Donald Trump has agreed to debate Kamala Harris on the friendly environs of Fox News in September – but the vice-president has not signed on to what would be a switch-up.

Trump had previously agreed to appear on ABC News and debate Joe Biden a second time this year before the president ended his re-election campaign.

In a statement on his Truth Social platform, Trump said the debate would be held on 4 September in Pennsylvania. The former president said that there was a conflict of interest at play after filing a defamation lawsuit against ABC and network host George Stephanopoulos over the anchor’s assertion that Trump had been “found liable for rape” in the E Jean Carroll case.

Trump earlier this year was ordered to pay $83m for defamatory statements he had made about the magazine columnist after an earlier case found him liable for defamation and sexual abuse.

“The Debate was previously scheduled against … Biden on ABC, but has been terminated in that Biden will no longer be a participant, and I am in litigation against ABC Network and George Slopadopoulos, thereby creating a conflict of interest,” Trump wrote.

The former Republican president added that the site of the debate on Fox News – which is generally welcoming to the GOP – had not been determined. But he said the moderators would be Fox News’ Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, and the rules would be similar to his 27 June debate with Biden – except that this time there would be a studio audience.

But on Saturday, in a statement that invoked Trump’s previous challenge to debate Biden at any time or place, Harris’s campaign made clear she did not agree to the terms of the proposed Fox News debate – and she particularly rejected using that one to replace the ABC debate.

“Donald Trump is running scared and trying to back out of the debate he already agreed to and running straight to Fox News to bail him out,” Harris campaign spokesperson Michael Tyler said in a statement shared on X by NBC News political correspondent Yamiche Alcindor.

“He needs to stop playing games and show up to the debate he already committed to on [10 September]. The vice-president will be there one way or the other to take the opportunity to speak to a prime-time national audience. We’re happy to discuss further debates after the one both campaigns have already agreed to.

“Mr Anytime, anywhere, anyplace should have no problem with that unless he’s too scared to show up on the 10th.”

She said in July that she was “ready” to debate Trump and accused him of stepping back from the previous agreement involving ABC.

Democratic party alarm at Biden’s June debate performance on CNN set in motion his dramatic withdrawal from the race, with polls indicating he was likely headed for a blowout electoral defeat.

Trump and Harris are now polling neck-and-neck.

The political dance over presidential debates is now set to escalate. Earlier this year, Biden and Trump agreed to sidestep the typical arrangement of three debates, typically held in the fall and organized by the bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates.

Democrats said reducing the number to two and moving them up to June and September reflected changes in the “structure of our elections and the interests of voters”.

Biden said he had won two debates with Trump in 2020 and challenged him to two this year. “I hear you’re free on Wednesdays,” Biden said, referring to a weekly off-day during the New York criminal trial that saw Trump convicted of falsifying business records in connections with hush-money payments to the adult film actor Stormy Daniels.

But that decision ultimately backfired for Biden.

The latest twist in the 2024 debate drama comes after Trump said he would not face Harris because she was not the party’s official candidate. On Friday, Harris secured enough Biden delegates to officially become her party’s nominee.

At a rally in Atlanta on Tuesday, Harris said she welcomed a debate against Trump, who days earlier had called her a “bum”.

“As the saying goes, you got something to say, say it to my face,” Harris said.

Donald Trump is “doing great” after last month’s assassination attempt last month, his son said.

Eric Trump, 40, arrived at the Trump International golf resort in Aberdeenshire by helicopter on Saturday to view a half-finished new course on the North Sea coast, which will open next year.

The businessman and hotelier said the family’s investment in Scotland demonstrated why his father’s Republican candidacy for the US presidency would benefit Britain as he invited Sir Keir Starmer to visit the golf course.

Speaking about the assassination attempt on his father on 14 July, he said: “It should never have been allowed to happen.

“Somebody let him down – as his son I’m not very happy about it. In the west, you can’t have leaders assassinated.

“When you spend $3bn on an agency, it was a failure that day. Those 48 hours could have been very different. He’s doing great, he’s out campaigning.”

Trump described his father as “the best president his country has seen ever” and compared him to Winston Churchill due to his lack of political correctness.

Trump said: “You could probably draw a lot of parallels with Churchill – funny and un-politically correct, and effective. He says what everyone’s thinking.

“When he was shot with blood running down his face, chanting ‘fight, fight, fight’ – that’s what our country needs. There will never be a better ally for the UK and the west than Donald Trump.”

He also described the Gaza war as “insane” and said he believed his father would meet Palestinian leaders in an effort to end the war – as well as the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and Russian president, Vladimir Putin.

“I’m sure he would meet anybody, he doesn’t want wars,” he said.

He said “the world was laughing at the Biden administration” and pledged his belief that his father would win the presidency, adding: “He wants to see people living the American dream.”

Speaking about Kamala Harris, his father’s rival for the presidency, he said: “What’s she done? She’s been in charge of AI and immigration – she doesn’t even know how to spell AI.”

He vowed the new golf course would become “the best 36 holes in the world” when it opens in 2025.

He said: “What we have done on this side of the pond is incredible.”

Minnesota’s governor captured the internet’s attention and swayed Democrats’ messaging by succinctly summing up how he views Republicans: they’re weird.

Clips of Tim Walz have spread widely, cementing him as a national voice for Kamala Harris’s campaign – and a potential pick to run alongside her as vice-president.

It’s not just the “weird” of it all: he’s been able to run through a list of what Democrats want, and what he’s done as governor during a banner time for Democrats in his state, that articulates to voters what they would be voting for, not just the danger of what they’re voting against. He speaks plainly and pragmatically, showing the commonsense policies his party stands for.

Walz, 60, was born and raised in small-town Nebraska. He became a teacher, first in China, then in Nebraska and finally in Mankato, Minnesota, where he taught geography and coached the high school football team. He was the faculty adviser for the school’s first gay-straight alliance chapter in 1999, long before Democrats nationally stood for gay rights. He also served in the army national guard for 24 years, enlisting at age 17, a role that took him around the country and on a deployment to Europe. And like JD Vance, Walz has a penchant for Diet Mountain Dew.

He had a whole life before politics.

“Frankly, a lot of politicians are just not normal people,” said David Hogg, a gun control advocate and a Walz fan. “They just don’t know how to talk to normal people.”

He comes across as what he is: a straight-talking teacher, America’s youth football coach. He’s “right out of central casting as the way you think of Minnesota governor would be like,” said Michael Brodkorb, the former deputy chair of the Minnesota Republican party.

Walz first ran for office in 2006 in a Republican-leaning congressional district, knocking off the incumbent in an upset. He kept the district until 2016, dispatching Republicans over and over. In 2018, he ran for governor and won, then defended the seat successfully in 2022.

He’s now the chair of the Democratic Governors Association, a perch that has given him a national profile in the past year as he has stumped first for Biden and now Harris. His appearances in recent weeks have taken off, putting his name on the VP shortlist and his tone center stage for Democrats.

In Minnesota, Democrats secured a narrow government trifecta in 2022, taking both chambers of the legislature and the governorship, and Walz and his colleagues in the legislature got to work, delivering a laundry-list of progressive policy wins such as free school meals, abortion protections, gun restrictions and legal marijuana.

If Democrats want to see what their party governing would look like, Minnesota is the example. But maybe the policies would be too liberal for the national stage, one TV interviewer posed to Walz.

“What a monster! Kids are eating and having full bellies so they can go learn and women are making their own healthcare decisions,” Walz said jokingly.

Hogg pointed to a speech Walz gave when Trump came to Minnesota last week, in which Walz was dressed down – like a midwestern dad – in a camo hat and a T-shirt, as an example of how he’s down to earth. The outfit caught attention online for not looking like a politician’s attempt to look like a regular person, but just like Walz’s regular clothes. “He might run for Vice President or he might clean the garage. It’s the weekend, anything can happen,” one tweet quipped.

“Tim’s just a freaking down-home guy,” said Tim Ryan, a former Democratic US representative from Ohio who worked with Walz in Congress and worked out alongside him in the House gym.

Ryan called to mind a recent clip in which Walz mentioned that Minnesota ranked in the top three for happiest states in the nation. “Isn’t that really the goal here? For some joy? When he mentioned that I was like, dang man, that’s really good. That’s really good, because it gets us out of the political space and into the human being space.”

It’s part of a vibe shift Democrats are feeling since Biden announced he wouldn’t seek re-election. There’s less focus on the dire consequences of electing Trump again – though those consequences are certainly still part of the motivation – and more on detailing what Democrats want to do if they win.

“Fear and anger is such a low vibration,” Ryan said. “It’s just a negative vibration. And I think what Tim talked about, like the hope of things to come, and the hope of what we’ve actually accomplished, and we can do more. That’s optimistic, that’s a high vibration.”

Ryan is on text chains with former members who served with Walz who are excited to see him in the spotlight and are rooting for him to be tapped as vice-president, but will be proud of him either way. House Democrats are also reportedly advocating for him to be Harris’s pick.

Former US senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota said Walz’s plainspokenness works because it’s real. Contrast that with Trump’s VP pick: “There’s an inauthenticity about JD Vance that is the antithesis of what Tim Walz is. Tim is the most authentically kind of normal person you’re going to meet, and he has a background that is uniquely situated in these times, especially for people in my part of the country.”

Heitkamp and Walz got to know each other flying back and forth between DC and the upper midwest. She felt an instant recognition of the kind of person he was that she thinks translates throughout the midwest.

“I met Tim Walz and I knew Tim Walz,” she said. “I didn’t have to say, what’s this guy all about and what’s his agenda? I knew his agenda, because I had high school teachers just like him, who cared about their students and cared about their community.”

Progressives in Minnesota, who have at times clashed with Walz on policy, are still rooting for him, too. Elianne Farhat, the executive director of TakeAction MN, said she and her organization had disagreed deeply with Walz over the years, but that he was a person who will move and change his position based on feedback. He evolves.

She and others pointed to his position on guns. Walz is a gun owner and a hunter who previously received endorsements and donations from the National Rifle Association and had an A rating from the group. But he shifted: he gave donations from the group to charity after the mass shooting in Las Vegas in 2017, and he supported an assault weapons ban after the 2018 school shooting in Parkland, Florida. While governor, he has signed bills into law that restrict guns. He now has an F rating from the NRA.

“We’re not electing our saviors. We’re not electing perfect people. We’re electing people who we can make hard decisions with, we can negotiate with, and who are serious about getting things done for people. And Governor Walz has shown that pretty strongly the last couple years as governor of Minnesota,” Farhat said.

The biggest drawback for Walz – and a perk for other picks on the shortlist, such as the Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro – is his geography. Minnesota is not a swing state, though Trump has said he thinks he can win it. Joe Biden being replaced on the top of the ticket probably takes the state out of contention, though.

Republicans will also surely bring up the 2020 protests after George Floyd’s murder by police, tying Walz, who was governor at the time, to the aftermath.

Still, his background as a teacher and a veteran from a congressional district that typically voted for Republicans help make his case. “I mean, if you want the blue wall, Tim Walz is the blue wall,” Hogg said.

And Walz can win. His electoral record shows his ability to bring in coalitions of voters, from progressives to moderate Republicans, Brodkorb said. Then after winning, he has shown he knows how to get results.

“It is a part of his political DNA to be able to soften up his critics, win over people and win in Republican areas,” Brodkorb said.

Regardless of whether Walz is on the ticket, his messaging shift will continue. “Weird” is sticking around. The Harris campaign has used it. “It’s really gotten under the Republicans’ skin, which is, I think, a sign as to how effective it is,” Brodkorb said.

Trump himself responded to the charge. “Nobody’s ever called me weird. I’m a lot of things, but weird I’m not.”

“No one called Trump weird until Tim Walz did,” Heitkamp said. “And it resonated for a reason, because he is weird. I mean, anyone who talks about Hannibal Lecter, that’s not normal behavior. I think that there’s been people who have tried to intellectualize Donald Trump, and Tim just cut through it all and said, ‘This guy’s not normal. This is weird.’”

While Trump surrogates often spend their time “doing cleanup on aisle five,” Walz can be out talking to voters about what he’s accomplished in Minnesota and what Democrats envision for the country, Heitkamp said. It’s a message that resonates with the base, but also swing voters who struggle with childcare costs and tuition, two of the issues Walz has tackled in his state.

“Being anti-Trump can’t be what the Democratic message is,” she said. “The Democratic message has to be about how we will govern differently from Republicans.”

If Walz isn’t the VP pick, he’ll stay on the campaign trail boosting Harris. Ryan said they should put him on a bus from Pittsburgh to Milwaukee, crisscrossing the rust belt, talking to voters.

“He’s a guy that I think we need to mimic, whether he’s the VP or not. He’s kind of the north star for us,” Ryan said.

Acquitted killer Kyle Rittenhouse announced he would not be supporting Donald Trump’s attempt to return to the White House – but ultimately ended up endorsing him anyway after he was inundated with vitriolic messages from the former president’s supporters.

The flip-flop by Rittenhouse – who has fashioned himself as a gun rights activist after shooting two people to death in Kenosha, Wisconsin, during racial justice protests in 2020 – followed an initial pledge to write in former congressman Ron Paul as his choice on November’s presidential election ballot.

In a video posted on the social media platform X, Rittenhouse argued that Trump had a “bad” record with respect to gun rights and explained he would instead back Paul.

The 21-year-old then spent the next several hours grappling with ire directed at him by proponents of Trump’s “Make America great again” (Maga) movement, which embraced Rittenhouse as a hero after the shootings in Kenosha and raised money for his successful criminal defense. Among other insults, they taunted him with prison rape jokes and accused him of betraying Trump less than three years after the Republican met with him at Mar-a-Lago and declared Rittenhouse “really a nice young man”.

One of the more typical comments responding to Rittenhouse’s temporary endorsement of Paul was from political commentator Joey Mannarino, who wrote on X: “If not for Maga, you would be rotting in a prison bending over for Bubba … Fuck you and the horse you rode in on!”

Another X user added: “I wish they would’ve let you go to prison so you could be the bitch you actually are.”

By Friday afternoon, Rittenhouse had gone back on X and wrote that he was “100% behind Donald Trump and [would] encourage every gun owner to join me in helping send him back to the White House”.

“Over the past 12 hours, I’ve had a series of productive conversations with members of the Trump’s team, and I am confident he will be the strong ally gun owners need to defend our … rights,” Rittenhouse also said. “My comments made last night were ill-informed and unproductive.”

Some commentators met the quick about-face with equally swift mockery.

“You stand for absolutely nothing and have zero backbone,” read one reply. Another said: “This time try not to murder anyone while you’re backpedaling.”

Rittenhouse was 17 when he traveled 20 miles from his home in Antioch, Illinois, as protests erupted after a white police officer shot Jacob Blake, who is Black.

Roaming Kenosha with other armed men claiming to be self-appointed security guards, Rittenhouse used a rifle to fatally shoot 36-year-old Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, then 26. He also injured Gage Grosskreutz, then 27, and was charged with five felonies, including first-degree intentional homicide.

Rittenhouse contended to the jury which heard his case that he carried out the shootings in self-defense and had acted justifiably. At the end of a tumultuous trial, jurors found him not guilty of all charges against him, a verdict hailed by far-right politicians and pundits but decried by civil rights activists.

When Léon Marchand became the greatest swimmer in French history this week with an unprecedented double run of two gold medals in less than two hours on Wednesday night, Marchand mania took over the nation.

Commentators announced that the shy, smiling 22-year-old, known as “half man, half dolphin” for his powerful underwater push-offs, had “restored national pride”.

The cheering frenzy was not confined to 17,000 spectators raising the roof of the swimming arena – even though coaches said they had never heard anything like it. Applause and screams also erupted on streets from Paris to Toulouse, even on public transport. More embarrassingly for France, other Olympics competitions – including table tennis, tennis and a fencing final – had to be briefly paused as the noise of French spectators in the stands cheering Marchand while following on their phones interrupted proceedings.

Marchand, who took his gold tally for a remarkable Games to four on Friday night in the men’s 200m individual medley, is adored not only for his technique in the pool but for his personal story. Born in the south-western city of Toulouse, he comes from a family of Olympic swimmers – his mother, father and uncle – who initially didn’t want him to follow their footsteps because they knew the stress it entailed.

Indeed Marchand, a computer programming student who loves video games and Japanese manga comics, and whose hobby is aviation as he hopes to gain a pilot’s licence, has described himself as reserved and not naturally at ease in the spotlight. He has been open about the emotional challenges of elite sport and says mental wellbeing matters as much as technique for competitive swimming. His pre-race relaxation breathing techniques and a determination to smilingly enjoy the race are crucial, he has said. “You have to take pleasure in it,” he told Brut Media two years ago – suggesting this wasn’t a given amid the pressure on the starting blocks.

When Marchand was 19 he left France for the US to study computing at Arizona State University and train with Bob Bowman, the coach who built the career of the American Michael Phelps – the most decorated Olympic swimmer with 28 medals, including 23 golds.

Bowman refuses to compare the two swimmers, whom he considers very different. Bowman never allowed Phelps to attempt two golds in two hours and tried to persuade Marchand against competing in two key finals on the same night in Paris, but Marchand insisted. “He’s polite, calm, has great humility, is an excellent student and a swimmer with a rare work ethic,” Bowman previously told L’Équipe. “What I like is that he viscerally loves swimming,” Bowman added, saying Marchand has had good technical training as well as his good genes.

Marchand’s mother, Céline Bonnet, now a flight attendant, was a professional swimmer who began breaking French records at 15 and swam at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992. His father, Xavier Marchand, now a TV journalist for the French public broadcaster, competed in two Olympics. “My parents never pushed me,” Marchand has said, adding that they initially tried to dissuade him, knowing the sacrifices it entailed. As a young child, he found the pool a bit chilly as he waited shivering at the edge after winning races. He briefly tried judo and rugby, but always came back to the pool. His parents advised him to focus on the individual medley, like they had, because a range of strokes was more interesting.

As a teenager, Marchand trained with the Dolphins team at the TOEC club in Toulouse. He swam in a pool named after Alfred Nakache, who swam for France in the 1936 Olympics, before he was deported to Auschwitz where his wife and two-year-old daughter died. He survived and went on to compete at the 1948 Games. Documentary footage of Marchand as a young teenage hopeful in Toulouse saw him studying hard at high school for his baccalaureate, which he passed with excellent grades, telling the cameras he needed academic work “as a back-up option” in case swimming didn’t work out.

Marchand has been open about how when he was about 18 and performing well in French competitions, the pressure to constantly succeed and the fear of failure almost became too much. Confinement during Covid ironically helped him as it allowed him to spend down time with his family and live, as he says “like a normal human being”, having the occasional lie-in and playing video games with his younger brother.

Marchand worked with Thomas Sammut, who trains elite athletes on their mental approach to sport. Through working on the psychological aspects of competing, he turned things around before his appearance at the Tokyo Olympics aged 19. “I now like to ask myself what would happen if I fail,” Marchand told Brut. “And I realise nothing will happen: my family will always be just as happy for me. So now I have no more fear of failure. I’m enjoying it.” He said of Sammut: “Sportspeople used to be scared to see that type of person because it could maybe show mental weakness, I was never afraid of that. I wanted to get better in my sport, but above all I wanted to keep smiling in my everyday life.”

Marchand’s massive support from the crowds in France could have brought renewed pressure. In his first breaststroke race, the crowd would fall silent at intervals then cheer each time he took a breath. But Marchand now thrives on it. As a coach, Bowman understands rowdy home crowds and passed on a tip that the Australian Ian Thorpe had once told him: not to see it negatively as pressure, but frame it positively as support.

Marchand told journalists after his double gold win that he was so grateful for the French support. “It’s crazy because the public is so present and I’ve really shared some incredible moments with the spectators,” he said.

Five other French Olympic stars

Victor Wembanyama, basketball

The 20-year-old basketball prodigy, known in France as “Wemby”, towers over rivals at 2.24m (7ft 4in). He is the driving force of the men’s basketball team, drawing huge crowds. Wembanyama, who was born outside Paris to parents who were competitive athletes, moved to the NBA last year, where he was considered the most promising young player since LeBron James entered the league almost 20 years before. After his debut for the San Antonio Spurs, Wembanyama was unanimously voted NBA Rookie of the year for 2024 – the first French player to take the award.

Cyréna Samba-Mayela, 100m hurdles

The 23-year-old sprinter and European champion in the 100m hurdles is France’s biggest hope in athletics. Born in Champigny-sur-Marne, east of Paris, she tried various sports from figure skating to judo before settling on athletics at 15. Samba-Mayela has been training in the US, but caught Covidthis year, affecting her training. Her Irish coach John Coghlan hailed her “physical and mental strength, her technique and her love for the sport”. He said at the start of the Games: “She can become one of the best in history.”

Antoine Dupont, rugby sevens

The Toulouse scrum-half, 27, pivoted to the fast-paced rugby sevens for the Olympics. He played a key role in France winning gold and he was seen as the best player on the pitch in the final, held aloft by cheering supporters in the Paris fanzone. “Competing for an Olympic gold medal is really motivating,” he said when he announced he would quit his comfort zone and move into high-intensity rugby sevens for the Games.

Félix Lebrun, table tennis

The 17-year-old from Montpelier is a household name in France credited, alongside his brother Alexis, 20, with creating so much excitement around the sport that French table tennis clubs have seen a rise in membership. They have a large following in China and drew huge crowds in the men’s singles in Paris, where Félix is aiming for a bronze medal. Both will play in the men’s team events next week.

Manon Apithy-Brunet, fencing

The 28-year-old from Lyon took gold in women’s sabre fencing after a final against her teammate Sara Balzer – the first all-French Olympics fencing final in almost 30 years. More than 8.6 million viewers tuned in for the dramatic last moments of the final on the French public broadcaster France 2. Apithy-Brunet is the first French women’s sabre fencer to take an Olympic gold. She is hoping for another medal with the women’s team, which competes this weekend. After the Rio 2016 Olympics, Apithy-Brunet joined the French gendarmerie through its scheme for elite athletes.

At least 32 people have been killed and 63 injured in a suicide bombing and gun attack at a popular beach in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, police said.

The attack happened on Friday night, when residents of the city typically gather at the beach.

Agence France-Presse reported that police and witnesses said the bomber detonated his device late on Friday along the Lido beach before gunmen stormed the area. Government forces said they “neutralised” the attackers after a gunfight near the beach.

Videos posted on X showed bodies lying on the beach in the dark, and people running to safety.

“Over 32 civilians died in the restaurant attack,” the police spokesperson, Abdifatah Aden, told a press conference. He said one attacker had blown himself up, three others had been killed, and one was captured.

A spokesperson for the police warned Mogadishu’s residents to exercise caution in public and be wary of anyone behaving suspiciously.

Somalia’s president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, convened an emergency session of the country’s security agencies on Saturday to find out how the attack happened. The Lido beach is in the Abdiaziz district, and is in one of the most affluent and relatively secure areas in the city. It has, however, previously been targeted in attacks.

Dr Abdikadir Abdirahmman, the director of the ambulance service, said the toll could rise.

Abdilqadir Yousuf Abdullahi, the medical director of the Somali-Sudanese Specialized hospital, said 14 victims were taken to his hospital. The emergency department of the hospital was overwhelmed with the influx, requiring immediate triage to prioritise treatment, Abdullahi said.

“Fourteen victims were rushed to our hospital. Medical staff worked tirelessly to stabilise and treat the injured but six of those victims have succumbed to the critical injuries as a result of being struck by shrapnel and bullets,” he added.

Somalia’s disaster management agency made an urgent appeal for blood donors.

The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabaab group, a jihadist organisation which the Somali government has been fighting since 2007, claimed responsibility for the attack. Somalia’s president vowed to eradicate the group during his election campaign in 2022, but has faced setbacks in recent months as the group has rolled back government gains in south-central Somalia.

Omar Hashi, special presidential envoy for stabilization and civilian protection, said on X: “We are heartbroken by the heinous terrorist attack”.

Abdirahman Abdishakur, a veteran MP, said the images from Lido beach were “terrifying”. Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, a former president, said: “The fact that the terrorist attack coincided with this Friday night, when the beach is the most crowded, shows the hostility of the terrorists to the Somali people.”

Abdullahi Mohamed Warsame, 31, who was at Lido beach with his family, said the blast caused him to fall to the ground. “When I looked over, I saw my sister crunched up on the sand, with screams and cries for help all around us. I then got up, grabbed my sister and began running across the beach to get away.

“It was supposed to be a casual night, taking up the breeze at the beach, but it nearly cost us our lives.”

After the explosion, Farhan Ismail Dahir, 19, said he saw tens of people on the ground, “some screaming, others not moving at all”. He added: “I briefly froze, then one of my friends tugged me by the shoulder … that’s when the gunfire started.”

In a statement, Egypt’s ministry of foreign affairs condemned the attack and sent its condolences to the victims. Turkey, a significant security partner for the Somali government, said it “strongly condemned” the attack and said Ankara would “continue to stand by Somalia in its fight against terrorism”.

The International Olympic Committee has been forced to issue a correction after its president, Thomas Bach, got in a muddle when defending a decision to let an Algerian boxer who failed a gender test fight in the Paris Games.

In a sign of the issue’s complexity, Bach confused the terms transgender and DSD, an abbreviation of “differences in sexual development”, as he sought to quell the row over a swiftly terminated bout between Algerian fighter Imane Khelif and Italian Angela Carini.

“I will not confuse the two issues,” Bach said, before confusing the two issues. He said: “We are not talking about the transgender issue here. This is about a woman taking part in a woman’s category and for all the rest.

“The IOC framework, which is scientifically based, applies to all Federations. This is available to everybody on the website and the rules of the International Federations are on the websites to be followed by everybody. But I repeat here this is not a DSD case.” The IOC subsequently tweeted that Bach had meant to explain that this was not a transgender case.

Differences of sex development (DSD) describes a group of conditions that occur early in pregnancy in which sex development is not typical. It was previously known as “intersex”. Some people with DSDs are raised as female but have XY sex chromosomes and blood testosterone levels in the male range.

The term transgender refers to people whose current gender identity or way of expressing their gender differs from the sex they were registered with at birth.

On Thursday, Carini broke down in tears after she abandoned her bout against Khelif after 46 seconds, saying: “I have never felt a punch like this”.

Khelif competed at Tokyo 2020 but was disqualified from last year’s world championships by the International Boxing Association (IBA) for failing to meet their gender eligibility criteria. Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan also failed the test and is competing at the Paris Games.

A complication is that the IBA has since been stripped of its status as boxing’s governing body over governance issues and has been accused by the IOC of making decisions over gender “arbitrarily”.

On Saturday, Italy’s far-right prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, raised the issue as one of “fairness” with the IOC but Carini has expressed her regret over the row and for failing to shake Khelif’s hand at the end of the bout.

“All this controversy makes me sad,” Carini told the Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport. “I’m sorry for my opponent, too. If the IOC said she can fight, I respect that decision … I have nothing against Khelif and if I meet her again, I will kiss her.”

On Saturday, Bach condemned as “hate speech” the criticism directed by some at two women boxers. “We will not take part in a politically motivated … cultural war”, he said.

He said: “We have two boxers who are born as women, who have been raised as women, who have a passport as a woman and have competed for many years as women. Some want to own a definition of who is a woman.”

The IBA, led by Umar Kremlev, a Russian national and funded by the sanctioned company Gazprom, has said it will pay the winner’s prize of $100,000 to Carini.

Bach responded: “What we have seen from the Russian side and in particular from international federation from which we had to withdraw the recognition, that they have undertaken way before these Games a defamation campaign against France, against the Games, against the IOC. They have made a number of comments in this respect which I don’t want to repeat.”

The International Olympic Committee has been forced to issue a correction after its president, Thomas Bach, got in a muddle when defending a decision to let an Algerian boxer who failed a gender test fight in the Paris Games.

In a sign of the issue’s complexity, Bach confused the terms transgender and DSD, an abbreviation of “differences in sexual development”, as he sought to quell the row over a swiftly terminated bout between Algerian fighter Imane Khelif and Italian Angela Carini.

“I will not confuse the two issues,” Bach said, before confusing the two issues. He said: “We are not talking about the transgender issue here. This is about a woman taking part in a woman’s category and for all the rest.

“The IOC framework, which is scientifically based, applies to all Federations. This is available to everybody on the website and the rules of the International Federations are on the websites to be followed by everybody. But I repeat here this is not a DSD case.” The IOC subsequently tweeted that Bach had meant to explain that this was not a transgender case.

Differences of sex development (DSD) describes a group of conditions that occur early in pregnancy in which sex development is not typical. It was previously known as “intersex”. Some people with DSDs are raised as female but have XY sex chromosomes and blood testosterone levels in the male range.

The term transgender refers to people whose current gender identity or way of expressing their gender differs from the sex they were registered with at birth.

On Thursday, Carini broke down in tears after she abandoned her bout against Khelif after 46 seconds, saying: “I have never felt a punch like this”.

Khelif competed at Tokyo 2020 but was disqualified from last year’s world championships by the International Boxing Association (IBA) for failing to meet their gender eligibility criteria. Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan also failed the test and is competing at the Paris Games.

A complication is that the IBA has since been stripped of its status as boxing’s governing body over governance issues and has been accused by the IOC of making decisions over gender “arbitrarily”.

On Saturday, Italy’s far-right prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, raised the issue as one of “fairness” with the IOC but Carini has expressed her regret over the row and for failing to shake Khelif’s hand at the end of the bout.

“All this controversy makes me sad,” Carini told the Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport. “I’m sorry for my opponent, too. If the IOC said she can fight, I respect that decision … I have nothing against Khelif and if I meet her again, I will kiss her.”

On Saturday, Bach condemned as “hate speech” the criticism directed by some at two women boxers. “We will not take part in a politically motivated … cultural war”, he said.

He said: “We have two boxers who are born as women, who have been raised as women, who have a passport as a woman and have competed for many years as women. Some want to own a definition of who is a woman.”

The IBA, led by Umar Kremlev, a Russian national and funded by the sanctioned company Gazprom, has said it will pay the winner’s prize of $100,000 to Carini.

Bach responded: “What we have seen from the Russian side and in particular from international federation from which we had to withdraw the recognition, that they have undertaken way before these Games a defamation campaign against France, against the Games, against the IOC. They have made a number of comments in this respect which I don’t want to repeat.”

An American-Israeli man deployed in Gaza with a combat engineering unit of Israel’s armed forces posted videos online that show indiscriminate fire at a destroyed building and the detonation of homes and a mosque.

One video posted by the man, Bram Settenbrino, and filmed from the shooter’s viewpoint, shows dozens of rounds being fired into the ruins of a building. Another video shows what appears to be an armored vehicle’s fire-control system trained on a mosque before it is razed to the ground. Others depict the detonation of several homes as soldiers cheer.

It is not clear whether Settenbrino personally filmed the videos or was involved in the acts depicted in them, but the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Settenbrino did not dispute the videos’ authenticity. The videos recently went viral on X, drawing accusations that they showed “war crimes”. Settenbrino wrote in a message to the Guardian that the videos were “taken out of context” but declined to elaborate. “I have not committed any war crimes whatsoever,” he added.

After the Guardian reached out to Settenbrino and his family, his father published a response attributed to his son through Arutz Sheva, a news site associated with the settler right. “The machine gun fire video in question was suppressive fire in an area cleared of civilians after my team was attacked by Hamas terrorists from that area. The mosque that was blown up was being used to house armed terrorists and weapons stockpiles and used as a base to attack IDF soldiers.”

The soldier’s father said his son had “sent a congratulatory video dedicating a detonation to honor a friend’s new marriage”, and that the family business had received threats since the videos began circulating.

Israeli soldiers have shared scores of videos during the 10-month war showing themselves mocking Palestinians in Gaza and destroying Palestinian property. Some have been used as evidence in the genocide case against Israel at the international court of justice (ICJ). Israeli forces have killed more than 39,000 Palestinians since the beginning of the war, displaced most of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents and destroyed more than half of the strip’s structures.

With thousands of Americans serving in the IDF, potential misconduct documented by soldiers themselves raises uncomfortable questions for US officials about their willingness to enforce federal law against citizens acting in an overseas war the US government funds and supports.

The extensive destruction of property, when “not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly” is a violation of international law regulating conflict and a war crime under US law.

The US has an obligation to ensure respect for the Geneva conventions, a series of international treaties regulating armed conflict, said Brian Finucane, a former legal adviser for the US Department of State. “If US citizens are violating the Geneva conventions or committing war crimes in Israel and Palestine, that implicates the US’s obligations,” he said, adding that under the federal War Crimes Act, the US has the authority to prosecute perpetrators of war crimes when either the victim or perpetrator are US citizens, or when perpetrators of any nationality are on US soil.

The IDF did not answer questions about why the mosque and homes in Settenbrino’s videos were targeted but has regularly claimed buildings it destroyed were used by Hamas fighters. Combat engineering corps usually plant explosives inside buildings they identify as targets and detonate them remotely, a more controlled demolition than bombing them from the air or from a tank.

The video showing the destruction of the mosque is dated 10 December, approximately when Settenbrino’s unit was deployed in the north of the strip. Israeli forces partially or fully destroyed more than 500 mosques in the strip since 7 October, Palestinian officials said in March.

Rights groups have called on the Biden administration to investigate crimes committed in Gaza as potential violations of US law. Ahead of the trip to the US last week of the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Center for Constitutional Rights urged the US Department of Justice to investigate him and others responsible for serious crimes being committed in Gaza, “including potentially US and US-dual citizens”.

Brad Parker, CCR’s associate director of policy said: “Federal criminal statutes prohibit and criminalize genocide, war crimes, and torture, among other serious international crimes.

“US officials, government employees approving or facilitating continued weapons transfers to Israel, and individual US citizens currently serving active-duty roles in the Israeli military should definitely be concerned about their own individual criminal responsibility.”

Since the start of the war in Gaza, US efforts to crack down on violence against Palestinians have focused on the West Bank, where officials sanctioned a handful of settlers, freezing assets they may hold in the US and blocking American individuals and institutions from doing business with them. While the sanctions also include a ban on travel to the US, this would not extend to Americans. “But there are other tools available to the US government,” said Finucane, noting that citizens committing crimes abroad could be prosecuted in US courts.

An estimated 60,000 US citizens live in settlements in the West Bank. Many are deeply ideological, inspired by extremist figures like Brooklyn-born Baruch Goldstein, who massacred 29 Palestinians in Hebron in 1994, and Rabbi Meir Kahane, whose party was designated a terror group in both the US and Israel. The justice department did not answer questions about whether it is considering any action against settlers who are US citizens.

Americans in the IDF

An estimated 23,380 US citizens serve in Israel’s armed forces, according to the Washington Post – a figure the IDF did not confirm but probably includes both Americans traveling to Israel for the purpose of service and Israeli-raised soldiers holding dual citizenship.

A spokesperson for the US state department did not answer questions about Settenbrino and referred questions about US obligations regarding its citizens’ actions in Gaza to the justice department. “We do continue to emphasize that the IDF must abide by international humanitarian law,” the spokesperson wrote. The justice department did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

A spokesperson for the IDF declined to comment on Settenbrino specifically, citing privacy concerns, but said in a statement that “the IDF examines events of this kind as well as reports of videos uploaded to social networks and handles them with command and disciplinary measures”. The spokesperson declined to say whether the IDF regulates soldiers’ use of social media but said that it refers cases of suspected criminality to the military police for investigation.

The state department spokesperson was not able to confirm the number of Americans serving in the IDF, as citizens are not required to register their service with the US government.

Settenbrino has been deployed in Gaza since the beginning of the war with the Handasah Kravit, the IDF’s engineering corps. An Eagle scout raised in New Jersey, he moved to Israel as a teenager, becoming one of an estimated 600,000 US citizens who live there. He first joined the Israel dog unit, a civilian group that trains and deploys search-and-rescue dogs, and later enlisted in the IDF.

Last year, he received an “Outstanding Soldier of the Year” award from his division, according to his father, Randy Settenbrino, who has written about his son in op-eds for Israeli and Jewish publications.

‘Destroying homes is a day-to-day activity’

Settenbrino’s videos were first circulated in July by a prominent X account under the name Younis Tirawi that regularly surfaces videos posted by soldiers. Israeli soldiers have also shared videos of themselves playing with children’s toys and women’s underwear, the burning of Palestinian food supplies and rounding up and blindfolding civilians. Another video recently shared by Tirawi and originally posted by a member of Settenbrino’s unit showed the deliberate destruction of a water facility in Rafah.

One video by an IDF soldier, depicting a huge explosion in Gaza City as the soldier says “Shuja’iyya neighborhood gone … peace to Shuja’iyya” was screened in January before the ICJ as part of the genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel and others were cited during the proceedings.

“There is now a trend among the soldiers to film themselves committing atrocities against civilians in Gaza, in a form of ‘snuff’ video,” the South African lawyer Tembeka Ngcukaitobi said in court. He cited examples of soldiers recording themselves destroying houses and declaring their intent to “erase Gaza” or “destroy Khan Younis” – potential evidence of genocidal intent.

Such videos have rarely led to consequences. The IDF spokesperson said that when military investigations determine that “the expression or behavior of the soldiers in the footage is inappropriate […] it is handled accordingly”, but did not offer examples.

“The vast number of such videos online demonstrates that the military leadership isn’t even trying to discipline the rank and file,” said Joel Carmel, a member of the Israeli veterans group Breaking the Silence.

He added: “More importantly, the issue is less about the videos themselves and more about what it says about the way we fight in Gaza. Destroying homes and places of worship is a day-to-day activity for soldiers in Gaza – it is the opposite of the ‘surgical’ strikes on carefully chosen targets that we are told about by the IDF.”

Whether the US would ever prosecute American citizens fighting for Israel is as much a political question as a legal one.

“The US government could prosecute these US citizens if they participate in war crimes,” Oona Hathaway, director of the Center for Global Legal Challenges at Yale Law School, told the Guardian. “Politically, however, that’s unlikely, for all the obvious reasons.”

The parties in lawsuits seeking damages for last year’s Maui wildfires have reached a $4bn global settlement, a court filing said on Friday, nearly one year after the deadliest US wildfire in more than a century.

The term sheet with details of the settlement is not publicly available, but the liaison attorneys filed a motion saying the global settlement seeks to resolve all Maui fire claims for $4.037bn. The motion asks the judge to order that insurers can’t separately go after the defendants to recoup money paid to policyholders.

The settlement was reached amid fears that Hawaiian Electric, the power company that some blame for sparking the blaze, could be on the brink of bankruptcy. The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is investigating the 8 August 2023 fires that killed 102 people and destroyed the historic downtown area of Lahaina.

Gilbert Keith-Agaran, a Maui attorney who represents victims, including families who lost relatives, said the amount was “woefully short”. But he said it was a deal plaintiffs needed to consider given Hawaiian Electric’s limited assets and potential bankruptcy.

The agreement was the first step toward getting fire victims compensation, said Jake Lowenthal, a Maui attorney selected as one of four liaisons for the coordination of the cases. More work needs to be done on how to divvy up the amount.

“We’re under no illusions that this is going to make Maui whole,” Lowenthal told the Associated Press. “We know for a fact that it’s not going to make up for what they lost.”

Thomas Leonard, who lost his Front Street condo in the fire and spent hours in the ocean behind a seawall hiding from the flames, welcomed the news.

“It gives us something to work with,” he said. “I’m going to need that money to rebuild.”

Hawaiian Electric said the settlement will help re-establish the company’s financial stability. Payments would begin after final approval and were expected no earlier than the middle of next year, it said.

“For the many affected parties to work with such commitment and focus to reach resolution in a uniquely complex case is a powerful demonstration of how Hawaii comes together in times of crisis,” Hawaiian Electric’s chief executive officer, Sheelee Kimura, said in a statement.

The seven defendants will pay the $4.037bn to compensate those who already have brought claims, Hawaii’s governor, Josh Green, said. He called the proposed settlement an agreement in principle and said it would “help our people heal”.

“My priority as governor was to expedite the agreement and to avoid protracted and painful lawsuits so as many resources as possible would go to those affected by the wildfires as quickly as possible,” he said in a statement.

He said it was unprecedented to settle lawsuits like this in only one year.

“It will be good that our people don’t have to wait to rebuild their lives as long as others have in many places that have suffered similar tragedies,” Green said. On Wednesday, Green told the AP in an interview the settlement money would be important for Lahaina’s recovery.

More than 600 lawsuits have been filed over the deaths and destruction caused by the fires, which burned thousands of homes and displaced 12,000 people. In the spring, a judge appointed mediators and ordered all parties to participate in settlement talks.

Maui county, a defendant in the suit, said the agreement represents a shared commitment between the parties to continue negotiating in good faith towards a larger, detailed resolution that would seek to equitably distribute the settlement money.

The state’s largest landowner, Kamehameha Schools, a charitable trust formerly known as the Bishop Estate, said it has agreed to contribute a portion of the settlement assuming a final binding agreement is reached.

Two other defendants, Hawaiian Telcom and the West Maui Land Co, did not immediately respond to email messages or phone calls seeking comment.

Spectrum/Charter Communications declined to comment.

• Russian assaults are raising pressure on the strategic eastern logistics hub of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, Ukraine says, as waves of guided bombs and infantry lead to some of Moscow’s largest territorial gains since the spring. The push is fuelling a surge in civilians fleeing, with requests for evacuation in the area increasing about tenfold over the past two weeks, according to a volunteer helping people leave. Russia’s gains of about 57 sq km (22 sq miles) in the space of a week are the third-largest recorded since April after they made only modest gains in June, Pasi Paroinen, an analyst with the Black Bird Group, told Reuters.

• Russian forces are using warplanes and artillery fire to support waves of infantry assaults in the area near Pokrovsk, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s National Guard said in televised remarks. “These assaults are not always supported by armoured vehicles, often it is infantry assaults,” Ruslan Muzychuk said on Friday, flagging the bombing by Russian warplanes as a particular problem. “It’s a significant threat … because the Pokrovsk and Toretsk fronts are taking a large share of the daily aviation strikes carried out on the positions of Ukrainian defenders.” Russian forces have been steadily inching forward on several fronts in the eastern Donetsk region, staging particularly fierce attacks near Pokrovsk, with Kyiv’s troops stretched thin.

• Russia’s defence minister said its forces had captured five settlements in the Donetsk region in the past week. Russia’s use of warplanes to fire guided bombs was crucial for Moscow’s battlefield tactics, said Valeriy Romanenko, a Kyiv-based aviation expert, who compared it to a “conveyor belt”. “The Russians are not piercing our defence, they are pushing it back. They are advancing 100, 150, 200 metres every day using this tactic: dropping guided bombs, then a ‘meat assault’, [and if those are] repelled, dropping guided bombs again, a ‘meat assault’ again.” He said the supply of US F-16 fighters to Ukraine could disrupt that dynamic if the jets were able to threaten Russian warplanes, but that such operations were unlikely for now given the risk it would present for the new pilots operating expensive jets.

• Ukraine said on Friday it had received the bodies of 250 killed soldiers in one of the largest exchanges of remains since Russia invaded in February 2022. Kyiv said it handed over the remains of 38 Russian soldiers in the deal, which was mediated by International Red Cross. DNA analysis will be used to identify the bodies before releasing them into the custody of the families for funeral ceremonies and burials.

• Ilya Yashin, a Russian activist jailed for supporting the war in Ukraine, said he had not given his consent to being deported from Russia in a prisoner exchange and warned that the move would encourage president Vladimir Putin to take more “political prisoners”. “What happened on August 1 is not an exchange,” he told reporters in Bonn. “This is my expulsion from Russia against my will. My first wish in Ankara was to buy a ticket and go back to Russia.” Yashin’s comments came as Russian dissidents freed as part of Thursday’s historic prisoner swap between Moscow and the west shared their mixed feelings about the deal and vowed to continue their political activity from abroad.

• Ukraine’s central bank has predicted emigration levels this year will be far higher than previously forecast, largely due to power cuts caused by Russian attacks on energy facilities. “The worsening of the energy situation and slow normalisation of the economic conditions will lead to a larger outflow of migrants abroad in 2024 and 2025 than previously expected,” the National Bank of Ukraine said in a report. It predicted there would be a net outflow of 400,000 people this year, while next year’s outflow would be 300,000. The bank predicted a net return of 400,000 people in 2026 but said the process would be “gradual”.

• The US rating agency S&P cut Ukraine’s credit rating to “selective default” on Friday, citing the country’s failure to make a coupon payment on an existing bond. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has signed a law allowing Ukraine to suspend foreign debt payments until 1 October, paving the way for a moratorium to be called that would formally mark a sovereign default.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has congratulated Edmundo González “for receiving the most votes” in Venezuela’s election, as more countries came out to recognise the opposition candidate as the winner of Sunday’s disputed poll.

Blinken spoke with González and opposition leader María Corina Machado in a phone call on Friday and voiced concern for both of them, the state department said. On Thursday, Blinken recognised González as the winner of last Sunday’s vote, citing “overwhelming evidence”.

Venezuela’s electoral authority, seen by critics as favouring the ruling socialists, proclaimed President Nicolás Maduro the winner, saying on Monday that he obtained 51% of the vote compared with 46% for González. The head of the CNE electoral body reaffirmed a similar margin of victory for Maduro on Friday and said it had now counted 97% of the vote.

However, despite demands from the opposition and governments and organisations throughout the region, the CNE has still not released detailed vote tallies. The CNE’s website has been down since Monday, which authorities have blamed on a hack, without presenting evidence.

The opposition says its own detailed tally shows González likely received 67% of the vote, winning by a margin of nearly 4m votes, and earning more than double Maduro’s support.

On Friday, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Panama and Uruguay joined the US in recognising that González received the most votes. Argentina also followed the US’s lead, with its foreign minister, Diana Mondino, declaring González “the legitimate winner and president-elect”

Others, including Russia, China and Cuba, have congratulated Maduro.

According to a diplomatic source speaking to the Reuters news agency, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico are pushing for Maduro to meet with González.

On Friday, the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, criticised the US stance as “an excess” and accused Blinken of “overstepping his boundaries”.

Celso Amorim, the main foreign policy adviser for the Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has cast some doubt on the opposition’s vote tallies, describing them as “informal data”, and arguing that parts were “based on quick count mechanisms, exit polls”, in an interview with CNN Brazil.

Amorim emphasised that Brazil did not seek to interfere in its neighbour’s internal affairs but wanted to promote “social peace for Venezuela”.

The top diplomat for Norway, which has attempted to mediate past disputes between the government and opposition, cited “legitimate doubts” over how the election was conducted in a statement on Friday.

“We expect the Venezuelan authorities to comply with the agreed commitments and to respect the will of the Venezuelan people,” the foreign minister, Espen Barth Eide, said.

The Maduro government has sought to brush off foreign critiques as interference in its affairs, accusing Washington of seeking to overthrow Venezuela’s government.

Earlier on Friday, the Venezuelan foreign minister, Yvan Gil, accused Washington of being “at the forefront of a coup attempt”.

In a post on social media, González thanked the US “for recognising the will of the Venezuelan people”.

Once one of Latin America’s wealthiest nations, oil-rich Venezuela has suffered a prolonged economic meltdown and the mass migration of about a third of its population over roughly the past decade. That largely overlaps with the tenure of Maduro, who blames US sanctions for the country’s problems.

Anti-Maduro protesters clashed with police this week, and fresh opposition marches are expected on Saturday, which both González and Machado are expected to attend.

So far, at least 20 people have been killed in post-election protests, according to rights group Human Rights Watch. About 1,200 others have been arrested in connection with the demonstrations, according to the government.

Aerosmith have announced their retirement from touring after the band said the full recovery of frontman Steven Tyler’s vocal cord injury was “not possible”.

The US rock group, known for hits including I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing, Dream On and Walk This Way, said: “As you know, Steven’s voice is an instrument like no other. He has spent months tirelessly working on getting his voice to where it was before his injury.

“We’ve seen him struggling despite having the best medical team by his side. Sadly, it is clear that a full recovery from his vocal injury is not possible.

“We have made a heartbreaking and difficult, but necessary, decision – as a band of brothers – to retire from the touring stage.”

The band cancelled dates on their farewell tour, titled Peace Out, last September because Tyler needed “ongoing care” for damage to his vocal cords and a fractured larynx, which they said was “more serious than initially thought”.

They were due to finish the farewell tour in February 2025 and had played three dates before postponing the remaining ones prior to the decision to cancel them altogether.

Queen guitarist Sir Brian May took to Instagram to share his emotions and said: “This has brought a tear to my eye. Aerosmith have been a huge part of my life, as they have been for millions of other rock fans.

“Steve Tyler stands as one of the greatest vocalists and frontmen of all time and it’s heartbreaking that his extraordinary voice has been so damaged. All things must pass, but the inspiring work of Aerosmith will live on – along with the memories of truly one of the most awesome bands to ever hit a stage.”

Fellow American rock band the Black Crowes, the tour’s opening act, said on X: “We are shocked and saddened by this news from earlier today. Nothing but much love and respect to our friends in Aerosmith. Heartfelt thanks for all of the incredible [memories].”

Aerosmith, comprising founding members Tyler, lead guitarist Joe Perry, bassist Tom Hamilton, guitarist Brad Whitford and founder drummer Joey Kramer , said it had been “the honour of our lives to have our music become part of yours”.

“It was 1970 when a spark of inspiration became Aerosmith,” the statement said. “Thanks to you, our Blue Army, that spark caught flame and has been burning for over five decades. Some of you have been with us since the beginning and all of you are the reason we made rock’n’roll history.”

The band said they were “grateful beyond words” for those who were set to see them on their farewell tour. “A final thank you to you – the best fans on planet Earth,” the statement said. “Play our music loud, now and always. Dream on. You’ve made our dreams come true.”