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Europe
Germany
17.07.2025 Through a two-year collaboration between Berlin's Health Ministry, the German military, and 12 of the capital's medical facilities, German authorities have developed a comprehensive contingency plan for hospitals in Berlin ’to prepare for potential war scenarios’. The contingency planning addresses several critical scenarios, including ’military attacks on the metropolitan area’, hybrid threats, natural disasters and infrastructure collapse. Key questions addressed in the framework include maintaining critical hospital services during conflicts, distributing patients during emergencies, and ensuring adequate emergency power, medical supplies, and medications. (Source: Anadolu Agency - Turkey)
European Commission
17.07.2025 The European Commission today said that it has referred Hungary to the Court of Justice of the European Union for refusing to comply with a key EU ruling on investor-state arbitration under the Energy Charter Treaty. (Source: Anadolu Agency - Turkey)
Russia
8:29 ET, Jul 17 2025 Soldiers were killed ‘in mass poisoning by laced bottles of water, convulsing and moaning in agony and slipping into unconsciousness as medics scramble to help. Russian war channels suspect it was part of a Ukrainian sabotage operation. At least four soldiers were said to have died in excruciating pain after drinking from bottles labelled "Our Water", allegedly supplied to the front line in a humanitarian consignment. Several others are said to be in critical condition. The deadly incident unfolded in the Panteleimonivka area of Donetsk. The water reportedly came from Simferopol and was distributed under the guise of aid. As poisoned soldiers writhed on one front, an aerial onslaught across Ukraine was striking shopping centres, apartment blocks, and industrial targets. In the town of Dobropillia, a 500kg glide bomb dropped by Russian forces ripped through a busy shopping centre, killing two and wounding at least 25. At least 54 shops and 13 residential buildings were hit. (Source: The U.S. Sun)
Ukraine
July 17, 2025 Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022 Ukraine has experienced 2000 total attacks on health care. 285 health workers were killed and 245 health workers injured. 1059 attacks damaged or destroyed hospitals and clinics. The new data is from a coalition of global and Ukrainian organizations. The dataset uses the definitions of attacks on health care as defined by the World Health Organization and used by the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition. (Source: Physicians for Human Rights - a New York-based advocacy organization, U.S.)
United Kingdom
17.07.2025 At a ceremony in central London, the UK and Germany today signed a Friendship and Cooperation Treaty aimed at strengthening bilateral ties across defense, foreign policy, economic cooperation, and migration. (Source: Anadolu Agency - Turkey)
Asia
Gaza
17.07.2025 Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni today slammed Israel's deadly attack on the Holy Family Catholic Church in Gaza. Two women were killed in the attack. The attacks against the civilian population that Israel has been carrying out for months are unacceptable, Meloni wrote on X. (Source: Anadolu Agency - Turkey)
Central America
Panama
Jul 17, 2025 at 3:21 AM EDT The United States has trained for the defense of the Panama Canal during a joint exercise with the Central American country amid concerns over China's growing presence in the region. U.S. Army soldiers assigned to the 25th Infantry Division arrived in Panama to advance joint security efforts between the two nations, including site surveys for potential future training locations The exercise, code-named PANAMAX-Alpha Phase I and scheduled from July 13 to 18, The Joint Task Force-Bravo of the U.S. Southern Command deployed three helicopters - two UH-60 Black Hawk and one CH-47 Chinook aircraft - for the exercise, which took place at three air bases in Panama. The Southern Command is one of the Pentagon's combatant commands, responsible for "providing contingency planning, operations, and security cooperation" within its area of responsibility - a region that includes Central America, South America and the Caribbean. A U.S. naval hospital ship, USNS Comfort, has been conducting a medical mission known as Continuing Promise 2025 iacross Central and South America since May 30. (Source: Newsweek - U.S.)
North America
United States
July 17, 2025, 3:30 PM GMT+2 New U. S. assessment finds American strikes destroyed only one of three Iranian nuclear sites. The two others were not as badly damaged and may have been degraded only to a point where nuclear enrichment could resume in the next several months if Iran wants it to. The assessment was briefed to some U.S. lawmakers, Defense Department officials and allied countries in recent days. As early as last fall and into this spring, U.S. Central Command had developed a much more comprehensive plan to strike Iran that would have involved hitting three additional sites in an operation that would have stretched for several weeks instead of a single night. Army Gen. Kurilla, the head of U.S. Central Command, had developed the plan to go all-in on striking Iran. That option was designed to truly decimate Iran’s nuclear capabilities. Under the plan, the United States would have hit six sites repeatedly to inflict the kind of damage necessary to completely end the program. The plan would also have involved targeting more of Iran’s air defense and ballistic missile capabilities. Planners projected it could result in a high number of Iranian casualties. U.S. officials expected that if that were to take place, Iran would target American positions, for example in Iraq and Syria. Some Trump administration officials believed a deeper offensive option against Iran was a viable policy. Trump was briefed on the so-called all-in plan, but it was rejected ultimately because it would have required a sustained period of conflict. It was at odds with his foreign policy ’instincts’ to extract the United States from conflicts abroad, not dig deeper into them, as well as the possibility of a high number of casualties on both sides. As more intelligence comes in, the United States could find itself back in a conflict there. Assessments of Iran’s nuclear program after the U.S. strikes are expected to change over time. The U.S. strikes targeted three enrichment sites in Iran: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. U.S. officials ’believe’ the attack on Fordo, which has long been viewed as a critical component of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, was successful in setting back Iranian enrichment capabilities at that site by as much as two years. The United States hit surface targets at Isfahan with Tomahawk missiles and did not drop GBU-57s there, but it did use them at Natanz. In late June CIA Director Ratcliffe said the only metal conversion facility at Natanz, required for nuclear enrichment, was destroyed to the point that it would take years to rebuild. Ratcliffe also said that the intelligence community believes the strikes buried the vast majority of enriched uranium at Isfahan and Fordo and that thus it would be extremely difficult for the Iranians to extract it to resume enrichment. The United States has not seen indications that Iran is trying to dig out the facilities. The official also said Israel believes Iran’s nuclear program has been set back by up to two years. From their point of view, the regime in Tehran now faces a credible threat of more airstrikes if Israel and the United States believe it is trying to revive clandestine nuclear work. Iran’s air defenses have been largely destroyed, making it all but impossible for Iran to defend against further strikes on facilities in the future. Asked late last month whether he would consider bombing Iran again if intelligence reports concluded Iran can enrich uranium at a level that concerns him, Trump said: ’Sure. Without question. Absolutely.’ (Source: NBC News - U.S.)
(Thursday), July 17, 2025 Maxwell collected letters from Trump and dozens of Epstein’s other associates for a 2003 birthday album, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. It was Epstein’s 50th birthday, and Maxwell was preparing a special gift to mark the occasion. She turned to Epstein’s family and friends. One of them was Trump. The letter bearing Trump’s name, which was reviewed by the Journal, is bawdy - like others in the album. It contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker. A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the signature is a squiggly “Donald” below her waist, mimicking pubic hair. The letter concludes: “Happy Birthday - and may every day be another wonderful secret.” When he turned 50, Epstein was already wealthy from managing Wexner’s fortune and was socializing with Trump, Clinton and other powerful people at his Manhattan townhouse, Palm Beach, Fla., home and private Caribbean island. Epstein and Trump spent time together in the 1990s and early 2000s and were photographed at social events, including with Maxwell and Melania. A 1992 tape from the NBC archives shows Trump partying with Epstein at his Mar-a-Lago estate; Trump is seen pulling a woman toward him and patting her behind. A 2002 New York magazine profile of Epstein quoted Trump. “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy,” Trump said. "It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it - Jeffrey enjoys his social life.' Trump, along with others including Clinton, also appeared several times on flight logs for Epstein’s private jet. Allegations that Epstein had been sexually abusing girls became public in 2006 and he was arrested that year. Trump has said their friendship ended before Epstein pleaded guilty to procuring a minor for prostitution in 2008, served time in a Florida jail and registered as a sex offender. In 2019, the FBI confiscated evidence from Epstein’s properties in the U.S. Virgin Islands and New York. When Epstein was arrested again in 2019, Trump said he hadn’t talked to Epstein for about 15 years. Epstein died in 2019 in jail after he was arrested a second time and charged with sex trafficking conspiracy. Maxwell, a British socialite, was convicted in 2021 of helping Epstein’s sex-trafficking and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Allegations that bureaucrats covered up Epstein’s connections with participants in his trafficking scheme were fanned by people now in top roles in the Trump administration, including FBI Director Patel and his deputy, Bongino. in June Musk, amid a public feud with Trump, alleged that the FBI was withholding documents from the Epstein case because Trump was in the files. On July 8, Trump criticized a reporter for asking about Epstein. “Are people still talking about this guy, this creep?” Trump said. “Do you want to waste the time?” Tuesday evening, Trump denied writing the letter or drawing the picture. “This is not me. This is a fake thing. It’s a fake Wall Street Journal story,” he said. “I never wrote a picture in my life. I don’t draw pictures of women,” he said. “It’s not my language. It’s not my words.” Earlier Tuesday, Trump told reporters at the White House that he believed some Epstein files were 'made up' by former Presidents Obama and Biden and former FBI Director Comey. (Source: The Wall Street Journal - U.S.)
17 July 2025 The Department of Justice (DoJ) and the FBI published almost 11 hours of footage amid calls for greater transparency regarding the Epstein case, which has been the subject of conspiracy theories for years. It went on to say: "After a thorough investigation, FBI investigators concluded that Epstein committed suicide in his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City on August 10, 2019. Epstein was awaiting trial for child sex trafficking charges. Two minutes and 53 seconds of footage showing the outside of Epstein's prison cell before his death appears to have been removed from the video. There are theories that he was killed to keep him from talking. Analysis of the metadata of the video by Wired has revealed that the 'full raw footage' of the evening was edited and saved repeatedly on May 23, 2025. The video has a gap in the footage between 11:58:58pm and 12:00:00am that Attorney General Bondi has attributed to a nightly system reset. The cut to the footage takes place milliseconds before the one-minute nightly reset gap. The video was edited and saved multiple times over a period of more than three and a half hours before it was exported and uploaded to the DoJ's website on July 14. In a memo announcing its publication, the DoJ said that edits had been made to increase the brightness and contrast for greater clarity. (Source: LBC – United Kingdom)
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