PARIS: Global leaders urged Hamas to free its remaining Israeli hostages following the death of its leader Yahya Sinwar, considered the mastermind of the October 7, 2023 attacks on Israel.
Israel’s military said Thursday that its forces had killed Sinwar in southern Gaza on Wednesday “after a year-long pursuit.”
Hamas militants seized 251 hostages during the October 2023 attack. Israeli officials say 97 remain in Gaza, including 34 said to be dead.
US President Joe Biden on Thursday hailed Sinwar’s death as marking a “good day” for the world, saying it also removed a key obstacle to a Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal.
“There is now the opportunity for a ‘day after’ in Gaza without Hamas in power, and for a political settlement that provides a better future for Israelis and Palestinians alike,” Biden said.
US Vice President Kamala Harris, who is seeking the presidency in a vote less than three weeks away, welcomed “an opportunity to finally end the war in Gaza.”
“And it must end such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends,” she said.
Germany’s foreign minister Annalena Baerbock branded Sinwar “a cruel murderer and a terrorist” while urging Hamas to “immediately release all the hostages and lay down its arms.”
French President Emmanuel Macron demanded the release of “all hostages” held by Hamas, saying: “Yahya Sinwar was the main person responsible for the terrorist attacks and barbaric acts of October 7.”
World leaders press Hamas to free hostages after Sinwar’s death
https://arab.news/m53m2
World leaders press Hamas to free hostages after Sinwar’s death
- Germany’s foreign minister Annalena Baerbock branded Sinwar “a cruel murderer and a terrorist“
- French President Emmanuel Macron demanded the release of “all hostages” held by Hamas
CIA and other spy agencies set to shrink workforce under Trump administration plan
- The administration plans to reduce the CIA workforce by 1,200 over several years, and cut thousands of positions at the NSA and other intelligence agencies
WASHINGTON: The White House plans to cut staffing at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, including the National Security Agency, Trump administration officials told members of Congress, The Washington Post reported Friday.
A person familiar with the plan but not authorized to discuss it publicly confirmed the changes to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The administration plans to reduce the CIA workforce by 1,200 over several years, and cut thousands of positions at the NSA and other intelligence agencies. The Post reported that the reductions at the CIA include several hundred people who have already opted for early retirement. The rest of the cuts would be achieved partly through reduced hirings and would not likely necessitate layoffs.
In response to questions about the reductions, the CIA issued a statement saying CIA Director John Ratcliffe is working to align the agency with Trump’s national security priorities.
“These moves are part of a holistic strategy to infuse the Agency with renewed energy, provide opportunities for rising leaders to emerge, and better position CIA to deliver on its mission,” the agency wrote in the statement.
A spokesperson for Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. Gabbard’s office oversees and coordinates the work of 18 agencies that collect and analyze intelligence.
The CIA and NSA have already offered voluntary resignations to some employees. The CIA also has said it plans to lay off an unknown number of recently hired employees.
The new administration has also eliminated diversity, equity and inclusion programs at intelligence agencies, though a judge has temporarily blocked efforts to fire 19 employees working on DEI programs who challenged their terminations.
Trump also abruptly fired the general who led the NSA and the Pentagon’s Cyber Command.
Ratcliffe has vowed to overhaul the CIA and said he wants to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China.
Trump’s tariffs bite at quiet US ports
- The Port of Long Beach says for the entire month of May it is expecting a 30 percent drop in imports
SAN PEDRO: At the Port of Los Angeles, the frenetic choreography of cranes unloading containers from Asia has slowed to a tiptoe, and the noise of the busiest docks in the US is quieting.
“You could hear a pin drop, it’s very unusual,” Port Director Gene Seroka told AFP.
By this unofficial barometer, the American economy faces slowdown under US President Donald Trump amid his trade war with China.
Along with the next-door Port of Long Beach, the area represents the biggest gateway in the United States for goods from China and the rest of Asia.
That has made it among the first victims to a burgeoning crisis threatening to disrupt the lives of millions of Americans.
Trump’s on-again-off-again tariffs — and the retaliation launched by other countries — has cowed importers, whose usual orders for furniture, toys, and clothing have dwindled.
For the week of May 4, the Port of Los Angeles will receive up to 35 percent less cargo compared with the same period last year, Seroka said.
The Port of Long Beach says for the entire month of May it is expecting a 30 percent drop in imports.
Dozens of ships have canceled their voyages to these ports.
“Many retailers and manufacturers alike have hit the pause button, stopping all shipments from China,” said Seroka.
The Asian manufacturing giant is the hardest hit by Trump’s tariffs, with levies as high as 145 percent on some goods. Sales of Chinese goods to the US last year totaled more than $500 billion, according to Beijing.
And while sales may not be going up this year, prices undoubtedly will.
“Effectively, the cost of a product made in China now is two and a half times more expensive than it was just last month,” said Seroka.
Trump last month announced a range of differing tariffs against nearly all countries in the world — including an island populated mostly by penguins — using a formula that baffled economists.
He reversed course a few days later and left a blanket 10 percent rate against most of the planet.
That extra cost, which is paid by the importer of a product, not by the seller, will affect trade across the United States.
“This is not just a West Coast issue,” warned Long Beach Port Director Mario Cordero.
“It affects every port, whether it’s in the East or in the Gulf” of Mexico, which Trump has decreed should be known as the Gulf of America.
At the start of the year, Long Beach and Los Angeles saw American companies scurry to get ahead of tariffs that Trump promised on the campaign trail.
Cargo volumes surged as they tried to build up as much untaxed inventory as possible.
But as the tariffs begin to bite, they will undoubtedly hold buying to eat into that inventory.
Without a reversal from the White House that would re-open the trade spigot, that could mean shortages that consumers will start to notice, and soon, according to Seroka.
“American importers, especially in the retail sector, are telling me that they have about five to seven weeks of normal inventory on hand today,” he said.
“If this trade dispute goes on for any length of time, we’ll likely see fewer selections on store shelves and online buying platforms.
“The impact on American consumers will be less choice and higher prices,” he said.
“The American consumer is going to get hit right in the wallet.”
For Antonio Montalbo, one of the 900,000 logistics workers in Southern California, the ordeal has already begun.
As the owner of a small trucking company, he needs to replace the starter on one of his vehicles; the part, made in China, now costs twice as much.
Trump has “created a hostile environment at the port for the drivers,” says the 37-year-old.
“We’re angry at Donald Trump. He needs to go check out the country a little bit, because he has a lot of angry truck drivers.
“It seems like he doesn’t care about the public or the working class.”
Between skyrocketing maintenance costs and the fall-off in work, he estimates he could be laying off staff within six months.
Montalbo says he voted for Trump last November because he was fed up with inflation, and trusted him to fix the economy.
“I thought that he was a businessman.
“Now we have something worse than inflation, called tariffs.”
US judge strikes down Trump order against law firm, scolds him for ‘settling personal vendettas’
- Judge Howell rules Trump’s order violates free speech and due process
- Trump’s order targeted Perkins Coie over Clinton campaign and diversity policies
A federal judge on Friday struck down Donald Trump’s executive order targeting law firm Perkins Coie as a violation of the US Constitution’s protections of free speech and due process, and castigated him for “settling personal vendettas.”
US District Judge Beryl Howell’s ruling represented the broadest rebuke yet for the Republican president’s pressure campaign against law firms that he has accused of “weaponizing” the justice system against him and his political allies.
It was also the first ruling by a judge deciding the legal merits of any of the several directives Trump has aimed at law firms that have handled legal challenges to his actions, represented political adversaries or employed lawyers who have taken part in investigations of him.
Howell, in a sharply worded, 102-page opinion, said Trump’s executive order was an attack on foundational principles of American jurisprudence and the role lawyers play in ensuring the fair and impartial administration of justice.
“Settling personal vendettas by targeting a disliked business or individual for punitive government action is not a legitimate use of the powers of the US government or an American President,” Howell wrote.
Perkins Coie said in a statement it welcomed the judge’s ruling and was grateful to “those who spoke up” in support of the firm’s lawsuit.
“As we move forward, we remain guided by the same commitments that first compelled us to bring this challenge: to protect our firm, safeguard the interests of our clients, and uphold the rule of law,” a spokesperson for the law firm said.
White House representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Howell, based in Washington, barred federal agencies from enforcing Trump’s March 6 order against Perkins Coie. The judge had previously issued a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of key provisions of Trump’s directive.
The Justice Department can appeal Howell’s order to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Perkins Coie, a 1,200-lawyer firm founded in Seattle, represented the campaign of 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, who Trump defeated in his first presidential run.
Trump’s executive order sought to restrict Perkins Coie’s lawyers from accessing government buildings and officials, and it threatened to cancel federal contracts held by the firm’s clients.
The firm sued, calling the order a violation of the Constitution’s First Amendment protections against government abridgment of speech and Fifth Amendment guarantee of due process — a requirement for the government to use a fair legal process.
US Justice Department lawyer Richard Lawson, defending the orders in court, argued in each case that Trump was lawfully exercising his presidential power and discretion.
“In a cringe-worthy twist on the theatrical phrase ‘Let’s kill all the lawyers,’” Trump’s executive order “takes the approach of ‘Let’s kill the lawyers I don’t like,’ sending the clear message: lawyers must stick to the party line, or else,” Howell wrote.
Three other major law firms — WilmerHale, Jenner & Block and Susman Godfrey — also sued the administration to block the executive orders Trump issued against them. Other judges have temporarily blocked those orders while the cases proceed.
Nine rival firms — including Paul Weiss, Latham & Watkins; Skadden Arps; and Willkie Farr — have reached deals with Trump that averted punitive actions, pledging a combined total of nearly $1 billion in free legal services to advance causes he supports.
Trump’s targeting of firms has drawn condemnation from many within the legal industry. Some have criticized the firms that reached agreements as capitulating to presidential coercion.
Perkins Coie argued it was targeted over its work for Clinton’s campaign and the firm’s policies promoting workplace diversity and inclusion.
Trump’s order accused Perkins Coie of “dishonest and dangerous activity.”
It also said Perkins Coie “racially discriminates” in its hiring — referring to the firm’s diversity policies. Trump and his allies have portrayed such policies as discriminatory against white people. Trump’s order also criticized the firm’s work representing Clinton’s campaign.
Each of the firms suing the administration called the orders against them existential threats. They argued that the orders limited the ability of their lawyers to practice law and sought to intimidate their clients into seeking new counsel.
Despite economic contraction, Trump insists US will have ‘greatest boom in history’
- Economy was down in first three months of the year as Trump began his plans for sweeping tariffs
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump insisted Friday that his policies will bring a boom in the US economy even as he acknowledged the possibility of a recession.
The US economy, the world’s largest, unexpectedly contracted in the first three months of the year as Trump began his plans for sweeping tariffs.
“This is a transition period. I think we’re going to do fantastically,” Trump told NBC News show “Meet the Press with Kristen Welker.”
Pressed on whether the United States could dip into recession, Trump said, “Anything can happen.”
“But I think we’re going to have the greatest economy in the history of our country. I think we’re going have the greatest economic boom in history,” Trump said in excerpts of the interview, which will be aired in full on Sunday.
Financial markets have been in tumult since Trump took office and moved to revamp the global economic order with a return to sweeping tariffs on imports.
Share prices rose on Friday, however, after a solid jobs report in the United States.
NYPD shared a Palestinian protester’s info with ICE. Now it’s evidence in her deportation case
- Leqaa Kordia, whose mother is an American citizen, was arrested at a protest outside Columbia University on March 13
- New York City law generally prohibits police from sharing information about arrests with federal immigration officials
NEW YORK: New York City’s police department provided federal immigration authorities with an internal record about a Palestinian woman who they arrested at a protest, which the Trump administration is now using as evidence in its bid to deport her, according to court documents obtained by The Associated Press.
The report — shared by the NYPD in March — includes a summary of information in the department’s files about Leqaa Kordia, a New Jersey resident who was arrested at a protest outside Columbia University last spring. It lists her home address, date of birth and an officer’s two-sentence account of the arrest.
Its distribution to federal authorities offers a glimpse into behind-the-scenes cooperation between the NYPD and the Trump administration, and raises questions about the city’s compliance with sanctuary laws that prohibit police from assisting with immigration enforcement efforts.
Kordia, 32, was among the earliest people jailed in President Donald Trump’s crackdown on noncitizens who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
She was detained during a voluntary check-in with immigration officials in Newark, New Jersey, on March 13, then flown to an immigration jail in Texas. Her arrest was announced by the US Department of Homeland Security the next day in a statement that cited an expired visa and her role in “pro-Hamas protests.”
It remains unclear how immigration authorities were able to learn about Kordia’s presence at the protest near Columbia last April.
At the demonstration, police cited Kordia with disorderly conduct. But the charge was dismissed weeks later and the case sealed.
City law generally prohibits police from sharing information about arrests with federal immigration officials, although there are exceptions for criminal investigations.
On March 14, an NYPD officer generated a four-page report on Kordia and shared it with Homeland Security Investigations, a division of US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.
In an emailed statement, an NYPD spokesperson said the department “received a request from a federal agency related to a criminal investigation and shared relevant information in accordance with our sanctuary city policies.”
“The NYPD does not participate in programs that are designed for visa revocation or any civil immigration matter,” the statement added.
The department declined to say what the investigation entailed.
Inquiries to the DHS and ICE were not returned.
Legal experts and civil liberties advocates said the document reflected a worrisome level of information-sharing between the city and the federal government, which has conflated criticism of Israel with support for Hamas, a US-designated terror group.
“The intention of the sanctuary laws is to protect against this kind of collusion and pretextual information sharing,” said Meghna Philip, the director of special litigation at the Legal Aid Society.
“It seems to be a clear violation of the law,” Philip added, “and raises questions about what guardrails, if any, the NYPD has around sharing information with a federal government that is seeking to criminalize speech.”
A low-profile protester
Kordia grew up in Jerusalem and the West Bank, and moved to New Jersey in 2016 with her mother, an American citizen. She studied English at a local exchange program, but let her student visa expire because she believed her application for permanent residency was sufficient to remain in the country legally, according to her attorneys.
Kordia’s case stood out among those ensnared by Trump’s crackdown. She was not an outspoken activist and had not publicly criticized Israel, either in social media posts or newspaper op-eds. She maintained no social media presence and did not appear on any of the public lists maintained by pro-Israel groups that seek to identify people who participate in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. Her name was not mentioned in news reports about the demonstrations.
While the Trump administration identified her as a Columbia student, she has never been affiliated with the university and was not enrolled in any college when she joined a protest in 2024 outside Columbia. Her attorneys said she was peacefully voicing her dissent against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, which they said has killed over 100 of her relatives.
A spokesperson for the NYPD declined to say when they were first approached by federal authorities or whether the March 14 report was the first time they had shared information about Kordia’s arrest record.
Surveillance and interrogations
Beginning in early March, attorneys for Kordia say federal agents began interrogating members of her family and her neighbors. They also subpoenaed records from her MoneyGram account and “established a trace on her WhatsApp messaging account,” her attorneys said in a court filing.
“The investigation revealed nothing except that Ms. Kordia sent a single payment to a Palestinian family member in 2022, which itself is protected First Amendment” rights, the filing states.
At an April 3rd hearing, the federal government pointed to Kordia’s prior arrest for protesting as a reason she should not be released. An immigration judge found no evidence she had acted violently at the protest and agreed to grant Kordia a $20,000 bond, which her family paid.
The government has appealed that decision, keeping her detained for now.
In a petition seeking her release, attorneys for Kordia, a devout Muslim, said she had been denied halal meals since arriving at the jail. As a result, she has lost 49 pounds (22 kilograms) and fainted in the shower, according to facility records shared with her attorneys.
“The government’s entire argument that Ms. Kordia is a danger to the United States rests on a single summons for her participation in a demonstration,” Arthur Ago, her attorney, said. “The only reason she’s confined right now is because of her political viewpoint.”
Mayoral cooperation
New York City Mayor Eric Adams has criticized the city’s sanctuary protections, while insisting his administration is “meticulously” following the law.
When asked by the AP last month if the NYPD could turn over information to its federal law enforcement partners about a summons issued to a protester, the mayor insisted no such request was ever made.
“We have no record that this happened,” Adams said. “When I inquired, they said we did not turn over anything and we don’t collaborate for civil enforcement. They said that over and over again.”
His office did not respond to inquiries Friday.
