The US military launched its ninth consecutive night of airstrikes against Iran, targeting "command centers, air defense, coastal surveillance sites, maritime capabilities, and missile and drone launch sites," according to Central Command. Iran's President Pezeshkian declared the country is in a "full-scale war" with the United States after Tehran retaliated with attacks on US positions across Syria, Jordan, and Bahrain. In a major escalation, Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis announced a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, threatening to open a new front and further disrupt global energy supplies through the Red Sea. Two vessels reportedly exploded in the Strait of Hormuz as shipping traffic is increasingly squeezed. Mediators from several governments have made contact with both sides, though Trump vowed Iran "will pay many times over" after 17 US soldiers have now been killed.
New Prime Minister Andy Burnham has appointed John Healey as Chancellor of the Exchequer and Ed Miliband as Foreign Secretary in his first cabinet reshuffle, with Shabana Mahmood remaining Home Secretary. Born in Aintree in 1970, Burnham — a former health secretary and Greater Manchester mayor — won the backing of 379 of Labour's 403 MPs to replace Sir Keir Starmer. He has pledged to shift power away from Whitehall, bring "greater public control" of water and energy, and build more council houses while keeping Labour's election pledge not to raise income tax, VAT or NI. Louise Haigh becomes First Secretary of State, and Yvette Cooper has been appointed Health Secretary.
Kevin Keegan, one of football's most charismatic figures — who won three First Division titles and two UEFA Cups with Liverpool, European Footballer of the Year twice in the 1970s, and later managed England, Newcastle United and the national team — has died following a battle with stage four stomach cancer. Tributes have poured in from across the football world remembering his relentless energy, passion, and the iconic "I would love it" moment during his Newcastle days.
Thousands of young protesters from the "Cockroach Janta Party" attempted to march on India's parliament to demand education reforms and the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over alleged NEET examination irregularities. Police blocked the march, and some protesters said they were injured in clashes. The movement, which began online, has grown rapidly from hundreds to thousands of participants, reflecting deep frustration with corruption in India's education system.
Russia is escalating strikes on civilian cargo vessels in the Black Sea, with ten people killed after a missile hit the Turkish-owned, Guinea-Bissau-flagged grain carrier Golden Leo as it was leaving a Ukrainian port. Russia is systematically targeting the last maritime export corridor outside Ukraine, seeking to disrupt grain shipments. Twenty-eight people have died in Russian strikes on Odesa region in July alone, according to regional officials.
West African nations have approved a $25 billion mega gas pipeline project intended to transport natural gas from Nigeria through multiple countries across the region. The deal signals a major infrastructure push for energy connectivity in West Africa, with implications for global energy markets as Europe continues to diversify away from Russian gas supplies.
The latest Resolve Political Monitor has delivered a political earthquake in NSW: support for both major parties has dropped to its lowest since records began. Chris Minns's Labor is at 29% (down 3) and Kellie Sloane's Coalition at 23% (down 3), while Pauline Hanson's One Nation has surged to 25% — almost neck-and-neck with the government. Almost half of all voters (48%) said they would vote for a non-major party, with the Greens at 11% and independents/others at 12%. Resolve pollster Jim Reed said the ICAC inquiry into Liberal Party donation schemes is "tarring all politicians with the same brush," and One Nation is the main beneficiary as the anti-institutional alternative. Separately, Senator Alex Antic's Liberal Party future is under threat after he praised One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts as a "clear thinker."
A world-first global study spanning 82 countries has found antibiotic resistance increased in every region between 2004 and 2022, with children increasingly vulnerable to common infections. The Guardian Australia exclusive reveals that frequent use of broad-spectrum antibiotics is driving resistance in bacteria responsible for chest and urinary tract infections, with immunocompromised children like 13-year-old Harry Booth — a kidney transplant recipient — facing particularly difficult treatment pathways.
Australian ski resorts have shattered July temperature records, with some areas recording temperatures 12°C above the monthly average. The unseasonable warmth has significantly reduced snow cover across alpine regions in NSW and Victoria, dealing a blow to the ski season at its peak period. The extreme temperatures follow a pattern of increasingly erratic winter weather linked to climate change.
South Australian Liberal senator Alex Antic is facing a reckoning within his party after declaring One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts, who has a history of antisemitic and fringe views, a "clear thinker" and "decent bloke." Angus Taylor had earlier highlighted Roberts's controversial views, putting Antic directly at odds with his own party leadership. The episode underscores the mounting tension within the Liberal Party as One Nation continues to erode its base from the right.
Swedish superstar chef Björn Frantzén, the only chef in the world to hold three Michelin stars across three separate restaurants simultaneously (Stockholm, Singapore, Dubai), will open a fine-dining restaurant at Crown Sydney in Barangaroo early next year. Named Én by Björn Frantzén, the venue will offer "majestic" harbour views and his signature Nordic-Japanese-French cooking — think fried langoustine tail with koshihikari and tomato butter, grilled scallops with truffle-and-goose-egg custard, and miso made from peas. His three-starred Stockholm flagship Restaurant Frantzén has been in operation since 2013. A more casual counterpart, Brasserie Astoria, is coming to Crown Perth. The deal was confirmed by Crown CEO Stanford Le, marking a major coup for Sydney's fine dining scene.
A profile in the AFR covers a mining executive's transition into the wine industry, launching a label with a charitable cause component. The story sits within a broader trend of high-net-worth individuals entering premium wine production, reflecting growing investment in Australian wine brands and cellar doors — relevant territory for RSN's fine wine glassware distribution business.
Broadsheet's winter 2026 roundup includes a hotly anticipated Korean fried chicken joint, Bar Planet's inner-west Margarita bar, two new sandwich spots, and the Bar Copains trio's latest project. Among the most anticipated: Parami (Burmese in Darlinghurst), Da Orazio Trattoria (Surry Hills), Joy Korean Fried Chicken (CBD), Amuro (modern Japanese, Darlinghurst), and Ashe (CBD, from the Bentley team). Curtosy Stone's Waldorf Astoria restaurant and Lo Presti's in Redfern were previously announced.
Creative Australia has announced the recipients of the 2026 First Nations Arts and Culture Awards, presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. Honourees include singer-songwriter Stephen Pigram, celebrated artist Dr Bronwyn Bancroft, leading artist and activist Dr Djambawa Marawili AM, and curator Hetti Kemarre Perkins. A new award category was established in memory of Rhoda Roberts. While this is from late May, it's worth noting as Creative Australia continues to recognise First Nations excellence in arts and cultural leadership.
No major new arts funding announcements today. The most recent Creative Australia funding round (278 projects, $13.72M), the touring investment, and the arts engagement survey were covered in Monday's briefing.
July 2026's AI leaderboard is set: Anthropic's Claude Fable 5 (re-deployed July 1 after a 19-day federal export-control suspension) leads the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index at 64, followed by Claude Opus 4.8 (61) and GPT-5.5 (60). OpenAI pre-emptively previewed the GPT-5.6 family — Sol, Terra, and Luna — with Sol running on Cerebras wafer-scale hardware at up to 750 tokens/sec and priced at $5/M input tokens, half of Claude Fable 5's $10/M. The Sol tier beat Fable 5 on Terminal-Bench and became generally available on July 9. Chinese models continue to drive prices down: Qwen 3.7 Max ($3.75/M, 194 tok/s) and MiniMax 3 ($0.53/M, 112 tok/s) offer remarkable value.
Moonshot AI's Kimi K3, released July 16, is the most recent model addition tracked across the AI release landscape. With 27 AI launches in July alone across OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind, Meta, and others, the pace of model releases shows no sign of slowing. DeepSeek V4 is expected to graduate from preview to official release with peak-hour pricing imminently.
ThursdAI's monthly recap of July 2026 counts 27 AI product/model launches, led by agents (including multiple autonomous coding and web-browsing agents), frontier models (Fable 5, GPT-5.6 family, Gemini 3.1 Pro), and open-source releases. The agent category is expanding rapidly, which is directly relevant to Hermes's competitive positioning in the open-source agent space.
Nous Research, behind the open-source Hermes AI agent (214K+ GitHub stars), is finalising a $75M+ funding round led by Robot Ventures with participation from Union Square Ventures, valuing the company at $1.5 billion. The round was previously covered but remains the biggest open-source agent funding story of the month — Hermes runs on desktop, VPS, or cloud from $20/month.