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Prince, Princess of Wales Meet with Families of Dance Class Stabbing Attack

William and Catherine, the Prince and Princess of Wales speak to members of the emergency services during a visit to Southport Community Center in Britain to meet rescue workers and the families of those caught up in the Southport knife attack earlier this year. Picture date: Thursday October 10, 2024. Danny Lawson/Pool via REUTERS
William and Catherine, the Prince and Princess of Wales speak to members of the emergency services during a visit to Southport Community Center in Britain to meet rescue workers and the families of those caught up in the Southport knife attack earlier this year. Picture date: Thursday October 10, 2024. Danny Lawson/Pool via REUTERS
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Prince, Princess of Wales Meet with Families of Dance Class Stabbing Attack

William and Catherine, the Prince and Princess of Wales speak to members of the emergency services during a visit to Southport Community Center in Britain to meet rescue workers and the families of those caught up in the Southport knife attack earlier this year. Picture date: Thursday October 10, 2024. Danny Lawson/Pool via REUTERS
William and Catherine, the Prince and Princess of Wales speak to members of the emergency services during a visit to Southport Community Center in Britain to meet rescue workers and the families of those caught up in the Southport knife attack earlier this year. Picture date: Thursday October 10, 2024. Danny Lawson/Pool via REUTERS

Prince William and the Princess of Wales on Thursday carried out their first joint public engagement since the end of Kate’s chemotherapy by meeting the bereaved parents of victims of a stabbing rampage in the seaside town of Southport.
The royal couple spent 90 minutes meeting privately with the families of Bebe King, 6, Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, 9, who were killed at the Taylor Swift-themed dance class on July 29. They also met with their teacher.
The couple later met with emergency workers at a community center, and told them how much their efforts had helped the families of the victims.
“I can’t underestimate how grateful they all are for the support you provided on the day,'' The Associated Press quoted Kate as saying. “On behalf of them, thank you.”
William and Kate sat beside each other on a bench and listened to their stories. Once the cameras left, Kate offered a hug to responders who were struggling to express their feelings.
“You’re all heroes,'' William said. "Please make sure you look after yourselves, please take your time, don’t rush back to work.”
The Princess of Wales revealed in March that she was undergoing treatment for cancer, in a stunning announcement that followed weeks of speculation about her health and whereabouts.
The princess disclosed her condition in a video message that followed relentless speculation on social media that began when she was hospitalized for unspecified abdominal surgery in January.
In a recent video, Kate said she had completed chemotherapy, and planned to slowly return to public duties, “undertaking a few more public appearances” in the coming months.
But she acknowledged that the path to recovery would be long and she would “take each day as it comes.”

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US Still Believes Iran Has Not Decided to Build a Nuclear Weapon

This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows Iran's nuclear site in Isfahan, Iran, April 4, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows Iran's nuclear site in Isfahan, Iran, April 4, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
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US Still Believes Iran Has Not Decided to Build a Nuclear Weapon

This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows Iran's nuclear site in Isfahan, Iran, April 4, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows Iran's nuclear site in Isfahan, Iran, April 4, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)

The United States still believes that Iran has not decided to build a nuclear weapon despite Tehran's recent strategic setbacks, including Israel's killing of Hezbollah leaders and two largely unsuccessful attempts to attack Israel, two US officials told Reuters.
The comments from a senior Biden administration official and a spokesperson for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) added to public remarks earlier this week by CIA Director William Burns, who said the United States had not seen any evidence Iran's leader had reversed his 2003 decision to suspend the weaponization program.
"We assess that the Supreme Leader has not made a decision to resume the nuclear weapons program that Iran suspended in 2003," said the ODNI spokesperson, referring to Iran's leader Ali Khamenei.
The intelligence assessment could help explain US opposition to any Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear program in retaliation for a ballistic missile attack that Tehran carried out last week.
President Joe Biden said after that attack he would not support an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear sites, but did not explain why he had reached that conclusion. His remarks drew fierce criticism from Republicans, including former President Donald Trump.
US officials have long acknowledged that an attempt to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program might only delay the country's efforts to develop a nuclear bomb and could even strengthen Tehran's resolve to do so.
"We're all watching this space very carefully," the Biden administration official said.
Iran's mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to a request for comment but Tehran has repeatedly denied ever having had a nuclear weapons program.
KEY IRAN ALLY WEAKENED
In the past weeks, Israel's military has inflicted heavy losses on Hezbollah, the most powerful member of the Iran-backed network known as the Axis of Resistance. The group's setbacks have included the killing of its leader Hassan Nasrallah in an Israeli airstrike last month.
The weakening of a key Iranian ally has prompted some experts to speculate that Tehran may restart its efforts to acquire a nuclear bomb to protect itself.
Beth Sanner, a former US deputy director of national intelligence, said the risk of Khamenei reversing his 2003 religious dictum against nuclear weapons is "higher now than it has been" and that if Israel were to strike nuclear facilities Tehran would likely move ahead with building a nuclear weapon.
That would still take time, however.
"They can't get a weapon in a day. It will take months and months and months," said Sanner, now a fellow with the German Marshall Fund.
Iran is now enriching uranium to up to 60% fissile purity, close to the 90% of weapons grade, at two sites, and in theory it has enough material enriched to that level, if enriched further, for almost four bombs, according to a yardstick of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN watchdog.
The expansion in Iran's enrichment program has reduced the so-called breakout time it would need to produce enough weapons-grade uranium for a nuclear bomb to "a week or a little more," according to Burns, from more than a year under a 2015 accord that Trump pulled out of when president.
Actually making a bomb with that material would take longer. How long is less clear and the subject of debate.
POSSIBLE ISRAELI ATTACK
Israel has not yet disclosed what it will target in retaliation for Iran's attack last week with more than 180 ballistic missiles, which largely failed thanks to interceptions by Israeli air defenses as well as by the US military.
The United States has been privately urging Israel to calibrate its response to avoid triggering a broader war in the Middle East, officials say, with Biden publicly voicing his opposition to a nuclear attack and concerns about a strike on Iran's energy infrastructure.
Israel, however, views Iran's nuclear program as an existential threat.
The conflicts in the Middle East between Israel and Iran and Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Gaza and Yemen have become campaign issues ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential election, with Trump and his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, positioning themselves as pro-Israel.
Speaking at a campaign event last week, Trump mocked Biden for opposing an attack on Iran's nuclear sites, saying: "That's the thing you wanna hit, right?"
Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence officer and government official, said Iran still had space to compensate for setbacks dealt to its proxies and missile force without having to resort to developing a nuclear warhead.
"The Iranians have to recalculate what's next. I don't think at this point they will rush to either develop or boost the (nuclear) program toward military capacity," he said.
"They will look around to find what maneuvering space they can move around in."