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Will America abandon Ukraine?

Will America abandon Ukraine?

George Packer writes: In the summer of 1940, when Great Britain was fighting Nazi Germany alone, Winston Churchill asked to borrow a few dozen aging American destroyers to defend the English coast from imminent invasion. Churchill wrote to Franklin D. Roosevelt: “Mr. President, with great respect, I must tell you that in the long history of the world, this is a thing to do now.” Today Ukraine is fighting Russia alone. American aid—never timely or sufficient, but enough to help…

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Republicans to meet allies of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán on ending Ukraine aid

Republicans to meet allies of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán on ending Ukraine aid

The Guardian reports: Allies of Hungary’s far-right prime minister Viktor Orbán will hold a closed-door meeting with Republicans in Washington to push for an end to US military support for Ukraine, the Guardian has learned. Members of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs and staff from the Hungarian embassy in Washington will on Monday begin a two-day event hosted by the conservative Heritage Foundation thinktank. The first day includes panel speeches about the Ukraine war as well as topics such…

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Half of Gaza’s population is starving, warns UN

Half of Gaza’s population is starving, warns UN

The Independent reports: Half of Gaza’s population is now believed to be “starving” as Israel’s attack on the besieged strip continues to escalate, a senior UN official warned. Calling for an immediate “humanitarian ceasefire”, Carl Skau, deputy executive director of the UN World Food Programme, took to X saying: “There’s not enough food. People are starving. “WFP has reached over one million people, but the situation is untenable. We need to get our supplies in [and we need] a humanitarian…

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IFJ: Almost 100 journalists killed, mostly in Gaza, and 400 imprisoned in 2023

IFJ: Almost 100 journalists killed, mostly in Gaza, and 400 imprisoned in 2023

The Guardian reports: A leading organisation representing journalists worldwide has expressed deep concern at the number of media professionals killed around the globe doing their jobs in 2023, with more journalists killed during Israel’s war with Hamas than in any other conflict in more than 30 years. In its annual count of media worker deaths, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) said 94 journalists had been killed so far this year and almost 400 others had been imprisoned. The figure…

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Liz Cheney’s 2024 campaign mission: secure a Democratic House majority

Liz Cheney’s 2024 campaign mission: secure a Democratic House majority

The Washington Post reports: Liz Cheney is considering many different political roles over the next several years. But there’s one certainty she’s trying for in the next 11 months: Defeating her former House GOP colleagues and electing a new Democratic majority. Cheney believes that the 2024 presidential contest could end without any candidate securing a majority of the electoral votes — an outcome that would toss the decision into the House. Or, ex-president Donald Trump could again contest the outcome…

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Jack Smith reveals sweeping scope of bid to debunk Trump election machine claims

Jack Smith reveals sweeping scope of bid to debunk Trump election machine claims

Politico reports: Special counsel Jack Smith on Saturday sharply rejected Donald Trump’s contention that foreign governments may have changed votes in the 2020 election, laying bare new details about his team’s extensive probe of the matter and its access to a vast array of senior intelligence officials in Trump’s administration. In a 45-page filing, Smith’s team describes interviewing more than a dozen of the top intelligence officials in Trump’s administration — from his director of national intelligence to the administrator…

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Trump defends dictator comments amid NYC soiree filled with MAGA diehards

Trump defends dictator comments amid NYC soiree filled with MAGA diehards

Politico reports: The chairman of an Austrian political party founded by ex-Nazis, the conservative Twitter star behind the anti-trans Bud Light backlash and former President Donald Trump all walked into a bar. Seriously. On Saturday night in Manhattan, amid butler-delivered bellinis, sequined ball gowns and a five-course French service meal, characters from all corners of the Republican Party’s MAGA faction gathered for “a night of dinner, drinking, and love of country.” Trump, the New York Young Republican Club’s 111th Annual…

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Humanitarian catastrophe is Israeli policy

Humanitarian catastrophe is Israeli policy

B’Tselem reports: The humanitarian crisis currently underway in the Gaza Strip is not a side effect of the war, but the direct intended result of the policy implemented by Israel. The people behind this policy see inflicting a humanitarian crisis on more than two million people as a legitimate way to put pressure on Hamas. Energy Minister Israel Katz, who signed an order to stop the supply of electricity to the Gaza Strip on the very first day of the…

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Civilians make up 61% of Gaza deaths from airstrikes, Israeli study finds

Civilians make up 61% of Gaza deaths from airstrikes, Israeli study finds

The Guardian reports: The aerial bombing campaign by Israel in Gaza is the most indiscriminate in terms of civilian casualties in recent years, a study published by an Israeli newspaper has found. The analysis by Haaretz came as Israeli forces fought to consolidate their control of northern Gaza on Saturday, bombing the Shejaiya district of Gaza City, while also conducting airstrikes on Rafah, a town on the southern border with Egypt where the Israeli army has told people in Gaza…

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Unexploded bombs, many U.S.-made, could make parts of Gaza uninhabitable

Unexploded bombs, many U.S.-made, could make parts of Gaza uninhabitable

The Washington Post reports: Israel’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip has reduced entire neighborhoods to dust. The resumption of fighting and intensified airstrikes on southern Gaza after a week-long pause could mean that even more of the territory could meet the same fate. But the war, however long it continues, is only the beginning. Parts of a postwar Gaza could long be dangerous to inhabit, let alone rebuild. Riddled with hundreds if not thousands of unexploded ordnance, ranging from makeshift…

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State Department bypasses Congress to approve Israel’s order for tank ammunition

State Department bypasses Congress to approve Israel’s order for tank ammunition

The New York Times reports: The State Department is pushing through a government sale to Israel of 13,000 rounds of tank ammunition, bypassing a congressional review process that is generally required for arms sales to foreign nations, according to a State Department official and an online post by the Defense Department on Saturday. The State Department notified congressional committees at 11 p.m. on Friday that it was moving ahead with the sale, valued at more than $106 million, even though…

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Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are openly talking about conditioning U.S. aid to Israel

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are openly talking about conditioning U.S. aid to Israel

Business Insider reports: Over the last several weeks, members of Congress have openly discussed the idea of conditioning US aid to Israel. The conversation has been driven by the climbing death toll and worsening conditions for Palestinian civilians in Gaza, far-right policies pursued by the Netanyahu government, and a sense that Israel has not been interested in pursuing a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in recent years. Conditions aren’t likely to happen, at least in the near term. The…

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Where are all the anti-Trump Republicans?

Where are all the anti-Trump Republicans?

Jonathan Martin writes: At a Hoover Institution conference here last week, former Trump Defense Secretary Jim Mattis — who in 2020 denounced the former president as a threat to the Constitution — said retired generals “need to go silent during elections” and argued that the “American people do not need military officers telling them how to vote.” Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) was on the same panel with Mattis and said afterward that the former president is dominating the lead-off Iowa…

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Climate change is already forcing lizards, insects and other species to evolve – and most can’t keep up

Climate change is already forcing lizards, insects and other species to evolve – and most can’t keep up

Temperature sensitivity makes western fence lizards vulnerable to climate change. Greg Shine/BLM, CC BY By Michael P. Moore, University of Colorado Denver and James T. Stroud, Georgia Institute of Technology Climate change is threatening the survival of plants and animals around the globe as temperatures rise and habitats change. Some species have been able to meet the challenge with rapid evolutionary adaptation and other changes in behavior or physiology. Dark-colored dragonflies are getting paler in order to reduce the amount…

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