Hello Weekend Briefing readers, I'm in for Robert today. After a week where I couldn't look away from US politics, I am looking forward to this weekend's Reuters World News podcast which asks, what comes after Donald Trump?
Biden speaks as he visits Garage Grill and Fuel Bar in Northville, Michigan. July 12, 2024. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
"I'm not going anywhere": President Joe Biden used a campaign rally in Detroit to reiterate that he doesn't intend to drop out as the Democratic candidate to face former President Donald Trump. Biden is working to change the narrative after a poor debate performance on June 27. Since the debate, at least 19 lawmakers have urged him to step aside so the party can pick another candidate.
Republican National Convention: Beyond the questions about Biden's future, the next big event will be next week's RNC. Here's everything you need to know about the four-day event in Milwaukee. First, Trump will hold a campaign rally near Pittsburgh, as suspense builds over who he will choose as his running mate. Get weekly news and analysis on the US elections and how it matters to the world with the newsletter On the Campaign Trail.
An Israeli airstrike targeted Hamas' military chief Mohammed Deif in Gaza, a security official and Israel Army Radio said, in an attack that the enclave's health ministry said had killed at least 71 Palestinians. Read more about the secretive Hamas leader here.
The Israel-Gaza war must end now, and Israel must not occupy the enclave after the war, according to President Biden. On Thursday he told reporters his ceasefire framework had been agreed on by both Israel and Hamas but there were still gaps to close.
A "Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly": SpaceX's workhorse Falcon 9 rocket was grounded by the US Federal Aviation Administration after one broke apart in space and doomed its payload of Starlink satellites, the first failure in more than seven years of a rocket relied upon by the global space industry.
The FCC lets him be: A US appeals court upheld the decision of the Federal Communications Commission to approve a SpaceX plan to deploy thousands of Starlink satellites to provide space-based broadband internet service.
Power couple: A four-day extravaganza sees Anant Ambani, the youngest son of Asia's richest person Mukesh Ambani marry his long-time girlfriend Radhika Merchant in Mumbai. The wedding is the culmination of lavish celebrations throughout the year and according to police, has been deemed a "public event" due to the presence of international and Indian household names.
Three days of receptions: The festivities take place as the wealth concentrated in the richest 1% of India's population is at its highest in six decades. The wedding, much in the news for its opulent celebrations and VIP-studded guest list, has suddenly developed more political overtones with posters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi now lining the road to the venue.
Before I forget…
The rise of illicit fentanyl and the epidemic of related overdoses prompted US border authorities to take an unprecedented step in 2017 - training drug-sniffing dogs to detect it. The program has proved crucial to the agency's efforts to stop transit of the drug from Mexico. Reuters reporters received exclusive access to counter-fentanyl operations.
A New Mexico judge dismissed involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin, agreeing with his lawyers that prosecutors and police withheld evidence on the source of the live round that killed "Rust" cinematographer Halyna Hutchins in 2021.
A bill to unban female genital mutilation in Gambia has ignited a heated public debate. The bill's supporters see the ban as an attack on African culture. Opponents decry the harmful consequences of FGM on women's health.
ChatGPT maker OpenAI is working on a novel approach to its artificial intelligence models in a project code-named "Strawberry," according to a person familiar with the matter and internal documentation reviewed by Reuters.
Russia accused Australia of inciting "anti-Russian paranoia" for charging a Russian-born couple with espionage, prompting Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to tell Moscow to "back off".
My top read this week was a profile of Volodymyr Zelenskiy, mapping the ways Ukraine's wartime president has changed since Russia's invasion in 2022. My colleagues write the war-hardened Zelenskiy is a world away from the political novice who became president, let alone the TV comedian he was years before.
A 97-year-old judge who was suspended from a US appellate court last year after being accused of unfitness due to cognitive and physical impairment related to her age lost a lawsuit that she had filed in a bid to return to work.
Spain's tourism minister condemned the actions of a small group of protesters who sprayed visitors to Barcelona with water pistols, saying they did not represent the country's culture of hospitality.
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