Portal:Current events/2025 May 16

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Gaza war
  • Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip
    • More than 74 people have been killed in Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip since midnight. (RTÉ News)
• Red Sea crisis
  • The Israeli Air Force launches airstrikes on the ports of Hudaydah and Salif in Houthi-controlled Yemen, as prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defense minister Israel Katz warn that if the Houthis persist in attacking Israel, their leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi will be directly targeted. (Al Arabiya)
• Persecution of Ahmadis in Pakistan
  • A locally renowned doctor in Sargodha, Pakistan, belonging to the Ahmadiyya community, is killed after an unknown assailant shoots him twice in the back. (Dawn)

Business and economy

• United States federal government credit-rating downgrades
  • Moody's Ratings lowers the United States' credit rating from Aaa to Aa1, citing the government's rising debt, widening deficits, and increased interest payments. (USA Today)

Disasters and accidents

• Tornado outbreak sequence of May 15–16, 2025
  • A tornado strikes St. Louis, Missouri. At least 5 people are killed, 35-45 others are injured and more than 100,000 are without power in the St. Louis metropolitan area following severe weather in the city and surrounding areas. (Associated Press) (KSDK)
• Five people are killed and three others are injured by a landslide at a hydropower plant construction site in Phong Thổ, Lai Châu province, Vietnam. (News.az)

Health and environment

• The U.S. Food and Drug Administration clears the Fujirebio Lumipulse for distribution, the first blood test that can be used to diagnose Alzheimer's disease in people 55 years or older with memory problems by detecting amyloid plaques. Alzheimer's can currently only be diagnosed using a PET scan. (NPR) (FDA)

International relations

• Foreign relations of Angola, 2023 Gabonese coup d'état
  • The Government of Angola says that former President of Gabon Ali Bongo, along with former First Lady Sylvia Bongo Ondimba and their son Noureddin Bongo Valentin arrived last night in Angola, where they received asylum "for humanitarian reasons", days after their release from prison, where they had been since the 2023 coup. (Reuters)

Law and crime

• Stabbing of Salman Rushdie
  • A court in New York, United States sentences 27-year old Hadi Matar to 25 years in prison for the August 2022 stabbing attack on Indian-British-American author Salman Rushdie, which left Rushdie severely injured while he was giving a talk in Chautauqua. (AP)
• At least two people are killed, including the perpetrator and four others are injured, including one critically, in a mass shooting and shootout when a man opens fire inside of a gym in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. (KTNV)
• Ten inmates take part in a mass escape from the Orleans Parish jail in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Three are recaptured; the other seven remain fugitives. (The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate)
• International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Ahmad Khan temporarily steps aside from his role while the United Nations investigates the sexual misconduct allegations against him. (The Washington Post)