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Hurricane Idalia strengthens en route to Florida, forcing mass evacuations

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Hurricane Idalia gained fury on Tuesday as it crawled toward Florida’s Gulf Coast, forcing mass evacuations in low-lying areas expected to be swamped when the powerful storm, forecast to reach Category 4 intensity, strikes on Wednesday morning.

Idalia was generating maximum sustained winds of 177 kph by late Tuesday night – at the upper end of Category 2 – and its force will ratchet higher before it slams ashore, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) projected.

By that time the storm was forecast to reach “an extremely dangerous Category 4 intensity” – with maximum sustained winds of at least 209 kph – on the five-step Saffir-Simpson wind scale, the NHC reported.

The hurricane was upgraded on Tuesday evening to a Category 2 after its top wind speeds surpassed 153 kph, feeding on the warm, open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Any storm designated Category 3 or higher is classified as a major hurricane.

Idalia’s most dangerous feature, however, appeared to be the powerful surge of wind-driven seawater it is expected to deliver to barrier islands and other low-lying areas along the coast.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination next year, urged residents in vulnerable communities to heed orders to move to higher ground, warning that the storm surge could cause life-threatening floods.

“They’re expecting some fatalities, so I don’t want to be one of them,” said Rene Hoffman, 62, of Steinhatchee, Florida, a coastal town in the area where Idalia is expected to make landfall. She owns a food stand that she lashed to her husband’s pickup truck to keep it from washing or blowing away.

“This is scary, you know, to think that water could come this high,” she said as she gathered her prescription medications and prepared to leave her home. “We’ve never had water up here before.”

The NHC said Idalia’s center would likely hit Florida’s coastline somewhere in the Big Bend region, where the state’s northern panhandle curves into the Gulf side of the Florida Peninsula, roughly bounded by the inland cities of Gainesville and Tallahassee, the state capital.

Sparsely populated compared with the Tampa-St. Petersburg area to the south, the Big Bend features a marshy coast, threaded with freshwater springs and rivers, and a cluster of small offshore islands forming Cedar Key, a historic fishing village devastated in 1896 by a hurricane’s storm surge.

Most of Florida’s 21 million residents, along with many in Georgia and South Carolina, were under hurricane, tropical storm and storm surge warnings and advisories. State emergency declarations were issued in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.

At the White House, U.S. President Biden said he and DeSantis were “in constant contact,” adding that he had assured the governor federal disaster assistance would remain in place for as “long as it takes, and we’ll make sure they have everything they need.”

Gulf energy producers were taking precautions as well. U.S. oil company Chevron evacuated staff from three oil production platforms, while Kinder Morgan planned to shut a petroleum pipeline, Reuters reported.

Idalia-related disruptions extended to Florida’s Atlantic coast at Cape Canaveral, where the Tuesday launch of a rocket carrying a U.S. Space Force intelligence satellite was delayed indefinitely due to the hurricane.

Idalia grew from a tropical storm into a hurricane early on Tuesday, a day after passing west of Cuba, where it damaged homes and flooded villages.

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As Iran tensions build, US military moves warplanes to reinforce Middle East

U.S. President Donald Trump threatened Iran on Sunday with bombing and secondary tariffs if Tehran did not come to an agreement with Washington over its nuclear program.

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U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has reinforced U.S. military capability in the Middle East with more warplanes, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, amid a more than two-week-old U.S. bombing campaign in Yemen and mounting tensions with Iran, Reuters reported.

The Pentagon’s brief statement did not specify which aircraft were being deployed or where precisely they were sent.

However, as many as six B-2 bombers have relocated in the past week or so to a U.S.-British military base on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, according to U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Experts say that puts the B-2s, which have stealth technology and are equipped to carry the heaviest U.S. bombs and nuclear weapons, in an ideal position to operate in the Middle East.

“Should Iran or its proxies threaten American personnel and interests in the region, the United States will take decisive action to defend our people,” Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a statement.

The U.S. military’s Strategic Command has declined to say how many B-2s have reached Diego Garcia and noted that it does not comment on exercises or operations involving the B-2.

There is already considerable firepower in the Middle East and the U.S. military will soon have two aircraft carriers in the region, read the report.

U.S. President Donald Trump threatened Iran on Sunday with bombing and secondary tariffs if Tehran did not come to an agreement with Washington over its nuclear program.

While B-2 bombers have been employed to strike buried Houthi targets in Yemen, most experts say use of the stealthy bomber is overkill there and the targets aren’t buried so deeply.

However, the B-2 is equipped to carry America’s most potent bomb — the 30,000-pound GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator. That is the weapon that experts say could be used to strike Iran’s nuclear program.

There are only 20 B-2 bombers in the Air Force’s inventory so they are usually used sparingly.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Monday the U.S. would receive a strong blow if Trump followed through with his threats.

Revolutionary Guards Aerospace Commander Amirali Hajizadeh threatened U.S. forces in the Middle East, noting American bases in the Middle East and adding: “They are in a glass house and should not throw stones.”

One official told Reuters that the U.S. military was also moving some air defense capabilities from Asia to the Middle East.

In his 2017-2021 term, Trump withdrew the U.S. from a 2015 deal between Iran and world powers that placed strict limits on Tehran’s disputed nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief. Trump also reimposed sweeping U.S. sanctions.

Since then, Iran has far surpassed that deal’s limits on uranium enrichment.

Western powers accuse Iran of having a clandestine agenda to develop nuclear weapons capability by enriching uranium to a high level of fissile purity, above what they say is justifiable for a civilian atomic energy program. Tehran says its nuclear program is wholly for civilian energy purposes.

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Israel kills Hezbollah official in deadly Beirut airstrike

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An Israeli airstrike killed four people including a Hezbollah official in Beirut’s southern suburbs on Tuesday, a Lebanese security source said, further testing a shaky ceasefire between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The Israeli military said the official – Hassan Bdeir – was a member of a Hezbollah unit and Iran’s Quds Force, and he had assisted the Palestinian group Hamas in planning a “significant and imminent terror attack against Israeli civilians,” Reuters reported.

The Lebanese security source said the target was a Hezbollah figure whose responsibilities included the Palestinian file. The Lebanese health ministry said the strike killed four people – including a woman – and wounded seven others.

It marked Israel’s second airstrike in the Hezbollah-controlled suburb of Beirut in five days, adding to strains on the U.S.-brokered ceasefire that ended last year’s devastating conflict.

The attacks on Beirut’s southern suburbs have resumed at a time of broader escalation in the region, with Israel having restarted Gaza strikes after a two-month truce and the United States hitting the Iran-aligned Houthis of Yemen in a bid to get them to stop attacking Red Sea shipping.

Hezbollah lawmaker Ibrahim Moussawi said the Israeli attack amounted to “a major and severe aggression that has escalated the situation to an entirely different level”.

Speaking in a televised statement after visiting the building that was struck, he called on the Lebanese state to “activate the highest level of diplomacy to find solutions”.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said the eliminated Hezbollah operative posed “a real and immediate threat”. “We expect Lebanon to take action to uproot terrorist organizations acting within its borders against Israel,” he said.

Israel dealt severe blows to Hezbollah in the war, killing thousands of its fighters, destroying much of it arsenal and eliminating its top leadership including Hassan Nasrallah.

Hezbollah has denied any role in recent rocket attacks from Lebanon towards Israel, including one that prompted Israel to carry out an airstrike on the southern suburbs last Friday.

Tuesday’s strike in the early hours appeared to have damaged the upper three floors of a building, a Reuters reporter at the scene said, with the balconies of those floors blown out.

The glass on the floors below was intact, indicating a targeted strike. Ambulances were at the scene as families fled to other parts of Beirut.

There was no advance warning, in contrast to the attack on Friday when the Israeli military announced which building it intended to hit and ordered residents to leave the area.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun condemned the latest airstrike, calling it a “dangerous warning” that signals premeditated intentions against Lebanon, which would intensify diplomatic outreach and mobilise international allies.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said the strike was a flagrant breach of a U.N. Security Council Resolution upon which the ceasefire was based, and the ceasefire arrangement.

U.S. BACKS ISRAEL

The ceasefire agreement demanded that southern Lebanon be free of Hezbollah fighters and weapons, that Lebanese troops deploy into the area, and that Israeli troops withdraw.

But each side accuses the other of failing to implement the terms fully. Israel says Hezbollah still has infrastructure in the south, while Lebanon and Hezbollah say Israel is occupying Lebanese soil by not withdrawing from five hilltop positions.

The U.S. State Department said that Israel was defending itself from rocket attacks that came from Lebanon and that Washington blamed “terrorists” for the resumption of hostilities.

“Hostilities have resumed because terrorists launched rockets into Israel from Lebanon,” a State Department spokesperson said in an email, responding to a question from Reuters seeking reaction to Tuesday’s airstrike. Washington supported Israel’s response, the spokesperson said.

The Israel-Hezbollah conflict was ignited when Hezbollah opened fire in support of Hamas at the start of the Gaza war. It escalated in September when Israel went on the offensive, declaring the aim of securing the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from homes in the north.

The war uprooted more than a million people and killed at least 3,768 people in Lebanon, according to a Lebanese health ministry toll from November. Dozens more have been reported killed by Israeli fire since the ceasefire.

Lebanon’s figures do not distinguish between civilians and fighters.

During the war, Hezbollah strikes killed 45 civilians in northern Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. At least 73 Israeli soldiers were killed in northern Israel, the Golan Heights, and in combat in southern Lebanon, according to Israeli authorities.

 

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Trump says Zelenskiy wants to back out of critical minerals deal

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U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy wants to back out of a critical minerals deal, warning the Ukrainian leader would face big problems if he did.

“He’s trying to back out of the rare earth deal and if he does that he’s got some problems, big, big problems,” Trump told reporters.

“He wants to be a member of NATO, but he’s never going to be a member of NATO. He understands that.”

(Reuters) 

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