10: Today marks 10 years since the coup against Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. A prominent Muslim Brotherhood figure, he was Egypt’s first democratically elected civilian president, winning the country’s first free elections after the Arab Spring. But he overplayed his hand, sidelining liberals, antagonizing the army, and provoking fresh pro-democracy protests. A decade later, the man who led the coup against him, General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, remains in power, presiding over a deeply authoritarian system and a teetering economy. Morsi died in 2019 while in the dock for espionage charges that human rights groups said were bogus.
2: At least two people were killed and close to 30 were injured in a mass shooting at a block party in the US city of Baltimore on Saturday. The violence marred the July Fourth holiday weekend, but it also came just days after federal prosecutors claimed they had made breakthroughs in reducing violent crime in Baltimore, which has one of the worst homicide rates in the country.
600,000: The king of the Netherlands has for the first time formally apologized for his country’s role in the slave trade that saw the trafficking of at least 600,000 people – from Africa to Dutch colonies in Asia, South America, and elsewhere – during the 17th and 18th centuries. A recent report found that the Dutch government reaped $545 million in today’s money from the exploitative trade between 1675 and 1770.
1: Wimbledon, the storied (and posh) tennis tournament, has for the first time revised its all-white-clothing rule for female players after years of complaints that the requirement deepens anxiety for women on their period who are afraid of blood leakage while on the court. The 146-year-old Grand Slam, which has some of the strictest rules in the business, will allow women to wear darker undershorts when the tournament starts today in London.
