PFL MENA announces fight card for 2025 opening event in Jeddah

PFL MENA announces fight card for 2025 opening event in Jeddah
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PFL has announced the fight card for the opening event of the 2025 PFL MENA season in Jeddah. (PFL MENA)
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Updated 11 April 2025
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PFL MENA announces fight card for 2025 opening event in Jeddah

PFL MENA announces fight card for 2025 opening event in Jeddah
  • Featherweight champion Abdullah Al-Qahtani faces Islam Reda in main event
  • Strong featherweight and lightweight matchups in quarterfinals

JEDDAH: The Professional Fighters League (PFL) has announced the fight card for the opening event of the 2025 PFL MENA season, which will take place in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on Friday, May 9, 2025.

Headlining the card is a highly anticipated featherweight quarterfinal bout, as Saudi champion Abdullah Al-Qahtani faces Egyptian star Islam Reda, known as “The Egyptian Zombie,” in a rematch of their 2018 contest, which ended in a win for Al-Qahtani.

Reda reached the featherweight final last season but was forced to withdraw due to injury, with Al-Qahtani stepping in and ultimately claiming the title.

The card will also feature the PFL MENA debuts of several top talents from the Middle East, including Salahdine Hamli from Morocco, Ezzedine Dourbani from Jordan, Yanis Ghemmouri from Algeria, and Hussein Salem from Iraq.

In addition, exhibition bouts will include the first appearances of Abdulaziz Bin Moammar, champion of the 2024 Saudi Games, and Yousef Al-Hosani, the Emirati jiu-jitsu champion and a strong candidate to become one of the region’s breakout stars.


Knicks beat Celtics 119-81 in Game 6 and advance to face Pacers in Eastern Conference finals

Knicks beat Celtics 119-81 in Game 6 and advance to face Pacers in Eastern Conference finals
Updated 3 min 25 sec ago
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Knicks beat Celtics 119-81 in Game 6 and advance to face Pacers in Eastern Conference finals

Knicks beat Celtics 119-81 in Game 6 and advance to face Pacers in Eastern Conference finals

NEW YORK: The New York Knicks reached the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in 25 years and ended the one-year NBA title reign of the Boston Celtics with astonishing ease, rolling to a 119-81 victory in Game 6 on Friday night.
Jalen Brunson and OG Anunoby each scored 23 points for the Knicks, who will face the Indiana Pacers, the same team they met in their last conference finals appearance in 2000. Game 1 is Wednesday night in New York.
The Knicks hadn’t won a playoff series on their home floor since the 1999 East finals. So the celebrating started late in the one-sided first half inside Madison Square Garden and was sure to carry on deep into the night around the arena.
Mikal Bridges scored 22 points and Karl-Anthony Towns had 21 for the Knicks, whose 38-point margin of victory was their largest in a postseason game.


Photo group says it has ‘suspended attribution’ of historic Vietnam picture because of doubts

Photo group says it has ‘suspended attribution’ of historic Vietnam picture because of doubts
Updated 18 min ago
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Photo group says it has ‘suspended attribution’ of historic Vietnam picture because of doubts

Photo group says it has ‘suspended attribution’ of historic Vietnam picture because of doubts
  • World Press Photo honored AP’s Nick Ut with its ” photo of the year ” in 1973
  • Picture of girl running from a napalm attack became an iconic symbol of the war’s tragedy

An organization that honored The Associated Press’ Nick Ut with its ” photo of the year ” in 1973 for a picture of a girl running from a napalm attack in the Vietnam War says it has “suspended its attribution” to Ut because of doubts over who actually took it.
World Press Photo’s report Friday adds to the muddle over an issue that has split the photographic community since a movie earlier this year, “The Stringer,” questioned Ut’s authorship. The photo of a naked and terrified Kim Phuc became an iconic symbol of the war’s tragedy.
After two investigations, The Associated Press said it found no definitive evidence to warrant stripping Ut’s photo credit. The AP said it was possible Ut took the picture, but the passage of time made it impossible to fully prove, and could find no evidence to prove anyone else did.
World Press Photo said its probe found that two other photographers — Nguyen Thanh Nghe, the man mentioned in “The Stringer,” and Huynh Cong Phuc — “may have been better positioned” to take the shot.
“We conclude that the level of doubt is too significant to maintain the existing attribution,” said Joumana El Zein Khoury, executive director of World Press Photo. “At the same time, lacking conclusive evidence pointing definitively to another photographer, we cannot reassign authorship, either.”
World Press Photo, an organization whose awards are considered influential in photography, won’t attempt to recover the cash award given to Ut, a spokeswoman said.
Ut’s lawyer, James Hornstein, said his client hadn’t spoken to World Press Photo after some initial contact before “The Stringer” was released. “It seems they had already made up their mind to punish Nick Ut from the start,” he said.
Gary Knight, a producer of “The Stringer,” is a four-time judge of the World Press Photo awards and a consultant to the World Press Photo Foundation.
The AP said Friday that its standards “require proof and certainty to remove a credit and we have found that it is impossible to prove exactly what happened that day on the road or in the (AP) bureau over 50 years ago.”
“We understand World Press Photo has taken different action based on the same available information, and that is their prerogative,” the statement said. “There is no question over AP’s ownership of the photo.”
Meanwhile, the Pulitzer Prize that Ut won for the photo appears safe. The Pulitzers depend on news agencies who enter the awards to determine authorship, and administrator Marjorie Miller — a former AP senior editor — pointed to the AP’s study showing insufficient proof to withdraw credit. “The board does not anticipate future action at this time,” she said Friday.
 


Israel launches ‘initial stages’ of new Gaza operation: military

Israel launches ‘initial stages’ of new Gaza operation: military
Updated 21 min 40 sec ago
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Israel launches ‘initial stages’ of new Gaza operation: military

Israel launches ‘initial stages’ of new Gaza operation: military
  • Gaza’s civil defense agency earlier said Israeli strikes on Gaza had killed 100 people on Friday

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said Saturday it had launched “extensive strikes” in the Gaza Strip over the past day as part of the “initial stages” of a fresh offensive on the besieged Palestinian territory.
The strikes were part of “the expansion of the battle in the Gaza Strip, with the goal of achieving all the war’s objectives, including the release of the abducted and the defeat of Hamas,” Israel’s army said in a statement in Arabic on Telegram.
Gaza’s civil defense agency earlier said Israeli strikes on Gaza had killed 100 people on Friday.
The offensive, known as “Operation Gideon’s Chariots,” comes as Israel faces pressure to lift a sweeping aid blockade in return for a US-Israeli hostage released by Hamas.
Israel resumed its military offensive in Gaza on March 18 after a two-month truce in its war against Hamas, which was triggered by an attack by the Palestinian group in October 2023.
That assault resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
Of the 251 hostages taken during the attack, 57 remain in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.
The health ministry in the Hamas-run territory said 2,985 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 53,119.
Israeli media reported on Friday that the military had stepped up its offensive in line with a plan approved by the government earlier this month, though there had not been any formal announcement of an expanded campaign.
The military said its forces had “struck over 150 terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip” in 24 hours.


In a stunning setback, GOP conservatives join Democrats in blocking Trump’s big tax breaks bill

In a stunning setback, GOP conservatives join Democrats in blocking Trump’s big tax breaks bill
Updated 35 min 5 sec ago
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In a stunning setback, GOP conservatives join Democrats in blocking Trump’s big tax breaks bill

In a stunning setback, GOP conservatives join Democrats in blocking Trump’s big tax breaks bill
  • Hard-right lawmakers want steeper spending cuts to Medicaid and the Biden-era green energy tax breaks
  • Democrats, on the other hand, slammed the package as a “big, bad bill,” and “one big, beautiful betrayal”

WASHINGTON: In a setback, House Republicans failed Friday to push their big package of tax breaks and spending cuts through the Budget Committee, as a handful of conservatives joined all Democrats in a stunning vote against it.
The hard-right lawmakers are insisting on steeper spending cuts to Medicaid and the Biden-era green energy tax breaks, among other changes, before they will give their support to President Donald Trump’s “beautiful” bill. They warn the tax cuts alone would pile onto the nation’s $36 trillion debt.
The failed vote, 16-21, stalls, for now, House Speaker Mike Johnson’s push to have the package approved next week. But the Budget Committee plans to reconvene Sunday to try again. Lawmakers vowed to negotiate into the weekend as Trump is returning to Washington from the Middle East.
“Something needs to change or you’re not going to get my support,” said Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas.
Tallying a whopping 1,116 pages, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, named with a nod to Trump, is teetering at a critical moment. Johnson is determined to resolve the problems with the package that he believes will inject a dose of stability into into a wavering economy.

With few votes to spare from his slim majority, the Republicans are trying to pass it over the staunch objections of Democrats who slammed the package as a “big, bad bill,” or as Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Washington, called it, “one big, beautiful betrayal.”
Ahead of Friday’s vote, Trump had implored his party to fall in line.
“Republicans MUST UNITE behind, ‘THE ONE, BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL!’” the Republican president posted on social media. “We don’t need ‘GRANDSTANDERS’ in the Republican Party. STOP TALKING, AND GET IT DONE!”
The Budget panel is one of the final stops before the package is sent to the full House floor for a vote, which is still expected sometime next week. Typically, the job of the Budget Committee is more administrative as it compiles the work of 11 committees that drew up various parts of the big bill.
But Friday’s meeting proved momentous even before the votes were tallied.
The conservatives, many from the Freedom Caucus, had been warning they would block the bill, as they holdout for steeper cuts. At the same time, GOP lawmakers from high-tax states including New York are demanding a deeper tax deduction, known as SALT, for their constituents.
Four Republican conservatives initially voted against the package — Roy and Reps. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma, Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia. Then one, Rep. Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania, switched his vote to no in a procedural step so it could be reconsidered later, saying afterward he was confident they’d “get this done.”
Norman insisted he was not defying the president — “this isn’t a ‘grandstand,’” he said — as he and the others push from Trump’s priorities.
In their quest for deeper reductions, the conservatives are particularly eyeing Medicaid, the health care program for some 70 million Americans. They want new work requirements for aid recipients to start immediately, rather than on Jan. 1, 2029, as the package proposes.
Democrats emphasized that millions of people would lose their health coverage and food stamps assistance if the bill passes while the wealthiest Americans would reap enormous tax cuts. They also said it would increase future deficits.
“That is bad economics. It is unconscionable,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle, the top Democratic lawmaker on the panel.
At the same time, talks are also underway with the New Yorkers have been unrelenting in their demand for a much larger SALT deduction than what is proposed in the bill, which could send the overall cost of the package skyrocketing.
As it stands, the bill proposes tripling what’s currently a $10,000 cap on the state and local tax deduction, increasing it to $30,000 for joint filers with incomes up to $400,000 a year.
Rep. Nick LaLota, one of the New York lawmakers leading the SALT effort, said they have proposed a deduction of $62,000 for single filers and $124,000 for joint filers.
The conservatives and the New Yorkers are at odds, each jockeying as Johnson labors to pass the package from the House by Memorial Day and send it onto the Senate.
At its core, the sprawling package extends the existing income tax cuts that were approved during Trump’s first term, in 2017, and adds new ones that the president campaigned on in 2024, including no taxes on tips, overtime pay and some auto loans.
It increases some tax breaks for middle-income earners, including a bolstered standard deduction of $32,000 for joint filers and a temporary $500 boost to the child tax credit, bringing it to $2,500.
It also provides an infusion of $350 billion for Trump’s deportation agenda and to bolster the Pentagon.
To offset more than $5 trillion in lost revenue, the package proposes rolling back other tax breaks, namely the green energy tax credits approved as part of President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. Some conservatives want those to end immediately.
The package also seeks to cover the costs by slashing more than $1 trillion from health care and food assistance programs over the course of a decade, in part by imposing work requirements on able-bodied adults.
Certain Medicaid recipients would need to engage in 80 hours a month of work or other community options to receive health care. Older Americans receiving food aid through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, would also see the program’s current work requirement for able-bodied participants without dependents extended to include those ages 55-64. States would also be required to shoulder a greater share of the program’s cost.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates at least 7.6 million fewer people with health insurance and about 3 million a month fewer SNAP recipients with the changes.
While Republicans insist the package will pay for itself, partly with economic growth, outside budget analysts are skeptical and say it will add trillions of dollars to the nation’s deficits and debt.
 


Cassie testimony against Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ends after she spent days describing abuse and texts

Cassie testimony against Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ends after she spent days describing abuse and texts
Updated 51 min 25 sec ago
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Cassie testimony against Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ends after she spent days describing abuse and texts

Cassie testimony against Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ends after she spent days describing abuse and texts
  • Cassie, who is pregnant with her third child and nearing her due date, spent four days on the witness stand

NEW YORK: R&B singer Cassie delved further into text messages with former boyfriend Sean “Diddy” Combs during her cross-examination Friday in the music mogul’s sex trafficking trial, telling him “I’m not a rag doll. I’m somebody’s child” after he beat her at a Los Angeles hotel in 2016.
However, as they tried to recover from the episode, she and Combs were expressing love for each other just days later, with Cassie writing in one text: “We need a different vibe from Friday.”
She and one of Combs’ defense attorneys read the couple’s messages aloud during two days of cross-examination in a Manhattan courtroom, which ended Friday afternoon. The defense also tried to discredit Cassie’s testimony that Combs raped her in 2018 after she ended their nearly 11-year relationship.
In the “rag doll” text, Cassie, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura, told Combs he was out of control from drugs and alcohol that day. After hotel security video of the assault was released last year, Combs apologized and said he was “disgusted” by his actions.
Federal prosecutors allege Combs exploited his status as a music executive and businessman to force women into drug-fueled encounters with male sex workers, called “freak-offs,” that he watched and directed. Cassie is one of several accusers expected to testify.
However, Combs’ lawyers want the jury to see Cassie as a willing and eager participant in his sexual lifestyle. He has pleaded not guilty to federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges.
His defense says that, although he could be violent, nothing he did amounted to a criminal enterprise. And Combs insists all the sex at the freak-offs was consensual.
Cassie, the prosecution’s star witness, testified she was ashamed and loathed taking part in “hundreds” of the freak-offs, which could go on for days. But she said she felt compelled because Combs threatened her with violence, and was physically abusive “a lot” during the encounters. He also threatened to publicly release sex videos of her if she made him angry, she said.
Combs, 55, has been jailed since September. He faces at least 15 years in prison if convicted.
Cassie cross-examination ends Friday
Cassie, who is pregnant with her third child and nearing her due date, spent four days on the witness stand.
When Judge Arun Subramanian told her she could leave, saying, “You’ve been here a long time,” Cassie glanced once toward the jury but never looked in Combs’ direction as she walked out of the courtroom for the final time.
Throughout Friday’s testimony, Combs kept lowering his head to write a steady stream of messages on small sheets of paper that he passed to his defense attorneys.
Singer Dawn Richard takes the stand
Dawn Richard is a singer who appeared on Combs’ reality show “Making the Band,” which launched her group act Danity Kane. She testified Friday that she witnessed Combs physically attack Cassie on multiple occasions.
Richard said she and another woman saw Combs hit Cassie “on the head and beat her on the ground” while at his home studio in 2009. He brought them back the next day, giving Richard flowers and putting a spin on what happened.
“He said that what we saw was passion and what lovers in relationships do,” she testified. But he also locked them in his recording studio and allegedly threatened them to stay silent or else, she said.
Richard sued Combs last year, accusing him of physical abuse, groping and psychological abuse during the years they worked together.
Cassie’s texts to Diddy are a key part of cross-examination
During cross-examination on Thursday and Friday, the defense had Cassie read texts and emails that showed her apparent willingness to participate in the sexual encounters Combs orchestrated.
In a 2012 exchange, Combs told Cassie he wanted to “FO one last time tonight,” using initials for freak-off. Cassie replied, “What?” Combs said, “You can’t read?” Then Cassie replied, “I don’t want to freak off for the last time. I want it to be the first time for the rest of our lives.”
Estevao ended her questioning there, but prosecutor Emily Johnson had Cassie read more messages for context.
“I want to see you, but I’m emotional right now,” Cassie wrote. “I don’t want to do one last time. I’d rather not do it at all.”
Cassie testified she was initially open to the encounters because she wanted to make him happy and spend time with him, but grew weary as the years went on.
The Associated Press does not typically name people who say they have been sexually abused unless they come forward publicly, as Cassie has.
Cassie filed a lawsuit in 2023 accusing Combs of physical and sexual abuse, but they settled within hours for $20 million — an amount she disclosed publicly for the first time this week. Dozens of other women have since made similar legal claims.
Cassie’s testimony ended with another bombshell disclosure: She said she recently reached an estimated $10 million settlement with Intercontinental Hotel in Los Angeles, where she was assaulted. She didn’t disclose the nature of her claim.
Scrutiny on the 2018 rape claim against Combs
Estevao also raised questions on Friday about Cassie’s rape claim against Combs, noting that Cassie gave differing descriptions of his demeanor and the timing of the alleged assault in interviews with investigators and in her trial testimony.
Cassie contends the rape happened at her Los Angeles home after she and Combs had dinner in Malibu, California, to discuss their breakup, either in August or September 2018.
While Cassie testified this week that Combs was “really nice” and “playful” at the dinner, Estevao pointed out that Cassie told investigators in 2023 that Combs had been “acting very strangely” that night. Cassie clarified, “Nice, but strangely.”
Cassie also testified this week that Combs, during the dinner, was trying to get her to go to the Burning Man festival in Nevada, but previously told investigators that the dinner and rape happened after Combs returned from Burning Man.
Cassie acknowledged she stayed in touch with Combs and had consensual sex with him a few weeks after she says he raped her. She also exchanged warm messages with Combs after they broke up, even after she marrying Alex Fine in 2019.
Cassie’s parting words
Cassie released a statement saying she hoped her testimony helps others “heal from the abuse and fear.”
“For me, the more I heal, the more I can remember,” she said. “And the more I can remember, the more I will never forget.”