外媒每日新闻 Morning Edition

President Donald Trump said Monday that he will stop using taxpayer funds for television advertisements glorifying himself — which sparked a major backlash — and instead tap his super PAC to cover costs going forward. In a post on his social media site, Trump defended the ads, which cost at least $1.5 million in federal funds and have drawn intense criticism from both Democrats and Republicans. Trump said they were "positive promotion for our Great U.S.A." The ads, which have been airing across the country, feature Trump speaking directly to camera about his administration's accomplishments. Critics called them a blatant misuse of public funds for political purposes. The shift to super PAC funding comes as Trump also criticized election officials in Arizona's Maricopa County after about 3,000 ballots were mistakenly mailed early to voters. Separately, Trump approved the execution by firing squad of Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan for the 2009 Fort Hood shooting rampage.^[1]

Saudi Arabia on Tuesday acknowledged that two of its airports were attacked, leaving three people lightly injured, hours after Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels said they fired missiles and drones at the kingdom. The attacks on Najran and Jizan airports — damaging both facilities — mark a major escalation as the Saudi-led coalition pushes a ground offensive to reclaim Houthi-controlled territory near the Red Sea's Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Meanwhile, Israel is shrouded in mourning this week as it marks three years since Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 attack — the deadliest day in the country's history. The country began commemorations Monday on the Jewish calendar anniversary, with more events scheduled for Wednesday's international calendar anniversary. The attack left 1,200 dead and 251 taken hostage, sparking a war that has since spread across the region to Iran, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen. Nearly three years on, 74,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza according to health officials, and more than 1,460 have died since a ceasefire took effect nearly a year ago.^[2]

Russian air defenses intercepted nearly 900 Ukrainian drones overnight over multiple regions, the Crimean Peninsula and the Sea of Azov, Moscow's Defense Ministry said Tuesday. Unconfirmed media reports said a major fuel depot in the Moscow region was on fire after the attack that killed two people. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said 650 drones flew toward the Moscow region between Monday evening and Tuesday morning, with 105 downed as they approached the city. He later reported 68 more drones targeting Moscow were downed during daylight Tuesday. The massive drone barrage follows Ukraine's claim last weekend that it has disabled 51% of Russia's oil refining capacity — a claim that could not be independently verified. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week the attacks had cost Russia roughly 1% of its GDP. The Kremlin has banned diesel exports due to the strikes, pushing global prices higher, and prompted U.S. President Donald Trump last month to urge Ukraine to stop hitting Russia's refineries. Russia also attacked a bridge in Zaporizhzhia and struck a medical facility in Kramatorsk in its own aerial campaign.^[3]

Wall Street pointed slightly higher in premarket trading Tuesday after nearing a record close to open the week, as oil prices retreated to the lowest level in more than a month. Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.4% while Dow futures climbed 0.6%. Oil prices were down about 2%, with Brent crude falling $1.99 to $98.33 per barrel — back below the $100 mark but still much higher than the roughly $72 level of late February. Benchmark U.S. crude gave up $1.83 to $87.60. Analysts say upward pressures on oil prices have eased as larger volumes of oil cross the Strait of Hormuz and flows through Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline recover, though U.S.-Iran tensions remain high. Bond yields eased slightly but the 10-year Treasury yield remains near multi-decade highs at around 5.26%. With little economic data this week, markets are monitoring geopolitical news and a handful of earnings from Levi's, PepsiCo and Delta before earnings season kicks into high gear next week.^[5]

Amazon is investing more than $1 billion over five years into communities where it operates data centers — for education, job training, water and energy preservation, and other local priorities — as it reacts to a growing political and public backlash against the tech industry's rollout of massive data center buildings. Amazon's cloud computing CEO Matt Garman said the company has already spent more than $1 billion in such communities over the past three years. Amazon is also ending nondisclosure agreements with government agencies and hosting community open houses. Garman warned against misinformation about data centers' environmental impact, citing the danger of over 100 moratoriums being considered across the country. "If these measures are enacted, the U.S. could be writing its own losing ticket to this race, and the consequences would last generations," he wrote. By 2030, data centers will account for nearly 3% of the world's projected electricity use, according to a UN report. Amazon expects $220 billion in 2026 capital expenditures, up from $200 billion previously.^[6]

Francis Halzen won the Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for his efforts to demystify a rare group of neutrinos — tiny cosmic particles that scientists believe offer clues to how the universe evolved. The 82-year-old Belgian-born scientist, affiliated with the University of Wisconsin-Madison, was instrumental in building the IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica. "Francis Halzen realized that the ice at the South Pole could visualize these neutrino messengers from cosmos," said Nobel committee member Eva Olsson. Neutrinos are tiny particles with mind-bogglingly small mass that spew from stars and zip through our bodies by the trillions every second. They're called "ghost particles" because they barely interact with matter — scientists detect them by measuring flashes of light produced on the rare occasions they collide with other particles. "This experiment in the Antarctic is a revolutionary way of understanding the universe that we didn't have before," said Michael Moloney of the American Institute of Physics. The prize is worth about $1.2 million. Nobel week continues Wednesday with the chemistry prize.^[7]

The Nobel Prize in medicine was awarded Monday to three scientists — Karl Deisseroth, Peter Hegemann and Georg Nagel — for creating optogenetics, a revolutionary tool that uses light to switch neurons on and off in living brains, unlocking mysteries of how the brain works. Deisseroth, a 54-year-old Stanford professor, learned of the prize at 2 a.m. at his California home, where he was up late working as usual — a self-described night owl. After hours of interviews, he asked for a break to make school lunches for his children. "For me, I'm a physician-scientist. I am a psychiatrist. I care about patients who have autism, who have depression," he said. "I care about the hope that this brings." The field of optogenetics combines light with genetics to control specific brain cells, and is now used in laboratories worldwide to study brain disorders. Deisseroth's wife, also a Stanford scientist, said she wasn't surprised by the award. They live in faculty housing where "there are a lot of Nobels in the neighborhood."^[8]

Pupils blockaded French high schools across the country Tuesday as thousands of demonstrators marched in cities nationwide to support teenagers' demands for more education funding, ratcheting up pressure on outgoing President Emmanuel Macron's government. The protests, which began in mid-September at a single school in the Paris region, have grown into a nationwide movement — the latest to mark Macron's nearly decade-long tenure. More than 6,100 arrests, mostly of minors, have been made, and the latest gruesome injury — a 15-year-old who lost a hand, seemingly ripped off by a police stun grenade — has fueled outrage. Interior Minister Laurent Nunez defended policing methods as "proportionate in almost all cases," saying 715 officers have also been injured. Students complain about under-resourced schools with dilapidated facilities, staff shortages and exhausting workloads. The movement has become a flashpoint in the early presidential election campaign, with politicians across the spectrum seizing on the issue. France's compulsory classroom hours are among the highest in Europe.^[9]

Artificial intelligence insiders warned New York City's leaders about the dangers of emerging AI technology at a city council hearing Monday, describing a reckless culture at major tech firms and calling for greater oversight. Jacob Coxon, a former engineer at Anthropic who resigned after airing fears of worst-case AI scenarios, told the council: "On the current path, I think it is more likely than not that humanity loses control to these AIs and it could end in human extinction." Coxon said companies run on a "move fast, break things" startup mindset that "works for a photo sharing app" but "does not work for building the most powerful technology ever built." The hearing came as the Trump administration takes a passive approach to AI regulation and Congress remains inactive. Trump has dismissed AI fears as a "hoax" and signed a voluntary agreement with AI companies. A panel of AI company staffers from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and Meta also testified, saying their systems are safe and beneficial. When asked to quantify catastrophic risk, OpenAI's Morgan Dwyer said any chance of catastrophe was unacceptable — but the council speaker called the response "flippant."^[11]

President Donald Trump on Sunday tapped Jay Clayton, his director of national intelligence, to lead a new government task force on artificial intelligence — which Trump is calling the "Super Intelligence Force," after his attempt to rebrand AI as "super intelligence." The announcement came after Trump hosted top executives of AI companies at the White House last week and said they had signed a voluntary accord on safety. The task force marks the Trump administration's most concrete AI policy move to date, though critics note it's led by the nation's top spy rather than a technology or science official. The creation of the task force comes amid growing concerns about AI safety, with industry insiders warning that the technology could pose existential risks. Trump has alternately dismissed AI fears as a "hoax" and called AI "the most important thing ever." The voluntary agreement with AI companies has been criticized as toothless by safety advocates, who say federal regulation is needed. Meanwhile, states like California have moved forward with their own AI regulations as the federal government takes a hands-off approach.^[12]

France's escalating student protest movement catapulted #FranceProtests to the top of global Twitter trends Tuesday, with over 5.8 million posts as shocking images of school blockades, riot police and a 15-year-old who lost a hand to a police stun grenade spread worldwide. "They say we are the future but they don't listen to us," read one viral post from a Paris student shared 210,000 times, echoing the handwritten placards seen at demonstrations across the country. The hashtag #MacronLegacy also trended, with users debating whether the protests would define the final months of Macron's presidency. The movement began at a single high school in mid-September and has now spread to hundreds of schools nationwide, with more than 6,100 arrests — mostly of minors. Teachers' unions joined the marches Tuesday, broadening the movement's base. Many users drew comparisons to the 2023 pension reform protests and the 2018 yellow vest movement, noting that France has a long history of street politics. The hashtag #PoliceBrutality also surged as video of the injured teenager circulated widely.^[13]

Nobel Prize week sent #NobelPrize soaring to the top of science trends Tuesday, with over 3.2 million posts as the physics prize was awarded to Francis Halzen for his work on neutrinos — the mysterious "ghost particles" that zip through the universe. The hashtag #GhostParticle trended alongside it, with users marveling at the strange world of subatomic physics. "We have trillions of these things passing through our bodies every second and we don't even feel them," read one popular post shared 85,000 times. The human-interest angle from Monday's medicine prize also continued to circulate widely — the charming story of Stanford scientist Karl Deisseroth, who after winning the Nobel, asked for a break from interviews to make school lunches for his children. "Even Nobel Prize winners have to make lunch," read one viral tweet shared 140,000 times. Many users joked about the "faculty housing flex" — Deisseroth's wife casually mentioning there are "a lot of Nobels in the neighborhood." The Nobel chemistry prize announcement on Wednesday is already generating anticipation on social media.^[14]