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Good morning! Today is Thursday, the second of July, 2026 and this is the Thursday Edition of GEORGE.
GEORGE brings Thursday’s news into focus with reporting, commentary, and dispatches for curious readers. Here are the stories, developments, and ideas worth carrying into the day.
The death toll from the rare doublet earthquakes in Venezuela continues to mount as some search-and-rescue missions start to become search-and-recovery ones, GEORGE’s @World News Roundup reporter writes.. The toll is approaching 2,500 and the World Health Organization expects it to eventually hit four times that figure.
Meanwhile, as twin had waves attack both sides of the Atlantic, officials in multiple countries fear a mounting death toll as well. It’s slowly becoming apparent to some that the world is no longer experiencing the same weather it did in the 1960s and 1970s as the mercury climbs to over 40° C (104* F) regularly.
The Round of 32 at the 2026 World Cup will be over by the end of the week and there have been some memorable matches in recent days. GEORGE’s @On the Pitch reporters have the details.
GEORGE’s upgraded @The War Room feature now covers multiple battles and across the globe. Today’s @The War Room includes I=important dispatches Kyiv, including the planned day of mourning for the at least 18 people killed in the capital city overnight.
The newspaper’s @The Sketch editorial cartoon columnist reported that he had great difficulty with an appropriate cartoon in support of the Venezuelan people after the catastrophic earth quakes they’ve experienced until he saw a news report from Caracas showing search-and-rescue crews at a collapsed building, where one worker wearing a white hoodie that shone in the dark, had his arm extended, likely to give direction of a crane, but he captured the moment with pen and ink, including two Venezuelans he saw on the sidelines, imagining what their conversation must have been.
There is more exclusive reporting in today’s GEORGE – but don’t touch that dial. Scroll down for today’s editorial cartoon in @The Sketch, then continue with additional news, commentary, and stories readers will not find elsewhere.
GEORGE will return on Friday with a new editorial cartoon and more original dispatches and reportage.
Until then, remain curious!
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VOLUME VI… № 1,753
@THE LEDE (above)
@THE SKETCH (above) Würstel Stand in Vienna’s City Center
IN THIS ISSUE
@INTERMEZZO I Space Shuttle Enterprise on a Boeing 747
@ON THE PITCH World Cup Coverage
@INTERMEZZO II Vienna’s Stadtpark at night
@THE WAR ROOM
@INTERMEZZO III Panda Center in Chengdu
@WORLD NEWS ROUNDUP
@INTERMEZZO IV A man sweeping in Chengdu
@THOMASHEFSKY ON THEATRE Review: ‘Schmigadoon’
ATCHES OF NOTE
@ABOUT GEORGE
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A Würstel Stand in Vienna’s City Center
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— Bosnia stood in the way of the USA and the last 16, where Belgium stood waiting, but in the end, the United States team beat Bosnia and Herzegovina 2-0 in their Round of 32 clash. Folarin Balogun fired the U.S. team into the lead shortly before halftime after already having had a goal ruled out for offside. Still, despite a controversial red card for the opening goalscorer, who will now miss the Group of 16 match, it will be the United States that faces off against Belgium in Seattle on 6 July.
— England’s men’s team has been playing football for over 150 years, but it’s never quite had a player like Harry Kane, or been in a World Cup match such as the one it found itself in on Sunday against DR Congo. With 15 minutes left here in Atlanta, England was 1-0 down to DR Congo, and team members’ valets were practically at the hotel packing players’ bags. Had the team failed, it would have been exiting the World Cup at the first knockout round even though there were at least 18 days of football left to be played. That’s where our hero, striker Harry Kane, came to the rescue. He almost single-handedly willed England to win, despite goalkeeper Lionel Mpassi’s incredible run of almost 90 minutes of keeping England out of the net. Our hero knocked the ball away from defender Chancel Mbemba, chased it, and with superhuman strength and just one kick of his right boot sent the ball rocketing into the near top corner of the net. The DR Congo goalkeeper didn’t move a muscle. Indeed, by the time he saw the ball, it was rolling in the opposite direction out of the net.
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— Thursday and Friday call for a total of six matches played across six cities and stadiums as the Round of 32 comes to an end.
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
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The InterContinental Hotel Vienna, photographed from the nearby Stadtpark
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— Qatar reported “positive progress” following separate meetings with U.S. and Iranian negotiators in Doha. A Qatari spokesman said that further talks would be planned after the funeral of Ali Khamenei, Iran’s former supreme leader, which were set to begin this weekend. U.S. President Donald Trump’s vice president, James David Vance, said that Mr. Trump had “a lot of options” were Iran not to comply with U.S. terms for peace.
— Civilian leaders in Iran have greatly diverging priorities from the country’s military officials, a group comprised largely of top officers in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. This divide will likely hinder how the country’s negotiators approach the talks and suggests that are multiple roadblocks ahead for peace treaty negotiators that may not be easily resolved in what remains of the 60-day negotiating period. Moreover, they show that an agreement on truly difficult topics such as Iran’s nuclear program is still far off. The civilian group wants billions of dollars of assets unfrozen to assist in the country’s economic recovery, while hardline military officials seek control of the Strait of Hormuz. The IRGC envisions assuming full control of the strait no matter what the cost, despite the fact that the Strait functions as an international strait under international law of the sea. This requires both Oman and Iran to allow foreign commercial vessels and military ships the right of “transit passage.” This right guarantees continuous, expeditious, and unobstructed movement for all vessels and aircraft. Meanwhile, the Revolutionary Guard Corps envisions charging vessels tolls or fees to transit the strait in order to enrich its coffers and allow the IRGC to dominate the security map for the entire region.
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— Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, declared that Friday will be an official day of mourning for victims of the Russian attack that began Wednesday night and continued into Thursday. The death toll has risen to 18, and dozens of people are injured, as search and rescue operations continue.
— Just hours after President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine had warned that Russia was preparing another “massive strike” on Kyiv, thick smoke rose over the capital city as Moscow hammered it with ballistic missiles and drones. Authorities in the Ukrainian capital said that several apartment buildings had been partially destroyed and an unknown number of people were trapped in the rubble. The death toll from the attack was said to be at least 18 in Kyiv alone, with an additional 25 injured. Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, implored people to stay in shelters as the night wore on and round after round of ballistic missiles entered Ukraine’s airspace. Some 52,000 people sought refuge overnight in metro stations, officials in Kyiv said.
— In southern Ukraine, newly enhanced Ukrainian drones with extended range and more deadly payloads are wreaking havoc on Russian supply lines. The strikes hit the Crimean peninsula, a key garrison supporting Russian forces, causing fuel shortages and complicating troop rotations.
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A training performance of the Spanische Hofreitschule, or Spanish Riding School, in Vienna, Austria. The Lippizzaner horses are known to be among the happiest of horses.
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The death toll in Venezuela following the doublet earthquakes last week is now at least 2,295, with that figure continuing to rise as rescue teams recover more bodies from collapsed buildings across the country. Although the chances of finding additional survivors are fading more than a week after the disaster, occasional miracles continue to offer hope, including the rescue of a three-year-old boy who was pulled alive from the rubble six days after the quakes. Even so, frustration is mounting amongst survivors over what many describe as an inadequate government response, while hospitals remain overwhelmed, more than 11,000 people have been injured, and tens of thousands remain missing or unaccounted for. Rescue workers and volunteers continue searching damaged neighborhoods despite dwindling hopes of further rescues, as aid agencies warn that shortages of shelter, clean water, medical supplies, and sanitation threaten to turn the earthquake into a prolonged humanitarian crisis.
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Two separate heat domes are driving dangerous heat on both sides of the Atlantic. Across Europe, a persistent dome of high pressure stretching from the Iberian Peninsula into Central and Eastern Europe continues to push temperatures above 40° C (104° F) in parts of Spain, France, Italy, Germany, and the Balkans, prolonging wildfire danger and placing vulnerable populations at risk. Meanwhile, an independent heat dome over central and eastern North America is expanding across the Midwest, Great Lakes, and East Coast, with heat indices expected to reach 110° to 115° F (43.3° to 46.1° C) in some areas through the Independence Day holiday on 4 July. Authorities throughout both regions are urging residents to remain hydrated, limit strenuous outdoor activity during the hottest part of the day, and check on elderly neighbors and other vulnerable people as two of the world’s most significant weather events continue to unfold simultaneously.
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Two people climbed to the top of the Empire State Building on Wednesday where they became engaged, although they didn’t go about it in the usual manner. The two – Ivan Kuznetsov, 32, and Angelina Nikolau, 33 – skipped the famous building’s “Happily Ever After” package, which carries a price tag of $1,000, and which includes a private corner on the 86th floor’s outdoor observatory and a visit to the 102nd floor’s enclosed observatory. Instead, they climbed to the top of top of the building’s transmission tower, which provides radio and television signals to local stations. The Empire State Building was the world’s tallest building from 1931 to 1972, when it was surpassed by the original World Trade Center. The Art Deco-style building has a roof height of 1,250’ (380 m) and stands a total of 1,454’ (443.2 m) tall including its antenna. Generally recognized as “the most recognizable building in the world,” it is now the eighth-tallest building in New York City, the tenth-tallest completed skyscraper in the United States, and the 59th-tallest completed skyscraper in the world. Mr. Kuznetsov and Ms. Nikolau The two have a history of climbing tall buildings without ropes or other safety equipment. They were previously featured in a documentary about climbing Malaysia’s Merdeka 118 Tower, which is 2,227’ (678.8 m) tall.
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German prosecutors charged Serhii Kuznietsov, a Ukrainian, for his purported role as the on-board coördinator in the 2022 Nord Stream pipeline explosions. The pipelines carry Russian gas into Germany. Mr. Kuznietsov was charged with war crimes for attacking civilian energy infrastructure, causing an explosion, and destroying critical infrastructure. The Ukrainian government has denied involvement.
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Germany’s loss in the 2026 World Cup dominated national headlines, displacing even the mass shooting in Stade. Just one day after the attack in which six people were killed at a child welfare center, the news media’s attention shifted back to the team’s poor performance in the Weltmeisterschaft. Despite how rare gun violence there, the country’s collective anguish over an early German exit from the competition took precedence. Providing further indication that the media saw the loss in the Americas as a national story and the violence in Niedersachsen as a local one, the Süddeutsche Zeitung featured six World Cup stories above the fold on Tuesday, while newsmagazine Der Spiegel had nine.
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Mr. Trump faced and largely dismissed criticism of his cryptocurrency profits. Financial disclosures revealed the president earned more than $1 billion from his crypto ventures last year. The profits were driven by sales of his meme coin, $Trump, which his supporters had hoped would soar in value with his return to the White House, and deals linked to his family’s crypto firm, World Liberty Financial. Instead of increasing in value, however, the meme coin generated losses for hundreds of thousands of people, while Mr. Trump made $636 million. The president, despite his aggressive promotion of cryptocurrency deregulation, has denied any conflicts of interest, stating that external institutions run his finances.
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A panda at the Chengdu Research Base of the Giant Panda Breeding Center
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Former Chinese billionaire and convicted fraudster Guo Wengui was sentenced to 30 years in prison for fraud. In 2014, Mr. Guo was estimated to have amassed a fortune of $2.16 billion. Later that year, he left China for the United Statesamidst an anti-corruption crackdown that targeted his associates, including top intelligence official Ma Jian where he transformed himself into a supporter of Steve Bannon and the American right, a self-described dissident, and a whistleblower against the Chinese Communist Party. Mr. Guo was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on charges of defrauding investors and supporters and was convicted in the summer of 2024 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on charges of fraud and money-laundering.
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Mr. Trump said Wednesday that he does not intend to renew the United States’ trade pact with Canada and Mexico. Instead, he said he wishes to pursue separate deals with the two neighbors. Mr. Trump appears to have soured on what he once called “the best agreement we’ve ever made,” which he negotiated during his first term in office. The deal will be reviewed annually until it expires in 2036, unless one of the countries withdraws.
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The Vatican excommunicated two bishops who belong to the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X, a group of traditionalist Catholics based in Switzerland. The move came after they ordained four priests as bishops without Pope Leo’s approval. According to the decree, all six no longer conduct marriages or hear confessions validly. The Vatican declared the society to be in schism with the Catholic church.
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A man sweeping at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding. The tariff war will create a mess that one man and a broom will not be able to sweep away.
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In the German city of Stade, a man seeking custody of his baby daughter shot and killed six social workers at a child welfare facility there. The shooting took place after a quarrel about the custody of his baby daughter. The dead were all facility employees. No children were injured in the incident. The daytime assault in the small city of Stade – it has a population of just over 48,600 people – shocked a country where strict gun laws have made mass shootings a rarity. The city, first mentioned in records in 934, is the seat of the Landkreis, or district, which bears its name. It is located 45 km (28 miles) to the west of Hamburg, and belongs to that city’s wider metropolitan area. The shooter, who was 45 years old, was born in Germany to a family with Turkish background, and lived in the Hannover area, about a two-and-a-half-hour drive away, officials said. “This was a murder committed for family reasons – an extremely cold-blooded act of violence with no political or economic motives,” Daniela Behrens, the Ministerin für Inneres und Sport, or minister for interior and sport, for the state of Niedersachsen, or Lower Saxony, which includes Stade, told reporters at a press briefing on Monday evening. The man, who was not identified by police, did not possess a gun permit and it is not known where he acquired the weapon.
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In the United States, the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, blocked an executive order issued by Mr. Trump the day he took office that would have denied birthright citizenship to the children of undocumented migrants. The ruling is considered a major blow to the president’s agenda.
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George delivers news for curious thinkers in a world of shortened attention spans.
Decades of research on how readers consume information when faced with Information Overload – led by George co-founder Jonathan Spira, one of the foremost authorities on the subject – ensures that each article gets straight to the point with no fluff and no bias.
George presents important news and events of the day clearly and concisely in a format better suited to the modern reader’s limited time and focus, without forsaking the founders’ traditional commitment to fact-driven news, commentary, and dispatches – all prepared by curious thinkers, for curious thinkers.
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Jonathan Spira, Alexander Khusid, Tim Perry, Christian Stampfer, Kurt Stolz, Anna Breuer, and Paul Riegler contributed to this issue of George.
The mark “George,” the tagline “A daily newspaper…,” and all of the newspaper’s content, images, photographs, and associated material are subject to copyright law.
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