For a ninth consecutive night, US forces struck targets inside Iran. CENTCOM confirmed attacks through Sunday and into early Monday against coastal installations at Jask and Sirik along the Strait of Hormuz, positions at Qeshm Island, Chabahar, Konarak, and Bushehr, and the northwestern city of Tabriz. Iran responded by striking US military assets at two bases in Kuwait over the weekend, targeting an ammunition depot at Al-Adiri and the Patriot radar system at Ali Al Salem air base. Three US service members have died since the conflict began July 7, with nearly 100 more injured, according to Pentagon figures. CNN has tracked the overnight exchanges.
There is a new development this morning. A 10-day ceasefire proposal has been passed to Tehran by mediators working between Washington and the Iranian government. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei confirmed the proposal’s existence Sunday, telling reporters that mediators are “working and trying to prevent tension from escalating,” according to Al Jazeera. No agreement has been reached. The last formal framework, the Islamabad Memorandum, was signed June 17 and lasted three weeks before Iran’s supreme leader declared Trump’s signature worthless and suspended Iran’s commitments. The US declared the ceasefire over at the NATO summit in Turkey on July 8. Nine nights of strikes have followed.
Qatar remains in the conversation at a distance after Iranian fire struck in its direction last week, straining its position as the primary host of back-channel talks. Pakistan has entered as a co-mediator, according to the Jerusalem Post. Commercial shipping through the strait has nearly stopped. Approximately nine vessels crossed in the past twenty-four hours, against a pre-conflict baseline of roughly 130 daily crossings. More than 490 vessels are anchored or holding in the region. Iran has struck seven commercial ships since the original ceasefire collapsed, killing at least one crew member. US gasoline prices are up roughly 34 percent since the conflict began.
The last time US and Iranian forces engaged in direct combat before this month, the exchange lasted one day. Operation Praying Mantis, April 18, 1988, was triggered by an Iranian mine that damaged the USS Samuel B. Roberts four days earlier. The US response sank two Iranian frigates and destroyed multiple patrol boats and oil platforms in roughly fourteen hours. That confrontation, alongside eight years of economic and military exhaustion from the Iran-Iraq War, contributed to Iran accepting a UN ceasefire that summer, in August 1988. This conflict is now entering its second week. Nobody in Washington or Tehran can say this morning whether the proposal on the table will produce what the Islamabad Memorandum couldn’t.
The confirmed death toll from Venezuela’s June 24 earthquake sequence has risen to 5,278, according to Venezuelan National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez, as reported by Azernews. More than 16,740 people were injured and nearly 18,000 left without permanent housing. The United Nations has estimated $37 billion in direct physical damage and is seeking $296 million in emergency funding over six months to reach 1.3 million affected people. The United States has pledged roughly $180 million in assistance. As of Sunday, the USDA is overseeing on-the-ground relief operations, a notable development in the context of the improving US-Venezuela relationship since the end of the Maduro government. The Washington Times reported on the USDA’s role Sunday.
The two-shock sequence, a 7.2 and a 7.5 striking thirty-nine seconds apart off Venezuela’s northern coast, hit four weeks ago today. Four weeks in, the toll has risen from the early estimates of 2,500 to 4,000 to 5,278, and recovery crews haven’t yet reached all areas of total structural collapse. The USGS estimated early on that the final count could exceed 10,000. The gap between the $37 billion in damage the UN estimates and the $296 million in aid being requested reflects how much of the reconstruction work ahead has no emergency pledge to cover it.
Congo’s health ministry reported 2,344 confirmed Ebola cases and at least 930 deaths as of Sunday, up from 2,181 cases and 864 deaths two days earlier, according to Al Jazeera. Ituri Province accounts for 2,090 of the confirmed cases and 776 of the deaths. The World Health Organization, which declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in May, has called this the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak ever recorded.
From Uganda, better news. The 42-day countdown that began July 16, when Uganda’s last confirmed patient was discharged, continues without interruption. Uganda’s outbreak totaled 20 confirmed cases and 2 deaths, all in Kampala, with no community transmission and no new case since June 21. The 42-day window, which is twice the maximum Ebola incubation period, is the standard WHO requires before a country can declare itself free of the disease. If it runs clean, it’ll mark Uganda’s ability to contain an outbreak that crossed its border from DRC without producing a single case of community spread inside the country. One country is holding. The other isn’t.
Ukraine’s parliament hasn’t confirmed a permanent defense minister since President Zelenskyy dismissed Mykhailo Fedorov on July 15. Major General Yevhenii Khmara is serving as acting minister. PBS NewsHour reported Sunday on the ongoing leadership gap as protests that followed the dismissal continue in Kyiv, Lviv, Odesa, and Dnipro. Fedorov has said publicly that Army Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi delivered Zelenskyy an ultimatum after months of conflict over drone strategy and conscription priorities. Zelenskyy’s office hasn’t addressed that account.
On Germany: Chancellor Merz announced July 9 that Germany had struck a deal to purchase US Tomahawk cruise missiles for deployment on German soil, a meaningful step for a country that has historically approached long-range precision weapons with considerable caution. Delivery approval is expected in August. The Coalition of the Willing, the alliance of European and allied nations discussing a potential security role in Ukraine, has scheduled its first exercises in Poland for autumn 2026. Russia declared on July 15 that any deployed coalition troops would be “legitimate military targets.” The Washington Post covered the German purchase.
The confirmed US heat death toll from the first wave of this summer’s heat dome stands at at least 44 nationally: 29 in New Jersey, 7 in Pennsylvania, 4 in Illinois, 3 in New York, and 1 in Mississippi, according to Axios and ongoing heat wave tracking. The Extreme Heat Emergency Act, which would add extreme heat to the Stafford Act categories that trigger federal disaster declarations, hasn’t come to a floor vote in either chamber. No major disaster declaration has ever been issued solely for extreme heat. Those two facts have been true for years. They’re still true this morning, with 44 people dead.
If you missed it this morning, Glenn Suttner has a piece in Money worth your time: how to set up a trust, what it actually costs, and who you need to make it work. It’s here.
Spain defeated Argentina 1-0 in extra time Sunday afternoon at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, to win the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The deciding moment came in the 106th minute, when substitute Ferran Torres drilled a left-footed finish after a headed pass from Nico Williams. Torres becomes the second substitute in World Cup history to score the winning goal in a final. The first was Mario Götze, for Germany against Argentina in 2014. Argentina lost to extra time, to a substitute, on a goal they couldn’t answer, for the second time in twelve years. FIFA’s match report is here.
The match’s turning point came in stoppage time of regulation, when Enzo Fernandez received a red card for a reckless challenge and left Argentina to begin extra time with ten men. Emiliano Martinez, in the Argentine goal, made eleven saves over 120 minutes, a World Cup final record in defeat. Spain held 65 percent possession. Argentina didn’t register a single shot on target in regulation. Going a man down in extra time against the best technical team in the world finished what the ninety minutes had started.
Lamine Yamal, who started the match eight days past his nineteenth birthday, played all 120 minutes and became the first teenager in history to win both a European Championship and a World Cup. He was born July 13, 2007. Lionel Messi, 39, became the first man to start three World Cup finals and captain his country in all three. He didn’t score Sunday and finished with 54 touches, among his fewest in any World Cup start. The two of them played on the same field in New Jersey, nineteen years apart in age, one opening a chapter and one closing one. It’s the kind of thing that doesn’t come around often in any sport. Spain is world champion for the second time, sixteen years after their first. The CBS News match summary is here.
Howard Fenn writes The Day, Monday through Friday.
