Weekday morning and evening editions. Saturdays once. Good news on Sundays. All sources labeled.
ISRAEL’S BROADEST LEBANON INCURSION IN 25 YEARS
Israel expanded its ground assault in Lebanon over the weekend with its deepest military push into the country since 2001. The Israeli military says Hezbollah fired more than 300 projectiles at Israeli soldiers and at northern Israel across Saturday and Sunday. Israel’s response was not limited to the south.
From Al Jazeera’s correspondent reporting from Tyre: “The entire south of Lebanon is now a conflict zone. People are being targeted in their vehicles on the main highways, and in areas north of Tyre along the road to Sidon.” Multiple strikes hit densely populated neighbourhoods in Tyre, including one that struck a residential building with several missiles. Israel had issued forced displacement orders ahead of the strikes. Strikes on Sunday also killed at least four people in the town of al-Abbasieh near Tyre. Hiram Hospital in Tyre reported 13 staff members injured in the strikes.
Bloomberg reported that the latest escalation has shattered a brittle ceasefire declared after Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the Iran war. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week that a large Israeli ground force was pushing deep into southern Lebanon to seize areas and establish what he called a “security zone.” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul called the advance “cause for serious concern,” warning that further escalation “will exacerbate the already tense situation and trigger new waves of displacement.”
The Lebanon escalation is not separate from the MoU negotiations with Iran. Iran has insisted any agreement covers Lebanon. An Israeli official said Trump told Netanyahu last week that Israel retains “freedom of action against threats on all fronts, including Lebanon.” Those two positions are not compatible.
🇺🇸 What American readers need to know: Israel is conducting its broadest ground campaign in Lebanon in 25 years while Washington’s attention is fixed on Iran negotiations. European governments are issuing public warnings about escalation. The current MoU draft, as the US has described it, would not cover Lebanon — a position Iran disputes and Israel is using to its advantage right now.
Sources: Al Jazeera (Qatar, state-funded/editorially independent — correspondent reporting from Tyre, displacement orders, al-Abbasieh casualties); Bloomberg (US, markets/business — ground incursion scope, ceasefire context); Times of Israel (Israel, centre-right — German FM statement, hospital strikes, IDF footage); Lebanon LiveUAMap (strike tracking — Tyre district strikes, Nabatieh, Hiram Hospital)
IRAN MoU: WEEKEND STRIKES, NO DECISION
The memorandum of understanding to extend the ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz is still unsigned. The US and Iran exchanged military strikes over the weekend as President Trump sent back changes to the proposed deal.
Trump entered the Situation Room on Friday to make what he called a “final determination.” The meeting ran two hours and ended without one. A senior administration official told the New York Times that an agreement was still close but required further debate, including over the unfreezing of Iranian funds. The weekend US strikes targeted Iranian radar and command and control sites, described by the Pentagon as “self-defense” after Iran shot down a US MQ-1 drone operating over international waters.
The known MoU framework, per Axios and confirmed by the White House: unrestricted passage through the Strait of Hormuz, Iran to clear mines within 30 days, the US blockade lifted gradually, Iran commits not to seek nuclear weapons, and the first 60-day negotiation window focuses on Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile. On Friday, Trump posted to Truth Social that Iran's uranium stockpiles "will be unearthed by the United States... in close coordination and conjunction with the Islamic Republic of Iran, plus the International Atomic Energy Agency, and DESTROYED." Iranian state media immediately repudiated the claim.
Iran’s Foreign Minister said Sunday that “dialogue” continues. That is the most optimistic public statement from Tehran since Friday. It is not a commitment.
🇺🇸 What American readers need to know: Brent crude stands at $94.48 as of publication. Gas nationally averages $4.32 a gallon. The market believes a deal is more likely than not — but the deal is not signed, strikes resumed over the weekend, and the public accounts of what Iran has actually committed to remain contradictory. Until Trump signs and Iran confirms, neither number moves for the better.
Sources: CNN (US — weekend strikes, self-defense framing, no-decision Situation Room meeting); Axios (US — MoU framework details, Trump approval pending); Times of Israel (Israel, centre-right — Situation Room meeting, White House statement); Al Jazeera (Qatar, state-funded/editorially independent — Iranian FM Sunday statement)
TWO WEEKENDS, TWO CROWDS, TWO RESPONSES
The same weekend that federal agents used pepper spray and batons against protesters at a Newark immigration detention facility, Paris police used teargas and made nearly 900 arrests after Paris Saint-Germain won the Champions League. The tactics were similar. The contexts were not.
Delaney Hall is a Newark ICE detention facility run by private prison operator GEO Group. For more than a week, protesters have gathered outside over documented conditions inside: expired and worm-infested food, inadequate medical care, and what detainees describe as retaliation for their hunger and labor strike. Federal agents used pepper spray and batons against protesters outside. GEO Group confirmed that guards also used chemical agents on detainees inside. During one confrontation, video footage appeared to show federal agents pushing a protester into the path of an 18-wheeler truck, which ran over the protester’s leg. Agents then pinned the protester to the ground before carrying him away. Governor Mikie Sherrill eventually sent state police to take over from ICE and established a designated protest zone, calling the situation “unsafe.” Newark Mayor Ras Baraka imposed a 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew covering a half-mile around the facility. On Friday night, after the zone was established, state police moved in with pepper spray and riot gear against protesters at and near the zone. A street medic on the ground told Rolling Stone beforehand: “When sunset happens, they’re going to push us into that cage and mace the fuck out of us.” On Saturday, pro-ICE demonstrators arrived to counter-protest. By Sunday, clashes continued past the curfew.
In Budapest on Saturday night, PSG beat Arsenal to win the Champions League for the second consecutive year. France deployed 22,000 police across the capital. Around 20,000 fans gathered on the Champs-Elysées. Some aimed fireworks at officers, set cars on fire, and vandalized stores. Police responded with teargas. French authorities announced 890 arrests nationwide in France 24’s Monday morning final tally, including 283 in Paris, and confirmed one death — a young man killed in a road accident during the celebrations.
The numbers look similar on the surface. The situations are not. In Newark, people protesting the conditions under which the government is detaining other people were met with federal agents in riot gear. In Paris, people celebrating a soccer championship who threw fireworks at police were met with teargas. Al Jazeera covered both — framing Delaney Hall as “a flashpoint in the debate over United States President Donald Trump’s mass deportation drive” while running the Paris arrests as a sports crowd story. The BBC covered the Newark facility too, reporting on four detainees who escaped. Senator Andy Kim, who was at the facility, told reporters the detainees got out by pushing through what he described as drywall with mesh inside. Senator Cory Booker, who was allowed inside Delaney Hall for an oversight visit, said detainees described inadequate food and medical care as the reason for the strike.
🇺🇸 What American readers need to know: Members of Congress were denied full access to a federal detention facility on US soil. The governor of New Jersey had to deploy state police to relieve federal immigration agents because the situation had become unsafe. A private corporation is running the facility, collecting federal dollars, and its guards used chemical agents on people in civil detention. The Paris comparison isn’t a gotcha — it’s a frame for what proportionate policing of a large, volatile crowd actually looks like.
Sources: CNN (US — Sunday curfew protests, state AG statement, arrest figures); The Intercept (US, independent/left-leaning — GEO Group confirmation of chemical agents on detainees, congressional reports); ABC7 NY (US — Governor Sherrill statement, state police takeover, curfew); Jersey Vindicator (NJ local — video footage, protester pushed under truck); CBS New York (US — Friday night pepper spray in and around designated zone); Rolling Stone (US — street medic account, on-the-ground reporting); Al Jazeera (Qatar, state-funded/editorially independent — curfew coverage, photo essay, tear gas video); BBC (UK, public broadcaster — detainee escape coverage); Irish Times (Ireland, centrist — Paris PSG, 22,000 police deployed, arrest figures); France 24 (France, public broadcaster — 890 national arrests confirmed, one death)
Editor’s Note (this is strictly my opinion): I sat on my balcony in Paris the night of the PSG victory - three blocks from Parc Des Princes where they play their home games. It was joyous and fun before the match.
But I knew to stay home once the match started. I went in the crowd after the match last season when PSG won what would be their first of back-to-back Champion’s League titles and got gassed and stampeded. I wasn’t hurt, or even bothered by the gas (wasn’t my first, or even third time). Young people were being young people - in the words of Saint Tupac, they were “kicking up dust, givin’ a motherfuck.” The French Police blocked my path back home, but once I said in my very bad French, “j’habite ici” and pointed towards my apartment they waved me on.
Watching from my balcony this time around I saw the hordes of young brown and black boys waving their flags, givin’ a … well, you know. I saw police arrive, too. They launched gas from a fair distance straight into the air aimed to land near the crowds. Boys would go running, cops would give chase for a little while then stop. Sometimes they caught a dumb kid and gave him a crack with a baton - usually they missed and I wondered if it was on purpose. But even when they connected and a kid went down, the cops would stop, grab the dumbass by the scruff and send him off away from the crowd.
As I sat there it occurred to me that if this had been in any number of American cities those brown and black boys would not have been handled the same way I witnessed on Saturday (and Sunday) night. I have no doubt that in the United States, once any of those brown or black boys was down there would have been a beating. Some parent would have gotten a call to come get their son from a hospital, or worse. Anyone reading this or listening to me right now from any one of a number of cities I don’t even have to mention is likely nodding along. Especially if they are a brown or black skinned human in America right now.
There was one boy/young man I saw essentially doing laps. The crowd would show up, shirtless Jesus amongst them, the cops would come and chase them away and sometime later he would be back. Three times shirtless Jesus made the rounds. I am an atheist and still I caught myself saying a little prayer for the dumbass.
“Let him make it home to the people who love him. Don’t break him and make him pay for a night of dumbassery for the rest of his life.” I said the same prayer for the kid who asked me if I could throw down a bottle of water. I said it for all those stupid kids - yes, even the white ones.
When the night ended around 3 AM I saw shirtless Jesus one last time - shirted this time. Suddenly he was less Jesus and more Chris Cornell. He was chatting up some girls who paid him no mind so he turned and walked back towards what I assumed was home.
I am naturally untrusting of police anywhere I go. They make me uncomfortable and leave me feeling unsafe. But on that night I was surprised at how relieved I was that it was French police instead of US cops working the streets.
ALSO DEVELOPING — for the curious: Ebola, DRC and Uganda: The WHO has declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. The outbreak, now in its second month, has spread from rural Ituri Province to the cities of Bunia and Goma, and crossed into Uganda with confirmed cases. The Bundibugyo strain has no approved vaccine or treatment. US global health funding cuts are hampering the international response, a dimension receiving almost no coverage in American media. Sources: WHO, CNN
NUMBERS AT PUBLICATION
🇮🇷 Iran: 3,468 killed, 26,500+ injured (Iran Health Ministry via Al Jazeera tracker, May 20)
🇱🇧 Lebanon: 3,324 killed (Al Jazeera live blog, May 28 — strikes continuing through weekend) 🇮🇱 Israel: 26 killed, 7,791 injured (Al Jazeera tracker, May 20)
🇵🇸 Palestine: 4 killed (Al Jazeera tracker, May 20 — does not reflect ongoing strikes)
🇸🇾 Syria: 4 killed (Al Jazeera tracker, May 20)
🌍 Gulf states / Iraq: 146 killed in Iran-attributed attacks (Al Jazeera tracker, May 20)
🇺🇸 US military: 13 killed, 381 injured (Al Jazeera tracker, May 20)
🛢️ Brent crude: $94.48/barrel (OilPrice.com, as of publication)
⛽ US national gas average: $4.32/gallon (AAA)
Sourcing note: All war casualty figures sourced to Al Jazeera live tracker, last updated May 20, 2026, except Lebanon which is updated to May 28 via Al Jazeera live blog. Methodology differs between countries; figures should not be treated as directly comparable.
“Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government.” — Thomas Jefferson, 1789
