strikes with Israel that killed Iran’s leader at the time, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The war has now entered its seventh month, with Iran retaining leverage over the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway for oil and gas flows from the Persian Gulf. A recent lightning offensive by Houthi rebels in Yemen, supported by Iran, has threatened to further imperil shipping through the Bab al-Mandab Strait.

    Dozens of U.S. aircraft have been damaged or destroyed during the operation, including four F-15E fighter jets, one F-35A damaged in enemy fire over Iran, and several other aircraft and helicopters, the report said.

    More than 50,000 U.S. service members have been deployed throughout U.S. Central Command’s area of responsibility in support of the operation, the watchdog report said. A total of 18 have died, the report said, including several in July. It said 417 service members were wounded between Feb. 28 and June 30.

    The State Department has also incurred around $113 million in costs, including nearly $80 million responding to events such as the evacuation of U.S. citizens and State Department personnel, the report said, adding that about 9,000 Americans have left the region on charter flights and buses.

    The war has also had an “immediate negative impact” on U.S. assistance across the Middle East, including agriculture, food, health, nutrition, and water sanitation, because of the departure of embassy staff, the report said.