Trump threatens to sue New York Times and CNN over Iran bomb strike reporting
President Donald Trump has threatened to sue The New York Times and CNN over its reporting on the amount of destruction caused by U.S. military strikes on Iran's nuclear program.
The U.S. bombed three nuclear sites in Iran at the weekend over what it said was to stop the country from obtaining nuclear weapons. Trump did a victory lap afterwards, claiming the strikes 'obliterated' Iran's nuclear program.
On Tuesday, CNN, followed by the Times, published the findings of a preliminary report that suggested the bombings only set Iran's nuclear program back by a few months, contradictory to Trump's boasting.
Despite his administration confirming the American intelligence assessment on the effectiveness of last weekend's airstrikes on three key Iranian nuclear facilities is indeed real, the president took to his social media platform on Wednesday afternoon and demanded CNN terminate the reporter who broke the story.
Trump targeted the two media outlets on social media, referring to them as the 'Failing New York Times' and 'Fake News CNN,' and calling their reporters 'BAD AND SICK PEOPLE.'
And now, the Times is reporting Trump's lawyer, Alejandro Brito, has threatened to sue the publication, claiming it damaged the president's reputation.
The Times cited a letter written by Brito and sent to the publication on Wednesday, in which he asserted that the Iran bombings were a 'historic and resounding military success' and that the Time s reporting about the preliminary report 'undermined the credibility and integrity of President Trump in the eyes of the public and the professional community.'
Brito demanded that the Times 'retract and apologize for' its reporting, which he called 'defamatory' and 'unpatriotic.'
The Times said its lawyer, David McCraw, wrote a letter in response, which stated, 'No retraction is needed.'
McCraw said the publication would not apologize, adding, 'We told the truth to the best of our ability. We will continue to do so.'
A CNN spokeswoman told the Times that it had responded to a similar legal threat from Trump's team.
On Wednesday, CNN released a statement that read, in part, 'We stand 100% behind Natasha Bertrand's journalism and specifically her and her colleagues' reporting of the early intelligence assessment of the U.S. attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.'
Bertrand, one of the authors of CNN's reporting on the preliminary report, was called out directly by Trump, who said on social media that she should be fired and 'thrown out 'like a dog.''
When CNN released the findings of the preliminary report, it included a statement from White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, which read, in part, 'This alleged assessment is flat-out wrong.'
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth revealed Wednesday that the preliminary report did exist. During a press conference Thursday morning, Hegeth lashed out against the press, saying, 'You cheer against Trump so hard.'
CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard announced what they said were new findings Wednesday revealing apparent further damage to Iran's nuclear program.
Ratcliffe said in a statement Iran's nuclear program had been 'severely damaged' and that it 'would have to be rebuilt over the course of years.'
Gabbard also said it 'would likely take years' for Iran to rebuild the bombed nuclear sites in an X post.
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Reuters
17 minutes ago
- Reuters
'She's not coming back': Alawite women snatched from streets of Syria
DAMASCUS, June 27 (Reuters) - "Don't wait for her," the WhatsApp caller told the family of Abeer Suleiman on May 21, hours after she vanished from the streets of the Syrian town of Safita. "She's not coming back." Suleiman's kidnapper and another man who identified himself as an intermediary said in subsequent calls and messages that the 29-year-old woman would be killed or trafficked into slavery unless her relatives paid them a ransom of $15,000. "I am not in Syria," Suleiman herself told her family in a call on May 29 from the same phone number used by her captor, which had an Iraqi country code. "All the accents around me are strange." Reuters reviewed the call, which the family recorded, along with about a dozen calls and messages sent by the abductor and intermediary, who had a Syrian phone number. Suleiman is among at least 33 women and girls from Syria's Alawite sect - aged between 16 and 39 - who have been abducted or gone missing this year in the turmoil following the fall of Bashar al-Assad, according to the families of all them. The overthrow of the widely feared president in December after 14 years of civil war unleashed a furious backlash against the Muslim minority community to which he belongs, with armed factions affiliated to the current government turning on Alawite civilians in their coastal heartlands in March, killing hundreds of people. Since March, social media has seen a steady stream of messages and video clips posted by families of missing Alawite women appealing for information about them, with new cases cropping up almost daily, according to a Reuters review which found no online accounts of women from other sects vanishing. The U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria told Reuters it is investigating the disappearances and alleged abductions of Alawite women following a spike in reports this year. The commission, set up in 2011 to probe rights violations after the civil war broke out, will report to the U.N. Human Rights Council once the investigations are concluded, a spokesperson said. Suleiman's family borrowed from friends and neighbours to scrape together her $15,000 ransom, which they transferred to three money-transfer accounts in the Turkish city of Izmir on May 27 and 28 in 30 transfers ranging from $300 to $700, a close relative told Reuters, sharing the transaction receipts. Once all money was delivered as instructed, the abductor and intermediary ceased all contact, with their phones turned off, the relative said. Suleiman's family still have no idea what's become of her. Detailed interviews with the families of 16 of the missing women and girls found that seven of them are believed to have been kidnapped, with their relatives receiving demands for ransoms ranging from $1,500 to $100,000. Three of the abductees - including Suleiman - sent their families text or voice messages saying they'd been taken out of the country. There has been no word on the fate of the other nine. Eight of the 16 missing Alawites are under the age of 18, their families said. Reuters reviewed about 20 text messages, calls and videos from the abductees and their alleged captors, as well as receipts of some ransom transfers, though it was unable to verify all parts of the families' accounts or determine who might have targeted the women or their motives. All 33 women disappeared in the governorates of Tartous, Latakia and Hama, which have large Alawite populations. Nearly half have since returned home, though all of the women and their families declined to comment about the circumstances, with most citing security fears. Most of the families interviewed by Reuters said they felt police didn't take their cases seriously when they reported their loved ones missing or abducted, and that authorities failed to investigate thoroughly. The Syrian government didn't respond to a request for comment for this article. Ahmed Mohammed Khair, a media officer for the governor of Tartous, dismissed any suggestion that Alawites were being targeted and said most cases of missing women were down to family disputes or personal reasons rather than abductions, without presenting evidence to support this. "Women are either forced into marrying someone they won't want to marry so they run away or sometimes they want to draw attention by disappearing," he added and warned that "unverified allegations" could create panic and discord and destabilize security. A media officer for Latakia governorate echoed Khair's comments, saying that in many cases, women elope with their lovers and families fabricate abduction stories to avoid the social stigma. The media officer of Hama governorate declined to comment. A member of a fact-finding committee set up by new Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa to investigate the mass killings of Alawites in coastal areas in March, declined to comment on the cases of missing women. Al-Sharaa denounced the sectarian bloodshed as a threat to his mission to unite the ravaged nation and has promised to punish those responsible, including those affiliated to the government if necessary. Syrian rights advocate Yamen Hussein, who has been tracking the disappearances of women this year, said most had taken place in the wake of the March violence. As far as he knew, only Alawites had been targeted and the perpetrators' identities and motives remain unknown, he said. He described a widespread feeling of fear among Alawites, who adhere to an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam and account for about a tenth of Syria's predominantly Sunni population. Some women and girls in Tartous, Latakia and Hama are staying away from school or college because they fear being targeted, Hussein said. "For sure, we have a real issue here where Alawite women are being targeted with abductions," he added. "Targeting women of the defeated party is a humiliation tactic that was used in the past by the Assad regime." Thousands of Alawites have been forced from their homes in Damascus, while many have been dismissed from their jobs and faced harassment at checkpoints from Sunni fighters affiliated to the government. The interviews with families of missing women showed that most of them vanished in broad daylight, while running errands or travelling on public transport. Zeinab Ghadir is among the youngest. The 17-year-old was abducted on her way to school in the Latakia town of al-Hanadi on February 27, according to a family member who said her suspected kidnapper contacted them by text message to warn them not to post images of the girl online. "I don't want to see a single picture or, I swear to God, I will send you her blood," the man said in a text message sent from the girl's phone on the same day she disappeared. The teenage girl made a brief phone call home, saying she didn't know where she had been taken and that she had stomach pain, before the line cut out, her relative said. The family has no idea what has happened to her. Khozama Nayef was snatched on March 18 in rural Hama by a group of five men who drugged her to knock her out for a few hours while they spirited her away, a close relative told Reuters, citing the mother-of-five's own testimony when she was returned. The 35-year-old spent 15 days in captivity while her abductors negotiated with the family who eventually paid $1,500 dollars to secure her release, according to the family member who said when she returned home she had a mental breakdown. Days after Nayef was taken, 29-year-old Doaa Abbas was seized on her doorstep by a group of attackers who dragged her into a car waiting outside and sped off, according to a family member who witnessed the abduction in the Hama town of Salhab. The relative, who didn't see how many men took Abbas or whether they were armed, said he tried to follow on his motorbike but lost sight of the car. Three Alawites reported missing by their families on social media this year, who are not included in the 33 cases identified by Reuters, have since resurfaced and publicly denied they were abducted. One of them, a 16-year-old girl from Latakia, released a video online saying she ran away of her own accord to marry a Sunni man. Her family contradicted her story though, telling Reuters that she had been abducted and forced to marry the man, and that security authorities had ordered her to say she had gone willingly to protect her kidnappers. Reuters was unable to verify either account. A Syrian government spokesperson and Latakian authorities didn't respond to queries about it. The two other Alawites who resurfaced, a 23-year-old woman and a girl of 12, told Arabic TV channels that they had travelled of their own volition to the cities of Aleppo and Damascus, respectively, though the former said she ended up being beaten up by a man in an apartment before escaping. Syria's Alawites dominated the country's political and military elite for decades under the Assad dynasty. Bashar al-Assad's sudden exit in December saw the ascendancy of a new government led by HTS, a Sunni group that emerged from an organization once affiliated to al Qaeda. The new government is striving to integrate dozens of former rebel factions, including some foreign fighters, into its security forces to fill a vacuum left after the collapse of Assad's defence apparatus. Several of the families of missing women said they and many others in their community dreaded a nightmare scenario where Alawites suffered similar fates to those inflicted on the Yazidi religious minority by Islamic State about a decade ago. IS, a jihadist Sunni group, forced thousands of Yazidi women into sexual slavery during a reign of terror that saw its commanders claim a caliphate encompassing large parts of Iraq and Syria, according to the U.N. A host of dire scenarios are torturing the minds of the family of Nagham Shadi, an Alawite woman who vanished this month, her father told Reuters. The 23-year-old left their house in the village of al Bayadiyah in Hama on June 2 to buy milk and never came back, Shadi Aisha said, describing an agonising wait for any word about the fate of his daughter. Aisha said his family had been forced from their previous home in a nearby village on March 7 during the anti-Alawite violence. "What do we do? We leave it to God."
Daily Mirror
an hour ago
- Daily Mirror
Tech expert believes Iran's missiles may have been hacked mid-flight over Israel
The tech expert described both jamming and spoofing as 'prolific', although he explained spoofing is less frequently used and is a bit harder to detect than jamming A tech expert has shared an 'exotic new' hack which he believes could have tricked Iranian missiles into plunging into the Mediterranean Sea during the Iran-Israel war. Israel launched attacks against Iran on June 13, claiming the country was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran then retaliated with its own series of airstrikes. But in recent days the two countries have now agreed on a ceasefire. Just after 5am GMT on Tuesday, June 24 Trump announced that the ceasefire had taken effect. The requirements for either side were slightly different, with Iran told to stop fighting a few hours from the time of the post, while Israel agreed to halt hostilities at 7.10am UK time. However, hours after Israel's side of the agreement, the state accused Iran of deploying missiles towards it - adding that defence systems were working to intercept the threat. Israel's Defence Minister Israel Katz claims Iran's "violation of the ceasefire" will not go unpunished, adding that he's ordered the Israel Defence Forces to "respond forcefully". He said they will be deploying " intense strikes against regime targets in the heart of Tehran". Now, a tech expert believes that he and his team witnessed a new defensive tactic that involved tricking missiles into flying against their programming during the conflict between Israel and Iran, reports MailOnline. Sean Gorman, the co-founder and CEO of believes he and his team have seen is a highly sophisticated version of spoofing meant to mimic the arcing flight paths of missiles and send them to safer locations. Like many missile systems found across the world, Iranian missiles rely on Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) data to find their way to their targets. Sean said: "Missiles are guided munitions. They all track latitude and longitude and elevation the same way we navigate in our cars or the same way aeroplanes navigate. "You're basically providing that same navigation system in ammunition so that it lands in exactly the right place. Jammers and spoofers have been incredibly effective at preventing guided munition from landing where you where they wanted to land and maybe where you instead getting it to go somewhere else or to fail." Sean described both jamming and spoofing as 'prolific', although he explained spoofing is less frequently used and is a bit harder to detect than jamming. He also warned they're both risks to civilian and commercial operations. He said: "Collisions could be an issue both from an aviation standpoint, as well as a maritime standpoint', adding that the ability to 'detect spoofing will be critical for civilian safety."
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Israel-Iran war highlights Asia's dependence on Middle East oil, and slow progress on clean energy
Asia's dependence on Middle East oil and gas — and its relatively slow shift to clean energy — make it vulnerable to disruptions in shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic weakness highlighted by the war between Israel and Iran. Iran sits on the strait, which handles about 20% of shipments of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas, or LNG. Four countries — China, India, Japan and South Korea — account for 75% of those imports. Japan and South Korea face the highest risk, according to analysis by the research group Zero Carbon Analytics, followed by India and China. All have been slow to scale up use of renewable energy. In 2023, renewables made up just 9% of South Korea's power mix — well below the 33% average among other members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, or OECD. In the same year, Japan relied more heavily on fossil fuels than any other country in the Group of Seven, or G7. A truce in the 12-day Israel-Iran war appeared to be holding, reducing the potential for trouble for now. But experts say the only way to counter lingering uncertainty is to scale back reliance on imported fossil fuels and accelerate Asia's shift to clean, domestic energy sources. 'These are very real risks that countries should be alive to — and should be thinking about in terms of their energy and economic security,' said Murray Worthy, a research analyst at Zero Carbon Analytics. Japan and South Korea are vulnerable China and India are the biggest buyers of oil and LNG passing through the potential chokepoint at the Strait of Hormuz, but Japan and South Korea are more vulnerable. Japan depends on imported fossil fuels for 87% of its total energy use and South Korea imports 81%. China relies on only 20% and India 35%, according to Ember, an independent global energy think tank that promotes clean energy. 'When you bring that together — the share of energy coming through the strait and how much oil and gas they rely on — that's where you see Japan really rise to the top in terms of vulnerability,' said Worthy. Three-quarters of Japan's oil imports and more than 70% of South Korea's oil imports — along with a fifth of its LNG — pass through the strait, said Sam Reynolds of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. Both countries have focused more on diversifying fossil fuel sources than on shifting to clean energy. Japan still plans to get 30-40% of its energy from fossil fuels by 2040. It's building new LNG plants and replacing old ones. South Korea plans to get 25.1% of its electricity from LNG by 2030, down from 28% today, and reduce it further to 10.6% by 2038. To meet their 2050 targets for net-zero carbon emissions, both countries must dramatically ramp up use of solar and wind power. That means adding about 9 gigawatts of solar power each year through 2030, according to the thinktank Agora Energiewende. Japan also needs an extra 5 gigawatts of wind annually, and South Korea about 6 gigawatts. Japan's energy policies are inconsistent. It still subsidizes gasoline and diesel, aims to increase its LNG imports and supports oil and gas projects overseas. Offshore wind is hampered by regulatory barriers. Japan has climate goals, but hasn't set firm deadlines for cutting power industry emissions. 'Has Japan done enough? No, they haven't. And what they do is not really the best,' said Tim Daiss, at the APAC Energy Consultancy, citing Japan's program to increase use of hydrogen fuel made from natural gas. South Korea's low electricity rates hinder the profitability of solar and wind projects, discouraging investment, a 'key factor' limiting renewables, said Kwanghee Yeom of Agora Energiewende. He said fair pricing, stronger policy support and other reforms would help speed up adoption of clean energy. China and India have done more — but gaps remain China and India have moved to shield themselves from shocks from changing global energy prices or trade disruptions. China led global growth in wind and solar in 2024, with generating capacity rising 45% and 18%, respectively. It has also boosted domestic gas output even as its reserves have dwindled. By making more electricity at home from clean sources and producing more gas domestically, China has managed to reduce imports of LNG, though it still is the world's largest oil importer, with about half of the more than 11 million barrels per day that it brings in coming from the Middle East. Russia and Malaysia are other major suppliers. India relies heavily on coal and aims to boost coal production by around 42% from now to 2030. But its use of renewables is growing faster, with 30 additional gigawatts of clean power coming online last year, enough to power nearly 18 million Indian homes. By diversifying its suppliers with more imports from the U.S., Russia and other countries in the Middle East, it has somewhat reduced its risk, said Vibhuti Garg of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. 'But India still needs a huge push on renewables if it wants to be truly energy secure,' she said. Risks for the rest of Asia A blockade of the Strait of Hormuz could affect other Asian countries, and building up their renewable power generating capacity will be a 'crucial hedge' against the volatility intrinsic to importing oil and gas, said Reynolds of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis Southeast Asia has become a net oil importer as demand in Malaysia and Indonesia has outstripped supplies, according to the ASEAN Centre for Energy in Jakarta, Indonesia. The 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations still exports more LNG than it imports due to production by Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Myanmar. But rising demand means the region will become a net LNG importer by 2032, according to consulting firm Wood Mackenzie. Use of renewable energy is not keeping up with rising demand and production of oil and gas is faltering as older fields run dry. The International Energy Agency has warned that ASEAN's oil import costs could rise from $130 billion in 2024 to over $200 billion by 2050 if stronger clean energy policies are not enacted. "Clean energy is not just an imperative for the climate — it's an imperative for national energy security,' said Reynolds. ___ The Associated Press' climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at
