US Senator Murphy says Pentagon denied him access to US base in Qatar

"I've never encountered anything like this in my time in the Senate," US Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said regarding what he alleges to be the US attempting to conceal details of the Iran war.

The Al Udeid Air Base is the largest US base in the region and has repeatedly been attacked by Iran during the war launched by the US and Israel in February.

"This trip confirmed for me that there is an active, unprecedented, unconstitutional effort underway to hide the costs of this war and the implications of this war from Congress and the American people," Murphy told a group of journalists in Riyadh, the second stop on his trip.

Many members of Congress, including some of President Donald Trump's Republicans, have been pushing his administration to provide them with more information about the cost of the war, strategy and casualties.

"The U.S. military has withdrawn its forces from Iraq, 23 years after it invaded the country, sparking an insurgency and civil war and opening the door to Iranian influence in Iraq that it is still trying to combat."

"Germany will lower tax on petrol and diesel by 17 cents per liter in a relief package worth €2.5 billion, the German government announced Friday.

"Those who rely on their cars every day are reaching their financial limits. ... The relief package of €2.5 billion is no small sum in times of strained budgets," German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said. The tax discount is to be implemented next month.

The measure, brokered between Germany's federal and state governments, is part of the package promised by Merz as fuel prices continue to climb in response to the war in Iran and the escalating conflict between Yemen's Iran-backed Houthis and Saudi Arabia."

Context: This particular group used to be exempt from the draft, and therefore, was one of Netanyahu's closest supporters. Now they're fleeing the country.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ProIran/comments/1uaaf83/israel_drafts_more_and_more_of_netanyahus_closest/

The fact that Israel resorted to removing this exemption, and throwing them in its meat grinder should tell you how its invasions of Lebanon and Gaza are going.

Thailand issues prostitution warning as USS Abraham Lincoln docks in tourist town after 200 days at sea

Local authorities in a Thai resort city have issued a crackdown on prostitution ahead of a visit from a US Navy aircraft carrier carrying 5,000 sailors and Marines who have been at sea for over 200 days.

The USS Abraham Lincoln will dock on Wednesday at Thailand's resort city of Pattaya. The visit has raised hopes of an economic boost.

Ahead of its arrival, police are preparing additional patrols around Pattaya's main beachfront ⁠and nightlife district besides raids over the weekend that led to 40 ​to ⁠50 people in detention for suspected prostitution.

Finishing at nearby Laem Chabang, with two accompanying Navy vessels, those onboard will be allowed to rest and recuperate after over 200 days at sea.

“We are doing our best, but it is difficult,” Pattaya police chief Anek Srathongyoo said on Monday, explaining that sex workers could potentially solicit in public areas without the knowledge ⁠of the authorities.

Prostitution is illegal in Thailand and, despite occasional crackdowns, the sex industry is openly visible in major ​tourism hubs, including ⁠parts of Bangkok and Pattaya.

The Lincoln left ‌its home port of San Diego in November and was later redirected to the Middle East to support military operations in the US-Israeli war with Iran — setting a modern-day record for consecutive days at sea, according to Democratic lawmakers.

But the prolonged deployment ‌has also brought with it reports of mental health concerns and deteriorating conditions aboard, ‌with two military-focused outlets this month describing suicide attempts and declining morale on the ship.

...

"It should help stimulate Pattaya's economy in the short term," Poramase said.

But money may also flow into the unseemly part of Pattaya's entertainment industry, so massive that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation described it a decade ago as "one of the world's leading sex tourism destinations."

"The risk to health and safety, as the influx of a large number of customers may increase the likelihood of ‌sexual exploitation and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases," said Pipatpong Fakfare, an associate professor at Bangkok University's School of ​Humanities and Tourism Management.

He also pointed to reports of stress and suicide attempts among personnel aboard the aircraft ‌carrier that add another layer of concern.

https://m.economictimes.com/news/international/world-news/six-eu-countries-urge-windfall-tax-on-energy-firms/amp_articleshow/133426400.cms

Synopsis

Six EU nations are urging a bloc-wide windfall tax on oil companies. Profits have surged due to the ongoing Middle East war and rising costs. Ministers want this levy discussed at an upcoming meeting of finance chiefs. They cite lessons learned from a similar measure introduced in 2022. Germany's finance minister believes excessive profits must be returned to consumers.

Frankfurt: Six EU countries are stepping up calls for a bloc-wide windfall tax on oil companies as profits soar due to the Middle East war, according to a letter seen by AFP Saturday.

The finance ministers of Germany, Italy, Austria, Poland and Portugal, along with Spain's economy minister, sent the joint letter to Ireland's finance minister.

Ireland currently holds the EU's rotating presidency, and the ministers urged the issue of a levy be put on the agenda at a meeting of the bloc's finance chiefs in Dublin next month.

"Oil companies are enjoying overall profitability and margins on refined products that exceed the rise in crude oil prices," it read.

"We are experiencing one of the biggest supply shocks in decades, and all over the world there is growing discontent about the rise in the cost of living."

They called for discussions on an "EU-wide framework to tax windfall profits," which would take into account lessons from when a similar measure was introduced in 2022 following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

German Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil has repeatedly stressed that energy companies must not "rip off" consumers during the current crisis, a ministry source told AFP.

"Excessive crisis profits must be returned to consumers," said the source.

Several of the countries had already called for a levy to be imposed on oil firm profits earlier this year.

Energy firms have seen their earnings soar since the United States and Israel launched a war against Iran in February, resulting in constricted traffic through the key transit route the Strait of Hormuz.

The EU has so far not indicated it intends to impose a levy on oil companies, however.

There are also divisions within the German government over the issue.

While Klingbeil of the centre-left SPD, the junior partners in the ruling coalition, backs a levy, the centre-right CDU party of Chancellor Friedrich Merz is against it.

https://www.reddit.com/r/oil/comments/1vulsa1/lightning_sparks_massive_fire_fuel_storage/

"USS Benfold lost power after ‘engineering casualty’ leaving sailors without galley services, toilets and air conditioning

A US guided-missile destroyer reportedly spent four days adrift and without power in the South China Sea in July, furthering concerns about strain being placed on deployed military members.

The USS Benfold, an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer which had been sailing with the George Washington carrier strike group, was reported to have been towed to Subic Bay in the Philippines, according to the US Naval Institute News, an independent military publication.

The 10,000-ton destroyer lost power after what a spokesperson with the US seventh fleet called “an engineering casualty involving its generators”, resulting in a loss of power.

That loss of power meant sailors were without galley services, toilets and air conditioning, Commander Matthew Comer told USNI News in a statement. Another vessel, USS Robert Smalls, the cruiser attached to the strike group, had to help provide meals for the crew.

Comer said that the Benfield lost power on 24 July and was towed on 28 July.

...

The USS George Washington strike group on Monday was headed to the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, a carrier that in recent days was subject to reports by the Navy Times and Stars and Stripes of multiple attempts by sailors to jump overboard after more than 200 days without a port call.

Trump told reporters on Monday the carrier had been at sea for a “good period of time” and said he had spoken with a retired admiral over the weekend who recounted being on ships for “much longer”. Trump said the admiral assured him that the Lincoln is “beautifully maintained and beautifully taken care of”.

Reports of poor morale prompted Democratic lawmakers and military families to demand that the Trump administration answer questions about low morale, mental health challenges and living conditions for crew members.

Senator Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat and retired marine, said on ABC News on Sunday that the problems arose from the Iran war that the Trump administration started in February but has not been able to resolve. The Lincoln originally deployed to the Indo-Pacific before being ordered to sail to the Middle East in January.

“The deep, deep, deep problem here is that this administration did not plan for this war, did not plan how to get out of this war, and did not really understand how this war was going to escalate,” he said."

"Navy Carrier’s Problems Are Tied to Attacks on U.S. Base Early in War

Diego Garcia, a tiny island 2,200 miles from the Gulf of Oman, took over as the Navy’s logistics hub after Iran damaged a base in Bahrain."

The same famine conditions that America forced on the rest of the world for decades, using US sanctions, they are now getting a taste of their own medicine on the USS Lincoln carrier.

Smart move, Iran.

https://kvia.com/politics/cnn-us-politics/2026/08/02/exclusive-us-military-asks-troops-for-creative-and-unconventional-ideas-to-punish-iran/

“We are looking for new creative and unconventional ways to pressure and punish Iran,” an officer in US Central Command’s intelligence branch wrote in a message sent Wednesday to a broad group of military analysts, according to a source familiar with the message. A second source also said that a senior US military officer sent the message last week soliciting new ideas for how to deal with Iran.

The crowdsourcing-style query, which military officials said was unusual over email, is one sign of the limited — and potentially unpalatable —options available to Trump to force Iran into a deal on his terms. Hoping to find an alternative, the official at CENTCOM kicked off the brainstorming session via email to see if anyone had a better idea. The second source said CENTCOM is looking at everything, acknowledging it needs to reevaluate the strategy.

“At the end of the day, POTUS will want a deal, so he’ll continually look for ways to get tough and get out of this,” said one of the sources familiar with recent planning discussions.

“You need creative minds at times — especially if you’re running out of conventional options.”

Both the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency have recently assessed that the kind of bombing the US is carrying out is unlikely to shift the Iranian negotiating position, CNN has reported.

The president’s most senior military adviser, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine, has acknowledged publicly that bombing alone is unlikely to accomplish all Trump’s previously stated objectives for the war.

“Air power has its limits,” Caine told lawmakers last month.

Trump could escalate by putting American boots on the ground, a threat he’s made repeatedly as he’s talked about occupying the strategic Kharg Island or removing Iran’s highly enriched uranium. But that would further break a key promise he made to his MAGA base: “I will not send you to fight and die in stupid foreign wars that never ends,” he said during a 2024 campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

https://kvia.com/politics/cnn-us-politics/2026/08/02/exclusive-us-military-asks-troops-for-creative-and-unconventional-ideas-to-punish-iran/

“We are looking for new creative and unconventional ways to pressure and punish Iran,” an officer in US Central Command’s intelligence branch wrote in a message sent Wednesday to a broad group of military analysts, according to a source familiar with the message. A second source also said that a senior US military officer sent the message last week soliciting new ideas for how to deal with Iran.

The crowdsourcing-style query, which military officials said was unusual over email, is one sign of the limited — and potentially unpalatable —options available to Trump to force Iran into a deal on his terms. Hoping to find an alternative, the official at CENTCOM kicked off the brainstorming session via email to see if anyone had a better idea. The second source said CENTCOM is looking at everything, acknowledging it needs to reevaluate the strategy.

“At the end of the day, POTUS will want a deal, so he’ll continually look for ways to get tough and get out of this,” said one of the sources familiar with recent planning discussions.

“You need creative minds at times — especially if you’re running out of conventional options.”

Both the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency have recently assessed that the kind of bombing the US is carrying out is unlikely to shift the Iranian negotiating position, CNN has reported.

The president’s most senior military adviser, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine, has acknowledged publicly that bombing alone is unlikely to accomplish all Trump’s previously stated objectives for the war.

“Air power has its limits,” Caine told lawmakers last month.

Trump could escalate by putting American boots on the ground, a threat he’s made repeatedly as he’s talked about occupying the strategic Kharg Island or removing Iran’s highly enriched uranium. But that would further break a key promise he made to his MAGA base: “I will not send you to fight and die in stupid foreign wars that never ends,” he said during a 2024 campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

One less imperialist asset to bomb innocent schoolgirls.

Keep in mind that Q2 was before Saudi Arabia chose to bomb an airport in Yemen, and chose to provoke the Houthis into the fight. So you can imagine how much worse it's already getting now for the Saudis.

Invade and blockade Yemen for years, suffer the consequences.

Hide behind US military bases, while letting the US bomb your neighbors, suffer the consequences.

Pentagon list of service members killed in Iran war removes most recent four

New York Times reports that list of those killed changed from 18 on Wednesday to 14 on Thursday

The Pentagon’s official online list of service members killed in the ongoing Iran war does not include the four soldiers who died during renewed fighting over the weekend, despite the fact that their names were included in a Pentagon press release on the formal transfer of their remains back to the United States on Wednesday.

A review of the current list on the Pentagon’s Defense Casualty Analysis System website shows that, despite having been last updated on Wednesday, the number of US military personnel killed during Operation Epic Fury, the Pentagon’s name for the US-Israeli war on Iran that Donald Trump launched on 28 February, remains at 14.

A separate Names of Fallen list on the same Pentagon casualties site currently includes just 13 service members.

According to a New York Times report, the Pentagon website listed 18 American service members as having been killed during the war on Iran on Wednesday, but was changed on Thursday to exclude three service members killed last Friday, Saturday and Sunday as Iran retaliated for new US strikes with an attack on a base used by US forces in Jordan. The list also excluded a fourth soldier who was killed during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone at Erbil airbase in Iraq.

By Thursday, the defense department had lowered that number, reporting that 14 American troops had been killed in the war.

Three military officials told the Times that “one reason behind the change was that the Trump administration decided to remove four service members killed this past weekend from the list … because their deaths occurred after President Trump declared a cease-fire in the war in April”.

A Pentagon spokesperson disputed that contention, telling the Times that the decreased total of service members killed was due to “temporary data disruptions” that would be quickly fixed.

The Pentagon did not immediately return the Guardian’s request for comment.

The reported removal of the recent service members killed from the Pentagon list comes one day after Trump traveled to Dover air force base in Delaware to salute the remains of the four soldiers killed in the past week and as he continues to demand credit for the number of people killed being so much lower than in years-long conflicts like the US wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.

On Wednesday, Trump posted a chart on his social media platform comparing the death toll of 18 in his Iran war with those previous wars, which misstated the number of people killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, with the caption: “These are the real facts. REPORT THEM!”

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, on his way to what the Pentagon calls the “dignified transfer” of the service members’ remains, Trump claimed that the dead soldiers had supported his claim that the war on Iran is necessary to prevent that country from developing a nuclear weapons – an effort US intelligence assessed Iran abandoned in 2003.

“We’re going to Dover,” Trump said, “to honor our heroes, and they’re indeed great heroes. All of them said, very strongly, that we can’t let Iran have a nuclear weapon.”

At an event on Thursday, Trump again argued that the death toll from his war on Iran was low compared with that of Vietnam, the war he did not serve in as a young man.

Thomas Massie, a Republican congressman of Kentucky, suggested that the reason the Pentagon death toll for the Iran war excludes the four soldiers killed in the past week is that the Trump administration claims that the war technically ended in June, when Trump signed a temporary ceasefire with Iran over dinner at the palace of Versailles.

“Let me explain this absurd ruse: The Pentagon is pretending there have been two Iran wars separated by a brief cease-fire,” Massie wrote on social media. “The reality: By going more than 90 days without congressional authorization,” the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, “IS BREAKING THE LAW and must be held accountable”.

Invade and blockade Yemen for years, suffer the consequences.

Hide behind US military bases, while letting the US bomb your neighbors, suffer the consequences.

"4 US soldiers killed in Iran war return to American soil

DOVER AIR FORCE BASE — Four U.S. service members returned to American soil in flag-draped caskets on Wednesday after being killed in Iranian attacks in the Middle East.

The ceremony, known as a “dignified transfer” of the bodies, comes amid growing frustration with the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.

The war has cost U.S. taxpayers at least $37.5 billion, has led to the deaths of 18 U.S. service members and injured more than 450 troops. It has killed thousands of Iranians.

Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have raised questions about the war, which has boosted global oil prices and shows no signs of ending. Since the war started in February, President Donald Trump has offered differing objectives for the war.

Four in five Americans expect ‌the war to drag on for an extended period, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll conducted this month. Some 37% of respondents approved of U.S. military strikes against Iran."

CORRECTION: It was 2 Saudi oil-carrying tankers. Can't change post titles, unfortunately.

For those who don't know, this is the Gulf states' invasion of Yemen:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi-led_intervention_in_the_Yemeni_civil_war

Saudi Arabia, UAE, Sudan, Bahrain, Qatar, Morocco, and Jordan, all backed by the US, all invading...Yemen.

"12,907 Yemeni civilians killed (per the LCRD) 8,672 civilians killed, 9,741 injured by coalition's airstrikes (per Yemen Data Project)[80]"

You won't see this plastered all over mainstream media.

"As 69% of US adults hold an unfavorable opinion of the Israeli government, Israel has spent an all-time high on hasbara at roughly $730 million, over four times the sum allowed in 2025.

Israel paid at least $50 million to US-based firms to help its standing with Americans, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

The report alleged that the Israeli government had retained at least six firms to help in its efforts to sway public opinion in the United States in its favor. It added that at least three dozen new people, many of them in the marketing industry, have registered as foreign agents for Israel

This comes as 42% of American adults hold an unfavorable opinion of Israeli people, and 69% hold an unfavorable opinion of the Israeli government, a July poll from the Pew Research Center found.

The WSJ reported that Israel’s 2026 budget to improve its image and global standing was set for over $700 million. In 2025, Israel’s Foreign Ministry received $150 million, on top of what it gets for its existing activities, for public diplomacy, or in Hebrew, hasbara.

Israel spends record numbers on Hasbara in 2026

That sum was more than 20 times what hasbara efforts have typically been allotted in past years.

But in 2026, the government allocated roughly $730 million, more than four times the sum allotted in 2025.

Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft researcher Nick Cleveland-Stout told the WSJ that Israel is on track to spend more than any other country on influencing US public opinion, based on funds disclosed to the US federal government this year.

In the past, nations such as Qatar spent around $400 billion to influence US public opinion, according to a June memo from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

Notably, the WSJ report is also the latest accusation that former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale has been hired to act on behalf of Israel.

According to the report, Parscale, who is now the chief strategy officer at Salem Media, was paid over $45 million to launch a series of campaigns by Israel to help boost its standing in the US.

Time reported that Parscale promised the campaign would produce "at least 50 million digital impressions per month, as well as influence how AI tools such as OpenAI's ChatGPT, Anthropic's Claude, and Google's Gemini characterized Israel and the war.”

The WSJ also reported that part of Parscale’s contracts were launching artificial-intelligence-generated texts to thousands of US citizens under the guise of “sharing perspectives and educating people about the importance of the US-Israel relationship.”

The goal of the AI in the campaign was to deduce the biggest concerns US citizens have about Israel, combat them, and report the answers back to the government, Parscale said, according to the WSJ.

One Foreign Ministry source told Time that another aim of the campaign was to prevent any “young conservatives from turning against Israel,” which the ministry believed Parscale was uniquely capable of doing.

But beyond Parscale, the Israeli government is using several other firms to improve Americans’ opinions of it.

One group, Show Faith by Works, reportedly filed documents outlining plans to send pro-Israel messaging to around 4 million megachurch members and Christian college students in the American Southwest through a geofencing campaign, the WSJ reported.

Show Faith by Works said that it would show “positive associations with the Nation of Israel while linking the Palestinian population with extremist factions.”

[Original paywalled article:]

https://www.wsj.com/politics/israels-50-million-experiment-to-change-u-s-public-opinion-253b3b70