Iran's AI Fail

Hi Global Recap readers,

Lately, I’ve seen a lot of chatter on social media about the new Axis forming.

Sure, geopolitical posturing has always been around, but there’s a growing sense that the whole “us vs. them” mindset, especially on the military front, is becoming way too normalized.

🤔 Do you agree? That definitely feels like the theme of the day. Stick around till the end, as we break down the latest from the Iran-Israel conflict, including Iran’s reported first use of cluster munitions.

🌐 WORLD
Fast Scroll News

🇮🇩 Indonesia Joins Russia Pact. Indonesia just signed a strategic partnership deal with Russia after President Prabowo Subianto met Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on June 19. This agreement, alongside Indonesia’s accession to BRICS, focuses on increased trade, nuclear technology, and defense cooperation, supported by a joint $2.29 billion joint investment fund. Prabowo skipped the G7 in Canada to be there, calling Putin a “great friend.” This has generated scrutiny in the West, especially since Indonesia also holds upgraded strategic ties with the US since 2023.

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🇳🇿 New Zealand Freezes Aid. New Zealand just hit pause on $11 million in development funds for the Cook Islands after learning about its "secret" deal with China back in February. The “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership” lets Beijing bankroll more infrastructure and push deep-sea mining. The problem is, some documents of this pact were not revealed. Currently, Cook Islanders have New Zealand passports and military protection, so any China tie-up raises alarms in NZ’s parliament. PM Christopher Luxon, currently in China, says trust has to be rebuilt before the cash starts flowing again.

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🇫🇮 Finland Ditches Mine Ban. On Thursday, Finland’s parliament voted to exit the Ottawa Treaty banning landmines, citing Russia’s threat across their shared 1,300-km border. President Alexander Stubb said the decision comes down to realism: “an aggressive, imperialist state called Russia” uses landmines and isn’t bound by the treaty anyway. Finland will legally start stockpiling mines six months after notifying the UN, joining Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia in scrapping the ban. UN chief António Guterres called the withdrawals “gravely concerning,” but Finland says defending civilians now comes first.

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🇪🇸 Spain Rejects NATO Hike. Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez just shot down NATO’s push for members to spend 5% of GDP on defense, calling it “unreasonable” and a threat to the welfare state. He’s angling for a more “flexible formula” ahead of next week’s summit in The Hague, hinting Madrid might opt out entirely. Sánchez says Spain’s vision doesn’t align with ramped-up military budgets, especially when the alliance already agreed on a 2% target.

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🇮🇷 IRAN & 🇮🇱 ISRAEL
Soroka Hospital
in Rubble

Inactive Nuclear Reactor

Overnight, Israel reportedly struck Iran’s Khondab heavy water research reactor, which was still being built and hadn’t gone online.

• IAEA: “It was not operational and contained no nuclear material.” Meaning, there's no apparent radiation risk.

• A follow-up assessment confirmed “key buildings at the facility were damaged, including the distillation unit.”

• It was the former Arak site, redesigned under the 2015 nuclear deal to minimize weapons risk.

• The reactor was set to begin operation in 2026.

Nuclear Possibility

It's important to note that heavy water reactors can be reconfigured to produce plutonium, despite Iran insisting it has no interest in nuclear weapons.

• Its original design made weaponization easier.

• As part of the 2015 nuclear deal, the reactor was filled with concrete to shut that option down.

• Still, Israel and other skeptics aren’t buying Iran’s "peaceful" intentions.

Iran Strikes Israeli Hospital

Early Thursday morning, in what looked like a direct response, Iran unleashed hundreds of missiles and drones on Israel. Most were shot down, but a few made it through, hitting a high-rise and several residential buildings in Tel Aviv.

One more target: Soroka Medical Center.

• An Iranian missile tore into the hospital, which serves around 1 million residents in Southern Israel, reducing several parts of it to rubble.

• Iran denies targeting the hospital and says it was actually going after a nearby tech center.

• Israel says Iran was targeting civilians, with PM Netanyahu promising to "exact the full price from the tyrants in Tehran."

• At least 80 people were injured.

Enter: The AI Map

To justify the hospital strike, Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted a long explanation on X, complete with a map.

But here's the problem: the map was clearly AI-generated.

Why fake it (allegedly)? Critics say it was either an attempt to invent military targets near Soroka that didn’t actually exist, or just plain laziness in not bothering to use a real one.

• If you’ve spent any time with AI image generators like Midjourney or Stable Diffusion, you’ve probably noticed the classic giveaways, such as warped letters, made-up roads, random highway names, and other odd AI artifacts.

  • It placed buildings on the wrong streets and invented an “Eli Cohen Boulevard” that simply doesn’t exist.

  • Yitzhak Rager Boulevard was miswritten as “Rager Bivd” and mislabeled as multiple routes.

  • etc.

• Araghchi defended the strike by claiming the hospital was “mainly used to treat Israeli soldiers engaged in the genocide in Gaza.”

  • View 1: Some argue the AI-generated map doesn’t change the core claim that Iran was aiming for military targets. They go further, claiming the strike proves their belief that the Israeli military is “using civilians as shields.”

  • View 2: Others push back, asking, if that’s true, why did Araghchi downplay the hospital damage as just “superficial”? Why use a fake map at all? And why invoke Gaza if not to stir emotions and rally “Free Palestine” supporters behind a strike that clearly hit civilians?

Cluster Bomb-Bearing Missiles

On top of all this, Israel claims this was Iran’s first cluster munition attack in their ongoing conflict.

• According to Israel’s Washington embassy, Iran “fired a missile that contained cluster submunitions at a densely populated civilian area.”

• The missile’s warhead reportedly burst 7 km up, scattering 20 bomblets over central Israel.

• One hit a home in Azor, causing damage but no injuries.

• Cluster weapons are banned by 111 countries due to long-term dangers like unexploded ordnance.

• However, neither Iran nor Israel signed the treaty banning them.

• Iran's UN mission declined to comment when asked.

Trump’s “Two Weeks” Ultimatum

While all this is unfolding, and after President Trump signed off yesterday with a "Good luck" to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who refused to back down, the White House says Trump will decide within two weeks whether the US will jump into Israel’s war with Iran. But not everyone’s buying.

• Many say that Trump will simply TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out) again.

• On the other hand, some say he’s already decided to hit Iran, but only after the financial markets close for the weekend.

• Trump supporters are betting that he is trying to find a diplomatic solution to this.