Thursday Briefing: Fears of a wider Middle East war

Leaders of Iran and Hamas vowed to strike back.

View in browser|nytimes.com August 1, 2024 By Natasha Frost Good morning. We're covering fears of escalation in the Middle East and tensions over race in the U.S. presidential election. Plus: A slower Olympic pool? Professors in Tehran protesting the killing of Ismail Haniyeh. Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times Iran and Hamas vow to strike back The assassination yesterday of Ismail Haniyeh, a top Hamas leader, in Tehran has left the entire Middle East on edge, bringing vows of revenge from Iran's leaders and threatening to derail fragile negotiations about a Gaza cease-fire. Both Iran and Hamas accused Israel of killing Haniyeh, which Israel has neither confirmed nor denied. Now, the focus is on whether a response from Iran and its proxies could lead to a regional war. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Haniyeh's assassination would prompt a "harsh punishment," and officials said he had issued an order for Iran to strike Israel directly. In recent years, Israel has carried out several high-profile assassinations in Iran, rattling the country's leaders. In November, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel told reporters that he had ordered the Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence service, to "act against the heads of Hamas, wherever they are." White House reaction: For President Biden, the back-to-back assassinations of a Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and the political leader of Hamas in Iran have once again scrambled the geopolitical equation and revised the risk assessment of a wider war in the Middle East. In Israel: Riots broke out after Israeli soldiers were detained on suspicion of sexually abusing a Palestinian detainee, highlighting a growing divide among Israelis about the conduct of their soldiers. Hamas: Haniyeh was among the most senior members of the leadership of the militant group. Who are the organization's other prominent leaders? 🇺🇸 U.S. ELECTION 2024 The presidential election is less than 100 days away. This is what we're watching. Kamala Harris accused Donald Trump of "divisiveness and disrespect." Erin Schaff/The New York Times Harris and Trump spar over racial identity At an event for a prominent Black sorority last night, Kamala Harris criticized comments Donald Trump had made about her racial identity hours earlier. His remarks showed "divisiveness and disrespect," she said, adding, "The American people deserve better." At a conference for Black journalists, Trump falsely suggested that Harris — who is of Jamaican and Indian heritage and attended a historically Black university — had previously identified as Indian, then "all of a sudden, she made a turn, and she became a Black person." Here's a fact-check. Trump also repeatedly chided a reporter as "rude" and "nasty" after she read a list of his past comments about Black people. Read more about his confrontational interview. Here's the latest on the election: Recent polls show a surge in enthusiasm about Harris's candidacy. Republicans are attacking Harris on immigration. Here's what her record shows. More than 100 Silicon Valley investors pledged to back Harris. What do you want to know? We're asking readers to send us their questions about the U.S. presidential election. Fill out the form here. Stay up-to-date: Live coverage | Poll tracker | The "Run-Up" podcast | On Politics newsletter Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Tyler Hicks/The New York Times Accused Sept. 11 plotters to plead guilty Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the man accused of plotting the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and two of his accomplices have agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy charges in exchange for life sentences rather than a death-penalty trial at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, prosecutors said yesterday. A senior Pentagon official approved the deal, Defense Department officials said. The men have been in U.S. custody since 2003, but the case had become mired in pretrial proceedings focusing on whether their torture in secret C.I.A. prisons had contaminated the evidence against them. The plea averted a trial of as long of 18 months, or alternatively, the possibility that the military judge would throw out confessions that were crucial to the government's case. The three men will still face a mini-trial of sorts, but probably not before next year. Details: "These three accused have agreed to plead guilty to all of the charged offenses, including the murder of the 2,976 people listed in the charge sheet," a letter from war court prosecutors to family members of victims of the attacks said. Related: Zacarias Moussaoui, the only prisoner convicted in the U.S. of having ties to the attacks, was denied his application to serve out his life sentence in his native France. MORE TOP NEWS Getty Images/Getty Images England: A day after an attacker with a knife killed three girls in Southport, far-right protesters attacked a mosque during riots driven partly by disinformation. Venezuela: Partial results from the disputed election, provided by researchers associated with the opposition, suggest that President Nicolás Maduro lost by more than 30 percentage points. Media: Huw Edwards, who was one of the BBC's top TV anchors, pleaded guilty to three offenses involving indecent images of children. Sudan: The army said two drone strikes had hit an army base near Port Sudan during a visit by the de facto leader, Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. India: The death toll from mudslides in Kerala State rose to at least 144. More than 190 people were still missing. Ukraine: Recent polls found that more Ukrainians appear to be opening up to the idea of a negotiated peace to end the war with Russia. Iceland: The country's Meteorological Office warned that a volcanic eruption could happen "in the coming days." The Olympic Games Triathlon: After the Seine was deemed clean enough for swimming, Alex Yee of Britain won gold in the men's triathlon with an improbable comeback. Cassandre Beaugrand of France won the women's competition. Soccer: The U.S. women's team beat Australia and advanced to the quarterfinals. Here are the highlights from Day 5 at the Olympics. Dance lessons: A dressage rider explains how she and her horse, Jagerbomb, made it to the Olympics. SPORTS NEWS Business: Kylian Mbappé has become the majority owner of the Ligue 2 club Caen with the approval of a takeover. Soccer: Nico Williams is expected to stay at Athletic Bilbao, leaving Barcelona with little chance of signing the winger this summer. Formula 1: Alpine named Oliver Oakes its new Formula One team principal, succeeding Bruno Famin. MORNING READ Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York Times Gouda, the small city where the renowned Dutch cheese is made, is subsiding as sea levels rise, threatening centuries of tradition. "I wouldn't expect much cheese from Gouda anymore in 100 years," one expert said. "If the land turns into water and the cows disappear, the cheese will have to come from the eastern part of the country, and it won't be Gouda anymore." Lives lived: Sir Kenneth Grange, the British industrial designer whose cameras, food mixers, lamps and even taxis and trains were celebrated examples of modernist, post-World War II design, died on July 21 at 95. CONVERSATION STARTERS Travel vlogs: Chinese propaganda loves foreign travel bloggers — as long as they tell a certain story. Elite table tennis: No, you can't beat an Olympian at "Ping-Pong." Do not touch: Sloth bears may be responsible for more attacks on people than any large carnivore in the world. Videos of them fighting off tigers show why. ARTS AND IDEAS James Hill for The New York Times Is the Olympic pool too shallow for speed? At this year's Olympic swimming events, favorites like Ariarne Titmus and Léon Marchand have already won gold — but no one has set a world record yet. The reason may be the depth of the pool at Paris La Défense Arena, where the races are taking place. Olympic swimming pools are usually three meters deep, like the "Water Cube" at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, the site of 25 individual and team world records and 65 Olympic records. But the pool at La Défense is only 2.2 meters deep. "When you swim, you create a wave, and the wave goes behind and goes under," said one scientist. "And if the pool is too shallow, the wave reflects from the bottom and causes the water to be turbulent, and therefore it slows down the swimmers." For more: Katie Ledecky set an Olympic record in the 1,500-meter freestyle, and Léon Marchand set one in the 200-meter butterfly. We hope you've enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times. RECOMMENDATIONS Kelly Marshall for The New York Times. Cook: Iwuk edesi is a Nigerian one-pot chicken dish, best enjoyed straight off the stove. Watch: "Kleo" is an archly humorous spy series about an ex-Stasi assassin. Listen: Our music critic made an Olympics playlist. Read: Mai Sennaar's debut novel, "They Dream in Gold," is extraordinary, our critic writes. Play the Spelling Bee. And here are today's Mini Crossword and Wordle. You can find all our puzzles here. That's it for today's briefing. See you tomorrow. — Natasha Reach Natasha and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance. You received this email because you signed up for Morning Briefing: Europe Edition from The New York Times. To stop receiving Morning Briefing: Europe Edition, unsubscribe. 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