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The cost of living has become absolutely suffocating for millions of Americans. For years, the bureaucrats in Washington have been feeding us numbers that show that the rate of inflation is low, but it is obvious to everyone that what they are telling us is simply not true. Many of the items that I regularly purchase at the grocery store have more than doubled in price over the past decade. Some have more than tripled in price. When I get to the register to check out, I feel like asking the cashier which organ I should donate to pay for my groceries.

We have reached a stage where grocery prices are causing extreme financial stress for families all over America. One man recently caused quite a stir on social media when he revealed that a grocery order from Target that cost $64.50 in 2020 is now $158.30 in 2026…

This post has already been viewed a million times.

The reason why it is so popular is because it instantly resonates with people.

Everyone knows that grocery prices have risen to absurd levels, and yet the statisticians in Washington keep assuring us that everything is fine.

I don’t believe them.

Do you?

The Washington Post just conducted a poll that found that 66 percent of Americans consider the cost of groceries to be unaffordable.

That figure has risen by 21 percent just since February…

Americans are feeling worse about the price of groceries than they were before the war with Iran began, a Washington Post-Ipsos poll finds.

About two-thirds, or 66 percent, of Americans say they would describe the cost of groceries as unaffordable, up sharply from the 45 percent who said the same thing in February before the conflict started.

Partisanship continues to play a big role in perceptions, with half of Republicans saying groceries are affordable in the latest poll, compared with about one-quarter of independents and Democrats.

Housing is even worse.

The median price of an existing home in the United States has now surpassed the $440,000 mark…

With a landmark housing affordability bill in political limbo, U.S. home prices have hit an all-time high.

The median price of existing homes in June was $440,660, up 1.8% from $432,700 a year ago, according to new data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). Home prices have risen for 36 straight months.

“Housing affordability remains low under slowing wage growth and stronger home price growth,” Ershang Liang, an economist with PNC Economics Research, said in a report.

Who can afford to pay that much for a house?

Rental prices have also gone through the roof.

If you can believe it, the average rent on a one bedroom apartment in Manhattan is now a whopping $5,408 a month…

The city’s housing crisis has hit “DefCon 1” — with average rents for a one-bedroom in Manhattan hitting an all-time high of nearly $5,500 last month, and Brooklyn following suit, according to new data and critics.

“We need bold action. This is a crisis,’’ New York City Comptroller Mark Levine posted on X over the weekend, along with a link to the latest figures from the inhabit blog by real-estate giant Corcoran Group.

The dismal June stats reveal that renters paid an average of $5,408 for a one-bedroom in Manhattan, with studio prices not far behind at $4,014.

It isn’t a mystery why most Americans are struggling in this sort of an environment.

Many are turning to debt in a desperate attempt to make ends meet…

Many American families are struggling to make ends meet on their incomes alone and have resorted to credit cards, payday loans, and Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) options for groceries, according to nonprofit research center Urban Institute.

The findings are based on a survey of 18-to 64-year-old working-age adults conducted in December 2025. About 8.7 percent of adults said they used a credit card for groceries and were unable to make the minimum payment, up from 7.1 percent in 2023, the Urban Institute said in a July 13 report. This suggests “worsening financial distress” among families.

Almost one in 10 used BNPL to pay for groceries, out of which more than a third missed a timely repayment last year.

Unfortunately, when you keep piling up debt a day of reckoning eventually arrives.

Coming into this year, alarmingly large numbers of Americans were getting behind on their credit cards…

And the number of foreclosures in the U.S. is way above the highly elevated pace that we witnessed last year…

Foreclosures across the U.S. ballooned in the first half of the year, a sign of the increasing financial strain facing the nation’s homeowners.

Foreclosure filings reached nearly 228,000 from January to June, up 21% from a year ago and 28% from two years ago, according to data released Thursday from real estate data company ATTOM.

Rising foreclosure rates indicate that more homeowners are in financial distress, Rob Barber, CEO of ATTOM, said in a statement. Homes go into foreclosure when the owner falls behind on mortgage payments, often due to extenuating life circumstances such as a job loss. ATTOM defines foreclosures as default notices, scheduled auctions or bank repossessions.

This reminds me so much of the conditions that we experienced just before the financial crisis of 2008.

Unfortunately, the cost of living is only going to go higher.

The cost of energy directly affects the cost of everything else, and it appears that the Strait of Hormuz is going to be closed for an extended period of time.

The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the U.S. has nearly reached four dollars again, and the average price of a gallon of diesel has already risen above the five dollar mark…

US gas prices have rocketed higher during the on-again, off-again war with Iran.

After a brief respite, the average price for gas has surged 15 cents in a week to $3.94 a gallon and appears headed north of $4 again. Diesel, which shows up in customers’ shipping costs, topped $5 a gallon again Thursday for the first time in 3 weeks, according to AAA.

It serves as a painful reminder of how the military conflict in the Persian Gulf has a direct effect on your wallet.

Of even greater importance is what the closure of the Strait of Hormuz means for the global fertilizer market.

As Mike Adams has pointed out, without sufficient quantities of nitrogen fertilizer we won’t even come close to producing enough food for everyone…

Admittedly, I have failed to explain the stakes clearly enough. For months, I have written about fertilizer supply chains, the Haber-Bosch process, and the vulnerability of the Strait of Hormuz. But the gravity of this crisis has not sunk in for most people. Let me put it as plainly as I can: The global population of more than 8 billion people depends on a fragile web of natural gas, oil, and downstream chemistry that took 60+ years to build on this planet. If we lose 25 percent of these critical substances, we lose 25 percent of the population. That is 2 billion people. Here is why that math is inescapable.

As I documented in my article “The Haber-Bosch House of Cards,” the single chemical reaction that fixes nitrogen from the air into fertilizer is responsible for feeding roughly half of humanity ^[1]. That process requires vast quantities of natural gas. The Persian Gulf region, especially Qatar and Iran, supplies much of that gas. When the Trump administration launched its war on Iran in February 2026 and the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed, the global fertilizer supply chain began to collapse. This is not a prediction of future famine. The famine is already baked in. But it could still get a whole lot worse depending on how things go from here.

We could be facing multiple years when global food production is at depressed levels.

That means that food prices will go even higher in wealthy countries, and in poor countries there will be shortages.

Famine is one of the major trends that I am tracking, and what we are already witnessing in some parts of Africa is absolutely heartbreaking.

There is no magic button that we can press that is going to make these problems go away.

A crisis of historic proportions is now upon us, and we are still only in the very early stages of it.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

Now we are going to get to see what really happens to the global economy when the Strait of Hormuz is completely closed for an extended period of time. Before the war, approximately 45 percent of all Asian oil imports traveled through the Strait of Hormuz. The Chinese normally get more oil from the Middle East than anyone else, and the amount of crude oil that they have been importing has collapsed. That is not sustainable for the Chinese, and they are getting very angry. At the same time, relentless drone attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure have forced the Russians to buy gasoline from India. If the Strait of Hormuz remains completely closed for months, global energy supplies will get extremely tight and the price of oil will go into unprecedented territory.

On Monday, the world was shocked when two oil tankers from the United Arab Emirates were struck by Iranian cruise missiles…

Iranian cruise missiles hit two oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, killing one crew member and injuring eight, the United Arab Emirates’ Ministry of Defense said Monday.

The attacks took place when the tankers — Mombasa and Al Bahiyah — were sailing through the strait’s southern shipping lane, which hugs the coast of Oman, the defense ministry said. Iran has insisted that commercial ships use a separate lane near the Iranian coastline and seek permission from Iranian authorities. Iran has not publicly commented on the apparent attacks.

The deceased crew member and six injured crew members were Indian nationals, and two of those injured were from Ukraine, according to the United Arab Emirates.

The Iranians have warned that any commercial vessels that attempt to travel through the Strait of Hormuz without their permission are subject to attack, and they were not bluffing.

On Tuesday, three Liberian-flagged oil tankers were also attacked by the Iranians…

Oman’s Maritime Security Center said Tuesday that three Liberian-flagged oil tankers were targeted in separate incidents off the Omani coast.

The center said the Al Bahyah, owned by Al Bahyah Inc. and based in the United Arab Emirates, was targeted about 9.6 nautical miles off the coast of Musandam Governorate.

A Royal Navy of Oman vessel is monitoring the situation, and 18 crew members were evacuated by nearby maritime vessels, while three crew members remain missing, officials said.

These attacks have brought traffic through the Strait of Hormuz to a standstill.

And that isn’t going to change any time soon, because the IRGC just announced that “as long as the US evil stays in the region, not a drop of oil and gas will be exported from the region”…

Amid ongoing cross-Gulf attacks today between Iranian and US forces, the IRGC says they targeted enemy weapons and parts storages in Bahrain and Kuwait. This after the US appeared to attack some critical Iranian infrastructure on coastal islands.

The IRGC has issued a fresh statement via state media on Tuesday, saying that “as long as the US evil stays in the region, not a drop of oil and gas will be exported from the region.”

Wow.

That is quite a strong statement.

Meanwhile, President Trump has decided to impose a “full blockade” on all ship traffic coming to and from Iran…

This is really happening.

Even before these latest moves, traffic through the Strait of Hormuz had fallen to the lowest level in five weeks…

Tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz dipped on Sunday to the lowest number in five weeks as the latest U.S.-Iran escalation reignited concerns among ship operators about safety at the key oil and LNG chokepoint.

Now that the Iranians have shown that they are quite serious about enforcing the closure of the Strait, it is highly unlikely that shipping companies will dare to test them.

Even the smallest oil tankers cost millions of dollars, and so if you own one you don’t want it getting sent to the bottom of the ocean by a cruise missile.

And the U.S. Navy is going to make sure that no Iranian oil gets shipped out of the region.

The U.S. blockade of Iran is really going to upset the Chinese, because they depend on that oil.

On Tuesday, they demanded the resumption of “normal and safe passage” through the Strait…

A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson demanded “normal and safe passage” be restored in the Strait of Hormuz Tuesday before the United States reinstated a naval blockade targeting Iranian ports.

Lin Jian made the remark when asked by Iranian state media about the renewed U.S. military blockade and if Beijing is “prepared to take any concrete steps to mitigate the impact of these measures against Iran and deepen its economic and military cooperation with Iran.” President Donald Trump said Monday he was reinstating the blockade because Iran broke the recent ceasefire deal by launching missile attacks on commercial tankers and by trying to shut down the Strait of Hormuz.

“China is deeply concerned over resumed military conflict in the Gulf region. China calls on relevant parties to heed the strong call for peace and stability from the region and beyond, remain calm and exercise restraint, safeguard the hard-won ceasefire, avoid the return of war and more importantly, prevent the fighting from spreading and hurting more innocent people,” Lin Jian said Tuesday.

The good news for the Chinese is that they have larger oil reserves than anyone else.

But the bad news is that China’s crude oil imports have fallen to exceedingly low levels…

China’s crude oil imports crashed to a decade-low in June as the reduced flows through the Strait of Hormuz hiked oil prices and reduced refiners’ appetite for costly crude.

Overall Chinese imports of crude oil plunged by 41.3% in June from a year earlier, to just 29.27 million tons, or 7.12 million barrels per day (bpd), according to official Chinese customs data released on Tuesday.

If this crisis goes on for long enough, China will be forced to do something to restore the flow of oil.

But unless one side chooses to back down, there is no chance that this crisis will end any time soon.

As a former Pentagon official named Jason H. Campbell has pointed out, bombing Iran from the air will not be enough to win the battle for the Strait of Hormuz…

“It’s very difficult to envision any scenario where you could satisfactorily secure the Strait of Hormuz absent ground forces,” Campbell said.

Doing so would require tens of thousand of troops, Campbell said, not only to take out Iran’s hidden munitions but to secure hundreds of miles of coastline and large swaths of inland territory. The U.S. troops would likely face insurgent attacks.

Standing up that kind of force would take a few months and include “very high costs,” Campbell said.

This is what I have been saying all along.

Hitting Iran from the air is not going to get the job done, but sending ground forces in is unthinkable.

So where do we go from here?

For now, the bombing of Iran continues.

On Tuesday the Iranians hit Bahrain with cluster munitions, and the U.S. response has already begun…

We are also being told that the U.S. is attacking Qeshm Island once again…

Projectiles hit Iran’s Gulf island of Qeshm near the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, Iran’s state broadcaster reported, citing local officials who blamed the U.S.

“At 19:00, a location on Qeshm Island was struck by projectiles from the American enemy,” Hormozgan governor’s office said, according to IRIB.

This is it.

Iran War 3 is here.

The IDF is not an active participant yet, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is telling the Iranians that they will get hit really hard if Israel is attacked…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Iran Tuesday that Israel would hit back if attacked.

“Do not count on things remaining quiet if you attack us,” Netanyahu said at a conference in Dimona, in Israel’s southeast, in a video released by his office. “The days are over when someone strikes us and we don’t hit back with a decisive blow.”

I think that it is just a matter of time before Iranian missiles are flying toward Israel once again.

And then things will get really crazy.

Speaking of crazy, the Houthis just bombarded an airport in Saudi Arabia after one of their own airports got bombed by the Saudis…

Meanwhile, the threat of Iranian-backed Houthis being dragged into the war was raised when Saudi Arabia said the militant group fired ballistic missiles and drones at a civilian airport in the kingdom’s southwestern city of Abha.

The attacks were the first major fighting since a 2022 truce that ended a seven-year conflict between northern Yemen’s Tehran-aligned rulers and several Arab countries.

The militant group had accused the Saudis of bombing its airport in the capital Sanaa to prevent the landing of a plane returning the Houthi delegation from the funeral of Iran’s slain leader, Ali Khamenei.

A full-blown war between the Houthis and the Saudis could erupt at any time.

And that could drag in Pakistan, because the Pakistanis recently signed a mutual defense pact with the Saudis…

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Tuesday in a post on X that Pakistan “strongly condemns” the Houthi ballistic missile attacks targeting southern Saudi Arabia, calling them a violation of the kingdom’s sovereignty and reaffirming Islamabad’s “unwavering support” for its security.

The time for talk is over.

I am convinced that we will soon witness some absolutely shocking escalations, and the Strait of Hormuz will be closed for an extended period of time.

This will be a real test of the resilience of the global economy.

Oil stockpiles are being steadily depleted, and once they get low enough there will be a tremendous amount of panic.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

There will be no negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz. There will only be fighting. The U.S. and Iran will now engage in an all-out war for control of the Strait of Hormuz, and the consequences will be felt by every man, woman and child on the entire planet. Traffic through the Strait will be paralyzed for the foreseeable future, and there will be a severe worldwide energy supply crunch as a result. Since neither side intends to surrender, the only way that the crisis ends is for one side to achieve military victory. The U.S. military cannot take out the Iranian missiles and drones that are threatening commercial traffic through the Strait from the air. If that was possible, it would have been done already. To fully eliminate the threat of Iranian missiles and drones, it would require either boots on the ground or nuclear war, and both of those options are unthinkable. So unless a negotiated solution somehow materializes out of thin air, we have got a giant mess on our hands that has no easy solution.

On Friday, President Trump gave the Iranians a 24 hour ultimatum.

The Iranians were told that they must declare the Strait of Hormuz to be completely open and they must stop attacking commercial ships.

In response, the Iranians rejected that ultimatum, they severely damaged a commercial vessel, and now they have declared the Strait of Hormuz to be closed…

“Due to recent hostile actions by the US forces, passage through the Strait of Hormuz is currently unfeasible,” Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority declared in a social media post Monday.

“As soon as stability and calm are restored, all applications will be reviewed in accordance with the scheduled timeline, and the permitting process will resume,” the PGSA added, reminding vessels that in Iran’s view, “the sole means of obtaining a passage permit” to transit the strait is through its website.

The PGSA was created by Iran during the war and Tehran insists that all commercial vessels wishing to transit the waterway seek permission via the agency and then use a northern route, close to Iran’s coast.

Once the Iranians rejected Trump’s ultimatum, it will inevitable that there would be military action, and over the weekend U.S. Central Command hit Iran really hard…

US forces decimated Iran’s drone and missile sites in their latest efforts to keep the Strait of Hormuz secure for transiting cargo ships.

US Central Command announced late Sunday night that American troops completed a new wave of ‘offensive strikes,’ hitting dozens of targets ‘to degrade Iran’s ability to continue attacking international shipping flowing through the Strait of Hormuz.’

‘The Strait of Hormuz is a vital maritime corridor for global trade,’ Central Command said. ‘Iran does not control it.’

Iran responded by launching retaliatory strikes and insisting, ‘The Strait of Hormuz is our territory.’

We are being told that U.S. Central Command struck approximately 140 targets inside Iran.

Of course the Iranians were going to strike back, and it is being reported that they targeted U.S. bases in Kuwait, Bahrain, Jordan and Oman…

US Central Command revealed US forces unleashed air-delivered munitions on dozens of Iranian air-defense systems, coastal radar systems, missile launch sites, and drone capabilities, bringing the weekend total to about 140 targets. This move aimed to degrade the IRGC’s ability to threaten commercial shipping in the Hormuz chokepoint, which it has done over the past week.

Iran responded with attacks on US-linked facilities in Kuwait, Bahrain, Jordan, and Oman, while also claiming it intercepted two vessels using what it called an “illegal route” through Hormuz.

A large pillar of smoke was seen rising from the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain.

There is no turning back now, and Trump just escalated matters by reinstating the naval blockade on all Iranian ports…

“We are reinstating the THE IRANIAN BLOCKADE, so named because it is only stopping Iran’s ships or customers from entering or leaving. All other countries will have fair and open use of the Strait,” Trump said in a post on his social media platform.

But that wasn’t all that Trump said.

In an absolutely shocking post on his Truth Social Account, Trump also announced that everyone else will be charged a rate of 20 percent on all cargo shipped to pass through the Strait of Hormuz…

We have never seen anything even remotely close to this before.

Trump told Fox News that the U.S. will get paid “a lot of money” for guarding the Strait…

President Trump said Monday, speaking with Fox News, that the U.S. would not only take control of the Strait of Hormuz, but that other countries – which he did not name but he implied were the Persian Gulf energy producers – would pay the U.S. for securing it.

“We’ll become the guardian of the strait. Maybe we’ll call it ‘the Guardian Angel of the Strait,’ and we should be reimbursed for that. When we do that, we’re going to be reimbursed, because the other nations are very wealthy; they’re on our side, and we can’t be expected to do that for nothing,” Mr. Trump said in the phone interview.

He claimed the U.S. had “guarded the strait for 50 years, more, and we never got paid for it,” saying other nations “made all the money … We guarded it for nothing, and now we’re going to guard it. We’re going to get paid for guarding it, a lot of money.”

To guard commercial traffic going through the Strait, the U.S. will have to take out the underground missile cities where Iran is hiding their missiles and drones from our airstrikes.

That would take boots on the ground, and supposedly that was an option that was not even being considered.

Until the threat of Iranian missiles and drones is eliminated, very little traffic will be getting through the Strait of Hormuz.

On Sunday, just 14 commercial vessels passed through the Strait…

Ship traffic has fallen steeply in the Strait of Hormuz over the last week, after Iranian attacks on commercial vessels sparked renewed fighting between Washington and Tehran.

Fourteen ships transited Hormuz on Sunday, four of which were crude oil tankers, a decline of about 60% compared to the 37 vessels that crossed the same day last week, according to data from the trade intelligence firm Kpler.

Before the war, approximately 120 to 130 commercial vessels would pass through the Strait each day.

The flow of oil, natural gas, fertilizer and other essential commodities will be seriously interrupted until this crisis is over.

And that could be a while, because the fighting with Iran threatens to spark a major regional conflict.

In fact, it appears that Saudi Arabia just bombed Sanaa International Airport in Yemen…

The Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen accuse Saudi Arabia of carrying out airstrikes at Sanaa Airport in the capital.

“In a blatant and unjust aggression, the criminal Saudi enemy carried out a number of airstrikes targeting Sanaa International Airport, thereby ending the period of de-escalation and bearing responsibility for the consequences of its aggression,” Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree says in a statement.

“We affirm that this aggression will not go unanswered or unpunished,” he adds.

The Houthis have pledged to retaliate, and that could potentially include strikes on Saudi oil facilities…

The Houthis are also threatening to completely shut down the Bab al-Mandab Strait…

We could potentially be just hours away from all-out war between Saudi Arabia and Yemen.

That would certainly begin another frightening new chapter in the crisis in the Middle East.

I kept warning my readers that there wasn’t going to be peace in the Middle East, and now that is becoming obvious to everyone.

Meanwhile, the U.S. political establishment is dealing with the sudden death of U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham.

Apparently he was planning to seek medical attention shortly before he died…

• A person who spoke with Graham shortly afterward said the senator complained that he was feeling unwell. When the person urged him to seek medical attention immediately, Graham said he would do so Sunday morning after his scheduled appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
• Graham then joked: “I can’t die now. I still need to do the Russia sanctions, get Iran sorted out and do Israeli-Saudi normalization.”
• He passed away several hours later.

There is a lot of speculation that a foreign power may have been involved in Graham’s death.

If that could be proven, it would change everything.

For now, we are being told that his heart was the cause of his death…

US Senator Lindsey Graham’s preliminary cause of death has been divulged following an investigation by the DC Medical Examiner.

Per a statement issued by Graham’s office just before 5:00pm EST on Sunday, ‘Aortic Dissection due to Arteriosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease,’ was the cause of his ‘sudden’ passing.

‘The death certificate will be PENDING until all the toxicological and microscopic testing are finalized, and at that point the death certificate will be updated to reflect the cause of death and appropriately classify the manner of death,’ Graham’s spokesperson added in the statement.

We live at a time when absolutely crazy things are happening nearly every day.

For a long time, most people in the western world were able to ignore global events because they weren’t being directly affected by them.

But now we have reached a stage where everyone is going to be deeply affected by the stunning events that are occurring on the other side of the globe.

The pace of change is about to go into overdrive, and so I would encourage you to hold on tight as we plunge into an abyss of uncertainty.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

We knew that this wasn’t over. The ill-fated “Memorandum of Understanding” may have delayed the inevitable, but now the ceasefire is dead and fighting is raging throughout the Middle East all over again. Sadly, we shall soon see just how far both sides are willing to escalate matters. In my opinion, we are going to witness some absolutely shocking escalations in the months ahead. None of the parties involved in this war have any intention of backing down, and I am convinced that some very shocking “surprises” are ahead.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, U.S. forces pounded dozens of important Iranian military targets…

US strikes on Iran over the last 48 hours have targeted Iran’s military assets near the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway responsible for one-fifth of the world’s oil supply.

Various Iranian air defense systems, drones, regime speed boats, and missile storage sites have been destroyed, according to US Central Command. US officials claim that the strikes are designed to stop Iran from attacking commercial shipping vessels crossing the strait.

U.S. Central Command is telling us that a total of 170 targets were hit.

These airstrikes were far more extensive than what we witnessed near the end of last month, and the Iranian response has been much larger as well.

In fact, in recent hours the Iranians have launched missiles and drones at bases in Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Jordan…

Just as the US nighttime strikes were significantly bigger than prior rounds in June, so has Iran’s ‘retaliation’ been bigger – chiefly on Gulf states and American bases there.

In the overnight and Thursday daytime hours, Iranian ballistic missiles and drones have targeted Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and even faraway Jordan. The country is reporting that it has intercepted several missiles, which targeted Muwaffaq Salti Air Base – jointly operated by US and Jordanian forces. Oil prices have persisted above prewar levels on Thursday.

If Iran was ready to stop shooting, it appears that the U.S. was willing to stop shooting as well…

Unfortunately, the Iranians didn’t stop shooting.

Instead, they seem quite eager to fight.

In fact, on Thursday the Iranians have just kept on striking more targets…

Iran has launched fresh strikes on US targets today, following a second night of strikes between the two countries last night.

The fragile ceasefire between the two countries was ruptured earlier this week when the US accused Iran of targeting commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.

Apparently the “ports of some Arab countries” are being targeted in this latest round of attacks…

I really wish that the Iranians would show some restraint.

But that isn’t likely to happen at this stage.

Meanwhile, there have been rumors of more U.S. airstrikes in Iran…

The U.S. is denying that it conducted those strikes.

So if it wasn’t the U.S., who was it?

There are reports that Kuwait and Bahrain actually decided to conduct “a joint strike operation”…

This would be a major development if it is true.

If other Gulf nations have decided that now is the time to directly fight Iran, that could greatly expand the scope of the conflict.

It is being reported that the renewed fighting has interrupted the final stage of the funeral procession for Ayatollah Khamenei…

The chaos from the latest US-Iran strikes has delayed the final stage of the funeral procession for slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to the New York Times.

Hundreds of thousands of mourners in recent days have taken to the streets of Tehran to mourn the death of the country’s notorious dictator.

Khamenei was set to be buried in his hometown, the holy city of Mashhad, on Thursday, but the burial was delayed as strikes rang out nearby.

This multi-day funeral procession has whipped the Iranians into a frenzy, and it would be difficult to overstate how angry they are at this moment.

I don’t think that there is any turning back now.

President Trump has been trying to do everything that he can think of to resolve the crisis in the Middle East, but so far nothing has worked…

President Trump has used every tactic in the book to wind down his war with Iran. Threats (he threatened the end of their civilization). Cajoling (he offered them hundreds of billions of dollars). Loosely worded interim deals (there have been at least two, the April ceasefire and then the June memorandum of understanding).

But none of it has worked. Iran has continued attacking ships in the Strait of Hormuz. This week, Trump took away Iran’s ability to sell oil. He’s bombing dozens of sites in the country. Iran is launching attacks at Bahrain and Kuwait, where there are U.S. bases. The stock market is falling. And oil prices are spiking.

Is it a full-blown war again? Hard to tell. But it’s sliding toward ugly.

So where do we go from here?

Trump was supposed to get an important intelligence briefing at 1 PM eastern time…

It appears that the U.S. is willing to fight to break Iran’s control of the Strait of Hormuz.

As a result, now the Iranians have some key decisions to make…

So, the immediate choice to go up or down the escalation ladder lies with Iran. If Tehran deescalates, they cede control of Hormuz. If they escalate, their options are to hit Hormuz more – triggering more US counter strikes; or GCC energy – triggering a larger war; to use (battered) proxies like Hezbollah – triggering wider war; or perhaps to rush for a nuclear weapon – which would mean far worse war. The New York Times reports Iran’s president and foreign minister were physically attacked this week by supporters of a hard-line faction that vehemently opposes any deal with the US: it remains to be seen if the streets, IRGC, clerics, or politicians will decide what happens next – but both the politicians and the IRGC benefit from talks going on and oil flowing.

The US would also have to decide if it can afford to cede Hormuz or will fight to keep it open when the SPR is seen near a tank bottom– was this discussed at the NATO summit, perhaps?

I don’t think that there is any way that the Iranians will back down.

So there will be a lot more fighting, and Israel is apparently ready to join in if needed…

Israel is willing to join future US attacks on Iran should Washington seek help after President Trump declared the cease-fire with Tehran “over,” sources in Jerusalem told The Post.

“We’ve proved that we stand with the US,” one source said. “I’m not sure it will be the interest of them — of the US that Israel will join on this — but, you know, we realize that we need to stretch our muscles.”

“We’re willing to do it again, if needed,” the person added.

I have no doubt that this is true.

In fact, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz just confirmed that the IDF is ready to hit Iran “with even greater force” this time around…

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Thursday said his country was prepared to resume its military campaign against Iran if needed, vowing to do so “with even greater force.”

The latest remarks came as new fighting erupted between the United States and Iran, raising fears of a return to full-scale war after an April ceasefire and a U.S.-Iran agreement in June to end hostilities.

“The army is ready and on alert for a resumption of fighting, in order to regain air superiority and strike again … in Iran, to eliminate threats, including a third time if necessary,” Katz said at a military ceremony.

“If we have to go back, we will go back, with even greater force,” he added.

Israel is not going to be on the sidelines for long.

What all of this means is that the Strait of Hormuz is going to be closed for the foreseeable future.

The Iranians have not officially shut it completely down yet, but even now barely any commercial vessels are getting through…

Barely any oil tankers have been passing through the Strait of Hormuz since the US and Iran renewed their fighting in earnest earlier this week.

This morning, July 9, only two tankers had made it through, according to Reuters. One of them loaded in Iran and is subject to US sanctions. The other carries a flag for the Marshall Islands. On July 8, at least four oil and gas tankers turned around instead of risking being attacked in the Strait of Hormuz, according to Reuters.

The next chapter of the global energy crisis has begun, and it is going to be even more intense than the last chapter.

And the fighting in the Middle East will ultimately escalate to a level that will shock the entire planet.

We have been waiting for Iran War 3, and now it is here.

Even as I wrap up this article, missiles and drones are flying all over the Middle East.

We are falling through the air with no parachute, and this story is going to have an absolutely crazy ending.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

A lot can happen in 48 hours. Just two days ago, things were relatively calm in the Middle East and global financial markets were humming along. But now everything has changed. Just like that, the ceasefire is over, the price of oil is soaring and stock prices are plummeting. It appears that all-out war in the Middle East is the scenario that we are now facing, and that has all sorts of crazy implications. I cannot even begin to describe how serious this is. The possibility of a peace agreement kept both sides from really pushing things over the edge for a long time. Now that there is no longer any hope for peace, events could spiral out of control very quickly.

The Iranians never should have started attacking commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz again.

That was such a foolish thing for them to do.

Everyone knew that this would provoke a very strong response from the United States, and that is precisely what occurred.

After the U.S. military hit more than 80 targets in Iran, the Iranians struck back by targeting U.S. facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait…

US Central Command said they struck over 80 targets as ‘punishment’ for three tankers coming under fire from the regime. Iran responded with strikes targeting Bahrain and Kuwait.

Many were hoping that things would calm down after this exchange, but that obviously did not happen.

In fact, President Trump just publicly declared that the ceasefire with Iran is over…

Trump, asked by reporters about the ceasefire, had said “for me, I think it’s over.”

He then added: “It’s just a waste of time dealing with them.” Along with his comments about Iran, Trump repeated his complaints he had made previously about NATO at the alliance summit for not helping the U.S. in the Iran war.

Trump also accused Tehran of misusing the recent period of funeral ceremonies and mourning for the late Supreme Leader Ali Khameini, who was killed in U.S.-led strikes on February 28.

“They asked for a timeout, they wanted to go to the funeral of Khamenei and I said give it to them, and they start shooting missiles,” Trump said.

But that wasn’t all that Trump said.

He also warned that “we’re going to hit them hard again tonight”…

Speaking to reporters at a NATO summit in Turkey, alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President Trump said the U.S. would probably hit Iran with a deluge of strikes again Wednesday evening.

“They are behaving very badly, as they have for 47 years,” he said, adding that the U.S. hit Iran “hard last night” after Iran launched “a couple of drones and one rocket” at ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

“And so we hit them very hard last night,” he said. “Very, very hard. Probably hit them hard again tonight. I’ll give them a little warning, we’re going to hit them hard again tonight.”

The war is back on, and I fully expect it to escalate to an entirely new level.

In response to Trump’s comments, the Iranians have declared that the “Memorandum of Understanding” is dead…

Wow.

I was quite stunned when I first read that.

In addition, the Iranians are threatening to immediately halt all traffic through the Strait of Hormuz if the U.S. conducts more strikes…

Iran will “immediately” close the Strait of Hormuz to all traffic if the country is attacked again, the state-owned Press TV network said Wednesday, quoting an unnamed regime source. The report said Iran would retaliate for any U.S. strikes by attacking twice as many targets.

I will be watching what the Iranians do tonight very closely.

An IRGC spokesperson has ominously warned that “the next move will disregard any red lines”…

If the Iranians target key energy production facilities throughout the Persian Gulf region, they could do an immense amount of damage.

Fully rebuilding and repairing the facilities that Iran already hit earlier in the year will take years, but most oil and natural gas facilities in the region are still operational.

If Iran was able to take out a significant portion of the oil and natural gas facilities that are still operational, it would plunge the world into a nightmarish energy crisis for the foreseeable future.

Investors know this, and this is just one of the reasons why the price of oil suddenly spiked today.

Meanwhile, stock prices are way down as I write this article.

A moment of reckoning really is approaching for the global economy, because oil stockpiles have just continued to get tighter and tighter…

If that crude stops flowing, that could create significant problems for America’s oil market.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, America’s emergency stockpile of oil, has been drawn down significantly since the war broke out to help replace all those barrels of oil lost in the strait. The SPR is now at 319.5 million barrels, down 23% from its pre-war level and at its lowest point since the Reagan administration started filling it in 1983.

That puts the United States in a precarious position if it faces severe weather or another full closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Perhaps more crucially, commercial stockpiles remain at critical levels. Inventories in Cushing, Oklahoma, the pipeline crossroads of America, remain below operational stress levels.

There was hope that we could avoid widespread shortages and rationing.

Some commercial traffic was getting through the Strait of Hormuz, and many were optimistic that the U.S. and Iran would soon sign a permanent deal to end the war.

Needless to say, that wave of optimism is now gone.

Meanwhile, Russia is also facing a historic energy crisis because Ukraine keeps striking their oil and natural gas facilities…

Anger is growing in Russia over lengthy lines at gas stations nationwide, with Vladimir Putin forced to acknowledge a fuel crisis in a rare public admission of weakness.

More than four years into the Russian president’s invasion of Ukraine, Kyiv’s relentless attacks on Putin’s oil refineries are being felt across the country. Russia, one of the world’s largest oil producers, has struggled to produce enough fuel to meet domestic demand. Meanwhile, wholesale fuel prices have risen, and rationing has been introduced in several regions.

Russia normally exports a great deal of oil, but now they have been forced to start importing it.

What a mess.

If the Strait of Hormuz ends up being closed for an extended period of time, how will the global economy possibly function normally?

The U.S. has been the supplier of last resort in recent months, and as a result we have been rapidly running through the cushion that we had.

It appears that we are just weeks away from a major supply crunch.

So many of the scenarios that I specifically warned about are starting to play out right in front of our eyes.

Once we go tumbling over the edge, there will be no way back.

History is making a major turn in July 2026, but most people in the general population still don’t seem to realize what is happening.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

Those that boldly proclaimed that the global energy crisis was over have been proven dead wrong. Within the past 24 hours, the Iranians have attacked numerous commercial vessels that were attempting to travel through the Strait of Hormuz. The Iranians have told the world over and over again that traffic through the Strait of Hormuz will never go back to the way that it was before the war, and they mean it. Any commercial vessels that want to go through the Strait must get permission from Iran and they must travel a very specific route that has been authorized by the Iranians. Any vessels that do not meet those requirements are subject to attack.

The rest of the world can never accept permanent Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz, and that is just one of the reasons why this war is far from over.

For now, the Iranians are running the show in the Strait, and CNN is reporting that three commercial vessels have been attacked…

Iran fired on three commercial vessels Tuesday in Oman’s territorial waters near the Strait of Hormuz, according to a US official.

The official described the strikes as a “gross violation” of the memorandum of understanding with Iran. The third strike had not previously been reported. The US has a broad range of potential responses to the alleged violations and is considering all of them, according to the official.

I agree that this is a very serious violation of the Memorandum of Understanding.

But the Iranians are going to keep doing it until somebody forces them to stop.

Just a little while ago, there were reports that a fourth commercial vessel has now been attacked by Iran…

These guys are not bluffing.

Just two days ago, the Iranians once again made it very clear that any commercial vessels that attempted to travel through the Strait of Hormuz using the “Omani route” would be subject to attack…

On Sunday, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned that its navy deployed patrol boats to block the “Omani route,” Iranian media and a Telegram channel affiliated with the IRGC said. In its report on the alleged attack, Iran’s Fars News Agency cited its sources as claiming the tanker had been attempting to transit the “Omani route.”

When your enemies tell you exactly what they intend to do, you should believe them.

In response to the latest attacks, the Trump administration has already “revoked a waiver allowing Iran to sell oil and petrochemicals”…

The Treasury Department on Tuesday afternoon revoked a waiver allowing Iran to sell oil and petrochemicals, prohibiting Iran from a significant revenue source negotiated during recent talks and again escalating the tensions between the two sides.

The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said the action is effective Tuesday. The waiver the U.S. issued last month as part of the 14-point memorandum of understanding allowed Iran to sell oil as talks continued.

It is likely that this won’t be the only response.

Many are expecting renewed U.S. military action against Iran in the coming hours.

The Memorandum of Understanding is coming apart at the seams right in front of our eyes, and President Trump has warned that if Iran doesn’t make a deal he will “finish the job”…

“And it won’t be tough to finish the job. I’d rather make a deal because I don’t want to affect 91 million people,” the President said.

“We can knock down their bridges in one hour. We can knock out their energy supply. All of those big plants that they built, big, beautiful, modern plants. They had a lot of money. They don’t have any money now. We haven’t given them any money. But we can knock out their electricity and power-generating plants in, I would say, a small part of an afternoon. Every plant will be gone, and they know that.”

Unfortunately, no negotiations between the United States and Iran are happening right now, and the Iranians are warning that they won’t even begin if Trump keeps making threats…

Iran’s foreign minister said Tuesday that Tehran will not resume negotiations if threats continue, a day after President Trump said the U.S. would “finish the job” if no peace deal is struck.

In a social media post, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said neither the Iranian people nor the Islamic Republic’s military would be “moved by any threats,” without referencing Mr. Trump’s comments specifically.

“Negotiations on final Deal will not commence if threats continue,” Araghchi warned, citing the memorandum of understanding signed by President Trump and his Iranian counterpart in mid-June, which calls for both sides to “refrain from the threat or use of force against each other.”

I don’t mean to spoil the ending for those of you that still want to be surprised, but there isn’t going to be peace in the Middle East.

And that means that the global energy crisis is going to continue to intensify.

Last week, the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve dropped to the lowest level that we have seen since April 1983…

The United States is burning through its emergency oil stash at a pace that hasn’t been seen in over four decades. Strategic Petroleum Reserve inventories have dropped to 319.5 million barrels as of July 3, the lowest level since April 1983.

The most recent weekly draw pulled 6.2 million barrels out of the reserve, part of a broader government initiative to release up to 172 million barrels. The goal: address global supply gaps driven by the ongoing conflict with Iran and try to keep domestic fuel prices from spiraling further out of control.

This is not good news at all.

On Friday, I shared a tweet from Chris Martenson with my paid subscribers that contained some extremely alarming numbers…

This is how close to disaster we really are at this stage.

Commercial oil inventories in the U.S. also continue to decline…

U.S. crude stocks fell to their lowest last week since 2018 as domestic refinery demand rose, while gasoline inventories also fell ahead of the July 4 holiday weekend, the Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday. Commercial crude inventories fell by 3.8 million barrels to 408.4 million barrels last week, the lowest level since September 2018, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 4.5 million-barrel draw.

We had a very large cushion when the war with Iran began.

Now that cushion is much, much smaller.

If you would like to get an idea of where things could eventually be heading, just check out what has happened to gasoline prices in Alaska…

John Stelling had just cranked the digits of his fuel pump to $9.10 at his gas station in this remote Alaskan community when he realized he had a problem. Could he push the meter to $10 if he had to?

“Not sure if it’ll handle those,” he said of double-digit fuel prices.

In rural Alaska, the war with Iran has led to some of the highest fuel prices in the nation. Remote towns and villages aren’t connected to the road system, so they pay hefty premiums to procure gasoline, heating oil and diesel for cranking out electricity.

When I was in my early twenties, there were times when I would keep running my vehicle even though the gas gauge was sitting on empty.

That was a very foolish thing to do.

But now we are literally doing the same thing as a nation.

The party is about to end my friends.

The final countdown is upon us, and things are going to get so crazy in the months ahead.

Sadly, even though what is transpiring in the Middle East should be obvious to everyone, most people in the western world are still convinced that everything will work out just fine somehow.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

Global weather patterns have begun to resemble a Hollywood disaster movie, and the mainstream media is starting to admit what many of us have known all along. Thanks to the “Super El Niño” that is now upon us, the second half of this year is going to be really crazy. Europe was just hit by the worst heatwave that it has ever experienced. Throughout all of last week, I was writing about the “mega heat dome” that brought unprecedented temperatures to many areas of the east coast. As I write this article, an absolutely colossal storm is causing apocalyptic damage in the Pacific Ocean, and a severe lack of rainfall threatens to cause a horrifying shortage of rice in India. It is often the case that the mainstream media needlessly freaks out about things, but in this case they are right on target.

I wish that I was exaggerating about the power of this Super El Niño, but I am not.

Every El Niño brings higher temperatures, but this one is really baking us…

We’re officially in an El Niño year, and as predicted, it’s a scorcher.

Record temperatures are already being recorded around the world, from the streets of New York to the icy shelves of the Antarctic. Even the surface waters of the world’s waterways are under unprecedented stress from the heat, with the average global ocean temperature breaking the all-time record high for the month of June.

We are less than a month into this El Niño.

How bad will conditions be once we get a few months down the road?

Even CNN is calling it “a Super El Niño”, and they are openly warning that “computer models are predicting this El Niño could be stronger than any other event”…

El Niño is poised to rapidly strengthen in the tropical Pacific Ocean during the next few months and is forecast to reach the upper echelon of intensity by the time it peaks in late fall to early winter, forecasters warn.

It’s already being referred to colloquially as a Super El Niño. Only a handful of events have reached that level of intensity in the last few decades, with the most recent one occurring in 2015 to 2016.

But now some computer models are predicting this El Niño could be stronger than any other event, back to at least 1950. “I think it’s fair to say that, depending on [the] model, the forecasts are close to unprecedented,” said Michael Tippett, an atmospheric scientist at Columbia University, in an email.

CNN is not supposed to run articles like this.

But they just did.

One expert that CNN interviewed explained that the projections for the intensity of this El Niño have been getting higher each month…

“The consensus is definitely shifting towards an even stronger event,” said Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist who is closely following El Niño model projections.

“The model runs have been consistently showing higher probabilities for a very strong event compared to a few months ago, and every month sees higher estimates,” he said. “Currently, the odds of seeing a record-strong El Niño event this year are quite large.”

It has become clear that this El Niño is going to dwarf any El Niño that has come before.

It is even going to surpass the Super El Niño of 1877-1878 that resulted in 50 million people starving to death.

India always receives less rain during an El Niño, and rainfall in many key rice producing areas is already way below normal…

The warning comes during India’s kharif planting season, when crops such as rice and maize depend heavily on the southwest monsoon. El Niño can weaken the summer monsoon across much of India, putting rainfed crops under stress during a critical growing period, the FAO said.

Between June 1 and 22, half of India had received deficient rainfall (-20% to -59% below the expected normal), while nearly a quarter had recorded large deficient rainfall (-60% to -99% less than the expected normal), according to the categories used by the India Meteorological Department (IMD).

The FAO analysis, based on 41 years of satellite data from its Agricultural Stress Index System, identifies a broad belt of elevated drought risk across Asia — from Pakistan and India through Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, and further east to the Philippines, Indonesia and Timor-Leste.

The world is not going to grow enough rice this year.

In fact, the amount of rice grown won’t even be close to enough to feed everyone.

That is very troubling news, because more than half of the population of the world is heavily dependent on rice…

Over half the world’s population relies on rice. India and China grow more than half of the world’s supply, and rice supplies more than half of all daily calories in countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia.

Poorer households spend the largest share of income on food, so price spikes hit them first and hardest. In 2007-08, rice prices roughly tripled, food riots broke out in dozens of countries, and in Haiti, the unrest helped bring down the prime minister. Securing rice is about more than food – it underpins public order.

During this “Super El Niño”, some parts of the planet will experience drought, while others will get hammered by absolutely gigantic storms.

Just hours ago, a monstrous “super typhoon” with frighteningly high winds absolutely pummeled the island of Rota…

A “super typhoon” with equivalent force to a category-5 hurricane made landfall on the U.S. island of Rota in the Pacific on Monday, the National Weather Service said, warning of “catastrophic damage and (a) life threatening situation.”

“The western eyewall of Super Typhoon Bavi is currently moving over the island of Rota. The latest forecast intensity is at 180 mph (290 kph) as it passes over Rota,” the NWS said. “Catastrophic winds exceeding 150 mph will continue across Rota during eyewall passage.”

The weather system also brought extremely strong winds and lashing rain to other parts of the Northern Marianas and the nearby separate U.S. territory of Guam, collectively home to around 210,000 people.

Nearly every structure on Rota has been flattened.

According to the National Weather service, the island will be “uninhabitable for weeks”…

Before the NWS had said that a direct hit on Rota would make most of the island “uninhabitable for weeks, perhaps longer. Many non-concrete, non-reinforced homes will be destroyed, with total roof failure and wall collapse.”

“Nearly all trees will be snapped or uprooted and power poles downed. Fallen trees and power poles will isolate residential areas. Power outages will last for weeks to possibly months,” it said.

How would you like to be without power for months?

Now Super Typhoon Bavi is headed for Taiwan and China…

Bavi is expected to produce destructive wind gusts around Taiwan and across eastern China from Friday into Monday. Wind gusts up to 160 mph (260 km/h), with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 200 mph (320 km/h), are anticipated and will result in power outages, structural damage and logistical delays.

The super typhoon is expected to maintain its intensity or strengthen slightly as it tracks west-northwest through at least Thursday, July 9, local time. Bavi is expected to impact Taiwan and eastern China from Friday into Monday.

More giant storms are coming as 2026 rolls along.

You can count on that.

Meanwhile, the weather has been so hot and so dry in Europe, and this has produced ideal conditions for huge wildfires to erupt…

Thousands of people were evacuated in southern France on Monday as ‘catastrophic’ wildfires ravaged the region, while poisonous clouds swept through Greece and Costa Brava in Spain was put on alert.

It comes as temperatures across Europe are on the rise again, predicted to reach 40C in parts still suffering the aftermath of a recent record-breaking heatwave.

Hundreds of firefighters are battling blazes that have devastated more than 19,000 hectares (42,000 acres) of land – an area more than twice the size of Manhattan – across Portugal, Spain, France and Greece.

This is no ordinary heatwave.

Week after week, Europe is getting absolutely cooked, and a lot of people are dying. For example, just check out what has been happening in the Netherlands…

More than 3,500 people died in the Netherlands during last week’s extreme heat, according to provisional mortality figures from the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). The number is about 16 percent higher than what was expected, based on seasonal trends.

RIVM said there were around 480 excess deaths compared with expected levels, with most fatalities among people aged 80 and older. Proportionally, the highest impact was seen in the east and south of the Netherlands, where temperatures were highest during the heat period.

The RIVM noted that the figures are not yet complete, as it can take several weeks for deaths to be officially registered.

Of course people have been dying from the heat in the U.S. as well.

At this point, we are being told that at least 25 residents of New Jersey have died as a result of heat exposure just since Thursday…

At least 25 people died in New Jersey since Thursday amid a sweltering heat wave.

Temperatures soared into the triple digits over the Fourth of July holiday weekend in New Jersey, New York, DC and other East Coast states.

Power outages in New Jersey and New York reportedly affected 1 million customers.

According to officials, many of the deceased were found in their homes with no air conditioning.

After experiencing an extremely hot weekend, now the east coast is facing the threat of severe flash flooding…

A life-threatening flash flood threat is increasing for nearly 60 million people across the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and southern New England, with more rounds of heavy rain expected to soak the region through Monday night.

Heavy rain and thunderstorms from this weekend saturated the soil across the region, creating prime conditions for flash flooding Monday, particularly in the New York City metro area.

All over the world, this “Super El Niño” is going to produce monster storms, extreme heat and severe drought in 2026.

We were already experiencing a worldwide food crisis before this “Super El Niño” came along, and so there is no way that we are going to avoid very serious global food shortages.

In fact, the number of people on our planet that are experiencing acute hunger was already at an all-time record high before the war with Iran started.

What we are facing is not a theoretical disaster that may or may not happen someday.

It is happening right now.

We are in far more trouble than most people realize, and we are going to witness so much chaos in the months ahead.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

Did you know that the number of Americans that are out of work right now is far higher than it was at any point during the Great Recession? I know that sounds crazy, but I will prove it to you in this article. A whopping 111 million Americans do not have a job, and we are spending more than a trillion dollars a year on the social safety net that supports them. Of course we cannot afford to do this, because the national debt has already reached 39 trillion dollars and it is growing at an astounding rate. If we do not fix our economy, disaster is inevitable.

The bureaucrats in Washington keep telling us that the unemployment rate is low even though there are vast numbers of adults all around us that are not working.

The way that they are able to do this is by dumping almost everyone that is not working into a category known as “not in labor force”.

This allows them to keep the official rate of unemployment suppressed even as the labor force participation rate hits an insanely low level…

On the surface, a June drop in the unemployment rate helped provide some upside to what was an otherwise downbeat jobs report — but it was for all the wrong reasons.

That’s because the decline in the jobless level to 4.2%, the lowest in a year, came largely from an exodus of workers from the labor force, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics data Thursday.

In fact, the measure of the working-age population either employed or looking for a job slid to 61.5%, the lowest since March 2021. Excluding the Covid-era jobs market, it was the lowest labor force participation rate in exactly 50 years.

Today, there are just over 7 million Americans that are officially unemployed.

That doesn’t sound bad at all.

But they rarely mention those that are considered to be not in the labor force. This is how the Federal Reserve defines that category…

Persons who are neither employed nor unemployed are not in the labor force. This category includes retired persons, students, those taking care of children or other family members, and others who are neither working nor seeking work.

As you can see from the chart below, the number of people that they have been dumping into that category has grown dramatically since 1990.

Right now, there are 104 million Americans that do not have a job that are considered to be not in the labor force…

When you add the 7 million Americans that are officially unemployed to the 104 million Americans that are considered to be not in the labor force, you get a grand total of 111 million Americans that do not have a job right now.

At no point during the Great Recession did that combined figure ever reach 100 million.

That is how bad things are in the U.S. at this moment.

Of course the 111 million Americans that are not working need to be supported somehow.

Some of them are supported by other family members that have incomes coming in.

But most of them are either partially or totally supported by our social safety net.

According to the House Ways and Means Committee, we spend more than a trillion dollars a year on more than 80 different social safety net programs…

Buying Americans out of poverty is undermining incentives to work, with families living in poverty relying more on taxpayer-funded welfare checks than income from work, according to a newly released report from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Costing well over $1 trillion, America’s social safety net encompasses more than 80 federal programs, and is discouraging beneficiaries from seeking income from work.

The report, which was requested by Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (MO-08), shows low-income families are becoming increasingly dependent on government transfers. In 1979, families living below the poverty line earned about 60 percent of their income from work. In 2021, that number dropped to an all-time low of around 25 percent. The report also shows how the dramatic increase in dependency on government transfers for low-income families was accelerated by COVID-era benefits.

Read that first paragraph again.

I had no idea that it was this bad.

For over a decade I have been writing about America’s ongoing economic collapse, and now we have reached a very advanced stage.

If the federal government was not supporting them, tens of millions more Americans would be living in poverty right now.

So what would our society look like if we stopped borrowing gigantic mountains of money to fuel this system?

And each day, even more Americans are losing their places in the middle class because they are getting laid off.

In fact, it is being reported that Microsoft is preparing for yet another round of massive layoffs…

Microsoft is reportedly planning another round of layoffs, expected to be announced as early as next week.

The cuts will impact thousands of roles across sales, consulting, and the Xbox gaming division. Total layoffs will amount to less than 2.5%% of the company’s workforce.

Microsoft employs roughly 220,000 people across the globe. The company eliminated approximately 15,000 positions just last year — 6,000 layoffs in May 2025 and another 9,000 layoffs in July 2025.

But if we just throw the entire country into the “not in labor force” category, we can pretend that the unemployment rate is at 0.0 percent and that everything is just fine, right?

What a joke.

Of course most Americans that are actually working are really struggling these days.

Home prices in the U.S. have risen by about 60 percent since the beginning of the last pandemic, and at this stage housing in the U.S. is more unaffordable than it has ever been before…

Home prices have grown by roughly 60 percent since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to JP Morgan data. Mortgage rates are historically high, and have been so since 2022. And the U.S. homeownership rate hit its lowest level since 2019 last year, at 65 percent, according to Census data.

“I think right now the housing market is pretty unprecedented,” Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at Redfin, told Newsweek. “We have the highest home prices that have ever been on record, along with pretty high mortgage rates. The mortgage rates aren’t the highest we’ve seen on record—they exceeded 18 percent in 1981—but they are higher than they have been for the last 10 years or so.

“And so housing affordability has gotten really bad, especially for young people who don’t already own homes. Breaking into the housing market is incredibly tough.”

How are young adults supposed to purchase homes in this environment?

Home prices have risen far faster than incomes have, and this has “put homeownership out of reach for millions of millennial and Gen Z Americans”…

Back in 1975, a typical home cost about 2.4 times as much as the average under-40 household earned in a year, a standard measure of housing affordability, according to a new report from Pew Research Center.

By 2019, that price-to-income ratio had risen to 2.9. In 2024, it reached 3.5.

Over the past decade, home prices have risen much faster than wages. The rising ratio of price to income, coupled with elevated interest rates, has put homeownership out of reach for millions of millennial and Gen Z Americans.

This is one of the biggest reasons why young adults are so angry.

They simply can’t afford to live normal lives.

Last year, the percentage of first-time homebuyers dropped to the lowest level ever recorded…

First-time buyers represented only 21% of all home purchasers in 2025, a record low, according to the National Association of Realtors. The typical age of a first-time buyer climbed to 40, an all-time high.

Meanwhile, virtually everything else is becoming more expensive too.

For example, the price of ground beef is up 13 percent over the past year, and that price of steak is up 16 percent over the past year…

The average price of ground beef was $6.75 per pound in May, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data, up nearly 13% from a year ago and just below April’s record high of $6.90. Beef steak prices averaged $12.80 per pound, up 16% from a year earlier and the second-highest level on record.

Tens of millions of Americans are deeply hurting right now, and what we have experienced so far is just the beginning.

This is why I rant about the economy so much.

I hear from so many people out there that are in very real pain.

Decades of very foolish decisions have resulted in decades of economic decline, and now we really have reached a breaking point.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.