- Pentagon reports four service members killed in Iran conflict operations
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Get you up to speed: Pentagon lists 4 killed in Iran war under “Overseas Operations Casualties”
Four U.S. service members, 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan, Sgt. Angel S. Rampersad, Pvt. Isabella Gonzales, and Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, were killed in military operations in Jordan and Iraq in July. The Pentagon’s recent reports categorised these deaths under “Overseas Operations Casualties,” separate from the ongoing conflict with Iran.
The Pentagon has confirmed that nearly 100 U.S. service members have sustained injuries since military operations resumed on July 7, with 96% returning to duty. As of Sunday, the Defence Casualty Analysis System indicated that 417 service members were wounded in the war with Iran, down from 482 listed the previous week.
Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell stated there was a “temporary data disruption” affecting the Defence Casualty Analysis System, attributing discrepancies in casualty reporting to “site errors.” Moving forward, Parnell assured that further updates would be posted on the Defence Casualty Analysis System.
What remains unclear — The Pentagon has not addressed how the classification of the four service members’ deaths may affect the overall casualty figures in the ongoing conflict.
Pentagon reports four service members killed in Iran conflict operations
The Pentagon website that informs the public about the dead and wounded in military conflicts now lists four service members killed in Jordan and Iraq in July under “Overseas Operations Casualties” — separate from 14 other service members who have been killed during the war with Iran.
The other 14 appear in the database as casualties of Operation Epic Fury, the Defense Department’s name for the conflict. At one point last week, the four service members’ deaths also appeared on that list, but by last Thursday, their names no longer appeared there, and the database said that 14 were killed in the war with Iran, as opposed to 18.
The New York Times first reported the database’s missing numbers and cited three sources who said it was because the four service members who were most recently killed died after the Trump administration had declared a ceasefire in April.
But the four service members were killed about a week after President Trump notified Congress by letter that the ceasefire was over and military action had resumed on July 7. The four who died are 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan, Sgt. Angel S. Rampersad, Pvt. Isabella Gonzales and Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton.
Sean Parnell, the chief Pentagon spokesperson, in a statement shared on X last Thursday, blamed “site errors on the Defense Casualty Analysis System” on “a temporary data disruption” and said the “site anomalies are currently being resolved in coordination with the Military Services.” Parnell in his statement slammed the New York Times for “colluding with anonymous sources to push a completely fake story.”
When the Pentagon first released the names of two of the three killed in an Iranian attack in Jordan earlier this month, it initially classified them as deaths under Operation Inherent Resolve, the name for the years-long mission targeting ISIS. Later, the Defense Department amended the releases to say the service members had died in “overseas operations.”
Throughout the war with Iran, the Pentagon has been slow to provide information about injuries. After the New York Times reported earlier this week that dozens of troops had been injured in attacks in the Middle East, the Pentagon initially referred reporters with questions on the wounded to the website — even though it had not been updated in several days and did not account for the recent deaths.
Defense officials have not briefed reporters on the Iran war since May, and they have not commented on the categorization of the deaths of the four service members.
WTX US News first reported and Parnell confirmed that nearly 100 U.S. service members had been injured since July 7. In a statement on X, he said that among those injured, 96% had returned to duty and the vast majority of injuries experienced “were minor concussions.” Minor concussions can often be traumatic brain injuries that vary in severity and can display symptoms some time after the initial injury.
He concluded by saying that “further updates will be posted on the Defense Casualty Analysis System.”
As of Sunday, the site said 417 service members have been wounded in the war with Iran, which is dozens fewer than the 482 it listed early last week. Now, 207 service members are listed as having been wounded in Overseas Operations.
In:
‘Cheer up, you caught the bad guy,’ says killer Virginia McCullough as she is arrested for murdering her parents
A woman who murdered her parents “in cold blood” before hiding them in makeshift tombs for four years told officers to “cheer up, you caught the bad guy” as she was arrested in her home.
Virginia McCullough, 36, poisoned her father John McCullough, 70, with prescription medication and fatally stabbed her mother Lois McCullough, 71, shortly afterwards in 2019.
She ran up large debts on credit cards in her parents’ names and after their deaths, she continued to spend their pensions until she was finally caught in 2023.
In body-worn video footage released by police, a handcuffed – and eerily calm – McCullough told officers: “I did know that this would kind of come eventually.
“It’s proper that I serve my punishment.”
She said she had slipped something into her father’s drink then put his body under a bed on the ground floor, and put her mother’s body in an upstairs wardrobe.
McCullough, having been arrested on suspicion of double murder, told an officer: “Cheer up, at least you’ve caught the bad guy.”
She added: “I know I don’t seem 100% evil.”
At the police station, she told officers where a kitchen knife was, which she described as a “murder weapon”, and a hammer which she said “will still have blood on it”.
McCullough, of Pump Hill, Chelmsford, Essex, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday with a minimum term of 36 years at Chelmsford Crown Court, after she admitted to their murders between 17 and 20 June 2019 at an earlier hearing at the same court.
Chelmsford Crown Court heard how she hid their bodies in makeshift tombs at the family home in Great Baddow in Essex, then told persistent lies to cover her tracks.
The court heard she cancelled family arrangements and frequently told doctors and relatives her parents were unwell, on holiday or away on lengthy trips.
But concerns over Mr and Mrs McCullough’s welfare were raised in September 2023 by a GP at their registered practice, and Essex County Council’s safeguarding team referred these to police.
The GP had not seen the couple for some time and said Mr McCullough had failed to collect medication and attend scheduled appointments. It was found McCullough had frequently cancelled appointments, using a range of excuses to explain her father’s absence.
Police said a missing persons investigation was initially launched and McCullough lied to officers, claiming her parents were travelling and would be returning in October.
It became a murder investigation, and when officers forced entry to the house in Pump Hill on September 15 2023, McCullough confessed that her parents’ bodies were in the house and that she had killed them.
Nicola Rice, a specialist prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “McCullough callously and viciously killed both of her parents before concealing their bodies in makeshift tombs within their home address.
“She spent the next four years manipulating and lying to family members, medical staff, financial institutions, and the police, spending her parents’ money and accruing large debts in their name.”
She added: “This was a truly disturbing case, which has left behind it a trail of devastation, and I can only hope that the sentence passed today will help those who loved and cared for Lois and John begin to heal.”
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Defense alliance NATO chief Mark Rutte has met US President-elect Donald Trump to discuss global security issues, according to a NATO spokesperson.
The meeting took place in Palm Beach, Florida.
During his first term as US president, 2017-2020, Trump pushed for European NATO countries to spend more on defense and described the alliance’s cost-sharing as unfair to the US.
Rutte took over as NATO chief from Norwegian Jens Stoltenberg in November.
Before taking office in January, Trump has nominated Pete Hegseth for the post of defense secretary, which has raised eyebrows among many allies.
Hegseth, 44, has served as an infantry captain in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has no senior military or government officer experience.
Multiple missiles were fired in an airstrike towards a densely populated part of Lebanon’s capital early on Saturday.
The huge airstrike targeted Beirut’s Basta neighbourhood, and no prior warnings were given by the Israeli military. The largely residential area was struck last month.
At least one violent explosion was heard across the city, Reuters witnesses said, and plumes of smoke could be seen. Scenes of massive destruction at the site were shared online, including a massive crater in the ground.
“Beirut, the capital, woke up to a horrific massacre, as the Israeli enemy’s air force completely destroyed an eight-story residential building with five missiles on Al-Mamoun Street in Basta,” the state-run National News Agency reported.
The health ministry put the initial death toll at four, with 23 wounded. The number is expected to climb in the coming hours as search and rescue efforts continue.
It came after a long day of Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, which have been non-stop since last week.
The cross-border fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group escalated into a full-blown war in mid-September.
Israel has bombed southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs and the eastern Beqaa region, and has sent ground troops across the border. Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets deeper into Israel.
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