The United States and Iran have officially signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at ending the war in Iran. President Trump signed the agreement at a dinner at the Palace of Versailles hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron, hours after the G7 summit wrapped up in Évian. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signed the agreement in Tehran; he later shared the memorandum on social media, calling it a “historical document and a message from a powerful Iran.” The 14-point agreement calls for an immediate end to fighting on all fronts, including Lebanon; the full resumption of maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz; the lifting of the U.S. blockade; the waiving of U.S. sanctions on Iran; the unfreezing of Iranian assets; and a $300 billion investment fund to rebuild Iran. Iran’s lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said, “Everything we sought to achieve through military action, we obtained several times over through negotiation; it ​was not even comparable.” On Capitol Hill, some lawmakers have criticized Trump’s deal, with Republican Senator Bill Cassidy calling it the “worst foreign policy blunder in decades.” 

Meanwhile, President Trump has signaled that no one will face consequences for the U.S. cruise missile strikes that killed more than 175 people at a school in Minab on the first day of U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran last February. Most of the victims were schoolgirls.

President Donald Trump: “If it was a fault — and as you know, that’s under investigation — it’s such a strange question to be asked at this state, talking about a long time ago, but nobody did that on purpose.”

Lebanon’s National News Agency reports an Israeli drone strike near the town of Kfar Tebnit has killed one person, while seriously wounding another. A separate drone strike on Beit Yahoun in southern Lebanon wounded two people. Israel’s attacks came even though the U.S.-Iran ceasefire deal calls for an end to hostilities on “all fronts,” including Lebanon.

Ukrainian drones have struck a massive oil refinery in Russia’s capital region for the second time in a week, sending thick black smoke over Moscow and halting flights at the city’s four airports. Elsewhere, Russian officials say one woman was injured as debris from downed Ukrainian drones fell on homes, cars, a fitness center, a large mall and an industrial site. Ukraine’s attack came as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met with President Trump and other heads of state at the G7 summit in Évian, France. 

In Gaza, at least two Palestinians were killed and another left wounded after Israel bombed the southern Gaza Strip. The attack targeted al-Mawasi, a crowded tent camp that Israel had designated as a so-called humanitarian zone. The latest killings bring the number of deaths since Israel agreed to a U.S.-brokered so-called “ceasefire deal” with Hamas in October to more than 1,000. Israel now occupies 64% of the Gaza Strip — far more than the 53% allowed under the October agreement. 

California Democratic Congressmember Ro Khanna has become the first member of Congress to sign a pledge not to take money from pro-Israel lobbying groups. The PEACE Pledge stands for the Pledge to Enforce American law, Counter foreign influence, and End war crimes. It was created by the group Track AIPAC, which tracks political spending by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

Rep. Ro Khanna: “It’s pretty commonsense. It means that we shouldn’t be sending our tax dollar money for foreign wars overseas. We should be spending it here at home. And it says that we shouldn’t be taking money from AIPAC or all of its affiliate PACs or bundled money from those organizations, and that we have to recognize the genocide that took place in Gaza.”

The PEACE Pledge includes a promise to support the First Amendment rights of people critical of the state of Israel, including supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, or BDS, movement.

Peace activists rallied in Baltimore on Wednesday to celebrate a decision by the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System to divest most of its holdings in Israeli sovereign bonds. This is Evie Frankl, a member of Jewish Voice for Peace and the Break the Bonds Campaign and the daughter of Holocaust survivors.

Evie Frankl: “When we started this campaign, held about $73-$74 million worth of Israel bonds, and currently we’re down to $11 million in Israel bonds. That’s an 85% reduction in their holdings. And we’re declaring that a victory, but we want them to divest the other $11 million, and we want a policy to make clear that they can’t reinvest.”

In Haiti, at least 1.5 million people have been displaced and forced to live in makeshift shelters due to rising gang violence across the country. That’s according to new data announced by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres during a visit to Haiti Tuesday. Guterres spoke from the capital Port-au-Prince.

Secretary-General António Guterres: “Since the start of the year, gang violence has killed more than 2,300 people and wounded more than 1,100. It has paralyzed the state, the economy, education and the delivery of aid. Yet the greatest shame is not gang violence. The greatest shame is indifference, a world that looked the other way for too long.”

Guterres welcomed the deployment of a new U.N.-backed force to combat gangs — approved by the U.N. Security Council in September — that will replace Kenyan police troops. But many Haitians have opposed further foreign intervention in Haiti, denouncing a history of political and economic destabilization. 

Lawyers for Haitian immigrants are petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court to dismiss the Trump administration’s efforts to end temporary protected status, TPS, for more than 300,000 Haitians living in the United States. This comes as evidence uncovered during ongoing litigation has raised serious questions regarding the process Trump officials used to terminate the relief.

The Department of Homeland Security announced Thursday that all immigrants detained at an isolated ICE jail in the Florida Everglades, known as “Alligator Alcatraz,” have been transferred to other facilities across the U.S. ahead of the approaching hurricane season. DHS did not say whether the embattled ICE jail would be closed. Advocates warn those transferred from the jail have been disappeared, with their whereabouts unknown to family members. People detained at the Everglades ICE jail have described egregious abuses, including the denial of medical care and being placed in a 2×2-foot cage-like structure as punishment, according to Amnesty International.

Georgia’s state Legislature has rejected a push by President Trump to redraw congressional and legislative districts. Republican Governor Brian Kemp had proposed a special session to revise Georgia’s political maps ahead of the 2028 elections. But on Wednesday, Republican lawmakers revolted, declaring there would be no vote on redistricting, after protesters filled the state Capitol, many of them chanting, “Black voters matter!” This is Tennessee state Representative Justin Jones, who traveled to Atlanta to join the protests.

Rep. Justin Jones: “I’m here because what happens in Atlanta is connected to what happens in Nashville, connected to what happens in Jackson, Mississippi, connected to what happens in Montgomery, Alabama. They’re waging a battle against multiracial democracy in the South, so we have to show up for each other. But what we saw in real time was the power of people. You saw an almost entirely white caucus up there who represents the new Confederacy. We represent a new South that is multiracial, rooted in racial justice, rooted in protecting our vote.”

The Trump administration has launched a legal fight to block the United States’ first-ever reparations program which serves Black community members of Evanston, Illinois. The program was approved by Evanston city councilmembers in 2021, allotting some $20 million to Black residents who lived in the city between 1919 and 1969, or their direct descendants, over discriminatory housing policies and the lasting impacts of slavery. Robin Rue Simmons, who pioneered the program and now serves as the chairperson of Evanston’s Reparations Committee, denounced the Trump administration’s lawsuit as a “fear tactic.” 

President Trump called off a confirmation hearing for his pick to become the next U.S. spy chief on Wednesday, just hours before it was set to begin. The Senate Intelligence Committee had been scheduled to hear testimony from federal prosecutor Jay Clayton, Trump’s pick to succeed Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who steps down on Friday. But Trump said from the G7 summit he would stall Clayton’s nomination and would refuse to sign an extension of the Foreign Intelligence ​Surveillance Act allowing for expansive domestic surveillance, unless lawmakers first approve the SAVE America Act. Voting rights experts say the SAVE Act could disenfranchise millions of citizens who lack easy access to a required birth certificate or a passport in order to vote. Trump also demanded Senate approval of his personal defense attorney, Jamie McDonald, to replace Jay Clayton as the U.S. attorney in Manhattan. That means the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Bill Pulte — a MAGA loyalist with no national security experience — will become acting director of national intelligence on Friday. Pulte has used his position as the top U.S. housing official to join Trump’s campaign of retribution against his political enemies, making criminal referrals over claims of mortgage fraud. Pulte will now have access to the government’s most closely guarded secrets across 18 U.S. intelligence agencies. He was opposed by a number of Republicans, as well as Democratic senators.

The Pentagon has released the names of eight U.S. service members killed when a B-52 bomber crashed shortly after takeoff from Edwards Air Force Base in California on Monday. The crash came as the Air Force is testing ways to keep its fleet of so-called strategic bombers operating through at least 2050. The B-52 can carry up to 70,000 pounds of high-explosive or nuclear ordnance. 

In Idaho, a federal judge has temporarily blocked a new state law that threatened transgender people with up to five years in prison for using public restrooms that match their gender identity.

In related news, the Federal Trade Commission, joined by four states — Alaska, Iowa, Nebraska and Texas — have sued the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. The lawsuit alleges the group made deceptive claims about gender-affirming care for minors. The group said in a statement the FTC is “acting out of pure retaliation as part of the federal government’s relentless and targeted campaign to undermine gender-affirming care … The [FTC] is not a medical provider and has no place interfering with the process of individualized medical decision-making.”