For the mayor of London, it’s clear that the rush of Americans applying for British citizenship is connected to the return of Donald Trump to the White House.

Americans applied for British citizenship in record numbers last year, according to Britain’s Home Office, with a big spike in applications logged during the final quarter — a period coinciding with Trump’s reelection.

Speaking at the MIPIM real estate conference in Cannes, France, last week, Khan recalled teasing former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during Trump’s 2017-21 presidential term: “I wanted all the Americans who were leaving America. And he was saying, no, he wanted all the Americans leaving America.”

Now that Canada is very much in Trump’s crosshairs — the US president has repeatedly said the country should become America’s “51st state” — Khan believes London has the stronger hand: “I suspect those Americans are probably not choosing Canada and choosing London.”

More than 6,000 Americans applied for British citizenship in 2024, the most since the Home Office began tracking applications two decades ago. Around 1,700 of those applied during the last three months of the year, almost 40% more than in the same period in 2023.

There is no love lost between Trump and Khan. In a high-profile spat in 2019, Trump called Khan a “stone-cold loser” after the mayor criticized Britain’s decision to invite Trump for a formal state visit.

Khan, London’s mayor since 2016, wrote in The Observer newspaper ahead of the visit that it was “un-British to be rolling out the red carpet” for a US president who amplified the views of the far-right. And the year before, Khan gave his permission for protesters to fly a 20-foot-tall “Trump baby” balloon near Britain’s Houses of Parliament during Trump’s first presidential visit to the United Kingdom.

During a state visit, foreign leaders are welcomed to Britain by the reigning monarch and are treated to a carriage procession to Buckingham Palace and a grand banquet. Last month, Prime Minister Keir Starmer — who, like Khan, belongs to Britain’s center-left Labour Party — handed Trump an invitation from King Charles III for the second state visit.

“America is a superpower,” he said. “Just like we feel the ripples of hope and optimism from America, we can often feel the ripples of hatred and negativity.”

Still, the mayor’s approach to Trump appears softer this time around.

“I wish President Trump all the best,” he said, stressing that the two countries are “best mates.” “I hope he’s a successful president. I love America. I love American culture, American people, American politics, American businesses and so, of course, I wish him well.”

But Khan did not rule out allowing another “Trump baby” balloon to fly over London during the president’s next visit, saying he would respond to any applications from protesters “based on (their) merits.”

“Satire and humor and protest are quintessentially British — and actually American —traits,” he said. “Watch ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm.’”

Sudan’s army is close to taking control of the Presidential Palace in Khartoum from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, state TV reported on Thursday, in a significant milestone in a two-year-old conflict that threatens to fracture the country.

The RSF quickly took the palace and most of the capital at the outbreak of war in April 2023, but the Sudanese Armed Forces have in recent months staged a comeback and inched towards the palace along the River Nile.

The RSF, which earlier this year began establishing a parallel government, maintains control of parts of Khartoum and neighboring Omdurman, as well as western Sudan, where it is fighting to take control of the army’s last stronghold in Darfur, al-Fashir.

The taking of the capital could hasten the army’s full takeover of central Sudan, and harden the east-west territorial division of the country between the two forces.

Both sides have vowed to continue fighting for the remainder of the country, and no efforts at peace talks have materialized.

The war erupted amid a power struggle between Sudan’s army and the RSF ahead of a planned transition to civilian rule.

World’s largest humanitarian crisis

The conflict has led to what the UN calls the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, causing famine in several locations and disease across the country. Both sides have been accused of war crimes, while the RSF has also been charged with genocide. Both forces deny the charges.

The fight for the Presidential Palace has raged over the past several weeks, with the RSF fighting fiercely to maintain control, including via snipers placed around surrounding downtown buildings. Its leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, instructed troops earlier this week not to give up the palace.

Late on Wednesday into Thursday morning, explosions could be heard from airstrikes and drone attacks by the army targeting central Khartoum, witnesses and military sources told Reuters. The army has long maintained the advantage of air power over the RSF, though the paramilitary group has shown evidence of increased drone capabilities recently.

On the Telegram messenger app, the RSF said its forces were making advances towards the Army General Command, also in central Khartoum, and eyewitnesses said the force was attacking from southern Khartoum.

The army’s advance in central Sudan since late last year has been welcomed by many people, who had been displaced by the RSF, which has been accused of widespread looting and arbitrary killings, and of occupying homes and neighborhoods.

The RSF denies the charges and says individual perpetrators will be brought to justice.

Hundreds of thousands of people have returned to their homes in Central Sudan, though late on Wednesday activists in Omdurman warned that some soldiers have engaged in robbery. The military has routinely denied such allegations.

Hamas fired rockets at Israel from Gaza Thursday, the militant group’s first response to Israel’s renewed offensive in the Strip that shattered the two-month-old ceasefire.

Three projectiles were fired at central Israel, the Israeli military said. One was intercepted and two “fell into an open area,” with no casualties reported.

Hamas’ military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, confirmed it had launched an attack, saying it had “bombed the city of Tel Aviv deep inside the occupied territories with a barrage of M90 rockets” in retaliation for Israel’s attacks this week on Gaza that killed hundreds.

The rockets are the first to be fired from Gaza since Israel this week broke the ceasefire with Hamas that had held since January, first bombarding the Strip with airstrikes on Tuesday before launching a ground offensive a day later.

Israel also came under fire overnight from Yemen’s Houthi rebels. The Iran-back militia said it fired a ballistic missile at Israel in response to Israel’s renewed war in Gaza – the second it has fired since the ceasefire collapsed. Israel’s military said it intercepted the missile.

Israel blames the new fighting on Hamas for refusing to accept revised ceasefire terms. Hamas, in turn, has accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of unilaterally upending the truce and putting hostages “at risk of an unknown fate.”

Netanyahu faced fury from protesters in Jerusalem on Wednesday as thousands gathered outside Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, to oppose the renewed fighting.

Protesters have accused Netanyahu of restarting the war in order to solidify his governing coalition, which has long threatened to collapse due to divisions over the war in Gaza.

Swiftly after Tuesday’s airstrikes, which Gaza’s health ministry said killed more than 400 people, far-right minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said he would be returning to Netanyahu’s coalition. He had quit the government in January as Israel agreed to a ceasefire in Hamas.

At a National Security Ministry meeting on Thursday, Ben-Gvir said he was “happy to return after two months of respite.”

Ben-Gvir’s return to government will come as a boon to Netanyahu, who has to pass Israel’s next budget before a March 31 deadline or face fresh elections.

Israel continued to pound Gaza overnight – killing at least 59 people, according to Palestinian officials – after it announced “targeted ground activities” earlier Wednesday.

The military said it had retaken the Netzarim Corridor, a strip of land that splits Gaza in half, dividing the central Gaza City and northern areas from the southern parts of the Strip that borders Egypt.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Conor McGregor will run for the Irish presidency in elections later this year, the controversial former fighter said on Thursday, as he announced his candidacy for the largely ceremonial role on an anti-immigration stance.

McGregor, who in recent years has emerged as a figurehead for the far-right in Ireland, said on social media that he would run for president to oppose a long-awaited new European Union migration pact aimed at sharing the burden of processing asylum claims more evenly across the bloc.

“Who else will stand up to Government and oppose this bill?” he said in an Instagram post to his more than 46 million followers. “Any other Presidential candidate they attempt to put forward will be of no resistance to them. I will!”

The post comes just days after McGregor, 36, appeared at the White House with Donald Trump on St. Patrick’s Day, where he became the latest European ally of the US president to promote anti-immigrant sentiment – drawing controversy and censure back home.

“Ireland is at the cusp of potentially losing its Irishness,” McGregor said Monday, claiming the government had “abandoned the voices” of Irish people and that rural towns were being overrun by immigrants.

Irish leader Micheál Martin said McGregor’s comments “did not reflect the spirit of St. Patrick’s Day, or the views of the people of Ireland.”

Once the face of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, Dublin-born McGregor was the first fighter to hold two UFC belts simultaneously and, according to Forbes, was the world’s highest paid sports star in 2021.

Despite several rumored comebacks, he hasn’t fought in the UFC since back-to-back defeats four years ago – and has become a hugely controversial figure in Ireland, dogged by accusations of sexual assault, which he has denied.

In a January civil lawsuit, a woman accused McGregor of sexual battery during the 2023 NBA Finals in Miami. The incident was investigated by police at the time and the Miami-Dade state attorney declined to press charges against him. McGregor said the allegations were false.

Last fall, a civil jury in Dublin awarded nearly 250,000 euros ($257,000) in damages to a woman who claimed McGregor had “brutally raped and battered” her in a hotel in Dublin in 2018. McGregor testified that the two had consensual sex and vowed to appeal the verdict.

As far back as 2022, McGregor had expressed support for people protesting against immigration. Some Irish politicians have accused him of fanning the flames of discontent online, voicing his anger at Ireland’s immigration policy – a particularly sensitive issue given the country’s long history of emigration.

Ireland, a country of just over 5 million people, saw 141,600 immigrants arrive in the year leading up to April 2023 – the highest figure in 16 years with some attracted by its strong economic performance, according to the Central Statistics Office Ireland.

But for many ordinary workers, the benefits are failing to reach their pockets and they are struggling to afford high housing prices and rents.

Ireland’s next presidential election must take place by November 11.

In his Instagram post Thursday, McGregor said he would put the EU migration bill to a referendum if elected.

“Although I oppose greatly this pact, it is neither mine nor government’s choice to make. It is the people of Ireland’s choice! Always!” he wrote.

“This is the future of Ireland with me as President.”

But McGregor faces an uphill task to get his name on the ballot as few Irish lawmakers share his vehement anti-immigrant views, and many publicly criticized him after the civil case last November.

Presidential candidates must be nominated by at least 20 of the 234 members of the lower and upper houses of parliament or by four of Ireland’s 31 local councils, according to the country’s electoral commission.

London’s Heathrow Airport announced a complete shutdown all day Friday due to a “significant power outage” due to a large fire nearby, causing massive disruption to one of the world’s busiest travel hubs as flights were forced to turn back midair or divert to other locations.

“Due to a fire at an electrical substation supplying the airport, Heathrow is experiencing a significant power outage,” Heathrow Airport said in a statement on X. “To maintain the safety of our passengers and colleagues, Heathrow will be closed until 23h59 on 21 March.”

A transformer at an electrical substation in Hayes, a London suburb located just a few miles from the airport, caught fire Thursday night, according to the London Fire Brigade. The cause is not yet known, and firefighters were still working to extinguish the blaze as of early Friday morning.

The brigade said it evacuated 150 people from the area. More than 16,000 homes lost power, according to utility supplier Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks — with Britain’s National Grid “working at speed” to restore power.

Videos shared on social media showed huge flames and smoke rising into the air early Friday.

“As we head into the morning, disruption is expected to increase, and we urge people to avoid the area wherever possible,” Assistant Commissioner Pat Goulbourne said in the fire brigade’s statement.

Heathrow Airport appeared largely dark amid the power outage, according to videos shared on social media.

Massive disruption

The shutdown could affect tens of thousands of travelers. Heathrow was the world’s fourth-busiest airport in 2023, according to the most recent data, with a record-breaking 83.9 million passengers passing through last year.

Spread across four terminals and located 14 miles west of central London, it usually runs at 99% capacity, with every major airline passing through, meaning it’s always very busy.

Airline analytics firm Cirium estimated that “upwards of 145,000” passengers could be impacted.

Dual US-Norwegian citizen Kim Mikkel Skibrek had already been flying for three hours from Minneapolis to London when crew announced they had to turn back due to the fire.

On the same flight, Abby Hertz and her family were traveling to London for the wedding of her husband’s best friend. The couple had postponed the wedding once due to Covid and were finally getting married now that their son was in remission from leukemia, Hertz said — but it’s not clear if they’ll be able to make the wedding now.

Meanwhile at New York’s JFK Airport, passenger Christine said her British Airways flight had been ready to depart when the pilot announced they’d been asked to hold for a while. Half an hour later, passengers were told Heathrow was closed and that another flight which had already taxied to the runway had turned back — leaving them stuck on the tarmac.

“The mood is fairly relaxed on the plane, surprisingly. They’ve just come around to feed us,” said Christine, who declined to give her last name. But, she said, with a wedding in the UK to attend Saturday, “I really hope we’re not stuck until then!”

According to flight tracking website FlightRadar24, more than 1,350 flights going in or out of Heathrow on Friday will be affected. It also said 120 flights were in the air when the announcement came. They had to be diverted to other airports or turned back to their original location.

Thomas added that while shorter domestic flights might be able to turn back, that’s not an option for long-haul international flights. There are several other airports near London, including Gatwick Airport and Stansted Airport, but those are likely “at capacity,” meaning diverted flights have to go further to find an alternative place to land — like in Glasgow or Edinburgh, he said.

And that could pose another problem. Those other airports, some of them smaller and lower-cost than Heathrow, aren’t equipped to handle the sheer number of diverted passengers coming their way, he said.

As authorities race to contain the fire and navigate the fallout, they’ll also face tough questions, Thomas said, including why such a crucial travel and economic hub wasn’t able to tap into a backup power source.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

The government of Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has voted to dismiss Ronen Bar, the chief of Israel’s Shin Bet internal security service.

The vote in the early hours of Friday local time could still be subject to appeals by Israel’s Supreme Court.

“The government has now unanimously approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to terminate the term of Shin Bet head Ronen Bar,” the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement Friday.

“Ronen Bar will end his role as Shin Bet head on April 10, 2025, or when a permanent Shin Bet head is appointed – whichever comes first,” it added.

It came after Netanyahu met with Bar last week and informed him that he would propose his removal.

In a video statement released on Sunday, Netanyahu said his “ongoing distrust” of Bar had led to the move. “At all times, but especially in such an existential war, the prime minister must have full confidence in the head of the Shin Bet,” Netanyahu said.

Netanyahu added that removing Bar would be necessary for achieving Israel’s war goals in Gaza and “preventing the next disaster.” The prime minister has frequently criticized the agency, placing blame on its leaders for the security lapses that led to the Hamas October 7, 2023, attacks that killed more than 1,200 people.

Shin Bet, which is in charge of monitoring domestic threats to Israel, conducted an internal investigation that determined that the agency had “failed in its mission” to prevent the attacks. But it also blamed policies enacted by Netanyahu’s government as contributing factors, such as politicians’ visits to the Al Aqsa compound in Jerusalem, “the treatment of prisoners, and the perception that Israeli society has been weakened due to the damage to social cohesion.”

Shin Bet is reported to have recently opened an investigation into allegations that members of Netanyahu’s office inappropriately lobbied on behalf of Qatar – something his office denies.

On Wednesday, the office of Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara sent a letter to Netanyahu saying that the government could not fire Bar without the approval of a special committee.

Netanyahu responded with a letter on Thursday, saying Baharav-Miara was “exceeding her authority” and “giving legal opinions and instructions to the government in violation of Supreme Court rulings.”

Bar released a statement just hours before his dismissal saying the vote by Netanyahu’s cabinet “was hastily convened, contrary to every basic legal rule dealing with the right to be heard and contrary to the position of the legal adviser to the government.”

Netanyahu has previously removed both Bar and the head of the Mossad intelligence service, David Barnea, from the negotiating team engaging in indirect talks with Hamas regarding the Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal.

Opposition politicians have criticized Netanyahu’s targeting of Bar, claiming it is politically motivated.

“The dismissal of the head of the service at this time, at the initiative of the prime minister, sends a message to all those involved, a message that may jeopardize the optimal outcome of the investigation. This is a direct danger to the security of the state of Israel,” Bar said in his statement Thursday.

A French researcher was denied entry to the United States after US authorities found messages about President Donald Trump on his phone, a French government official said on Thursday.

France’s minister of higher education and research Philippe Baptiste said that the researcher was traveling to a conference near Houston earlier this month when US authorities found that his phone “contained exchanges with colleagues and friends in which he expressed a personal opinion on the Trump administration’s research policies.”

The researcher was then denied entry to the US and expelled from the country, Baptiste said.

The French ministry of higher education and research said that he worked in the field of space research, and that the incident took place on March 9.

“Freedom of opinion, free research, and academic freedom are values that we will continue to proudly uphold,” Baptiste said in a statement.

“I will defend the right of all French researchers to adhere to these values, while respecting the law, regardless of the country in which they find themselves,” he added.

“If an individual has material discovered on their electronic media that raises flags during an inspection, it can result in further analysis. Claims that such decisions are politically motivated are completely unfounded,” Hilton Beckham, CBP Assistant Commissioner of Public Affairs, said in a statement.

This is a developing story and will be updated.