5 Big News Stories Overnight - Saturday, June 27, 2026

U.S. Strikes Iran in Response to Attack on Commercial Vessel

USCENTCOM

U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces conducted strikes against Iran, June 26, as a powerful response to yesterday’s attack on a commercial ship that was transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

U.S. aircraft struck Iranian missile and drone storage locations and coastal radar sites after Iran hit M/V Ever Lovely on June 25 with a one-way attack drone. The Singapore-flagged cargo ship was exiting the Strait of Hormuz along the Omani coast at the time of Iran’s attack.

The unwarranted aggression against commercial shipping by Iranian forces clearly violated the ceasefire. Furthermore, Iran’s dangerous behavior undermined freedom of navigation as commerce increasingly flows through the vital international trade corridor.

CENTCOM forces continue to provide safe passage coordination and support to commercial vessels transiting the strait. The U.S. military remains present and vigilant to ensure all aspects of the agreement with Iran are adhered to, obeyed, and in full force and effect.

PHOTO: CENTCOM

Sarah Ferguson visited Epstein twice while he was in prison

The Telegraph reports:

Sarah Ferguson visited Jeffrey Epstein twice at his office for a bogus firm he set up while imprisoned on a child sex offence.

The former Duchess of York met the convicted paedophile on two occasions at the Palm Beach office of the fake company he invented to secure work release while in jail.

She also planned to meet him a third time at the headquarters of the bogus firm, the Florida Science Foundation, but her travel plans fell through at the last minute.

Lord Mandelson also phoned Epstein at the office and video-called him there on one occasion while he was staying in the financier’s New York mansion, The Telegraph has discovered.

The Nationwide Backlash Against Cameras Watching Your Car

The WSJ reports:

Troy, N.Y.,’s Victorian-era charms include brownstones, cast-iron storefronts and dozens of Tiffany stained-glass windows in churches.

But the city also has a 21st-century problem. Some residents say its artificial-intelligence enabled street cameras are creating a surveillance state. 

This spring, tensions boiled over at a city council meeting that dragged past midnight. Dozens of speakers railed against the mayor, police chief and company that provides the cameras for fostering a “dystopian hellscape.” The cameras violate privacy rights, opponents said, and are ripe for misuse. 

“As a Troy resident, I am appalled that our own mayor, our own administration, can essentially write off the rights of a significant portion of people who pay their salaries,” one speaker said.

Mayor Carmella Mantello said the technology has helped reduce crime and solve homicides, robberies and narcotics cases, plus recover missing persons and stolen cars. 

Venezuela Live Updates: Hospitals Overwhelmed as International Rescue Teams Arrive

The New York Times reports:

Survivors dug through mountains of bricks and cement with their bare hands across Venezuela’s earthquake-shattered north on Friday, hushing each other to listen for whispers of life and praying for help in reaching people still trapped under the ruins.

At a small hospital in La Guaira, the worst-hit state, Juan David Arsia, 17, said he had spent 21 hours under rubble. “I was there with my mom and I could hear her screaming,” he said. “I would yell to her, ‘Don’t give up, mom, have faith — don’t give up!’”

As feared, though, the death toll sharply rose on Friday, compounding the pressure on President Delcy Rodríguez and President Trump, who embraced her as Venezuela’s leader after U.S. forces seized the country’s longtime dictator early this year.

At least 920 people have died, Jorge Rodríguez, the leader of the National Assembly, said in a televised address on Friday, and at least 3,300 more people were injured. He added that about 1,400 buildings have been damaged, including 13 hospitals.

PHOTO: Social Media

Fourth toddler dies in France as Europe’s brutal heatwave forecast to shift east

The Guardian reports:

The number of deaths in France linked to the heatwave has climbed to four toddlers and more than 55 drownings, as the brutally hot conditions sweeping Europe were forecast to shift east, choking 150 million people under 35C (95F) temperatures.

Scientists said the heatwave was the most severe and widespread ever, leaving nearly half of the region’s 850 largest cities grappling with unprecedented heat stress. They said the extreme temperatures had been made possible by the climate crisis driven by fossil fuel burning.

On Friday, a hospital in Marseille said an 18-month-old child had died in emergency care earlier in the week after he was found in a car in a state of hyperthermia. A police source told the newspaper Le Figaro it was believed that the father, who works in the area, may have forgotten his son in the car when he was supposed to drop him off at daycare.