The Headlines - Israel’s ‘Decapitation’ Strategy, and the Trump Official Who Resigned Over the War

Episode Date: March 18, 2026

Plus, how owning a car is becoming unaffordable.  Here’s what we’re covering: Israel Keeps Killing Key Iranian Leaders. Will It Work?, by David M. Halbfinger Joe Kent, a Top U.S. Counterterrorism Official, Resigns Over the Iran War, by Julian E. Barnes, Robert Draper and Luke Broadwater Small U.S. Airports Could Close if Shutdown Continues, Official Warns, by Gabe Castro-Root Trump Promised the ‘World’s Lowest’ Drug Prices. We Checked the Numbers., by Rebecca Robbins ‘It’s Just Crazy’: High Car Payments Make Ownership Feel Impossible, by Kailyn Rhone Why Some Birds Seem to Be Developing a Cigarette Habit, by Lesley Evans Ogden Tune in every weekday morning, and tell us what you think at: [e-mail]. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From the New York Times, it's the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Wednesday, March 18th. Here's what we're covering. As the operation continues, so does our mission. Every day that goes by, we degrade the Iranian regime's capabilities even more. In Iran yesterday, Israel dealt one of the most damaging blows yet to the country's leadership, killing Ali Larjani, the de facto leader of Iran, along with top commanders of the country's internal security militia.

Lali Jani became the Iranian regime. regime's number one, until we eliminated him too. Larjani had been an influential force in Iran for decades, at one point leading nuclear negotiations with the U.S. He also personally oversaw the violent crackdown on protesters earlier this year that left thousands dead. His killing demonstrates Israel's ongoing focus on picking off Iranian leaders one by one in hopes of destabilizing the whole regime. Israel's defense Minister has said the goal is to, quote, repeatedly cut off the head of the octopus and not let it grow. And Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday that weakening the country's security forces

in particular could pave the way for an uprising by everyday Iranians. Some analysts tell the times that breaking the chain of command like that could work, but others are more skeptical. A former senior member of Israeli military intelligence said, Decapitation has its limits, and that Iran has. will be able to find replacements for the commanders and keep fighting. This morning, at least two people were killed outside Tel Aviv after Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps fired missiles at Israel

in retaliation for Larjani's killing. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Court, which I'll just call the guards, is kind of the shock troops of the Iranian government. My colleague Neil McFarquhar has covered Iran since the early 2000s. He says how the guards are structured, in what's known as the Mosaic Strategy, was designed for exactly this kind of moment. So the Mosaic strategy is something that the Iranians

have been developing over two decades and was inspired, not least, by watching closely what the Americans did when they attacked Baghdad in 2003 in order to overthrow Saddam Hussein. The Iranians saw at that point that the Americans had successfully decapitated the regime, basically by leveling Baghdad, and they were determined not to allow that to happen if Tehran

were ever attacked. So they spread out the command all over the country. And, you know, what it means is that regional commanders have their own autonomy in terms of when they fire off missiles, when they fire off drones, what they target. And it seems like it's been what they have applied to this war, that the wind, you just need to kind of wear out the enemy. And so if you spread the command all over the country, hence the mosaic name, it would be much harder to overcome the Iranian armed forces and they can, you know, live to fight another day. Meanwhile, in Washington. Mr. President, your director of national counterterrorism, Joe Kent, he just resigned today.

He said he can't support your conflict with Iran. What's your reaction to that? And did you talk to it? Well, I read his statement. I always thought he was a nice guy, but I always thought he was weak on security, very weak on security. One of the U.S.'s top counterterrorism officials has stepped down, becoming the first senior member of the administration to quit over the war. In a public letter to President Trump, Joe Kent wrote, quote, Iran posed no immediate threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.

This criticism from Kent, who is a combat veteran, came as a surprise. He's previously been in step with the president, dismissing what you. Trump has called the Russia hoax, spreading conspiracy theories about January 6th, and even pressuring his colleagues to change an intelligence assessment to match the administration's views. But his split over the war highlights a major rift in the president's base, with those who supported Trump because of his promises to avoid endless wars, growing uneasy as the war with Iran has gone on 18 days and counting. Now, a few more quick updates on the Trump administration.

Three, four hour wait times at select airports, as you mentioned, in New Orleans, Atlanta, Houston. So this is going to get worse before it gets better, particularly if we are not refunded. A senior TSA official is warning that wait times at the airport are only going to get longer as funding for the Department of Homeland Security remains in limbo. Lawmakers have deadlocked over it with Democrats insisting that any money for DHS must come with restrictions on immigration agents. That's left workers in some. Some branches of the department, like TSA officers, going unpaid. This is the TSA situation at Atlanta Airport.

I have never even seen, oh, my. I'm going to miss this flight. At several airports this week, more than 30% of TSA agents were absent, leading to long, long lines. A growing number of TSA employees have picked up second jobs to pay their bills. They're sometimes calling out sick to do that. Also, it's called TrumpRX.gov. That's TrumpRX.gov. Since the federal government's TrumpRX website went live last month, it has promised in giant letters across the main page that it will help Americans find the world's lowest prices on prescription drugs, thanks to deals the White House struck with pharma companies.

A new review by the Times found that is not true. In Germany, for example, where the public health system, foots the bill for most drugs, it is often paying less than the price the Trump administration negotiated. And it's not just Germany. For two of the biggest name brand drugs on the site, the weight loss medications Wagovi and Zepbound, both are available for lower out-of-pocket prices at pharmacies in wealthy countries around the world. Overall, the analysis shows that while Trump appears to have brought down some prices, in many cases, Americans still pay more than people elsewhere. White House officials and drug makers have contested these findings.

The full review, which the Times did in partnership with several German news organizations, is at NYTimes.com. Gas prices in the U.S. reached their highest point in years this week and have jumped more than 25% since the start of the war in Iran. The high prices are coming at a time when the cost of owning a car at all had already been skyrocketing. In this economy, oh, you think I'm going to go out here and have, A $500 car note. As of January, the average monthly payment for new cars was $774.

I felt so defeated about the fact that my car payment was now going to be $830. Repair prices have also been going up. Tire rotation, $2999, rear differential, $10999. And so has the cost of car insurance. According to one estimate, that's made the total cost of owning a vehicle surge more than 40% since 2020. As a result, more middle and lower-income Americans are falling behind on their car payments. Facing that, some have even stopped paying for their insurance, even though that's illegal in most states. The Times talked with one woman who gave up her car altogether, a 32-year-old nursing assistant in Michigan.

She turned to Uber instead to get to work, but that still cost her $1,000 a month, and she has since moved back in with her mom to save money. And finally, around the world, a lot of birds have picked up a curious habit. Song threshes in New Zealand, House finches in Mexico, Darwin's finches in the Galapagos, they're all putting cigarette butts in their nests. Some songbirds in Britain are even straight up nesting inside outdoor ash trays. Now, a new study adds evidence to why this may be happening. It found that for the colorful little blue tits, which are found across Europe, the toxins in tobacco may keep parasites out of their nests.

Researchers at a university in Poland studied the birds, both in parks and the forest, and monitored the health of them split across a couple different kinds of nests. Some were in normal nest boxes, others had cigarette butts mixed in. Fun fact here, the researchers used bellows to smoke the cigarettes mechanically so that no human lungs were harmed in getting. getting the materials. Then they collected blood samples, and about two weeks after hatching, blood work on babies from the nests with cigarette butts indicated they were healthier than the ones in untreated nests. The theory is that the cigarette butts, which have about 4,000 chemical compounds in them, including nicotine, arsenic, and heavy metals, may have helped ward off pests that could affect the birds and their helpless hatchlings. A separate experiment

out of Mexico City suggested something similar. When researchers added pests to finch nests, the birds responded by adding more cigarette butts. An evolutionary ecologist who helped lead the study out of Poland hopes there's one clear takeaway from all of this work, and it's that, quote, birds are smart. Those are the headlines.

Today on the Daily, how the White House is trying to shape the media narrative around its policies, and what that means for network TV. You can listen to that in the New York Times app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.