The Israeli prime minister left Israel on Sunday on his fifth visit to see Trump in the US this year

Further to that, the Kremlin has said that Putin informed Trump about the supposed drone attack on Putin’s residence in their phone call today, and would review its position in peace negotiations as a result.

Per my last post, Ukraine has already labelled the supposed attack as “fake” and a “lie”, with Zelenskyy saying Russia has come out with this story to undermine the US-Ukrainian work on a deal to end the war.

Russian manipulations regarding the alleged “attempt to attack Putin’s residence” are fabricated for only one reason: to create a pretext and false justification for Russia’s further attacks against Ukraine, as well as to undermine and impede the peace process.

Usual Russian tactic: accuse the other side of what you are doing or planning yourself.

• Updates from 4pm kick-off (GMT) in Group B

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The stadium in Agadir looks rather empty.

The transfer window is almost upon us.

The Argentinian captain has his critics but is the leader and inspiration behind a team finding their feet again

Leave it to a 20-year-old, with three Serie A starts under his belt, to provide a most perceptive analysis of the Italian top flight as we head into a new year. “The most difficult thing to do in this game,” said Francesco Pio Esposito on Sunday night, “is to stick the ball in the net.”

He was speaking in praise of his Inter teammate, Lautaro Martínez, whom he set up for the decisive goal in a 1-0 win away to Atalanta. Pio Esposito had barely entered as a second-half substitute when he was gifted possession by an opponent, Berat Djimsiti. Instead of taking the chance on himself, he froze the last defender and released Lautaro to score with a side-footed through-ball.

Move comes after party’s exclusion for last two years was lambasted by JD Vance at this year’s event

The Munich Security Conference (MSC) has invited lawmakers from Alternative für Deutschland to join its annual gathering of top international defence officials in February after shutting out the far-right party for the last two years.

The reversal, which was confirmed by organisers, came after the US vice-president, JD Vance, lambasted the AfD’s exclusion in a blistering speech at this year’s event in which he accused Germany of stifling free speech by sidelining the anti-migrant, pro-Kremlin party.

It is never enjoyable to be stuck in traffic or pressed up against a stranger’s armpit. But there are ways to make the most of your commute. You could even use it to write that novel

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For many of us, the idea of “the perfect” commute might sound laughable. If we travel to an office, it’s likely to involve either peak-time public transport or stressful traffic. You might not expect that either of those offers much scope for joy, but there are things we can do to make them more enjoyable, productive and healthier. It’s worth putting some thought into this, because commuting can increase stress, reduce capacity for exercise and encourage us to consume extra calories in on-the-go snacks.

The former lawyer turned time management coach Kelly Nolan suggests starting with a commute audit to assess its true impact. “Begin by blocking it out on a calendar. Creating a visual representation of how much commuting takes out of your day gives an accurate picture. It’s not just about how much free time you have left, it’s about seeing how commuting affects other activities in your life.”

Other outlets have asked their writers to compromise, but the Guardian has never – and would never – ask me to pull a punch

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It might be most generous to characterize the behavior of major US media organizations since 2024 as negotiating between competing incentives.

On the one hand, billionaires have consolidated their ownership over major news outlets and platforms. The Murdochs are squabbling over Fox. Jeff Bezos has remade the Washington Post in his own image. The pharmaceutical magnate Patrick Soon-Shiong places a thumb on the scale at the Los Angeles Times, and the Trump-aligned Ellison family has taken over Paramount and CBS, and spent the final weeks of this year making hostile takeover bids for CNN owner Warner Bros. The influence of these billionaire personalities has often reshaped their organizations’ newsrooms and editorial boards, directing investigations and particularly opinion sections towards ownership’s pet projects and preferred policies.

Greene gives lengthy interview with New York Times days before stepping down as congresswoman for Georgia

Marjorie Taylor Greene, now just days away from stepping down as a congresswoman for Georgia, has said in her latest mea culpa interview that she “was just so naive” for believing that Donald Trump was a man of the people.

In a lengthy interview with the New York Times that examines her break with the president after years of devotion, Greene explained that a series of minor ruptures with the president culminated in a total breach after conservative influencer Charlie Kirk was killed in September.

Filipinos make up a large percentage of the healthcare workforce, which includes undocumented people

In the Philippines, she spent three years providing end-of-life care for a family’s grandmother. When the grandmother died, family members told the healthcare worker to arrange her own way to the United States, where they operated home healthcare facilities.

In California, they promised, she would have a place to stay and a stable job. They would look after her just as she had cared for their grandmother.

Effects on inflation and employment have not been as bad as feared – but could still materialise with full force in 2026

When Donald Trump took office last January, most economists feared what would happen if he raised tariffs. The expectation was that, as the new duties drove up prices of consumer goods and inputs – affecting households and companies, respectively – surging inflation and falling real incomes would follow. This would be a supply shock, so the US Federal Reserve could not do much to counteract it.

Trump did raise tariffs to shocking levels, violating international agreements and blowing up the Republican party’s oft-professed commitment to free trade. In terms of severity and disruptiveness, Trump’s 2025 tariffs went far beyond the already harmful tariffs of his first term, and even beyond the infamous Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930. According to the Yale Budget Lab, the average effective tariff on US imports rose from 2% to 18%, the highest level since the 1930s, this year. Add to that the uncertainty caused by frequent and inexplicable policy changes, and large adverse effects on inflation, employment and real incomes appeared all but inevitable.

New head of preparedness at OpenAI will face unnerving in-tray amid fears from some experts that AI could ‘turn on us’

The maker of ChatGPT has advertised a $555,000-a-year vacancy with a daunting job description that would cause Superman to take a sharp intake of breath.

In what may be close to the impossible job, the “head of preparedness” at OpenAI will be directly responsible for defending against risks from ever more powerful AIs to human mental health, cybersecurity and biological weapons.

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Father Patrick McCarthy was brutally murdered in 1988. The two half-brothers in prison for the killing say he sexually abused them for years

More than 600 alleged survivors of clergy abuse have claims against the Roman Catholic archdiocese of New Orleans in its long bankruptcy. Attorneys Frank Lamothe III and Kristi Schubert have 75 clients. Twenty-three of them are prisoners, and most of them allege abuse at two long-shuttered orphanages, Hope Haven and Madonna Manor.

Two of these men had a different path to prison.

The challenges of drug and alcohol addiction are familiar, but violence against others is highly unusual, parents say

When news broke that Rob and Michele Singer Reiner had been killed and a possible suspect was their son, Nick Reiner, who had struggled with addiction and mental health issues, it brought addiction back into the public spotlight. But parents who have been affected by their children’s addiction fear the conversation will focus on the exceedingly rare act of violence instead of the more widespread risks.

Ron Grover and his wife, Darlene, have been glued to the news. They only knew the Reiners by their work, but they feel a connection: Grover’s son also became addicted at 15 to opioids and then heroin, much like Nick Reiner, and he was in and out of rehab and jail for years. But after seven excruciating years, Grover’s son got sober in July 2010.

Exclusive poll: Americans are also increasingly blaming the White House for their financial woes

Twice as many Americans believe their financial security is getting worse than better, according to an exclusive new poll conducted for the Guardian, and they are increasingly blaming the White House.

The poll, conducted by Harris, will be a further blow to Donald Trump’s efforts to fight off criticism of his handling of the economy and contains some worrying findings for the president.

Nearly half (45%) of Americans said their financial security is getting worse compared to 20% who said it’s getting better.

57% of Americans said the US economy is undergoing a recession, up 11% from a similar poll that was conducted in February.

Topped by Rosalía’s multilingual, ultra-ambitious Lux, here are the best albums of the year as voted for by 30 Guardian music writers
• More on the best culture of 2025

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A family classic reborn in a wide open world, a satirical adventure through teenage life and a mystery puzzler for the ages – our critics on the year’s best fun
• More on the best culture of 2025

Ivy Road/Annapurna Interactive; PC, PS5, Xbox
An arena warrior on a losing streak takes refuge in a vast forest where she discovers the joy of working in a cosy teashop. From this simple premise comes a joyful game of mindfulness and social interaction, as Alta learns how to serve up witty conversation and decent hot drinks. Colourful and highly stylised, it is a thoughtful study of burnout and recovery.

New novels from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Ian McEwan, plus the return of Slow Horses and Margaret Atwood looks back … Guardian critics pick the must-read titles of 2025

The Guardian’s fiction editor picks the best of the year, from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Dream Count to Thomas Pynchon’s return, David Szalay’s Booker winner and a remarkable collection of short stories.

MPs reject calls to strip British-Egyptian activist of UK nationality over social media posts from a decade ago

Downing Street has defended its campaign for the release of a British-Egyptian activist and its decision to welcome him to the UK despite his “abhorrent” tweets a decade ago.

Alaa Abd el-Fattah, who arrived in London on Boxing Day after the British government successfully negotiated his release, said he apologised “unequivocally” for his posts after opposition parties called for him to be deported and his citizenship revoked.

Albin Kurti’s emphatic victory strengthens mandate for domestic reforms including welfare expansion

Kosovo’s prime minister, Albin Kurti has won an emphatic election victory, marking a resurgence for the nationalist leader and ending a political deadlock in Europe’s youngest state.

The win in Sunday’s snap election strengthens Kurti’s mandate to push through domestic reforms, including welfare expansion and higher salaries for public workers, although he faces significant problems including tensions with Serbia and health and education systems that lag behind Kosovo’s Balkan neighbours.

When a friend found out the painting she’d given me had made its way to a charity store, I wanted to dig a hole in the earth

As the recipient of an unwanted gift, is it necessary to pretend you like it? This is what most of us are trained to do as children; for some it was our first experience of being instructed to lie.

“Thank you,” I might have said to my grandmother, “for this frilly, itchy lace-trimmed dress identical to the one you gave my sister. I love it.”

The old rivals have clashed in eight of the 27 Tests to finish inside two days – these are the tales behind the six matches played before the current series

To put in context the surprise that greeted the two-day Boxing Day Test just gone, consider the rarity by arithmetic. The match in Melbourne was Test number 2,615, and was two-day Test number 27. You don’t need a calculator to see that’s roughly 1%. And yet we’ve had two such matches in the current Ashes series, plus another in Australia three years earlier. We’ve had half a dozen two-day Tests worldwide since 2021. What gives?

Nine two-day Tests – fully one-third of the total – happened in the 1800s, when pitches could become swamps or shooting galleries. The next few mostly involved weak teams in their early years of development. Australia and England each dished one out to South Africa in the tri-series of 1912, and the South African team was little stronger when ripped up by Clarrie Grimmett and Bill O’Reilly in 1936. Australia also bashed up a new West Indies team in 1932 and New Zealand in 1946.

Planet’s oldest bee species and primary pollinators were under threat from deforestation and competition from ‘killer bees’

Stingless bees from the Amazon have become the first insects to be granted legal rights anywhere in the world, in a breakthrough supporters hope will be a catalyst for similar moves to protect bees elsewhere.

It means that across a broad swathe of the Peruvian Amazon, the rainforest’s long-overlooked native bees – which, unlike their cousins the European honeybees, have no sting – now have the right to exist and to flourish.

For more than three decades, the Nassars have battled Israeli efforts to reclassify their property as ‘state land’

In 1916, Daher Nassar, a Christian Palestinian farmer living south of Bethlehem, made a move considered more than unusual at the time. He bought a 42-hectare stretch of farmland on the slopes and valleys of Wadi Salem, and formally registered the purchase with the Ottoman authorities, who then ruled the region.

A few years later, after transferring the title to his son, Nassar did something even more extraordinary. He re-registered the deed under each successive administration – the British mandate, then the Jordanian government, and finally, after 1967, under Israeli occupation.

When the hot winds hit Roebourne, as many as 16 people pile into Yindjibarndi elder Lyn Cheedy’s home – one of the few with air conditioning

Few places are more exposed to extreme weather than Roebourne, a tiny cyclone-prone town on the Western Australian coast, where public housing residents endure 50C heat without air conditioning.

Lyn Cheedy, a Yindjibarndi elder, takes her grandson to the pool most afternoons.