Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

News

Hard Numbers: US hits 5 million COVID cases, Niger attack kills French citizens, Venezuela jails former US green berets, New Zealand's 100-day milestone

Hard Numbers: US hits 5 million COVID cases, Niger attack kills French citizens, Venezuela jails former US green berets, New Zealand's 100-day milestone
Make us preferred on Google

5 million: The number of coronavirus cases in the United States surpassed 5 million on Sunday. That's double the number of cases in the country since the end of June, as states across the Midwest, the South and the West grapple with new surges. The US now accounts for one quarter of all COVID-19 cases worldwide.


8: A deadly attack by jihadist fighters on a convoy carrying a group of aid workers in Niger resulted in eight deaths, six of whom were French nationals. Groups linked to the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda have gained a foothold in the Sahel region in recent years, imposing fear and hardship on millions of the people who live there, and capturing the attention of European leaders.

20: A Venezuelan court has sentenced two former US soldiers to 20-year jail terms for their part in a failed operation earlier this year to take down Venezuela's autocratic president, Nicolás Maduro. The two men say that the botched mission was backed by the Trump administration, a claim the White House vehemently denies.

100: New Zealand reached a new milestone on Sunday, recording 100 days without any community transmission of COVID-19. While a strict lockdown and robust testing scheme helped flatten the curve, the island nation also doesn't have the population density problem that has contributed to the infection's spread in places like India and the UK.

More For You

Hunger strike in India intensifies
Farida Dowidar
Sonam Wangchuk has long campaigned for the reform of India’s corrupt and inefficient system of entrance exams for higher education. That issue is also central to the recently formed Cockroach Janata Party protest movement, led by people decades younger than Wangchuk, who is 59-years-old. In India, millions of students compete vigorously for a [...]
​Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a session at the Knesset, in Jerusalem, Israel, on July 16, 2026.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a session at the Knesset, Israel's parliament, before it dissolves ahead of the 2026 Israeli elections, in Jerusalem, Israel, on July 16, 2026.

REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
It’s official: on Sunday, Israel’s parliament affirmed that the country will hold a national election on Oct. 27. It will be the first time that Israelis head to the polls since the Hamas attacks on Israel of Oct. 7, 2023, and the subsequent wars in Gaza, southern Lebanon, and Iran.The big question in this election yet again is whether Benjamin [...]
Crowds carry signs and chant during a protest in Kyiv, Ukraine to protest the dismissal of the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Mykhailo Fedorov by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Several hundred Kyiv residents gather in front of Ivana Franka Theater to protest the dismissal of the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Mykhailo Fedorov by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, on July 16, 2026, in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Justin Yau/ Sipa USA
Ukrainians take to the streets over defense minister’s firingPresident Volodymyr Zelensky’s decision to remove Mykhailo Fedorov on Wednesday has not gone down well with the Ukrainian public. Thousands took to the streets of Kyiv and other cities today to demand that he be reinstated. Fedorov – who only took the job six months ago – was seen as an [...]
Ukraine has won Trump's favor. Can it keep it?
- YouTube
Winning Trump's favor is one thing. Keeping it is another.Just four months after their tense Oval Office meeting on February 28, 2025, Donald Trump welcomed Volodymyr Zelensky at the NATO summit in Ankara with a noticeably warmer tone. For Ukraine, that's an encouraging shift—but hardly a guarantee of lasting American support. [...]