The United States Marine Corps on Wednesday celebrated the end of service for the AV-8 Harrier, the vertical takeoff and landing jet that’s been an icon of Marine aviation for 55 years, a favorite of air show spectators and, once, the subject of a controversial Pepsi TV commercial. “As a platform that has continuously forward deployed across the globe, the Harrier will be remembered for its distinguished combat legacy, legendary Vertical/Short Take Off and Landing (V/STOL) capability, and the Marines and sailors that made the community special,” Lt. Col. John B. Cumbie, commanding officer of Marine Attack Squadron 223, said at a “sundown” ceremony for the last US unit to fly the Harrier. About 5,000 people at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in North Carolina watched as the jets showed off the capabilities that made them famous, including the ability to hover, to take off and land vertically.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/04/us/us-marine-corps-harrier-jump-jet-retirement-intl-hnk-ml
French-Iranian artist and activist Marjane Satrapi, whose graphic novel “Persepolis” brought home the struggle of the Iranian people to millions around the world, has died. She was 56. A statement from the Élysée Palace announcing her death Thursday lauded Satrapi’s work, saying her work “captivated a global audience.” “Her passing marks the loss of a leading figure in French culture and an artist deeply committed to freedom, whose work carried a universal message and earned her immense international acclaim,” the Élysée said.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/04/style/marjane-satrapi-persepolis-author-dies-intl
Israel secretly deployed elite military and intelligence units to Azerbaijan during the war with Iran as part of a network of covert sites across the Middle East to facilitate operations against Iran, four sources familiar with the matter said. The forces operated out of several locations in southern Azerbaijan, two of the sources said, adjacent to Iran’s northern border and, at its closest point, only about 60 miles from the Iranian city of Tabriz, which Israel struck during the war. Special commando units were also deployed to the location and carried out intelligence-gathering missions and drone operations, the other two sources said, giving Israel a valuable perch from which to see into northern Iran during the war.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/05/middleeast/azerbaijan-israel-iran-war-intl
When a fire burned aboard the world’s biggest aircraft carrier in March as it took part in operations against Iran, the US Navy released a short statement saying the blaze had been “contained,” that two sailors had received medical treatment for “non-life-threatening injuries” and that the carrier was “fully operational.” But new video obtained by CNN makes clear the fire was more severe and damaging than the Navy suggested. Bunks where sailors slept were totally destroyed, the video shows. What remained of the beds was charred, twisted metal beneath a ceiling also apparently hollowed out by the inferno. Wires dangled from the ceiling and heaps of ashes littered the ground around the bunks, according to the video. “I seriously thought we were going to lose the ship,” one sailor aboard the ship, the USS Gerald R. Ford, told CNN, describing how he felt while fighting the fire. “It’s either fight or die.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/04/politics/fire-gerald-ford-aircraft-carrier-video