Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, who ruled Qatar from 1995 to 2013, making it the world's top LNG exporter, founding Al Jazeera and securing the 2022 World Cup, has died at 74, the Amiri Diwan announced.
Iran buried assassinated supreme leader Ali Khamenei at the Imam Reza shrine, closing a vast state funeral clouded by an unresolved succession: his proclaimed heir, Mojtaba Khamenei, remains unseen.
Ali Khamenei's six-day state funeral reached Iraq's holy cities of Najaf and Karbala on 8 July, four months after the Iranian Supreme Leader was killed in US-Israeli airstrikes. His son Mojtaba, named successor by the Assembly of Experts, remains unseen, deepening uncertainty over Iran's leadership after a war that closed the Strait of Hormuz and sent oil above $120.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard fired at least two missiles at commercial ships crossing the Strait of Hormuz overnight into 7 July, striking a Qatari LNG carrier and setting it on fire. Two vessels were badly damaged but no casualties were reported. The strikes are the first in the chokepoint since a US-Iran truce took hold in June, and pushed crude prices higher as Europe watches its energy lifeline.
Israel's cabinet has voted unanimously to defy a Supreme Court ruling for the first time in the state's history, escalating the confrontation between Benjamin Netanyahu's government and the judiciary.
Iran is holding a vast, days-long funeral for slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei, choreographed as a demonstration of regime strength even as his successor son Mojtaba stays out of view.
The United States and Iran concluded two days of indirect, Qatari- and Pakistani-mediated talks in Doha on 2 July without resolving control of the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint for about a quarter of seaborne oil. The round focused on maritime traffic and unfreezing Iranian funds under June's Islamabad Memorandum. Oil fell to four-month lows, and the next round awaits the six-day funeral of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as his son and successor Mojtaba Khamenei consolidates power.
Iran began six days of funeral ceremonies for Ali Khamenei on 3 July, four months after the supreme leader was assassinated in the opening hours of the US–Israeli war. Officials expect crowds in the tens of millions before his burial in Mashhad on 9 July, while his son and successor Mojtaba Khamenei — chosen by the Assembly of Experts in March — has yet to appear in public. US–Iran talks in Doha are paused for the funeral, and oil prices have fallen back to near pre-war levels.
A US-brokered agreement linking Israel's withdrawal to Hezbollah's disarmament has split Lebanon, with the armed group calling the deal a surrender and warning of internal conflict.
A senior US official says Washington and Tehran have agreed to stop attacking each other and return to talks in Doha on 30 June, a de-escalation that has steadied oil prices and drawn cautious EU welcome.
Israel's cabinet voted unanimously on 28 June 2026 to recognise the 1915 Armenian genocide, the first official state act after a century of reticence shaped by ties with Turkey and Azerbaijan. Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar called it a moral and historical duty; the resolution now heads to the Knesset. Turkey condemned the move as a political decision designed to cover Israel's own conduct in Gaza.
Israel and Lebanon, still technically at war, signed a US-mediated framework on 26 June pledging to end their conflict through a sequenced, conditional process. Israel will hand two pilot zones to the Lebanese army once Hezbollah is disarmed there, but keeps its security zone and sets no timetable. Beirut called it a first step; Hezbollah rejected it.
A renewed tanker strike and US retaliation have tested the June ceasefire between Washington and Tehran, leaving the six Gulf monarchies to mediate, hedge and absorb the risks to oil flows and European energy security.
With the Iran war paused, southern Syria — Israel's buffer zone in Quneitra and Daraa and the Druze crisis around Suwayda — is emerging as the front Europe fears most.
Lebanon, Israel and the United States signed a trilateral framework agreement in Washington on 26 June 2026, setting out a sequenced process to disarm Hezbollah and eventually withdraw Israeli forces. Hours later Hezbollah, excluded from the talks, rejected the deal, exposing the framework's central weakness.
Two waves of cyberattacks in June 2026 disrupted card payments, ATMs and online banking at Iran's largest state banks, with a group calling itself Black Wolves claiming responsibility. The outages revive memories of the 2025 Predatory Sparrow assaults on Bank Sepah and the Nobitex crypto exchange, and underscore how financial-system sabotage has become a frontline weapon in the wider Middle East confrontation.
Iran's parliament speaker and lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, called the US-brokered deal that ended the 2026 Iran war 'a declaration of America's defeat.' The Pakistan-mediated Islamabad Memorandum trades an end to US and Israeli strikes and sanctions relief for Iranian curbs on uranium enrichment — but a clash over IAEA inspections, and a split between Tehran's pragmatists and hardliners, leaves the peace untested. For Europe, the payoff is already visible in falling crude prices.
Iran has told the IAEA it will not allow inspectors back into the three nuclear facilities bombed a year ago, deepening a verification standoff just as Tehran and Washington advance a 60-day roadmap toward a final agreement — leaving the watchdog unable to account for some 440 kg of high-enriched uranium.
US and Iranian delegations meeting at the Bürgenstock resort above Lake Lucerne agreed what mediators Qatar and Pakistan called a roadmap toward a final deal within 60 days, including a Strait of Hormuz communication line, a Lebanon de-confliction cell and the return of IAEA inspectors. The diplomacy unfolded as President Trump publicly threatened fresh strikes, leaving the core nuclear and sanctions questions unresolved and oil markets watching the Gulf.
A renewed US-, Qatari- and Iranian-mediated truce halted the deadliest flare-up along the Israel-Lebanon frontier as negotiators prepared to reconvene the week of 22 June, though Hezbollah's rejection of disarmament terms and Israel's refusal to leave a buffer zone keep a comprehensive settlement out of reach.
The first round of formal U.S.-Iran post-ceasefire talks ended at the Bürgenstock resort with a road map toward a final deal in 60 days, sending oil lower and equities higher even as the enrichment dispute remained unresolved.