BIG: Israeli Channel 12 reports Trump administration officials have quietly opened backchannel contacts with opposition leaders Naftali Bennett and Gadi Eisenkot, hedging against Netanyahu ahead of Israel's elections (due by October 2026).
Bennett and Eisenkot are seen as top contenders to replace Netanyahu, with Eisenkot's Yashar! party rising in polls and Bennett's "change bloc" coordinating with Lapid, Gantz, and Liberman.
🇫🇷 Macron claims Trump wanted to hand over Ukraine to Russia during the Alaska meeting and that Europe prevented the deal.
Emmanuel Macron:
📌 “During the meeting in Alaska, Trump wanted to hand Ukraine over to Russia.”
📌 “Europe thwarted the Putin-Trump deal, from which Ukraine could expect nothing good.”
🗣️ According to him, Trump was in such a hurry to establish peace that he was ready to hand Ukraine over to Putin: “The agreement with the Russian dictator even envisaged the transfer to the Russian Federation of territories that had not yet been captured. Moreover, no one asked Kyiv for its opinion.”
📌 Later, a European delegation arrived in Washington and convinced Trump to abandon this approach. Macron asserts that European leaders explained the real situation on the front to the US President and showed that Ukraine continues to resist.
🗣️ “Trump realized that Russia is not fulfilling its obligations, and his vision of peace is Ukraine’s capitulation,” the French President stated.
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According to a release from U.S. Central Command, despite Iran’s announcement of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the strait remains open. Per the release, 55 vessels transited the strait today, transporting 17 million barrels of oil.
❗️Pro-Russian Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev stated that he would block the EU’s 21st sanctions package against Russia.
Reasons: harm to the Bulgarian economy, particularly to Lukoil’s local subsidiary (the country’s only oil refinery), problems with the supply of spare parts for the Sofia metro and fertilizers, as well as his objection to the inclusion of Patriarch Kirill on the list.
Radev questioned the effectiveness of the sanctions: “In what way have these sanctions stopped the war so far?”