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You can’t see Iran from Israel, but on its scenic northern border stand the hills of Lebanon, which at the point where the two countries are closest, is done up to look just like the Islamic Republic.

In Kfar Kila, a town just yards from an Israeli town, you might be in Tehran: Iran’s leaders, past and present, wave from a monument adorned with the emblem from its flag. Blue metal boxes on posts line the roadway, a slot beckoning a few coins to the Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation, named for the cleric who, in 1979, turned Iran from Israel’s stalwart ally to its implacable foe.

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In the decades since, every other country in the region has made some sort of accommodation with Israel, persuaded on the one hand by its formidable U.S.-backed military, and on the other by the security-minded tech sector that grew out of that military. Iran was different. It cast Israel as the unifying nemesis in its unlikely ascension to leadership of a Muslim-only Middle East. The eradication of “the Zionist entity” remains core to the radical regime Khomeini installed some 1,000 miles away.

That distance was the largest challenge to the 200 warplanes the Israel Defense Forces launched into Iran the early morning hours of June 13. The primary target was nuclear facilities that have edged ever closer to producing a bomb, and Iranian state television showed footage of an attack on the Natanz facility where uranium is enriched. Bursts of orange flash under a half dozen columns of black smoke billowing just beyond a freeway where traffic continues as usual. It’s daylight, which meant the assault had been under way for hours. It was not yet 3 a.m. when the apartments of senior commanders began exploding in northeast Tehran. Iran announced the deaths of the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, two other senior commanders, and as at least two of the 25 nuclear scientist Israel reportedly targeted.

By first decapitating the military leadership before going after the hardware, Israel’s plan of attack mirrored the one that had made it possible. Last September, it had carried out an extraordinarily effective campaign against Hezbollah—the militia Iran had installed in Lebanon, then armed with more than 100,000 missiles, with instruction that they were to be launched on its order. Those missiles were pointed at Israel, which lived in mortal fear of them. There were more than could be knocked out of the sky by Iron Dome or any other defense system. They were why Israeli hospitals made plans to treat mass casualties in underground garages. The missiles essentially protected Tehran by making Israeli leaders think hard about the consequences of an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.

“We thought of it as an existential threat,” an Israeli reserve officer told me on June 12, wonder in his voice at the reality that the missiles were gone. They vanished in waves of Israeli bombs last fall – precision strikes that followed the demise of Hezbollah’s leadership deep in their bunkers. The militia’s rank and file, meanwhile, was shattered first by pagers, then walkie-talkies that detonated in their hands, having been boobytrapped by Mossad. After living in fear of Hezbollah for 20 years, Israel decimated it in the space of a month. Then turned to Iran.

The Islamic Republic was looking poorly. Israel had already humiliated it by exploding a bomb in the most highly guarded zone of in Tehran, killing the leader of Hamas in a government guesthouse. None of its gains over the prior two decades—seeing Iraq turned from enemy to vassal by the U.S. invasion; getting to call the shots in Syria, where it saved the Assad regime; and finding a friend in Yemen, where it sponsors the Houthi militia—none of that compared to the loss of Hezbollah. Compelled to reply, Iran’s leaders launched scores of missiles and drones toward Israel. As had been the case in an even larger attack in April, when almost all were knocked down with the help of U.S., European, and even neighboring Arab forces, the result was ineffectual.

Worse, the attack gave Israel standing to retaliate, which it did by launching precision strikes that knocked out Iran’s most important anti-aircraft defenses—in preparation for the assault now underway. In announcing it, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attack would last at least a few days, and noted that the targets included Iran’s ballistic missiles. Iran has so many that, even from 1,000 miles away, the numbers could overwhelm any interception systems. “We can’t leave these threats for the next generation,” Netanyahu said. “If we don’t act now, there won’t be a next generation.”

President Trump called the attack “excellent.” Iran’s initial response, reportedly of 100 drones, produced no result. Meanwhile, Israel released footage of what it said were its own commandos on the ground in Iran, with a drone base prepositioned. It said it killed most of the leadership of Iran’s air force, after luring them to a meeting. A half day in, the war was going well.

Like the cascading campaign against Hezbollah, it was the war Israel has been preparing for.

Meanwhile, in Gaza, the other kind drags on: 1,200 civilians and soldiers killed in Israel in one day (and 251 dragged into captivity) and 55,000 civilians and soldiers killed in Gaza over the next 20 months. Israel, accurately, calls Hamas a client of Iran, though the relationship has had its ups and downs. Iran counts itself the leader of the smaller of Islam’s two branches, Shi’ism, and all its other clients align with the sect in some fashion. Hamas is firmly Sunni, which has caused problems in the past. The elimination of Israel is their common ground, and Hamas’ attack of Oct. 7 was intended to ignite. After overwhelming Israel with its strike out of Gaza in the south, its planners’ hope was that Hezbollah would unleash the assault Israelis had long feared from the north, and the “Zionist entity” would collapse.

Instead, Iran instructed Hezbollah to hold back. For the next year, as tens of thousands of Israelis fled their homes near the border, Tehran played the military equivalent of chess, sending a few missiles a day over the border in tit-for-tat exchanges that signaled no change, status quo. As if this could go on forever.

Anti-Semites and other terrorist sympathizers were heartbroken Thursday evening after Israel launched a massive preemptive strike to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities and eliminate much of the regime’s military leadership. Few, if any, individuals on Earth were more distraught than Ben Rhodes, the failed novelist and former Obama adviser who spearheaded the controversial nuclear deal with Iran.

Rhodes, who attended Fidel Castro’s funeral in 2016 alongside his Iranian comrades, hated Israel with such intensity that his colleagues in the Obama White House gave him the nickname “Hamas” after the Iranian-sponsored terrorist group that started an ill-advised war by murdering hundreds of Jews on Oct. 7. He immediately lashed out in distress after news broke of Israel’s military action. “This is all so unnecessary,” he typed between short, heaving breaths as thick tears pooled on his phone screen. “All of it. Everywhere.”

The Israeli military campaign, dubbed “Operation Rising Lion,” was intended to decimate Iran’s capacity to build a nuclear weapon that could threaten the Jewish state’s existence. As far as Rhodes was concerned, any effort to stop the Islamist regime from producing a weapon capable of destroying Israel was “an utterly pointless, dangerous, and immoral action.” It is not yet known how many close personal friends Rhodes lost in the attack. President Donald Trump told CNN on Friday that “the people I was dealing with are dead, the hardliners,” and they “didn’t die of COVID.”

Rhodes’s tantrum grew more severe as the night wore on. He repeatedly asserted (without evidence) that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu had “humiliated” Trump by attacking Iran, and denounced the U.S. president as “the weakest strongman.” He warned of the harm that Israel’s action would inflict upon “innocent people for no good reason,” and lamented the “truly cruel, perilous and stupid times” we are living in.

The Iran nuclear agreement, which gave the Islamist regime billions of dollars in exchange for a promise of good behavior, was (briefly) the signature achievement of Rhodes’s career. He bragged about creating an “echo chamber” of support for the deal by manipulating compliant journalists who “literally know nothing.” Rhodes went ballistic when Trump tore up the deal in 2018. Years later, he argued that Trump’s decision was “directly” responsible for the Hamas terrorist attack on Oct. 7.

In fact, there is evidence to suggest that Rhodes’s inflammatory rhetoric was directly responsible for the second failed assassination attempt against Trump that occurred in September 2024. Ryan Wesley Routh, the left-wing lunatic who was apprehended after being spotted with a rifle near Trump’s golf club in West Palm Beach, cited the Iran deal in a handwritten letter outlining his motivations for trying to kill the president. “He ended relations with Iran like a child and now the Middle East has unraveled,” Routh wrote. The failed assassin self-published a book in 2023 in which he personally apologized to Iran and said the Islamist regime was “free to assassinate Trump as well as me.”

The last time Rhodes is known to have been so profoundly inconsolable was on election night in 2016, when he was unable to speak while fighting back tears after Donald Trump was declared the winner over Hillary Clinton.

The post World’s Saddest Man: Ben Rhodes Mourns Loss of Iranian Comrades in Israeli Airstrikes appeared first on .

Resecurity researchers found 7.4 million records containing personally identifiable information (PII) of Paraguay citizens on the dark web.

Resecurity has identified 7.4 million records containing personally identifiable information (PII) of Paraguayan citizens leaked on the dark web today. Last week, cybercriminals have offered information about all citizens of Paraguay for sale, demanding $7.4 million in ransom payments, $1 per citizen. A ransomware group was extorting the entire country in what is probably one of the most significant cybersecurity incidents in the nation’s history, with a symbolic deadline – Friday, June 13, 2025.

The stolen data has been published on multiple underground forums. Interestingly, besides ZIP files containing databases, the actors also published a torrent file, enabling other Internet users to freely download citizens’ records using P2P networks. Notably, such tactics were previously used by LockBit 3.0. The group used P2P platforms to disseminate data leaks via torrent files to prevent takedowns.

Paraguay has lost data about the entire population, including their PII, which was exfiltrated from several different government information systems. Notably, in the ransom demand, the actors accuse the country’s leadership of corruption and a lack of attention to citizens’ data protection. Government of Paraguay declined to pay the ransom in the official statement, and did not share any insights on how the information about 7.5 million citizens has been stolen, bringing only vague statements. Few days before the leak publication, Twitter account of the President of Paraguay has been compromised.

The leaked data is presumably coming from the Agencia Nacional de Tránsito y Seguridad Vial de Paraguay (National Agency for Transit and Road Safety of Paraguay), the Ministry of Public Health and Social Welfare of Paraguay (Ministerio de Salud Publica y Bienestar Social) and another unnamed system storing PII. These leaks are not new in Paraguay. Notably, the newly revealed incident follows several other recent data breaches affecting Paraguay. In 2025, just a few months ago, Paraguay experienced two massive data breaches originating from public institutions. The first involved the Superior Tribunal of Electoral Justice (TSJE) and exposed information on more than 7 million people. The second affected the Ministry of Finance, the Central Bank of Paraguay, and Itaipú, where a file containing over 17,000 records was made public, including sensitive data such as payments to public officials, salaries, full names, and ID numbers. In 2023, a data breach at the National Police exposed documents and personal data of detained individuals, including criminal records and photographs.

The actors positioned themselves as “mercenaries” – calling themselves “Cyber PMC” – and attacking government systems for profit, claimed the responsibility. It is unclear whether a foreign state sponsors the actors and if cybercriminal motives purely drive their activity. Considering the previous attacks by China, this new development confirms the growing number of cyberattacks against Paraguay. These events, with a “hack-and-leak” narrative, could be interpreted as a landmark in known cybersecurity incidents today, by size and scale, as the entire country was extorted due to a massive data breach. The profile of one of the key actors is known for several large-scale data breaches across South America, including Bolivia, Venezuela and Ecuador, leading to theft of millions of PII records. His motivation is not entirely clear, as the price he offers for this data is not substantial. Likely, such tactics could be employed by foreign intelligence or state-sponsored actors, masking targeted espionage operations under the guise of possible cybercrime activity to obscure attribution.

Flax Typhoon, a cyber-group linked to the Chinese state, was found to have infiltrated Paraguayan government networks last year, according to a joint statement from the Paraguayan Ministry of Information and Communication Technologies and the U.S. Embassy in Asunción. Flax Typhoon carried out an advanced persistent threat (APT), meaning a targeted and sustained cyberattack. The Chinese group utilized malware to infiltrate systems, extract sensitive information, and maintain a covert presence over extended periods. No data has been leaked for that event, and no victim organizations have been officially named as compromised.

Resecurity noted that Paraguay is the only South American country to recognize the independence of Taiwan. China considers the island nation as its territory, and has carried out a global campaign to convince other governments to do the same. 

The intensity of cyberattacks and data breaches targeting Paraguay and other countries in South America is alarming. Resecurity highlights the increasing efforts of foreign threat actors to compromise government information systems and portals that store PII of citizens.

Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon

Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, Paraguay)

Another Russian Su-25 has been lost, this time to friendly fire near Soledar. The incident, caught on video, adds to the growing list of aviation mishaps plaguing Russia’s aging fleet.

The New York City Primary Election is less than two weeks away, and with early voting starting on June 14, now is the time to learn about who’s running in your local City Council race.

Two Democrats are competing in the primary for Council District 33, which includes Greenpoint and Williamsburg along with parts of Bed-Stuy, Downtown Brooklyn, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. 

Incumbent Lincoln Restler is facing a last-minute challenge from Sabrina Gates, a deputy director at the Brooklyn Democratic Party. As is often the case in the left-leaning D33, there will be no Republican primary.

Lincoln Restler

Incumbent City Council Member

Restler, a lifelong Brooklynite, got his start in politics in 2007, when he started work as a program analyst in the New York City mayor’s office under Mike Bloomberg. He was elected to the City Council in 2021, and handily won re-election in 2023.

A member of the council’s Progressive Caucus and chair of the body’s Committee on Governmental Operations, State & Federal Legislation, Restler has prioritized street safety, climate change, and transportation. He helped lead a local effort to “Make McGuinness Safe,” introduced legislation meant to help warn and protect New Yorkers when air quality is low, and last year invested $4 million in the district’s Title I schools. 

“From fighting for housing affordability and school equity to fixing potholes and preventing evictions, our office has resolved thousands of constituent cases — and we’re not slowing down,” Restler said on his campaign website. “With your vote, we’ll keep shaping a 33rd District that’s a model for Brooklyn, New York City, and beyond.”

Restler has been endorsed by U.S. Rep. Nydia Velázquez, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, the New York Working Families Party, and SEIU 32BJ, among others.

Sabrina Gates

Gates, who has lived in northern Brooklyn for two decades, graduated from Georgetown University and spent several years working in the nonprofit sphere before getting involved in local politics.

Now a deputy director at the Brooklyn Democratic Party, Gates said on her campaign website that she has organized large events and programs for the party, supported young people through after-school financial literacy initiatives, and supported individuals and organizations as a consultant.

Gates entered the primary just last month and says that If elected, said she will prioritize increasing affordable housing in the district, increasing public investment in Pre-K and 3-K programs, supporting local small businesses, and defending the district against climate change. 

I believe in smart, common-sense policies that genuinely uplift people and communities,” Gates said on her website. “I believe in democracy, not hypocrisy—because our values, our rules, and our integrity shouldn’t only apply when it’s convenient.”

Gates is backed by the Brooklyn Democratic Party and its chair, Assembly Member Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn.

New York’s primary election will be held June 24, with early voting scheduled from June 14 to June 22. To find your pollsite, visit vote.nyc. The winner of the Republican primary will move on to the general election on Nov. 5.

This roundup is part of an ongoing series. Check back for more information on candidates in competitive races across Brooklyn, and check out our candidate roundups for Brooklyn Borough President, Council District 35, Council District 38, Council District 39, Council District 41, Council District 47, Council District 48, and Civil Court Judge. 

Donald Trump sent a message to Iran following Israel’s successful strikes on the Islamic Republic’s military chiefs and main nuclear facility: I tried to warn you, but you didn’t listen.

In a Friday morning Truth Social post, Trump said he “gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal” and “told them, in the strongest of words, to ‘just do it.'” Iran “just couldn’t get it done,” Trump continued—but not for lack of warning on what would happen if a deal was not reached.

“I told them it would be much worse than anything they know, anticipated, or were told, that the United States makes the best and most lethal military equipment anywhere in the World, BY FAR, and that Israel has a lot of it, with much more to come – And they know how to use it,” Trump wrote.

“Certain Iranian hardliners spoke bravely, but they didn’t know what was about to happen,” the president added. “They are all DEAD now, and it will only get worse!”

Shortly after issuing the post, Trump spoke to CNN’s Dana Bash. He called the strikes “a very successful attack.”

“We of course support Israel, obviously, and supported it like nobody has ever supported it,” Trump said. “Iran should have listened to me when I said—you know, I gave them—I don’t know if you know, but I gave them a 60-day warning, and today is day 61.”

Trump went on to say that Iran “should now come to the table to make a deal before it’s too late” but may have trouble doing so.

“You know the people I was dealing with are dead, the hardliners,” he said. When Bash asked whether they died in the Israeli attack, Trump responded, “They didn’t die of the flu, they didn’t die of COVID.”

The post Trump to Tehran: I Tried To Warn You, but You Didn’t Listen appeared first on .

The move came as US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wrapped up his multi-day testimony binge on Capitol Hill during which he clashed with lawmakers over the administration’s Ukraine policy.

Iranian proxy Hezbollah announced Friday that it has no plans to retaliate after Israel’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, with the Lebanon-based terror group’s leader saying Iran can “defend itself and its choices.”

“Hezbollah will not initiate its own attack on Israel in retaliation for Israel’s strikes,” an unnamed Hezbollah official told Reuters.

Hezbollah secretary general Naim Qassem issued a statement condemning the “criminal Israeli enemy and its tyrannical sponsor, America,” but stopped short of pledging any military response of its own.

“We support Islamic Republic of Iran [sic] in its rights and position, in all the steps and measures it takes to defend itself and its choices,” said Qassem.

The Free Patriotic Movement (FPM), a political party founded by Hezbollah-allied former Lebanese president Michel Aoun, also warned against any retaliatory action that would pull Lebanon into the conflict.

“Lebanon should not be a party to this conflict,” the FPM said in a statement calling on “everyone to preserve the country’s neutrality and not to intervene in this conflict, in the higher interest of the nation and in order to preserve the security of its people and institutions,” according to L’Orient–Le Jour.

The likelihood of retaliation by Hezbollah, which operates near Israel’s northern border, has long been seen as one of the largest risks of an Israeli strike on Iran. But over the past year, Israeli military operations have decimated the terror group’s once-formidable military capabilities.

Last September, Israel killed Hezbollah’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, along with dozens of the group’s high-ranking officials, and wounded thousands of its operatives by remotely blowing up their pagers in a daring covert operation. Israeli military officials said they also destroyed about 70 percent of Hezbollah’s missile capabilities and drone program around the same time.

The post Hezbollah Says Iran Can ‘Defend Itself,’ Signals It Will Sit Out Fight appeared first on .

The Soviet-era combat aircraft struck key Russian targets in the Zaporizhzhia direction, destroying a UAV control point and an ammunition depot.

As a mom, it’s so important to be able to be there for my son – whether it’s taking him to school, baseball or soccer practice, or being home with him when he’s sick. It’s this ability to be present in his life every day that led me to explore food delivery work. 

When I was laid off from my full-time job a few years ago, my husband and I had a long discussion about what’s next. We agreed it was important for me to find work that provided the flexibility to be there for our son while still earning additional income to support our family.

But in the past few years, the City Council has put that flexibility in jeopardy. Now, yet another threat to my livelihood is emerging from the Council, and on behalf of thousands of delivery workers, I’m asking them to stop before they make it any harder for me to make a living. 

When I first started working on the apps, I – like many delivery workers – took advantage of multiple platforms, including restaurant delivery. But that was short-lived. When the City Council passed a law that forced restaurant delivery companies to create a nightmarish scheduling system, one that required workers to book full shifts just for the chance to make deliveries. Even if you were lucky enough to get the shift you wanted, you may not be lucky enough to get any orders. 

For me, eventually it wasn’t worth taking extra time out of my day to fight over limited shifts with fellow delivery workers. And I’m not alone. 

On top of that, when food costs started to rise because of the changes being made to the apps, tips went down considerably. Ultimately, I became one of the 12,000 delivery workers who were no longer able to get work through restaurant delivery apps. 

Fortunately, that law only affected restaurant delivery platforms. Which is why now, I only deliver groceries, as I still have the flexibility to choose my own hours.
But that could soon change.

The City Council is considering another bill that would put grocery delivery work at risk too, once again threatening to jeopardize the income I’m able to bring home to my family. If passed, it would mean grocery delivery platforms will likely need to put in place the same disastrous shift-based schedules that restaurant delivery was forced to do – jeopardizing the essential service shoppers like me provide and eliminating the flexibility we want that comes with app based work.

I lived through what happened when restaurant delivery platforms had to comply with similar rules. If the Council goes through with this latest bill, they will be doubling down on that mistake. 

If this new bill passes, fewer workers will be available when demand spikes, delivery prices will go up, and more New Yorkers will struggle to access fresh food and afford the services they count on to get everyday essentials –all while grocery prices continue to rise. 

If City lawmakers truly want to improve conditions for grocery delivery workers, they should talk directly to grocery delivery workers like me and listen to what’s important to us – the people this would affect the most. We should have a say in the decisions that affect our livelihoods, and the City Council should pass legislation that doesn’t put this work at risk.

Jean-Marie Padilla is a Brooklyn-based food delivery worker and advocate.