• Rockets aimed at Kabul airport intercepted: U.S. anti-missile defenses intercepted as many as five rockets fired at Kabul's airport early Monday. The attempted attack, for which no one has claimed responsibility, comes after last week's deadly suicide attack at the airport and less than 48 hours before the United States is due to complete its troop withdrawal from Afghanistan.

• Missile and drone attack in Yemen kills 30: A missile and drone attack on a key military base in the South of Yemen killed at least 30 troops on Sunday and wounded at least 65. It was one of the deadliest attacks in the country's civil war, which has been going on since 2014.

• COVID-19 update: The European Union is expected to reinstate travel restrictions on visitors from the U.S., Israel, Lebanon and three Balkan countries, according to a new report Monday. New Zealand, which has largely been virus free, extended its lockdown by another two weeks after a Delta variant case was imported from Australia.

• New Orleans loses power as hurricane Ida strikes: Hurricane Ida has made landfall in Louisiana with 150mph (240km/h) winds that left the city of New Orleans without power. The storm claimed its first victim on Monday. President Joe Biden has declared Ida a major disaster and ordered federal aid to supplement recovery efforts.

• North Korea restarts nuclear reactor: According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), North Korea appears to have restarted its Yongbyon nuclear reactor. The UN Watchdog said the reactor has been discharging cooling water since July, which suggests it is operational again, the first sign of operational activity since December 2018.

• Messi's Paris debut: Argentine soccer legend Lionel Messi made his debut with French team Paris Saint-Germain, where he came off the bench in the second half of the Ligue 1 game against Reims. It's Messi's first appearance since he joined PSG from Barcelona where the 34-year-old had played his entire career.

• Female octopuses throw shells at annoying males: Researchers studying octopuses were taken aback when video footage showed a female throwing shells and rocks at a male who the scientists said had been attempting to mate with her. They then studied other octopuses in the wild and found that females were generally more likely to exhibit this type of behavior

The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports on Hurricane Ida as the storm made landfall in Louisiana with 150mph (240km/h) winds. It arrived on the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the 2005 storm that caused more than 1,800 deaths and $125 billion in damage.

Italy's record droughts: How it looks from the farm

Giovanni Bedino, a 59-year-old Italian farmer, has been working the land since he was 15. "I love this job, but a year like this takes away your love," he told Turin daily La Stampa. "We couldn't water the fields and nothing came down from the sky. I remember, the summer of 2003 was a very difficult one — but it wasn't even close to this year. I have never seen such a drought."

🇮🇹 The earth is cracking in Italy's northwest region of Piedmont: the crops and the animals suffer. Italy has been ravaged by fires and storms, like Greece, Turkey and much of southern Europe.

⛅ Italy has recorded 1,200 "extreme" meteorological events — a 56% increase from last year. Wildfires ravaged the southern regions of Sardinia, Calabria and Sicily. The town of Florida, in Sicily, is thought to have recorded the hottest temperature ever recorded in Europe: 48.8 °C. Meanwhile, heavy rainfall devastated other parts of the country.

🚜 Coldiretti, Italy's largest agricultural association, has just summed up the bill for this Italian summer: The damages to agriculture, it says, amount to €1 billion. Wheat yields have fallen 10%; cherries 30%, nectarines 40%. Tomato and corn crops have also suffered heavy losses.

💧 This is the summer in which the news about climate change matches with reality on the ground. In northern Italy, the area that's bearing the brunt of the crisis is Cuneo province, near the French border. Livio Quaranta, the president of the consortium that manages water in 108 municipalities, says there are now no permanent snowfields on this entire stretch of the Alps: "The snow cover has changed: It doesn't remain on the ground for long — it just washes away, because of higher average temperatures."

➡️ Read more on Worldcrunch.com

3 hours

China is imposing strict new restrictions about when minors can play video games, limiting access to three specific hours each week, over growing fears of gaming addiction. Users under the age of 18 would only be allowed to play games from 8 to 9 p.m. on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, with online gaming companies barred from providing services to minors outside of these hours.

For us, our trophy is to get to the gate.

— says Khalida Popal, a founder of the Afghanistan women's national football team. She told The Guardian about a small dedicated team that helped the team, most of them teenagers, and other female athletes make it to the Kabul airport and to flee the country.

✍️ Newsletter by Meike Eijsberg and Bertrand Hauger