👋 Jambo!*
Welcome to Monday, where Israel approves a plan to expand its military offensive against Hamas in Gaza, Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelensky says a ceasefire with Russia is possible “at any moment” and today’s quiz bids farewell to a 2010s fixture that shuts down today. Meanwhile, we feature a great reportage by Die Zeit journalists in the Baltic Sea, where “the real war is what you cannot see.”
[*Swahili – Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique]
✅ SIGN UP
This is our daily newsletter Worldcrunch Today, a rapid tour of the news of the day from the world’s best journalism sources, regardless of language or geography.It’s easy (and free!) to sign up to receive it each day in your inbox: 👉 Sign up here
🗞️ FRONT PAGE
Bucharest-based daily România liberă lends its front page to Romanian voters’ return to the polls on Sunday, just months after the country’s presidential election was annulled over allegations of campaign fraud and Russian interference. Nationalist George Simion has won the first round of the rerun with 40.96% of the votes. Simion’s support was especially strong in the country’s diaspora, as he secured more than 70% of votes in Italy, Spain and Germany, where Romanians largely do blue-collar work.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Israel votes to expand Gaza ground offensive. Israel’s security cabinet has approved a plan to expand its military offensive against Hamas in Gaza, to the point of seizing the entire enclave and holding its territories, an Israeli official said on Monday. The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) said it was calling up tens of thousands of reservists in an attempt to return hostages held in Gaza and defeat Hamas. But critics say that the most recent offensive has failed to free the remaining hostages. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised a multi-phased response to Yemen’s Houthi rebels after a missile strike hit near Israel’s main airport in Tel Aviv and injured six on Sunday.
• Zelensky says ceasefire is possible “at any moment.” Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelensky said at a press conference in Prague that a ceasefire with Russia was possible “at any moment” in the more than three year conflict, urging allies to Kyiv to apply increased pressure on Moscow to force Russia into taking “real practical steps to end the war.” Meanwhile, in a documentary interview, Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed his “hope” that nuclear weapons will not be required in the war in Ukraine, and that the invasion would come to a “logical conclusion with the outcome Russia requires.” The comments from the two leaders came after U.S. President Donald Trump said in an interview that aired Sunday that peace negotiations were being held up by one side, but he declined to specify whether Russia or Ukraine was stalling an agreement.
• Trump to reopen Alcatraz, impose 100% tariffs on foreign films. President Trump said in a Truth Social post on Sunday that he was directing the agency in charge of prisons in the U.S. to rebuild and reopen the Alcatraz prison in the San Francisco Bay. The reopening of the infamous prison that held Al Capone was “just an idea I’ve had,” Trump said to reporters. Trump also said in a similar announcement on Truth Social that the U.S. would be putting 100% tariffs on movies produced abroad, although the enforcement mechanism and what criteria would qualify a film to be tariffed were unclear.
• Two arrested in Brazil for plotting Lady Gaga concert attack. Police in Brazil said they arrested two people in connection to an alleged plot to set off explosives at a free Lady Gaga concert in Rio de Janeiro. The pop star’s concert on Saturday brought an estimated 2.5 million people to Copacabana beach, the biggest of her career. Police say they believed the suspects were planning the attack to target the LGBTQ+ community in the country.
• EU leaders hold Paris conference to attract U.S. scientists. French President Emmanuel Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen are hosting a conference in Paris today to attract U.S. researchers and scientists looking to relocate because of U.S. President Trump’s policies. The conference, held at the Sorbonne university, will have European commissioners, scientists and ministers for research discussing financial incentives to entice American scientists as universities and research facilities in the U.S. come under intensified scrutiny and budget cuts.
• Capsized tourist boats kill 10 in China. Ten people died after four boats capsized in a sudden storm in China on Sunday evening. The tourist boats in a scenic area of southwestern China sank under the sudden rain and hail, with more than 80 people falling into the river and dozens being sent to a hospital, most with minor injuries.
• News Quiz! What online platform, popular in the 2010s, is officially shutting down today?
A. MySpace
B. Angry Birds
C. OkCupid
D. Skype
[Answer below]
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
63 years
Audrey Backeberg, who disappeared from Reedsburg, Wisconsin in 1962 at age 20, has been found alive and living in another state after a cold case review by local authorities. Her disappearance was voluntary and came shortly after she filed a domestic abuse complaint against her husband, some 63 years ago. Investigators in Sauk County, Wisconsin, solved the case with help from online ancestry records, confirming she had started a new life and, now 82, reportedly remains content with her decision.
📰 IN OTHER NEWS
🇵🇸 In Gaza, the humiliation and despair has now reached a point where the living are forced to pay money for the right to bury their dead.
— DARAJ
🚢 Amid growing tensions between NATO and Russia, the Baltic becomes a battlefield of hidden threats beneath the waves.
— DIE ZEIT
♂️ In this deeply personal account, journalist Ignacio Pereyra looks back on his journey through desire, fear and what a moment in Vigo, Spain, some 20 years ago taught him about the silence of masculinity.
— RECALCULATING
📣 VERBATIM
“It wasn’t good.”
— On the sidelines of a mass in Rome on Sunday, U.S. Cardinal Timothy Dolan disapproved of Donald Trump’s posting of an AI-generated image of himself as the pope on his Truth Social account. The image was later republished on the White House’s official social media accounts. Dolan, who is in Rome ahead of the papal conclave set to begin Wednesday, criticized the image, calling it a “brutta figura,” an Italian term for an embarrassing misstep. This comes just days after the U.S. president jokingly told reporters ”I’d like to be pope.”
Let us know what’s happening in your corner of the world!
✍️ Newsletter by Jacob Shropshire & Rein Arnauts
Quiz Answer: D. After 23 years of service, and a peak of more than 300 million monthly users, Skype is shutting down. The platform, founded in 2003 by a group of engineers in Tallinn, Estonia, was one of the first to introduce free voice and video calls over the internet. Microsoft, which bought Skype in 2011, said in February that it would be retiring the platform to prioritize its primary calling platform, Teams.
