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Category: Politics

Can Israel root out Hezbollah?

Can Israel root out Hezbollah?

  Israel says its army has launched a ground operation in southern Lebanon to target Hezbollah. It’s the latest escalation after more than a week of air strikes across the country, which have killed hundreds of Lebanese civilians, and the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah. It comes as Israeli allies, including US President Joe Biden, urge it to agree to a ceasefire with Hezbollah. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has voiced support for the Israeli military’s goals in Lebanon. So. does America…

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Trump lies about federal response as he campaigns in area ravaged by Hurricane Helene

Trump lies about federal response as he campaigns in area ravaged by Hurricane Helene

The Associated Press reports: Donald Trump repeatedly spread falsehoods Monday about the federal response to Hurricane Helene despite claiming not to be politicizing the disaster as he toured hard-hit areas in south Georgia. The former president and Republican nominee claimed upon landing in Valdosta that President Joe Biden was “sleeping” and not responding to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who he said was “calling the president and hasn’t been able to get him.” He repeated the claim at an event with…

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U.S. is ‘fully complicit’ in Israel’s attacks on Lebanon and Gaza

U.S. is ‘fully complicit’ in Israel’s attacks on Lebanon and Gaza

  “Everybody [in Lebanon] is talking about … this $9 billion that the US has just promised the Israelis now in the middle of this invasion.” On this week’s ‘Mehdi Unfiltered,’ American University of Beirut professor Karim Makdisi joins the show to discuss Israel’s latest attacks on Lebanon – including Israel’s explosive pager attacks – and how Israel’s offensive is only increasing Lebanese support for Hezbollah. Also joining the panel discussion is the Center for International Policy’s Matt Duss, a…

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Drunk with power, Israel’s ‘victory’ opens the gates for war without end

Drunk with power, Israel’s ‘victory’ opens the gates for war without end

Lubna Masarwa writes: The media in Israel reacted to the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah with euphoria. On Channel 12’s “Meet the Press”, Amit Segal and Ben Caspit raised a glass of arak to mark Nasrallah’s death. Paz Robinson, Channel 13’s reporter, distributed chocolates in Karmiel. Channel 13 is considered left wing. Channel 14’s flagship programme, The Patriots, opened with singing and celebration led by presenter Yinon Magal. Nadav Eyal wrote in Ynet:”[Nasrallah’s] assassination is an event…

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‘Just not right’: A GOP governor confronts Trump’s lies

‘Just not right’: A GOP governor confronts Trump’s lies

Jonathan Martin writes: Springfield was once a manufacturing hub. Perched on the interstate between Dayton and Columbus, it had tire and farm implement factories. Like a lot of Midwestern towns, that economy declined in the 1970s and 1980s. Yet in recent years, a number of jobs have been created in the area and with that a demand for more workers. It’s the same story in all of Ohio, which is why [Ohio Gov. Mike] DeWine made a point in his…

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An Ohio businessman faces death threats for praising his Haitian workers

An Ohio businessman faces death threats for praising his Haitian workers

The New York Times reports: For Jamie McGregor, a businessman in Springfield, Ohio, speaking favorably about the Haitian immigrants he employs has come to this: death threats, a lockdown at his company and posters around town branding him a traitor for hiring immigrants. To defend himself and his family, Mr. McGregor has had to violate his own vow to never own a gun. “I have struggled with the fact that now we’re going to have firearms in our house —…

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Republicans lay legal groundwork for election challenges

Republicans lay legal groundwork for election challenges

Reuters reports: In Arizona, one of seven competitive U.S. states that are expected to decide the 2024 presidential election, an advocacy group founded by Donald Trump adviser Stephen Miller is advancing a bold legal theory: that judges can throw out election results over “failures or irregularities” by local officials. The lawsuit by the America First Legal Foundation, a conservative advocacy group, says the court in such cases should be able to toss the election results and order new rounds of…

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Elon Musk, now one of illegal immigration’s harshest critics, was once of questionable immigration status

Elon Musk, now one of illegal immigration’s harshest critics, was once of questionable immigration status

  CNN reports: The world’s richest man stood steps away from the US-Mexico border, adjusting the brim of his black cowboy hat. “As an immigrant to the United States, I am extremely pro-immigrant,” Elon Musk said, “and I believe that we need a greatly expanded legal immigration system, and that we should let anyone in the country who is hardworking and honest and will be a contributor to the United States.” But in the September 2023 video from Eagle Pass,…

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Israel’s vision of no Palestinians ‘from the river to the sea’

Israel’s vision of no Palestinians ‘from the river to the sea’

Sahar Aziz writes: Words matter. That is the purported principle behind a national campaign by pro-Israel organizations to censor, punish and even criminalize protests on American college campuses demanding a cease-fire to Israel’s unrestrained assault on 2.4 million Palestinians in Gaza. University administrators have obliged with draconian restrictions that effectively deny their own students the ability to speak out against what the International Court of Justice has described as Israel’s “plausible” violations of the Genocide Convention in Gaza. Pro-Israel advocates often point…

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How Beirut is responding to Nasrallah’s death

How Beirut is responding to Nasrallah’s death

Robert F Worth writes: As word spread on Saturday that Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah had been killed in his underground Beirut bunker by an Israeli airstrike, people began quietly reckoning with the possibility that Lebanon’s political architecture might be about to shift for the first time in more than three decades. And that, in turn, raised the prospect that locked doors might soon open across the Middle East. Those who have fought against Hezbollah—not just Israelis but also Lebanese from…

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Far-right Freedom party finishes first in Austrian election, latest results suggest

Far-right Freedom party finishes first in Austrian election, latest results suggest

The Guardian reports: The far right won the most votes in an Austrian election for the first time since the Nazi era on Sunday, as the Freedom party (FPÖ) rode a tide of public anger over migration and the cost of living to beat the centre-right People’s party (ÖVP). The pro-Kremlin, anti-Islam FPÖ won 28.8% of votes, beating the ruling ÖVP of the chancellor, Karl Nehammer, into second place on 26.3%, according to near-complete results. The opposition Social Democratic party…

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What Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination spells for the Middle East

What Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination spells for the Middle East

Hassan Hassan and Kareem Shaheen write: The killing of Hassan Nasrallah in Israeli strikes on Friday surpasses in significance those of Osama bin Laden in May 2011, Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in January 2020 and other towering figures who have shaped the region’s violent modern history. With Nasrallah’s demise, we are witnessing the fall of a figure whose influence extends well beyond Hezbollah, Iran and the “Axis of Resistance.” For both foes and followers, Nasrallah was larger than life, occupying…

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Is the killing of Hassan Nasrallah a game changer?

Is the killing of Hassan Nasrallah a game changer?

  He led Hezbollah for more than three decades and made it into a military and political force to be reckoned with, in the long-running conflict in the Middle East. Hassan Nasrallah’s killing in a massive Israeli air attack in a southern suburb of Beirut is sure to open a new page in the ongoing war. Israel is on high alert and says it is prepared for all options after it announced his death. But will Hezbollah respond – and…

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Israel must end the war and start building a real democracy

Israel must end the war and start building a real democracy

Dahlia Scheindlin writes: Since the war in Gaza began, there have been proliferating signs that Israel’s institutions of state are under severe stress. Netanyahu has ignored repeated warnings from Israel’s attorney general that his government’s actions have violated the law; in response, government ministers have called for the attorney general’s dismissal. Israel’s legal system is in disarray. For over a year, the government held up dozens of judicial appointments, including on Israel’s Supreme Court; and in September, Netanyahu’s justice minister…

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Moody’s lowers Israel’s credit rating for 2nd time this year, amid Hezbollah escalation

Moody’s lowers Israel’s credit rating for 2nd time this year, amid Hezbollah escalation

The Times of Israel reports: US rating agency Moody’s downgraded Israel’s credit rating for a second time this year on Friday, doing so this time by two notches, while citing the increased intensity of the fighting with Lebanon’s Hezbollah terror group and the lack of an Israeli “exit strategy.” The prominent credit rating agency cut Israel’s score from A2 to Baa1, raising concerns that domestic political risks have increased alongside geopolitical ones “with material negative consequences for the country’s creditworthiness…

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Timothy Snyder: ‘The moment you believe freedom is given, it is gone.’

Timothy Snyder: ‘The moment you believe freedom is given, it is gone.’

Seven years ago, Timothy Snyder wrote the best-selling book “On Tyranny.” His new book “On Freedom” is a rumination of what it truly means to be free, especially during a time when authoritarianism has been making strides around the world. “Being against things is just the beginning; you have to know what you’re for,” Snyder tells Ali Velshi. “Being angry is not the right first step. Being joyous is the right first step.” He adds, “We have to be rebels…

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