Thursday, 11 September - Just tea for 2 and 2 for tea

Good morning, it’s Thursday, 11 September. In your Squiz Today…

• Israel cops international heat over a strike on Qatari soil

• There’s breaking news out of the US with conservative activist Charlie Kirk shot at a college campus in Utah - you can follow updates on that here

• And Prince Harry and King Charles share a private tea…

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Squiz Sayings

Said musician Teddy Swims after being announced as the headline entertainment act for the NRL and NRLW Grand Finals on 5 October. You probably know Swims from his megahit ‘Lose Control’, which hopefully none of the players take as advice on the day…

Qatar is drawn into the fray

The Squiz

There’s growing international criticism of Israel’s deadly strike on Hamas leaders in Qatar’s capital, Doha, with US President Donald Trump saying he’s “not thrilled” and other reports saying his team was “infuriated”... That’s because, although the US - Israel’s biggest ally on the world stage - was told about the strike just before it was carried out, it’s not likely to help get the Trump administration’s latest ceasefire proposal for the war in Gaza over the line… But Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has doubled down - he says the strike was “fully justified” because it was aimed at Hamas leaders responsible for planning the 7 October attacks on Israel. 

What do we know about what happened?

The strike took place on Tuesday morning, local time, with the Israeli military announcing it had carried out targeted attacks on Hamas leaders/its ceasefire negotiating team in Doha. Photos/video posted online showed smoke rising above the city skyline, with reports saying the strike hit about 25km north of Doha’s Hamad International Airport - a major stopover location for international flights. As for who was killed, Hamas has confirmed that 5 of its members were, including the son of its exiled Gaza chief Khalil al-Hayya - but there’s still no word that al-Hayya or any other Hamas leaders are dead. Israel says it won’t stop until they are…

So what does it mean?

This isn’t the first time Israel has surprised the US with its military action - Trump was also caught off guard by Israel’s attacks on Iran a few months ago. The difference this time is that Qatar is another Middle Eastern ally of the US, so it puts Trump in an awkward spot… White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the President has called Qatari leaders to assure them there won’t be any more attacks there. But some analysts are questioning how much influence Trump really has over Netanyahu’s decisions… As for Qatar, PM Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani accused Israel of sabotaging peace talks. He also said they’ll “take all necessary measures to respond”, forming a team to decide how to do that. Stay tuned…

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Tensions are also high in Europe…

…after Polish PM Donald Tusk said his country's military shot down at least 3 Russian drones that entered Polish airspace. Just to recap the geography here, Poland shares its eastern border with Ukraine to the south and key Russian ally Belarus to the north, and it says that during a Russian attack on Ukraine’s west, 19 drones came into Polish territory. Russia says it didn’t plan any attack on targets in Poland, but Tusk says the incursion “brings us the closest we have been to open conflict since World War II”. Unlike Ukraine, Poland is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) - the collective defence organisation that includes the US. NATO planes were involved in shooting down the drones, and its leaders are discussing how to respond. 

Some sub-stantial developments

The Albanese government says it’ll spend $1.7 billion over 5 years to build ‘ghost shark’ submarines, which are autonomous underwater drones that have been jointly developed by Oz and the US. Like their namesakes, they’re stealthy, but they’re also piloted by AI, can carry out intelligence missions and also fire torpedoes. Defence Minister Richard Marles described them as “the best underwater autonomous military capability on the planet”... While we’re on torpedoes in politics, the career of Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has taken a hit after she was dumped from the Coalition’s frontbench by leader Sussan Ley yesterday. The Senator refused to support Ley’s leadership after she was asked to retract false comments about Labor prioritising Indian-Australian migrants to gain votes, and chose to resign from the Shadow Defence Industry portfolio instead. Ley said the comments were “deeply hurtful” and that Nampijinpa Price had “failed the test of high standards” she has for her shadow ministry.

The big banks wield the axe

It’s been a week of job cuts in the banking sector, with NAB and ANZ axeing thousands of jobs between them. Most of those cuts come from ANZ, with newish CEO Nuno Matos confirming on Tuesday that 3,500 jobs, plus another 1,000 contractors, will go over the next 12 months - about 8% of its global workforce. Matos denied the cuts were linked to the rise of artificial intelligence - he said they were about “simplifying the company” and “getting the basic things right”. And yesterday, NAB followed suit by cutting 410 roles from its workforce and moving some of those jobs overseas. The Finance Sector Union isn’t happy - its President Wendy Streets says “this isn’t one rogue bank, it’s the whole sector driving the same agenda at the expense of workers and communities”.

Big Ange is back on deck

The former Socceroos coach Ange Postecoglou will make a return to the English Premier League with Nottingham Forest after he was sacked as Tottenham Hotspur’s manager in June. Ange was the first Aussie to be a senior manager in the EPL, and his sacking was controversial… Though he won Spurs their first trophy in yonks, they also dropped to 17th spot on the regular season ladder - perilously close to dropping out of the EPL altogether. But he’s back and will take over 10th-placed Forest after it sacked its coach of nearly 2 years, Nuno Espírito Santo, just 3 matches into the new season. Postecoglou will be officially unveiled as the new manager tonight, and he's straight into the deep end - his first match is against league heavyweights Arsenal on Saturday night. But if anyone can handle the hot seat, mate, he can… 

A tea-time reunion

Prince Harry has met with his father King Charles overnight for the first time in nearly 2 years. The estranged royals shared tea at Clarence House in London, spending about 50 minutes together - and it's got palace watchers excited for a reconciliation. The Prince has been in the UK for charity events this week to coincide with the third anniversary of his late grandma Queen Elizabeth's death, while King Charles travelled from Scotland. They last met face to face 20 months ago after the King was diagnosed with cancer. Since then, their 'people' have met in private clubs, fuelling speculation about a possible reunion. Harry has said that he'd "love" that, telling the BBC in April: "Life is precious. I don't know how much longer my father has". The Palace won't spill the tea on whether Haz will meet with his bro Prince William, but going by this exchange with a young fan, Wills is on his mind…

Apropos of Nothing - Snail mail edition

Some German apartment dwellers were surprised to find out that the kids they suspected of ringing their doorbells and running away were in fact, not kids at all, but a slug that had been repeatedly sliding over the doorbell. That’s an embarrassing convo with the police…  

We’ve been waiting for the right slime time to bring you the story of Ned, the Kiwi snail with an unusual shell that makes it very difficult to find a mate due to incompatible sex organs. But with the help of some intrepid humans, his search for love is ongoing, so he may not stay shelibate for long… 

And over in Spain, several beaches have been closed due to sightings of the beautiful but deadly ‘blue dragons ‘- toxic sea slugs that have been called “the most beautiful killer in the ocean”. With all this slug/snail news, we might have to start a gastropod-cast…

Squiz the Day

9.00am (AEST) - The National Road Transport Association annual conference gets underway (until 12 September) - Melbourne 

9.30am (AEST) - Two men are due be sentenced over an alleged arson attack on a synagogue in Newtown - Sydney

10.00am (AEST) - Single-match tickets go on sale for the AFC Women’s Asia Cup which starts in March 2026

5.00pm (AEST) - The Desert Mob art festival begins (until 26 October) - Araluen, NT

5.30pm (AEST) - The opening of the Sydney Contemporary Art Fair at Carriageworks (until 14 September) - Sydney

7.30pm (AEST) - Darwin International Film Festival opens with the premiere of the documentary Journey Home, David Gulpilil - Darwin

11.00 pm (AEST) - New York Fashion Week gets underway 👠 (until 14 September) - New York, US

ABS data releases: Overseas Arrivals and Departures, Australia, July 2025; National Land Cover Account, 1988-2024

Enkutatash (Ethiopian New Year)

R U OK? Day

Birthdays for ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad (1965), and musician Moby (1965)

Anniversary of:

• Enid Blyton publishing the first of her Famous Five children's novels (1942)

• the release of the Atari 2600 video game console, which revolutionised the video game industry (1977)

• the last known smallpox death - that of medical photographer Janet Parker who was infected in a British lab (1978)

• the 9/11 terror attacks on the US, which killed 2,996 (2001)