Iran's Military Elite Emerges From War Bruised and Emboldened
It's a mundane picture of office life in a city of 10 million people. There's little to suggest it's part of an organization that's had a profound influence on security in the Middle East for almost half a century and has often posed a direct challenge to the US and its allies.
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New York Times
14 minutes ago
- New York Times
Netanyahu Faces Pressure From Far Right Over New Cease-Fire Proposal
Far right members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition denounced a proposed cease-fire deal with Hamas that would see the release of some of the remaining hostages held in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. Hamas said on Monday it had agreed to the terms of a deal presented by Qatari and Egyptian mediators. But the flurry of statements from hard-liners in Mr. Netanyahu's coalition illustrated the pressure he was under over the latest proposal, which would force him to forgo his stated plan to send the Israeli military into Gaza City, at least in the near term. 'Going for a partial deal is a moral folly and a difficult strategic error,' Moshe Saadeh, a lawmaker in Mr. Netanyahu's Likud party, told Israel's Channel 14 on Tuesday. 'In the end, it will strengthen Hamas,' he added. A 'partial deal' broadly refers to an arrangement that would allow for the exchange of some hostages and Palestinian prisoners and a temporary cease-fire, without resolving the dispute between Israel and Hamas over the end of the war. The terms accepted by Hamas include both a temporary cease-fire and a path to an agreement to end the war, according to officials briefed on its contents, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy. Mr. Netanyahu has not publicly shared his position on the new cease-fire proposal. In July, President Trump said Israel had agreed to 'the necessary conditions' to finalize' a 60-day cease-fire, during which the United States would work with 'work with all parties to end the war.' . Talks to reach that deal ultimately collapsed. Itamar Ben Gvir, the national security minister, said on Monday that Mr. Netanyahu does not have a 'mandate to go to a partial deal.' Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister, rejected 'stopping in the middle with a partial deal that abandons half of the hostages and that could lead to the suspension of the war in defeat.' 'It is forbidden to surrender and give a lifeline to the enemy,' he said. Mr. Netanyahu relies on the support of Mr. Ben Gvir's and Mr. Smotrich's parties to maintain the stability of his government. Hamas has said it is willing to release all the hostages on the condition that Israel ends the war. But Hamas has not publicly accepted Mr. Netanyahu's conditions for ending the war, which include the group's disarmament. The gulf between Hamas and Israel's position on ending the war, analysts say, shows that a partial deal is more realistic than a comprehensive agreement. Last week, Mr. Netanyahu suggested Israel was no longer interested in a deal that would involve the release of only some hostages. 'I think that is behind us,' he told the Hebrew-language channel of i24 News. But Gila Gamliel, a minister in Israel's security cabinet and an ally of Mr. Netanyahu, did not rule out the latest offer. 'There's a proposal. We know what it says,' she told Channel 14. 'We will examine what we will say about that.'
New York Times
14 minutes ago
- New York Times
A United Front?
President Trump has been known to parrot the positions of the last person he's heard. Which might explain why European leaders rushed to the White House yesterday. They were loath to let Vladimir Putin's message during Friday's Alaska summit with Trump go unanswered. So presidents and prime ministers disrupted summer holidays and scrambled to Washington on less than 24 hours' notice from, among other places, an island off the French Riviera. Our London bureau chief, Mark Landler, called it 'diplomatic FOMO.' They came to support Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky. One by one, they lavished Trump with the praise and gratitude that moves him. (They've learned by now, that's what works.) And they repeated their priorities: security guarantees and cease-fire, cease-fire and security guarantees. Trump was a gracious host, complimenting the German chancellor's tan and the Finnish president's youthful looks. He demurred on a cease-fire, saying several times that he'd ended six wars around the world this year without one. He seemed to commit to security guarantees, though it's not clear what they would look like. He all but promised a 'trilat' — a three-way meeting — among himself, Putin and Zelensky within a week or two. Here's a look at yesterday's talks, the prospects for a peace deal and what's at stake. Presidential pivots. The tone of Trump's appearance with Zelensky was a 180-degree shift from their disastrous Oval Office session six months ago. Having been accused of disrespect last time, the Ukrainian leader traded his fatigues for a black jacket, a button-down and slacks. Having been chastised for ingratitude, Zelensky publicly thanked Trump at least 10 times. Trump, in turn, was downright friendly. Land concessions? Putin says he won't withdraw from Ukraine unless Russia gets the Donbas, an industrial region he has claimed since 2014. It's the focus of Russia's summer offensive. But at least 200,000 civilians live in the fraction still under Ukrainian control. And the Ukrainian Constitution bars Zelensky from giving up territory without a public referendum. Still, it's clear the men discussed the idea, writes David Sanger, a White House correspondent who covered the Alaska summit. 'Thank you for the map, by the way,' Zelensky said in front of the cameras. Not said was who had drawn the map or what, exactly, it showed. (This piece helpfully explains Putin's fascination with the Donbas.) Protection from Russia. What does Ukraine need to feel safe? 'Everything,' Zelensky said. He ticked off weapons, troops, training and intelligence. Trump ducked questions about whether American troops might join a peacekeeping force. But after months of berating his predecessor for spending billions to help Ukraine defend itself, Trump now suggests that the U.S. would indeed help protect the country from future invasions. Read more about how security guarantees could work. Seated around a table with cameras whirring, several of the European leaders invoked as a model NATO's Article 5 — which says that an attack on any member is considered an attack on all members. Trump agreed that the provision for Ukraine could be 'NATO-like.' The NATO chief, a Trump fan and one of his eight guests yesterday, called this seeming change of heart 'a really big deal.' Fighting continues. Even as Zelensky arrived in Washington, Russia was still firing on Ukraine. Its strikes yesterday killed at least 14 people, including two children. But Trump was noncommittal as several of his European counterparts said that hostilities must stop immediately. 'I don't think you need a cease-fire,' Trump said, noting that his negotiations to end the decades-long conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, among others, had taken place without one. 'I know that it might be good to have. But I can also understand, strategically, why one country or the other wouldn't want it.' Later, he said that 'all of us would obviously prefer an immediate cease-fire,' but that Putin and Zelensky would have to work it out themselves. 'As of this moment, it's not happening.' Next steps. Trump says he'll soon bring the Ukrainian and Russian presidents together. 'If you like, I'll go to that meeting,' Trump told Zelensky. ('Ukraine will be happy if you participate,' Zelensky responded.) It would be the first face-to-face for the adversaries since 2019, three years before Putin invaded Ukraine. 'If we have a trilat,' Trump said, 'there's a good chance of maybe ending it.' While Zelensky and the Europeans were still at the White House, Trump called Putin to fill him in on the day's talks. He said they'd talk again after the European leaders left. If he did, the Russian leader would again be the last person he heard on the subject. For more The most clicked article in The Morning yesterday was about what to expect from the talks. Read about what actually happened: Here are five takeaways. After the Alaska summit, some feared that Trump was about to forge a peace around Russian demands. Yesterday's talks seem to have forestalled that outcome. Trump gave vague assurances of security guarantees if Zelensky agreed to a deal with Putin. A lot is riding on whether Zelensky can trust Trump, Zolan Kanno-Youngs writes. Trump published a personal letter that Melania Trump sent to Putin, asking him to protect children. It did not directly mention the war in Ukraine. Voting Trump said that he would push to eliminate voting by mail shortly after he discussed the issue with Putin. Trump claims, without evidence, that mail-in voting is rife with fraud. Texas Democrats ended their two-week walkout, allowing Republicans to pass a gerrymandered congressional map backed by Trump. Newsmax, a right-wing cable channel, will pay $67 million to settle a libel lawsuit over its false claims that Dominion Voting Systems rigged votes. More on the Trump Administration The Air Force's top general will retire early, about halfway through his term. Trump purged much of the Pentagon's top brass soon after returning to office. The governors of Mississippi and Louisiana said they would deploy hundreds of National Guard troops to Washington. The administration has discussed taking a 10 percent stake in Intel, the troubled American chipmaker, as part of a revival effort. European Heat Wave Thousands of soldiers and firefighters are battling wildfires in Spain as southern Europe swelters under life-threatening heat. Spain's afternoon napping tradition has helped people cope with extreme heat for centuries. Here's a map tracking Europe's heat wave. Middle East Hamas accepted a new cease-fire proposal put forward by Qatar and Egypt, diplomats said. It was unclear whether Israel would accept it. Israel is in talks to send Gazans to South Sudan. Critics say a mass relocation could violate international law. Protests in Tel Aviv show that many Israelis believe that the government needs to come to terms with Hamas in order to free hostages, writes Isabel Kershner. Media Shari Redstone spent a lifetime trying to win control of her family's media empire. Why did she then sell Paramount Global so quickly? She spoke to The Times about her decision. A group of philanthropists are giving $27 million to the PBS and NPR stations most at risk from government funding cuts. Trending: People were searching online for why MSNBC is changing its name to MS NOW. (A corporate spinoff is splitting it from NBC News.) Other Big Stories Air Canada reached a tentative deal to end its flight attendants' strike. The airline says the walkout has affected 500,000 passengers. A top House Republican said that the Justice Department would begin to share documents related to its Jeffrey Epstein investigation this week. Hurricane Erin is getting bigger: Its powerful winds and heavy rain could cause dangerous conditions along parts of the East Coast. North Carolina ordered some coastal evacuations. Do you have questions about the new school year? Ask them here, and we will pick some to answer in an upcoming newsletter. The Humanoid Robot Games sounds like something out of a science-fiction movie. But the event is real. Over three days in Beijing, robots from 16 countries competed in running, kickboxing and soccer. Some landed back flips and navigated obstacle courses. Others fell over — a lot. Alan Fern, a robotics professor, said the games highlighted the progress of the industry, but also how far it had to go. 'The robots are still dumb,' he said. Vaccines don't cause autism, but this visual analysis shows how a father and son manipulated data to say it does, Jessica Steier writes. Tech companies should stop obsessing over the prospect of making A.I. superhuman and focus on its benefits for everyday life, Eric Schmidt and Selina Xu write. Here's a column by Thomas Edsall on Trump's wartime style. Romeo and Juliet: The Times spent an evening in Central Park following two shy and graceful coyotes. 'Roommate Court': In a video series, a comedian passes judgment on New Yorkers' household disagreements. Can you eat that? Food expiration dates are often not based on science, experts say. A Hollywood staple: Dan Tana, who has died at 90, was a former soccer player who opened the buzziest and most beloved Italian restaurant in Los Angeles. On a scale of 1 to 10, The Los Angeles Times wrote in 1989, 'the people-watching at Tana's rates 10.' Cincinnati Open: Iga Świątek won the Cincinnati Open, a message to the U.S. Open field that she's back in top form. Carlos Alcaraz won the men's title in just over 20 minutes after Jannik Sinner, the world No. 1, retired through illness down 5-0. (Sinner fought back tears.) M.L.B.: The M.L.B. commissioner, Rob Manfred, says potential league expansion would provide an opportunity to geographically realign, which would 'save a lot of wear and tear on our players in terms of travel.' A new masculine archetype has arrived. Social media is obsessing over 'performative males'; TikTokers are posting stealth videos of them in the wild. But what is a performative male? He is the opposite of macho — the antithesis of toxic masculinity. His vibe is designed to attract progressive women. He carries a tote bag (perhaps with a Labubu attached). He sips an iced matcha latte. He reads — or pretends to read — Sally Rooney or Joan Didion. He wears wired headphones and baggy pants. He listens to Clairo and wants to tell you about his vinyl collection. Street contests in Seattle and New York have sought to crown the best example. See photos and read about how we got here. Make creamy tomato lentil soup in the slow cooker. Achieve the perfect smoky eye with these expert tips. Keep cool with a neck fan. Here is today's Spelling Bee. Yesterday's pangram was inflexible. And here are today's Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections, Sports Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@
New York Times
44 minutes ago
- New York Times
Securing Postwar Ukraine, Even With Trump's Pledge to Help, Is Complex
President Trump has pleased Ukrainian and European leaders by promising American involvement in providing security guarantees for Ukraine if a peace settlement with Russia ever comes together. Mark Rutte, the NATO secretary general, pronounced himself 'excited' over Mr. Trump's public commitment on Monday at a summit at the White House to some sort of security guarantee, a pledge that the Europeans have been eagerly seeking. He called it 'a breakthrough.' But exactly what those guarantees would involve remains ambiguous. Officials promised more clarity in the weeks to come as defense ministry planners come to grips with the considerable complications of turning a broad promise into realistic options. Mr. Trump said that European countries would be the 'first line of defense' in providing security guarantees for Ukraine, but Washington will 'help them out, we'll be involved.' He added later: 'European nations are going to take a lot of the burden. We're going to help them and we're going to make it very secure,' he said. He did not explain how. Some involved, like Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy and the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, spoke of an 'Article 5-like' guarantee outside of NATO itself, though based on the commitment in the alliance's charter that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all of them. But it is hard to imagine that NATO itself would not be quickly implicated if any member state of the alliance with troops stationed in Ukraine gets into a shooting war with Russia. Nor is it a given that Russia would change its stance and agree that troops from NATO countries could be stationed in Ukraine under a form of a de facto NATO-backed guarantee. Many analysts, like John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago, believe that Russia's effort to control Ukraine is based on its stated desire to stop NATO enlargement for countries Moscow considers part of its sphere, especially those that were part of the Soviet Union. In that view, Moscow invaded Ukraine to block NATO and ensure the country does not become a member. So the idea that Russia would agree to let NATO country troops station themselves in Ukraine after fighting a long war to prevent them from being there in the first place is complicated at best. 'Our goal is to ensure that we build the security guarantees together with the U.S.,' President Alexander Stubb of Finland said Monday night. 'I should think that Russia's view of security guarantees is quite different from our view.' Russian officials rejected the idea even before Monday's meeting. A Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said Russia 'categorically rejects any scenario that envisages the appearance in Ukraine of a military contingent with the participation of NATO countries.' Some European officials and analysts see Mr. Trump's new commitment to security guarantees as a way of convincing President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine to agree to Russian demands to give up the rest of the eastern Donetsk region that is not occupied by Russian forces, in order to stop the war that Russia is slowly winning. That argument suggests that what matters is a sovereign Ukraine, its future assured, even if Russia retains the 20 percent or more of Ukrainian territory it has occupied since 2014. The territory issue did not even come up in the meeting with European leaders on Monday, according to Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany. Europeans were relieved, but the question has hardly gone away and underlies what may be part of a final settlement. The land that the Kremlin wants in Donetsk alone is considerably larger than the total amount of land Russia has managed to take since November 2022, and at great cost in lives. So it would be a major gift to Moscow and a major sacrifice for Mr. Zelensky, who rejects the idea out of hand. Instead, the focus in the White House was on security guarantees. Mr. Zelensky warned of the lack of details on Sunday and stressed that the proposal still needed to be worked out. 'We need security to work in practice,' he said. Some work has been done on what a security guarantee might look like under a 'coalition of the willing' led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain and President Emmanuel Macron of France, with a small headquarters in Paris. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has now been charged with coordination from the American side. But France, Britain and tiny Estonia are the only countries that have indicated that they could deploy troops in a post-settlement Ukraine. Germany has hesitated and major frontline states like Poland have refused to take part. The Poles, mistrustful of Russia, have said that they want to keep their troops at home for their own defense, and where they are genuinely protected by NATO's Article 5, rather than vulnerable to incidents or accidents that Russia might use to weaken or divide peacekeepers. A likely solution could be about 15,000 to 20,000 European troops being deployed in Ukraine, said Camille Grand, a former NATO assistant secretary general who has studied options for such security guarantees. Troops would be away from the front lines, in support of the Ukrainian military, already the largest and most experienced in Europe, with some 900,000 people under arms. The Europeans would represent a 'reassurance force.' Other countries or even the United Nations could provide separate, unarmed frontline observers, aided by satellite and drone surveillance. The United States would be asked to provide operational intelligence, including satellite cover and information about Russian intentions or troop movements, and perhaps train Ukrainian forces, but without troops on the ground. But 'if things go sour,' said Mr. Grand, now an analyst with the European Council on Foreign Relations, 'it would be good to have a public commitment that the Americans would not sit on their hands.' Ideally that would include a vow to use U.S. air power and naval assets. The Europeans also want to maintain an American troop presence on the eastern flank of NATO, especially if European troops are deployed in Ukraine, potentially weakening NATO's own deterrence. Europe's ready forces are relatively small, so a deployment of some of them in Ukraine would shrink NATO's defense posture. Ideally, Mr. Grand said, Mr. Rutte and the new NATO and American supreme commander in Europe, Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, would be charged with helping the coalition of the willing with planning. NATO is experienced at coordinating different country forces and assets, Mr. Grand said, as it has done in previous non-NATO conflicts, like Libya. 'And none of this needs to be negotiated with Putin,' Mr. Grand said. Russia could be informed but not allowed a veto, he said. He added that Moscow's reluctance or willingness to accept such guarantees 'will be a test of its good faith.' Still, Mr. Grand said, 'what worries me is who in Europe is willing to do something.' Mr. Starmer has made vague promises but the British military is small, and a commitment to Ukraine is risky and expensive and has no end date. That would normally involve rotational forces with one group in country, one group training to go and one group returning. And it would require materiel support, from arms to barracks, including armor, air defenses, air power and naval power on standby. Mr. Macron kept his enthusiasm in check after the meeting. Security guarantees come with a peace settlement, and Mr. Putin wants to continue the war, he said. With many details unsettled, it was clear that a deal to end the war is not at hand. 'Do I think Putin wants peace? I think the answer is no,' he said. 'It's far from over.' Johanna Lemola contributed reporting from Helsinki.
