Far from the cold dead rock imagined by modern science, Earth’s Moon is actually tectonically active, according to researchers who triangulated quake data with fault locations. Even stranger, it may still be shrinking.

By comparing lunar orbital imagery from NASA with seismic readings obtained nearly half a century ago from equipment left on the moon by the Apollo missions, researchers believe they’ve figured out what’s behind a pattern of mysterious moonquakes that have frustrated scientists for decades, seemingly originating from the upper few miles of the moon’s crust: our neighboring satellite, believed to be a cold lifeless rock, is actually geologically alive, just like Earth.

During the eight years the five Apollo seismometers functioned, they picked up 28 near-surface moonquakes measuring the Earth equivalent of between a 2 and 5 on the Moment Magnitude scale. By analyzing images from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and using an earth-based algorithm to more accurately pinpoint the epicenters of those quakes, the researchers found eight of them happened within 19 miles of “fault scarps,” long clifflike formations crisscrossing the lunar terrain.

“It’s very likely that these eight quakes were produced by faults slipping as stress built up when the lunar crust was compressed by global contraction and tidal forces,” said Thomas Watters of the Smithsonian Institute, lead author of a paper on the findings published in Nature Geoscience on Monday. If so, “the Apollo seismometers recorded the shrinking moon and the moon is still tectonically active,” he said, calling the results “amazing.”

While other seismic disturbances measured by the Apollo-era seismometers could be attributed to Earth’s own gravity making itself felt through space – in the same way that the moon’s gravitational pull causes the oceans to rise and fall, so the Earth’s pull actually deforms the moon’s surface, stretching it into a slightly oblong shape before releasing it back into a sphere – asteroid impacts, or temperature shifts, these “shallow” moonquakes had previously frustrated all attempts to study them. They seemed to start in the upper few miles of the moon’s crust, yet accepted wisdom holds the moon is a big dead rock. Even Watters, who published a paper in 2010 analyzing the first NASA LRO images of the faults, believed the most recent scarps were “as young as a hundred million years.” 

While the theory remains just a theory until scientists are able to conduct more detailed study on the moon, the researchers made certain that the lineup of quakes and faults was not due to coincidence, running 10,000 seismic event simulations in an effort to reproduce the pattern and coming up with just a 1 percent chance the lineups had been random.

“For me, these findings emphasize that we need to go back to the moon,” said researcher Nicholas Schmerr of the University of Maryland. “We learned a lot from the Apollo missions, but they really only scratched the surface. With a larger network of modern seismometers, we could make huge strides in our understanding of the moon’s geology.”

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Facebook-owned WhatsApp messenger has been weaponized to bug the phones of human rights campaigners, lawyers, and other dissidents with an Israeli spyware, sparking a backlash against the program’s manufacturer.

“NSO Group sells its products to governments who are known for outrageous human rights abuses, giving them the tools to track activists and critics. The attack on Amnesty International was the final straw,” Danna Ingelton, deputy director of Amnesty Tech, said in a statement on Monday. “It’s time to stop the use of NSO Group’s tools to infiltrate, intimidate and silence civil society.” 

Amnesty, which was targeted along with several human rights lawyers by the WhatsApp exploit, is working with a group of Israeli citizens and a civil rights group on a legal action to force the Israeli Ministry of Defense to revoke NSO Group’s export license, claiming the company’s flagship product, called Pegasus, is dangerous and prone to abuse – and that NSO deliberately sells it to repressive governments.

After discovering the vulnerability last week, WhatsApp claims it worked “around the clock” to develop a patch to protect users from the exploit, finally releasing the fix on Monday. WhatsApp has also reported the issue to the US Department of Justice, which declined to comment to the Financial Times. The company is not yet aware of how many of its 1.5 billion users were affected by the exploit.

Attackers installed Pegasus on target users’ phones through WhatsApp’s call function, according to the company; users did not even have to answer the call to become infected. Pegasus can turn on a target’s microphone and camera at will, peruse emails and texts, and track location – all without the target’s knowledge.

While NSO claims Pegasus is intended for government usage – its website insists its mission is “developing technology to prevent and investigate terror and crime,” and the company claims it carefully vets customers – a number of activists and human rights campaigners in the Middle East have found themselves on the wrong end of Pegasus attacks. Amnesty International claims “at least 24 human rights defenders, journalists and parliamentarians in Mexico,” an employee, several Saudi activists, an Emirati human rights campaigner, and even (allegedly) Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi, whose killers reportedly used the software to track him, have been targeted using Pegasus.

“Under no circumstances would NSO be involved in the operating or identifying of targets of its technology, which is solely operated by intelligence and law enforcement agencies,” NSO said, adding that it would not have the ability to target an individual or organization.

Amnesty International is not the only organization pursuing legal action against NSO. Alaa Mahajne, a lawyer based in Jerusalem, is suing on behalf of Mexican and Saudi citizens targeted with the software. “It’s upsetting but not surprising that my team has been targeted with the very technology that we are raising concerns about in our lawsuits,” she said.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is not coming to Moscow on Monday as previously planned, according to a report citing a State Department official. He will still meet the Russian president and foreign minister on Tuesday.

Instead of heading straight for the Russian capital, on Monday Pompeo will hold talks with European officials about “Iran and other issues,” an anonymous State Department official told Reuters.

The cancellation of the Moscow leg of Pompeo’s visit will reportedly not affect his planned meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, which is scheduled to take place in Sochi on Tuesday. Pompeo is expected to talk to them about what Washington calls Russia’s “aggressive and destabilizing actions.” The US has repeatedly accused Russia of meddling all around the world, including most recently in Venezuela, where, according to Pompeo, only the US is allowed to meddle.

Pompeo has spent the past week escalating pressure on Iran, threatening it with “swift and decisive” US action in response to nebulously defined “attack on American interests or citizens” by “[Iran] or their proxies.” On Tuesday, he canceled a visit to Germany and instead went to Iraq, where he hinted that Baghdad should stay away from doing business with Tehran – for the sake of its own independence.

On Friday, the Pentagon said it was sending additional Patriot anti-air missiles to the Middle East in addition to the carrier strike group and bombers it had dispatched to near the Iranian coast as a “warning” a week earlier. Pompeo, meanwhile, has been insisting the US does not want war with Iran.

On Wednesday, Iran announced that it would stop disposing of excess heavy water and uranium, which was one of the key terms of the landmark 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement it had struck with the US, the EU, Russia and China. Tehran accused the EU of caving in to American pressure and failing to stick to its end of the deal. European diplomats shot back by saying the EU “rejects any ultimatums,” but also urged “countries not party to the JCPOA” – which includes the US after its unilateral withdrawal in 2018 – to “refrain from taking any actions that impede the remaining parties’ ability to fully perform their commitments.”

The United Arab Emirates has said that four commercial ships were hit by “sabotage” in its waters, hours after denying reports of explosions at an oil tanker terminal. The incident comes as US/Iran tension ratchets up.

The four vessels were targeted by “sabotage operations” in waters near the emirate of Fujairah, the country’s foreign ministry said on Sunday. The exact nature of the sabotage was not revealed, nor were the nationalities of the ships. There were no reported casualties.

“Subjecting commercial vessels to sabotage operations and threatening the lives of their crew is considered a dangerous development,” the foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that it is investigating the alleged incident.

The statement came hours after Fujairah’s government denied reports that an explosion had rocked an oil terminal at the emirate’s port. Lebanese broadcaster Mayadeen first reported the explosion, before the story was picked up by Iran’s Press TV. Officials in Fujairah called on the media to “investigate accurately and rely on official sources.”

Although the exact events are unknown, Iranian lawmaker Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh tweeted that “the explosions of Fujairah showed that the security of the south of the Persian Gulf is like glass.”

Should the security situation in the region deteriorate, much is at stake. Fujairah backs on to the Gulf of Oman on the south side of the Strait of Hormuz. With the UAE and Saudi Arabia on one side and Iran on the other, one-third of the world’s oil at sea transits the strait, which is only 39 kilometers wide.

The UAE did not directly blame Iran for the alleged sabotage, but its claim comes just days after the United States Maritime Administration warned that “Iran and/or its regional proxies could take action against US and partner interests, including oil production infrastructure” in the region. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are steadfast American allies.

Egypt, another American ally in the Middle East, sided with the UAE’s take on events, condemning the alleged act of sabotage later on Sunday night.

Iran has insisted that it has no interest in escalating tensions in the region, yet the US has pressed ahead with the deployment of a carrier strike group and an Air Force bomber group to the region, to protect US interests from the unspecified threat. The USS Abraham Lincoln passed through Egypt’s Suez Canal on Thursday, in what National Security Advisor John Bolton called a “clear and unmistakable message” to Tehran.

The carrier will be joined by a battery of Patriot missiles and a transport ship – the USS Arlington – the Pentagon announced on Friday. Still, State Secretary Mike Pompeo assured the world that “our aim is not war, our aim is a change in the behavior of the Iranian leadership.”

Details about the “intelligence” used to justify the buildup are thin on the ground. A CNN report on Friday warned that Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps may be planning on launching missiles from small civilian boats, citing an anonymous “defense official.” The network’s report has not yet been substantiated. Multiple sources within the US government have said that Bolton and Pompeo are “overreacting” to the threat posed by Iran, and “mischaracterizing” intelligence reports.

Iran has matched the US in the rhetoric game, with IRGC aerospace head Amirali Hajiadeh telling the Iranian Students’ News Agency that an aircraft carrier parked in the Gulf provides “opportunities” for Iran to test its missile capabilities. Ayatollah Yousef Tabatabai-Nejad also warned Washington that a single missile from Iran could easily sink its “billion-dollar fleet.”

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Those dastardly Russian hackers are alive and well and meddling in the upcoming European Parliament elections, warned the New York Times. Just don’t expect to see any proof, because the paper offers none.

Fresh from interfering in seemingly everything wrong in America, unidentified Russian hackers have shifted their attention to Europe, deploying information warfare tactics to give a boost to populist and right-wing parties ahead of next month’s European Parliament elections. At least according to a New York Times article, given the front-page treatment on Sunday.

The story is heavy with accusation. The Russians, it states, are busy “spreading disinformation, encouraging discord and amplifying distrust in the centrist parties that have governed for decades.” Among their tools are news websites that “bear the same electronic signatures as pro-Kremlin websites,” Twitter accounts, Facebook profiles, and WhatsApp groups.

Although the Times article claimed that “intelligence officials,” and “security experts” back up its theories, it quotes only one: Former FBI analyst Daniel Jones, who now runs a nonprofit entitled Advance Democracy.

“They’re working to destroy everything that was built post-World War II,” Jones said, an explanation rivaling George W. Bush’s “they hate our freedom” for its nonsensical reductionism.

Is it possible that Jones might have an agenda? Most definitely. The former intelligence analyst runs a second nonprofit, The Democracy Integrity Project, from his home in Virginia. TDIP spent much of the last two years emailing a daily “collusion”newsletter to journalists, including those at the New York Times.

Jones’ ties to the Democratic party machine are also extensive. A former staffer for California Senator Dianne Feinstein (D), Jones reportedly worked with opposition research firm Fusion GPS to continue to search for evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia even after Trump’s election. The uncorroborated claims made in the so-called ‘Steele Dossier’ often featured prominently in TDIP’s daily memos to reporters, and leaked text messages to Democrat Senate Intelligence Committee member Mark Warner revealed Jones to be an associate of Christopher Steele, the former British spy who compiled the dossier.

With the Steele Dossier deemed unfit to print by every single mainstream media outlet (except, of course, Buzzfeed), and with the “collusion” narrative completely dismantled by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s final report, who else can the New York Times bring in to back up their Russian meddling expose?

Enter Ben Nimmo, who claims at the end of the article that Europe is a “test bed” for Russian interference efforts. Again, Nimmo offers no proof, but a glimpse at his resume gives an idea of what his motivations might be. A senior fellow at NATO-sponsored think tank the Atlantic Council, Nimmo has emerged in recent years as a reliable Russia-basher, always ready to give a juicy soundbite to the media. He’s also identified thousands of ‘Russian-linked’ Twitter accounts, based on some thoroughly dodgy methodology.

With two ‘experts’ down, what has the Times got left? Not much. The article notes that “a definitive attribution would require the kind of tools that the American government used to reveal the 2016 interference.” Of course, none is provided.

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Even if the Russians aren’t involved, the article claims that populist and right-wing groups in Europe are “adopting many of the Kremlin’s tactics.” In practice, this means that the nasties on the right side of the political spectrum make funny memes and videos to support their candidates of choice.

Running through the article is a palpable fear that the centrism that has dominated European politics for more than half a century is now under threat. “False and divisive stories about the European Union, NATO, immigrants and more,” amplify the threat, driving voters into the embrace of populist parties, “many of them sympathetic to Russia.”

However, never once does it occur to the authors that perhaps Europeans are simply tiring of the consensus. Perhaps they disagree with mass immigration, especially at a time of slow economic recovery from the Great Recession. Perhaps they disagree with the often unaccountable bureaucracy of Brussels, and their membership in a military alliance that they have personally never felt a connection with. After all, populism is called populism because its positions are popular ones.

But nope, it’s all a sinister Russian plot to undermine democracy. Let’s go with that one.

Graham Dockery, RT

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Saudi Arabia says two of its oil tankers were among the ships the United Arab Emirates earlier said were targeted in “sabotage operations” off its coast. The alleged attack damaged the ships, but caused no casualties or oil spill.

One of the two vessels was on its way to pick up crude for delivery to the US when it was hit, according to a statement by Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih, carried by state broadcaster SPA. Earlier, the UAE said that commercial vessels were hit in “sabotage operations” near its waters, apparently referring to the same incident. Neither elaborated on the nature of the alleged sabotage.

According to both Saudi Arabia and the UAE, the “sabotage” took place in waters near the emirate of Fujairah, in the Gulf of Oman just outside the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint for about a third of the world’s oil tanker traffic, with Iran on one side and Saudi Arabia and the UAE on the other.

While much of what could happen outside Fujairah Port remains unknown, the timing for the alleged “sabotage attack” is particularly notable. Just recently, the Pentagon dispatched a carrier strike group and a bomber force, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo vaguely citing some “escalatory actions” by Iran as a pretext for the deployment.

Iran’s top military commanders, among them the head of the Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), Gen Hossein Salami, said the deployments were part of a US plan to intimidate Iran. The IRGC commander said it was unlikely that the US wants a war against Iran as Washington lacked adequate military resources to do so.

Eurovision organizers wanted to advertise Israel to tourists and show that the locals aren’t afraid to laugh at themselves but missed the mark completely uniting the most fierce political rivals in outrage.

The clip, released by state-owned Kan broadcaster ahead of the Eurovision Song Contest in Tel-Aviv next week, begins with a pair of terrified European guests arriving at Ben Gurion International Airport. They are jumped on by the contest’s host Lucy Ayoub and the channel’s journalist Elia Grinfeld, who break into a catchy song full of various stereotypes about Israel.

“Don’t say a word, I know what you just heard, that it’s a land of war and occupation. But we have so much more than that,” Lucy and Elia reassure the visitors in the opening verse of their 4-minute-long musical number.

They then insist that people in Israel treat each other as “frenemies” because most of them have “complex identities.”

The exercise in self-deprecation continues with a scene at the shop where Elia sings that “most of us are Jews but only some of us are greedy” as he snatches the tourist’s change for himself.

Lucy and Elia then warn the Eurovision guests of “mad drivers,” recommend enjoying “our lovely b*tches” and the Dead Sea soon to be obsolete because of industries, trying “good shawarma” and to laugh at shops working on Saturday.

For most of the video, Elia is also seen sporting a t-shirt, which reads: “I love Iron Dome,” referring to the Israeli air defense system.

However, when the video was released on Friday not many in Israel and abroad got the joke, no matter of their political affiliation.

Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, raged on Twitter over taxpayer money being used to make an “anti-Semitic” video.

Other right-wing commentators also chipped in, saying that the clip didn’t mock, but only reinforced negative stereotypes about Jewish people.

Some suggested that the scandalous video was sponsored by Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) international movement, which pushes for Israeli withdrawal from occupied territories. But a pro-BDS Jewish Voice for Peace group also attacked the clip, describing as “anti-Semitism and misogyny set to music.”

There were, of course, some Twitterati, who supported the video and even called it “genius,” but the majority of comments were still on the negative side.

The Palestinians were also unhappy, but for another reason. They said the part in which Israeli performers briefly visit Jerusalem and refer to it as “our beloved capital,” was “unacceptable” claiming the video “wipes… the State of Palestine from the map.”

The PA’s foreign ministry demanded the sequence about Jerusalem be removed from the promo and accused Israel of using the Eurovision to “entrench its colonial occupation by effectively normalizing the global acceptance of its unlawful conduct.”

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Six people, including a priest, have been killed in an attack on a Catholic church in Dablo, Burkina Faso after attackers opened fire as people prayed at Sunday mass.

“Towards 9.00 am, during mass, armed individuals burst into the Catholic Church,” the mayor of Dablo, Ousmane Zongo, told AFP. “They started firing as the congregation tried to flee.”

Dablo is a village located 90km from Kaya in the north-central part of the country.

The attack is the first on a Catholic church since terrorist attacks began in the country in 2015. Over 350 people have been killed in the raids which have been attributed to a number of jihadist groups, including the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara and the Ansarul Islam group.

On April 29, gunmen attacked a Protestant church, killing a pastor and four worshippers in Silgadji near Djibo, which was the first attack on a church, France 24 reports.

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Muslim and Christian clerics have been targeted by the groups. In February, a Spanish Catholic priest was killed in a raid in Nohao in the center of the country.

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Five people were killed during a terror attack on a private five-star hotel in the Pakistani southwestern port city of Gwadar, the military now confirmed announcing that the clearance operation is over.

Four hotel staff members and a Navy soldier lost their lives as three gunmen broke into the Pearl Continental hotel. Six more people were injured including in the ensuing gun fight

The attackers who reportedly had rocket launchers were killed by the security forces during the operation while all hotel visitors were safely evacuated. A local militant group, the Balochistan Liberation Army, claimed responsibility for the attack, according to local media.

Gwadar is one of the major hubs involved in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project development and is often visited by Chinese nationals.

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The US peace deal for the Middle East includes establishing Israeli law over the Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, an Israeli TV channel has reported. The condition has been a no-go for Palestine.

More than two years in the making and bogged down by delays, the Trump administration’s “peace deal” for Israel and Palestine is finally expected to be unveiled next month. With that day approaching, parts of the draft, shrouded in a thick veil of secrecy, have been leaked to media, confirming the general expectations of it being heavily skewed in Israel’s favor. 

The latest leak reported by Channel 12 on Sunday suggested that the deal envisages the implementation of Israeli civil law over its settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law. The practice of rampant settlement construction has become a hallmark of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. The PM, who is set to become the longest-serving Israeli leader this summer after his re-election last month, made the issue of Israel’s sovereignty over the West Bank settlements one of the core tenets of his campaign.

The new report is in line with an alleged draft of the plan reportedly leaked by Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom earlier this week. According to the draft, a demilitarized ‘New Palestine’ state will be established, while all illegal settlements would be de facto annexed by Tel Aviv. Jerusalem, according to the draft, is set to become a shared capital of the two states.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has long indicated that he will not sign any deal that does not envisage an end to the Israeli occupation and the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

In Israel, left-wing opposition has cried foul over the proposed “deal of the century,” saying its blatant support of Netanyahu’s hardline policies leave no place for a Palestinian state – or for peace. Some right-wing lawmakers, on the other hand, are reportedly unhappy that it compromises too much, instead of fully annexing the West Bank.

The UN continues to view the Jewish settlements built on occupied Palestinian land as illegal under international law. The latest UN Security Council meeting on the issue took place as recently as Thursday and saw Palestinian and US envoys sparring over the issue.

Speaking at the meeting, Palestinian Foreign Affairs Minister Riad Malki called the proposed deal “not a peace plan, but rather conditions for surrender,” while US envoy Jason Greenblatt accused the council of anti-Israel bias.

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