Saudi Arabia has first YouTube Fan festival

Saudi Arabia will begin receiving requests for umrah pilgrimage from abroad for vaccinated worshipers starting August 9. The move comes 18 months after a border closure due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Police say the man was arrested Sunday near Dhaka, but his female dance partner is on the run. The 20-year-old could face up to five years in prison on religious charges.

Kasegeran is a remote town in Java that most Indonesians would struggle to find on a map. But it’s also home to an unlikely collection of emerging YouTubers, as villagers swap their traditional jobs for the big earnings of online video stars.

Once allies, Saudi Arabia and the Taliban have been divided by war, betrayal, and 9/11. As Afghanistan changes and Middle East relations shift, the two won't rekindle ties, but another nation is looking closely at Kabul.

Since the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan, women's rights have been quashed. Women are being told what to wear, what to study and being segregated from men at universities. After a violent crackdown on female protesters, a demonstration has taken place in Kabul by women deemed supportive of the Taliban's ultra-hardline interpretation of Islam. Images of that rally have sparked considerable reaction on social media. FRANCE 24's Haxie Meyers-Belkin tells us more.

YouTube will ban any videos that claim commonly used vaccines approved by health authorities are ineffective or dangerous, moving beyond COVID-19 to include content targeting vaccines such as measles and chicken pox.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has threatened to "retaliate" after YouTube deleted Russia Today's German-language channels. YouTube said the Moscow-backed broadcaster had violated its COVID misinformation policy.

RT's German YouTube channels have been blocked over alleged COVID-19 misinformation. What does the German government make of the move? And what do other observers think?

A live broadcast video from Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has been removed from Facebook, YouTube and Instagram. In the video, the president falsely stated that UK citizens are developing AIDS after receiving two Covid-19 vaccine doses. After the video was posted, fact-checking and governmental entities scrambled to clarify that there is no evidence to demonstrate a link between Covid-19 vaccines and the development of viruses such as HIV.

Facebook began this week by announcing more than $9 billion in quarterly profits, an increase of about 17 percent. The social media giant also announced that it now has close to three billion users. But all is not well on the Facebook front as Mark Zuckerberg’s platform has been facing a deluge of scathing reports.

Here are a few reasons to pick up a copy of The Guardian on Thursday. Find these stories and much more when you grab a copy of The Guardian on Thursday.⁣⁣⁣⁣ ⁣

The Lebanese ambassador has been asked to leave Saudi territory within 48 hours. The move comes after Lebanon's information minister criticized the Saudi-led war against Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.