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“We were attacked last night from four corners of the Middle East with proxies shooting at us, firing ballistic missiles, drones and cruise missiles,” Isaac Herzog tells Sky News.

Iran’s attack on Israel was a “declaration of war”, Israel’s president has told Sky News.

Isaac Herzog said it was “about time the world faces this empire of evil in Tehran”.

World leaders need to “make it clear” to the Iranian regime that its behaviour is “unacceptable”, Mr Herzog added.

“We should be looking lucidly at the phenomena called Tehran and Iran.”

Israel has not sought war since its creation in 1948, the president insisted.

“We are peace seekers. We went to peace with our neighbours time and time again. Unfortunately, it all started on the 7th of October when a proxy of Iran, Hamas, led an unbelievably brutal massacre against Israeli citizens and the rest is history. We know it. So we should put it in perspective.”

Follow live updates after Iran’s attack on Israel

He described Iran’s launch of more than 300 drones and missiles towards Israel on Saturday as “just another example of how [Tehran] has operated for years and years”.

“We were attacked last night from four corners of the Middle East with proxies shooting at us, firing ballistic missiles, drones and cruise missiles,” he told Sky News’s Middle East correspondent, Alistair Bunkall.

“This is like a real war. I mean, this is a declaration of war,” he said, before adding that Israel would exercise restraint.

Asked whether he agreed with Western allies who are calling for calm, Mr Herzog said: “The last thing that Israel is seeking in this region since its creation is to go to war – we are seeking peace.”

But Tehran has been “spreading havoc, terror and instability all over the world, and especially in our region”, he said.

Iran has proxies all over the Middle East and terror cells all around the world, Mr Herzog went on.

Damascus strike ‘wasn’t in Iranian consulate’

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said its direct assault on Israel was in retaliation for an “attack on the consular section of the Iranian embassy in Damascus” on 1 April.

Two generals and seven members of the IRGC were killed in the strike, which Tehran blamed on Israel. Israel has not publicly commented.

Mr Herzog told Sky News the strike “wasn’t in the consulate” but in a “separate building nearby the consulate”.

He added that the most senior general assassinated had led operations from Lebanon and Syria.

There had been “terror attacks day in, day out, with the entire machine instructed from Tehran”, he said.

Mr Herzog said the “number one issue” for Israel was the release of hostages still being held in Gaza.

“We want them back as soon possible,” he said. “The entire world leadership is calling for that. But Hamas is adamantly refusing. Time and again. That’s the real situation at hand.”

Regarding aid deliveries to Gaza, he said: “We’ve opened up many crossings and passages. We’ve enabled an enormous amount of aid also to be parachuted down, and also coming from the sea and from terrestrial openings.”

Following last night’s attack, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said 99% of Iranian missiles and drones were intercepted.

Mr Herzog said he was “happy that we are part of an incredible coalition of nations that has been part and parcel in preventing most of these missiles and drones and weapons to come into Israel”.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/world-must-face-irans-evil-empire-israeli-president-says-13115263

Biden warns Netanyahu US will NOT support Israel’s counterattack on Iran amid fears of all-out war: President tells PM in late-night call ‘you got a win, take the win’ after IDF shot down ‘nearly all’ incoming drones and missiles

• President Biden has made it clear to Benjamin Netanyahu that US forces will not join offensive operations against Iran, according to reports
* The comments were made by Biden during a phone call between the two leaders after Iran unleashed a drone and missile attack on Israel
* Biden released a statement following the call between the two leaders saying it had reaffirmed America’s ‘ironclad commitment to the security of Israel’

President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the US will not support any counterattack against Iran, sources have revealed.

Biden spoke with Netanyahu in a late-night phone call after Iran bombarded Israel with hundreds of missiles and drones on Saturday in response to a drone strike in Syria that killed 12 Iranians, including two top generals.

A senior White House official told Axios that Biden made it clear to Netanyahu that US forces would not participate in any further operations. Netanyahu said he understood.

Biden reportedly told the Israeli Prime Minister: ‘You got a win. Take the win’, amid fears amongst White House officials that an Iran attack will lead to a greater war in the region.

Officials told CNN that all in US forces managed to intercept more 70 drones and at least three ballistic missiles during the attack, but don’t have an appetite to take Iran head on.

Three senior administration officials have also told NBC News that Biden had privately expressed concern that Netanyahu is trying to pull the US into the conflict.

The White House believes the Israelis are not looking for a direct war with Iran but US officials can’t be certain, an official told the outlet.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13306161/Biden-warns-Netanyahu-NOT-support-Israels-counterattack-Iran-amid-fears-war-President-tells-PM-late-night-call-got-win-win-IDF-shot-nearly-incoming-drones-missiles.html

After reports surfaced of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards seizing an Israeli-linked cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, government sources told CNN-News18 that there are 17 Indian nationals among the crew on board.

The sources further added that they are in contact with Iranian authorities through diplomatic channels, both in Tehran and New Delhi, to ensure the security, welfare, and early release of the Indian nationals.

Commandos from Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard raided a ship near the Strait of Hormuz by helicopter as tensions between Iran and Israel grew following the latter’s alleged strike on the former’s consulate in the Syrian capital of Damascus earlier this month.

Sources also informed CNN-News18 that the ship, MSC Aries, was en route to the port of Nhava Sheva in Mumbai, India and the expected arrival was on the night of April 15.

In response to the attack, Israel issued a warning, stating that Iran would face “consequences” for escalating the conflict in the region.

“Iran will bear the consequences for choosing to escalate the situation any further,” stated Israel’s military spokesman Daniel Hagari in a video statement.

US vows ‘ironclad commitment’ to Israel

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said he spoke with his Israeli counterpart, Tzachi Hanegbi, regarding the issue and and reiterated the United States’ “ironclad commitment” to the country.

“This morning, I spoke with my Israeli counterpart, National Security Advisor Hanegbi, to discuss events in the Middle East. During the call, I reiterated the United States’ ironclad commitment to the security of Israel,” stated Sullivan in a social media post on X.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/iranian-revolutionary-guards-raid-seize-vessel-headed-towards-india-near-strait-of-hormuz-8850434.html

Police say there is no continuing threat, adding that it was too early to determine the attacker’s motive.

Seven people are dead and others are in serious or critical condition after a stabbing rampage at a mall in Sydney, Australia, on Saturday, according to police. The attacker, who was shot by a lone officer, was among the dead, and a baby among those stabbed.

New South Wales Police Commissioner Anthony Cooke told a news conference that the attacker walked into the Westfield Bondi Junction mall at about 3:20 p.m. local time (1:20 a.m. ET) where he “caused harm” to about nine people “stabbing them with a weapon he was carrying.” The weapon “was most likely a knife,” he said.

A spokesperson for New South Wales Ambulance told NBC News that a 9-month-old baby was “transported to Sydney Children’s Hospital with a pediatric stab wound.”

Cooke said that an inspector near the scene was guided to the offender’s location by members of the public. As she pursued him from behind, Cooke said the offender turned and the officer shot him.

“She took the action, saving a range of people’s lives,” he added.

He said the offender’s motives were not clear, but he acted alone and that there was no continuing threat.

Speaking at the same news conference, NSW Ambulance Assistant Commissioner Brent Armitage said two other people had been transported to hospitals across Sydney. Their condition was not known.

Surveillance video showed a man running through the mall holding a long knife. Reports from local media described chaos, as some shoppers fled and others attempted to stop the man. Some shops reportedly pulled down their shutters, sequestering some people inside in order to keep them safe.

Hundreds of people were evacuated from the mall.

In a live interview with 9News Sydney, the local broadcaster, a man outside the mall said he helped a baby after a woman was stabbed. “The mum came over with the baby and threw it at me, with this hole in the baby, it looked pretty bad,” he said.

Roi Huberman, a sound engineer at ABC TV in Australia, told the network that he sheltered in a store during the incident.

“Suddenly we heard a shot or maybe two shots and we didn’t know what to do,” he said. “Then the very capable person in the store took us to the back where it can be locked.” She then locked the store and led them out through the back entrance.

Andrew Reid described helping some of the injured victims, including one woman who was “bleeding pretty badly.”

“That poor woman she there was a lot of blood,” Reid, who was shopping for a bed, told Sky News. “She lost a lot of blood and me and a couple of other bystanders helped with her.”

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the attack “a horrific act of violence that indiscriminately targeted innocent people.”

In a news conference, he said the nation “offers our deepest condolences and sympathies to all those who are grieving for someone they have lost. And we send our strength to those who have been injured.”

King Charles III said he and Queen Camilla “were utterly shocked and horrified to hear of the tragic stabbing incident in Bondi.”

“Our hearts go out to the families and loved ones of those who have been so brutally killed during such a senseless attack,” he said in a statement. “While details of these shocking circumstances are still emerging, our thoughts are also with those who were involved in the response, and we give thanks for the bravery of the first responders and emergency services.”

Prince William and his wife Kate, the Princess of Wales, issued statement on X.

Source : https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/sydney-mall-shooting-australia-westfield-bondi-multiple-stabbings-rcna147686

Booms and air raid sirens sounded across Israel early Sunday after Iran launched hundreds of drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles in an unprecedented revenge mission that pushed the Middle East closer to a regionwide war. In Washington, President Joe Biden said U.S. forces helped Israel down “nearly all” the drones and missiles and pledged to convene allies to develop a unified response.

The attack, less than two weeks after a suspected Israeli strike in Syria that killed two Iranian generals in an Iranian consular building, marked the first time Iran has launched a direct military assault on Israel, despite decades of enmity dating back to the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Condemnation from the United Nations chief and others was swift, with France saying Iran “is risking a potential military escalation,” Britain calling the attack “reckless” and Germany saying Iran and its proxies “must stop it immediately.”

The Israeli military’s spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said Iran fired scores of drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles — with the vast majority intercepted outside Israel’s borders. He said warplanes intercepted over 10 cruise missiles alone, also outside Israeli airspace.

Hagari said a handful of missiles landed in Israel. Rescuers said a 7-year-old girl in a Bedouin Arab town was seriously wounded in southern Israel, apparently in a missile strike, though they said police were still investigating the circumstances of her injuries. Hagari said a missile struck an army base, causing light damage but no injuries.

“A wide-scale attack by Iran is a major escalation,” he said. Asked whether Israel would respond, Hagari said only that the army “does and will do whatever is required to protect the security of the state of Israel.” He said the incident was not over, and dozens of Israeli warplanes remained in the skies.

Israel’s military said its Arrow system, which shoots down ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere, handled most interceptions and noted that “strategic partners” were involved.

“At my direction, to support the defense of Israel, the U.S. military moved aircraft and ballistic missile defense destroyers to the region over the course of the past week,” Biden said in a statement. “Thanks to these deployments and the extraordinary skill of our service members, we helped Israel take down nearly all of the incoming drones and missiles.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a separate statement that U.S. forces “intercepted dozens of missiles and UAVs en route to Israel, launched from Iran, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.”

Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke early Sunday, Israeli time, their governments said. Biden said in his statement that he reaffirmed “America’s ironclad commitment” to Israel’s security — a departure from his growing criticism of Israel’s conduct in its war on Hamas in Gaza.

Iran had vowed revenge since the April 1 airstrike in Syria, which Tehran accused Israel of being responsible for. Israel hasn’t commented on it.

Israel and Iran have been on a collision course throughout Israel’s six-month war against Hamas militants in Gaza. The war erupted after Hamas and Islamic Jihad, two militant groups backed by Iran, carried out a devastating cross-border attack on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 250 others. An Israeli offensive in Gaza has caused widespread devastation and killed over 33,000 people, according to local health officials.

Almost immediately after the war erupted, Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon, began attacking Israel’s northern border. The two sides have been involved in daily exchanges of fire, while Iranian-backed groups in Iraq, Syria and Yemen have launched rockets and missiles toward Israel.

In a statement carried late Saturday by Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency, the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard acknowledged launching “dozens of drones and missiles towards the occupied territories and positions of the Zionist regime.”

Source : https://apnews.com/article/strait-of-hormuz-vessel-33fcffde2d867380e98c89403776a8ac

The New York judge overseeing Donald Trump’s hush money criminal case rejected the former U.S. president’s bid to delay Monday’s scheduled trial on the ground that substantial pre-trial publicity would make the proceedings unfair.
Trump had sought an indefinite delay, saying media coverage was prejudiced against him, and finding an acceptable jury in Manhattan would be tough because the borough was “overwhelmingly biased” against him.

But in a decision on Friday, Justice Juan Merchan said an indefinite adjournment was “not tenable.”
Merchan also said Trump himself generated much of the publicity surrounding his legal troubles, including through “unrelenting media posts” attacking people he blamed for them.
“The situation defendant finds himself in now is not new to him and (is) at least in part, of his own doing,” Merchan wrote.
Prosecutors argued the publicity was not likely to drop, and it would be “perverse” to reward Trump with a delay based on media attention he courted.

They also said thorough questioning of prospective jurors would likely find enough who could decide the case fairly.
Trump is the Republican presidential candidate in an expected Nov. 5 election rematch against Democratic incumbent Joe Biden, who beat him in 2020.
Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Trump’s campaign, said in an email: “President Trump and his legal team will continue fighting against this Biden Trial and all of the other Witch Hunts.”

Source: https://www.reuters.com/legal/trumps-hush-money-trial-will-not-be-delayed-because-publicity-judge-rules-2024-04-12/

The White House said on Friday there is no reason for China to see a U.S. summit this week with Japan and the Philippines as a threat.
White House national security spokesperson John Kirby spoke after China complained to Japan and the Philippines about some of the rhetoric emerging from President Joe Biden’s summit talks with the leaders of Japan and the Philippines this week.
“These meetings were not about any one other nation. This was about deepening and revitalizing existing alliances and partnerships and strengthening some new ones,” Kirby told reporters.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/us-sees-no-reason-china-see-us-meetings-with-japan-philippines-threat-2024-04-12/

US President Joe Biden has said he expects Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” in response to an airstrike in Syria that killed a senior officer. Meanwhile, several countries have warned their citizens against travel to the region.

Israel remains braced for an attack from Iran as the US moves “additional assets” to the Middle East.

Joe Biden said he expects an attack “sooner, rather than later” and simply told Tehran “don’t”, with warnings growing of retaliation for the killing last week of a senior officer in Iran’s embassy in Syria.

The White House said the threat of an imminent attack on Israel is real and viable, while at least three other countries have updated their travel advice, including France, Russia and India.

As Mr Biden pledges the US is “devoted” to Israel’s defence, an official has told Sky News “additional assets” are being moved to the region to boost “deterrence efforts” and protect American forces.

According to Sky’s US partner NBC News, most of the assets involved are already deployed in the area and are just being moved around.

Sky’s US correspondent Mark Stone said no further details have been provided.

“I think the consensus among experts is that the Iranians will respond, but they will almost certainly respond against Israel directly rather than any American military in the region,” Stone added.

“Nevertheless, what that response will look like and what it will mean in terms of an Israeli response, we don’t know yet.”

Israel did not claim responsibility for the airstrike on 1 April that killed Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ overseas Quds Force.

But Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Israel “must be punished and shall be” for an operation he said was equivalent to an attack on Iranian soil.

Six other officers were also killed as they attended a meeting in the Damascus embassy compound.

Iran has missiles capable of hitting Israel, which has in recent weeks bolstered its air defences.

The Israeli military has called back reservists in preparation for any escalation along its northern border, where it exchanges fire almost daily with Iran-backed militants Hezbollah.

While there have been no formal security instructions in Israel, some parents said their children have been told to take books home for the Passover school holidays in case of possible lesson disruptions.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/israel-braced-for-iranian-attack-as-us-moves-additional-assets-in-region-13113874

The leaders are expected to announce that their coast guards will hold a joint patrol in the Indo-Pacific this year, a follow-up on law enforcement drills carried out last year by the allies in waters near the disputed South China Sea

Russia fired more than 40 missiles and about 40 attack drones overnight as Moscow targeted energy infrastructure in Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has fired veiled criticism at Kyiv’s Western allies as he calls for more support.

He suggested the West is “turning a blind eye” to what is happening in Ukraine after Russian forces launched strikes on five regions across Ukraine.

Zelensky said Russia fired more than 40 missiles and about 40 attack drones overnight, many of which hit energy infrastructure in Ukraine.

Posting on X, Zelensky said in full: “Overnight, Russia fired more than 40 missiles and about 40 drones at Ukraine.

“I thank everyone engaged in recovery efforts after the attack, as well as to every warrior of our air defense system who was on guard last night.

“Some missiles and ‘Shahed’ drones were successfully shot down. Unfortunately, only a part of them. Russian terrorists have once again targeted critical infrastructure.

“There was another heinous missile attack on Kharkiv and the Kharkiv region. They also targeted objects in Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, Lviv, and Odesa regions.

“All of our European neighbors and other partners see Ukraine’s critical need for air defense systems. Right now, with our ability to overcome Russian terror, the world can demonstrate that all terror is treated equally as a crime.

“However, if Russia is allowed to continue doing so, if Russian missiles and ‘Shahed’ drones continue to strike not only Ukraine but also the resolve of our allies, this will amount to a global license for terror.

“We need air defense systems and other defense assistance, not just turning a blind eye and having lengthy discussions.

“I am grateful to everyone in the world who truly supports Ukraine’s struggle for life. I thank every leader who will not remain silent, who will continue to support us and condemn Russian terror.”

Ukraine is concerned that it is lacking in terms of both ammunition and manpower.

Source: https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1887464/zelensky-ukraine-russia-war

Major U.S. airlines and aviation unions on Thursday urged the Biden administration to pause approvals of additional flights between China and the United States, citing ongoing “anti-competitive policies of the Chinese government.”
In February, the U.S. Transportation Department said Chinese passenger airlines could boost weekly round-trip U.S. flights to 50 starting on March 31, up from the current 35, about a third of pre-pandemic levels. U.S. carriers were authorized as well to fly 50 flights per week but are currently not using all those flights.
Airlines for America, a trade group whose members include American Airlines (AAL.O), opens new tab, Delta Air Lines (DAL.N), opens new tab and United Airlines (UAL.O), opens new tab, and unions in a letter to the Transportation and State departments cited the “advantage Chinese airlines receive by continuing to access Russian airspace, while U.S. carriers stopped flying through Russian airspace at the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in March 2022.”
The letter, which was first reported by Reuters, was signed by the Air Line Pilots Association, Allied Pilots Association and Association of Flight Attendants. It called on Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to “pause additional passenger flights between the United States and the People’s Republic of China until U.S. workers and businesses are guaranteed equality of access in the marketplace, free from the existing harmful anti-competitive policies of the Chinese government.”
Flights between China and the United States – which were a point of contention during the COVID-19 pandemic – have emerged as a rare area of cooperation between the two super powers, but U.S. airlines have expressed concern about the rapid pace of increasing flights.
Airlines are worried the Biden administration could boost or even double to 100 the number of weekly flights permitted by Chinese carriers.
Separately, U.S. Representative Mike Gallagher, the chair of the House select committee on China, and the panel’s top Democrat, Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi, urged the Biden administration in a separate letter Wednesday not to approve more flights until China abides “by its existing bilateral agreement, and passenger demand begins to recover.”
The lawmakers said Chinese carriers “operate air
routes at an anticompetitive commercial advantage that must not be allowed to increase without reciprocal parity in the number of U.S. carrier operated routes” to China. It added that “American passengers must not be exposed to unnecessary security risks by traversing Russian airspace.”

Source: https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/us-airlines-unions-urge-biden-not-approve-more-china-flights-2024-04-11/

U.S. President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Wednesday unveiled plans for military cooperation and projects ranging from missiles to moon landings, strengthening their alliance with an eye on countering China and Russia.
A joint news conference at the White House reflected the growing importance of Japan on the world stage and to the United States, as the two leaders weighed in on Gaza and Israel, Ukraine and Russia, North Korea and other world flashpoints.

Biden and Kishida brushed off a dispute over Nippon Steel’s offer for U.S. Steel, saying the issue was not a major factor in their discussions on a day of White House pomp and pageantry that culminated in a lavish state dinner.
“This is the most significant upgrade in our alliance since it was first established,” Biden said after about two hours of talks that focused on the restive Indo-Pacific region and China’s actions.

The United States and its allies, including Japan, have been bolstering their militaries to counter what they see as a growing threat from China in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, and to deter any attempt to seize Taiwan, a self-ruled Island that Beijing considers its own.
Kishida said the two leaders discussed tense relations between Taiwan and China, and pledged to uphold international order based on the rule of law. Chinese leader Xi Jinping recently said outside interference could not stop the island’s “family reunion” with mainland China.

“Unilateral attempts to change status quo by force or coercion is absolutely unacceptable, wherever it may be,” Kishida said. The U.S. and Japan will continue to respond to such actions, including challenges from China, he said.
“Regarding Russia’s aggression of Ukraine … Ukraine today may be East Asia tomorrow,” Kishida said.
Biden also vowed to keep open lines of communication with China and said the U.S.- Japan alliance was defensive in nature. He spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping last week.
JOINT MILITARY STRUCTURE
The announcements from Biden and Kishida brought the two World War Two enemies into the closest collaboration they have had since they became allies decades ago.
Biden said their militaries will cooperate with a joint command structure and they will, together with Australia, develop a new air missile defense network. The two leaders also announced that Japanese astronauts will participate in NASA moon missions.
Overall, the U.S. and Japan have hammered out about 70 agreements on defense cooperation, including moves to upgrade the U.S. military command structure in Japan to make it better able to work with Japanese forces in a crisis.

Japan, often described as the U.S.’s most important Asian ally and its largest source of foreign direct investment, is taking on a stepped-up global role after a series of security law changes in the past decade that have transformed its pacifist constitution.
Kishida will address the U.S. Congress on Thursday and join Biden and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for a meeting expected to focus on Beijing’s South China Sea incursions.
The meeting took place as China steps up pressure on the Philippines in the South China Sea over areas Beijing claims but that international law says belong to the Philippines.
China is attempting to isolate Japan and the Philippines, a U.S. official said. By meeting the leaders of those two nations this week in Washington, Biden is aiming to “flip the script and isolate China.”
Fitch cut its outlook on China’s sovereign credit rating to negative on Wednesday, citing risks to public finances as the economy faces increasing uncertainty in its shift to new growth models.
On Thursday, Biden will also hold a bilateral meeting with Marcos, whom he welcomed in Washington just last year, before the pair join Kishida for a trilateral summit.
The visit may give a political boost to Kishida, whose popularity has waned at home.
He is being greeted with great fanfare, with Japanese flags on display throughout Washington ahead of the glitzy state dinner where guests included former President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, actor Robert De Niro, Amazon.com’s (AMZN.O), opens new tab Jeff Bezos and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-welcomes-global-partner-japans-kishida-white-house-summit-2024-04-10/

US Ambassador Eric Garcetti praised India’s progress and developmental journey, and said that if people want to “see” and “feel the future”, they should come to the country.

US Ambassador to India, Eric Garcetti, has praised India’s developmental journey, saying that if anyone wants to “see the future”, they should come to the country. Speaking at an event, he also mentioned his “great privilege” of being future-ready because of his position as the leader of the United States’s mission.

“If you want to see the future, come to India. If you want to feel the future, come to India. If you want to work on the future, come to India. I have the great privilege of being able to do that every single day as the leader of the US Mission,” he said at an event in India.

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan also commended the country’s ties with India, saying the partnership has “gone to new heights”.

Speaking to reporters at the White House, Sulivan said, “The partnership between the US and India, a country in BRICs, has gone to new heights with an engagement across technology and security and so many other dimensions.”

The relationship between the two countries has been under the scanner lately after US prosecutors charged an Indian national, namely Nikhil Gupta, in November last year in connection with his involvement in an alleged foiled plot to assassinate Khalistani terrorist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun on US soil.

America alleged that Nikhil Gupta was working with an Indian government employee and had agreed to pay an assassin $100,000 to kill Pannun, who lives in New York City.

Source: https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/us-envoy-eric-garcetti-message-to-those-who-want-to-see-feel-future-come-to-india-2525365-2024-04-10

China Plays Tense Game of ‘Russian Roulette’ With U.S. Ally.

Chinese coast guard ships have slammed Philippine boats with water cannons, shattering a windshield and injuring Filipino crew

China is intensifying a dangerous game in the South China Sea, in ways that risk drawing the U.S. into its fight with the Philippines.

In early March, two Chinese coast guard ships slammed a Philippine boat with high-pressure blasts of water cannon, smashing its windshield and preventing it from delivering supplies to a military outpost.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/china-plays-tense-game-of-russian-roulette-with-u-s-ally-580473a1

In an exclusive interview, the president of Ukraine talks about his outreach to Trump, stalled Ukraine aid and Russia’s growing influence in the U.S.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine warned in an interview that Russian influence had pierced the American political system and rejected the idea, backed by allies of Donald Trump, that Ukraine could swiftly end the war just by making massive territorial concessions.

But Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he had privately urged Trump through intermediaries to travel to Ukraine and that Trump had expressed interest but had not yet committed to making a trip. Zelenskyy said he was open to hearing Trump’s proposals for the war, while making clear he was highly skeptical.

“If the deal is that we just give up our territories, and that’s the idea behind it, then it’s a very primitive idea,” Zelenskyy said in an interview with Axel Springer media outlets. POLITICO is owned by Axel Springer.

Zelenskyy continued: “I need very strong arguments. I don’t need a fantastic idea, I need a real idea, because people’s lives are at stake.”

Any deal that merely gave up land to Russian President Vladimir Putin in exchange for an end to hostilities, Zelenskyy said, would just open the way for more Russian wars of conquest in the future. A negotiated peace, he said, had to leave the Russian despot “no room to carry out his plans.”

In the interview, Zelenskyy swerved at times between expressing impatience with Western allies that have not delivered military aid readily enough — he faulted Germany most explicitly — and admitting that Ukraine is under considerable pressure to show new progress in the war. The interview was conducted in a combination of English and Ukrainian, partially using translators.

Trump has been a consistent skeptic of the war effort and a critic of Zelenskyy, and he recently said he would encourage Russia to act with impunity against members of the NATO alliance who do not spend large sums of money on defense. President Joe Biden has attacked Trump in the campaign as a threat to world stability and a stooge of Putin and other foreign dictators.

Zelenskyy’s textured approach to Trump represents the latest effort by a major world leader to calibrate his handling of the former American president who is now the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for the 2024 election. While disagreeing with Trump emphatically on war policy, Zelenskyy spoke respectfully about Trump as a leader with whom he is eager to build a constructive partnership.

Those comments came a day after David Cameron, the British foreign secretary and former U.K. prime minister, met with Trump at his Florida estate, in part to plead the case for supporting Ukraine despite having denounced Trump in the past as a bigot.

The fate of Ukraine may well hang in the balance in the U.S. election. And as a massive aid package languishes in the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives, Zelenskyy predicted that Putin would demolish Ukrainian cities and butcher hundreds of thousands of people if the Russian military were to prevail in the war.

In recent weeks, two Republican lawmakers who support aiding Ukraine — Reps. Mike Turner of Ohio and Mike McCaul of Texas — have declared that pro-Russian propaganda has filtered into the thinking of some members of Congress.

Asked about that claim, Zelenskyy said it understated the problem of Russian influence in democracies like the United States.

“They have their lobbies everywhere: in the United States, in the EU countries, in Britain, in Latin America, in Africa,” Zelenskyy said of Russia. “When we talk about the Congress — do you notice how they work with society in the United States?”

Russia, he said, had succeeded in warping “the information field of the world.” Without naming names, Zelenskyy claimed that American citizens were effectively doing Russia’s work within the U.S. media.

Source: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/04/09/zelenskyy-invites-trump-ukraine-russia-00151310

A New York state appellate judge on Monday denied Donald Trump’s bid to delay his April 15 criminal trial on charges stemming from hush money paid to a porn star while the former U.S. president seeks to move the case out of Manhattan.
Associate Justice Lizbeth Gonzalez issued her decision shortly after a half-hour hearing at the Appellate Division in Manhattan, a mid-level state appeals court.
Emil Bove, a lawyer for Trump, said during the hearing that his client was seeking to stay the case pending the application to move the trial on the charges brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

A lawyer from Bragg’s office, Steven Wu, countered that Trump waited too long to object to being tried in Manhattan, where he once lived. The charges were brought in April 2023.
Trump, the Republican candidate challenging Democratic President Joe Biden in the Nov. 5 U.S. election, has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records.
Bove did not specify where Trump’s team would like the trial to be held. Bove said a survey taken by Trump’s legal team of residents in heavily Democratic Manhattan, one of New York City’s five boroughs, found that 61% of respondents thought Trump was guilty, and 70% had a negative opinion of him.

“There is real potential prejudice here to moving forward,” Bove said. “Jury selection cannot proceed in a fair manner starting next week in this county.”
Wu said biased jurors can be weeded out during the jury selection process, and that Trump cannot cite media attention as a reason to move the trial.
“He himself has been responsible for stoking that publicity,” Wu said.
A criminal trial would be the first for a former U.S. president.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/legal/trump-files-appeal-hush-money-criminal-case-week-before-trial-2024-04-08/

Former U.S. President Donald Trump said it would be “my great honor” to go to jail for violating a gag order imposed by the judge who will hear his upcoming trial on charges stemming from a hush-money payment to a porn star.
“If this Partisan Hack wants to put me in the ‘clink’ for speaking the open and obvious TRUTH, I will gladly become a Modern Day Nelson Mandela – It will be my GREAT HONOR,” Trump posted on Saturday on his Truth Social platform.

Trump was referring to Justice Juan Merchan, who will preside over his trial in New York state court in Manhattan on criminal charges of covering up a $130,000 payment before the 2016 election to porn star Stormy Daniels to buy her silence about an alleged sexual encounter.
The trial begins on April 15.
The Republican, who is challenging Democratic President Joe Biden in the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election, has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records and denies an encounter with Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

Merchan on April 1 expanded an existing gag order that had barred Trump from publicly commenting about witnesses and court staff to make clear it also applies to family members. He did so after Trump disparaged Merchan’s daughter.
The looming hush-money trial is one of four criminal cases Trump is confronting ahead of the U.S. election. It could be the only one to reach trial before the election. He has pleaded not guilty to all and called them politically motivated.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-it-would-be-great-honor-go-jail-violating-gag-order-2024-04-07/

Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant says troops had been pulled out to prepare for future missions, including in Gaza’s southern city of Rafah.

Israel has withdrawn almost all of its troops from southern Gaza.

Only one brigade remains in Khan Younis and is tasked with securing the Netzarim corridor that divides the Gaza Strip, according to The Times of Israel.

The move came six months since Hamas launched the October 7 attacks on Israel, which left more than 1,100 people dead.

It was the trigger for Israel’s ongoing military action in Gaza, which has resulted in the deaths of more than 33,000 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health authority.

The withdrawal of troops is linked to ongoing negotiations with Hamas over Israeli hostages and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “desperate” for a ceasefire deal, a senior source in the Israeli government told Sky’s Middle East correspondent Alistair Bunkall.

The killings of seven aid workers in Gaza in an Israeli airstrike “changed everything”, the source added.

Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant said troops had been pulled out of Gaza on Sunday to prepare for future missions, including in the enclave’s southern city of Rafah.

“We saw examples of such missions in the Shifa operation, and also of their coming mission in the Rafah area,” Mr Gallant said at a meeting with military officials, according to a statement from his office.

Israel had planned a ground invasion of the southern city of Rafah, claiming it is a hive of Hamas’s remaining strongholds. More than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are taking refuge in the city.

Following the withdrawal of the troops, Israeli government spokesperson Avi Hyman told Sky News Mr Netanyahu would “absolutely” go ahead with a ground invasion of Rafah.

“If we don’t go ahead with Rafah, we lose the war,” he said.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/israel-withdraws-almost-all-troops-from-southern-gaza-as-iran-says-no-israeli-embassy-is-safe-13110075

A state of emergency has been imposed in a Russian city due to nuclear contamination.

The Russian authorities have not explained what is causing the alarming radiation in Khabarovsk.

A mystery radiation source was today ‘removed and placed in a protective container’ and ‘transported to a radioactive waste storage facility’ in the city, the largest in Russia’s far east and close to the border with China.

Yet a state of emergency is to remain for at least three more days in the Industrialny district of the city, as law enforcement agencies examine the origin of the leak.

It appears to have taken a week for the authorities to act.

A man wearing a nuclear protective mask is seen in darkness with a radiation reader that quickly rises as he walks over a ‘waste dump’.

His reader sounded an alarm at 0.45 microsieverts and the highest reading visible on screen is 5.99.

Yet on the video the man says there was a reading of 20, enough potentially to increase cancer risk, damage DNA, cause foetal damage, and threaten the health of children.

Astonishingly, the potentially lethal radiation leak in Khabarovsk was known for around one week before action was taken on it, or the public alerted, say reports.

A ‘boy’ who made an initial reading on 28 March had reported it to the Russian special services, yet it was only today that a state of emergency was called.

Andrey Kolchin, head civil defence in the city, said: ‘A source of increased radiation levels was discovered….the area was cordoned.

‘It was decided to introduce a state of emergency in Khabarovsk to carry out work faster.’

The authorities insisted there was no threat to life.

‘The radiation source was removed and placed in a protective container, transported to a radioactive waste storage facility,’ said a source at Radon nuclear agency.

Source : https://metro.co.uk/2024/04/05/mystery-nuclear-leak-sparks-state-emergency-russian-city-20593791

While the Israeli ambassador walked out of the plenary session in protest at the end of her speech, India was among 13 countries which abstained from voting for the resolution.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) adopted a resolution on Friday, calling for Israel to be held accountable for possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip at the end of the 55th Council session.

While the Israeli ambassador walked out of the plenary session in protest at the end of her speech at the UN, India was among 13 countries which abstained from voting for the resolution. Other countries which abstained were Albania, Benin, Cemeroon, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, France, Geogia, Japan, Lithuania, Montenegro, Netherlands and Romania.

“Draft resolution A/HRC/55/L.30 on the Human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and the obligation to ensure accountability and justice was ADOPTED,” tweeted United Nations Human Rights Council.

In the resolution adopted on Friday, the UN condemned Israel for the war in Gaza but made no mention of Hamas or its crimes on October 7. The resolution equates the abductees with detainees suspected of terrorist activity, news agency ANI reported.

Furthermore, “the resolution provided legitimacy for Palestinian ‘resistance’ to the ‘occupation,’ calls for an arms embargo on Israel, and blatantly disregards the supply of weapons to Hamas by Iran and its allies”.

The resolution was passed with 28 of the council’s 47 member states voting in favour, six opposed and 13 abstaining. The United States voted against the anti-Israeli resolution, as did Germany, Argentina, Paraguay, Bulgaria and Malawi.

“There are 47 member states in the United Nations Human Rights Council, according to geographic distribution. Currently, its members include Malaysia, Kuwait, Qatar, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Algeria, South Africa, Somalia, Cuba, together with the United States, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium, Romania, Georgia, Bulgaria among other states,” the Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in its press release.

Source : https://www.livemint.com/news/world/unhrc-adopts-resolution-over-gaza-israel-war-india-among-13-countries-to-abstain-11712329524074.html

‘… as populations in India, South Korea, and the United States head to the polls, we are likely to see Chinese cyber and influence actors … work toward targeting these elections,’ the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center (MTAC) said in its report.

New York: China is likely to deploy Artificial Intelligence-generated content via social media to sway public opinion to boost its geopolitical interests during elections in countries like India, South Korea and the US, tech giant Microsoft has warned.

Voting for 543 Lok Sabha seats in India will take place between April 19 and June 4, spread across seven phases.

South Koreans will go to the polls in a general election on April 10 while the US will hold the Presidential election on November 5.

“With major elections taking place around the world this year, particularly in India, South Korea and the United States, we assess that China will, at a minimum, create and amplify AI-generated content to benefit its interests,” Clint Watts, General Manager, Microsoft Threat Analysis Center, said in a blog post.

Despite the chances of such content in affecting election results remaining low, China’s increasing experimentation in augmenting memes, videos, and audio will likely continue – and may prove more effective down the line, he said.

China will do it along with North Korea, he wrote.

These are among the Microsoft Threat Intelligence insights in the latest East Asia report published on Wednesday by the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center (MTAC).

China is using fake social media accounts to poll voters on what divides them most to sow division and possibly influence the outcome of the US presidential election in its favour.

Source : https://www.deccanherald.com/world/china-may-misuse-ai-to-target-elections-in-india-us-to-boost-geopolitical-interests-microsoft-2967744

The US is on high alert and actively preparing for a “significant” attack that could come as soon as within the next week by Iran targeting Israeli or American assets in the region in response to Monday’s Israeli strike in Damascus that killed top Iranian commanders, a senior administration official tells CNN.

Senior US officials currently believe that an attack by Iran is “inevitable” – a view shared by their Israeli counterparts, that official said. The two governments are furiously working to get in position ahead of what is to come, as they anticipate that Iran’s attack could unfold in a number of different ways – and that both US and Israeli assets and personnel are at risk of being targeted.

A forthcoming Iranian attack was a major topic of discussion on President Joe Biden’s phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday.

As of Friday, the two governments did not know when or how Iran planned to strike back, the official said.

A direct strike on Israel by Iran is one of the worst-case scenarios that the Biden administration is bracing for, as it would guarantee rapid escalation of an already tumultuous situation in the Middle East. Such a strike could lead to the Israel-Hamas war broadening into a wider, regional conflict – something Biden has long sought to avoid.

It has been two months since Iranian proxies attacked US forces in Iraq and Syria, a period of relative stability after months of drone, rocket and missile launches targeting US facilities. The lone exception came on Tuesday, when US forces shot down a drone near al-Tanf garrison in Syria. The drone attack, which the Defense Department said was carried out by Iranian proxies, came after the Israeli strike on the Iranian embassy in Damascus.

“We asses that al-Tanf was not the target of the drone,” a defense official said Tuesday. “Since we were unable to immediately determine the target and out of safety for US and coalition partners, the drone was shot down.”

The incident came after the Israeli airstrike on the Iranian embassy in Damascus on Monday, though an Israel Defense Forces spokesman told CNN that their intelligence showed the building was not a consulate and is instead “a military building of Quds forces disguised as a civilian building.”

Israel has carried out numerous strikes on Iran-backed targets in Syria, often targeting weapons shipments intended for Hezbollah, a powerful Iranian proxy in Lebanon. But the targeting of the embassy itself marks a significant escalation, since embassies are considered the sovereign territory of the nations they represent.

Iran vowed to take revenge after Israel’s airstrike on Iran’s embassy complex in Syria, which killed at least seven officials. Mohammed Reza Zahedi, a top commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), and senior commander Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi were among those killed, according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry.

At least six Syrian citizens were also killed, Iranian state television reported on Tuesday.

Zahedi, a former commander of the IRGC’s ground forces, air force, and the deputy commander of its operations, is the most high-profile Iranian target killed since then-US President Donald Trump ordered the assassination of IRGC Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in 2020.

The US was quick to inform Iran that the Biden administration was not involved and had no advance knowledge of Monday’s strike on the embassy and has warned Iran against coming after American assets.

“The United States had no involvement in the strike and we did not know about it ahead of time,” a National Security Council spokesperson told CNN earlier this week.

The US has warned Iran not to use the Israeli strike in Damascus as “a pretext to attack US personnel and facilities,” a State Department spokesperson told CNN Friday.

The warning was sent in response to a message from Iran, the spokesperson said. Iran’s message to the US blamed the US for the Damascus attack, a senior administration official said, though it was not clear what, if anything else, Iran conveyed to the US in that initial message.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/04/05/politics/us-israel-iran-retaliation-strike/index.html

A rare earthquake rocked the New York City area Friday morning, swaying buildings and sending terrified residents into the streets — the strongest temblor to strike near the Big Apple in 140 years.

City officials quickly warned people of the danger of potential aftershocks — which began in the early afternoon in New Jersey, a report said.

The preliminary 4.8-magnitude earthquake struck near Lebanon, NJ, around 10:23 a.m. and was potentially felt by more than 42 million people, according to the US Geological Survey.

“I was doing my morning reporting, and this safe in my office, that’s a ton, starts shaking. The whole room is shaking,” said Monique Horton, who works at the Balmain store on Madison Avenue in Manhattan. “I was just freaked out. Scary, really scary. I’m a New Yorker, my whole life, 36 years, never seen anything like it.”

At the United Nations in Midtown Manhattan, a Security Council address on the Israel-Gaza conflict was interrupted as cameras began shuddering.

The Federal Aviation Administration told airlines to expect flight delays in and out of the Big Apple because of the quake. Some flights bound for New York had already diverted to other airports, according to FlightAware.

The US Geological Survey logged 160,000 reports on its website from panicked residents in the quake’s aftermath – a potential new record, officials said.

“This is one of the largest earthquakes on the East Coast in the last century,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said.

The last time an earthquake with a magnitude close to 5 struck near New York City was back in 1884, the USGS said. That quake appeared to have been centered in Brooklyn.

A stronger 5.8 quake was felt in the city in 2011, although that started in Virginia.

Friday’s temblor was the strongest to hit New Jersey in 240 years, according to the Fox Forecast Center.

USGS officials said at least two aftershocks had been recorded by Friday afternoon.

Both Hochul and Mayor Eric Adams said there were no initial reports of injuries or damage from Friday’s quake, however it later emerged that the walls of a gym at a Brooklyn middle school suffered several cracks.

Engineers with the city Department of Buildings were dispatched to J.H.S. 218 James P. Sinnott in East New York, where they ordered the gymnasium shut down until repairs are made, though the rest of the school can remain open, the agency said.

It was determined the bricks that make up the gym’s masonry walls could potentially break loose due to the cracks, according to the DOB. No other structural issues were found in the school.

Meanwhile, Hochul and Adams warned New Yorkers to be wary of the possible aftershocks.

“We are always concerned about aftershocks after an earthquake but New Yorkers should go about their normal day,” Hizzoner said.

“Earthquakes don’t happen every day in New York, so this can be extremely traumatic. I encourage New Yorkers to check on their loved ones to make sure that they are fine.”

City and state officials said there were no reported infrastructure issues as a result of the quake, noting that all major bridges and tunnels had been inspected.

Source: https://nypost.com/2024/04/05/us-news/earthquake-rocks-nyc-tri-state-area/

President Joe Biden threatened on Thursday to condition support for Israel’s offensive in Gaza on it taking concrete steps to protect aid workers and civilians, seeking for the first time to leverage U.S. aid to influence Israeli military behavior.
Biden’s warning, relayed in a call with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday, followed a deadly Israeli attack on World Central Kitchen aid workers that spurred new calls from Biden’s fellow Democrats to place conditions on U.S. aid to Israel. Israel said the attack was a mistake.

The U.S. president, a lifelong supporter of Israel, has resisted pressure to withhold aid or halt the shipment of weapons to the country. His warning marked the first time he has threatened to potentially condition aid, a development that could change the dynamic of the nearly six-month-old war.
Biden “made clear the need for Israel to announce and implement a series of specific, concrete, and measurable steps to address civilian harm, humanitarian suffering, and the safety of aid workers,” the White House said of the leaders’ phone call. It said the call lasted about 30 minutes.

Israel war cabinet member Benny Gantz called for national elections in September on Wednesday (Apr 3) as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government faces pressure at home and abroad over the war in Gaza.

“We must agree on a date for elections in September, towards a year to the war if you will,” Gantz said in a televised briefing. “Setting such a date will allow us to continue the military effort while signalling to the citizens of Israel that we will soon renew their trust in us.”

Thousands of Israelis have taken to the streets in recent days demanding new elections. Many have criticised Netanyahu and expressed anger at his government’s handling of the 134 Israeli hostages still held in Gaza six months into the war.

Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has repeatedly ruled out early elections, which opinion polls suggest he would lose, saying that to go to the polls in the middle of a war would only reward Hamas, the Islamist movement that ruled Gaza.

His Likud party on Wednesday said Gantz must “stop engaging in petty politics” during the war. “Elections now will bring about paralysis, division, harm to the fighting in Rafah and a fatal blow to the chances of a hostage deal,” Likud said.

Gantz, a former army general, joined Netanyahu’s government in the early days of the war as a gesture of political unity during the crisis. Polls suggest his party would come top in any election and he would be favourite to take over as premier.

NETANYAHU PLEDGED TO BRING HOSTAGES HOME
Netanyahu has pledged to bring the hostages home, as well as destroy Hamas, though it is unclear how Israel would be able to do so and experts doubt that is even possible. Israel’s unrelenting air, ground and sea assault has killed more than 32,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, and led to a humanitarian catastrophe.

Source: https://www.channelnewsasia.com/world/israel-war-minister-gantz-calls-sept-elections-amid-gaza-assault-4240951

NATO foreign ministers meet on Thursday to celebrate the 75th anniversary of their alliance, having agreed to start planning for a greater role in coordinating military aid to Ukraine.
On the second day of a meeting in Brussels, the ministers will mark the signing in Washington on April 4, 1949, of the North Atlantic Treaty that established the transatlantic political and military alliance.
“As we face a more dangerous world, the bond between Europe and North America has never been more important,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday.

NATO began with 12 members from North America and Europe, founded in response to growing fears that the Soviet Union posed a military threat to European democracies.
At its heart is the concept of collective defence, the idea that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all, giving U.S. military protection to Western Europe.
Seventy-five years later, NATO has 32 members and has retaken a central role in world affairs, after Russia’s war in Ukraine prompted European governments to view Moscow once more as a major security threat.

NATO’s two newest members, Finland and Sweden, joined in direct response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“Democratic nations, free people chose to join (NATO) unlike how Russia expands by annexation or illegal aggression,” Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen told reporters.
Russia said on Wednesday that NATO had returned to a Cold War mindset. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters NATO had no place in the “multipolar world” Moscow says it seeks to build to end U.S. dominance.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/ministers-mark-75-years-nato-discuss-more-support-ukraine-2024-04-03/

The US country-turned-pop singer is the only musician to have earned more than $1bn from her songs and performances alone, Forbes says.

Taylor Swift has made it on to a list of the world’s billionaires, according to Forbes, as her Eras Tour spanning 152 shows and five continents generated more than $1bn (£800m) in revenue.

The 34-year-old superstar, who stole the show at this year’s Grammy Awards by winning album of the year for the fourth time, is now said to have accumulated a fortune of $1.1bn (£874m).

According to Forbes, the estimated figure is based on the value of Swift’s music, earnings from her world tour and her real estate portfolio.

The US country-turned-pop singer is the only musician to have earned so much money from her songs and performances alone, Forbes adds.

Swift, whose relationship with NFL player Travis Kelce, 34, has gained her – and American football – even more publicity, is one of the 265 people to have joined the 2,781-strong list of billionaires over the past year.

The list has never been longer than this year’s, Forbes reports, with the total wealth of those on it amounting to an eye-watering $14.2tn (£11.3tn).

The richest new person on the list is ION tycoon Andrea Pignataro, 53, from Italy, who is now worth $27.5bn (£21.8bn).

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/taylor-swift-now-a-billionaire-as-worlds-wealthiest-revealed-in-2024-forbes-list-13106631

The move came after Israeli lawmakers passed a new law that allows the government to temporarily shutter foreign media outlets deemed to be a risk to national security.

Israeli lawmakers passed a law on Monday allowing the government to temporarily shutter foreign media outlets that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has determined undermine the country’s national security, and the Israeli leader said he would use the new law to block Al Jazeera broadcasts and activities in Israel.

Mr. Netanyahu’s government has had a tense relationship with Al Jazeera for years, but the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7 escalated tensions. Mr. Netanyahu has called Al Jazeera a “Hamas mouthpiece.”

On Monday, the prime minister said it was time for the Qatar-based network, one of the most widely viewed sources of television news in the Arab world, to stop broadcasting in Israel, although he did not specify when that would happen.

“The terrorist channel Al Jazeera will no longer broadcast from Israel. I intend to act immediately in accordance with the new law to stop the channel’s activity,” Mr. Netanyahu posted on X, while recovering from hernia surgery.

Al Jazeera called Netanyahu’s comments “lies that incite against the safety of our journalists around the world.”

“The network stresses that this latest measure comes as part of a series of systematic Israeli attacks to silence Al Jazeera,” it said in a statement, adding that the new law would not “deter us from continuing our bold and professional coverage.”

Under the new law, if the prime minister deems a foreign media outlet to “concretely undermine” Israel’s national security, the government can temporarily close its offices, confiscate its equipment, remove it from Israeli cable and satellite television providers, and block access to any of the channel’s online platforms hosted on servers in Israel or owned by Israeli entities.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent, nonprofit organization that promotes press freedoms around the world, criticized the new law, saying that it “contributes to a climate of self-censorship and hostility toward the press.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, asked about the law during a news briefing in Washington, said that “a move like this is concerning.”

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/01/world/middleeast/al-jazeera-israel-netanyahu.html

The Kremlin on Monday dismissed a report that Russian military intelligence may be behind the mysterious “Havana syndrome” ailment that has afflicted U.S. diplomats and spies globally.
Insider, a Russia-focused investigative media group based in Riga, Latvia reported, opens new tab that members of a Russian military intelligence (GRU) unit known as 29155 had been placed at the scene of reported health incidents involving U.S. personnel.

Tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated Saturday night in front of the military’s headquarters in Tel Aviv, in the biggest protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu since the terrorist attack of Oct. 7.

• During the demonstration, a group of roughly 20 hostage families called on Netanyahu to resign. They say that for his own political reasons, he isn’t pushing hard enough for a deal with Hamas.

Why it matters: The protests, which many political observers thought would happen months ago, could signal a turning point for the Israeli public.

The big picture: Netanyahu and his government faced only limited protests at home over the past five months, compared to mass demonstrations before the war.

• The vast majority of Israelis have felt political demonstrations weren’t appropriate while hundreds of thousands of Israeli soldiers, many of them reservists, were fighting in Gaza or stationed on high alert along Israel’s borders.

Saturday’s eruption was driven by three key groups — all of whom think Netanyahu’s decisions are driven mainly by political survival:

1. Families of hostages in Gaza.
2. The anti-Netanyahu protest movement, which was very active before the war and now is resurfacing.
3. Many Israelis are angry at Netanyahu over attempts to bypass an Israeli Supreme Court ruling Thursday that ultra-orthodox men can no longer be exempt from military service.

Behind the scenes: Netanyahu has rejected requests by the director of Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, and other Israeli negotiators to give them more leeway so they can get a hostage deal with the Hamas captors.

• Several members of the Israeli war cabinet also pushed Netanyahu to show more flexibility. But he accused them of being soft and not knowing how to negotiate with Hamas.
• During a security cabinet meeting on Thursday, most of the ministers from Netanyahu’s own party said there’s a need to make more compromises to get a deal. Netanyahu rejected their proposals.

Between the lines: A development that helped turn the tide was a New York Times interview with a former hostage who was abducted from her home on Oct. 7, and was released last November.

• Amit Soussana told The Times, in a story published Tuesday, that she was sexually assaulted at gunpoint by a Hamas militant who was guarding her while she was in captivity in Gaza.
• Two days later, another female hostage, Moran Stela Yanai, suggested in an interview with Israel’s most-watched investigative television show, “Uvda,” that she was molested by her male captors.
• Yanai shocked many Israelis when she said that not even one minister in the government had visited her or called her after she was released.

• But the Hamas attack — the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust — eroded Netanyahu’s political situation even more.
• While a majority of Israelis support the war, recent polls show they also want Netanyahu to resign and call for new elections once the war winds down.

Source: https://www.axios.com/2024/03/31/netanyahu-critics-mobilize-in-israel

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree setting out the routine spring conscription campaign, calling up 150,000 citizens for statutory military service, a document posted on the Kremlin’s website showed on Sunday.
All men in Russia are required to do a year-long military service, or equivalent training during higher education, from the age of 18.
In July Russia’s lower house of parliament voted to raise the maximum age at which men can be conscripted to 30 from 27. The new legislation came into effect on Jan. 1, 2024.

Compulsory military service has long been a sensitive issue in Russia, where many men go to great lengths to avoid being handed conscription papers during the twice-yearly call-up periods.
Conscripts cannot legally be deployed to fight outside Russia and were exempted from a limited mobilisation in 2022 that gathered at least 300,000 men with previous military training to fight in Ukraine – although some conscripts were sent to the front in error.

Donald Trump posted a video to his Truth Social account showing a pickup truck whose tailgate featured a photoshopped image of a tied-up President Joe Biden being hauled away.

The truck in question can be seen driving in what looks like a caravan of Trump-themed trucks.

Above the video, Trump posted, “3/28/24 | LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK…” and the post is labeled as “viral.”

On X, formerly Twitter, right-wing watchdog group Patriot Takes posted about the Truth Social video.

Another X user posted what looked like a different truck sporting the same image.

Journalist Sandi Bachom posted,”The guy that drove that truck sent the video to me, Dan Scavino tweeted it. I filmed it at the Kathy Griffin protest.”

Trump was recently criticized for saying, “if I don’t get elected, it’s gonna be a bloodbath,” in a rally speech, causing some pundits to fear he would promote violence if he lost to Biden in November.

Trump diputed this claim, saying he was talking about the auto industry, not the country as a whole. The May 18 remarks from his rally were: “We’re gonna put a 100% tariff on every single car that comes across the line, and you’re not gonna be able to sell those guys if I get elected. Now, if I don’t get elected, it’s gonna be a bloodbath for the whole — that’s gonna be the least of it, it’s gonna be a bloodbath for the country, that’ll be the least of it.”

Source : https://www.mediaite.com/trump/trump-shares-image-of-biden-tied-up-in-the-back-of-maga-pickup-truck

If the tragic events that pulled the US into World War 2 were to repeat themselves today, NATO would not be obliged to enact Article 5.

Experts have warned that Vladimir Putin could use a NATO loophole to attack the US and not trigger Article 5.

On Sunday, December 7, 1941, the course of World War 2 changed forever when Japan launched a surprise attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Consequently, it led then-president Franklin D. Roosevelt to join the Allies and declare war on the Axis – a move that would eventually lead to the use of nuclear weapons to force Japan into surrender.

However, experts warn that if Vladimir Putin did the same thing today, the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation would not be obligated to rise to the Aloha State’s defence.

David Santoro, president of the Pacific Forum think tank in Honolulu, said: “It’s the weirdest thing. People tend to assume Hawaii is part of the US and therefore it’s covered by NATO.

“The argument for not including Hawaii is simply that it’s not part of North America.”

The clue is in the alliance’s name – the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

Hawaii is, of course, in the Pacific, and unlike California, Colorado, or Alaska, the 50th state is not part of the continental US that reaches the North Atlantic Ocean on its eastern shores.

And while Article 5 of the treaty provides for collective self-defence in the event of a military attack on any member state, Article 6 limits the geographic scope of that.

It reads: “An armed attack on one or more of the Parties is deemed to include an armed attack on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America.”

However, such an attack would likely trigger Article 4.

A US State Department spokesperson confirmed to CNN that Hawaii is not covered by Article 5, but said Article 4, which says members will consult when “the territorial integrity, political independence or security” of any member is threatened, should cover any situation that could affect the 50th state.

NATO has not responded to a request for comment.

John Hemmings, senior director of the Indo-Pacific Foreign and Security Policy Program at the Pacific Forum, says Hawaii’s exclusion from NATO removes “an element of deterrence” from those who threaten the Western way of life.

He said: “For Americans, there is a direct link between this state and our involvement in the Second World War and ultimately our help in contributing to the victory over the Axis (the alliance of Nazi Germany, Japan and Italy).”

Source: https://www.express.co.uk/news/us/1883251/vladimir-putin-nato-loophole-article-5-russia

Guyana President Irfaan Ali while discussing Guyana’s recently found offshore oilfields had an argument with BBC’s Stephen Sackur, who hosts the interview programme HARDTalk, over climate change.

Irfaan Ali did not approve when journalist Sackur questioned him regarding Guyana’s plans to drill oil from its recently discovered oil reserves. “Over the next decade or two, it’s expected that there will be 150 billion dollars worth of oil and gas extracted off your coast. It’s an extraordinary figure. But in practical terms, that means two billion tons of carbon emissions will come from your seabed and be released into the atmosphere,” Sackur said.

President Ali immediately interjected and said: “Let me stop you right there! Did you know that Guyana has a forest that is the size of England and Scotland combined, a forest that stores 19.5 gigatons of carbon, that we have kept alive”.

He then peppered Sackur with many counterpoints. Sackur tried to counter by asking if protecting Guyana’s forests gave him the right to release carbon in the atmosphere.

This visibly enraged Ali, who said in response: “Does that give you the right to lecture us on climate change? I’m going to lecture you on climate change. We have kept this forest alive that you enjoy that the world enjoys, that you don’t pay us for, that you don’t value. Guess what? We have the lowest deforestation rate in the world! Guess what? Even with the greatest exploration of oil and gas we will still be net zero”.

“This is the hypocrisy that exists in the world. The world in the last 50 years has lost 65 percent of its biodiversity. We have kept ours,” he further added.

The enraged Guyanese President then asked Sackur if he was “in the pockets of those who destroy the environment through the Industrial Revolution”.

Source: https://www.news18.com/world/im-not-finished-yet-guyana-president-shuts-bbc-interviewer-down-on-climate-change-video-goes-viral-8833504.html

An American YouTube star has been kidnapped in Haiti by one of the gangs that have become its de facto rulers, as he was attempting to interview the nation’s most notorious gang leader.

Addison Pierre Maalouf, known online as YourFellowArab or just “Arab,” traveled from his home in Atlanta to interview Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier, the leader of the notorious G9 Family and Allies gang that has seized control of the government, according to Haiti 24.net.

But just 24 hours after he arrived in the country, Maalouf and a Haitian colleague were taken by members of the 400 Mawozo gang on March 14.

He is being held for a $600,000 ransom, and even though $40,000 has already been paid, the kidnappers are continuing to demand a large sum of money to secure Maalouf’s release, the Haitian outlet reports.

As news of the YouTube star’s disappearance spread online Thursday, fellow streamer Lalem confirmed that his friend had been taken hostage.

“Tried keeping it private for two weeks, but it’s getting out everywhere now,” Lalem posted on X.

“Yes, Arab has been kidnapped in Haiti and we’re working on getting him out,” he said, vowing, “he’ll be out soon.”

Lalem also shared the last video that Maalouf posted online, showing him at a hotel in Haiti telling his viewers about the dangers of being in the country.

In the video, Maalouf said he and his crew intended to travel to the capital city of Port-au-Prince, but had to wait until the early morning hours so they could arrive in the sunlight.

He also notes that Port-au-Prince is “completely run by gangs” and even though they had secured safe passage, “all it takes is one stupid gang member holding an AK-47 for one thing to go wrong.”

Maalouf had earlier posted on March 10 that he was “going on another one of those trips.”

“If I die, thanks for watching what I’ve put out,” he posted on X.

“If I live, all glory to God.”

By Friday, another YouTuber, Miles “Lord Miles” Routledge, claimed he spoke directly with Maalouf using his kidnappers’ phone.

Routledge said Maalouf arrived in the country with “fixer” Sean Roubens Jean Sacra to film the ongoing riots in Haiti, and was kidnapped just 24 hours after he arrived.

“Arab has been kept in a cage in a place on the eastern outskirts of the capital, Port-au-Prince,” Routledge wrote.

“His location is known.”

He claimed there was an attempt to pay the ransom, “but it went wrong and truthfully everyone was out of their depths to help Arab.”

Routledge, a Brit, then went on to criticize the US government and the State Department for failing to secure the Georgian’s release.

He said they were “very hands off on helping, even though Arab is a US citizen.”

Source: https://nypost.com/2024/03/29/world-news/american-youtube-star-kidnapped-in-haiti/

NATO faces a “pre-war era” in which “literally any scenario is possible” given the potential for aggression from Russia, according to Poland’s prime minister, the latest evidence that allies see a growing likelihood of major conflict.

“Literally any scenario is possible,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told a group of journalists in a newly-published interview. “I know it sounds devastating, especially to people of the younger generation, but we have to mentally get used to a new era. We are in a pre-war era. I don’t exaggerate. This is becoming more and more apparent every day.”

Tusk is the second senior politician from a NATO member-state to suggest that the alliance faces “a pre-war world,” as British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps likewise put it in a January speech. His urgent appeal adds a center-left voice to a chorus of Russia hawks typically populated by more conservative perspectives or the Baltic state leaders who feel acutely their vulnerability to Russia.

“But I would dare to say that it is only now, in the midst of this great war, that it has dawned on all NATO leaders and senior military leaders that all this may actually be needed very soon, that there is a real threat, a real military task, and that we must behave and act in such a way that this machinery, when it is needed, is ready,” Estonian Ambassador Jüri Luik, the Baltic ally’s envoy to NATO, told an Estonian outlet in an interview published Friday. “It seems to me that this final realization has come only after the aggression began.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin denies any intention to “fight NATO” in the event that the war in Ukraine ends with a Russian victory.

“The United States’s defense spending amounts to about 40% of the global figure, or more precisely, 39%, while Russia accounts for 3.5%,” Putin said Wednesday during a visit to a Russian air base. “Considering this difference, are we planning to fight NATO? This is nonsense. We are only defending our people on our historical territories. It is therefore complete nonsense when people say that we intend to attack Europe after Ukraine.”

Those statements are no consolation for Central and Eastern European leaders given that Putin and other Russian officials lied about their intent to attack Ukraine even in the weeks just prior to the full-scale invasion. And Baltic officials, especially, are conscious that Putin regards their countries as part of the historical Russian empire. The justification for the war in Ukraine, as Putin emphasized in June 2022, also “applies to Narva,” a city in Estonia where Tsar Peter the Great won a major battle in 1704.

“Then the question is, could NATO be challenged? … we’re more technologically advanced, we’re better prepared, we’re better trained, and all the other things,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said Monday at the Hudson Institute. “But Russia is fighting an actual war right now, building up this army and expecting us to be, politically, not prepared — not militarily [unprepared], but politically.”

Tusk, likewise, emphasized that European leaders need to adopt a more hard-headed attitude.

“At the last European Council, I had an interesting discussion with the Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez,” Tusk said. “He asked us to stop using the word ‘war’ in statements. He argued that people do not want to be threatened in this way, that in Spain it sounds abstract. I replied that in my part of Europe, war is no longer an abstraction — and that our duty is not to discuss, but to act and prepare to defend ourselves.”

The Polish leader aired his warning while arguing that European allies must recognize the urgent need for major defense spending increases, on their own behalf and in direct support of Ukraine.

Source: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/foreign-policy/2945273/nato-allies-war-with-russia-soon/

FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried will serve 25 years in prison after being convicted of defrauding his customers, investors, and lenders.

The man who presided over the largest crypto collapse in history received his sentence Thursday in a Manhattan federal court from US Judge Lewis Kaplan, who presided over Bankman-Fried’s trial last fall.

He faced up to 110 years. Prosecutors argued for a sentence of 40 to 50 years, while Bankman-Fried’s lawyers asked for six and a half years.

Sentences for white collar crimes have varied in recent years, from 150 years for Bernard Madoff to 11 years for Elizabeth Holmes.

The 32-year-old Bankman-Fried, in his final statement before the judge, said what happened at FTX “haunts me” and that “I made a lot of mistakes.”

As CEO, “I was responsible at the end of the day.”

Bankman-Fried’s defense lawyer tried to draw a distinction between his client and Madoff, who ran the largest Ponzi scheme in history.

“Madoff stole from Holocaust survivors,” his lawyer said. “That is not Sam. He did not want to personally inflict pain on anyone in any way. Sam was not a ruthless financial serial killer. He wasn’t predatory. He makes decisions with math in his head, not malice in his heart.”

Dozens of FTX victims, including those who said they lost their life’s savings due to the demise of the cryptocurrency exchange, submitted letters urging Kaplan to impose a harsh sentence.

The federal sentencing guidelines, while advisory rather than mandatory, suggest prison term enhancements that lengthen sentences as victims’ losses increase.

Kaplan had to weigh the billions that prosecutors say Bankman-Fried stole from FTX customers against claims made by FTX that those who were harmed may be fully repaid via FTX’s bankruptcy.

In January, lawyers for the defunct exchange told a Delaware bankruptcy court judge that a plan for FTX to repay customers and general unsecured creditors in full was “within reach.”

But the judge was not sympathetic to that claim, calling the assertion “misleading” and “speculative.”

Kaplan also had some strong words about Bankman-Fried before delivering his sentence, citing the “brazenness” of his actions, his “exceptional flexibility with the truth” and “his apparent lack of any remorse.”

“He knew it was wrong,” the judge added.

Rise and fall

The sentencing of Bankman-Fried completes a dramatic fall for a onetime billionaire who ran the world’s second-largest crypto exchange and was the face of a boom in digital assets during the early years of the pandemic.

His empire imploded in late 2022 as FTX filed for bankruptcy and he was arrested by authorities in the Bahamas.

The group, prosecutors claimed, allowed Bankman-Fried’s sister crypto trading firm Alameda Research “secret” backdoor access to FTX’s customer deposits, then spent the money on investments, loan repayments, political donations, and real estate.

“He spent his customers’ money, and he lied to them about it,” prosecutor Nicolas Roos said in the government’s closing argument.

The other three FTX executives — Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison, FTX co-founder Gary Wang, and FTX engineering director Nishad Singh — pleaded guilty to fraud charges and testified against Bankman-Fried under plea agreements with the government.

The World Court on Thursday unanimously ordered Israel, accused by South Africa of genocide in Gaza, to take all necessary and effective action to ensure basic food supplies to the enclave’s Palestinian population and halt spreading famine.
But Gaza’s Hamas rulers said a ceasefire was needed to halt the humanitarian crisis.
The order from the International Court of Justice came as Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters battled in close combat around Gaza’s Al Shifa Hospital, where the armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they attacked Israeli soldiers and tanks with rockets and mortar fire.

Judges at the court said the people in the coastal enclave face worsening conditions.
“The court observes that Palestinians in Gaza are no longer facing only a risk of famine (…) but that famine is setting in,” the judges said in their order.
The new measures were requested by South Africa as part of its case that accuses Israel of state-led genocide in Gaza.
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim said the ruling did not go far enough and Israel must be ordered to end its military offensive to halt the suffering.

“We welcome any new demands to end this humanitarian tragedy in Gaza and especially in the northern Gaza Strip, but we hoped the court ordered a ceasefire as an absolute solution to all the miseries our people in Gaza are living through,” Naim told Reuters.
The U.N. Security Council voted on Tuesday to demand an immediate ceasefire and the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. The United States abstained from, but did not veto, the vote.

There was no immediate comment from Israel’s Foreign Ministry on the World Court ruling. Israel has said it is making efforts to expand access for humanitarian groups to Gaza overland, through air drops and by ship.
Israeli leaders have said Hamas can end the war by surrendering, freeing all hostages it holds in Gaza and handing over for trial those involved in the Oct. 7 attack.
The Israeli army said it continued to operate around the Al Shifa Hospital complex in Gaza City after storming it more than a week ago. Its forces had killed around 200 gunmen since the start of the operation “while preventing harm to civilians, patients, medical teams, and medical equipment”, it said.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/palestinian-fighters-battle-israeli-forces-around-gazas-al-shifa-hospital-2024-03-28/

The United Nations Security Council on Monday adopted a resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, after the United States abstained from the vote — prompting Israel to cancel the visit of a high-level delegation to Washington.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had warned before the vote that the delegation’s visit would be pulled, if Washington did not veto the motion. The U.S. abstention signals a widening divide between the White House and Israel’s current government, the most right-wing in its history, nearly six months into its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Israel’s offensive into the Gaza enclave, which comes in response to the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks, has killed tens of thousands of people, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry.

“This is a clear retreat from the consistent position of the U.S. in the Security Council since the beginning of this war,” a statement from Netanyahu’s office said, adding that “this withdrawal hurts both the war effort and the effort to release the abductees.”

The U.S. denied that the abstention marked a shift in its policy. Some observers see it differently.

“It’s a breakthrough. An abstention from a UN Security Council permanent member is a yes vote, because it means they are not exercising their veto and basically agree with the text, even if they don’t want to say so,” Hussein Ibish, a senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, told CNBC.

“The U.S. declining to protect Israel from a resolution it passionately objects to by not providing a veto is an extraordinary thing.”

The first of its kind passed since the onset of the war, the resolution called for an immediate cessation of hostilities between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas for two weeks, breaking a five-month impasse during which the U.S. vetoed three U.N. calls for a halt in fighting. The motion also called for the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington’s reasons to not approve the measure included its lack of condemnation for the Hamas terror attack, which led to roughly 1,200 deaths in Israel and took around 240 more people hostage.

But, Miller added, “the reason we didn’t veto it is because there were also things in that resolution that were consistent with our long-term position, most importantly, that there should be a cease-fire and that there should be a release of hostages, which is what we understood also to be the government of Israel’s position. So it is a bit surprising and unfortunate that they are not going to apparently attend these meetings.”

‘The United States is losing patience’
The move follows condemnations of Netanyahu from a number of U.S. lawmakers — most notably, Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish member of Congress, who is known for steadfastly standing by Israel’s government over the years.

“In this case, the abstention is a very strong signal to Israel that the United States is losing patience,” Ibish said.

The canceled Israeli delegation’s visit to Washington was set to discuss Israel’s planned military operation in Rafah, the southernmost corner of Gaza, where more than a million displaced Palestinians are taking shelter and where Israel says the bulk of Hamas’ remaining fighters are located.

The Biden administration has warned against a Rafah operation, already frustrated by Israel’s hindering of aid deliveries into the besieged strip. At the start of the year, the U.N. warned that half a million Palestinians were facing famine.

For former Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami, the rift between the two longtime allies is a grave threat to Israel’s security — and the blame lies with Netanyahu.

Asked by CNBC’s Dan Murphy if the U.S. and Israel are now at a turning point in the war, Ben-Ami said:

“I think we definitely are. This is a crisis, [and] Americans are conveying the powerful message that they disagree on the way Israel is conducting the war, that they think this is the moment to move to a political process.”

He added, “The whole attitude of confronting Americans instead of serving with their interests, which are essentially Israel’s interests, is working against the nation’s security. Netanyahu has become a threat to Israel’s security by conducting war from the very first day. With him, political domestic consideration is more [important] than catering to the strategic interest of Israel.”

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/26/israel-gaza-us-abstention-on-un-cease-fire-vote-triggers-netanyahu-rage.html

Barack Obama spent several hours last Friday in the family dining room of the White House, visiting his former vice president, Joe Biden. The mood was cheerful as the pair exchanged jokes, and the meeting served as a small reunion of sorts for the two presidents’ respective staff – many of whom have known each other going back to the Obama White House.

Still, the occasion was hardly just two old friends catching up.

Obama has made clear to associates in recent months that he believes Biden’s intensifying re-match with Donald Trump in November will be incredibly close, and that the 2024 election marks an “all-hands-on-deck” moment, people familiar with his thinking told CNN. To that end, his return to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue last week was largely a working visit.

Biden and Obama, along with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, participated in an organizing call in the White House residence heralding the 14th anniversary of the Affordable Care Act. “We have the chance to do even more, but that only happens if we send Joe and Kamala back to the White House in November,” Obama said in the video. “So, we’ve got to keep working.”

Off camera, Obama told Biden that he thought the president’s State of the Union remarks earlier this month had been effective and were breaking through, according to people familiar with their conversation. Obama also emphasized to Biden how much he believes health care will be a politically potent and important issue in the upcoming election.

The campaign also recorded other content featuring the two presidents, sources said, that they plan to roll out in the coming weeks.

Obama and Biden speak with regularity, sources said, and the former president remains in direct contact with some top White House officials, including Biden’s chief of staff, Jeff Zients, who worked in the Obama administration.

The former president has lent an occasional hand to Biden since the current president’s reelection announcement last year, particularly through public fundraising appeals and in quiet conversations in hopes of allaying concern from some Democrats about Biden seeking a second term. His engagement with the Biden campaign is expected to intensify as the general election kicks into higher gear, and aides said he has already agreed to several campaign appearances before November as he works to help rebuild Biden’s winning coalition from 2020.

Obama’s biggest embrace of Biden’s reelection effort comes Thursday at a star-studded Manhattan fundraiser featuring Biden, Obama and former President Bill Clinton. The three presidents will sit for a rare conversation, moderated by Stephen Colbert.

It will hardly be a routine meeting of the Presidents Club, and when Clinton and Obama take the stage at Radio City Music Hall, their appearance will underscore the extraordinary moment in American history as a sitting president is locked in a bitter fight to keep his predecessor from returning to the White House.

“No one can speak to disillusioned Democrats better than President Obama,” a senior strategist who has worked closely with Obama and Biden told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to be candid about the campaign. “But there are limits to what Obama can do. The burden to win this race is still on President Biden.”

Attending the sold-out, high-dollar event Thursday night will be numerous celebrities and artists like Queen Latifah, Lizzo, Cynthia Erivo, Mindy Kaling, Ben Platt and Lea Michele, according to the campaign. The evening will be overseen by high-profile producers Jordan Roth and Alex Timbers, and tickets will range from $225 to $500,000.

Capitalizing the rare joint appearance of Biden and two of his predecessors, the campaign is offering some of the high-dollar guests the opportunity to get their photographs taken with all three presidents by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz.

As president, Biden has also been in frequent touch with Clinton, sources familiar say. Steve Ricchetti, a top Biden adviser who also worked in the Clinton White House, is also in regular touch with his former boss. Advice and consultation related to the 2024 election have been a part of all of those conversations, those people said.

Obama’s appeal and popularity as one of the best-known national Democrats has been undeniable. The campaign’s grassroots fundraising efforts featuring the former president have raised over $15 million so far this cycle, with a “Meet the Presidents” contest featuring Biden and Obama alone hauling in some $3 million, according to the campaign.

For the next seven months, a specific area of focus for Obama will be making fundraising appeals and helping to motivate young Americans, particularly Black and Latino voters, who are seen by campaign advisers as a weak spot for Biden’s candidacy.

Obama has no plans to hit the stump aggressively until the fall, when early voting begins, following a pattern he has adopted since leaving office. Saving the former president until the end of the race – at the time when voters are paying the most attention – is how Obama and his advisers believe he can be the most effective.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/27/politics/barack-obama-joe-biden-bill-clinton-donald-trump/index.html

China criticizes EAM Jaishankar’s support for Philippines in maritime dispute, asserts third parties have no right to interfere in territorial matters.

China criticizes EAM Jaishankar’s comments on India supporting the Philippines for upholding its national sovereignty. Responding to Jaishankar’s comments, China said, “Third parties have no right to interfere whatsoever. Respect China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights.”

Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lin Jian told Reuters that, “Marintime disputes are issued between the countries concerned. Third parties have no right to interfere whatsoever. We urge relevant parties to dae squarely the facts and truths on the South China Sea issue, and respect China territorial sovereignity and marinetime rights and interest and the efforts of regional countires to keep the South China Sea peaceful and stable.”

Earlier on Tuesday, in a firm public assertion of India’s position on the South China Sea issue, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said India firmly supported the Philippines in upholding its national sovereignty as Manila and Beijing were currently involved in a raging maritime territorial dispute over the resource-rich region.

Philippines President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. conveyed his appreciation to India for its prompt and resolute response in aiding Filipino crew members of a merchant vessel targeted by Houthi insurgents in the Gulf of Aden earlier this month. The swift intervention by the Indian Navy’s medical team ensured the rescue and provision of essential medical attention to all crew members of MV Confidence after the vessel came under attack from a Houthi missile strike on March 6. Tragically, three crew members, among them two Filipinos, lost their lives in the incident. According to the Philippine News Agency, all surviving Filipino crew members have been safely repatriated.

Source: https://www.livemint.com/news/south-china-sea-issue-china-miffed-with-eam-jaishankars-comment-on-philippines-says-third-parties-have-no-right-11711510676959.html

The ship crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge and, according to reports, several vehicles and as many as 20 people were sent plunging into the river below.

The container ship that rammed a bridge in US’ Baltimore, causing it to collapse almost entirely and sending cars and people plunging into the river below, was manned entirely by a crew of Indians. This was confirmed by shipping company Maersk, which had chartered the Singapore-flagged container ship, named Dali.
According to a report by news agency AFP, several vehicles and nearly 20 people are believed to have fallen into the Patapsco River after the 300-metre-long vessel crashed into one of the legs of the bridge. The ship had a crew of 22 members, all of whom were Indian. Quoting the Synergy Marine Group, which manages the Dali, a report said all crew members had been accounted for and none of them were injured.

Footage showed lights going out on the ship just before it rammed a leg of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, a portion of which collapsed on the vessel itself.

Maryland’s governor said the ship, which was moving at a “rapid” eight knots (nine miles per hour), issued a Mayday call moments before it collided with the pillar of the bridge and that quick thinking by authorities after that allowed officials to stop vehicles from going onto the bridge.

“We’re thankful that between the Mayday and the collapse that we had officials who were able to begin to stop the flow of traffic,” Mr Moore said, according to AFP.

Source: https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/all-indian-crew-on-board-ship-that-collided-with-baltimore-bridge-5314989

The US abstained from the proposal, which also called for the immediate release of hostages and the expansion of aid into Gaza.

The United Nations Security Council has passed a resolution that demands a ceasefire in Gaza for the rest of Ramadan.

The Muslim holy month began on 10 March and is set to finish on 9 April – meaning the council is calling for a two-week truce, though the proposal said the pause in fighting should lead “to a permanent sustainable ceasefire”.

The US abstained from the vote, with the 14 other council members – including Russia, China and the UK – voting in favour.

The resolution also demanded the immediate, unconditional release of all hostages – not linked to a timeline – and “emphasises the urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian assistance to… the Gaza Strip”.

After the vote, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled a planned delegation visit to Washington as “the US withdrew from its consistent position”.

In a statement, Mr Netanyahu’s office said “the US did not veto the new text that calls for a ceasefire without the condition of releasing the abductees”, and called the American abstention a “clear retreat”.

“This withdrawal hurts both the war effort and the effort to release the hostages, because it gives Hamas hope that international pressure will allow them to accept a ceasefire without the release of our hostages,” the office said.

The Israeli delegation was to present White House officials with plans for an expected ground invasion of the strategic Gaza town of Rafah, where more than one million Palestinian civilians have sought shelter from the war.

Meanwhile, Hamas welcomed the UN resolution and said it “affirms readiness to engage in immediate prisoner swaps on both sides”.

Vote ‘does not represent policy shift’, US says

On Friday, Russia and China vetoed a US-sponsored resolution that would have supported “an immediate and sustained ceasefire” in the Israeli-Hamas conflict.

The council had adopted two resolutions on the worsening humanitarian situation in Gaza since the start of the war but Friday’s proposal marked the first time the US has backed a resolution containing the word “ceasefire” – reflecting a toughening of the Biden administration’s stance towards Israel.

But the White House said after Monday’s vote that the US abstention “does not represent a shift in policy” and that the resolution “did not have language the US deems essential”.

US ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said the US “fully supports” the resolution’s “critical objectives” despite its abstention.

“In fact, they were the foundation of the resolution we put forward last week – a resolution that Russia and China vetoed.”

Resolution ‘could have come months ago’

Emphasising that her country’s support for the objectives “is not simply rhetorical”, Ms Thomas-Greenfield said the US “is working around the clock to make them real on the ground through diplomacy”.

She also said a ceasefire could have come “months ago” had Hamas been ready to release the hostages, accusing the Palestinian group of throwing roadblocks in the path of peace.

“So today my ask to members of this council… is ‘speak out and demand unequivocally that Hamas accepts the deal on the table’,” she said.

The US had vetoed three previous resolutions demanding a ceasefire in Gaza, the most recent a measure backed by the 22-nation Arab Group at the UN on 20 February.

Vote ‘sends clear and united message’

In explaining the UK’s support of the proposal, Dame Barbara Woodward, the country’s ambassador to the UN, said she “regrets that this resolution has not condemned” the 7 October attack but welcomed the ongoing diplomatic efforts by Egypt, Qatar and the US.

She said: “The resolution sends a clear and united message on the need for international humanitarian law to be upheld and for aid to be scaled up urgently, including the lifting of all barriers impeding its delivery.

“We need to focus on how we chart the way from an immediate humanitarian pause to a lasting sustainable peace without a return to fighting.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/un-security-council-passes-resolution-demanding-gaza-ceasefire-13101682

It comes as a separate court agreed to hold off collection of his $454m civil fraud judgement if he puts up $175m within 10 days.

Donald Trump is set to stand trial in his hush-money case on 15 April – marking the first of four criminal cases against the former president to reach trial.

A New York judge ruled today that the former president will face charges next month related to payments made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, meant to cover up claims of marital infidelity.

Trump stands accused of criminally altering business records to cover up a $130,000 payment to Ms Daniels shortly before the 2016 election.

Trump’s lawyers say the payment was meant to spare himself and his family embarrassment, not to help him win the election.

Judge Juan Merchan also rejected claims of prosecutorial misconduct made by the defence during the hearing.

If the date holds, it marks the first of four criminal cases against Trump to reach trial as he mounts his campaign for US president as the presumptive Republican nominee.

Outside the courtroom, Trump complained about the ruling, characterising the case as an act of “election interference”.

He accused Biden of waging a legal witch hunt against him and accused the judge of corruption without providing evidence of either.

The former president also claimed the case could bolster his campaign, saying: “It can make me more popular because the people know it’s a scam.”

Trump has claimed he should not have to stand trial during the campaign, and his lawyers have filed a blizzard of motions to delay or derail the cases.

As it stands now, only the New York case is guaranteed to go to trial before November.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/donald-trump-hush-money-trial-to-start-15-april-13101819

Beijing has lashed out at the United States and the United Kingdom for imposing sanctions over alleged Chinese government-backed cyberattacks, calling the Western allies’ move an act of “political manipulation.”

The US and the UK announced Monday a set of criminal charges and sanctions against seven Chinese hackers for allegedly conducting sweeping attacks on behalf of China’s civilian intelligence agency.

The yearslong campaign allegedly targeted American officials, senators, journalists and companies – including Pentagon contractors – as well as British parliamentarians, the UK’s election watchdog and members of the European Parliament, affecting millions of people.

New Zealand also weighed in on Tuesday, accusing state-sponsored Chinese hackers of launching “malicious cyber activity” against the country’s parliament in 2021.

Accusations of cyber espionage have long been a major point of friction between Beijing and Washington, with the US indicting a series of Chinese hackers in recent years.

The public accusations from three members of the so-called Five Eyes intelligence alliance show key Western democracies are now taking a more concerted – and coordinated – stand against what they view as unacceptable levels of hacking and espionage by Beijing.

At a news conference Tuesday, China’s Foreign Ministry lashed out at the US and the UK, accusing them of “hyping up the so-called cyberattacks by China.”

“This is purely political manipulation. China is strongly dissatisfied with this and firmly opposes it,” ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said, adding China has made solemn representations to both sides.

Exterior view of the Northern side of the White House in Washington DC as seen from Lafayette Square park and Pennsylvania Avenue. The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States of America POTUS and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. The residence was designed by Irish-born architect James Hoban in the neoclassical architecture style. Outside of the the North side is a fountain in the lawn, the executive residence northern facade is with a columned portico. Secret Service police with cars and dogs are patrolling and guarding the building as many tourists visit the location daily. The American flag is flown at half-staff honoring the victims of the tragedy in Allen, Texas and respect for the victims of violence. Washington DC, USA on May 8, 2023 (Photo by Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via AP)

“We urge the United States and the United Kingdom to stop politicizing cyber security issues, stop slandering and smearing China, impose unilateral sanctions, and stop cyberattacks on China.”

The spokesperson did not mention New Zealand.

Australia and the European Union also expressed solidarity with the UK and voiced concerns over China’s alleged malicious cyber activities, as Beijing comes under growing scrutiny in a big election year for democracies around the world.

The accusations and sanctions come as China is trying to manage tensions and repair frayed relations with major Western powers, as it grapples with a host of economic challenges including an exodus of foreign investment.

Beijing’s frustration was evident on Tuesday, when Lin, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson, blamed the US for encouraging the Five Eyes alliance “to spread all kinds of disinformation about the threats posted by Chinese hackers for geopolitical purpose.”

Liu Dongshu, an assistant professor focusing on Chinese politics at City University of Hong Kong, said the coordinated move by the US and its allies undermines Beijing’s “divide and rule” strategy.

“My observation is that China has always sought to create some distance between the US and other Western countries, such as European nations and Australia. Especially considering the possibility of a reelection of Donald Trump, China feels there may be a chance to separate them a little more,” he said.

“But (the accusations) show that despite their differences, these countries remain united on many issues regarding China.”

‘Sensitive time’
The sanctions against two Chinese nationals and a technology company in the central Chinese city of Wuhan mark the first time Britain has slapped penalties on Chinese state-affiliated entities for alleged cyberattacks, even as Western intelligence agencies have increasingly sounded the alarm in recent years.

“It is an escalation, but perhaps only because the UK has been rather mild in its previous actions,” said Jonathan Sullivan, an associate professor and China specialist at the University of Nottingham.

British cybersecurity officials said a Chinese state-backed hacking group known as APT31 had “conducted reconnaissance activity” against British parliamentarians who were openly critical of Beijing in 2021.

Chinese hackers have also “highly likely” breached the UK’s Electoral Commission in 2021 and 2022 and accessed personal data of 40 million voters, according to British officials.

On Tuesday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said China had made “technical clarification” in response to the APT31-related information submitted by the UK, calling its evidence “insufficient” and “unprofessional.”

The sanctions come at a sensitive time in the UK, which is facing a general election and bracing itself for a wave of misinformation, said Sullivan, the China expert at the University of Nottingham.

“Our economic relations with China are already undergoing securitization, from investment to data protection,” he said, citing Britain’s bans on Chinese tech giant Huawei from its 5G networks, and on the camera systems of Chinese surveillance company Hikvision from sensitive sites.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/26/china/china-cyber-hacking-accusations-intl-hnk/index.html

Win or lose, the Justice Department’s antitrust suit against Apple could force the company to do something it hates: It will have to share detailed info about its inner workings.

Why it matters: The famously tight-lipped company likes to carefully craft every narrative, releasing only information that makes its products and business practices look good.

• But business lawsuits involve “discovery” — in which the other side gets to rifle through a company’s email, reports and numbers.
• Some of that information is kept confidential, but some of it is made public at trial.

Flashback: Apple has faced this challenge before in deciding how to handle legal matters. After choosing to sue Samsung a decade ago, Apple was forced to share details of unlaunched prototypes, market research and its secretive design process.

• That suit even dragged in details that other tech companies wanted to keep secret, with Intel, Qualcomm and others filing motions to keep their business dealings out of the public record.
• In 2005, the company was forced to essentially confirm unannounced products when it went to court to punish people who leaked its product info.

Be smart: The antitrust case is likely to force Apple to reveal even more of its business dealings, though it may be able to keep its most confidential arrangements under seal.

The other side: An Apple official told Axios that new secrets won’t necessarily be exposed.

• “We have litigated dozens of high-profile cases over the last 15 years,” the official said. “DOJ has already had access to millions of documents during the course of the investigation. Yet they only used the same tired documents that have been part of the public record.”

The big picture: Apple is particularly averse to having its business arrangements made public, but many tech companies have faced similar dilemmas in choosing whether to fight or settle antitrust complaints or other legal challenges.

• Such suits inevitably become uncomfortable for all parties, as happened in the recent battle between Apple and Fortnite maker Epic Games.
• In that case, court documents revealed secrets not only from Apple and Epic, but also from Microsoft, Sony and others.

Source : https://www.axios.com/2024/03/24/apple-secrets-antitrust-suit

France’s government increased its security alert posture to the highest level Sunday after the deadly attack at a Russian concert hall and the Islamic State’s claim of responsibility.

French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced the decision in a post on X, saying authorities were “taking into account the Islamic State’s claim of responsibility for the (Moscow) attack and the threats weighing on our country.″

The announcement came after Presiden t Emmanuel Macron held an emergency security meeting prompted by Friday’s attack in a Moscow suburb that killed more than 130 people. The attack was claimed by an affiliate of the Islamic State group.

France has repeatedly been hit by deadly Islamic State attacks, including the Bataclan theater massacre in 2015 in which extremists opened fire on concert-goers and held hostages for hours. French troops have also fought against Islamic extremists in the Middle East and Africa.

France was already on high security alert ahead of the Paris Olympics and Paralympics this year, which are expected to draw millions of visitors to the country. Security concerns are notably high for the the exceptional opening ceremony July 26, which will involve boats riding along the Seine River and huge crowds watching from the embankments.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/france-threat-level-russia-attack-aa08ac650ac8760410806568d9477197

The news comes after many weeks of speculation about the health of the 42-year-old future queen, who has not been seen on official duties since Christmas.

Kate, Princess of Wales, has revealed she has been diagnosed with cancer and is undergoing preventative chemotherapy.

In a personal message, the 42-year-old said planned abdominal surgery in January was successful and it was initially thought her condition was non-cancerous.

But tests after the operation found cancer had been present, she said, adding: “This of course came as a huge shock, and William and I have been doing everything we can to process and manage this privately for the sake of our young family.”

The mother of George, Charlotte and Louis said doctors had advised her to have a course of preventative chemotherapy and she is currently in the early stages of that treatment.

“It has taken me time to recover from major surgery in order to start my treatment,” she said.

“But, most importantly, it has taken us time to explain everything to George, Charlotte and Louis in a way that is appropriate for them, and to reassure them that I am going to be okay.

“As I have said to them; I am well and getting stronger every day by focusing on the things that will help me heal; in my mind, body and spirits.”

She described having her husband Prince William by her side as a “great source of comfort and reassurance”, adding: “As is the love, support and kindness that has been shown by so many of you – it means much to us both.”

The princess’s chemotherapy began in late February, although it is unclear when it will end.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/kate-princess-of-wales-reveals-she-is-having-treatment-for-cancer-13099988

The newly-released photograph of the Princess of Wales came amid online speculation about her health. Kate has not been seen at an official event since Christmas Day.

Major photo agencies have pulled a new image of the Princess of Wales from circulation over concerns it was “manipulated” by “the source”.

The image was circulated by a number of picture agencies on Sunday before Reuters, Associated Press (AP), Getty Images and Agence France-Presse (AFP) told media outlets to “kill” the photo from their systems and archives.

AP has told Sky News the photo shows an “inconsistency in the alignment of Princess Charlotte’s left hand”.

The picture in question was released to celebrate Mother’s Day and shows Kate surrounded by her and Prince William’s three children: Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis.

Kensington Palace has declined to comment after the photo was pulled by picture agencies.

AP told Sky News in a statement: “The Associated Press initially published the photo, which was issued by Kensington Palace. The AP later retracted the image because at closer inspection, it appears that the source had manipulated the image in a way that did not meet AP’s photo standards.

“The photo shows an inconsistency in the alignment of Princess Charlotte’s left hand.”

Reuters said it withdrew the picture following a “post-publication review” with a spokesperson saying the agency is “reviewing the matter”.

Meanwhile, AFP said it had “come to light” that the image of the “Princess of Wales and her kids had been altered” and was therefore removed from its systems.

A spokesperson for Getty Images told Sky News: “Earlier today our picture desk identified a problematic image provided to Getty Images by Kensington Palace. We can confirm the image in question was removed from our site in accordance with our editorial policy.”

A spokesperson for the Press Association news agency said it had not killed the picture on its service, but was seeking urgent clarification from Kensington Palace about the concerns raised about manipulation.

Readers on X, formerly known as Twitter, added a community note to a post from the Prince and Princess of Wales’ account which shared the image.

Community notes allow readers to add context to posts to help other users have a better understanding of what they are reading or viewing.

The note reads: “This photo is believed to be digitally altered and as a result many major news outlets have pulled the image from their reports.”

Source:https://news.sky.com/story/picture-agencies-pull-kate-photo-amid-manipulation-concerns-13092352

With Russia gaining momentum on the battlefield, Pope Francis has said Kyiv should not be ashamed to talk to Moscow.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has dismissed the Pope’s call for Ukraine to enter peace talks with Russia as “virtual mediation”.

In his nightly video address, Ukraine’s president did not refer directly to Pope Francis or his suggestion, but said his ideas had nothing to do with efforts from religious figures in Ukraine.

“They support us with prayer, with their discussion and with deeds,” he said. “This is indeed what a church with the people is.

“Not 2,500km away, somewhere, virtual mediation between someone who wants to live and someone who wants to destroy you.”

The head of the Catholic Church had called on Ukraine to have “the courage of the white flag”, adding “I think that the strongest one is the one who looks at the situation, thinks about the people, has the courage of the white flag, and negotiates.”

In an interview with Swiss broadcaster RSI, he said Kyiv, shouldn’t be ashamed to talk to Vladimir Putin’s regime, “before things get worse”, as “the word negotiate is a courageous word”.

“When you see that you are defeated, that things are not going well, you have to have the courage to negotiate. Negotiations are never a surrender,” he added.

Zelenskyy’s comments come after a leading Ukrainian cleric and a senior Polish politician joined those condemning Pope Francis’s remarks.

Radek Sikorski, foreign minister of Poland, a staunch and vocal Ukraine ally, responded on X: “How about, for balance, encouraging Putin to have the courage to withdraw his army from Ukraine? Peace would immediately ensue without the need for negotiations.”

Mr Sikorski drew parallels between those calling for negotiations while “denying [Ukraine] the means to defend itself” and European leaders’ “appeasement” of Adolf Hitler just before the Second World War.

Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, responded, too, saying surrender is not on the minds of Ukrainians.

While meeting some Ukrainians in New York, he said: “Ukraine is wounded, but unconquered! Ukraine is exhausted, but it stands and will endure. Believe me, it never crosses anyone’s mind to surrender.”

Andrii Yurash, Ukraine’s ambassador to the Holy See, in a post on X, appeared to compare the pope’s comments to calls for “talking with Hitler” while raising “a white flag to satisfy him”.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/zelenskyy-dismisses-pope-franciss-call-for-ukraine-to-negotiate-peace-with-russia-13091610