Top World News

Jul 22, 2026 - World

Iran's chief negotiator dropped a bombshell Wednesday, warning that if Iran cannot export a single drop of oil, then no one else in the region will either, according to The New York Times.Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, speaker of Iran's Parliament, fired off the threat on X. "The equation of this war is clear: either all or none!" Ghalibaf wrote.Ghalibaf doubled down, insisting the Strait of Hormuz — a lifeline for global oil — will never go back to how it was before the war. "If our security is not ensured, no infrastructure will be safe," he wrote, adding the Strait will stay unsafe as long as American forces stick around."We have repeatedly said that the situation of the strait will not return to pre-war conditions," he wrote.The waterway between Iran and Oman has remained closed amid the military conflict. Roughly a fifth of global petroleum shipments pass through it daily.President Donald Trump warned on Wednesday that the United States would target civilian areas, including a bridge or power plant near Tehran, in retaliation if Iran strikes more ships in the strait.

Jul 22, 2026 - World

President Donald Trump's relationship with peace envoy Steve Witkoff started in an unusual way — over a deli sandwich, according to a Slate report on Wednesday.Journalist and author Andrea Bernstein described her encounter with Witkoff, the Trump insider, whose financial ties have come under scrutiny as he works as "Special Envoy for Peace Missions." "He looks like a grandpa, and sounds a little like a Jewish sidekick in a Pixar movie," Bernstein wrote. "I’d known of him as a New York real estate mogul from covering Trump’s first presidency, and New York politics and real estate before that, but only vaguely. One day, I leaned forward to ask Witkoff what brought him to the courtroom that day. He told me he’d come for his friend. That word stuck with me: friend."That friendship started in the 1980s, around 3 a.m. in New York City, Witkoff has said.“And he was—I knew who he was. He didn’t know who I was. And he didn’t have any money with him, and I was ordering from a local delicatessen for the people who were on my team. And he asked me if I would order him a ham-and-Swiss sandwich,” according to the report. "Witkoff did. Years later, when the two ran into each other again, Witkoff said, 'he actually remembered who I was, and remembered the sandwich incident. And we just, you know, had just developed a, you know, a friendship as a result of it.'”That relationship eventually led him into Trump's administration. Since then, a number of questions have surfaced over Witkoff's business dealings amid his negotiating role representing the Trump administration with Ukraine and Russia, and in the Middle East."The Iranians see Witkoff’s business ties to the UAE, and Jared Kushner’s ties to the Saudis, not to mention Israel, as cause for deep suspicion as well, people familiar with Iranian negotiators told me," Bernstein wrote. "Saying that Kushner 'is a volunteer' with a 'record of success in helping the President,' Kelly maintained that 'his private business activities have nothing to do with the President or the administration.'""Even in Witkoff’s earliest encounters, 'there were concerns about Witkoff business ties,' including his earlier dealings with Qatar and the UAE, said Seyed Hossein Mousavian, a former Iranian diplomat who moved to the U.S. and became a scholar at Princeton University," Bernstein wrote. "'They knew he had close ties to Netanyahu.' The Iranians believed that 'Witkoff had meetings with high-level Israelis before and immediately after' he met with them, Mousavian said."The White House has denied any conflicts of interest."Mr. Witkoff, like all Administration officials, takes seriously his compliance with the government ethics rules," the White House counsel, David Warrington, told Slate. "As Special Envoy for Peace Missions, he has not and does not participate in any official matters that could impact his financial interests. He has also divested from World Liberty Financial, notwithstanding his ability and willingness to recuse."

Jul 22, 2026 - World

Already mired in a war with Iran that has cost him support with the Republican Party and his most avid base of voters, President Donald Trump is being pressured internally towards a military intervention in Mali.The administration is preparing plans to strike an al-Qaeda-affiliated militant group operating across West Africa, according to current and former U.S. officials, The Washington Post is reportingIf approved, Mali would become the eighth nation where Trump has authorized military operations since taking office—a stark contradiction of his campaign promises of ending America's endless wars.The proposal has sparked internal debate among senior officials. National Security Council counterterrorism director Sebastian Gorka is pushing hard for military action, while others within the administration urge caution.The target is JNIM, or Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, an al-Qaeda-aligned group that has transformed into the region's most formidable militant force. Operating from Mali, JNIM has expanded its reach across coastal West African nations, establishing itself as one of the world's most heavily armed insurgent organizations.Mali, a landlocked nation of nearly 25 million, has "in recent years been plagued by violence by Islamist militant groups — and by Mali’s own junta government and the Russian mercenaries whom it hired to get the situation under control," the report notes.According to the Post, "Any direct U.S. military involvement in Mali runs the risk of hostilities with Russian forces in the region. It also could require deconfliction efforts between Washington and Moscow akin to ones that existed in Syria during that country’s civil war."The timing is catastrophic for Trump politically. His Iran war has already fractured his base. Adding an eighth military engagement while Americans struggle with inflation and rising costs could accelerate the political erosion already evident in recent polling.

Jul 22, 2026 - World

President Trump's envoy to Israel during his first administration dismissed accusations from Democrats on Wednesday that the war with Iran has strained the Abraham Accords -- the U.S.-brokered normalization agreements between Israel and several of its Arab neighbors.

Jul 22, 2026 - World

A Republican's shrugging comments about fallen U.S. military service members were criticized on Wednesday amid growing unpopularity over the Iran war.Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-FL) was talking to CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer about recent polling showing that Americans are opposed to the conflict, despite President Donald Trump's remarks that Americans are in favor of the war. Trump had defended the military strikes before heading to the dignified transfer ceremony at Dover Air Force Base for four military members killed in recent days.Journalist Aaron Rupar shared the exchange on X and quoted Gimenez in a manner highlighting a significant word in his statement: "My heart goes out to the families of those four, but ... "That "but" rankled with Rupar's readers. Patric Reynolds, comic book artist and progressive political commentator, wrote, "There should be no 'but' after that,"Liberal political commentator Trish Crawford raised her concerns over what Gimenez said."I’ve started to view all of the words in a sentence that come before 'but' as untruthful" Crawford wrote on Bluesky. "The heart of the statement comes after."Giminez followed up his comment by explaining, "At the end I think the best way to honor the dead... is to make sure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon. Anything short of that, for me, is failure, to be honest with you." Georgetown professor and political commentator Steve Vladeck took a sarcastic tone when he quoted a famously inaccurate speech in the movie "Animal House" meant to inspire drunken frat boys to sabotage a parade. "Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?'” he wroteMason, a political commentator and user who self-describes as a veteran and an independent, wrote on X."We just need a Hiroshima or a Nagasaki, right Carlos?" he wrote.BLITZER: How do you explain the disconnect between what the president says and how Americans feel according to almost all of these most recent polls?REP. CARLOS GIMENEZ: Prior to World War 2, 85% of Americans were not in favor of entering that war, and then it all changes pic.twitter.com/iwmzGQStEk— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 22, 2026