The Daily Briefing highlights the news of the day and research that reveals the spirit of the day.
The Daily Briefing is a newsletter sent straight to your inbox every morning that provides biblical insight on today's news.
Top News
6. Iran Hatched Fresh Plot to Kill Trump, Israel Told U.S. (WSJ)
“Israel shared new intelligence with the U.S. that it said indicated a fresh Iranian plan to kill President Trump, people familiar with the matter said, a finding that would mark an escalation in the war between Washington and Iran. Iran for years has vowed openly to retaliate against Trump for the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, who was a top general in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, in the president’s first term.
“American military officials say they hit about 170 targets in Iran during strikes earlier this week, 15 times the number struck during a previous round of attacks in late June. U.S. Central Command said the strikes had hit air defense systems, drone and missile storage sites and logistics infrastructure along the Iranian coast. The goal, military officials said, is to degrade Iran’s ability to threaten ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
“The U.S. and Iran continue to engage in technical negotiations on nuclear issues, a U.S. official said Thursday, following two days of retaliatory strikes against Tehran this week. "The United States is still committed to finding a resolution, and technical talks continue. Iran can never possess a nuclear weapon, the official said.”
Can Iran be trusted with any agreement? In his book The Weirdest People in the World, Joseph Henrich differentiates between 2 frameworks: impersonal prosociality and kin-based societies. In WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, Democratic) societies, life relies on impersonal prosociality—the idea that you should treat strangers and authorities with the same universal rules and ethical standards as you would your own family. In this framework, lying and deception are viewed as universal moral failures that destroy the broad social trust required for market economies to function. Conversely, in intensive, kin-based societies, like Iran, a person's primary moral obligation is to their family, clan, or network. Protecting or helping an in-group member can heavily outweigh an abstract obligation to tell the truth to an impersonal institution.
Consider taqiyya. Meaning deception and rooted in Islam, taqiyya is allowed in 3 situations: to reconcile 2 or more quarreling parties; a husband to a wife and vice versa; and in war. Permitted by Muhammad, taqiyya is based in the Quran (3:28): “Let believers not take for friends and allies infidels instead of believers. Whoever does this shall have no relationship left with Allah – unless you but guard yourselves against them, taking precautions.” According to another authoritative Arabic text, “Taqiyya [deception] is of fundamental importance in Islam. Practically every Islamic sect agrees to it and practices it...Taqiyya is very prevalent in Islamic politics, especially in the modern era.”
This isn’t the first time someone brought moldy bread to the party… In Joshua 9, the kings west of the Jordan River came together to wage war against Israel… except the Gibeonites. They heard about Joshua and his army and, in response, pretended to be from a distant land to make peace with a powerful enemy. They wore old clothes, loaded their donkeys with moldy bread, and ended up deceiving Joshua… until he found out and made them pay. Iran may have moldy bread, but we trust in the Living Bread. (Jn. 6:51)
5. Ukrainian drones batter Russian oil facilities and set more oil tankers ablaze (ABC News)
“Ukrainian drones on Thursday hit more Russian oil facilities and set two oil tankers ablaze in the Sea of Azov, a day after U.S. President Donald Trump pledged to grant Ukraine a license to manufacture the Patriot air defense systems. Ukraine's strikes on oil refineries and other infrastructure across Russia has triggered a widespread fuel crisis with gasoline shortages and fuel rationing reported in multiple regions and drivers waiting for hours to fill their tanks. The lines are growing at Russian gas stations -- and so is the frustration. Fuel rationing has been introduced in many regions, with hourslong queues of cars snaking beside roads.
“During Wednesday's meeting with Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Turkey, Trump said the U.S. will give Ukraine a license to make Patriot air defense systems to counter missile attacks from Russia in their more than four-year war, a huge coup for Kyiv which has long requested the technology. On Wednesday, he praised the Ukrainian leader’s willingness to reach a deal to ending the war, saying he has “done an amazing job” and “been very effective.”
Quantity has a quality of its own… This purported quote from Stalin refers to the Soviet tank attack against the Nazi Germans. They threw masses of cheap tanks (and sadly, humans) against the more sophisticated Nazi war machine, and managed to stop the blitzkrieg through their sheer numbers. As one historian put it: “The average Soviet soldier fought as much out of fear of Stalin as out of hatred for Hitler.”
Not much has changed… There are reports that “the average life expectancy of a new recruit—from arrival at a training ground to death in a combat zone—lies somewhere between 10 days and three weeks. Once they are sent onto the battlefield, Russian fighters survive an average of 20 to 35 minutes.” There are some accounts that Russia is now incurring 8 men killed or seriously wounded for every 1 lost by Ukraine.
Pharaoh Putin? The Russian leader isn’t the first to disregard his people… Pharaoh repeatedly refused to let the Israelites leave, hardening his heart after each successive plague. By the time the seventh plague (hail) was threatened, Pharaoh’s own officials begged him to surrender, saying, "Do you not yet realize that Egypt is ruined?" Pharaoh ignored his advisors and his suffering citizens, prioritizing his own pride. The same could be said today. (Ex. 7-14)
4. Democrats seek a way forward amid finger-pointing in Maine (WaPo)
“Democrats in Maine sought to swiftly move on from Graham Platner’s failed Senate campaign Thursday. But as they began picking up the pieces of a campaign that flamed out as spectacularly as it had caught on, they remained divided and uncertain about how to keep the movement he had energized intact. Several candidates who rushed to replace him late Wednesday and early Thursday — following his 11-minute, conspiracy-laden withdrawal video — told The Washington Post they would not accept Platner’s endorsement.
“Platner privately told staff that he is planning to officially file paperwork to end his Senate campaign on Monday — the drop-dead deadline for him to exit the race. Though Democrats largely appear to think Platner is done with his bid, his last-minute timing is likely to cause a final pang of anxiety within the party. Meanwhile, the Maine Democratic Party worked to outline the details of the process to select a new nominee, which must be complete by July 27 under state law.”
Not all values are created equal… In his 11-minute video, Platner said he was assured the process to replace him would be "open and democratic moving forward,” adding that he is not "trying to dictate to anyone who it should be... But I will say this: it needs to be open, transparent, and democratic. It needs to be reflecting the will and the values of the people that built this movement.”
Considering the allegations surrounding Platner, I didn’t expect to hear him talk about values and being open and honest. But nevertheless, this illuminates some of Ryan Holiday’s thinking in his work Ego is the Enemy. “With success comes the temptation to tell oneself a story, to round off the edges, to cut out your lucky breaks and add a certain mythology to it all…It’s a type of storytelling in which eventually your talent becomes your identity and your accomplishments become your worth. But a story like this is never honest or helpful.”
We have emphasized values over virtues, according to George Will. In his book The Conservative Sensibility, Will writes: “Values-talk comes naturally to a nonjudgmental age--an age judgmental primarily about the cardinal sin of being judgmental… Values are an equal-opportunity business: They are mere choices. Virtues are habits, difficult to develop and therefore not equally accessible to all. Speaking of virtues rather than values is elitist, offensive to democracy's egalitarian, leveling ethos.”
Like Judah with Tamar, Platner has been caught. Some are refraining from judging, others are judging those who are judging, but AW Tozer rings true in moments like this: “A Pharisee is hard on others and easy on himself, but a spiritual man is easy on others and hard on himself.” (Gen. 38)
Cultural News
3. The ideal movie length for American viewers is shorter than you think (NY Post)
“Americans want shorter films— the ideal movie length is just 88 minutes, according to new research. That’s the finding of a new survey of 2,000 people from Talker Research, which indicates Americans want less time in movie theaters overall.
“While the average ideal movie length came in at just under the hour-and-a-half mark, only ten percent of Americans voted for two hours or longer, and just three percent say movies should run over two and a half hours. The patience of moviegoers is slightly decreasing over the years. Talker Research conducted the same questioning in 2024, with the average ideal movie time deemed 92 minutes two years ago.”
The Longest Time isn’t just a Billy Joel tune… Researcher Stephen Follows analyzed the run times of 36,000 films that were released theatrically from 1980 to 2025. He discovered the average length of a wide-release theatrical title has grown from roughly 106 minutes in the 1990s and early 2000s to 114 minutes in recent years. In addition, pre-show advertising and trailers have also expanded to an average of around 20 to 30 minutes. In the 1980s, 14 percent of wide releases ran more than two hours. In the 2020s, that number jumped to 32 percent.
Do screenwriters need to kill their darlings? The phrase "kill your darlings" was coined by English writer Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, who wrote under the pseudonym Q. In his lecture On the Art of Writing, Q noted: “If you here require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: ‘Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it — wholeheartedly — and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings.'” At the core, killing your darlings is about eliminating unnecessary sections of your writing despite how much you love them, balancing creativity with utility.
In his book Movies are Prayers, Josh Larsen argued that the theatre and the temple are both places where human longings find residence. Regardless of the director's faith affiliation, the movie is a platform where artists offer gestures of prayer in their art, even without knowing it or naming it as such. “There was a big world out there, full of all sorts of people with all sorts of ways of living. The one thing we all seemed to share, if I was to understand the prayers these films were offering, was a yearning for reconciliation.” (2 Cor. 5, Acts 17)
News You Can Use
2. A family's husky in Connecticut stepped in to save a child after a bear charged.
Watch it here. “But the Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard you against the evil one.” (2 Thess. 3:3)
1. Types Of Corn Eaters
Watch it here. “Food will not commend us to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do.” (1 Cor. 8:8)
