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President Trump Threatens 100% Tariffs on Countries Imposing Digital Taxes

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President Trump Threatens 100% Tariffs on Countries Imposing Digital Taxes


US President Donald Trump announced on Friday that the US will levy a 100% import tariff on any European country that adopts a digital services tax targeting major US technology companies.

In a post on Truth Social, President Trump said several European countries were considering such a tax and that some were nearing implementation. He said the tariffs would take effect immediately and would override any existing bilateral trade agreements.

“Please let this statement serve to represent that any Country that imposes such a Tax will immediately be met with a 100% TARIFF on any and all Goods sent to the United States of America,” he wrote.

President Trump’s proposals would likely affect previous agreements, such as a deal the US and EU agreed to last year, which caps US tariffs on European goods at 15% in exchange for EU countries reducing tariffs on US. industrial goods to zero.

A lengthy EU legislative process to meet the bloc’s commitments under the deal prompted President ‌Trump ⁠to threaten to reimpose a 25% tariff on imports from Europe, including autos. EU lawmakers then scrambled to meet the president’s deadline to implement the changes by July 4.

French President Emmanuel Macron said last week, before meeting with Trump at a G7 summit, that France would not bow to pressure from him and scrap its digital tax on US tech giants. The digital ⁠services it taxes include online marketplaces and advertising.

Before the G7 summit, President Trump warned he would “have no choice” but to impose the 100% tariffs on French wine unless Paris eliminated its digital tax.

King Charles Slammed for ‘Selfish and Self-Indulgent’ Decision

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King Charles Slammed for ‘Selfish and Self-Indulgent’ Decision


King Charles is facing fresh backlash after deciding he will not move back into Buckingham Palace, even after taxpayers helped fund a massive renovation project costing nearly half a billion dollars.

The decision has sparked outrage among critics who say the King should live in the historic palace after so much public money was poured into fixing it up.

Charles, 77, and Queen Camilla, 78, are expected to keep Clarence House as their main London home instead of returning to Buckingham Palace when its long-running refurbishment is finished.

The palace has been undergoing a major 10-year overhaul to replace old boilers, electrical systems, plumbing and other aging infrastructure. The project was designed to reduce the risk of fire and flooding while bringing the famous royal residence into the modern age.

But now that the work is almost complete, some are asking a blunt question: What was the point of spending all that money if the King does not even plan to live there?

One senior Labour figure in Britain has been especially critical of the decision.

Baroness Margaret Hodge, a former Labour MP and former chair of the Commons Public Accounts Committee, questioned whether the huge renovation bill really gave taxpayers value for money.

“They’ve spent £370million on doing up Buckingham Palace,” Hodge said. “They’re now not going to move back there.”

When asked if she believed that was a problem, she replied: “I think it is.”

Royal officials have pushed back against the criticism, insisting the decision is not as dramatic as it sounds. They noted that Buckingham Palace has not been used as a regular royal home for several years.

Queen Elizabeth II last stayed overnight at the palace on March 18, 2020, before moving to Windsor Castle ahead of the first Covid lockdown.

Instead of serving as the King and Queen’s personal residence, Buckingham Palace will continue to operate as the official headquarters of the monarchy. The palace will still be used for state events, royal duties and formal occasions.

James Chalmers, Keeper of the Privy Purse, said the decision was made partly to open more of the palace to the public.

“After careful consideration, and to greatly increase opportunities for public access, the King and Queen have decided not to adopt Buckingham Palace as a personal residence and will instead continue to use Clarence House as their London home,” Chalmers said.

He added that the King and Queen will still have access to private rooms inside the palace during working days.

“Their Majesties will, however, have access to private rooms within the palace where they can retire during the course of a working day, and which could be utilized as potential residential accommodation in times ahead,” he said.

Buckingham Palace has been the official home of British monarchs since Queen Victoria moved her court there in 1837. Over the years, it became one of the most recognizable symbols of the monarchy and one of Britain’s biggest tourist attractions.

That is why critics say Charles’ decision feels like a snub to the building’s history — and to the taxpayers who helped pay for its renovation.

One critic blasted the move as “selfish and self-indulgent.”

“With this amount of money being spent on Buckingham Palace, Charles should install himself there and help bring in tourism money to Britain,” the critic said.

The controversy comes as royal finances are once again under the microscope.

The latest royal accounts showed Charles paid about $17.4 million in tax during the 2024-25 financial year, after paying an estimated $15.8 million the year before. Since becoming King in 2022, he has paid more than $40.5 million in taxes.

Prince William, 44, also disclosed his tax payments for the first time. He paid around $10.5 million in 2024-25 and roughly $11.3 million the previous year.

The accounts also revealed that William’s charter flight to Saudi Arabia in February was the royal family’s most expensive overseas trip, costing about $176,000.

Meanwhile, the Sovereign Grant, which funds the monarch’s official duties and household operations, is also rising. It increased to about $178 million for 2025-26, while its core funding is expected to climb from around $70 million to roughly $135 million by 2027-28.

Hodge also took aim at the wider royal money machine, including the Duchy of Cornwall and Duchy of Lancaster.

“Their personal taxation shouldn’t be a concern of us,” she said. “What I am bothered about is that they get the sovereign grant, they get money from the Crown Estate, and then they have these two big pots of money, they have the Duchy of Cornwall and the Duchy of Lancaster.”

She argued those funds should be treated as public money.

“Now, in my view, those are both public pots of money,” Hodge said. “The Royal Family doesn’t agree with me.”

She added: “They were given to the Royal Family in the 13th century by Edward III as a sovereign grant, so I think they should still be part of the public pot, and if you put all that together, it’s one heck of a lot of money.”

For Charles, the Buckingham Palace decision may have been framed as practical and modern. But to critics, it is another royal money controversy at a time when many families are struggling with rising costs.

And after nearly $500 million in renovations, the optics are hard to ignore: the palace is polished, modernized and ready — but the King appears to have no interest in calling it home.

The end of ambiguity: How the Washington framework broke the post-Taif order

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The end of ambiguity: How the Washington framework broke the post-Taif order

The framework agreement signed in Washington on June 26 between the United States, Israel, and Lebanon is being analyzed in most capitals as a diplomatic development. In Lebanon, it is being experienced as something closer to a political earthquake. Within hours of the signing, Hezbollah’s secretary-general called it “null and void.” Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, the principal intermediary between Hezbollah and the state, called it “incitement to civil war.” Hezbollah supporters blocked roads in Beirut’s southern suburbs with burning tires. And Kataeb leader Samy Gemayel congratulated the president and prime minister on “an achievement accomplished by the Lebanese state.”

The reactions do not describe a country debating the merits of an agreement. They describe a country discovering that the arrangement it has lived under since 1990 has been formally terminated.

The post-Taif order was built on ambiguity. The Taif Accord of 1989 ended the civil war by distributing power across Lebanon’s confessional communities through a set of formal and informal arrangements that left the most dangerous questions deliberately unanswered. The most dangerous question of all, whether the Lebanese state was sovereign over its own territory or whether sovereignty was shared with Hezbollah, was resolved not by answering it but by agreeing never to ask.

The state and the resistance coexisted through institutional opacity: each operated within its own sphere, each maintained its own logic, and neither was forced to confront the other’s claims. This was not a failure of governance. It was governance itself. The ambiguity was the architecture.

The framework agreement ends the ambiguity.

The text commits Lebanon to a “sequenced process” in which the Lebanese Armed Forces will restore “effective sovereign authority over all Lebanese territory, pending the verified disarmament of non-state armed groups.” The language is precise. “Effective sovereign authority.” “All Lebanese territory.” “To the exclusion of all non-state actors.” “Verified disarmament.” Each phrase answers the question that the post-Taif order was designed to avoid. Is the state sovereign over the south? Yes, says the document. Does sovereignty include Hezbollah’s territory? Yes. Does sovereignty require Hezbollah’s disarmament? Yes. Is the disarmament subject to external verification? Yes.

The Lebanese government signed this document at the State Department, witnessed by the US Secretary of State, on the same day the Shia community was marking Ashura in processions through the destroyed streets of Nabatieh. The timing was not designed to provoke, but it did. Ashura commemorates the refusal to submit to illegitimate authority.

The framework agreement commits the Lebanese state to dismantling the institution that a significant portion of its population considers the only legitimate guarantor of their security.

The community was commemorating resistance while the state was signing its terms of resolution.

Netanyahu removed any ambiguity about what the agreement means for Israel: “We will maintain the buffer zone until Hezbollah disarms and as long as there is a threat to the State of Israel.” Since Israel defines the threat and controls the verification timeline, the agreement produces not a process for ending the occupation but a legal framework for extending it indefinitely, conditioned on a requirement, Hezbollah’s disarmament, that every actor involved knows will not be met.

The Lebanese domestic response to the agreement did not follow the usual pattern of managed disagreement within the confessional system. It followed a pattern that Lebanon has not seen since the years preceding the civil war: absolute rejection from one side, celebration from the other, and the language of existential conflict entering the political discourse within hours.

Berri’s statement is the most structurally significant. The Speaker of Parliament is not a commentator. He is the chairman of the legislative body of the state that signed the agreement. He is the leader of the Amal Movement, the Shia community’s state-aligned political organization. He is the intermediary who facilitated every round of the Washington talks.

For Berri to call the agreement “incitement to civil war” is to say that the state he sits atop has produced a document that threatens to unravel the political order he has spent three decades managing.

Berri is not rejecting the agreement from outside the system. He is warning, from inside the system, that the system cannot survive what it has just signed.

His position reveals the impossible geometry of post-agreement Lebanese politics. Berri cannot endorse the framework without endorsing Hezbollah’s disarmament, which would destroy his communal base. He cannot reject it without breaking with the government his parliamentary bloc supports, which would destroy his institutional position. He cannot remain silent because the agreement forces a response from every actor in the political system. The result is the language of civil war, deployed not as a threat but as a diagnosis: this is where the agreement leads if it is implemented.

Hezbollah’s rejection went further than opposition. Qassem’s declaration that the agreement is “null and void” is not the language of political disagreement. It is the language of an organization that does not recognize the authority of the entity that signed the document. Mohammad Raad, head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, called the agreement “the Lebanese authority’s complete submission to America and the Zionist enemy.” The phrasing is deliberate: “the Lebanese authority,” not “the Lebanese government.” The distinction delegitimizes the state itself, not merely the officials who happen to occupy it.

On the other side, Gemayel’s congratulations framed the agreement as a national achievement, the state asserting its sovereignty over its own territory for the first time since Taif. This reading is shared, with varying degrees of enthusiasm, by the Lebanese Forces, segments of the Sunni establishment, and the Druze leadership. For these communities, the framework agreement is what they have demanded for three decades: the state reclaiming its monopoly on force. Their celebration is genuine. It is also premature. The agreement commits Lebanon to delivering an outcome, Hezbollah’s disarmament, that the Lebanese state has never had the capacity or the political consensus to deliver.

The fracture the agreement has produced runs along every fault line in Lebanese society simultaneously. Shia politics is split between Berri’s state track and Hezbollah’s rejection. The broader national divide between communities that have long demanded disarmament and communities that have long defended against the resistance has been formalized in an international document. The coexistence that held the system together, the deliberate ambiguity about sovereignty, about the resistance, about who controls what and who can see what, has been replaced by a text that answers every question the system was built to avoid.

This is not a ceasefire agreement. It is the death certificate of the post-Taif order, issued from Washington and signed by one side of the Lebanese political equation without the consent of the other.

Whether what follows is a new political settlement, a prolonged crisis, or something worse depends on whether the political class can construct a new form of coexistence to replace the one that just died. The history of Lebanese politics suggests that such reconstructions are possible. It also suggests that they are preceded by periods of intense instability, during which the language of civil war stops being a warning and becomes a description.

The agreement was signed on Ashura. The old order ended on the day the Shia community commemorates the original refusal to accept an unjust settlement. Whether the new order that emerges from this moment is more just than what preceded it, or merely differently unjust, is a question that no framework signed in Washington can answer. That answer will come from the streets of Dahiyeh, the halls of parliament, and the villages of the south, where the consequences of what was signed will be lived long after the ceremony is forgotten.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

Online Age Verification Law Could Kill Whistleblowing

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Online Age Verification Law Could Kill Whistleblowing


Caitlin Vogus is a senior adviser to the Freedom of the Press Foundation and a First Amendment attorney.

Aliya Bhatia is a senior policy analyst with the Center for Democracy & Technology’s Free Expression Project. 

Democrats and Republicans in Congress have struck a deal on a bill they say will help keep children and teens safe online. The KIDS Act could pass on the House floor as soon as next week; if enacted, it would fundamentally change the way everyone — not just kids — accesses the internet.

At stake is your ability to use many social media platforms without revealing your identity. 

That’s because the KIDS Act at least strongly incentivizes — and, for some services, outright requires — age verification. Many platforms will turn to age verification to avoid potential liability under the law. Companies like X, video-sharing services like Vimeo, and others with a history of users’ populating social feeds with edgy content may be required to verify users’ ages because they host a certain amount of content deemed “sexual material harmful to minors,” a term that the KIDS Act defines broadly. 

That’s a big problem for people who need to be able to use the internet anonymously, since, as Taylor Lorenz has previously written about in The Intercept, “there’s no way to reliably verify someone’s age without verifying who they are.” 

Threats to online anonymity harm everyone, but one group is often overlooked: journalists and the sources who talk to them. Age verification requirements will help the Trump administration carry out its vendetta against the press by creating new avenues to identify journalists’ confidential sources.  

Age verification laws will create a new pool of data that the government can demand when it’s hunting for information about the people who may have spoken to the press.

Trump’s administration has made no secret of the fact that it wants to destroy journalism that holds it to account, including by unmasking sources and punishing them. This week, for instance, news broke that the Department of Justice had unsuccessfully subpoenaed reporters from the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal, likely as part of a leak investigation.

But what if it could skip the journalists and simply demand that tech companies identify sources who may have spoken to reporters using their platforms?

The risk isn’t hypothetical. The first Trump administration abused its authority to spy on journalists to figure out who they’re talking to, including online. The second Trump administration has already repeatedly attempted to unmask its critics online and raided a journalist’s home and seized the devices she used to communicate with her sources. 

In the face of these risks, using secure communication methods, like Signal or SecureDrop, can help. But some sources may still reach out to reporters through social media. As a result, age verification laws will create a new pool of data that the government can demand when it’s hunting for information about the people who may have spoken to the press.

The most common methods of age verification rely on the collection of government IDs to verify a user’s date of birth with certainty. The KIDS Act says it won’t require platforms to collect government IDs, but at least some platforms will likely choose this route to comply with the law or offer it as a fallback approach when other methods inevitably fail. 

But online anonymity isn’t assured even if platforms use other ways to verify users’ ages. Even so-called “privacy-preserving” approaches risk exposing users’ identities and undermine anonymity. All of the methods ultimately require platforms to collect, process, and retain more data on all users, raising the risks for anonymous sources who use online platforms to contact reporters.

Age verification laws will also make it difficult or impossible for journalists to use anonymous social media accounts to gather information, like sock puppet accounts used to infiltrate and report on online extremist groups, or to avoid surveillance by the very Big Tech companies they’re reporting on. Reporters outside the U.S. who publish anonymously on platforms like X or Facebook to avoid the wrath of autocratic regimes will also find those entry points vanish.

Requiring platforms to collect less data, not more, is a better approach.

Pools of incredibly sensitive identity data also creates an enticing “honey pot” of information that malicious actors could use to target, intimidate, and chill journalists from pursuing certain stories or sources from speaking to them. Already, many age verification providers have been breached, leaking users’ sensitive data and allowing others to link online activity to users’ offline identity. Age verification companies may also grant access or sell the data they collect to others, like payment processors, creating another avenue for data breaches.

Many Democratic lawmakers recognize that journalism is under threat from the Trump administration. Rep. Frank Pallone, the ranking member of the House committee that reached the deal on the KIDS Act, has rightfully blasted the Federal Communications Commission for abusing its power to destroy press freedom and free speech, for instance. So why would he and other Democrats now support legislation that serves the same anti-press agenda? 

Proponents of the KIDS ACT, and similar bills in the Senate, say these laws are necessary to protect children. But the truth is that age verification requirements are bad for everyone, including children. Why should we trust platforms with even more personal information, including from kids, when so many companies already use that data to target ads or share materials with law enforcement agencies that users believed was private?

That’s not to say that platforms shouldn’t be required to do more to actually protect children online — they should. But comprehensive privacy legislation that protects everyone and requires platforms to collect less data, not more, is a better approach.

Mandating age verification, in contrast, effectively hands Big Tech and the government a skeleton key to the identities of every whistleblower, dissident, and investigative reporter who uses online platforms, not to mention everyone else, including children. This kind of surveillance on steroids that surrenders our right to speak, report, and read the news anonymously won’t make anyone safer.  

Iranian Suspect Arrested in Montenegro Over Alleged $3.4 Billion US Cyber Hacking Campaign 

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Iranian Suspect Arrested in Montenegro Over Alleged $3.4 Billion US Cyber Hacking Campaign 


An Iranian national wanted by US authorities on cybercrime charges was arrested in Montenegro in a joint operation involving Montenegrin authorities and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, after investigators alleged he participated in a yearslong hacking campaign targeting American universities and infrastructure that caused an estimated $3.4 billion in losses. 

The suspect, identified only as A.B., is a 39-year-old dual Iranian and Turkish citizen sought by the Southern District Court in New York on charges including conspiracy to commit computer fraud, hacking and identity theft. 

Montenegro’s police directorate said he was detained Thursday in the Adriatic coastal resort of Kotor. Authorities said the case will now be referred to a High Court judge in Montenegro’s capital, Podgorica, to begin extradition proceedings. 

In a statement, the police directorate alleged that, “From 2013 onward, … he carried out massive hacking attacks … targeting more than 150 universities in the United States, causing damage estimated at over $3.4 billion.” 

Authorities said the cyber campaign focused on compromising university systems and stealing data from academic institutions across the United States. Investigators also alleged that access to hacked university accounts, along with the information obtained through the intrusions, was exploited for the benefit of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and other Iranian entities, including universities. 

The arrest followed cooperation between Montenegrin authorities and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation as part of the effort to locate and detain the suspect sought by US prosecutors. 

The extradition request will now be reviewed by the Montenegrin judiciary, which will determine whether A.B. will be transferred to the United States to face the charges filed in New York. 

US authorities have repeatedly warned about cyber operations linked to Iran that target American infrastructure and institutions. Intelligence and law enforcement agencies have also reported an increase in Iranian hacking campaigns during April, citing continued efforts by state-linked actors to infiltrate networks and obtain sensitive information. 

 

Kentucky Man Believed Dead ‘Wakes Up’ as Doctors Prepared to Harvest Organs

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Kentucky Man Believed Dead ‘Wakes Up’ as Doctors Prepared to Harvest Organs


A Kentucky man who was believed to be brain dead was allegedly moments away from having his organs harvested when he suddenly woke up on the operating table — crying, moving and proving he was still alive.

Anthony Thomas “TJ” Hoover was rushed to Baptist Health Richmond Hospital in Richmond, Kentucky, on Oct. 25, 2021, after suffering cardiac arrest following a drug overdose. The next day, his family was reportedly told there was no hope.

His sister, Donna Rhorer, said doctors told relatives that Hoover had “no reflexes” and “no brain activity.” Faced with the heartbreaking news, the family made the painful decision to remove him from life support.

They were then told Hoover was a registered organ donor.

But as the family prepared to say goodbye, Rhorer noticed something that stopped her cold. Her brother’s eyes were opening — and, she said, they appeared to be following people around the room.

“We had his honor walk Friday afternoon. During his honor walk, his eyes started opening up,” she told WKYT. “He was tracking. His eyes were tracking us around.”

When the family raised concerns, Rhorer said medical staff reassured them that what they were seeing was “just reflexes” and “normal.”

“Who are we to question the medical system?” she said.

Hoover was taken into surgery, where doctors were reportedly preparing to remove his organs for transplant. But about an hour later, a surgeon came back out with shocking news.

“He said he wasn’t ready,” Rhorer recalled. “He woke up.”

Even more disturbing, Rhorer said the family later learned that Hoover had allegedly shown signs of waking up earlier that same day during a heart catheterization — something she says relatives were not told at the time.

“If we had known that, then clearly we would have known he wasn’t brain dead,” she said.

After the terrifying ordeal, doctors reportedly told the family to take Hoover home and keep him comfortable because his prognosis was still grim.

Three years later, Rhorer is still caring for her brother. Hoover survived, but the overdose and cardiac arrest left him with lasting struggles, including problems with walking, balance, speech, memory and vision.

The case became even more disturbing when Rhorer said a former Kentucky Organ Donor Affiliates employee later contacted her with new details about what allegedly happened inside the operating room. According to the former employee, Hoover had been “thrashing” on the table and “crying visibly” as staff prepared for the organ donation procedure.

The near-tragedy has sparked serious questions about how organ donation cases are handled and how doctors determine whether a patient is truly beyond saving.

Baptist Health said in a statement that patient safety is its “highest priority,” adding that the hospital works closely with patients and families to make sure organ donation wishes are followed.

Reports say the Kentucky attorney general’s office and a federal agency that oversees organ procurement organizations are now looking into the case.

For Hoover’s family, the horror of that day still lingers.

They walked into the hospital believing they were saying goodbye. Instead, they watched a man declared brain dead fight his way back from the brink — just before it was almost too late.

Lebanon’s Washington framework entrenches power, not order

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Lebanon’s Washington framework entrenches power, not order

Diplomacy often celebrates the signing of agreements. History judges whether those agreements change realities or merely rename them. The trilateral framework negotiated in Washington between Lebanon, Israel and the United States belongs, at least in its current form, to the latter category. 

Marketed as the ‘beginning of the beginning’ of a pathway towards peace, the arrangement appears less a diplomatic breakthrough than a sophisticated mechanism for managing instability. Rather than resolving the conflict, it institutionalises its underlying asymmetries, transforming peace into a conditional privilege rather than a reciprocal obligation. Even the framework’s architects have stopped short of calling it a final settlement, acknowledging that it remains only an experimental process built around phased implementation and ‘pilot’ security zones.

The central paradox is striking. Lebanon has formally accepted obligations that its own government lacks the practical capacity to enforce, while Hezbollah—the military actor capable of determining whether any ceasefire survives—was absent from negotiations and has publicly rejected the process.

As the framework itself acknowledges, the Lebanese Armed Forces are expected to establish authority over southern Lebanon through internationally supported deployments, while Israel retains the right to resume military operations should Hezbollah violate the arrangement. The agreement therefore depends upon compliance from an actor that never accepted its legitimacy in the first place.

This disconnect exposes something deeper than another fragile Middle Eastern ceasefire. It reveals the increasingly performative character of sovereignty in contemporary international politics. Classical international law assumes that governments exercise a monopoly over the legitimate use of force within their territory. Lebanon demonstrates the limits of that assumption. Formal sovereignty exists on paper, yet decisive coercive authority remains fragmented among the Lebanese state, Hezbollah, Israel and the external patrons sustaining each side. 

READ: FACTBOX – Key points in US-mediated framework between Israel, Lebanon

International diplomacy nevertheless continues treating Beirut as though it possesses unified control over territory and armed actors, creating what amounts to sovereignty by legal attribution rather than empirical reality.

This matters because the Washington framework is built around performance rather than parity.

Success is measured not through mutual restraint but through Lebanon’s ability to satisfy security benchmarks established largely around Israeli threat perceptions. Israeli withdrawals are conditional and reversible.

Lebanese compliance is externally monitored. Hezbollah’s behaviour determines implementation, despite Hezbollah refusing participation altogether. The result resembles less a peace treaty than a perpetual examination in which only one side continuously sits the test.

The real story begins where the map of Lebanon ends. The framework treats the conflict as a local security problem, yet its trajectory is increasingly dictated by a regional balance of power stretching from Washington to Tehran. Peace on the border has become inseparable from rivalry far beyond it.

The architecture inherits the structural asymmetries embedded within United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701. Passed after the 2006 Lebanon war, Resolution 1701 requires the Lebanese state to prevent armed groups from operating south of the Litani River and calls for the extension of exclusive state authority. Yet it has never established equivalent enforcement mechanisms regarding Israeli overflights, cross-border incursions or targeted strikes inside Lebanese territory. 

The consequence is not simply legal imbalance but political predictability: Lebanon remains perpetually vulnerable to accusations of non-compliance while Israel retains broad latitude to justify exceptional measures under the doctrine of self-defence. As your source argues, this asymmetry transforms UNSCR 1701 into a framework of ‘managed failure’ rather than durable conflict resolution.

This is where the Washington framework becomes more than a Lebanese story. It illustrates an emerging characteristic of the contemporary rules-based international order: legal obligations increasingly operate asymmetrically according to relative power rather than formal equality. The strongest actors retain considerable discretion in interpreting obligations, while weaker states are judged primarily by their capacity to satisfy externally defined conditions.

Israel occupies a unique position within this structure. It functions not simply as a participant in negotiations but, in practical terms, as a de facto veto-player over implementation. Security concerns become self-interpreting legal instruments. Military action can be presented as a defensive necessity rather than a treaty violation. 

Without an independent enforcement authority capable of binding all parties equally, the distinction between legal obligation and strategic preference becomes increasingly blurred. The framework thereby risks institutionalising precisely the unilateral discretion that international law is designed to constrain.

Equally significant is the role of the United States. Washington simultaneously serves as mediator, principal military supporter of Israel, and principal architect of implementation mechanisms. That combination inevitably raises questions about structural neutrality. Mediation traditionally depends upon confidence that competing interests receive comparable consideration. 

READ: Hezbollah chief rejects Lebanon-Israel deal, demands Israeli withdrawal

Yet the framework overwhelmingly translates Israeli security requirements into operational benchmarks while asking Lebanon to demonstrate state capacity that decades of internal fragmentation and regional intervention have rendered extraordinarily difficult. Even supporters of American diplomacy acknowledge that the arrangement is fundamentally security-driven rather than politically balanced.

The framework exposes an uncomfortable truth: modern diplomacy has become remarkably adept at managing instability while repeatedly failing to resolve it. Lebanon is no longer the subject of diplomacy but its object—a battlefield governed by external calculations rather than national sovereignty. Peace has become a carefully curated illusion, preserving strategic hierarchy while leaving the conditions for the next confrontation entirely intact.

The broader geopolitical picture reinforces this concern. The framework cannot be understood independently of US-Iran relations. Hezbollah’s strategic calculations remain closely linked to Tehran, while Israeli military decisions remain deeply intertwined with Washington. Consequently, southern Lebanon risks becoming less a bilateral frontier than a pressure valve within wider regional bargaining. Local communities become spectators to negotiations whose decisive variables increasingly reside in Washington and Tehran rather than Beirut or Jerusalem.

This reality challenges one of international relations’ oldest assumptions: that peace agreements reflect the sovereign consent of the parties most directly affected. Here, sovereignty appears increasingly conditional, mediated through external patrons whose strategic calculations ultimately shape the conflict’s trajectory. Lebanon signs. Israel calibrates. Iran influences. The United States arbitrates. The state ostensibly at the centre of the agreement exercises the least strategic autonomy.

None of this diminishes Israel’s legitimate security concerns, nor does it excuse Hezbollah’s refusal to submit to exclusive state authority. Both remain central obstacles to lasting peace. But sustainable diplomacy requires recognising that stability achieved through structural imbalance rarely remains stable for long. History repeatedly demonstrates that agreements perceived as privileging one side’s strategic discretion over genuinely reciprocal obligations tend to postpone confrontation rather than resolve it. 

The Washington framework therefore represents something more troubling than another imperfect ceasefire. It exposes an uncomfortable truth about the contemporary international order. Peace is increasingly defined not by equal application of law but by successful management of hierarchy. 

International legitimacy becomes contingent upon alignment with prevailing distributions of power. Sovereignty becomes conditional. Compliance becomes selective. Stability becomes synonymous with preserving strategic freedom for the strongest actors. If that becomes the accepted model of conflict resolution, Lebanon will not be the exception. It will be the precedent.

OPINION: Lebanon paid the price for a ceasefire that never existed

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

Adidas edging Nike in World Cup sales boost

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Adidas edging Nike in World Cup sales boost


As the World Cup brand battle heats up, sportswear giant Adidas appears to be getting a bigger boost than rival Nike, early data show.

Both companies are investing heavily in the ​tournament, but Nike is relying on it for sales and visibility as it tries to right its ship amid years of steadily leaking market share. ‌Investors will be looking for signs of progress next week when Nike reports fourth-quarter earnings.

Adidas, an official World Cup sponsor and a brand long associated with soccer, is sponsoring 14 teams and supplying the coveted match ball.

Nike is outfitting 12 national teams, partnering with local street-wear designers, and refreshing soccer merchandise at more than 5,000 Nike and wholesale stores globally.

But while both brands are poised to get a ​World Cup boost to their apparel businesses, Adidas is benefiting “to a greater degree thus far,” said Drake MacFarlane, a research analyst at M Science.

Spending on Adidas ​apparel surged 70% in May from the previous year and stayed strong into June, according to M Science data. MacFarlane attributed the ⁠trend to “substantial growth” in jersey sales ahead of the World Cup.

Nike’s apparel business is growing as well, he added, but that growth is being outpaced by Adidas, which ​has “the right set of product for the consumer.”

Foot traffic data tell a similar story.

Visits to Adidas’ U.S. stores surged 47% during the first week of the World Cup compared to ​2026 averages, versus an 11% jump at Nike’s U.S. factory stores, according to data from Placer.ai, shared with Reuters.

For Adidas, those visits represented a 16% jump versus the same week last year — but for Nike, they represented a drop, Placer.ai found.

While the Nike data only covers outlet stores, the overall findings still indicate that Adidas “has been top of mind for shoppers and may have done a good job ​in its store activation around the event,” said Elizabeth Lafontaine, Placer.ai’s director of research.

British retailer JD Sports said Mexico jerseys – which are supplied by Adidas – were its best-selling team ​kit during the week beginning June 15. Nike’s U.S. team jerseys took the second spot in total sales, the retailer said.

A bright spot for Nike: 28% of its World Cup merchandise in ‌the U.S. ⁠sold out during the first two weeks of the tournament – well above Adidas’ 7%, according to a report from LSEG this week.

FOOTWEAR IN FOCUS

Nike has had a strong presence at the World Cup.

A Reuters analysis found that 232 of the 528 World Cup starters so far have worn Nike boots, with Adidas close behind at 218. “Nike is right there” despite Adidas’ close association with FIFA, said David Swartz, an equity analyst at Morningstar. “Strong visibility … is good for its brand strength.”

World soccer’s governing body FIFA runs the tournament.

Nike could use the ​win: sales have fallen as demand for classic ​lines like Dunk and Air Jordan ⁠has cooled. Competition from newer players like On and Deckers has intensified, and analysts say the company has been slow to pivot to new styles.

While World Cup visibility can’t hurt, “at the end of the day it’s really all about the product,” said Mari Shor, senior ​equities analyst at Columbia Threadneedle, which holds Nike stock. “If [Nike’s] product isn’t resonating, the rest of it doesn’t matter.”

Nike’s share of the ​global sports footwear market ⁠has fallen from 29.2% in 2022 to 22.9% last year, according to Euromonitor International data, obtained by Reuters.

Nike and Adidas have lately traded blows.

In April, Nike entered exclusive talks to provide balls for certain UEFA soccer matches, a role that was Adidas’ for 25 years. Later that month, though, Kenyan Sabastian Sawe wearing new, ultra-light shoes from Adidas broke the two-hour marathon barrier, a ⁠coup as the ​two companies battle for sports innovation.

Nike CEO Elliott Hill, who took the helm in 2024, vowed to refocus Nike ​on key sports like soccer and running, saying the company had “lost its obsession with sport.”

Yet it remains the larger company by far, its footwear market share still nearly double second-place Adidas.

It’s “the biggest dog in the fight,” ​said Sarah Henry, a portfolio manager at Logan Capital Management. “It should be able to hit everybody else pretty hard.”

Source:  Reuters

Netanyahu Defends Lebanon Framework, Says Israel Retains Freedom To Strike Hezbollah 

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Netanyahu Defends Lebanon Framework, Says Israel Retains Freedom To Strike Hezbollah 


Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended Israel’s framework agreement with Lebanon on Saturday, saying the accord preserves Israel’s military freedom of action, weakens Hezbollah and Iran, and creates new diplomatic opportunities, while using a wide-ranging press conference to address questions about the military campaign, domestic politics, and Israel’s regional strategy. 

Opening the briefing, Netanyahu said Israel had withdrawn only from two pilot areas that the Israel Defense Forces determined were not operationally necessary and would remain in what he described as the “yellow security zone.” 

“We remain in the yellow security zone that protects us, and that is a tremendous, tremendous achievement,” he said, arguing that international pressure to remove Israeli forces from the area had failed. 

Netanyahu thanked President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Ambassador Yechiel Leiter, and the Israeli negotiating team, as well as the Lebanese government, for helping reach the agreement. He said Israel had “dealt Hezbollah a severe blow” and was “breaking not only Iran’s axis of terror, but also its political axis.” 

The prime minister said Hezbollah had possessed 150,000 rockets and missiles before the war and that Israel had destroyed about 90% of that arsenal, eliminated Hassan Nasrallah and the commanders of the Radwan Force, and killed more than 1,000 Hezbollah terrorists since the war began, including more than 200 during the past two weeks. 

Netanyahu also said Israeli forces had seized the Beaufort and the Ali al-Taher Ridge overlooking Bint Jbeil and continue destroying Hezbollah’s infrastructure throughout the security zone. 

“There are bunkers there, there are tunnels there, there are terror villages there. We are eliminating all of it,” he said, while adding that Israel still faces challenges, particularly the threat posed by explosive drones. 

The first question came from Nadav Elimelech of i24NEWS, who asked whether the agreement limits Israel’s operational freedom against Hezbollah and whether such operations could jeopardize the agreement. Elimelech also asked about legislation concerning ultra-Orthodox military service and Netanyahu’s proposal for a broad national government. 

Netanyahu insisted the military’s instructions remain unchanged. “If you see a threat, act,” he said. “It is not only the right to act—it is the obligation to act against an immediate threat.” He said the standing orders had recently resulted in the elimination of 200 terrorists and described an operation in which Israeli forces destroyed a building containing seven Hezbollah terrorists before they could attack. 

Turning to domestic politics, Netanyahu argued that Israel must avoid internal divisions. 

“As Menachem Begin said, ‘No more civil war.’ There will not be one here,” he said, adding that he intends to establish “a broad national government—not a narrow government, not a left-wing government dependent on Arab parties.” Netanyahu said any party willing to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, support individual rights, a free economy, technological advancement, and Israel’s ability to defend itself would be welcome. 

Responding to Elimelech’s question on Haredi conscription, Netanyahu called for broad agreement on military service and judicial reform. He said arrests of Torah students inside yeshivas discourage enlistment, arguing that “Young Haredim want to enlist,” but that such enforcement produces “exactly the opposite” result. At the same time, he said those not engaged in Torah study should remain subject to the full force of the law. 

Channel 14 reporter Saria Herush asked how Israel would respond if Hezbollah violated the agreement and what assurances Israel had received from Lebanon and the United States that Hezbollah would be removed from southern Lebanon. 

Netanyahu replied that Israel’s primary guarantee was its own military capability. “The moment they violate the agreement … we strike with great force,” he said, adding that the Lebanese government’s decision to sign the agreement was “a very courageous move” because it effectively told Hezbollah and Iran, “We are making peace with Israel.” 

He also said support for the agreement had emerged among Lebanon’s Christian, Druze, Muslim, and even some Shiite communities, while cautioning that Israel would judge the accord by Lebanon’s actions. He said the Lebanese army must still reform itself because “There are jihadists within its ranks.” 

Ynet’s Itamar Eichner challenged Netanyahu over comments by opposition lawmaker Gadi Eisenkot, who described Lebanon as “a political graveyard for prime ministers,” and also asked about government recognition of the Armenian Genocide. 

Netanyahu dismissed Eisenkot’s criticism, arguing that following his advice would have meant stopping operations in Khan Yunis, avoiding Rafah, never entering Lebanon, and leaving Hamas and Hezbollah largely intact. 

“So, you know what I say? I’ll answer you in Yiddish,” Netanyahu said. “Who cares?” He added that his decisions were guided by national security rather than political considerations and defended operations in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Iran. On the Armenian Genocide, he responded, “I did not block it, and I certainly support it.” 

Danny Zaken of Israel Hayom asked whether the Lebanon agreement conflicted with the US-Iran memorandum of understanding and which political parties Netanyahu hoped would join a future coalition. 

Netanyahu said Israel was not a party to the US-Iran agreement but would continue protecting its own interests. He announced plans to send a delegation to Washington to present Israel’s position on Iran’s nuclear program and said Secretary of State Marco Rubio had supported Israel’s insistence on maintaining the security zone in southern Lebanon. 

Asked which parties he hoped to bring into government, Netanyahu said he would welcome anyone who accepted his core principles. He specifically rejected the creation of a Palestinian state “between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River,” saying public opinion had shifted during the war. He also argued that most Israelis reject internal conflict and said a broad national consensus was necessary to capitalize on what he described as Israel’s military victories in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran. 

Concluding the press conference, Netanyahu rejected criticism that Israel had failed to achieve all of its wartime objectives, saying opponents who had advocated halting operations in Khan Yunis had been prepared to accept “zero” achievements. “Your government didn’t achieve 100 percent; you only achieved 80 or 90 percent,” he said of his critics. “That is a joke. It is simply not serious.” 

He said Israel had removed the immediate nuclear threat from Iran, severely degraded Tehran’s ballistic missile production, brought back all of the hostages from Gaza, dismantled most of Hamas’ military capability, and transformed the strategic balance in Lebanon. Netanyahu concluded that those gains should now be preserved through a broad national government capable of addressing the remaining challenges and pursuing additional regional agreements. 

 

 

Madonna Eyes Shocking Sex Book Sequel 30 Years Later

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Madonna Eyes Shocking Sex Book Sequel 30 Years Later


Madonna may be ready to strip down her legacy all over again.

More than three decades after her notorious Sex book horrified critics, thrilled fans and turned the pop world upside down, insiders claim the 67-year-old Queen of Pop is now weighing a jaw-dropping follow-up to the scandalous project that nearly swallowed her career whole.

The original book, released on October 21, 1992, alongside her album Erotica, was not just a celebrity coffee-table book. It was a cultural bomb.

Wrapped in shiny silver Mylar and packed with provocative imagery, Sex sold more than 1.5 million copies in just days. It also unleashed a firestorm, with furious critics accusing Madonna of shamelessly using shock, nudity and controversy to keep herself at the center of the spotlight.

But the outrage only made the book more infamous.

Now, decades later, the once-condemned release has become one of the most coveted pop culture collectibles in the world. Original copies have never been officially reissued, and collectors still hunt them down like forbidden treasure. Rare editions can sell for hundreds or even more than $1,000, especially if they are still sealed in their original silver packaging.

According to insiders, Madonna has been watching the obsession closely.

“Madonna knows Sex still has power,” one source said. “People are still talking about it, still searching for it and still paying huge money for it. That has absolutely sparked conversations about whether she could do something even more daring now.”

The source added that a sequel could be explosive.

“She knows a modern follow-up would cause chaos,” the insider claimed. “A book looking back at her life, her body, her image and her decades of controversy could sell like crazy. Madonna understands shock better than anyone.”

Another insider said the singer is not interested in simply copying what she did in the ’90s.

“She does not want to look like she is repeating herself,” the source said. “But she is very aware that Sex is part of her legend. There have been serious discussions about what a new version would look like, especially now that she is older, more defiant and still determined to control her own image.”

The original Sex book hit shelves at a time when Madonna was already testing America’s limits. Some saw it as fearless self-expression. Others called it desperate, vulgar and career-damaging. For a moment, even some longtime fans wondered whether the Material Girl had finally gone too far.

But Madonna survived the backlash.

And now, the very project that once made her a target has become a collector’s prize.

Rare-book experts say the book’s scarcity has only made it more desirable. Because Madonna never allowed the original to return to shelves in its full form, demand has continued to grow year after year. BookFinder has repeatedly ranked Sex among America’s most sought-after out-of-print books.

One rare-book specialist said the demand is unlike almost anything else in celebrity publishing.

“People have been chasing this book for decades,” the specialist said. “Every year, a new generation discovers it and wants a copy. That kind of staying power is extremely rare.”

The condition of each copy can make a major difference. Sealed books are the holy grail for collectors, while clean opened editions can still attract intense interest. The book’s metal-and-spiral binding is fragile, which means many copies have been damaged over time.

“Condition is everything,” one memorabilia dealer said. “A sealed copy is the top prize, but even opened copies can bring strong money if they are well preserved.”

For Madonna, the timing could be tempting.

After years of headlines about her appearance, her age, her relationships and her refusal to fade quietly into pop history, a new Sex-style project would be the kind of headline-grabbing move only she would dare to attempt.

One collector source said the original book is no longer just a scandalous celebrity release.

“Sex is not just a book anymore,” the source said. “It is a piece of pop culture history. That is why people keep hunting for it.”

Whether Madonna will actually move forward with a sequel remains unclear. But the possibility alone is enough to send shockwaves through the publishing world, the collector market and her fan base.

After all these years, Madonna may be preparing to prove she still knows how to make America gasp.

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