Cindy McCain, executive director of the United Nations World Food Programme, confirmed in an interview on CBS News' Face the Nation taped May 29 that Gaza is in a famine situation. The WFP is the world's largest humanitarian organization focused on food assistance and the UN body with primary authority to assess and declare famine conditions. McCain's confirmation is the most direct and authoritative statement on the famine status of Gaza to date from an international organization.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed his military last week to advance from controlling 60 percent of Gaza to controlling 70 percent of the territory. Under the U.S.-brokered October 2025 ceasefire, Israel was meant to limit its presence to approximately 53 percent of Gaza. Israel has killed more than 900 people since the October ceasefire took effect, according to Gaza's health ministry. Approximately 2 million Palestinians are being compressed into a shrinking coastal strip.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who also goes by the title Secretary of War, has blocked or delayed military promotions for more than a dozen Black and female senior officers across all four branches of the U.S. military, nine current and former defense officials confirmed to NBC News in April 2026. The pattern, which began in early 2025 and continued this week with the Navy, has resulted in the firing of the Army's top officer after he refused to comply, the removal of multiple flag officers with decades of exemplary service, and a final one-star admiral promotion list for the Navy that includes no female officers despite women making up approximately 21 percent of the active-duty Navy.

The most significant confrontation in the confirmed record involved Army Chief of Staff General Randy George, a 61-year-old combat veteran who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan and was credited with integrating new technologies including artificial intelligence targeting systems and cheap missile interceptor drones into Army operations. When Hegseth directed him to remove two Black men and two women from the Army's list of officers nominated for promotion to one-star general, George refused. Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll, a close ally of Vice President JD Vance, also refused, telling officials the four officers had a long history of exemplary service and had done nothing wrong. Hegseth struck the names himself. On April 3, he fired General George effective immediately, along with two other generals, during an active war in the Middle East. No official reason was given.

The broader pattern spans all four military branches. Among those fired or sidelined under Hegseth: General CQ Brown, only the second African American to serve as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead the Navy; Air Force Vice Chief of Staff General James Slife; Air Force Lieutenant General Jennifer Short, who served as senior military assistant to the defense secretary; Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield, the sole female flag officer on NATO's Military Committee; and Vice Admiral Yvette Davids, the first female superintendent of the Naval Academy. In total the Times confirmed Hegseth has fired or sidelined at least two dozen generals and admirals.

This week the New York Times reported a new round of Navy promotions blocked by Hegseth. At least two of the seven officers removed from the Navy's one-star promotion list are women and two are Black men. The removal of the officers appears to violate Pentagon rules, which state that a defense secretary may only pull officers from a promotion list for moral, mental, physical, or professional failings that raise questions about their fitness to lead. The Pentagon spokesperson stated that promotions are given to those who have earned them and did not address whether race or gender factored into the decisions.

The New York Times also confirmed a separate incident in which Hegseth's chief of staff told Army Secretary Driscoll that President Trump would not want to stand next to a Black female officer at military events. The official was referring to Major General Antoinette Gant, a combat engineer who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, who had been selected to head the Military District of Washington. Driscoll pushed back, insisting the president is not racist or sexist. The Hegseth chief of staff denied the account.

The World Health Organization confirmed that the Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has grown to 906 suspected cases and 223 suspected deaths as of the latest official figures. The outbreak, which the WHO declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on May 16, has spread from Congo's Ituri Province to Uganda's capital Kampala. There is no licensed vaccine or approved treatment for the Bundibugyo strain. Healthcare facilities treating patients in the affected region have been attacked three times in the past two weeks, forcing medical staff to evacuate patients as gunfire rang out. The CDC continues to assess the risk to Americans not traveling to the affected region as low. Atlanta and Houston airports are conducting enhanced screening for travelers arriving from Congo, Uganda, and Rwanda.

47 gray whales have stranded dead on the U.S. West Coast in 2026, up from 31 last year, according to NOAA Fisheries' primary data. The eastern North Pacific gray whale population has declined to approximately 13,000, the lowest estimate since the 1970s, down from a historic high of more than 27,000 whales in 2016. NOAA determined in 1994 that the species had fully recovered from commercial whaling and no longer needed Endangered Species Act protection. Today the ongoing decline has scientists concerned. The leading cause is starvation. Gray whales feed primarily on tiny crustaceans that live in Arctic sea ice. As Arctic waters warm the food chain supporting them is diminishing. Only approximately 85 gray whale calves migrated past Central California earlier this year, the lowest number since records began in 1994.

California lawmakers sent a letter to NOAA demanding an investigation into the spike in deaths and raising the question of whether Trump administration cuts to NOAA staffing have contributed to a slower response. NOAA has not publicly responded to that specific allegation. Washington state alone has recorded 21 dead gray whales this year.