Anybody out there know Amman. I'm here for 24h + in the market for food and other recommendations...

Hungarian opposition ousts Viktor Orbán after 16 years in power Péter Magyar’s Tisza party wins election as prime minister concedes defeat, in result likely to reshape ties with EU

Hungary election result - best piece of news all year so far? A little optimism piercing the geopolitical storm., maybe the beginning of something broader...

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

An hour or so later and another 40% or so counted. Back home it'd be two seats in Sunderland and a long wait before a marginal declares

Why do UK elections take so long to count...

🔴 BREAKING: Russia heavily shelled the city center of Kramatorsk, a frontline city in the Donetsk region, with four guided aerial bombs.

This is the true face of the Russian “Easter truce”.

Explosives found near pipeline ‘likely a Russian provocation’, says military expert Former Ukrainian major general says 4kg of material found in Serbia was attempt to influence Hungary’s election

The amount of explosive (4kg) found in Serbia last week near Russian gas pipeline to Hungary was never enough to destroy it, says a Ukrainian military expert. Concludes it was likely to be a GRU false flag plot as a result -

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

JD Vance accuses EU of ‘interference’ as he visits Hungary to help Orbán win election US vice-president rails against ‘bureaucrats in Brussels’ interfering in Sunday’s vote during Budapest visit

When was the last election when the White House and the Kremlin were actively supporting the same side?

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

Two more explosions in the distance. Warnings in south and central Israel

Multiple explosions audible in Jerusalem, moderately distant. Not yet a ceasefire in practice

Explosion heard in the distance from Jerusalem.

Even Russia hasn't tried this in Ukraine. At least, not yet...

Trump reveals in the WH that the CIA found the second F-15 airman with long range visual surveillance. "They kept the camera on him for 45 minutes," he said. Eventually something was spotted: "We see something moving 40 miles away."

Can't say for sure, but looks likely. Copy says "according to initial assessments in Israel, the firing did indeed cause damage to the British warship," per machine translation

Missile could have missed; ship misidentified; pure error etc - so motivation difficult to judge

that was the response given when I asked MoD a few mins ago

UK MoD response - No RN ship attacked off Lebanon

Don't tell Pete Hegseth...

Discuss: has social media has improved public discourse, decision making? Example below....

IDF says troops seized cache of Hezbollah FPV drones, other weapons in south Lebanon * * *

A new find at a Hezbollah position, though we've seen this somewhere before. Will cheap FPV drones pose an increasing threat to Israeli forces? In southern Lebanon there may yet be a long war...

www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_ent...

Notes from the much larger and more significant war: in March Russia gained no net territory in Ukraine, and lost more soldiers than it was able to replace.

I'm back in Jerusalem, reporting for the Guardian over Passover, Easter and a little thereafter. From the Old City this morning...

High Flying Hawk; MISSION WITH LeMAY. My Story. By Gen. Curtis E. LeMay with MacKinlay Kantor. Illustrated. 581 pp. New York: Doubleday & Co. $7.95. (Published 1965)

Source - NYT review of LeMay's memoir from the time: www.nytimes.com/1965/11/28/a...

Bombing into the stone age? Originally advocated by retired US air force Gen Curtis LeMay in his 1965 memoir as a way to deal with North Vietnam. And how did that turn out?

How did the speech go down? (Chart edition).

Catching up with the Trump speech, some extraordinary comments from a war crimes-human rights-diplomatic strategy perspective...

a man in a suit and white shirt is looking at something ALT: a man in a suit and white shirt is looking at something

"Tell me what Trump said about Nato one more time..."

www.theguardian.com/world/middle...

Unusual Downing St statement - confirming that ministers have agreed collectively to an expansion of US bombing from UK to include targeting Iranian "capabilities" targeting ships in the Straits. Mission creep....

The King then asked Zelenskyy if he had a second iPad to give to the prime minister as well. Zelenskyy said no, prompting Charles to say he'd share the one that he'd just been given..

Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський on X: "Address to the Parliament of the United Kingdom https://t.co/s8fKXTdsSA" / X Address to the Parliament of the United Kingdom https://t.co/s8fKXTdsSA

Full video here:

x.com/ZelenskyyUa/...

"We can't live in a world where drones rule people"

President Zelenskyy describes Ukraine's national air defence system in an address to parliament - monitored and tracked from his own iPad - which he says he passed over to King Charles earlier as a demonstration of its effectiveness...