Israel’s military on Saturday said it had killed the chief of Hamas’ military wing in an air strike on Gaza the previous day, the most senior Hamas official killed by Israel since an October U.S.-backed ceasefire agreement that was meant to halt fighting, Reuters reported.

Reuters reported, citing a senior Hamas official who spoke on condition of anonymity, that Izz al-Din al-Haddad, born in 1970, was killed in the attack.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz said in a joint statement that Haddad had been “responsible for the murder, kidnapping and injury of thousands of Israeli civilians and IDF [Israel Defense Forces] soldiers”.

Israel described him as “one of the architects of the October 7 massacre”.

A 38-year-old man has been killed by a 4-meter great white shark in Western Australia, the BBC reported, citing local police.

On Saturday, the man was bitten just before 10:00 (03:00 BST) at Horseshoe Reef – north-west of the popular Rottnest Island near the city of Perth, according to the report.

“Sadly, the man was unable to be revived,” the BBC quoted a local police spokesperson as saying.

Authorities urged the public to take “additional caution” in waters around the area.

The attack is the first fatal incident in Western Australia since March last year, when a surfer was mauled off a remote beach.

Since records began in 1791, there have been almost 1,300 recorded shark attacks in Australia, with more than 260 of them resulting in death.

Armenian Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sports Zhanna Andreasyan marked Students and Youth Day — celebrated annually on May 16 — with an address emphasizing the historic role of education in strengthening Armenian statehood and outlining the government’s ongoing higher education reforms.

In the address issued by the ministry’s press service, Andreasyan highlighted education reforms, expanded scholarship opportunities, academic mobility programs, and the planned “Academic City” project aimed at creating a modern educational and research environment for future generations.

Andreasyan emphasized that education and statehood have developed hand in hand in Armenia.

“Dear students and young people, on May 16, 1919 — in the very first year following the establishment of the First Republic of Armenia — the Council of Ministers adopted a decision to found a university in Yerevan. Despite extremely limited conditions, the country, which had only with great difficulty restored its statehood, established a university through one of its very first legal acts. This embodies the formula by which Armenia stands to this day: statehood and education are born together, and the strength of one serves the strength of the other,” the minister said.

Students and Youth Day, she added, is not merely a celebration of youth; it is an annual reminder that enlightened minds are the creative and foundational force of the state.

“Inheriting that vision and initiative, the Government of the Republic of Armenia today has also adopted a consistent policy of empowering its citizens through education, convinced that an educated and capable citizen strengthens the state and contributes to achieving its key priorities,” the minister emphasized in her address, adding that much has already been accomplished in the process of reforming higher education and that these changes are not superficial, but systemic.

“Thus, on September 11, 2025, the Armenian law ‘On Higher Education and Science’ entered into force, bringing the governance of academic and scientific research systems under a single framework for the first time in the post-Soviet period. The ongoing reforms are also moving us toward a more inclusive and accessible education system where, thanks to a new scholarship policy, students with satisfactory academic performance will not be excluded from the educational process due to a lack of financial means,” the minister said.

Andreasyan noted that the changes are creating a more flexible education system for students, allowing them to enrich their educational paths both within Armenia and abroad through mechanisms for academic mobility, credit accumulation, and the acquisition of micro-qualifications.

“At the same time as the content of higher education is changing, the physical environment of higher education is also being transformed through the ‘Academic City’ project, which in its first phase, by 2030, will provide students with the opportunity to study in a large technological cluster equipped with advanced facilities and to benefit from the academic and cultural infrastructure located there, including student dormitories with the capacity to accommodate up to 3,600 students,” the minister said, adding that some of today’s students will have the chance to study in that environment, while the most distinguished among them will go on to teach and conduct research there.

“With state support, 13 youth centers have been established and are already operating, and by the end of 2026, another six youth centers will be renovated and reopened. Their mission is to become important platforms for non-formal education, the realization of ideas, community development, and the encouragement of creative thinking.

“The creation of quality infrastructure, advanced educational programs, international joint laboratories, and youth environments forms the stable foundation that encourages students and young people to live and create in the Republic of Armenia, feeling the state as a source of support,” Andreasyan said.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has said that the Armenian town of Meghri in the country’s south has transformed into a “regional and global hub” since the agreements on launching the TRIPP project.

“There was a time when just mentioning Meghri would trigger waves of alarm,” Pashinyan said at a campaign event in Yerevan for his Civil Contract party. “But today, Meghri has transformed into a regional, global hub. Today, the world’s top leaders believe that a turning-point event is taking place in Meghri. World leaders communicate with me, asking how they can participate, because they understand that something is happening that has key significance and that it will be of decisive importance for North–South and East–West communications,” Pashinyan said.

He emphasized that the perception of the country’s geographical position has also changed.

“Armenia remains on the same coordinates it has been on for the past hundred years, but our perception has always been that the country’s geographic position is extremely unfavorable. However, the Armenia–EU summit is taking place—the first in history—and the President of the European Commission begins our meeting with the following sentence: Armenia sits on the shortest East–West route,” said Pashinyan, referring to the inaugural Armenia–EU summit, which took place in Yerevan earlier this month.

He said that real estate prices in Meghri have increased by around 50 percent, while in the border village of Kirants in the Tavush region, where delimitation and demarcation have taken place, around 50 new houses are currently being built.

“Today’s Kirants and the Kirants of 2023 are kilometers apart. Kirants is safer and more developed than ever before. There used to be around 100 houses in Kirants; today, around 50 houses are under construction there. In more than 3,400 border communities, houses and new neighborhoods are being built. In various settlements, new districts are emerging with state support,” said Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

The Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) is a connectivity project in Armenia envisaged under the U.S.-brokered Armenian–Azerbaijani joint declaration signed in Washington, D.C. The project is expected to unlock strategic economic opportunities, create long-term benefits by promoting infrastructure investment, and enhance regional connectivity.