- WorldYahoo News
'Horrific for all': Pentagon intelligence chief says Iran does not want war
A U.S. Marines helicopter takes off from the flight deck of the USS Boxer during its transit through Strait of Hormuz. ASPEN, Colo. — As tensions in the Persian Gulf continued to ramp up on Friday afternoon amid news that Iran had seized a British oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Army Lt. Gen. Robert Ashley, concluded that Iran does not want to start a war with the U.S. or its allies. Answering a question posed by CNN national security correspondent Jim Sciutto in Aspen, Colo., about the latest incident, Ashley declined to give a specific response to the news, but later said that none of the United States' major adversaries or competitors, including Iran, China and Russia, wants to start a war.
- NewsThe National Interest
Alleged American ISIS Sniper Brought Home by the Defense Department to Face Charges
An American citizen who allegedly served as a sniper for ISIS and became a leader for the terrorist group is expected to appear in federal court on Friday after being returned to the United States by the Defense Department, officials said. Ruslan Maratovich Asainov, who was born in Kazakhstan and became a naturalized U.S. citizen, is charged with providing and attempting to provide material support to ISIS, the Justice Department announced on Friday. A U.S. official confirmed to Task & Purpose that the Defense Department had transported Asainov from Syria to the United States.
- WorldBloomberg
More Than 20 People Detained for Attack on LGBT Parade in Poland
More than 20 people were detained after an attack on participants and police at the first LGBT pride parade in Bialystok in eastern Poland. Four of the people detained are suspected of offences including threatening police officers and assault, a spokesman for the regional police headquarters told Bloomberg on Sunday. Surveillance-camera footage is being used to identify further suspects, he said.
PoliticsFOX News VideosBernie Sanders' campaign staff demanding a 'living wage' and health care
Bernie Sanders pushes for a $15 minimum wage during his campaign; reaction from 2016 Sanders campaign staffer Tezlyn Figaro.
WorldAFPS. Korean man kills himself as dispute with Japan escalates
An elderly South Korean man died on Friday after setting himself on fire outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul as a bitter diplomatic dispute over wartime forced labour compensation took a fatal turn. The row has seen Tokyo restrict exports of chemicals vital to Seoul's world-leading chip and smartphone industry in an escalation of a decades-long dispute over Japanese forced labour during World War II. The man in his 70s started a fire inside his vehicle parked in front of the embassy building and later died after being treated in hospital, authorities said, adding around 20 disposable gas canisters were also found in the car.
- NewsTime
Canadian Police Accidentally Livestream Double Homicide Press Conference Using Facebook's Cat Filter
Canada's national police force live-streamed a press conference regarding a double homicide on Friday and added animated cat-like features to the presiding officer. Facebook's video technology has the capabilities of overlaying the recording with filters that distort or change the video's subject. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police of British Columbia appear to have used a Facebook filter on Sgt. Janelle Shoihet, who led the briefing, that included whiskers and cat ears.
- NewsUSA TODAY
Gabbard, AOC join lawmakers to call on Puerto Rican governor to resign over corruption scandal
WASHINGTON – Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, has joined a growing chorus of lawmakers including Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., in calling for the resignation of Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló over a corruption scandal involving leaked text messages between the governor and top aides. In a Twitter video sent from San Juan, Puerto Rico, on Friday, Gabbard called "on all Democrats running for President to come here to Puerto Rico and show support for our fellow Americans" against corruption, and called for Rosselló's resignation.
- WorldAssociated Press
Hong Kong police seize explosives as rival camps rally
Police in Hong Kong discovered a stash of a powerful homemade explosive as the semi-autonomous Chinese city readied for another major pro-democracy protest on Sunday following a pro-Beijing rally that attracted thousands. Materials voicing opposition to an extradition bill that has sparked more than a month of demonstrations in Hong Kong were found at the site, local media said, but a police spokesman said no concrete link has been established and that the investigation is continuing. In a rally that aimed to counter the pro-democracy movement, thousands of people filled a park in central Hong Kong on Saturday to support the police, who have been accused of using rough tactics on protesters.
WorldAFPVatican opens burial chambers in hunt for princesses and missing teen
The Vatican on Saturday opened two burial chambers discovered under a trapdoor as it attempts to get to the bottom of a riddle involving two 19th-century princesses and a teenager who went missing 36 years ago. The ossuaries were found last week under the floor of the Pontifical Teutonic College after the shock discovery earlier this month that the bones of the princesses had disappeared from tombs in the Teutonic Cemetery. The graves of Princess Sophie von Hohenlohe and Princess Charlotte Federica of Mecklenburg, who died in 1836 and 1840, were exhumed after an anonymous tip-off that they may hold the remains of a missing Italian youngster.
- PoliticsYahoo News
Michelle Obama counters Trump: 'There's a place for us all'
Former first lady Michelle Obama countered President Trump's attacks on four Democratic congresswomen of color by emphasizing the importance of America's diversity. “What truly makes our country great is its diversity,” wrote Obama in a tweet Friday afternoon. Trump has spent the week attacking Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., a Somali refugee who became a U.S. citizen at age 17.
- WorldPolitico
Democrats want to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal. It’s not that simple.
Most of the Democrats running for president have promised to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal if they win the Oval Office. Then, there's the possibility that Iran and the U.S. could be in a full-blown military conflict. It's a way, they said, for candidates to link themselves to a popular Barack Obama legacy, distinguish themselves from Trump and send a signal to the world — including Iran — that the U.S. will once again be a reliable partner.
- PoliticsBloomberg
Booker Says He Could Confront Biden on Race at Detroit Debate
Booker, a New Jersey senator, said it would be “fair” to bring up the 1994 crime bill, which Biden supported in the Senate and has called the “Biden crime bill.” Booker said the measure put “mass incarceration on steroids” for African Americans. “Yeah, it is fair,” Booker said on CBS News's “Face the Nation,” when asked by host Margaret Brennan whether he would be more aggressive on race at the forums in Detroit on July 30-31.
- BusinessThe National Interest
Will Taiwan Get the New F-16V Fighters It Desperately Wants?
Sebastien Roblin Security, And how mad will China get? On July 8, the U.S. State Department announced it would approve a $2.2 billion arms deal with Taiwan including 108 Abrams main battle tanks and 250 Stinger man-portable surface-to-air missiles—a deal which elicited new sanctions from Beijing on the companies involved. But the announcement was more notable for what the approval didn't include—a nearly done-deal for sixty-six F-16V jet fighters built fresh off the F-16 production line in Greenville, South Carolina.
- WorldReuters
Japan undecided on response to U.S. plan for Mideast maritime coalition -PM Abe
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Sunday he had not yet decided on how to respond to an expected U.S. request to send its navy to join a military coalition to safeguard strategic waters off Iran and Yemen. "We've started to hear the United States' thinking on this and we want to keep listening carefully," he said on national television as votes were being counted for the upper house election. "At the same time, Japan also has friendly ties with Iran," Abe added.
- WorldTime
A Passenger Was Fined $105,000 and Banned for Life for 'Extremely Disruptive Behavior' on an Airplane
An unruly passenger has been billed $105,000 after her “extremely disruptive behavior” caused a flight to be diverted with a military escort. British budget carrier Jet2 accused passenger Chloe Haines of “a catalogue of aggressive, abusive and dangerous behavior,” including trying to open the aircraft door, during a flight from the U.K. to Turkey. The airline said in a statement Haines was restrained by crew with the help of other passengers as two military fighter jets escorted the aircraft back to London Stansted.
- LifestyleDelish
41 Low-Carb Breakfasts You'll Actually Want To Eat
Who needs toast when you have these? From Delish
- WorldAssociated Press
Funeral service held for 86 Muslims killed by Serbs
PRIJEDOR, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Several thousand people attended a funeral service in Bosnia on Saturday for 86 Muslims who were slain by Serbs in one of the worst atrocities of the country's 1992-95 war. Relatives of the victims, religious leaders and others gathered at a soccer stadium near the eastern town of Prijedor, standing solemnly behind lines of coffins draped with green cloths. The Serbs later threw bombs onto the bodies, which made identifying the victims difficult.
WorldAFPIraq Kurds arrest two suspects in killing of Turkish vice consul
Iraqi Kurdish authorities announced Saturday they had arrested two suspects involved in the murder of three people, including a Turkish diplomat, in the regional capital Arbil this week. The autonomous region's security council first said its counterterrorism unit had arrested "the main perpetrator" Mazloum Dag, a 27-year-old from Turkey's Diyarbakir region. The council had put out a wanted notice for Dag a day earlier in connection to Wednesday's killing of Turkish Vice Consul Osman Kose and two Iraqi nationals.
- NewsUSA TODAY
Universal Orlando reopens after police respond to report of a gunman in parking garage
Universal Orlando went under lockdown Saturday night after police received a report of a gunman spotted in a parking garage. Police arrived shortly after 8:30 p.m. local time and, along with Universal security staff, temporarily shut down both of Universal's parking garages to guests while they assessed the area. It was later deemed safe and park activity returned to normal.
- PoliticsThe Daily Beast
Rep Ilhan Omar’s Constituents on Trump’s Go Home Taunt: We’ve Heard it Before
For many residents of Minnesota's 5th Congressional District, President Donald Trump's repeated attacks on four minority Democratic members of Congress—which culminated in him telling them to go back to where they came from and goading supporters into echoing that call—amounted to much more than the latest race-centered controversy sparked by the White House. Much more, too, than an attack on their very own representative in Washington, Ilhan Omar, a first-year Democratic lawmaker. In lobbing that racist taunt at Omar, Trump also directed it at many of her constituents—because many of them have heard it themselves countless times.
- WorldBloomberg
U.S. Rejects Caracas’s Claim It Breached Venezuelan Airspace
The U.S. military rejected Venezuela's claim that a U.S. intelligence aircraft flew over the South American nation's airspace on Friday, saying the American jet was over international waters and had been “aggressively shadowed. The U.S. Southern Command said Sunday on Twitter that the U.S. EP-3 “was performing a multi-nationally recognized & approved” mission when shadowed “at an unsafe distance” by a Venezuelan SU-30 Flanker, “jeopardizing the crew & aircraft. Video of the incident was attached.
- BusinessThe National Interest
Facebook’s Former Security Chief Says It’s ‘Reasonable’ To Assume China Is Infiltrating Google
Chris White Technology, Now what? Facebook's former security chief Alex Stamos suggested Tuesday that it is very possible that China and Russia have subverted Google's employees. It is completely reasonable to assume that MSS and SVR have subverted employees at all the major tech companies,” Stamos said in a Twitter threadTuesday, noting tech billionaire Peter Thiel's accusations that China's Ministry of Security “likely” infiltrated Google.
- WorldReuters
Brazil alerted companies about U.S. embargo on Iran: Bolsonaro
The Brazilian government has been alerting local companies about the extent of sanctions imposed by the United States on Iran and the possible consequences in case of noncompliance, President Jair Bolsonaro said on Friday. His remarks came a day after Reuters reported that two Iranian vessels were stranded off the Brazilian coast, unable to head back to Iran due to lack of fuel, as state-controlled oil company Petrobras, which dominates the local bunker fuel market, refuses to sell them fuel. "There is this problem, the U.S. unilaterally imposed these sanctions on Iran.
- PoliticsPolitico
O'Rourke and de Blasio spar over 'Medicare for All'
Bill de Blasio blasted Beto O'Rourke on Saturday over the former Texas lawmaker's opposition to “Medicare for All,” accusing his fellow Democratic presidential candidate of engaging in "lazy fear mongering tactics" as the health-care policy debate ratchets up. Let's leave the lazy fear mongering tactics to Trump," the mayor of New York City wrote on Twitter after O'Rourke said getting rid of private health care would force a majority of Americans off their existing insurance. O'Rourke opposes the single-payer health care plan — which would eliminate private insurance — and instead advocates for a plan that preserves employment-based insurance while giving individuals the option to switch to a new Medicare-based program.
- NewsAssociated Press
Pittsburgh marks its 4th alligator sighting since May
A baby alligator was found far from the tropics in the parking lot of a grocery store outside Pittsburgh on Friday morning, the fourth alligator discovered near the city since May. An employee found the 2-foot-long (60-centimeter-long) creature near a garbage can at the Giant Eagle grocery store in Shaler, about 10 miles (15 kilometers) north of Pittsburgh. "It looks like a little baby alligator," Shaler Township Police Lt. Dave Banko told the Tribune Review newspaper.
