U.S. Strikes Iran as Ceasefire Collapses, Oil Prices Jump

NATO Leaders Pledge Ukraine Aid as Trump Meets Zelenskyy

Democrats Press Platner to Quit Maine Senate Race

Buckling Columns Force Evacuation of Manhattan High-Rise

Le Pen Enters French Presidential Race After Court Lifts Ban

U.S. Strikes Iran as Ceasefire Collapses, Oil Prices Jump

President Trump said he believed his ceasefire deal with Iran was over and sharply criticized the country's leadership after another round of Iranian attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz snarled efforts to reopen the strategic waterway. The U.S. military answered with its largest strikes on Iran in months late July 7, with Central Command reporting hits on more than 80 targets, including air defenses, coastal radar, anti-ship missile sites and roughly 60 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps small boats. Trump approved the operation from the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara, and the Treasury Department separately revoked a 60-day waiver that had authorized Iranian oil sales through Aug. 21, rescinding permission for new transactions immediately and cutting off all sales after 12:01 a.m. EDT on July 17. Iran vowed a "crushing response" and fired missiles and drones early July 8 at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, with an 11-year-old girl in Kuwait and a worker struck by falling debris reported killed. The exchange ends the fragile interim truce that had paused a wider war begun with U.S.-Israeli strikes on Tehran on Feb. 28. Brent crude climbed about 5% to above $78 a barrel, and with the strait carrying about 20% of the world's seaborne oil, renewed open combat between Washington and Tehran raises the risk of a broader regional war and a fresh shock to global energy markets.

WSJ / CBS News / CNN / NPR / Al Jazeera / NBC News

NATO Leaders Pledge Ukraine Aid as Trump Meets Zelenskyy

NATO's 32 leaders concluded a two-day summit in Ankara on July 8, the alliance's first meeting in Turkey since 2004, with the gathering overshadowed by the U.S.-Iran fighting Trump directed from its sidelines. On the second day, Trump held a one-on-one meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who pressed for additional U.S. Patriot air-defense systems as quickly and in as great a number as possible to blunt intensifying Russian strikes on Ukrainian cities. The summit's draft declaration reaffirmed that Russia poses a threat to Euro-Atlantic security, backed a pledge of roughly 70 billion euros in annual military aid to Ukraine in 2026 and 2027, and endorsed a longer-term goal of raising defense spending toward 5% of economic output by 2035. Zelenskyy also announced defense agreements with Denmark, Estonia and the Netherlands that share Ukraine's battlefield-tested drone expertise with allies as Russian missile attacks continue. The meeting followed months of friction after Trump publicly questioned the alliance's value and Europe's reliance on U.S. protection. With NATO having anchored Western security for more than 75 years, the strength of its support for Ukraine and the durability of the American commitment shape the calculations of allies and of Moscow alike.

Al Jazeera / Ukrainska Pravda / RFE/RL / Euromaidan Press / France 24

Democrats Press Platner to Quit Maine Senate Race

Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner faced a cascade of calls to withdraw on July 7 after Politico published an account from a former girlfriend alleging he sexually assaulted her in 2021. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent who had been Platner's most prominent backer in Washington, said he spoke with Platner and recommended he step aside in light of the allegations. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chair Kirsten Gillibrand and Maine Democratic Party leaders also urged him to exit the race, and the DSCC said it would not invest in the contest if he stayed on the ballot. Platner called the allegation "categorically untrue" but released a video saying he was weighing the best path forward. Under Maine law he would need to end his bid by July 13 for Democrats to nominate a replacement in time for the general election. The stakes reach beyond Maine, as Platner was running to unseat five-term Republican Susan Collins in one of Democrats' top pickup targets, and with Republicans holding a 53-47 majority, the party needs to net four seats to retake the Senate in November.

NPR / Reuters

Buckling Columns Force Evacuation of Manhattan High-Rise

New York City officials evacuated a 37-story Midtown tower at 235 East 42nd Street, Pfizer's former global headquarters now under conversion to luxury rentals, on July 7 after construction crews found structural columns buckling on the 21st floor around 8:10 a.m. Mayor Zohran Mamdani said cracks and sagging floors were discovered and that seven nearby buildings, including a Hampton Inn, were also cleared within a collapse zone, emptying a busy stretch of Midtown at the height of the morning. Fire officials warned of a possible localized collapse but said a total collapse of the building was not possible. By evening, the city said temporary shoring was stabilizing the structure.

NBC News

Le Pen Enters French Presidential Race After Court Lifts Ban

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen announced July 7 that she will run for president in 2027, hours after an appeals court upheld her embezzlement conviction but lifted the ban that had barred her from seeking public office. The ruling marks a stunning reversal of fortune, as her candidacy had been viewed as close to a lost cause for more than a year after her initial conviction carried a five-year ban, and her protégé Jordan Bardella had been primed to run in her place as the National Rally's candidate. Le Pen has come closer to victory in each of her last three presidential campaigns and now outpolls most of her rivals in many recent surveys. President Emmanuel Macron is constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive term, leaving the 2027 field without an incumbent. Because France is a nuclear-armed NATO ally and a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, a victory by Le Pen, whose National Rally has long been skeptical of the European Union and of NATO's integrated command, would put the far right in charge of Western Europe's second-largest economy for the first time and carry major consequences for U.S. alliances in Europe.

NYT

JULY 8 1959: FIRST AMERICANS KILLED IN SOUTH VIETNAM

In the early years of the Cold War struggle in Southeast Asia, Viet Cong guerrillas attacked a U.S. Military Assistance Advisory Group compound near Saigon, killing Maj. Dale R. Buis and Master Sgt. Chester M. Ovnand. Their deaths marked the first American combat fatalities in the U.S. phase of the Vietnam War, at a time when Washington still described its role as limited “advisory” support. Under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the United States was deepening its commitment to South Vietnam, seeing the country as a key front in the global effort to contain communism.

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Sources

1. WSJ / CBS News / CNN / NPR / NPR / Al Jazeera / NBC News / Al Jazeera
2. Al Jazeera / Ukrainska Pravda / RFE/RL / Euromaidan Press / France 24
3. NPR / Reuters
4. NBC News
5. NYT