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An unsanctioned coterie of pro-Israel quasi-lobbyists has descended on D.C.

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

This past week, an unlikely pair of men sat down for breakfast at the Capitol Hill Club, a Republican gathering site just a stone’s throw from Congress, to plot ways to help Israel.On one side of the table was Rep. Paul Gosar, a firebrand Republican who has faced criticism for ties to white nationalists. On the other was Bobby Rechnitz, a Los Angeles real estate developer dubbed a “confidant” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.Over coffee, the two discussed Israel’s former Prime Minister Golda Meir and the situation in Gaza. Rechnitz said he’d come to Washington to share real-time intelligence from Israel and to ensure lawmakers understood the challenges facing leadership there.“I hope to slightly enlighten the congressman about some of the things that I’m hearing,” he said. Rechnitz said he’s connected lawmakers with members of the Knesset, Israel’s governing body. He also uses a large iPad to show them photos of bullet-riddled bodies of babies and people burnt alive.The ...

CEO of Europe’s largest tech conference resigns over Israel-Hamas comments

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

Paddy Cosgrave, the founder and chief executive of Europe’s largest annual technology conference, Web Summit, resigned on Saturday in an effort to quell a controversy surrounding comments he made on the Israel-Hamas war. His departure came after several major companies withdrew from this year’s event, which is scheduled for November 13-16 in Lisbon.Cosgrave, an Irish entrepreneur who co-founded Web Summit in 2009, faced significant backlash for criticizing Western support for Israel’s military response to the October 7 attack by the militant group Hamas, which claimed the lives of 1,400 people.“War crimes are war crimes, even when committed by allies,” Cosgrave wrote on social media on October 13, referring to Israel’s ongoing airstrikes and blockade of the Gaza Strip, which the U.N. has warned could lead to mass starvation of the 2.3 million people living there. Cosgrave later followed up with a message condemning the Hamas attack.Amid growing cr...

As DeSantis falters, the race for second place in the GOP primary is open again

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

(CNN) — A furious scramble for second place is underway in the crowded Republican primary contest, with candidates vying for an opportunity to directly take on front-runner Donald Trump. The position, once held by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, now appears to be more of a free-for-all.Since the 2024 presidential race began, the second-place spot in GOP primary polling has been a coveted one. The conventional wisdom was that for candidates not named Trump, one of their earliest objectives would be to become the consensus alternative to the former president. Before and in the early days of DeSantis’ campaign, it seemed like he would be that candidate. The Florida governor enjoyed a robust campaign war chest and early polling showed him trailing only Trump, albeit by a wide margin.But more recently, DeSantis’s star has begun to fade. He was more muted compared with other rivals at last month’s first Republican primary debate in Milwaukee, and he’s no...

Turnover has plagued local election offices since 2020. One swing state county is trying to recover

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

WILKES-BARRE, Pa. (AP) — The polls had just opened for last year’s midterms in Pennsylvania when the phones began ringing at the election office in Luzerne County.Polling places were running low on paper to print ballots. Volunteers were frustrated, and voters were worried they might not be able to vote.Emily Cook, the office’s interim deputy director who had been in her position for just two months, rushed to the department’s warehouse. She found stacks of paper, but it was the wrong kind — ordered long ago and too thick to meet the requirements for the county’s voting equipment.Conspiracy theories swiftly began to spread: Republican polling places were being targeted; Democrats overseeing elections were trying to disenfranchise Republicans.“The feeling early on in the day was panic — concern — which grew to overwhelming panic,” Cook said. “And then at some point throughout the day, there was definitely a feeling of people are starting to point fingers — before the day ...

Author Salman Rushdie calls for defense of freedom of expression as he receives German prize

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

BERLIN (AP) — Author Salman Rushdie called Sunday for the unconditional defense of freedom of expression as he received a prestigious German prize that recognizes his literary work and his resolve in the face of constant danger.The British-American author decried the current age as a time when freedom of expression is under attack by all sides, including from authoritarian and populist voices, according to the German news agency dpa.He made his remarks during a ceremony in St. Paul’s Church in Frankfurt, where he was honored with the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade for continuing to write despite enduring decades of threats and violence.In August 2022, Rushdie was stabbed repeatedly while on stage at a literary festival in New York state. Rushdie has a memoir coming out about the attack that left him blind in his right eye and with a damaged left hand. “Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder” will be released on April 16. He called it a way “to answer violence with ...

South Korea, US and Japan hold first-ever trilateral aerial exercise in face of North Korean threats

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The South Korean, U.S. and Japanese militaries conducted their first-ever trilateral aerial exercise on Sunday in response to evolving North Korean nuclear threats, South Korea’s air force said.The training held near the Korean Peninsula was to implement the three countries’ earlier agreement to increase defense cooperation and boost their joint response capabilities against North Korean threats, the air force said in a statement.The drill involved a nuclear-capable B-52 bomber from the United States and fighter jets from South Korea and Japan, the statement said.South Korea and Japan are both key U.S. allies in Asia, which together host about 80,000 American troops. The three countries have occasionally held trilateral maritime drills, such as anti-submarine or missile defense exercises, but Sunday’s training marked the first time for them to perform a trilateral aerial drill.In South Korea, expanding military drills with Japan is a sensitive issue, becaus...

Biden walks tightrope with support for Israel as allies and the left push for restraint

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden told a crowd of Democratic donors over the weekend about a decades-old photo he took with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, an aside that seemed intended to illustrate his long support of Israel and track record of speaking bluntly with the conservative Israeli leader.Biden said he’d written on the photo of himself as a young senator and Netanyahu as an embassy hand, “Bibi, I love you. I don’t agree with a damn thing you say.’” He told donors at a Friday night fundraiser that Netanyahu still keeps the photo on his desk and had brought it up during Biden’s lightning visit to Tel Aviv last week.As expectations grow that Israel will soon launch a ground offensive aimed at rooting out Hamas militants who rule the Gaza Strip, Biden finds himself facing anew the difficult balancing act of demonstrating full-throated support for America’s closet ally in the Middle East while trying to also press the Israelis to act with enough ...

BoC expected to hold key interest rate steady amid ‘sluggish’ economy

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

The Bank of Canada is widely expected to hold its key interest rate steady on Wednesday as the Canadian economy bends to higher interest rates and inflation resumes its downward trend.The central bank held its key interest rate steady at five per cent last month but kept the door open to more rate hikes, citing concerns about the persistence of underlying price pressures. “Economic data releases since the Bank of Canada opted to forego an interest rate hike in September have been mixed, but we expect that they on net have made a hike at next week’s decision unlikely,” wrote RBC assistant chief economist Nathan Janzen and economist Claire Fan in a client note on Friday.The annual inflation rate rose in both July and August, while core measures  of inflation — which strip out volatile prices — have not eased by much in recent months.But the September consumer price index report helped quell some of those anxieties as the pace of price growth slowed across the eco...

2 injured after shooting in Walgreens on North Side: CPD

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

CHICAGO -- Two men are injured after a shooting in a Walgreen's store in the city's Old Town neighborhood, police said. According to police, a 26-year-old man was working at a 24-hour Walgreens in the 1600 block of North Wells Street around 11:55 p.m. when a man in his late twenties entered the store, had an altercation with the employee and produced a gun.Police said gunfire was exchanged and the employee sustained a graze wound to the chest. He refused medical attention on the scene. Police offer warning after string of 6 armed robberies in under 30 minutes on Southwest Side The offender sustained gunshot wounds to the chest, head, abdomen and self-transported to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in critical condition.Police said the two appeared to have known each other and investigators have not disclosed whether they have recovered how the two individuals knew each other.It is still unknown whether the employee is a CCL holder, and the company does ban guns inside store location...

Israel bombs Gaza, Syria and West Bank as war threatens to ignite other fronts

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:20:24 GMT

RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel warplanes bombed Gaza overnight and into Sunday, as well as two airports in Syria and a mosque in the occupied West Bank.Israel has traded fire with Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group on a near-daily basis since the war began, and tensions are soaring in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.For days, Israel has seemed to be on the verge of launching a ground offensive in Gaza as part of its response to Hamas' attack on Oct. 7. Tanks and tens of thousands of troops have massed at the border, and Israeli leaders have spoken of an undefined next stage in operations.A convoy of 17 aid trucks was allowed to enter Gaza from Egypt on Sunday, Egypt's state-run media reported, the second shipment into the territory since Israel imposed a complete siege two weeks ago. On Saturday, 20 trucks entered.Relief workers said far more was needed to address the spiraling humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where half the territory's 2.3 million people have fled their homes. The U.N....