Iran enters the second half of 2026 squeezed from two directions at once: a domestic economy in freefall and a military confrontation with the United States and Israel that has already reshaped the country’s leadership. Neither pressure shows signs of easing, and the interaction between them, a government trying to project strength abroad while its legitimacy erodes at home, is shaping much of what happens next.

On the economic side, the numbers describe a currency and a population under severe strain. The rial lost roughly half its value between mid-2024 and early 2025 and hit new record lows by the end of that year. Food price inflation topped 70 percent over the same stretch, eroding household purchasing power faster than wages or subsidies could keep pace. Those conditions fed a wave of protests that carried into 2026, met by government crackdowns that have included mass arrests, executions, and an intensified security presence in cities where unrest has been most visible. Reporting on the unrest describes an establishment increasingly divided over how to preserve the system in the face of economic collapse and declining public legitimacy.

The international dimension escalated dramatically earlier this year. In late February, the United States and Israel launched a joint military campaign against Iran, an operation that opened with a strike removing the country’s Supreme Leader from power, a moment with no real precedent in the Islamic Republic’s history. The campaign continued into early May before a memorandum of understanding was reached in June aimed at ending the fighting and establishing an interim ceasefire between Washington and Tehran.

That ceasefire proved short-lived. On July 8, it collapsed after Iran was accused of striking multiple commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most important oil shipping corridors. The United States responded with strikes on Iranian territory, and Iran followed with strikes on US military bases in Gulf states, reviving the direct exchange of fire that the June agreement had been designed to stop. The Strait of Hormuz disruption has consequences well beyond the immediate region, given how much global oil and shipping traffic depends on the route staying open.

Taken together, the picture is of a state fighting for stability on two fronts simultaneously. Domestically, Iran’s leadership faces a population squeezed by inflation and shortages and increasingly willing to demonstrate against a government it holds responsible. Internationally, it faces a security relationship with the US and Israel that has already cost it its top leader and shows no sign of settling into a durable truce. A detailed timeline of the 2026 conflict is a useful reference for readers trying to track how the military and diplomatic threads have unfolded since February.

Sudan’s civil war has now stretched into its fourth year, and the human toll continues to climb even as international attention drifts toward other conflicts. What began in April 2023 as a violent power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has evolved into one of the world’s largest displacement and hunger emergencies, with fighting now reaching cities that had, until recently, been spared the worst of the violence.

In recent weeks, the central city of El Obeid has become the latest flashpoint. Advancing RSF fighters have besieged the city, and drone strikes on civilian areas have forced more than 11,000 residents, over 5,500 of them children, to flee in just the past two weeks. The United Nations has warned that as many as 500,000 civilians remain trapped in or near the city, at risk of mass atrocities if the siege continues to tighten. Aid workers describe a familiar pattern: encirclement, bombardment, and the slow strangulation of food, water, and medical supplies to a besieged population.

The broader humanitarian picture is just as alarming. An estimated 30 million people required humanitarian assistance last year, and that number is projected to climb to 33.7 million in 2026, roughly two out of every three people in the country. More than 61 percent of the population is now acutely food insecure. In parts of Darfur and Kordofan, families report surviving on a single meal a day or less, with some resorting to boiling leaves or eating animal feed simply to stay alive.

Disease has compounded the crisis. Cholera, malaria, and dengue fever are spreading simultaneously across a health system that has been gutted by three years of war, with hospitals looted, destroyed, or abandoned, and medical staff killed or displaced. Cholera alone has produced over 1,100 confirmed cases and more than 120 deaths since the current outbreak began, figures aid workers say likely undercount the true scale given how little of the country health monitors can still reach.

What makes the situation especially difficult to resolve is the absence of a clear path to negotiation. Repeated ceasefire efforts led by regional and international mediators have failed to hold, and both the SAF and the RSF continue to pursue battlefield advantage rather than a political settlement. Meanwhile, disruptions far from Sudan’s borders, including instability affecting shipping routes through the Strait of Hormuz, have complicated the logistics of getting aid into the country at all, adding delays to an already overstretched relief pipeline.

For a conflict of this scale, sustained on-the-ground reporting matters. Al Jazeera’s coverage of the siege of El Obeid offers a detailed look at why the city has become so pivotal to the war’s next phase, and is worth reading for anyone trying to understand where the conflict may be headed.

Three years after fighting first broke out between Sudan’s army and the rival Rapid Support Forces, the war shows no sign of slowing down. If anything, the last several weeks have brought some of the most significant escalation since the conflict began, with humanitarian consequences now touching nearly every region of the country.

Latest developments

The most urgent flashpoint right now is the central Sudanese city of El Obeid, where RSF units have tightened a siege and stepped up drone strikes against civilian infrastructure. UN agencies estimate that up to half a million people are boxed in by the fighting, with tens of thousands already forced from their homes in just the past two weeks. Analysts see the battle for El Obeid as a turning point, since control of the city would open a route deeper into government-held territory, one reason both sides have committed so many resources to the fight.

Elsewhere, reporting continues to document a war increasingly shaped by drones and long-range strikes rather than direct ground combat, a shift that has made it harder for civilians to find safe ground and for aid workers to predict where the next wave of displacement will come from.

Humanitarian impact

The numbers behind the war are difficult to fully absorb. Roughly 33.7 million people, close to two-thirds of Sudan’s population, are expected to need humanitarian assistance in 2026, up from around 30 million the year before. Food insecurity has become the norm rather than the exception: more than 61 percent of the population is now classified as acutely food insecure, and in the hardest-hit areas, families describe going days without a proper meal, sometimes resorting to boiling leaves or eating livestock feed.

Public health has collapsed alongside food security. Cholera, malaria, and dengue are spreading at the same time, straining a health system with few functioning hospitals left standing. More than 1,100 cholera cases and over 120 deaths have been recorded since the latest outbreak began, and aid groups warn the real total is almost certainly higher given how few areas remain reachable for monitoring.

Getting help in has become harder, too. Instability affecting shipping lanes through the Strait of Hormuz has slowed the flow of fuel and supplies into the region, adding fresh friction to an aid pipeline already stretched thin by insecurity, bureaucratic obstruction, and the sheer scale of need on the ground.

With no durable ceasefire in sight and both sides still betting on military rather than political solutions, humanitarian officials say the coming months are likely to bring further displacement and worsening conditions before things improve. PBS NewsHour’s recent coverage offers a useful rundown of how the war’s fourth year is intersecting with these broader supply disruptions, for readers who want more detail on how the pieces connect.