BBC LIVE: Israel strikes central Beirut as US targets Iran's missile sites along the Strait of Hormuz

Summary

• Israel launches a series of strikes on Lebanon's capital Beirut and orders evacuations in the country's south, as it continues its offensive against Hezbollah

• One blast flattened a building in the city centre - this isn't the so-called Hezbollah heartland of southern Beirut, but an area surrounded by businesses and hotels, writes the BBC's Wyre Davies from the scene

• Meanwhile, the US military says it has used powerful "deep penetrator" bombs to hit Iranian missile sites along the Strait of Hormuz; the vital waterway for transporting oil has been effectively blocked by Iran since the war began

Historians Say They’ve Discovered a Long-Lost Page From the Archimedes Palimpsest, a Treasure Trove of Rare Ancient Mathematical Treatises

Cool Finds

Three leaves had been missing for more than a century. Researchers found one of them when they decided on a whim to check the archives of a French museum

Christian Thorsberg

Correspondent

March 17, 2026 7:00 a.m.

How the Iran War Ignited a Geoeconomic Firestorm

Six CFR fellows assess the geoeconomic fallout of the war in Iran, and they analyze the challenges that the United States and the world will have to navigate as the conflict enters its third week.

By experts and staff
Published March 17, 2026 7:00 a.m.

The power goes out in Cuba, leaving hospitals dark and highways deserted

It's been three months since any oil shipment has reached the island nation.

March 17, 2026, 6:43 AM PDT

By George Solis, Mary Murray and Patrick Smith

HAVANA — Cuba was plunged into darkness by an island-wide electricity blackout that affected its 11 million people Monday, hours after the country said it would allow foreign investment for the first time.

Top US counterterrorism official resigns over Iran war, urging Trump to 'reverse course'

Joe Kent is a long-time Trump supporter and decorated veteran of the US military.
30 minutes ago
Bernd Debusmann Jr at the White House

The Trump administration's top official on counterterrorism has resigned over the war in Iran, and has urged the president to "reverse course".

In a letter posted to his X account, National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent said that Iran posed "no imminent threat" to the US and claimed that the administration "started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby".

A Post-Order World

JACOBIN

By Juliano Fiori

As US power declines, it is destroying the norms and institutions that once organized its international projection of authority. While the US is losing its leadership role, no single power is replacing it as a global hegemon.

If there was still any doubt about our coordinates after a decade of shocks to the normal order of things, the disorientating opening of this year has confirmed that we are not in Kansas anymore. A new geopolitics is taking form, particularly evident in the ongoing US-Israeli bombardment of Iran, in the US abduction of Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela, and in the positioning of European troops in Greenland following Donald Trump’s claims on the island.

Thousands of Colorado Meatpacking Workers Are on Strike

JACOBIN

By Alex N. Press
A strike in Colorado shows what happens when thousands of workers confront one of the most concentrated industries in the American economy

Roughly 3,800 members of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 are now on strike at one of the country’s largest meatpacking plants in Greeley, Colorado, after months of negotiations over wages, health insurance costs, and working conditions. (Chet Strange / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Father Dead, Officer Reduced To "Kilos Of Flesh", How Mojtaba Survived Attack

Mojtaba Khamenei had stepped out into the yard moments before the strike and was heading back upstairs when the building was hit.

Edited by: Sanstuti Nath
World News
Mar 17, 2026 11:00 am IST

Tehran: Iran's newly appointed supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, survived the US-Israeli strike that killed his father and other members of his family, as he stepped outside the compound for some work minutes before the blast, according to leaked audio obtained by The Telegraph. The audio also revealed other gruesome details about the strike, which reportedly reduced Iran's military chief to "a few kilos of flesh" and left Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's son-in-law's head split in two.

‘This Is Not Our War’: Europe and U.K. Push Back Against Trump’s Demands

War in the Middle East

While some European countries said they were discussing ways to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, several rejected President Trump’s calls to send warships

By Michael D. Shear

Reporting from London

March 16, 2026

As President Trump’s assault on Iran enters its third week, European leaders are largely resisting his bellicose demands for help in reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump warns Nato faces 'very bad' future if allies do not help secure Strait of Hormuz

Summary

US President Donald Trump says it would be "very bad for the future of Nato" if allies don't help secure the Strait of Hormuz - a critical waterway for global oil shipping

In an interview with the Financial Times, Trump says he expects China to help unblock the strait and could delay a summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping if it doesn't

Most Iron Artifacts From The Bronze Age Appear To Have Their Origins In Outer Space

Space and Physics

We couldn't smelt iron in the Bronze Age. And yet there are many examples of iron artifacts from the time, including Tutankhamun's famous dagger.

James Felton, Senior Staff Writer
James is a published author with multiple pop-history and science books to his name. He specializes in history, space, strange science, and anything out of the ordinary.
Edited by Holly Large Image credit: Dzuba Pavel/Shutterstock.com

Donald Trump, globalist

FINANCIAL TIMES

Opinion Life & Arts

It should not have taken the Iran war to finish the idea that he is an ‘isolationist’.

JANAN GANESH

Published MAR 13 2026

There is an annual real estate mega-conference with the unresonant name of MIPIM that took place this week. As ever, Cannes was the nominal location. “Nominal”, I stress, because those who have visited this bizarre bazaar — full of sovereign investors, Brits on the sauce and middle men of uncertain tax domicile — will know that it could be anywhere. You begin to see how a career at the top end of the property game might instil a certain worldliness in someone: a certain unshockability.

Is Khamenei in Moscow for Surgery and did Netanyahu kick the bucket? Propaganda bombs rock the social Media

The Greek Courier

March 15, 2026

In the latest chapter of Middle Eastern propaganda wars, the scene is set for a riveting blend of rumors and reality featuring Iran's Mojtaba Khamenei and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu. So, what do you get when an injured leader seeks surgery and another is rumored to have kicked the bucket? A plot twist worthy of a soap opera!

Starmer speaks to Trump about importance of reopening Strait of Hormuz

Zahra Fatima and Maia Davies

The prime minister has spoken to Donald Trump about the importance of reopening the Strait of Hormuz "to end the disruption to global shipping", Downing Street has said.

It comes a day after the US president urged the UK and other nations to send warships to the Gulf to help secure the vital oil shipping channel, which has been all but shut since the US and Israel began their war against Iran two weeks ago.

Analysis: Two weeks into war with Iran, Trump has been knocked back on his political heels

The Trump administration has been trying to explain why it struck Iran and killed its supreme leader, and the shifting reasons range from Iran’s nuclear program to its ballistic missiles capabilities.

By WILL WEISSERT
Updated 1:01 PM PDT, March 15, 2026

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — In the two weeks since the U.S. and Israel launched strikes on Iran, President Donald Trump increasingly has been knocked on his political heels.

Trump: Can I get a Little Help from My Friends? "Pas Moi", Donnie. "Je ne suis pas ton Ami!", Macron said.

The Greek Courier

par JEAN Damellos

Ah, isn’t it delightful when the tables turn? Just yesterday, Donald Trump was scoffing at France and its European allies, treating them like a bad baguette and a sour strudel —more croissant-crushing and democracy-derailing than anyone could handle. Fast forward to today, and the same Trump is left looking like a lost tourist in Paris, begging for a little military support while asking, “Where’s my war machine and why do these infidels still fight?” C'est la vie, n'est-ce pas?

Greek oil tanker damaged in suspected Black Sea drone attack as wars disrupt global shipping

March 14, 2026
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — A Greek-flagged oil tanker was damaged in a suspected drone attack in the Black Sea while approaching the Russian port of Novorossiysk, authorities said.

Treasure hunter who refused to disclose location of shipwreck's 500 gold coins is released from prison after a decade

March 10, 2026 / 2:35 PM EDT 

CBS/AP

A former deep-sea treasure hunter who made one of the greatest shipwreck discoveries in American history and spent the past decade in prison after refusing to disclose the whereabouts of some of its missing gold coins is now free, federal records show.