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Category: Politics

Netanyahu orders Israeli army to seize ‘70% of Gaza Strip’, violating ceasefire deal

Netanyahu orders Israeli army to seize ‘70% of Gaza Strip’, violating ceasefire deal

The Guardian reports: Benjamin Netanyahu has said he has given orders to the Israeli army to seize control of 70% of the Gaza Strip in a move that threatens to torpedo an already fragile ceasefire and create catastrophic humanitarian conditions in the already devastated territory. Under the US-brokered ceasefire in October, the Israeli army withdrew to a demarcation line which gave Israel direct control of 53% of the occupied territory. Since then, Israeli forces have steadily advanced their positions westward…

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Democratic elite must face accountability for Gaza

Democratic elite must face accountability for Gaza

Matt Duss writes: As Democrats continue to struggle to coalesce around a shared message for the future, last week offered some troubling examples of their refusing, once again, to learn from the mistakes of the past. After a delay, the Democratic National Committee finally released the post-2024 election autopsy report that DNC chair Ken Martin had long promised. It was easy to see why he had tried to avoid making it public. In addition to being incomplete and a mess,…

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The high-seas black market that keeps Iran’s sanctioned oil flowing

The high-seas black market that keeps Iran’s sanctioned oil flowing

The Wall Street Journal reports: In this nautical no-man’s-land 45 miles off the coast of Malaysia, tankers laden with sanctioned Iranian oil sit low in the water, waiting to offload their cargo to vessels bound for Chinese refineries. They lower tarps and other objects over the names on their hulls and use black paint to conceal identity numbers. They’re here to carry out an elaborate deception: offshore trysts known as ship-to-ship transfers, in which one vessel offloads sanctioned oil onto…

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The White House intervened to get a $620 million deal for a company tied to Donald Trump Jr.

The White House intervened to get a $620 million deal for a company tied to Donald Trump Jr.

By Robert Faturechi This story was originally published by ProPublica When the Pentagon announced a $620 million loan last year to a small North Carolina startup linked to Donald Trump Jr., defense officials and the company tried to tamp down suspicions of cronyism.  The president’s eldest son said through a spokesperson that he wasn’t involved. The Pentagon said Trump Jr. played no role in the record-setting deal. And the startup’s founder told reporters that his company, Vulcan Elements, received no…

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Justice Alito’s son quietly operates inside Treasury Department

Justice Alito’s son quietly operates inside Treasury Department

The Daily Beast reports: Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s son quietly landed a top job in the Trump administration as his father ruled on huge cases involving the president. Philip Alito, 39, got the political appointee job as a lawyer in the Treasury Department in the early days of Trump’s second term, NOTUS reported. The “sheepish” Alito was acutely aware of the nepotism and laid low once he got through the door, according to sources. The office provides legal and…

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‘I don’t care about the midterms,’ Trump claims as Iran deal remains elusive and he threatens Oman

‘I don’t care about the midterms,’ Trump claims as Iran deal remains elusive and he threatens Oman

Jonathan Lemire and Nancy A. Youssef write: In 2015, then–Secretary of State John Kerry testified before a Senate committee about a new deal to restrict Iran’s nuclear development. After more than a year of talks, with Iran on one side and several nations—including the U.S., China, and Russia—on the other, an agreement was on the table, full of hyper-technical details about what Tehran could and couldn’t do for the next two-plus decades. The U.S. had plenty of other complaints about…

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‘It’s the West Bank’: Lebanese villagers on life inside Israel’s ‘yellow line’

‘It’s the West Bank’: Lebanese villagers on life inside Israel’s ‘yellow line’

The Guardian reports: For hours, Hussein Abdel al-El and his wife, Um Alaa, did not move. They sat in the bathroom in the dark, not daring to touch their phones; the faint glow of the screen might give them away to the Israeli soldiers outside. It was 1am, the Israelis were raiding their neighbours’ house, and the septuagenarian couple did not want their door knocked on next. In the next house over, Israeli soldiers had forced residents against the wall…

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The State Department’s ‘Office of Remigration’ is a shady operation, lacking oversight or accountability

The State Department’s ‘Office of Remigration’ is a shady operation, lacking oversight or accountability

Wired reports: The State Department doesn’t seem to want anyone to know that it has an Office of Remigration. There’s no mention on the department’s social media feeds or even on the official website. There aren’t many details about when it was established, who is running the office, or what work it is carrying out. When WIRED reached out to ask if the office exists, the State Department wouldn’t share specific details about the office and its work. But the…

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Former judges urge inquiry into slush fund deal Trump struck with IRS

Former judges urge inquiry into slush fund deal Trump struck with IRS

The New York Times reports: A bipartisan group of 35 former federal judges on Wednesday asked the judge who oversaw President Trump’s remarkable lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service to reopen the case and conduct an inquiry into whether the hasty deal to resolve it could be challenged as an act of fraud. The move by the former judges was one of an increasing number of legal efforts to attack the validity of the two extraordinary benefits that emerged from…

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Trump wants all federal employees to sign NDAs

Trump wants all federal employees to sign NDAs

Don Moynihan writes: Scott Kupor, the Director of the Office of Personnel Management, explained why nearly every federal employee should sign a Non Disclosure Agreement In much of the private sector, employees handling sensitive business or customer information are routinely required to sign confidentiality agreements, and the federal government should not be held to a lower standard. Set aside the small problem that Kupor — previously a longtime executive at Andreessen Horowitz — does not work in the private sector…

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The Democratic Party cannot continue giving unconditional support to Israel

The Democratic Party cannot continue giving unconditional support to Israel

Sen. Chris Van Hollen writes: Democrats need to face a hard truth. While Republicans’ approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has failed, so has ours. The Democratic Party has provided reflexive and unconditional support to Israeli governments, even as their actions have increasingly undermined American interests and values. For decades, we have called for a two-state solution, but we’ve failed to use our leverage to make it real. It’s past time that we use that leverage to end the occupation and…

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Israel escalates Lebanon offensive as U.S. pushes for Iran peace deal

Israel escalates Lebanon offensive as U.S. pushes for Iran peace deal

The New York Times reports: Israel intensified its military campaign against Hezbollah on Tuesday, striking targets across Lebanon and advancing deeper into Lebanese territory after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to “increase the blows” against the Iran-backed group. The Israeli military said it had struck more than 100 Hezbollah sites overnight in southern and eastern Lebanon, including weapons storage facilities and command centers. It also issued an evacuation warning on Tuesday for the entire city…

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Iran threatens to renew strikes against U.S. amid ongoing push for diplomatic deal

Iran threatens to renew strikes against U.S. amid ongoing push for diplomatic deal

The New York Times reports: Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps said on Tuesday that it would launch a “decisive reciprocal response” to any attack that violated the cease-fire, injecting more uncertainty into fragile diplomatic efforts a day after the U.S. military struck targets in southern Iran. Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, also suggested that the country could renew strikes on U.S. military installations in the Persian Gulf, which Tehran had repeatedly targeted after the United States and Israel started bombing…

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Southern Poverty Law Center seeks dismissal of ‘vindictive’ Justice Department indictment

Southern Poverty Law Center seeks dismissal of ‘vindictive’ Justice Department indictment

The Independent reports: A Justice Department indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center is part of a “top-down” campaign of retribution against President Donald Trump’s perceived political enemies and constitutes a vindictive prosecution that must be dismissed, lawyers for the nonprofit argued Tuesday in urging a judge to toss the case out. The Alabama-based nonprofit was indicted in April on fraud and money laundering charges that accuse it of misleading donors by paying informants inside white supremacist and other extremist…

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As Trump politicizes the DOJ, prosecutors struggle with grand juries

As Trump politicizes the DOJ, prosecutors struggle with grand juries

The New York Times reports: Grand juries are the heart of the criminal justice system, the inner sanctum where prosecutors, working unchecked and in secret, have enormous power to indict their fellow citizens. But under President Trump, the Justice Department has had serious difficulties presenting cases to grand juries, running into problems that would have seemed unthinkable a year ago. In the past several months, prosecutors have repeatedly failed to persuade grand juries that the cases they have brought warrant…

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Pope Leo just schooled the tech bros on Tolkien

Pope Leo just schooled the tech bros on Tolkien

Miles Klee writes: Nobody was surprised that Pope Leo XIV cited well-known saints and previous pontiffs in his first encyclical, or papal letter of spiritual guidance, “Magnifica humanitas,” released Monday. But the name that immediately jumped out to many readers is one synonymous with high fantasy literature: J.R.R. Tolkien, the Catholic author of The Lord of the Rings. Leo’s letter is concerned with “safeguarding the human person in the time of artificial intelligence,” a major theme of his first year…

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