YEMEN - The Houthi insurgents of Yemen, possibly the last combat-effective Iranian proxy force in the Middle East, are threatening to continue missile attacks against Israel after a devastating Israeli airstrike on the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah. Israel launched strikes against Houthi port facilities on Sunday after the Houthis attacked a Liberian-flagged, Greek-owned bulk carrier ship called Magic Seas. It was the first Houthi pirate attack against a civilian vessel in the Red Sea this year. The Houthis hit the Magic Seas with small arms fire, rocket-propelled grenades, missiles, and bomb-laden drone boats. The ship’s armed security team fought back as long as they could, but eventually, the Magic Seas caught fire and began taking on water, forcing the crew to abandon ship. The Houthis have said they intend to “blockade” Israel until it halts military operations in Gaza.

MIDDLE EAST - The saga of the Houthi attacks on shipping is now a long one. Since 19 October 2023 they have attacked over 130 ships, damaging 44 and sinking two. This has supposedly been a targeted campaign intended to punish Israel and its allies for events in Gaza but in reality the strikes have been largely random, like this latest one. So why start again now? The anti-shipping campaign put the Houthis on the map, generating significant international attention and local status for them. It’s perfectly possible that they just want to keep that going. What is clear between this attack and the subsequent counter, is that a key international chokepoint that appeared to have been pacified is under fire again. Whether it’s the first move in a new Iranian campaign or simply the Houthis attention-seeking, what we have here is a terrorist organisation with a stranglehold over a major world shipping route – and that can’t be a good thing.

USA - The AI arms race is accelerating. Companies are pouring billions into infrastructure, chips, and software with one clear objective: replace human labor. Not assist. Not augment. Replace. The shift is already visible. Amazon, Duolingo, Shopify, Salesforce, and Klarna have all issued internal memos or public statements confirming that AI is now doing work once handled by employees. Klarna cut 40% of its workforce. Salesforce says AI handles 50% of its internal tasks. The paradox is brutal. If AI replaces most jobs, who’s left to buy the products? The consumer base shrinks. Disposable income vanishes. Even B2B firms eventually hit the wall when the end customer disappears. The logic of profit through automation collapses when the economy loses its buyers. If AI does everything, and humans do nothing, the economy becomes a closed loop. Machines produce. Machines optimize. But machines don’t consume.

JAPAN - Social media is abuzz with panicky predictions of a massive quake that will strike Japan in July, but where is all this coming from? Experts say the rumours do not have a scientific basis, but that hasn’t stopped many travellers from getting spooked and cancelling their holidays. Rumours of a catastrophic disaster occurring in Japan on 5 July have been flooding social media and major television network broadcasts, sparking widespread concern and postponed travel plans. According to Japanese national broadcaster NHK, over 1,400 videos on the prediction have been posted online in many languages, garnering more than 100 million views. So many people have been spooked by the prophecy that Japan’s tourism industry is feeling the pinch, with airlines reporting sharp declines in sales for Japanese destinations.

JAPAN - Japan's manga earthquake prediction: More than 900 earthquakes have shaken a remote and sparsely populated island chain in southern Japan over two weeks, leaving the residents shocked. However, authorities in Japan have warned of more possible strong earthquakes. Authorities have dismissed the claims of any super-earthquake as predicted by the manga, while asking people to rely on ‘scientific evidence’. Tokara Islands in Japan's Kagoshima prefecture have witnessed more than 1,000 tremors in the past two weeks, with the earthquake on Thursday (July 3) being so strong that people faced difficulty standing. This quake on Thursday [coincided with] a comic book prediction that a major disaster would befall the country this month. Seismic activity was "very active" in the seas around the Tokara islands since 21 June. "It's very scary to even fall asleep," said one resident.

JAPAN - Unreleased stress energy along the Chishima Trench off Hokkaido has become large enough to potentially trigger a magnitude 9 megaquake. That is the warning from a research team in Japan. In 2019, researchers from the Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology and scientists from Tohoku and Hokkaido universities installed GPS observation stations on the seabed to monitor plate movements. They were placed around the point where an ocean plate sinks beneath a continental plate. Stations on the ocean plate moved approximately 8 centimeters per year toward the continental side. A station on the continental plate also moved around 8 centimeters in the same direction. According to the research team, this indicates that the plates are solidly joined together and strain may be accumulating. They believe the strain has accumulated to an extent that could potentially cause a magnitude 9 megaquake.

GERMANY - Germany is rapidly rearming itself: HAVE WE LEARNED NOTHING FROM HISTORY? As military escalations sweep the European continent, the Germans are no exception, as Berlin aims to make Germany the premiere European fighting force in the next few years. For that, the economically troubled nation is set to invest additional tens of billions of Euros in the process. Bloomberg reported: “Germany is considering purchasing up to 2,500 armored fighting vehicles and as many as 1,000 battle tanks as part of a joint European effort to create new NATO brigades to deter Russia, according to people familiar with the matter. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization has asked Germany to contribute as many as seven combat brigades to the alliance within the next decade. The fighting vehicles and tanks, if approved, would equip these forces, people familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity.”

INDIA - Mumbai Police Dismantle 1,500 Loudspeakers in a Landmark Blow to Islamic Supremacism in India. The Islamic call to prayer blasted over loudspeakers isn’t worship, it’s domination. It testifies that all other gods are false, all other beliefs are invalid, and submission to Islam is the only truth. In Mumbai, after decades of enduring this forced declaration five times a day, citizens have finally reclaimed their skies, their peace, and their constitutional rights. This is not about sound, this is about sovereignty. For the first time in decades, the skies over Mumbai are quieter. And for millions of Hindus, Christians, and non-Muslims across India’s financial capital, that silence is more than a break from relentless noise — it is a long-awaited liberation from what many have called noise jihad.

NATO - NATO chief Mark Rutte has chillingly warned that World War III will start with simultaneous invasions from Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin. Secretary-general Rutte suggested the combined attacks from the Chinese and Russian leaders could trigger a World War nightmare and bring the planet to the brink of Armageddon. According to the NATO chief, China would start by seeking to grab Taiwan - while ensuring the Kremlin dictator simultaneously attacks NATO territory, amid fears Putin is anyway eyeing the Baltic republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, formerly part of the USSR.

USA - Elon Musk says he is launching a new political party following his explosive row with President Donald Trump. The billionaire promised to "give back your freedom" as he made the announcement on X last night. Musk created an online poll on July 4 where he asked his followers if he should spearhead a fresh political party. Of those polled, over 65% answered "yes", which paved the way for the announcement. "By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it!" he wrote on his social media platform. "When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste & graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy. Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom." It is unclear whether the party has been formally registered with US election authorities.

MIDDLE EAST - With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu heading to Washington to meet President Donald Trump, diplomatic and domestic political pressure is rising on him to agree to a hostage deal with Hamas. After Hamas, over the weekend, added demands to the temporary ceasefire proposal presented by President Trump, Prime Minister Netanyahu rejected them as being “unacceptable.” The Gaza-based jihadist group is demanding that Israel release several high-level terrorists, including leaders of various terrorist groups, in return for a partial release of hostages after 21 months of fighting that began as a result of the October 7 massacre. Among them would be prisoners Israel has thus far refused to release, some of whom would likely assume leadership positions in terror groups. In addition to the freeing of convicted terrorists, Hamas is asking Israel to restore the aid distribution mechanism, which gave it control over the food and other humanitarian supplies entering Gaza. The terrorist group also wants an indefinite truce in a bid to regroup and rearm its fighters, and a complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from the enclave.

UK - What should be done about Palestine Action, the group that broke into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire last month and sprayed red paint on two military planes? Ministers want to ban the group but this has prompted outrage from a host of stars, including Tilda Swinton, Steve Coogan and Miriam Margolyes, who claim to know better. They have signed an open letter, organised by Artists for Palestine UK, which states that “labelling non-violent direct action as ‘terrorism’ is an abuse of language and an attack on democracy”. That depends of course on the definition of non-violent. Palestine Action’s own website describes it as a “direct action movement” that uses “disruptive tactics”. Such tactics include occupation of premises, destruction of property and vandalism. Several members of the group are awaiting trial accused of serious offences. Whose judgment carries more weight: the view of those charged with responsibility for public safety and security, or the celebrities?

UK - It's not surprising that people with such a strong sense of their own righteousness can show themselves to be utterly immoral. Glastonbury is no longer a music festival — it’s a megaphone for militant hate. By any traditional measure, Glastonbury was once a celebration of music. Today? It’s become a grotesque, hyper-political hate-fest. Glastonbury has now been hijacked by the militant left — a performative circus for the blue-haired brigade who are less interested in music and more obsessed with virtue-signalling and venom. This year’s spectacle on the West Holts Stage - punk duo Bob Vylan took to the stage and incited the crowd with a despicable chant of “Death to the IDF.” This isn’t political commentary — it’s incitement. These are calls for death, broadcast live to TV audiences and cheered by a mob who claim to represent “inclusivity.” Is this what we now accept as normal festival culture in Britain? If chanting for death on stage is “inclusive,” then Britain has truly lost the plot.

EUROPE - Not since the 1930s have young voters been so angry with their leaders. That is why populists are on the rise. Is European youth giving up on democracy? The latest YouGov poll of Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012) suggests that only 57 per cent now support democratic forms of government, while one in five would prefer authoritarian rule. In France, Spain and Poland, only about half of young people choose democracy. And criticism of the European Union is rising too: 39 per cent say that the EU is not very democratic. They see Europe as less influential than the authoritarian powers Russia and China. This is the first generation to have lived their entire lives in the post-Cold War era. Yet they are deeply disillusioned with the freedoms their parents embraced when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989.

JAPAN - Japan has been rocked by 900+ earthquakes in just 10 days across the Tokara Islands. Now the government says the risk of a magnitude 9+ MEGAQUAKE in the Nankai Trough is as high as 82% and could kill nearly 300,000 people. This isn’t fear porn. It’s math. The fault line snaps every 100–200 years. The last one? 1946. Japan admits their current response plans would only reduce deaths by 20%. They’re not ready. Not even close. Locals can’t sleep. Flights are being cancelled. Even a manga prediction of a July 5 quake has the public rattled. The Ring of Fire is active. The pressure is real. And this many quakes in this short a window? That’s not normal. Something’s coming. And Japan knows it.

(Source: Japan Meteorological Agency, 2025 Government Panel, Journal of Geophysical Research)