Bchasdei Hashem, the medical condition of the Vizhnitzer Rebbe showed improvement over Shabbos, following several days of weakness, per reports.

On Shabbos morning, at the minyan in Moshav Ora, those davening were honored to hear the Rebbe’s voice as he recited Birkas HaChodesh for Chodesh Elul.

Over Shabbos, chassidim in Vizhnitz chassidishe batei medrash across Eretz Yisroel and around the world increased their recitation of Tehillim for the refuah sheleimah of the Rebbe Shlit’a, Rav Yisroel ben Leah Esther

[Video below.] New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani says he has no plans to seek the Democratic presidential nomination in 2028, insisting the party’s focus should be on reconnecting with working-class Americans rather than searching for a new national standard-bearer.

Speaking during an interview on SiriusXM’s Urban View, Mamdani was asked whether he intended to run for president in the next election cycle. He quickly dismissed the idea.

“Well, first of all, not me,” Mamdani responded when asked about a potential 2028 campaign.

Instead, Mamdani argued that Democrats do not need to reinvent themselves but should return to the principles that once defined the party.

“I think we have a number of choices,” he said, adding that the Democratic Party’s priority should be addressing the financial struggles facing everyday Americans.

According to Mamdani, the party should concentrate on making life more affordable for working families rather than pursuing a dramatic political transformation or ideological overhaul.

His remarks come as speculation has grown over who could emerge as the Democratic nominee following the next presidential election cycle. While Mamdani has become one of the party’s most recognizable progressive figures since taking office as New York City mayor, he made clear that he does not see himself as a 2028 contender.

Instead, the mayor suggested Democrats should focus less on finding a new political identity and more on advancing policies aimed at reducing the cost of living and improving economic opportunities for working people.

WATCH:

{Matzav.com}

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Israeli officials are preparing plans for unilateral military action against Iran if the United States steps back from further strikes, Channel 13 reported Saturday.

Defense Minister Israel Katz has ordered the military to draw up an independent “blue and white” strike plan. Katz said Israel would hit Iran hard if attacked and that there would be no compromise on the country’s right to self-defense.

Other Israeli broadcasters have reported that officials expect diplomacy to fail and anticipate eventual escalation. Israeli sources said the country has prepared operational plans for further action but currently remains on the sidelines, with no imminent plans to join any renewed offensive.

Officials have not been formally asked to participate in a U.S. campaign, but military readiness remains high as talks between Washington and Tehran continue to falter.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon revoked former U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall’s “eligibility” to access classified information and barred him from holding “any sensitive position,” alleging Friday that he disclosed sensitive information about Air Force One’s capabilities to the media.

It follows reporting last month, including from The New York Times, on security concerns over the new, Qatari-gifted Air Force One, including that it lacked the advanced antimissile capabilities of its predecessor.

Kendall told The Associated Press late Friday that he was “completely mystified” by the revocation.

“I’ve always been extremely careful to not say anything classified, and as far as I know I have not,” Kendall said. “No one has said anything to me about what I’m asserted to have revealed and I can’t imagine what it could be.”

The plane underwent a $400 million retrofit and upgrade. It has been put into service domestically and President Donald Trump also flew on it to Turkey last month. But he used an older model Air Force One jet to leave the NATO summit, as the U.S. launched airstrikes on Iran and Tehran attacked three Gulf Arab states.

The Times reported that the president made the switch at the urging of the Secret Service and that the newer plane lacked some of the advanced security features of the older Air Force One aircraft. Trump denied to reporters that the swap was due to security concerns, although he also said he is under threat “all the time” and is Iran’s “No. 1” target.

In the Times article, Kendall, who served under President Joe Biden, is quoted as saying that the time for upgrades to the plane would not have been enough for “all the normal Air Force One modifications” and he was surprised that the plane was used outside the U.S.

Kendall said Friday, “I’ve been comfortable being on the record with reporters and on national television about the Qatari 747 because I’m confident that I haven’t said anything classified.”

In response to the reporting, the Justice Department subpoenaed the Times’ reporters to try to compel them to out their sources, which stirred fears over press freedoms. The department, after criticism from the judge for sloppy legal work, grudgingly withdrew the subpoenas last month.

The Air Force has argued that the rapid conversion of the jet was done “without accepting any risk regarding security, safety, or secure communications,” but it also has acknowledged the different capabilities. It said “several highly complex engineering modifications” required for the new U.S.-made Air Force One aircraft were intentionally excluded in the modifications to the plane from Qatar. The Air Force acknowledged it did not widen the doors leading out of the aircraft or include multiple stairs built into the hull of the plane.

Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell didn’t specify in a post on X which media outlet Kendall was accused of sharing classified information with.

“Safeguarding classified information is a non-negotiable duty,” he wrote. “Those who violate that trust forfeit the privilege of access and any role requiring it.”

It’s not the first time the Trump administration has revoked security clearances, including of 37 then-current and former national security officials last year. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth also pulled security protections and clearance for Gen. Mark Milley, retired Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, soon after the administration took office.

Parnell didn’t say if Kendall was being referred for prosecution, and the Pentagon declined to provide more information. Typically, such accusations are partnered with referrals for prosecution over violations of the Espionage Act.

A well-known example was when the Obama administration filed charges against Edward Snowden, a former intelligence agency contractor who publicly disclosed a massive trove of secret documents about U.S. surveillance operations before fleeing to Russia.

More recently, a federal judge sentenced a Massachusetts Air National Guard member to 15 years in prison in 2024 for leaking classified military documents about the war in Ukraine. That was the most consequential national security breach in years.

Political analyst Amit Segal believes Israel’s next election could ultimately be decided by as few as 10,000 votes, a relatively small number that may determine not only which parties cross the electoral threshold, but also whether Gadi Eisenkot or Prime Minister Binyomin Netanyahu has a viable path to forming the next government.

Writing in his weekly column in Yisroel Hayom, Segal argued that a shift of only several thousand votes could dramatically reshape the political map and determine the balance of power between the rival blocs.

According to Segal, if Chili Tropper and Yoaz Hendel succeed in crossing the electoral threshold, the four Knesset seats they are projected to win could bring Eisenkot’s bloc to 60 seats—placing it within striking distance of assembling a stable governing coalition for the next four years. However, if those same four seats instead go to a party led by figures such as Gilad Erdan, Yuli Edelstein, or Ofer Winter, all of whom have not ruled out joining a Netanyahu-led government, the political equation changes dramatically.

“If those four mandates are won by Erdan, Edelstein, or Winter, who have not ruled out Netanyahu, it means Eisenkot will not have a majority to form a government even with the Arabs abstaining,” Segal wrote. “10,000 votes moving from one side to the other—and the outcome will be completely different.”

Segal also discussed ongoing efforts to establish a new party in the center-right camp. He wrote that the decision by Erdan and Edelstein to announce their intentions immediately is designed to create political momentum and pressure other figures on the right to unite under a single framework.

According to Segal, Benny Gantz believes the financial resources and political infrastructure already at his disposal will enable him to attract additional partners. Tropper, meanwhile, reportedly believes favorable polling numbers will persuade others to join his effort. Erdan, by contrast, intends to project determination with a straightforward message: “I’m staying until the end. Anyone who wants can join me.”

Segal concluded that the battle over the smaller parties—and the movement of just a few thousand votes—could prove to be the decisive factor in the election, fundamentally altering the balance of power between Netanyahu and Eisenkot when Israelis head to the polls.

{Matzav.com}

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate in an overnight vote Saturday approved a short-term measure to fund federal agencies into early December and avoid a potentially chaotic government shutdown during the middle of campaign season.

The late-summer action on a funding fix is unusual. Normally, Congress waits until the final days or hours of a funding deadline to pass short-term patches, but this time senators acted nearly two months before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.

The 90-6 vote showed lawmakers are still smarting from the two historic shutdowns that occurred this past year and want to avoid another before voters go to the polls.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune wanted the funding dealt with before senators went home for the next five weeks to focus on their reelection campaigns and other matters. It got caught up with other issues that pushed votes into the night, but the bill had broad bipartisan support. The House will also have to approve the measure when members return from their August recess before it can go to President Donald Trump’s desk for his signature.

The bill generally funds the federal government at current levels though Dec. 11, but includes a variety of exceptions that senators negotiated with the White House.

Democrats secured language to ensure no money could be transferred to the Border Patrol. They also rejected the White House’s request of $1 billion for early work on a new “Trump-class” battleship that the administration announced on Dec. 22.

“The only person who wants these golden ships is Donald Trump so he can slap his name on them,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said.

Hemp provision became a point of contention
The bill also includes language delaying a national ban on most intoxicating hemp products. That one-month delay prompted outrage from some Senate Republicans who say that too many such products are falling into the hands of often unsuspecting children. The packaging of the products often relies on bright colors and intentionally mimics popular snack brands to attract consumers.

Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., said that since 2017 there has been nearly a 10-fold increase in cannabis-related emergency room visits by minors in his home state.

“This is a public health crisis that deserves this Senate’s immediate attention,” Budd said. “Our children should never be the testing ground for an industry willing to exploit a loophole in federal law for profit.”

But the hemp industry said the delay buys time for Congress to craft legislation that protects hemp farmers and businesses while also putting in place safeguards to protect children.

Trump himself has called Budd to discuss the issue, though the president did not specifically ask the senator to drop his effort, Budd’s spokesman said.

“Senator Budd had a friendly phone call with President Trump discussing the legislative efforts regarding THC,” said spokesman Christian McMullen. He said the senator outlined his concerns about “any delay to closing the hemp loophole.”

Budd tried to strip the hemp delay from the bill, but the Senate turned aside his effort.

The bill delays a Trump administration rule on grants
Democratic lawmakers, along with Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, also got language in the bill that would block, for the duration of the funding patch, new regulations on federal grants. The regulations would require a senior political appointee to review grants before they are awarded to ensure, among other things, that they advance the president’s policy priorities. Democrats worry it’s an effort to kill grants destined for Democratic-leaning states.

“They are not interested in making our tax dollars work better — they just want them to work for Donald Trump,” said Sen. Patty Murray, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee.

The White House Office of Management and Budget says its effort is about improving accountability to ensure taxpayer dollars aren’t wasted or misused. The issue is sure to be a topic of future negotiations on a full-year spending measure.

But Collins said the vast majority of the nearly 500,000 people and groups weighing in on the rule are opposed to it.

“I don’t think in my time that I’ve been privileged to serve in the Senate that I have ever seen a proposed rule generate that many negative comments,” Collins said.

New right-wing party leader and former Israeli ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan called for Israel to create an “army of hasbara” led by a public diplomacy “chief of staff” and said that the government had “abandoned” the battle over Israel’s global image.

“You need an army of hasbara (public diplomacy) and PR that would be led by ‘Ramatkal’ (IDF chief of staff) of hasbara,” Erdan told The Jerusalem Post following his Thursday announcement that he was launching a new right-wing party. “It never happened. You don’t have it. You have only one agency here, one agency there. You have few people with little money. They can’t fight with their arms tied behind their backs.”

Erdan attributed Israel’s current public diplomacy problems, at least in part, to what he described as government neglect.

“The Israeli government abandoned maybe one of the most important battles that we were supposed to fight: the fight for the truth and the narrative,” Erdan said.

Erdan blamed the government’s approach for having “led up to the situation that right now” where Israel is bleeding support from both American Democrats and younger Republicans.

He said he had been told directly by leaders of Turning Point USA, the conservative advocacy nonprofit founded by late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, that Israel was “losing the young generation of the Republican Party.”

A ‘comprehensive plan’ for fighting the narrative war

“So I know exactly what should be done,” Erdan continued. “I have a comprehensive plan on how we should work there to portray Israel in the right way, how to be on the offensive, how to expose the true face of our enemies, Qatar and others.”

“I learned a lot from what SJP and others have been doing against us to delegitimize Israel,” he said.

Asked how Israel could turn around the narrative war, Erdan pointed in part to what he described as a major funding gap.

“When I arrived at the UN as the ambassador, I was shocked at my public diplomacy budget,” he said. “It started with $10,000 for public activities in New York.”

Israel’s diplomatic missions lack effective resources

Despite Israel maintaining an embassy and eight consulates across the US, Erdan argued that its diplomatic missions lacked the resources needed for effective public diplomacy.

Erdan contrasted Israel’s public diplomacy spending with that of Qatar, which he said had successfully invested in “soft diplomacy” in the US despite having a much smaller economy.

According to the World Bank Group, Israel’s GDP stood at $610.78 billion last year, compared with Qatar’s $215.56 billion.

Given Israel’s nominal GDP advantage, Erdan said, “if they can spend on soft diplomacy and legitimize their crimes and whitewash, pinkwash, whatever you want to call it, their image,” Israel should be capable of mounting a much better-funded and more effective public diplomacy effort.

This post was originally published on here.

The Israeli Air Force revealed to Walla last week details of what unfolded inside air traffic control bases during the joint US-Israel war with Iran.

From the heavy burden placed on air traffic controllers in synchronizing an unprecedented cooperation between the IAF and US military – the world’s most precise aerial strike force – to the split-second decisions that kept the skies safe, and of course, what this formidable aerial machine will do next.

It was the most complex, dangerous, and historic day since the establishment of the Israeli Air Force’s air traffic control. Hundreds of aircraft of every possible type were returning simultaneously from precision strikes deep inside Iran.

Israel’s airspace turned into an explosive, high-stakes traffic jam of fighter jets, helicopters, refuelers, drones, and civilian flights operating at different altitudes and along overlapping flight paths. As if that were not nerve-wracking enough, the IDF and US military defense systems required immediate real-time calibration against incoming missiles and suicide drones launched from Iran and Lebanon.

There were several critical moments for the IDF’s air traffic control on the opening day of Operation Roaring Lion. Until now, many of these nerve-wracking, highly sensitive moments have never been discussed publicly. It began with controllers alerting IAF commanders that hundreds of aircraft were heading back from distances of roughly 1,500 kilometers following the strikes in Iran.

‘The most crowded airspace ever’

“Imagine hundreds of aircraft returning from a strike to land all across Israel: Fighter jets, transport planes, airborne early warning aircraft, refuelers, helicopters, drones – some belonging to a partner military (the US), which required coordination in English… Meanwhile, scores of other aircraft were taking off from Israel for a second wave of strikes in Iran while maintaining readiness across other fronts,” a senior IAF officer explained in an interview with Walla.

“On top of that, air defense batteries and naval forces protecting the country’s skies were on high alert for missiles and drones already en route from Iran to Israel… Interceptors were seconds away from launching… And this incredibly complex operation had to be synchronized with absolute perfection by the air controllers, who had trained for this exact moment for years. When the Americans increased the number of their aircraft operating in Israel, the challenge grew immensely. It was extremely congested, and we had to run communications in two languages simultaneously.”

While thousands of IAF personnel were prepared for their respective missions, right up to the second a fighter pilot presses the trigger to launch a missile or drop a bomb, air traffic control personnel were preparing for scenarios that diverged from the plan, ones that could catch the system off guard.

“The most crowded airspace ever, heavy radio traffic, aircraft flying in extremely close proximity – but that’s what we plan for. We trained for this years in advance,” the senior officer explained. “And that’s before factoring in sudden weather shifts, technical malfunctions, or last-minute operational changes. All of that has to be coordinated and integrated into the system on the fly.”

‘This is the war of our lives’

The Air Force commander on the day of the operation, Maj.-Gen. Tomer Bar, was deeply involved in the briefings ahead of the launch of Operation Roaring Lion and placed major emphasis on the element of surprise. The second priority was preparing for a scenario in which the enemy launched different types of threats from multiple locations simultaneously. Every plan had a contingency plan, approved down to the smallest details, including contingencies and responses, by Maj.-Gen. Bar, who routinely challenged unit commanders with difficult questions.

The order for H-hour was passed to the command of the air control system, which was responsible for coordinating and synchronizing all layers of aviation in Israeli airspace and deep into Iranian territory, using airborne controllers aboard aircraft. Col. R., who began his career in the system as a conscript and rose through the ranks with distinction, looked at his watch and realized he had 12 hours in total to prepare.

With meticulous planning, he traveled the length and breadth of the country to meet Air Force units face to face, including personnel in the control towers. His aim was to brief them, convey his feelings, and impress upon them the enormity of the moment resting on their shoulders. These were conversations about the opening of a war. They perform an extremely sensitive role, without which the well-oiled machine could not carry out the largest operation since the founding of the state, nor enable aircrews to unleash precise fire on thousands of targets simultaneously. And then do it around the clock.

“This is the war of our lives. We have done similar things before, but nothing like this has ever been done in the Air Force,” the system commander noted. Even then, he told them: “You have done things in the past that I never believed, and never dreamed, that we would do. You are going to fortify the security of the State of Israel for a long time. This is what we trained for, this is what we have fought for until today, and now, forward.”

The commanders of the air control system held their breath during the first minutes of the launch. Ground crews at the various squadrons sent the aircraft into the air. The hot air swept across their faces. Clearance for takeoff came from the control towers, and the aircraft were handed over to the control units one after another, using code words. The dots began filling the radar screens.

“If veterans of the system could have seen the picture, they would have fallen out of their chairs because of the scale… An unfathomable figure,” said a senior officer in the system. “When do you breathe? Only when the reports come in about the quality of the strikes in Iran – the battle damage assessment – as a result of the fact that we managed to surprise them.”

The opening wave was carried out on Saturday morning. Civilian aviation in Israel continued to operate normally. Light aircraft took off throughout the country, while passenger aircraft took off from and landed at Ben Gurion Airport. Within this aerial environment, the Air Force had to launch its aircraft without arousing suspicion among anyone on the Israeli side or in the region, so that the Iranians would not discover that they were about to experience an unprecedented attack that would eliminate the regime’s leadership.

Only at a relatively late stage, after explosions had been heard throughout Iran and the element of surprise had ended, did air control personnel instruct civilian aircraft to hurry and land at airports throughout the country.

‘On top of all those challenges, Hezbollah overloaded the picture’

The next stage involved issuing directives across the Middle East: synchronizing Israeli and US Air Force operations across the entire region against a backdrop of incoming and outgoing commercial and military air traffic.

It was an unprecedented operation, carried out under shifting weather conditions across multiple countries, with the ultimate goal of landing aircraft safely without safety incidents – all while THAAD, Arrow, David’s Sling, Iron Dome, and other air defense systems were locked and loaded for interceptions.

“Think of it like the most complex video game you’ve ever played. Hundreds of planes, massive amounts of ordnance in the air, incoming enemy missiles, our own interceptors racing to shoot them down – and we have to make it all work seamlessly. We have to bring every plane down safely on one hand, while ensuring smooth takeoffs for timely strikes in Iran on the other.”

Another vivid memory burned into the minds of senior air traffic control officers occurred a few days later, when Hezbollah’s leadership gave the order to join the war by launching rockets, missiles, drones, anti-tank guided missiles, and cross-border insurgent attacks.

“Imagine that on top of all those challenges, Hezbollah overloaded the overall picture. What they didn’t realize… was that for two years prior, we had been upgrading our capabilities to stop them before they could cross the border… while simultaneously providing air cover for ground maneuvering forces… in multiple sectors at once.

“But you can never rest on your laurels. We are constantly refining this area even further… Consider that Hezbollah launched drones just one kilometer from the border – the closest possible threat – which is an extremely tough scenario to handle… along with attack drones targeting the home front and our forces maneuvering inside Lebanon… all while managing long-range threats from third-tier nations simultaneously.”

During the war, an additional task was assigned to the air traffic control: Issuing early warning alerts for aerial threats – including rockets, missiles, and drones – intended for both civilians and troops. The alerts were routed directly through the air control units’ decision-making pipeline across various sectors to shave off vital seconds and improve targeting accuracy.

“The word ‘controller’ is a bit of a misnomer, because in reality, we don’t just oversee the process – we actively manage it. It’s hands-on air traffic management. First, you have to master the sky, understand the flight paths to and from target areas, and know what needs to be done at every step, including handling unexpected crises instantly.

“The constant fear of a mid-air collision – heaven forbid – in a war zone with that level of traffic creates non-stop high-pressure calls, and on top of that, you have to manage the entire IAF alongside our American partners. It’s a level of operational strain we had never experienced before,” the senior officer explained.

‘Everything flows through the air traffic control’

“Looking back at the war – without getting into classified details – we set strict separation distances and time windows for flying inside enemy airspace during strikes so we wouldn’t accidentally shoot each other down, heaven forbid. Throughout the war, because we were flying joint missions [with the US military], we operated at extremely tight proximities. Take mid-air refueling far from Israel’s borders, for example… coordinating an American tanker with an Israeli jet is highly complex.

“Then you have to synchronize the strike pattern over Iran at specific altitudes, but what happens if a jet struggles to climb to its assigned altitude because of unexpected weather, double the standard weapons payload, and a heavy fuel load? And that’s not even counting our air defense role over Israel. We reached a peak response time of 14 seconds from threat detection to shootdown. As a commander, it’s mind-blowing that we brought our people to this operational standard. Everything flows through the air traffic control.”

The air traffic control conducted exhaustive debriefs to refine its operations, but senior officers emphasize that the core foundations proved solid. However, training programs were overhauled based on the lessons learned from Operation Roaring Lion.

“We took our training courses and heavily sharpened the focus on rapid decision-making under extreme pressure. We applied the same split-second execution we used for airspace management directly to our air defense protocols. Beyond that, we integrated a host of advanced technologies – from detection systems to interception management tools – that drastically cut down response times. This requires our controllers to be both highly tech-savvy and capable of heavy multitasking under combat conditions.

“It was a vital transformation for our personnel, alongside massive operational shifts that I’m not at liberty to disclose.”

The final memory the senior officer reflected on was the moment rockets struck cities where the families of air controllers live.

“For example, towns like Dimona and Arad. We have many soldiers, officers, and NCOs who live there, and some of their families’ homes were damaged. It’s one of those moments that takes your breath away – and yet you have to keep running the mission while worrying about your loved ones, ensuring both our controllers and their families stay resilient. It’s a deeply complex reality.”

Concluding the interview, the senior officer stated: “It’s important for me to emphasize: no matter where the State of Israel sends us to carry out a mission, we will know how to execute it. That resilience is part of the massive evolution we underwent during this war – and throughout Operation Roaring Lion.”

This post was originally published on here.

A new Channel 12 News poll indicates that Israeli Prime Minister Binyomin Netanyahu has fallen to his lowest approval rating in months on the question of who is best suited to serve as prime minister, while a majority of respondents now say they would prefer a different candidate. The survey also found that voters in the so-called “Just Not Bibi” bloc are increasingly open to relying on Yoav Segalovich as the decisive 61st vote to form a government.

According to the poll, 31% of respondents believe Netanyahu is the most suitable person to serve as prime minister, while 56% said they would prefer someone else. The result marks a six-point decline for Netanyahu in less than a month, after a previous Channel 12 survey showed him at 37%.

The survey found a 25-point advantage for respondents aligned with the “Just Not Bibi” camp over those who support Netanyahu.

Participants were also asked what they would prefer if neither political bloc secured a 61-seat majority in the Knesset, excluding the Arab parties. Twenty-three percent favored the formation of a change coalition supported through the abstention of the Arab parties. Another 22% preferred a national unity government with Likud led by Netanyahu, while 21% supported a unity government with Likud that would not include Netanyahu as prime minister. An identical 21% said they would rather see the country head to another election.

The poll also examined whether a party leader’s ethnic background influences voting decisions. A combined 79% of respondents said it has either no impact or only a minimal impact on how they vote, while 13% said it plays a significant role in their decision. Among Netanyahu supporters, 80% said a candidate’s ethnic background has little or no influence on their vote.

By contrast, political ideology remains a much stronger factor. Sixty-four percent of respondents said whether a party is perceived as right-wing or left-wing has a significant impact on their voting decision, while 31% said it has only a limited effect.

The survey also explored the possibility of the change bloc relying on Yoav Segalovich as the decisive “61st finger” to form a government, amid expectations that he could align with Mansour Abbas. Among the general public, 44% said the bloc should not rely on Segalovich, while 28% said it should. However, among voters identified with the change bloc—the group most directly affected by such a scenario—the results were reversed: 45% supported relying on Segalovich, while 27% opposed the idea.

As momentum builds in Washington to make daylight saving time permanent, researchers say the long-held belief that the change would significantly reduce energy use is not strongly supported by decades of studies.

With fewer than three months remaining before Americans turn their clocks back to standard time, supporters of permanent daylight saving time—including President Trump—are intensifying efforts to push legislation across the finish line.

President Trump renewed his call Tuesday for year-round daylight saving time, arguing that the public overwhelmingly favors the idea.

“The vast Majority of Americans have asked to make Daylight Saving Time permanent, but no Administration has been able to get it done, until now,” Trump wrote.

The proposal has gained more traction than it has in years. Last month, the House approved the Sunshine Protection Act, sending the measure to the Senate, where its prospects remain uncertain after previous attempts to fast-track similar legislation failed.

Trump has described ending the twice-yearly clock changes as a rare issue capable of bringing Americans together across party lines, calling the current system “an issue that Republicans, Democrats, and Independents can unite behind,” while also describing the seasonal time changes as “foolish, inconvenient and, in some cases, very costly.”

Ironically, one of the original reasons the United States adopted year-round daylight saving time decades ago was to reduce energy consumption by shifting more daylight into the evening hours, particularly during the winter months.

However, numerous studies conducted over the years have concluded that any resulting energy savings are relatively modest.

Research conducted by the U.S. Department of Transportation during the nation’s experiment with year-round daylight saving time in the 1970s estimated energy savings of only 0.4% to 1.5%. A separate Department of Energy study later found that extending daylight saving time in 2007 reduced energy use by just 0.03%, according to a congressional report. That same report also cited additional research finding little or no measurable reduction in overall energy consumption and noted that one Indiana-based study actually found electricity demand increased after the time change.

The Department of Transportation also concluded in a separate report that there was insufficient evidence to show the extended daylight saving period “had any measurable impact on motor gasoline consumption for passenger vehicles or traffic volume in 2007.”

While energy savings appear limited, other analysts argue that the current practice of changing clocks twice each year carries its own financial burden. Studies released by the Independent Institute in 2008 and the American Enterprise Institute in 2013 estimated the annual economic cost of switching clocks at between $1.7 billion and $2 billion, citing the time Americans spend adjusting clocks and schedules—though far fewer clocks require manual changes today than in previous decades.

Researchers have also pointed to potential health consequences associated with the seasonal time changes. Experts say moving clocks forward or backward can disrupt sleep patterns for adults, children, and even pets for days afterward. Many sleep specialists have therefore advocated adopting permanent standard time instead of permanent daylight saving time because it provides more morning sunlight.

Any permanent change would also have broader implications beyond sleep and energy use. Experts note that year-round daylight saving time or standard time could affect religious observances for many Americans and temporarily require significant adjustments to airline schedules and other transportation systems.

For now, it remains unclear whether the Senate will take up the Sunshine Protection Act or bring it to a vote.

Meanwhile, lawmakers are also weighing several alternative proposals, including bills that would allow individual states to adopt permanent daylight saving time, establish permanent half-daylight saving time, or make standard time permanent while allowing certain exceptions.

WASHINGTON — The Senate confirmed Todd Blanche as attorney general early Saturday by a vote of 50-49, giving President Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer permanent authority over a Justice Department he has already been running on an acting basis since April.

The vote came after 4 a.m., with a late-night session running into the early hours ahead of a scheduled Senate recess. Two Republicans, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, joined every Democrat in opposing him. Blanche moved into the acting role in April after Trump forced out Pam Bondi, whom the president faulted for the department’s lack of action against his political opponents.

Blanche said afterward that he was “deeply honored by the trust and confidence” Trump had placed in him, noting he becomes the nation’s 88th attorney general and thanking senators for staying late to finish the process.

The Fight Was Not Where It Looked

The obstacle was not Democratic opposition, which was never in doubt. It was rare Republican pushback that left the nomination genuinely in question.

The sticking point was a $1.8 billion Anti-Weaponization Fund inside the department. The fund grew out of a settlement between Trump and the IRS over the leak of the president’s tax returns, and was intended to pay people who claimed the federal government had been turned against them. After the fund drew legal challenges, Blanche gave a verbal assurance it was not moving forward — but Republican Judiciary Committee members John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, both leaving Congress, demanded it in writing and held up the committee vote until they got it.

Blanche had been confirmed as deputy attorney general on a party-line vote in March of last year, but lost Republican support for the top job after a series of decisions that drew skepticism from members of his own party. Support from Louisiana Republican Bill Cassidy late in the week put the count over the line.

Senator Adam Schiff of California, the most vocal Democratic opponent, argued Blanche has never shed his identity as Trump’s personal defense lawyer and would not act independently of the president.

What It Means for Companies

Blanche now holds formal authority over the department’s 93 U.S. attorneys, its Antitrust Division, national security prosecutions and department-wide litigation strategy — a workforce of more than 100,000 people.

For business, the practical exposure sits in prosecutorial discretion. The Antitrust Division decides which mergers get challenged, which industries draw civil or criminal competition probes, and how hard the government pushes on pricing, labor-market and digital-platform conduct. On the white-collar side, the choices that matter to a general counsel are cooperation credit, whether individual executives are charged alongside the company, whether monitorships are imposed as part of settlements, and how foreign bribery and sanctions-evasion cases are prioritized.

Those decisions move real numbers. Charging policy shifts affect legal reserves, the timing of announced deals, risk-factor disclosures and board compliance spending — most acutely for companies already under investigation and for banks, defense contractors, technology firms and multinational manufacturers operating in heavily regulated markets.

The turnover itself is a factor. Two confirmed attorneys general in roughly eighteen months, with a four-month acting stretch in between, is the kind of churn that makes enforcement standards harder to plan around.

What to Watch

The one-vote margin leaves Blanche without political cushion. Democrats are expected to demand oversight of politically sensitive prosecutions, while Republicans continue pressing the department to investigate what they describe as the weaponization of federal law enforcement — the same subject that nearly sank his confirmation.

The early signals will come from personnel appointments, whether any pending merger challenges are dropped or expanded, and the first corporate charging decisions filed under his signature rather than in an acting capacity.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

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The U.S. Postal Service reported a $2.5 billion net loss for the third quarter of 2026 on Friday, underscoring its continuing financial struggles as postal officials race to prevent the agency from running out of cash as early as next year.

Although the latest figures represent an improvement over the same period last year—when the Postal Service posted a $3.1 billion loss—the agency remains deeply in the red.

USPS attributed the smaller deficit in part to a $416 million reduction in workers’ compensation expenses, along with a $1.1 billion increase in operating revenue. Even with those gains, however, the agency continues to face substantial financial challenges.

Operating revenue totaled $19.9 billion during the quarter, reflecting a 6.1% increase compared with a year earlier, though it slipped from $20.2 billion recorded in the previous quarter.

“The Postal Service is today continuing to face a severe liquidity crisis, and our financial losses this quarter reflect systemic challenges inherent in our Congressionally established business model and regulatory framework,” Postmaster General David Steiner wrote in a statement Friday.

Steiner previously warned the Associated Press in March that, without significant changes, the Postal Service is projected to exhaust its cash reserves by early 2027.

The agency is currently limited by a $15 billion federal borrowing cap that has remained in place since 1990. As expenses continue to rise, postal officials say they have increasingly relied on operating revenue to offset mounting losses.

During a March 17 hearing before a congressional subcommittee, Steiner proposed increasing the price of a First-Class Forever stamp from 90 cents to 95 cents, arguing that postage remains one of the Postal Service’s most important sources of income.

“If we were to change the stamp price to 90 to 95 cents, which is still less than half of the cost of most foreign posts, that would largely solve our controllable loss,” Steiner told House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Steiner has also opposed bipartisan legislation in the Senate that would establish more than 70 additional ZIP codes. In a December 2025 letter to Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who also chairs the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Steiner warned that the proposal would cost the Postal Service an estimated $800 million.

Earlier this year, USPS temporarily suspended its employer contributions to federal pension programs as part of broader cost-cutting efforts. The agency also approved another postage increase, raising the price of a First-Class Forever stamp by four cents beginning in July.

“We are taking responsible steps to conserve cash to extend our operating window, but we require thoughtful legislative and other actions to establish a financially sustainable Postal Service capable of serving the American public far into the future,” Steiner wrote in Friday’s statement.

The Strait of Hormuz is, by some accounts, named for a Zoroastrian deity destined to emerge victorious after a 9,000-year standoff with an adversary.

Iran’s leaders feel their own victory is at hand and won’t require the same epic patience.

They are betting that military pressure will ultimately force the United States to accept their control over the crucial waterway for global energy — and that time is on their side.

They know about the diminishing stockpiles of key U.S. weapons such as advanced missile interceptors. They know the war is deeply unpopular with Americans. They know that as long as the strait is largely closed, the price of gas and other goods will stay high ahead of U.S. congressional elections in November. They know that trying to open it by force would be costly and may require American ground troops. They know their Houthi allies in Yemen could widen the war and disrupt another major trade route.

By that logic, U.S. President Donald Trump has no choice but to capitulate.

But Iran’s strategy carries risks.

Trump points to strikes that have decimated Iran’s top leadership, navy and air force. He alternates between threatening escalation and saying talks are going well. Iran’s own economy has been battered, in part because of a U.S. blockade. Iranians rose up in mass protests just months ago and could do so again.

And Iran’s leaders need only look to how Trump’s “short-term excursion” to the Middle East has bogged down to be reminded that wars rarely turn out as expected.

An evolving deal could give Iran a major win
Iran says it is close to reaching a deal with Oman to manage the strait, which runs between the countries. But on Saturday, Tehran said the strait will not open until the U.S. “corrects its behavior,” saying it must permanently end the war, lift its naval blockade of Iranian ports and withdraw its military from the area. It also must “completely compensate” Iran for war damage, lift sanctions and “unconditionally” release frozen assets.

There was no White House comment.

A deal with Oman would formalize Tehran’s control over what had been an open international waterway before the war, one that carried a fifth of the world’s traded oil and gas.

Abdolreza Davari, an analyst who once advised former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said Iran’s effective control of the strait has given it leverage with the U.S. and regional countries that can help guarantee its security.

“More than revenue from the strait, Iran wants to confirm its management and sovereignty over the strait,” he said by phone from Tehran.

Formal control over even part of the strait would be a clear win for Iran and a loss for the U.S., which has yet to accomplish some of its various and shifting goals in the war.

It would also deal a blow to global norms on freedom of navigation and set a precedent that much of the world would find disturbing — that nations can shut down trade choke points at will.

China, which buys oil from Iran and has influence over it, said as recently as May that “normal and safe passage” through the strait should be restored.

Iran feels time is on its side
To borrow a phrase from Trump’s own theory of geopolitics, Iran believes it holds the cards.

“They started the war, but its end was never with them. We always decide for ourselves when it ends,” Mahdi Mohammadi, an adviser to Iran’s chief negotiator, posted on social media. “Iran is going after the enemy’s defeat — not an agreement.”

He said a surprise Iranian attack on Jordan in July “compensated” for a drop in oil prices. That contributed to the collapse of an interim agreement reached in June that had offered significant concessions to Iran, including a U.S. waiver to sell oil internationally and the promise of broader sanctions relief.

Iran has repeatedly said the Strait of Hormuz will not go back to being an open waterway, and that it will keep attacking ships trying to transit without its permission. Iran’s joint military command has called it an “unbreakable red line.”

“For Iran, the Strait of Hormuz has become a strategic lever for deterrence, maintaining the regional balance of power, and reshaping the security rules in the Persian Gulf,” said Mostafa Najafi, a Tehran-based security analyst.

That poses a major obstacle to ending the war, much less resolving the even more complex, long-standing dispute over Iran’s nuclear program.

“The atomic issue, because of the conflict in the Strait of Hormuz, has been pushed to the side, and in reality, that is in Iran’s interests,” said Rahman Ghahremanpour, an Iran-based analyst. Control of the strait would give Iran leverage if the nuclear talks resume, he added.

It’s still a risky gamble
The economic fallout from the war has spread worldwide but is particularly acute in Iran.

U.S. and Israeli strikes have pummeled its industrial base. The U.S. blockade has choked off much of its oil exports. Iranians are grappling with triple-digit food inflation. Trump has repeatedly threatened major strikes on civilian infrastructure like water and electricity.

In December, a currency crisis sparked some of the biggest anti-government protests in the 47-year history of the Islamic Republic. Authorities responded with a bloody crackdown in which thousands were killed and tens of thousands detained.

Many in Iran, including those close to its moderate President Masoud Pezeshkian, fear it may go too far.

Mohammad Javad Zarif, who as foreign minister helped negotiate the 2015 nuclear deal, wrote in a recent essay that Iran’s achievements in the war had opened “an exceptional window for diplomacy.” But he warned that if it doesn’t strike a deal soon, then “economic recovery will be difficult, and the possibility of internal unrest or renewed aggression, especially after the U.S. elections, cannot be ruled out.”

The war has already been marked by surprises.

After the first wave of U.S. and Israeli airstrikes on Feb. 28 killed Iran’s supreme leader and other top officials, Trump suggested it would be over in a matter of weeks.

Instead, the conflict has emboldened Iran’s leaders and mobilized their supporters. Tehran is using the strait “to show that it has not been defeated,” Ghahremanpour said. “It can increase its legitimacy at home.”

But the strategy could also backfire. Iran’s resilience has limits and there are concerns that an economic crash could trigger unrest. “Iran cannot continue with this strategy forever, and at a certain point, in reality, it has to reach a deal with America,” he said.

But Davari said that for now, Iran can withstand the pressure. “It’s unlikely, despite the difficulties of the economic situation, that Iran will retreat from its positions,” he said.

JERUSALEM (VINnews)-The Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet have for the first time publicly confirmed the existence of a joint military-intelligence unit created to track down and kill everyone involved in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel.

The unit, known as Nili, was described by officers in an interview with Channel 12 News. It marks the first on-record acknowledgment of the specialized effort.

Over nearly three years, Nili has compiled a list of thousands of names using facial recognition technology, artificial intelligence, interrogations of detainees and human intelligence. Much of the information was drawn from video footage the attackers recorded of themselves during the assault. The list includes not only those who crossed into Israel that day but also anyone who held or abused hostages, ranging from low-level participants to senior Hamas commanders.

According to the Channel 12 report, about 2,800 people on Nili’s list have been killed, including the roughly 1,200 who died during the initial attack. Of an estimated 5,000 total participants, more than 2,700 are now confirmed dead. Roughly 300 others have been captured and are awaiting trial before military tribunals, where a death penalty remains possible for convictions involving genocide.

Officials compared the campaign to Mossad’s decades-long pursuit of those responsible for the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre. One Israeli official said the operation will continue “until the last of [the terrorists is killed].”

Elon Musk’s latest industrial venture could rewrite the record books, as Tesla and SpaceX move forward with plans to construct a semiconductor megafactory in Texas that is expected to span more than 100 million square feet—making it the largest building ever built.

Tesla and SpaceX announced Thursday that construction of the first phase of the Terafab semiconductor complex will begin in Grimes County, Texas, just outside Houston. The initial phase carries a projected cost of $16.8 billion.

Once fully completed, the sprawling facility is expected to exceed 100 million square feet, eclipsing every existing structure on the planet and becoming the world’s largest building by footprint.

Musk, who leads both Tesla and SpaceX, described the ambitious project as “the largest and most valuable building on Earth by far.”

To put its scale into perspective, the completed Terafab would surpass China’s New Century Global Center in Chengdu, which currently holds the title at approximately 18.9 million square feet and includes attractions such as an indoor beach and ski slope.

At more than five times the size of that complex, Terafab would also dwarf some of America’s most recognizable mega-structures, including the Pentagon, Apple Park, and the Mall of America combined.

Whether the project ultimately earns the title of the world’s largest building will depend on whether it is completed as currently envisioned. Concept renderings depict a massive wing-shaped structure stretching across the Texas landscape beneath an expansive translucent roof.

Musk has also emphasized the project’s architectural ambitions. “It will be stunningly beautiful,” Musk wrote on X. “Sci-fi city is what we’re aiming for,” he said in another X post.

Tesla said the factory is being driven by an urgent need for dramatically increased semiconductor production.

“Both Tesla & SpaceX will need far more chips than current & future global production can supply,” the company wrote, adding that the goal is “producing over 1 terawatt of compute per year.”

According to SpaceX, the facility will integrate nearly every stage of semiconductor manufacturing under one roof, including logic chip production, memory fabrication, packaging, and testing.

“The facility will be an advanced semiconductor fab that will bridge the divide between current global chip supply and the compute demand of the future,” the post read.

Semiconductors serve as the foundation of modern electronics, regulating electrical signals and powering everything from smartphones and computers to automobiles and advanced industrial systems.

The companies say chips manufactured at Terafab will be designed for much more than consumer electronics. According to Tesla, the facility “will produce chips optimized for edge computing and inference for use in hardware like Tesla’s Optimus robots and self-driving Cybercabs, along with high-power chips designed for operating SpaceX’s space-based data centers.”

The project is expected to generate at least 3,000 new jobs, with hiring focused primarily on residents of Grimes County and neighboring Brazos County.

Tesla and SpaceX noted that between 60% and 80% of employees hired at their existing Texas facilities have come from nearby communities, and they expect a similar pattern as Terafab expands.

Musk first introduced the Terafab concept in March, when the companies announced plans centered around a projected $25 billion investment.

The current first phase has been revised to a cost of $16.8 billion, although total investment across all planned construction phases could eventually reach as much as $119 billion.

The project will be built on the site of the former Gibbons Creek Reservoir, which previously supplied cooling water to a coal-fired power plant that ceased operations in 2018.

Recognizing concerns over water usage for large-scale computing facilities, SpaceX said it plans to use water from the existing reservoir rather than drawing from local groundwater supplies.

Not everyone in the surrounding community has embraced the project. Hundreds of Grimes County residents attended a county meeting Wednesday to voice concerns over millions of dollars in tax incentives awarded to the development and what they described as a lack of transparency surrounding the approval process.

The project has also secured support from the state. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s administration has approved a $30 million grant through the Texas Enterprise Fund, while Terafab also qualifies for assistance under the state’s Texas Jobs, Energy, Technology and Innovation program.

Local education leaders expressed optimism about the development. Consolidated Independent School District Superintendent Sarah Borowicz described the announcement as a defining moment for the district.

Intel has also confirmed that it will participate in the Terafab project, although the company has not yet disclosed the specific nature of its involvement.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Saturday that every officer and agent working in the field will be carrying a body camera by the end of August — a month earlier than the agency’s own timeline from days ago, when it said the nationwide rollout would be finished by the end of September. The hardware is already bought and paid for, and the money went to one American company.

ICE spent $30.9 million in July on body camera equipment from Axon, the Arizona firm best known for making Tasers, according to federal spending records. The two purchases were placed through an existing government contract dating to 2023. Houston alone has received more than 800 cameras, and officers there have already begun training.

What Triggered the Spending

The purchases did not come out of a routine budget cycle. The buying began one day after an ICE officer fatally shot a 25-year-old motorist in Maine, and the accelerated rollout follows the July shooting death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston. A series of fatal shootings by officers carrying out the administration’s immigration enforcement push has increased pressure from Congress for the kind of record body cameras produce.

Timing matters here for a second reason: ICE did not buy body cameras even after receiving a $75 billion funding infusion in the 2025 policy bill and beginning to hire thousands of new officers.

The money to equip the force was available for roughly a year before the orders were placed.

The Catch on the Footage

Buying the cameras and releasing what they record are two separate questions, and the agency’s policy answers the second one in its own favor.

ICE’s body-worn camera policy specifies that any public release of footage must be in the agency’s best interests, and includes provisions allowing ICE leadership to withhold or indefinitely delay footage following serious injuries or deaths in custody. In plain terms: the cameras will roll, but the agency decides whether the public ever sees the video, and there is no fixed deadline forcing its hand.

Acting Director David J. Venturella defended the restrictions, saying they are meant to protect investigations and privacy and are consistent with federal law and with the practices of other federal law enforcement agencies. He said the agency was “committed to transparency and accountability” and on schedule to finish the rollout this month.

The Pushback

Christopher Schneider, a sociology professor at Brandon University in Canada, told the Associated Press that selective release of footage is common practice at law enforcement agencies but is rarely written so plainly into policy.

Jason Houser, who served as ICE chief of staff under President Biden and helped run the agency’s earlier camera pilot program, said deploying the technology was never technically difficult and accused the agency of dragging its feet. He argued that cameras should have been issued when the administration expanded mass arrests and traffic stops, and that acting only after several shootings and congressional pressure amounts to a political response rather than a safety measure.

There is also a precedent problem. ICE’s sister agency, Customs and Border Protection, has still not released footage of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis in January. CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott told lawmakers the video was part of an ongoing investigation and would be made public when appropriate.

Why It Matters for Business

For Axon, this is a fast, large federal order booked through a contract already in place — no new competition, no procurement delay. A workforce that is still hiring in the thousands means recurring demand not just for the cameras themselves but for the cloud storage, evidence management software and licensing that come attached to them.

That subscription tail is the more durable part of the business, and a federal agency of ICE’s size expanding its officer count is exactly the customer profile that drives it.

For taxpayers, the arithmetic is simpler: tens of millions of dollars are buying a visual record of federal immigration enforcement, and the agency holding the cameras is also the one deciding what the public gets to watch.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

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New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s plan to create a new Business Advisory Council is drawing sharp criticism from prominent figures on Wall Street, with several business leaders dismissing the initiative as little more than a public relations effort after months of hostile rhetoric toward the financial community, the NY Post reports.

The proposed council is intended to give leaders from major industries an opportunity to advise the mayor and provide feedback on economic issues, according to City Hall. Bloomberg reported that those approached to participate include Robert Wolf, the former chief executive of UBS Americas and a longtime ally of President Barack Obama.

One senior Wall Street executive blasted the proposal, calling it, “Phony. A pretend effort to fool reasonable people into thinking [Mamdani] is willing to be reasonable towards business.”

Another chief executive in the financial industry was equally skeptical, describing the panel as “probably a waste of time,” while dismissing Wolf as “a bag of air.”

A Wall Street attorney, when asked about Wolf’s reported involvement, was similarly blunt, saying of the prominent Democratic donor, “The old UBS guy? He’s kind of a douche.”

The criticism comes shortly after Mamdani removed the advisory board overseeing the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, a nonprofit that raises private-sector money to support city initiatives.

The 34-year-old mayor dismissed every member of the organization’s advisory board, replacing an established group of business leaders with a new approach that has already generated controversy.

The Wall Street attorney argued that the proposed Business Advisory Council is unlikely to fill that void.

“It only exists to get checks from appointees for the mayor’s pet projects,” the person said. “Mam is appointing many folks who can’t write checks, so I don’t get it.”

Wolf rejected the criticism, calling it “uninformed gossip.”

“If Mamdani or anyone else asks for my advice on how to make New York city thrive, I would raise my hand if they were Democrat or Republican,” he told The Post.

Wolf declined to say whether he had agreed to serve on the advisory council.

Another individual familiar with the discussions said there has been “no formal ask or acceptance” involving any of the names reportedly under consideration.

According to reports, the council is expected to advise the mayor on issues affecting the finance, technology, and real estate industries.

In addition to Wolf, Bloomberg reported that invitations have also been extended to former Lazard global investment banking chief Antonio Weiss and Bank of America New York City President Jose Tavarez.

“The administration is in the process of reaching out to business executives to form a Business Advisory Council,” a City Hall spokesperson said in a statement. “The purpose of the council is to engage with business leaders for their insights and input as we build an economic development strategy that improves life for all New Yorkers.”

Not everyone in the financial sector dismissed the effort outright.

“Wolf says he’s only doing stuff with Mamdani because he gives a s–t about NYC,” a friend of the former banking executive said.

Since taking office earlier this year, Mamdani has repeatedly clashed with some of New York’s most influential business leaders, drawing criticism from figures including JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and Citadel founder Ken Griffin.

Griffin also became the target of one of Mamdani’s more unusual political videos, in which the mayor stood outside the billionaire’s Manhattan residence while promoting his proposal to impose higher taxes on second homes.

Even so, one Wall Street executive said the formation of the advisory council only deepened his suspicions about the mayor’s intentions.

“Remember the Saul Alinksy formula — deception is a tool for amassing power,” he told The Post, referring to the late Chicago radical.

Mamdani’s shakeup of the Mayor’s Fund also removed several well-known business figures, including BD Hotels principal Richard Born, GFP Real Estate Chairman Jeffrey Gural, Blackstone senior managing director Alex Katz, Citigroup executive Edward Skyler, and Real Estate Board of New York President James Whelan.

The mayor has also undertaken a major restructuring of the city’s Economic Development Corporation, directing the agency—which oversees city-owned property and economic development initiatives—to prioritize economic justice and housing affordability with the goal of narrowing the city’s wealth gap and expanding financial opportunities for lower-income New Yorkers.

More than half of New York’s third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade students failed to reach reading proficiency on this year’s state English Language Arts exams, according to newly released preliminary data, raising fresh concerns about student achievement despite record levels of education spending, the NY Post reports.

Figures published this week by the New York State Education Department show that 57% of third graders, 52% of fourth graders, and 57% of fifth graders did not achieve proficiency on the 2025-26 ELA assessments.

Students in New York City experienced an even steeper decline. Among children in grades 3 through 8, English Language Arts scores dropped by six percentage points compared with last year, leaving only about half of students meeting the state’s proficiency benchmark.

Statewide, just 48% of students in grades 4 through 8 earned proficient scores in reading, representing what the Education Department described as a “significant” five-point decline from the previous year.

Fifth graders experienced the sharpest setback of any grade level, with reading proficiency falling by an astonishing 14 percentage points.

The downturn was even more pronounced in New York City, home to roughly 40% of the state’s public school enrollment.

Just one year earlier, approximately 56% of city students passed the reading exam, marking a seven-point improvement over the prior year.

Third graders in New York City posted the weakest results, with proficiency plunging 13.8 percentage points as only about 44% met state standards. Fifth graders followed closely behind, recording a 13.1-point decline.

Although the state data do not identify the precise reading skills where students struggled most, education policy experts argued that the disappointing results reflect systemic problems that cannot be solved simply by increasing education funding without changing instructional methods.

“If the amount of money spent alone determined the results, New York should be on top of the world,” Zilvinas Silenas, the president and CEO of the Empire Center for Public Policy, told The Post.

Silenas said New York’s schools include pockets of exceptional performance that should serve as models for the rest of the system. “I’m not trying to say that all of New York’s education system is bad. On average, it’s very mediocre, but we have some islands of excellence,” Silenas said. “Why aren’t we copying these islands of excellence on what they’re doing in order to improve?”

According to Empire Center data, New York spends approximately $37,000 per public school student each year—the highest figure in the nation and roughly double the national average of about $17,619.

In New York City, annual spending climbs even higher, reaching roughly $44,000 per student.

Education officials say fifth graders are expected to demonstrate the ability to “comprehend and analyze text,” including identifying central ideas, recognizing literary techniques, evaluating character and plot development, and understanding vocabulary.

One question on this year’s fifth-grade exam asked students to determine the meaning of the phrase “going live” as it appeared in a passage about a student-operated blog. Students were asked to choose from four possible definitions:
A) making the content available to all
B) announcing the project to the school
C) requesting feedback from others
D) accessing the new computer system

Students in fifth grade were also required to write short responses analyzing the impact of tone in poetry, identifying themes in stories, and demonstrating other reading comprehension skills.

Charter schools, which receive public funding but operate independently of traditional public school systems, continued to outperform district schools despite ongoing opposition from teachers unions.

Success Academy, one of New York’s largest charter school networks, achieved a 92% passing rate on the 2025 English Language Arts exam, trailing only the public schools in Scarsdale.

Students performed somewhat better in mathematics, with roughly 57% of children in grades 3 through 8 passing the state math assessment—a slight improvement over last year’s results.

Although officials cautioned that the numbers remain preliminary, the state Education Department acknowledged that the decline in reading achievement is unmistakable.

“The Department takes this decline seriously and will conduct a detailed analysis to better understand where students are experiencing challenges, which student groups and communities have been most affected, and where additional support and resources are needed,” said JP O’Hare, a spokesperson for the department.

O’Hare said the agency intends to address the disappointing results directly rather than minimize them. “We will not minimize or attempt to explain away what the data tell us. When scores increase, we report that progress. When they decline, we report that as well,” O’Hare said. “Our responsibility is not to create a narrative around the results, but to understand them, identify where students need additional support, and act accordingly.”

The disappointing scores come despite Gov. Kathy Hochul approving the largest education budget in New York history.

For the 2026-27 school year, the state is allocating a record $39.3 billion to public education, including funding aimed at expanding teacher training in what officials describe as “evidence-based math and reading instruction.”

A spokesperson for Hochul said improving literacy has been one of the governor’s chief education priorities.

“She specifically directed the State Education Department to place a heavy focus on reading proficiency, improve literacy instruction, and ensure schools have the tools and resources needed to help students succeed,” the spokesperson said.

“The governor will continue pushing for measurable improvements in literacy outcomes statewide because every New York student deserves a strong foundation in reading.”

Fordham University political science professor Nick Tampio argued that New York should abandon programs that have failed to produce results and instead invest in proven educational fundamentals.

“Hire skilled teachers. Provide schools with libraries. Give children time to read the books they want. Make reading a joy,” he told The Post.

He added, “New York’s approach is failing—as evidenced by the fact that over one fifth of SUNY students are failing their first English class.”

Eric Nadelstern, who served as deputy schools chancellor under then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg, argued that recent literacy initiatives—including the NYC Reads program introduced under Mayor Eric Adams—have hindered rather than helped student progress.

“There is no one-way for all kids to learn how to read,” Nadelstern told The Post.

He warned against applying identical teaching methods across a school system as diverse as New York City’s. “If you try a one-size-fits-all in a city as diverse as New York, — where students have such different needs and ways of learning and teachers have such different needs and ways of teaching — you’re gonna wind up alienating the staff and they’re gonna implement the program poorly,” he said.

Nadelstern added that educators achieve better results when given flexibility to tailor instruction to individual students. “If you allow them to do what they do best — that is to determine how the students they know by name and family and neighborhood can learn best — they will do whatever is necessary to make sure their kids succeed.”

Despite the disappointing scores, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels both expressed support for the NYC Reads initiative when commenting on the newly released results.

“As we review these initial statewide results, and what they mean for our students, we will focus on better understanding the scoring process to use this data with confidence and make the best decisions for our students,” Mamdani said.

Mary Vaccaro, vice president of education for the United Federation of Teachers, also attributed the decline to changes in curriculum and instructional strategies, including the rollout of the “NY Inspires” initiative, which allows students to satisfy graduation requirements through alternatives to traditional Regents examinations.

“We have to refocus on what we know works in literacy – a clear plan, a tailored science of reading curriculum, and meaningful professional development for educators. That recipe yields results,” Vaccaro said.

She concluded by criticizing the state’s recent approach to education reform. “This past school year, the system abandoned that approach and, with no real plan in place, simply piled on additional programs, assessments, consultant’s recommendations and curriculum in the hopes that ‘more’ would equal better, and we lost ground.”

The Pentagon has told America’s biggest weapons makers they have three weeks to come back with a plan for building missiles faster — and it is not asking for improvements at the margins. Deputy Secretary Steve Feinberg gave contractors 21 days to submit plans, writing in a memo dated Wednesday that “years-long development cycles are not acceptable.” The memo directs companies to lay out “significantly faster, more aggressive delivery schedules and/or increased production for critical capabilities.”

The reason is arithmetic. The war with Iran, now in its sixth month, has been fought largely with air-defense interceptors that cost millions of dollars each and take years to build, against drones and rockets that cost a fraction of that. A Center for Strategic and International Studies report published July 27 found the United States had burned through roughly a third of its Patriot interceptors and about half of its THAAD missiles since the war began, and the same analysis flagged the cost imbalance between expensive interceptors and cheaply built Iranian drones. By CSIS’s count, the military has fewer than 1,000 Patriot interceptors and fewer than 250 THAAD interceptors on hand.

American contractors are already being paid to fix that, and the sums are historically large. The Army last week awarded Lockheed Martin a contract worth up to $58.6 billion to produce Patriot interceptors, and on August 3 the department signed a pair of seven-year framework agreements with Northrop Grumman worth a combined $3 billion, making Northrop a second supplier of Patriot rocket motors and expanding its output of THAAD structural components. L3Harris signed its own seven-year framework the prior week, which the company said would let it triple propulsion components for the Patriot. RTX, Raytheon’s parent, has a similar arrangement to lift Tomahawk cruise missile output from roughly 60 a year to eventually 1,000.

The Pentagon is no longer trying simply to replenish missiles. It is trying to rebuild the industrial system that produces them.

The production targets behind those contracts are steep. The department wants to triple capacity for the PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement interceptor and quadruple capacity for THAAD, working toward a long-term procurement goal of nearly 14,000 Patriot and THAAD interceptors. Officials said they are now dealing directly with component suppliers rather than going only through prime contractors, pushing money toward tooling, plant upgrades and workforce so the higher rates can be sustained. Lockheed is aiming to build 2,000 PAC-3 MSE interceptors a year by the end of 2030.

The choke point is not final assembly. It is solid rocket motors, a single-source bottleneck that has capped interceptor output for years and cannot be widened by writing a bigger check alone. “Building the Arsenal of Freedom requires robust, dynamic supply chains at every level of the industrial base,” said Michael Duffey, the under secretary for acquisition and sustainment. Adding a second motor supplier is the department’s answer, and it is why the newest agreements run seven years rather than one — suppliers will not build new plants on a demand signal that expires.

Inside the administration, the shortage has become a political argument as much as an industrial one. President Trump said Thursday on Truth Social that the country holds “massive amounts” of munitions and that large volumes are being manufactured and delivered as needed. A department official, Jarred Conley of the Defense Innovation Unit, told Al Jazeera on Saturday that “we have sufficient munitions for the task at hand.” Officials have invoked the Defense Production Act to speed manufacturing, and Feinberg has held repeated meetings with contractors pressing for faster timelines.

Chief spokesman Sean Parnell confirmed the memo is authentic and framed it as a continuation of existing policy rather than an emergency measure. He said the document will inform the fiscal 2028 budget request going to Congress and is consistent with the push to rebuild the defense industrial base.

The biggest uncertainty is no longer whether Washington wants more missiles. It is whether Congress will fund production quickly enough for industry to build the factories, equipment and workforce needed to make them.

That is where the money question lands. Framework agreements are nonbinding — they signal intent and unlock supplier investment, but they are not appropriations. Whether the production ramp described in this week’s memo actually gets built depends on a divided Congress approving the defense spending to pay for it, and the budget cycle Parnell referenced does not begin until fiscal 2028. Contractors weighing whether to pour concrete for new motor lines are being asked to move now on funding that has not yet been voted.

For the companies, the deadline lands in early September. For investors and suppliers across the defense base — machine shops, chemical producers, electronics makers feeding Lockheed, Northrop, RTX and L3Harris — the memo is the clearest signal yet that the government intends to buy at wartime volumes for years, not months. The open question is whether the industrial base can add capacity faster than the war consumes it.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

© JBizNews.com⁠ All Rights Reserved. Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

Jersey Central Power & Light has asked New Jersey regulators to approve a rate proposal that would delay the impact of higher delivery charges for residential customers until 2028, while allowing the utility to continue billions of dollars in investments aimed at improving electric reliability.

The proposal, filed late Thursday with the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, would increase the company’s base distribution rates by $253 million. However, JCP&L said it would use offsets to shield residential customers from those higher delivery charges throughout 2027, with the new rates taking effect in January 2028 if approved.

Under the proposal, the typical residential customer using 767 kilowatt-hours of electricity per month would see their bill rise by about $14.23, or roughly 8.8%, beginning in 2028. The average monthly bill would increase from $162.30 to approximately $176.53.

The filing also seeks approval to recover $476 million in deferred storm restoration costs through a separate charge beginning in January 2028. JCP&L said the costs would be spread over 10 years rather than recovered over a shorter period, reducing the immediate impact on customer bills.

Company officials said the proposal is designed to balance affordability with continued investment in the electric system.

In their filing, JCP&L said it has invested approximately $1.5 billion in its electric system over the past three years and reported a 15% improvement in reliability during 2025 compared with the previous year. The company said reliability has improved by 38% so far in 2026.

If approved, the proposal would support an additional $2.1 billion in distribution investments as part of FirstEnergy’s broader five-year, $6.9 billion capital plan. Planned projects include modernizing portions of the electric grid, expanding remote monitoring capabilities, upgrading transmission infrastructure and continuing energy efficiency programs.

The utility is also seeking additional funding for vegetation management, citing trees as one of the leading causes of outages across its 3,200-square-mile service territory. JCP&L said dead and diseased ash trees have accounted for about 60% of tree-related outages since 2020. The company has removed more than 74,000 hazardous ash trees since 2017.

In addition to the infrastructure investments, JCP&L said it plans to continue offering energy efficiency rebates, payment assistance programs for qualifying customers and a proposed pilot program that would reward customers who shift electricity usage to off-peak hours.

The proposal is subject to review and approval by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities. If approved, the new residential bill impacts would not take effect until January 2028.

In the narrow alleys of Old Damascus, tour guide Raslan Ramadan has resumed guiding visitors through the Umayyad Mosque, traditional Damascene houses, and historic markets, after years during which he struggled to organize even a single tour.

According to Ramadan, visitor numbers have risen in recent months. However, he told The Media Line that tourism remains irregular and depends on the availability of flights, continued security and stability, and the quality of services provided to visitors.

Syrian authorities are betting on tourism as a sector capable of generating jobs and foreign currency more quickly than other industries that may require years of rehabilitation.

Official data indicates that Syria has more than 4,500 registered archaeological sites, including six listed as UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The country also offers ecotourism destinations in Kessab and Slinfah, coastal resorts in Tartus and Latakia, religious sites, and traditional markets such as Damascus’ Al-Hamidiyah Souq and Aleppo’s old markets.

The Tourism Ministry says Syria received 3.52 million visitors during the first half of 2026, compared with 1.67 million during the same period last year, an increase of 111%.

Syrian expatriates constituted the largest group, totaling 2.13 million. The number of non-Arab foreign tourists reached 719,000, an increase of 448%, while the number of Arab tourists rose by 107% to 664,000.

According to the ministry, arrivals from Turkey topped the list of foreign markets, followed by Germany, Sweden, the United States, the Netherlands, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Jordan led the Arab markets, alongside Lebanon and Iraq.

The figures, however, do not on their own establish the scale of Syria’s tourism recovery. Under the ministry’s classification system, Syrians arriving from abroad are recorded as visitors, while people of other nationalities are classified as tourists.

The increase also raises questions about how many of those arrivals represent traditional tourism, since several of the leading source countries have large Syrian diaspora communities and many citizens of Syrian origin.

Number of visitors, tourists in Syria increases after fall of Assad regime

Mohammed Suleiman, a receptionist at the Al Majed Hotel in Damascus, said the number of guests has risen steadily since the fall of the Assad regime. However, a large proportion are Syrian expatriates visiting the country rather than foreign tourists in the conventional sense.

Suleiman told The Media Line that the hotel now receives almost none of the Iranian, Iraqi, and Lebanese visitors who previously came as part of religious tourism groups. He maintained that those visitors had received special treatment and privileges under the former regime. “They used to come as though the country belonged to them,” he said. The Media Line could not independently verify that claim.

According to Suleiman, foreign guests generally stay between seven and 15 days, while visitors from Lebanon and Jordan tend to stay for shorter periods because of the proximity of the borders and the ease of overland travel.

On the streets of Damascus, Abdul Ghani, a Kenyan tourist who previously visited Syria in 2009, said his current trip felt more comfortable than his earlier experience. “In the past, tourists were afraid of Bashar Assad’s security services,” he told The Media Line. “Today, the situation is more relaxed.”

Ghani said Syria’s beauty and the friendliness of its people prompted him to choose the country as a tourism destination this year. He recalled trying to buy food with old Syrian banknotes during the transitional period for replacing the currency. Authorities had announced that July 30 would be the final deadline for using the old notes, after which only the new currency would be accepted. “I did not know what to do when the vendor refused to take the money,” he said. “Then another customer paid for the food for me.”

He described the incident as one of several experiences that showed him “the kindness of the Syrian people before the beauty of the tourist attractions.”

Hasib Mohammed, a Turkish citizen of Syrian origin, said he has visited Syria regularly since the fall of the Assad regime and described life in the country as “wonderful.”

“Syria offers Turks a welcome escape, and there are family ties and neighborly relations between the two peoples, which is why I come regularly,” he told The Media Line. “In Damascus, you feel as though you are in Istanbul, and vice versa.”

However, Mohammed said the tourism sector needs better organization, particularly in digital services that help visitors find hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions, and make reservations more easily.

Young Syrians working to create multilingual resources for tourism

A young Syrian team is working to address part of that gap. Anas al-Midani, a Syrian who returned from Germany and settled in Syria, said he and his team are developing an integrated, multilingual platform for tourists. The platform is expected to provide information about hotels, restaurants, tourist sites, and booking services. Al-Midani declined to disclose its name before its official launch.

According to statistics obtained by The Media Line from the Tourism Ministry, Syria has more than 348 hotels distributed across its provinces. Damascus has 183 hotels across various categories, in addition to 44 heritage hotels classified separately, most of which are located in Old Damascus. That brings the capital’s total number of hotel establishments to 227.

However, the number of establishments does not necessarily reflect their actual operating capacity or the quality of their services, amid price variations, weak online booking systems, and difficulty accessing reliable, consolidated information that tourists can use.

Tourism Minister Mazen al-Salhani said during a panel discussion at the Syrian-British Business Council conference, held July 1, 2026, that hotel occupancy indicators and tourist numbers had increased by between 150% and 200% compared with last year. The ministry, however, has not published an overall average occupancy rate or a breakdown by province and hotel category.

The ministry has not publicly released comprehensive data on average visitor spending, hotel nights, or tourism revenues, indicators that provide a more accurate measure of the sector’s economic impact than entry figures alone.

In an effort to improve services, the General Authority for Tourism and Hotel Training organized the first refresher course for tour guides since the issuance of Law No. 29 of 2024, which requires guides to attend a course every three years to renew their professional licenses.

Muslim al-Naim, the authority’s director general, told The Media Line that high transportation and accommodation costs prompted the authority to organize the course virtually for the first time. The online format enabled 101 tour guides to participate, including some living outside Syria. “This method enabled broad interaction and rich discussions while sparing participants the burden of travel and high costs,” al-Naim said.

Syrian authorities attempting to repair damaged security legacy

Syrian authorities are also attempting to address a security legacy that long damaged the country’s image as a destination for foreign visitors.

Media and human rights organizations documented cases in which foreign visitors were detained while traveling in Syria under the former regime. They included Canadian Kristian Lee Baxter, who was held for about eight months between 2018 and 2019, and American Travis Timmerman, who spent seven months in prison after entering Syria on an independent Christian pilgrimage in 2024.

The Media Line found no comprehensive public data on the number of foreign tourists or visitors detained by the former regime’s security services. However, for years, such cases reinforced Syria’s image as a destination where visitors faced security risks extending beyond those posed by the war itself.

To strengthen visitor security, the Interior Ministry, in cooperation with the Tourism Ministry, established a Tourism Police Department. Its first cohort comprised 518 male and female officers who graduated in May 2026 after receiving training in foreign languages, tourism studies, and the protection of tourist sites and facilities.

According to authorities, the force is tasked with securing tourist groups, archaeological sites, and hotels; accompanying major events such as the Damascus International Fair and cultural festivals; addressing violations; and preventing the exploitation of tourists or manipulation of prices. Tourism police officers have been deployed in uniforms and vehicles bearing a distinctive visual identity in Damascus, Rural Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, Latakia, and Tartus.

The Tourism Ministry says it has signed 17 memoranda of understanding and 10 partnership agreements to develop tourism facilities. The projects include plans to rehabilitate the Dama Rose and Carlton Damascus hotels, as well as facilities in Slinfah and al-Dimas. The ministry has not disclosed the agreements’ total value or their implementation schedules.

Damascus is also preparing to host the first Syria Travel Forum 2026 from September 28 to 30.

Organizers expect more than 30 exhibitors and 20 speakers to participate, with more than 5,000 visitors anticipated during the three-day event.

Rasha al-Shami, who organizes forums and exhibitions in Damascus, told The Media Line that the success of an investment forum should not be measured by the number of meetings or participants. Instead, she said, it should be judged “by its ability to turn meetings and discussions into partnerships and projects implemented on the ground.”

For Ramadan, the return of visitors to Damascus represents an encouraging start, but it has not yet become a regular tourism season. He said the sector’s success will depend on continued stability, easier access to the country, and improved services so visitors can plan with confidence, and the recovery can become more than intermittent.

This post was originally published on here.

Rav Yigal Rosen, rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Or Yisroel, delivered a sobering message to bochurim regarding Israel’s ongoing draft crisis, saying that there is no natural solution in sight and urging them to prepare for the coming of Moshiach.

During the Bnei Yeshivos conference held at Kibbutz Chofetz Chaim, bochurim asked Rav Rosen about the future of the draft law and whether there was any realistic expectation that the current situation would eventually be resolved.

The rosh yeshiva responded with a clear and forceful message. “Under normal circumstances, there is no solution, and things will only get worse. Don’t let anyone tell you stories about some political move that will solve this problem. What you should do is prepare yourselves for the coming of Moshiach.”

His remarks made a powerful impression on those attending the conference and reflected the view held by many leading roshei yeshiva that the Torah world should not place its hopes in political developments or natural solutions. Instead, they emphasized strengthening limud haTorah, deepening emunah, and anticipating the coming of Moshiach with renewed faith and confidence.

{Matzav.com}

Iran’s top national security official has warned that the Strait of Hormuz will not return to normal operations unless the United States agrees to a sweeping list of Iranian demands, casting doubt on hopes for a full reopening of one of the world’s most critical shipping lanes even as diplomatic efforts continue.

The warning comes as Iran is reportedly nearing a limited agreement with Oman that would allow a restricted maritime corridor for certain vessels. The arrangement, however, would stop well short of restoring full commercial traffic through the strategically vital waterway.

Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and a former deputy commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, outlined Tehran’s conditions for reopening the strait in a statement released Saturday.

Among Iran’s demands are a complete withdrawal of U.S. military forces from the region, an end to the American naval blockade, the lifting of sanctions against Tehran—including the release of frozen and confiscated assets—financial compensation for damage caused during the war, and an end to attacks on Iran’s regional allies.

“The Supreme National Security Council will never back down, neither in war nor in negotiations,” Zolqadr threatened, according to Iran’s state-run Tasnim News Agency.

Iran is also demanding permanent strategic authority over the Strait of Hormuz, along with the ability to impose transit fees of up to seven percent on vessels using the waterway.

Earlier Saturday, a spokesman for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps similarly insisted that the strait would not be permanently reopened unless Washington accepted what Tehran described as its “legal and logical conditions.”

“The ⁠reopening of the Strait of Hormuz is subject to the specific mechanisms and conditions of ⁠the Islamic Republic of Iran and is not related to the ⁠negotiations between Iran and Oman,” IRGC General Hossein Mohebbi told reporters in Iran’s southern Hormozgan Province.

“Whenever the American side accepts the conditions of the Islamic Republic of Iran and abandons its interventionist approach, the conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz will certainly be provided.”

The remarks came despite ongoing diplomatic efforts led by President Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff. According to reports, the proposal under discussion would establish a temporary shipping corridor jointly administered by Iran and Oman that would allow limited vessel traffic without tolls or special permissions.

The proposal would also include a 60-day negotiating period aimed at securing a permanent end to the conflict, with the United States agreeing to lift its naval blockade immediately upon the signing of the agreement.

President Trump recently suspended planned U.S. strikes against Iranian energy facilities, canceling a major military operation last weekend as diplomatic negotiations appeared to gain momentum. At the same time, he has repeatedly warned that military action could resume if the talks break down.

Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates condemned what it described as a “hostile Iranian attack” after one of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company’s vessels was struck by a missile while transiting the Strait of Hormuz early Saturday.

“Targeting commercial shipping and using the Strait of Hormuz as a tool of economic coercion or blackmail represents an act of piracy by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and constitutes a direct threat to the stability of the region,” the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement posted on X.

The Gulf nation further called on Iran to halt its “unprovoked attacks” and demonstrate its commitment to a “complete and unconditional” reopening of the strategically important waterway.

With the threat of additional attacks still looming, commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz remains severely reduced, with recent traffic reported at less than 10 percent of the volume seen before the conflict began.

Hunter Biden says his father, Joe Biden, is battling an increasingly difficult fight against advanced prostate cancer, revealing that the disease has spread beyond his bones and describing the former president’s condition as both painful and severely debilitating.

Speaking to the BBC on Friday, Hunter Biden disclosed that his father’s illness has worsened since his diagnosis. “The cancer has spread, metastasized into his bones and further,” he said. “It’s very painful and it’s very debilitating in many respects.”

Joe Biden, 83, announced in May 2025 that he had been diagnosed with stage four prostate cancer.

Hunter said watching his father endure the illness has been heartbreaking. “It’s really sad to watch,” Hunter Biden said. “The only thing that I’d say about my dad, about his health right now, is I wish he would complain more, because it’s not good.”

Despite his health challenges, Biden has continued making public appearances. In late June, he attended the Maryland Democratic Party’s “Fight Back and Win” gala near Baltimore. Earlier that month, he also participated in ceremonies marking the opening of the new Obama presidential library in Chicago, where he drew attention after approaching the podium and asking, “Where’s my granddaughter?”

Hunter Biden, 56, said his father remains determined to stay active and engaged. “He’s still out there,” he said. “He’s still doing his thing. He so believes in this country.”

Even while undergoing treatment, Biden continues working on his memoir, Promise Me, America, which is expected to be published after the upcoming midterm elections.

Last week, Jill Biden revealed in an interview with Kelly Ripa that she first became concerned about her husband’s health while they were still living in the White House, noticing that he was getting up to use the bathroom as many as seven times each night.

The former first lady, 75, said she alerted White House physicians to the issue at the time and believed it had been properly addressed.

However, after leaving the White House in January 2025 and seeing that the symptoms continued, she urged her husband to seek additional medical evaluation. “But when it continued when we got out of the White House, I said, ‘Joe, we’ve got to go up to Jeff in Philly – something’s wrong’,” she told the “Let’s Talk Off Camera with Kelly Ripa” host on Sirius XM.

In June, Jill Biden said her husband’s illness will be a lifelong battle, explaining that he “will have to live with cancer for the rest of his life, which means he’s on special medicines.”

When Biden first announced his diagnosis in May 2025, his office said doctors had identified an “aggressive form” of prostate cancer after he sought medical attention for urinary symptoms. Physicians also discovered a “nodule” on his prostate during the evaluation.

His office later announced in October that he had begun radiation treatments along with hormone therapy as part of his ongoing fight against the disease.

Consumers are still spending on travel, transportation and convenience services even as household budgets remain under pressure, with Airbnb, Lyft and Instacart all reporting stronger-than-expected demand Thursday.

Airbnb said second-quarter revenue reached $3.61 billion, ahead of Wall Street expectations, and raised its full-year growth outlook to at least the mid-teens. North American booking growth accelerated to its strongest pace in nearly three years, helped by major events including the FIFA World Cup.

The results suggest travelers are becoming more selective rather than pulling back entirely. Consumers may be cutting spending in some discretionary categories, but they continue to prioritize trips and experiences they consider worth the cost.

Lyft reported revenue of $1.84 billion, up 16% from a year earlier, while gross bookings rose 23% to a record $5.50 billion. The company also said roughly 30% of North American rides were connected to partnerships including DoorDash and United Airlines.

That partnership growth matters because ride-hailing companies are becoming more deeply integrated into travel, delivery and loyalty programs rather than relying only on customers opening an app and ordering a standalone ride.

Instacart also delivered stronger guidance, forecasting third-quarter gross transaction value of $10.30 billion to $10.55 billion, above Wall Street expectations. Consumers continued ordering groceries online even as they shifted toward cheaper products and smaller baskets.

The common thread across all three companies is not unlimited consumer strength. It is continued willingness to pay for services that save time, provide convenience or support experiences people still value.

For businesses, that distinction matters. Consumers remain highly sensitive to price, but demand has not disappeared. Companies that can demonstrate clear value are still finding room to grow even while households remain cautious elsewhere.

Airbnb shares jumped in after-hours trading, while Instacart also rose sharply following its report. Lyft gained more modestly.

The broader consumer picture remains uneven, but Thursday’s results offered another sign that spending is rotating rather than collapsing.

JBizNews Desk | San Francisco

© JBizNews.com All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A defense agreement between Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey is not aimed against Iran or any other country, Turkey’s foreign minister said Saturday, describing the pact as an important step toward regional stability.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif signed the agreement in the Saudi holy city of Mecca on Friday. It states that an attack on one would be considered an attack on all three.

The “Mecca Joint Defense Agreement” brings together oil-rich Saudi Arabia and nuclear power Pakistan as well as Turkey, which has NATO’s second-largest army and a rapidly growing defense industry. It deepens cooperation and deterrence at a time of increased regional uncertainty and threats from the war in Iran.

In an interview with Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency, Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan insisted that the three countries do not view any particular state as an adversary unless they take hostile action against them.

“We don’t have anything written down — nothing we’ve signed — that defines a common threat,” Fidan said. “Any country that does not attack us is not a target for us.”

The Turkish minister described the agreement’s clause on mutual defense as being “technically the same” as NATO’s Article 5, under which an attack on one of the 32 members is considered an attack on them all.

Asked how the mechanism would work, Fidan said a member would need to formally request help and that the other two countries’ assistance could range from intelligence sharing to logistic support — or the deployment of military units depending on the threat.

“These are multi‑layered matters that vary according to the scale of the threat,” Fidan said. “This is the perspective we have set out so far in our work.”

The Turkish minister said other nations — which he did not name — have expressed interest in joining the agreement, adding that he expects Egypt, which he described as a “natural partner,” to participate “at the next stage.”

Under the deal, the foreign and defense ministers of the three countries, along with their military chiefs, would hold regular committee meetings. The three countries would also establish a secretariat, to be based in Saudi Arabia, Fidan said.

Despite repeated public assurances that Israeli forces will remain in key areas of Gaza until Hamas is disarmed, senior defense officials are reportedly examining plans for a limited IDF withdrawal that would see multinational troops take over positions inside the Strip.

According to a report aired Saturday night by Channel 12 News, Israel’s defense establishment has recently held discussions exploring the possibility of pulling IDF forces out of several locations in Gaza as part of a potential future arrangement.

Under the proposal outlined in the report, Israeli troops would be replaced by a multinational force, even though Hamas has not come close to surrendering its weapons or agreeing to disarm.

Israeli officials have consistently declared that the IDF will not leave the strategic “Yellow Line” before Hamas is disarmed. Nevertheless, the report says security officials are already drafting contingency plans in the event that Israel’s leadership authorizes a withdrawal.

Channel 12 also reported that the precise meaning of Hamas “disarmament” has yet to be clearly defined, while the United States is reportedly increasing pressure on Israel to reduce its military presence in Gaza.

A senior Israeli security official expressed deep concern over the proposal, telling Channel 12, “The number of troops [in the multi-national force] is simply not enough. It’s only a handful of soldiers, and they’re trying to build towers on the basis of that force. It’s very worrying. The Americans aren’t leaving us with many alternatives – but they’re creating a problem for us in Gaza.”

According to the report, Morocco is expected to provide the largest share of the multinational contingent, with roughly 500 troops. Uganda is also said to be considering sending a force of similar size, while the remaining participating countries would each contribute only several dozen personnel—far short of the original vision of deploying several thousand peacekeeping troops.

Israeli defense officials reportedly remain highly skeptical that such a small international force would be capable of maintaining security in Gaza, particularly if it is expected to assume responsibility for areas vacated by the IDF.

The report added that, even if the plan ultimately moves forward, foreign forces are not expected to begin arriving in Gaza for at least another six weeks.

Israel has yet to sign or formally approve the roadmap for implementing the next phase of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza plan, amid growing opposition inside the security cabinet and warnings that Hamas intends to use the process to restrict Israel’s military freedom of action, The Jerusalem Post has learned.

Shin Bet Director David Zini warned ministers that Hamas views the proposed demilitarization process as a strategic opportunity to buy time and constrain Israel rather than as a path toward genuinely giving up its military capabilities.

Zini told ministers that, from Hamas’s perspective, the roadmap amounted to a “diplomatic October 7,” allowing the terrorist organization to achieve politically what it had failed to achieve militarily.

Zini argued that Hamas was seeking to drag the process out while waiting for Israel’s October elections and hoping Israel would be prevented from resuming military operations during that period.

The Post separately reported Friday that Zini told the security cabinet Hamas viewed the agreement as a way to “trap Israel” and limit its ability to operate militarily in Gaza in the coming months.

“They are dragging their feet,” Zini told ministers, according to sources cited by the Post. “They are waiting for the elections, and then they will see what happens.”

Ministers oppose 14-day preparatory period

The immediate dispute centers on a proposed 14-day preparatory period before implementation of the next phase.

According to Israeli officials cited by the Post, cabinet ministers broadly opposed Israel taking steps that could be interpreted as entering that period because it would require restrictions on Israeli military operations, including targeted strikes against Hamas operatives.

Walla similarly reported that Israel had neither signed nor formally approved the Board of Peace’s demilitarization roadmap and had raised significant objections to the proposed arrangements.

The dispute highlights a continuing gap between Jerusalem and Washington over how the next phase should begin.

Israel has demanded genuine and verifiable demilitarization of Gaza and has insisted that Hamas cannot retain military capabilities while the IDF withdraws further. The Trump administration and its Board of Peace have promoted a phased process combining Hamas disarmament, the establishment of a Palestinian technocratic administration, deployment of an International Stabilization Force and further Israeli withdrawals.

The 15-point roadmap published by the Board of Peace last week calls for both sides to complete outstanding commitments under the previous agreement before mechanisms for implementing Phase 2 are finalized during a 14-day period.

Conflicting reports over international force

The status of the proposed multinational force remains less clear.

The Post has learned that a separate document regulating deployment of the force remained unsigned following Israeli objections and that Israel had yet to formally authorize its entry under the new arrangements.

However, the Post further learned that the government had approved the entry of approximately 200 members of a multinational force under American pressure. Bohbot also reported that targeted killings in Gaza had recently been halted.

Reuters reported on July 26 that the security cabinet had approved a legal framework allowing a roughly 200-member International Stabilization Force to enter Gaza, while noting that each national contingent would still require individual Israeli approval.

The reports may reflect a distinction between Israel’s earlier approval in principle of a legal framework and final approval of the force’s actual deployment and operating arrangements.

Preparations outside Israel are nevertheless moving ahead. Uganda’s parliament voted Thursday to authorize the deployment of Ugandan troops to Gaza if required as part of the international force. Reuters reported that the broader Trump plan remained stalled and that it was unclear when the force would deploy.

This post was originally published on here.

[Video below.] An alleged antisemitic confrontation at Manila’s international airport erupted into a physical altercation after an American traveler reportedly directed hateful remarks at an Israeli passenger, including praise for Adolf Hitler. Authorities intervened, detained both men, and launched a legal investigation into the incident.

The confrontation unfolded at Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in the Philippine capital, where an American passenger allegedly hurled antisemitic insults at an Israeli traveler while both were waiting to board separate domestic flights. The exchange escalated into a fight before airport police arrived to restore order.

Philippine media reported that the incident took place in the airport’s domestic departure terminal. The Israeli, 37, and the American, 54, were each preparing to fly to Cebu when the dispute broke out.

According to the Israeli passenger, the American repeatedly directed antisemitic abuse toward him, referring to him as a “Jewish baby killer.” He also alleged that the man declared, “Hitler was right. It’s a shame Hitler didn’t finish killing the Jews.”

What began as a verbal exchange quickly turned physical. During the struggle, a marble table near one of the terminal’s food vendors was reportedly damaged.

The American passenger disputed that account, claiming the Israeli interrupted what had been a private conversation before attacking him without any justification.

Airport police officers responded to the disturbance, separated the two individuals, and took both into custody for questioning. They were later transported to Pasay City General Hospital to undergo medical evaluations.

The following day, the matter was forwarded to the Pasay City Prosecutor’s Office, where legal proceedings began over allegations that both men were involved in disturbing the peace.

WATCH:

VIDEO-2026-08-08-21-45-53

https://matzav.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/VIDEO-2026-08-08-21-45-53.mp4

{Matzav.com}

WK Kellogg announced Thursday that it will eliminate artificial colors from its entire cereal lineup by the end of this year, accelerating its original timetable by a full year as consumer demand and regulatory pressure continue to grow.

The company had previously pledged to remove synthetic food dyes from all of its cereals by the end of 2027. Thursday’s announcement moves that deadline forward to the close of 2026.

Kellogg said it has successfully developed fruit- and vegetable-based color alternatives that will replace artificial dyes while preserving the familiar appearance of cereals such as Froot Loops and Apple Jacks. The Battle Creek, Michigan-based manufacturer also said it has invested in new production equipment to support the transition to naturally derived colors.

In addition to eliminating synthetic dyes, the company announced it is removing BHT, an artificial preservative, from the small number of cereal products that still contain the ingredient.

“More and more consumers are looking for foods made with simple, recognizable ingredients and we are proud to meet those expectations even sooner than planned,” Kellogg Chief Growth Officer Doug VanDeVelde said in a statement.

Kellogg has faced mounting pressure for years to eliminate artificial ingredients from its cereals, changes the company has already implemented in countries including Canada. In 2024, dozens of demonstrators gathered outside the company’s headquarters and delivered petitions bearing approximately 400,000 signatures urging Kellogg to remove both artificial food dyes and BHT from its products.

The push intensified under President Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has repeatedly encouraged food manufacturers to phase out petroleum-based artificial colorings. Last August, Kellogg also entered into an agreement with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton committing to “permanently remove toxic dyes” from its cereals by the end of 2027.

Major retailers have also added pressure by changing their own product standards. Earlier this year, Target announced it would stop selling cereals containing artificial colors by the end of May, while Walmart said it plans to eliminate artificial colors from all of its private-label food products by January 2027.

A devastating tragedy struck when four-year-old Sholom Seginer tragically drowned while vacationing with his family in Mexico.

Sholom was a son of Rav Assaf and Mrs. Rivka Seginer, and a grandson of Rav Shalom Arush, rosh mosdos Chut Shel Chessed.

According to reports received from Mexico following Shabbos, the young child drowned in a swimming pool while the family was on a vacation. Local emergency personnel rushed to the scene and performed prolonged resuscitation efforts, but despite their desperate attempts, they were forced to pronounce his passing.

In a statement released by the grieving family, they wrote: “Baruch Dayan HaEmes. Death has entered our window with the bitter news of the passing of the pure child Sholom Seginer, son of Rabbi Assaf and Rivka, grandson of ybl”cht”a HaGaon Rabbi Shalom Arush. Only 4 years old, a pure and spotless soul has ascended. May Hashem comfort us and heal our broken hearts.”

Details regarding the levayah and arrangements to bring the aron to Eretz Yisroel will be announced as they become available.

Tehei nishmaso tzerurah bitzror hachaim.

{Matzav.com}

Federal Reserve officials are beginning to look beyond the promise of artificial intelligence and toward the financial system being built around it, raising questions about whether the scale of borrowing, data-center construction and interconnected investment could eventually create risks outside the technology sector itself.

New York Fed President John Williams said he does not currently see conditions resembling the housing bubble that preceded the 2008 financial crisis, arguing that much of the AI investment is being driven by large, profitable companies with substantial capacity to fund expansion. 

Kansas City Fed President Jeff Schmid has been more cautious. He said the financing structures surrounding the AI buildout deserve closer scrutiny and questioned whether the sector could eventually become “too big to fail” if enough lenders, utilities, developers and technology companies become dependent on the same growth assumptions. 

The shift matters because the central question is no longer only whether AI companies are overvalued. Regulators are starting to ask what happens to the rest of the financial system if expected returns from the buildout do not materialize.

San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly has similarly pointed to the speed and size of investment commitments as something policymakers need to watch. Many projects remain planned rather than completed, limiting the immediate risk, but higher leverage and increasingly complex financing arrangements could become more significant as construction accelerates. 

The AI expansion now stretches well beyond chipmakers. Data-center developers are borrowing to build facilities, utilities are committing billions of dollars to new generation and transmission capacity, landlords are financing specialized real estate, and private-credit funds are supplying capital to companies across the infrastructure chain.

That creates a different kind of risk than a simple decline in technology stocks. If AI demand disappoints, losses could move through property values, power contracts, private loans and corporate balance sheets even if the largest technology companies themselves remain financially strong.

The Federal Reserve is not signaling that a crisis is developing. Williams has explicitly pushed back on comparisons with the pre-2008 housing market, while other officials describe the issue as something that should be monitored before vulnerabilities become large enough to threaten financial stability. 

For businesses and investors, the message is increasingly clear: the AI boom is becoming a financing story as much as a technology story. The more capital that gets committed on the assumption of continued exponential demand, the more important it becomes to know who ultimately carries the risk if that demand falls short.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

© JBizNews.com All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

A 20-year-old woman was killed Friday afternoon in a serious crash on the Garden State Parkway, New Jersey State Police confirmed.

The crash occurred at approximately 2:57 p.m. on the northbound Parkway near milepost 75.8 in Lacey, Ocean County.

Troopers say a Toyota sedan traveling northbound veered off the roadway and struck the guiderail. The Toyota then re-entered the roadway and collided with a Hyundai sedan traveling in the same direction.

Two rear-seat occupants of the Toyota were ejected in the crash. One of them, identified as 20-year-old Iisiz Lopez of New York, N.Y., sustained fatal injuries.

The Toyota was being operated by 26-year-old Johan Mendez of New York, N.Y., and was occupied by four passengers. Mendez, the other passengers and an infant sustained minor injuries and were transported to an area hospital.

The driver of the Hyundai also sustained minor injuries.

The crash remains under investigation.

Saudi Arabia’s accession to the Abraham Accords could become one of the most important diplomatic achievements in Israel’s history. Normalization with the largest and most influential kingdom in the Arab world could reshape the Middle East, open new trade routes, strengthen the moderate camp against Iran, and grant Israel unprecedented legitimacy in the region.

But there is one price Israel must not agree to pay for that achievement.

Allowing Saudi Arabia to develop an independent uranium enrichment capability should set off alarm bells in Jerusalem.

According to Reuters, the agreement would not require the kingdom to adopt the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Additional Protocol, which permits more intrusive inspections, including access to undeclared sites.

This would make it fundamentally different from the agreement signed by the United States and the United Arab Emirates, under which Abu Dhabi renounced uranium enrichment and the reprocessing of nuclear fuel.

There is nothing inherently wrong with Saudi Arabia’s desire to build nuclear reactors for energy production. Many countries operate such reactors, and the kingdom is seeking to diversify its energy sources as part of its Vision 2030 program.

The problem lies elsewhere. Uranium enrichment is not necessary to operate nuclear power plants. Nuclear fuel can be purchased from other countries, as many nations around the world already do.

The distinction between a civilian nuclear reactor and an independent enrichment capability is critical. The technology used to enrich uranium to low levels for use in reactors can, if a political decision is made and the necessary infrastructure is available, also be used to advance toward the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons.

The debate, therefore, is not about Saudi Arabia’s right to nuclear energy. It is about why the kingdom needs the most sensitive component of the nuclear fuel cycle.

The concern is not theoretical. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has publicly stated that if Iran obtains a nuclear weapon, Saudi Arabia will also need to acquire one.

Following the confrontations with Iran and the efforts to prevent Tehran from establishing itself as a nuclear threshold state, it would be difficult to explain why an enrichment capability considered dangerous in Iran should suddenly become legitimate when it comes to Saudi Arabia.

Israel cannot base its security policy on the identity of the person currently occupying the palace in Riyadh. Regimes change, leaders are replaced, and alliances shift.

If the US allows one Mideast country to enrich uranium, what’s stopping others from aiming to achieve this as well?

An even greater danger is the potential domino effect.
If Saudi Arabia receives American approval to enrich uranium, why should Turkey forgo a similar capability? Why should Egypt agree to remain behind?

Cairo is already building four nuclear reactors at El Dabaa with a combined capacity of approximately 4,800 megawatts.

Other countries in the region could argue that if Riyadh is permitted to control its own nuclear fuel cycle, there is no reason they should remain dependent on foreign suppliers of enriched uranium.

This is where the real danger of the Saudi precedent lies.

In the Middle East, the balance of power is determined not only by immediate security requirements but also by prestige and regional status. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey has sought for years to establish itself as an independent power, while Egypt regards itself as a leader of the Arab world.

If Saudi Arabia possesses uranium enrichment technology, pressure in Ankara and Cairo to obtain equivalent capabilities could intensify. Other Gulf states may also reassess their positions.

The result could be a race in which no country openly declares that it wants a nuclear bomb, but each seeks to possess the infrastructure that would allow it to move toward one should the need arise.

This may be the most dangerous scenario of all. Instead of a Middle East with a single nuclear power, the region could become home to several threshold states, where one leader’s decision could quickly trigger similar decisions by neighboring countries.

The path toward a Middle East in which several countries possess nuclear threshold capabilities could become significantly shorter.

It is possible to imagine a region in which Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey each possess infrastructure that would allow them to move relatively quickly toward a nuclear weapon if a political decision were made. Egypt, too, could eventually reconsider its policy.

In such a situation, the region would no longer be dealing only with a conventional arms race. It would face a system of mutual suspicion in which every regional crisis could take on a nuclear dimension.
For Israel, this would represent a dangerous strategic transformation.

For decades, Israel has sought to prevent the emergence of a hostile nuclear threat in the Middle East. The prospect of multiple nuclear threshold states is dangerous not only because of their governments’ current intentions, but because the knowledge, centrifuges, and infrastructure remain in place even after governments change.

Supporters of the agreement will argue that American cooperation offers the best way to oversee the Saudi program.

There is logic to that position. If Riyadh turns to China or Russia, Washington’s ability to influence the program could be significantly reduced.

But the solution is not to oppose a Saudi civilian nuclear program. The solution is to adopt the model used with the UAE: nuclear reactors, yes; uranium enrichment and fuel reprocessing, no; strict international oversight, absolutely.
Israel must make this clear, including to its closest ally, the US.

Peace with Saudi Arabia is an important strategic objective. It could create a new alignment of moderate states, strengthen Israel’s economy, and deepen Iran’s regional isolation. Israel should make a major effort to achieve it.

Better to wait years for normalization than risk multiple countries attaining military nuclear capability

But peace agreements are signed with governments. Nuclear capabilities remain for generations.
If the price of Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords is Israeli acceptance of uranium enrichment on Saudi soil, Israel must be prepared to say no.

It would be better to wait several more years for normalization with Riyadh than to wake up a decade from now to a Middle East in which three or four countries are only a political decision away from a military nuclear capability.

Another Abraham Accords agreement would be a historic achievement. Preventing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East is an existential necessity.

When these two objectives conflict, Israel must not confuse one with the other.

The author is the CEO of Radio 100FM, an honorary consul, deputy dean of the consular diplomatic corps, and president of the Israel Radio Communications Association. He previously served as a monitor for Israel’s Army Radio and as a television correspondent for NBC.

This post was originally published on here.

New York City is bracing for what law enforcement officials are describing as a potential security nightmare when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrives in Manhattan next month, with furious NYPD sources warning that Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s rhetoric could turn the annual United Nations security operation into a dangerous “powder keg.”

Netanyahu is expected to visit New York for the United Nations General Assembly and is scheduled to address the world body on September 26. But according to the New York Post, police officials say the Israeli prime minister’s visit could now require a massive, presidential-level security operation amid fears of violent protesters and potential attacks.

“Basically, he’s making what would be considered a Category 1 hurricane that we deal with every year into a Category 5 because of his words,” a law enforcement source told the Post.

The extraordinary concerns center on Mamdani’s repeated attacks against Netanyahu.

Mamdani called for Netanyahu’s arrest during his 2025 mayoral campaign and reiterated the threat last month before acknowledging that the NYPD does not have the authority to carry it out.

He subsequently urged his supporters to “take to the streets” during Netanyahu’s visit, saying that “one of the bedrocks of our city is protest.”

Those comments have infuriated members of law enforcement who say the NYPD already faces an enormous challenge protecting Netanyahu and scores of other world leaders during the General Assembly.

“We have to protect hotels, we have to protect wherever [dignitaries] go out to eat, we have to protect everything,” one law enforcement source told the Post. “Having the mayor say, ‘Go ahead and protest, and he should be arrested’ . . . is unfair to your own cops.”

Netanyahu’s complete New York itinerary has not yet been finalized, meaning the precise size of his security detail remains undetermined.

Police sources said the operation surrounding Netanyahu could involve 60 or more officers assigned to “direct and peripheral” protection. By comparison, most visiting dignitaries receive a detail consisting of one sergeant and eight detectives. Federal and state law enforcement officers will also be involved, along with Israeli security personnel.

But police sources say their greatest concern is that Mamdani’s rhetoric could embolden radical demonstrators to cross the line from protesting into violence.

“What’s going to stop one of the protesters from becoming a vigilante and trying to hurt or God forbid kill him?” one source said.

Officers are also concerned that protesters who believe they are acting in support of the mayor’s position could attack police.

Such unrest, one source warned, “could cause an officer to get hurt or even killed.”

Another law enforcement source pointed to the chilling attempted bombing outside Gracie Mansion in March as evidence that the threat of politically motivated violence in New York cannot be dismissed.

In that incident, two Pennsylvania men allegedly inspired by ISIS attempted to detonate two bombs among people attending a protest outside the mayoral residence. Police officials reportedly fear that Netanyahu’s highly charged visit could provide another potential target for extremists.

“His rhetoric is reckless,” a law enforcement source said of Mamdani. “It emboldens radical and unstable agitators who could put both New Yorkers and law enforcement officers in harm’s way.”

A City Hall insider expressed similar fears, describing the situation surrounding Netanyahu’s upcoming visit as potentially explosive.

“It’s very concerning,” the insider told the Post. “I mean, [Mamdani’s] rhetoric has clearly caused this uptick in antisemitism all across our city, and now telling people to go out and protest is going to create a powder keg of a situation.”

“It’s not the mayor’s job to tell people to protest and to urge them to protest,” the source continued. “It’s likely to be very violent. And I mean, what on Earth is this accomplishing?”

“It’s completely irresponsible,” the source added.

The concerns come as NYPD statistics cited by the Post show that 56.9% of all hate crimes recorded in New York City have been antisemitic, despite Jews comprising approximately 10% of the city’s population. Overall hate crimes have reportedly increased 9.4% this year even as the city has recorded significant declines across all seven major crime categories.

Detectives Endowment Association President Scott Munro issued a blistering statement accusing Mamdani of making an already difficult assignment even more dangerous for police.

“Mayor Mamdani’s reckless rhetoric surrounding Netanyahu and his calls for protests only fan the flames — making the assignment of protecting UNGA dignitaries even more difficult,” Munro said.

Munro noted that NYPD officers and detectives are still recovering from injuries suffered during unrest in Midtown surrounding the NBA Finals.

“Our detectives will do their job, as they always do,” Munro said. “It’s time for the mayor to do his — stand with the city and the men and women in blue protecting it, not with those on the radical protest line.”

The NYPD said the size and scope of Netanyahu’s protection will ultimately be determined based on an assessment of the threats surrounding his visit.

“As we do every year, the NYPD works with the Secret Service, the State Department, and other federal agencies to provide protection to foreign dignitaries traveling to NYC based on the level of threat assessed,” an NYPD spokesperson said.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Hackers have targeted more than 200 prominent U.S. companies over the past month in a coordinated campaign aimed heavily at Wall Street, using fake corporate login pages and phone calls impersonating internal IT staff to steal employee credentials and multifactor-authentication codes.

The targets included Blackstone, Apollo Global Management, KKR, Bain Capital, TPG, Bridgewater Associates, CME Group and Moody’s, according to Google threat intelligence and internet data reviewed by Reuters. Hedge funds including Point72, Two Sigma and Citadel were also targeted, along with companies outside finance such as Uber, Zillow and Levi Strauss. 

The attack method was strikingly simple. Hackers created websites designed to look like legitimate company portals, then called employees while pretending to be technical-support staff. Victims were directed to the fake sites and asked to enter passwords and temporary authentication codes, allowing attackers to bypass security systems that normally require more than a password.

The campaign shows why the most expensive cybersecurity infrastructure can still fail when attackers convince employees to voluntarily surrender the credentials protecting it.

Google said the hackers appeared primarily motivated by money and had demanded ransoms from some victims. It did not identify which companies were successfully breached, though it confirmed that some organizations caught in the broader campaign paid attackers. The groups have operated under several aliases, including Redact, Pink, Falcon and Helix, and their precise identities remain unclear. 

Financial firms are particularly attractive because a compromised employee account can provide access not only to internal communications but to investment information, client records, transaction data and proprietary systems. For private-equity and hedge-fund firms, even information that never results in a direct cash theft can carry enormous value if it exposes transactions, portfolio strategy or trading activity.

The campaign also complicates a security practice many companies have treated as sufficient: multifactor authentication. Temporary codes are effective against stolen passwords, but they offer far less protection when an employee is tricked into giving both the password and authentication code directly to the attacker.

For businesses, the operational response increasingly requires procedures outside the software itself. Employees need a separate way to verify whether someone claiming to be from internal IT actually initiated a call, while privileged accounts may require authentication methods that cannot be relayed over the phone.

The broader lesson is that cybercrime is shifting toward the employee rather than simply attacking the machine. As companies spend more on firewalls, monitoring systems and identity controls, criminals are increasingly targeting the person authorized to get through them.

JBizNews Desk | New York

© JBizNews.com All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

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NEW YORK (VINnews) — A Florida teacher was fired for giving her students zeros for missing assignments.

Diane Tirado has been a teacher for years. Most recently, she was an eighth-grade history teacher at Westgate K-8 School in Port St. Lucie, Florida. Diane recently gave her students two weeks to complete an Explorer notebook project, but several students simply didn’t hand it in. Since there was zero work done, Diane gave them zeros.

She got fired for it, because the elementary school has a rule called the “no zero policy.”

The lowest possible grade that teachers can give students is a 50, even if they don’t turn anything in. That means that an extremely poor completed assignment is worth the same number of points as no assignment at all.

It’s a rule that Diane, unsurprisingly, does not agree with. After she was fired for disobeying, she left her students a charming goodbye message on the whiteboard.

“Bye kids. Mrs. Tirado loves you and wishes you the best in life. I have been fired for refusing to give you a 50 percent for not handing anything in. Love, Mrs. Tirado”

The scale, as outlined by the school, reads as follows:

A = 90 to 100
B = 80 to 89
C = 70-79
D = 60-69
F = 50-59

Diane later shared the story on Facebook, hoping to spread awareness about the school’s policy.

“A grade in Mrs. Tirado’s class is earned,” she said.

“I’m so upset because we have a nation of kids that are expecting to get paid and live their life just for showing up and it’s not real.”

Diane’s post has gone viral, and most commenters agree with her position, stating that it’s not fair to hand out grades for work that doesn’t exist.

No zero policies are common in many schools, and teachers notoriously hate them, but it’s at least worth considering why they exist. Some educators say it’s because when a student earns a zero, it’s very difficult for them to ever recover their grade in that class. In other words, it may be too harsh. Others argue that, if you don’t want a zero, don’t turn in nothing! Getting an earned zero is a great way to learn to at least try.

A follow up statement from the school stated: “Ms. Tirado was released from her duties as an instructor because her performance was deemed sub-standard and her interactions with students, staff, and parents lacked professionalism and created a toxic culture on the school’s campus. … During her brief time of employment at West Gate, the school fielded numerous student and parent complaints as well as concerns from colleagues. Based on new information shared with school administrators, an investigation of possible physical abuse is underway.”

However, school representatives did not deny the existence of the no zero policy, and Tirado claims the school engaged in a smear campaign after she became a “whistleblower” on their policies. She’s currently considering legal action against the district.

Still, the debate over the grading policy rages on.

“The reason I took on this fight was because it was ridiculous. Teaching should not be this hard,” Diane said.

Verizon experienced an outage Saturday afternoon, with Downdetector showing more than 12,000 reports by 4:25 p.m. ET.

“We are aware of an issue impacting voice services for wireless customers in some parts of the U.S.,” the company confirmed to FOX Business. “Our engineers are engaged, and we are working quickly to identify and resolve the issue.”

Verizon asked customers to look up their status on their Check Network Status page for updates on service.”

“We know how much people rely on Verizon and apologize for any inconvenience. We appreciate your patience,” the spokesperson added.

Users also flooded social media to try to figure out what was going on.

“Verizon is down. Looks pretty widespread based on posts. Can’t make or receive calls,” one person wrote on X, while another commented: “Nationwide Verizon outage, phone calls not going through, so far everyone I know is impacted doesn’t matter what state you are in.”

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — A Golani Brigade soldier in training from the Hasmonean Brigade was seriously wounded Tuesday evening in an apparent weapons-related accident at the Tabbatz base in the Jordan Valley. The soldier, a Chabad Hasid, was evacuated to a hospital for medical treatment, and his family was notified.

Following the incident, an investigation by the IDF Military Police Criminal Investigations Division (MPCID) was opened. According to an initial IDF inquiry, first reported by Kan News, the incident occurred at around 9 p.m., when soldiers undergoing training in the Hasmonean Brigade were given personal time before lights-out and bedtime.

Three soldiers entered their room and locked the door. According to the preliminary findings, they allegedly played with their weapons, competing to see who could cock his weapon more quickly.

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One of the soldiers, according to the initial inquiry, inserted a magazine into his weapon, continued playing, disengaged the safety, and pulled the trigger. The bullet struck another soldier, seriously injuring him.

Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif on Saturday claimed that Israel is an “illegitimate” country and “the Islamic world must unite to confront the common threat posed by Israel.”

His statement came a day after Pakistan signed a joint defense agreement with Saudi Arabia and Turkey in Mecca on Friday.

Speaking in an interview with a Pakistani news outlet, Asif said. “Israel poses a threat to all of us. Islamic countries must adopt a coordinated approach to address this threat.”

“Israel is a product of the Balfour Declaration, which was established in the 1940s as an illegitimate state, and it could pose a direct threat to any of the countries in the region,” he added, perhaps unaware that a similar declaration also established Pakistan as a country in 1947.

(YWN’s Jerusalem desk is keeping you updated after tzeis ha’Shabbos in Israel)

A vessel owned by Abu Dhabi’s state-owned ADNOC oil and gas company was attacked while transiting the Strait of Hormuz, Emirati authorities said Saturday. The Foreign Ministry said Iran fired the missile as part of attacks on commercial shipping.

ADNOC in a statement said there were no casualties following the attack early Saturday. The company said over a dozen of its vessels have been attacked by missiles and drones while transiting the strait since the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran in February. One crew member has been killed and 20 others wounded, it said.

ADNOC didn’t elaborate on the attack’s location or any damage.

Later, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center said a vessel east of the town of Khasab, Oman, had been struck by a projectile that caused a fire that was put out, with the vessel and crew safe. It was not clear whether this was the ADNOC incident.

(AP)

(YWN’s Jerusalem desk is keeping you updated after tzeis ha’Shabbos in Israel)

In a blatant violation of the ceasefire, Hezbollah launched an explosive drone on Friday toward IDF forces in southern Lebanon.

No injuries or damage were reported.

The IDF chose not to disclose the incident to the public but confirmed the details when questioned by Ynet. According to Kan News, the decision not to publicize the attack was made by Northern Command chief Maj. Gen. Rafi Milo.

According to the report, the IDF believes that the drone attack was part of a Hezbollah effort to help terrorists escape from an underground tunnel network in the Ali Taher Ridge area.

The IDF spokesperson later issued a statement saying: “The IDF releases information to the public based strictly on relevant operational considerations and situational assessments. The IDF spokesperson will not publish any information that, according to operational assessments, could endanger our forces operating in combat zones.”

(YWN’s Jerusalem desk is keeping you updated after tzeis ha’Shabbos in Israel)

Household affordability challenges are leading some consumers to consider refinancing their auto loans to save money on monthly payments.

Stephanie Roberts, director of auto products at PenFed Credit Union, told FOX Business that expanded access to credit terms has allowed consumers to more easily check the rates available to them as they consider refinancing.

“I think consumers from a credit education standpoint are more educated than ever on the health of their credit, so they’re taking out those refinances,” Roberts said, noting that many banking and personal finance apps give consumers access to their credit scores.

“A lot of lenders, PenFed included, are allowing for consumers to check their rate by way of soft pull… without any impact to their credit score or promises that I’m going to go through this process, and I think that’s why a lot of people are now seeing that refinance is a fruitful option for them, where it hadn’t been like that in the past,” she said.

Roberts said that PenFed is “proactively going after consumers where we can see that your rate is higher than what we have to offer in a pre-approval process,” adding that, “As a credit union, we care about our members’ financial health, so we really want them to save money when they can, where they can.”

“It doesn’t sound like a lot initially, but when you think about it over the life of the rest of the loan, it really does add up,” she said, noting that inflation is squeezing household budgets for necessities like groceries and gas. “That $100 can go a long way when it comes to monthly expenses.”

Improvements in the durability of vehicles have also made refinancing auto loans more viable, as cars are able to hold more of their value and stay operational longer.

“Cars are staying on the road longer than they ever have. Right now, the life of a car is about 13 years, there’s just been enhancements in technology and engines and things that are keeping them on the road,” Roberts said.

She said that affordability challenges with purchasing new cars are also contributing to consumers keeping their cars longer, so refinancing is “naturally coming into play as an option.”

Roberts outlined the steps a person considering refinancing an auto loan should consider before making any commitments.

“The very first thing that you should do is look at the value of your car,” she said, noting that there are a range of free tools that allow consumers to check. That process allows them to see if it makes sense financially to refinance their car “because if you owe more than the value, it becomes a harder conversation.”

She said the second thing consumers should do is look at their pre-approval options to see if their options for interest rates are lower than what they are paying. That will allow them to consider whether refinancing makes sense given their equity position in the vehicle.

Roberts added that consumers ought to consider whether a loan term extension would make sense for them in the refinancing process, as it may allow them to save more on payments if it makes sense given the car’s initial valuation.

Some lenders, including PenFed, offer a cash-out refinancing option, which Roberts added can even take the form of a title loan for paid-off vehicles. That can make sense for consumers who are looking at either a personal loan or using their credit card as an alternative to taking the equity out of the car, she said.

Medicaid spending on a top autism therapy has surged past $5 billion, drawing scrutiny over fraud and how taxpayer dollars are being spent.

Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), one of the most common treatments for children with autism, uses structured, one-on-one sessions to build communication, social and daily living skills. Between 2018 and 2024, Medicaid providers paid out more than $5.15 billion under an ABA billing code. Three providers received roughly $685 million in Medicaid reimbursements during that period.

The data alone does not explain why those reimbursements were so high, and billing experts say unusually large payments can reflect a variety of factors.

Officials at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) told Fox News Digital it has observed “significant growth” in Medicaid spending on ABA therapy in recent years.

“While access to medically necessary services remains a priority, rapid program growth also underscores the importance of ensuring services are clinically appropriate, delivered by qualified providers, and supported by strong program integrity safeguards,” a CMS spokesperson said.

As spending has grown, federal prosecutors have pursued multimillion-dollar fraud cases involving ABA providers.

In May, two Minnesota autism clinic operators were charged with allegedly billing Medicaid $46.6 million for services prosecutors say were unnecessary or never provided. Another Minnesota woman pleaded guilty in a separate $14 million Medicaid autism fraud scheme.

Investigations by The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times have also documented allegations that some providers billed for services that were never provided, inflated therapy hours and aggressively expanded as Medicaid spending surged.

The scrutiny comes as the Trump administration has made it a focus of his second term to eliminate fraud, waste and abuse across federal programs, including Medicaid, a central policy priority.

Meanwhile, states have responded differently.

Florida says it recovered more than $72 million in improper Medicaid payments over the past year.

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis recently announced a statewide Medicaid Integrity Initiative to strengthen provider screening, enhance fraud detection and increase oversight.

While Florida has focused on strengthening fraud enforcement, Georgia lawmakers have focused on reimbursement rates, even as industry representatives testified that use of autism therapy services has increased by more than 300% in recent years.

The debate reflects the difficult balance between rooting out fraud and preserving access to a therapy that many families say has been life-changing for children with autism.

After an uproar of social media backlash over what custom messages Coca-Cola permits on its personalized cans, a Fox News Digital investigation into the platform’s moderation rules reveals an inconsistent system.

Testing various words and phrases in the 18-character-or-less requirement, the Coke can customization blocks mainstream religious phrases like “Jesus is Lord” and political slogans like “Make America Great,” while permitting left-wing activism, right-wing group names and even terms associated with child exploitation.

Religious and faith-based expressions seemed to face strict algorithmic suppression compared to secular or alternative viewpoints. Mainstream affirmations like “Jesus is Lord” and “Allah is Lord” are blocked, while anti-theist and secular phrases like “God is Dead” and “Atheist Pride,” alongside religious greetings like “Shalom” and “Buddha Bless,” are allowed.

This message popped up for rejected phrase or words: “The name or phrase you’ve submitted is not permitted. Names and phrases may not be permitted if they belong to a business, organization, celebrity, public figure, school, team or other trademark, are religious or political in nature, or could be considered inappropriate or unsuitable for other reasons.”

Patriotic or right-leaning slogans like “Make America Great,” along with any specific political leader names and all racial or identity pride phrases (“White Pride,” “Black Pride,” “Black Lives Matter”), are not permitted on personalized Coke cans. However, left-wing political slogans like “Defund the Police” and controversial political groups like the far-right “Proud Boys” are acceptable.

Another political disparity appeared when Fox News Digital found that “Stand with Israel” is allowed, while “Free Palestine” is blocked, highlighting arbitrary geopolitical enforcement.

Though benign religious and political terms are flagged, extreme and harmful phrases like “Pedophile Pride” and “MAP Pride” (Minor-Attracted Person) are permitted by the filter, as of Friday afternoon.

Additionally, basic text loophole tactics — like adding spaces (“P e d o p h i l e”) or numbers (“Wh1t3 Pr1d3”) — bypassed the system’s security rules.

While the online customization tool generates real-time digital previews, Coca-Cola’s site terms state that submitted text may require additional review before an order is physically printed and shipped.

“We created the Share A Coke personalization tool for Coca-Cola fans to celebrate with one another and make connections by creating bottles and cans with special names or phrases on them,” a Coca-Cola spokesperson told Fox News Digital. **“**We are aware of a technical issue affecting the personalization preview tool and are working to address it.” 

“While we review and take corrective action, we have disabled the preview feature and paused new personalized product orders after becoming aware that it has been used to generate content previews using restricted terms that do not align with our guidelines,” the spokesperson continued. “All personalization orders are subject to moderation review after submission, and we have safeguards in place to prevent the approval and production of cans and bottles featuring religious, political, trademarked, inappropriate, or otherwise restricted terms and phrases. We will continue to enhance this tool based on consumer feedback.”

This is not the first time Coca-Cola’s automated customization filters have drawn public scrutiny. Previous iterations of the brand’s online customization engine faced similar criticism in 2021 over inconsistent word blocks regarding political, religious and social movement terms.

A Wizz Air flight from Rome to Tel Aviv was thrown into chaos moments before takeoff on Friday after a passenger unexpectedly requested to leave the aircraft, triggering a security response that forced all passengers to deplane and delayed the flight. It was later determined that the man had asked to get off because he feared the delayed departure would lead to chilul Shabbos.

The incident unfolded just before departure, after boarding had already been completed. According to passengers, the man suddenly insisted on leaving the aircraft without initially explaining his reason. His unusual behavior raised alarm among fellow travelers, prompting the captain to halt the flight while Israeli security personnel and local police were called to inspect the aircraft.

Under standard airport security procedures, once a checked passenger leaves an aircraft, that passenger’s luggage must also be removed from the cargo hold before the flight can continue. As crews began unloading the baggage, many of the approximately 300 passengers believed the flight had been canceled.

Passengers said the cabin crew had already announced that boarding was complete when the man unexpectedly requested to deplane.

“The flight attendant announced that boarding had ended, and then this man decided he wanted to get off the flight,” said M., a passenger on board. “He didn’t explain himself, he didn’t give any reason why he wanted to leave, he didn’t communicate with anyone, not in English and not in Italian. He didn’t even apologize. An entire plane was standing there because of him, and he wouldn’t even look at us. His behavior was very, very strange.”

As passengers waited for security forces to arrive, anxiety spread throughout the cabin.

“He didn’t care that an entire plane was waiting, with Israelis panicking, angry, and frightened,” M. said. “We’re all trying to get home from our vacations. There were many children on board, and above all there was a great deal of panic. He just stared straight ahead as if nothing around him mattered.”

Some passengers grew increasingly suspicious of the man’s conduct, prompting the flight crew to involve police rather than take any chances. The passenger was detained for questioning while everyone on board was escorted back to the terminal.

Authorities then carried out a complete security screening of both the aircraft and all passengers before preparations could begin for a new departure.

“We’re waiting for buses to take us back to the terminal so they can unload our luggage,” M. said. “At the moment, there’s no estimate for when we’ll take off. The flight was canceled because of security reasons that have nothing to do with the passengers, and all we want is to get home safely.”

Following the security investigation, officials determined that the passenger was an observant Jewish man who had requested to leave the aircraft because he feared the delayed departure would result in chilul Shabbos. His request to deplane, however, set in motion the mandatory security procedures that delayed the flight.

Wizz Air disputed reports that the flight had been canceled, saying it was only delayed while the additional security procedures were completed.

“The flight from Rome to Tel Aviv was slightly delayed due to an additional security inspection. Passengers were asked to disembark so the additional inspection could be carried out, and the flight will depart as soon as it is completed. The safety of our passengers and crew remains the airline’s highest priority,” the airline said.

{Matzav.com}

Although the 2028 presidential election remains years away, early prediction markets are already shifting, with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez edging past California Gov. Gavin Newsom in one closely watched betting market.

According to the latest market figures, Ocasio-Cortez now holds an implied 11% chance of winning the presidency, narrowly surpassing Newsom, whose odds stand at 10%. The change comes after the two Democratic figures traded places in recent days, putting the New York congresswoman slightly ahead of the California governor.

The shift has prompted renewed discussion about the Democratic Party’s future following another difficult election cycle. Supporters of Ocasio-Cortez view the market movement as evidence that democratic socialist ideas continue to resonate with younger and more progressive voters. Meanwhile, Newsom’s standing has raised questions about whether his years of high-profile political battles with Republicans will strengthen or weaken his appeal on the national stage.

Even so, Ocasio-Cortez would face significant challenges if she ultimately enters the race. She would be among the youngest candidates seeking the presidency, and Democrats would also be grappling with their recent history of unsuccessful bids by female presidential nominees.

On the Republican side, Vice President JD Vance currently holds the strongest position in the same prediction market, leading the field with an implied 21% chance of winning the presidency.

Market analysts caution that these figures should not be confused with traditional polling. Prediction markets reflect where traders are placing their money, meaning the odds can shift rapidly in response to major news events, endorsements, scandals, or other political developments.

With more than two years remaining before the next presidential election, the current odds are better viewed as an early indicator of market sentiment than as a reliable forecast of the eventual outcome.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine has been privately urging President Donald Trump and senior administration officials to find an “off-ramp” from the war with Iran, arguing that the military options available to the United States are limited and that airpower alone is unlikely to achieve Trump’s stated objectives, CNN reports.

“Caine is looking for an off ramp,” one source familiar with the matter said. Caine has discussed concerns about the military options for escalating the conflict and raised the prospect of finding an off-ramp with other key Cabinet officials, including CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance.

Caine has recently met with some of those officials in an effort to facilitate interagency coordination and ensure they are on the same page ahead of meetings with the president. His goal has been to make clear the limitations and potential pitfalls of the available military options, including those that do not involve putting U.S. troops on the ground.

“I think it is just his way of protecting the military,” one source familiar with Caine’s discussions with other top national security officials said, referring to his approach to the Iran war.

Trump has consistently appeared averse to deploying ground troops in Iran, instead signaling that he believes an air-bombing campaign can force Tehran to accept a deal on his terms. Caine and others in Trump’s Cabinet privately view that outcome as unlikely and have sought to develop alternatives that fit within the president’s own parameters, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions.

Privately, Caine has become increasingly direct about the limits of airpower, reiterating his view that bombing alone is unlikely to achieve Trump’s stated objectives at this stage of the war. He has also become more vocal about the potential second- and third-order consequences of further U.S. escalation.

During consideration of a larger operation, Caine and other Trump officials focused heavily on what could go wrong if the United States escalated, including the possibility that Iran could retaliate against U.S. forces and other targets throughout the region.

Trump ultimately backed away from that operation after speaking with Middle East allies who told him they feared Iranian retaliation, particularly against their energy infrastructure. The president instead ordered a smaller operation targeting Iranian infrastructure.

Caine has also repeatedly raised concerns about dwindling U.S. munitions stockpiles. He raised the issue during at least two recent meetings with Trump in which possible options for escalating the conflict were discussed.

Those warnings predate the war. Before the conflict began, Caine and other military leaders similarly cautioned Trump that a prolonged military campaign could significantly affect U.S. weapons stockpiles, particularly weapons also needed to support Israel and Ukraine.

The munitions shortage is one reason the Pentagon and U.S. Central Command have recently begun reevaluating U.S. military strategy toward Iran. A senior military official at CENTCOM recently sent out a crowdsourcing email seeking new, creative and unconventional ways to pressure and punish Iran.

Caine has nevertheless made clear that the military remains capable of carrying out further operations if ordered. As chairman of the Joint Chiefs, he is responsible for drafting military options for striking Iran, and even before the war he was vocal about the potential downsides of launching a major operation, including concerns over its scale, complexity and the possibility of U.S. casualties.

At the same time, many within the administration and outside analysts believe the only way to decisively defeat Iran would be through a major operation involving ground troops, potentially costing American lives. The Pentagon considers all scenarios, so plans for such an operation exist, but no one in the administration is currently advocating such drastic action.

The focus has therefore increasingly turned toward finding an off-ramp that could give Trump at least a “symbolic” victory while preserving the possibility of a diplomatic breakthrough. That could begin with an agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Caine’s spokesman, Joseph Holstead, declined to discuss the chairman’s private conversations, saying: “We do not discuss the Chairman’s confidential conversations with the President, the Secretary, or other senior leaders, nor do we comment on anonymous, agenda-driven characterizations of those conversations by sources who were not privy to them.”

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito says he has no plans to step down, confirming that he will remain on the nation’s highest court for another term and ending speculation that President Donald Trump could soon have the opportunity to nominate a fourth justice.

“Obviously I’m here for another term,” Alito told The Wall Street Journal in an interview published Friday.

Alito’s remarks appear to settle months of questions about whether the 76-year-old justice would retire before or during the court’s upcoming term.

Earlier this year, retirement rumors gained traction after National Public Radio mistakenly reported that Alito intended to leave the bench. The report was later withdrawn after the Supreme Court confirmed that the claim was false, according to The Associated Press.

With Alito remaining in place, the Supreme Court will begin its next term with its current 6-3 conservative majority unchanged.

The court’s conservative wing consists of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett. The liberal bloc is made up of Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

Overall, six of the court’s nine members were appointed by Republican presidents, while the remaining three were nominated by Democratic presidents.

During his first term, President Trump appointed Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, appointments that solidified the court’s conservative majority following Barrett’s confirmation in 2020.

Had Alito chosen to retire, Trump would likely have had the opportunity to appoint a fourth justice, potentially replacing one of the court’s most conservative members with a younger jurist who could serve for decades.

Instead, Alito’s decision leaves the ideological makeup of the court unchanged heading into the new term.

The Supreme Court’s composition has become an increasingly contentious political issue, with many Democrats and liberal advocacy groups continuing to push for legislation that would expand the size of the court.

House Democratic leaders have endorsed a proposal to increase the number of justices from nine to 13 by adding four new seats.

Republicans and other critics have characterized the proposal as court-packing, arguing that expanding the court would allow a future Democratic president and Senate to dramatically shift its ideological balance.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has accused House Democrats of attempting to “rig” the Supreme Court after some lawmakers proposed adding four additional justices.

Grassley argued in June that Democrats support expanding the court because they disagree with many of its recent decisions and hope to fill the new seats with liberal nominees.

Supporters of expansion counter that increasing the number of justices would restore what they view as ideological balance and strengthen public confidence in the judiciary.

One organization advocating the proposal, Supreme 13, contends that a 13-member court would correspond with the nation’s 13 federal judicial circuits and would help address what it describes as decades of Republican-appointed dominance on the bench.

The idea has been debated before. In 2021, Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation to expand the Supreme Court from nine justices to 13, though the measure ultimately failed to become law.

The U.S. Constitution does not specify how many justices must serve on the Supreme Court, leaving Congress with the authority to determine the court’s size.

The court has consisted of nine justices since 1869, following several changes in its membership during the 19th century.

Opponents of expansion argue that enlarging the court for political purposes would threaten judicial independence and encourage an endless cycle of both parties adding seats whenever they control both Congress and the White House.

For now, Alito’s decision ensures that the court’s 6-3 conservative majority remains intact while eliminating, at least for the time being, the prospect of another Trump appointment to the Supreme Court.

It also guarantees that the debate over the future makeup of the nation’s highest court will continue to play out in the political arena, including during the 2026 midterm elections and the 2028 presidential campaign.

{Matzav.com}

In a landmark development for the Upper East Side’s Orthodox Jewish community, Manhattan’s historic Park East Synagogue and Chabad-Lubavitch of the Upper East Side have announced a major partnership that will officially begin this Rosh Hashanah, bringing together two of the neighborhood’s most influential Torah institutions.

As part of the new arrangement, Rav Arthur Schneier, the internationally known diplomat and longtime Rav of Park East—whose tenure is the longest of any congregational Rav in New York City’s history—will be joined by Rav Ben Tzion Krasnianski, who has led Chabad of the Upper East Side for decades and will now also serve as Associate Rav of Park East Synagogue. Rav Yosef Wilhelm, who heads Chabad Young Professionals Upper East Side, has been appointed Assistant Rav.

“This collaboration brings together two vibrant Jewish communities with a shared commitment to Torah, prayer, education, and acts of kindness,” Rav Schneier and Park East President Les Lieberman wrote in a letter to members of the kehillah. “By working together, we will be able to expand the opportunities available to our members and create an even more dynamic and welcoming synagogue experience.”

The agreement, which received unanimous approval from Park East’s Board of Trustees, will relocate the majority of Chabad of the Upper East Side’s programming into Park East’s historic building on East 67th Street. Among the initiatives moving to the new location are Chabad Young Professionals, Friendship Circle, Chabad Young Families, and the Upper East Side Kollel and Adult Education Center.

Chabad’s mikvah and preschool will continue operating from the Schneerson Center for Jewish Life on East 77th Street.

Founded in 1890 as Congregation Zichron Ephraim, Park East Synagogue has served as one of Manhattan’s oldest Orthodox kehillos for 136 years. Its distinctive Moorish- and Byzantine-style building on East 67th Street was designated a New York City Landmark in 1980 and added to the National Register of Historic Places three years later.

Rav Schneier assumed the rabbonus of Park East in 1962. Born in Vienna in 1930, he witnessed Kristallnacht as a child and survived the Holocaust while hiding in Nazi-occupied Budapest before eventually immigrating to the United States. Over the decades, he became a leading advocate for Soviet Jewry and numerous other Jewish causes. President Bill Clinton awarded him the Presidential Citizens Medal, praising him for “devoting a lifetime to overcoming forces of hatred and intolerance.”

Under Rav Schneier’s leadership, Park East Synagogue became known not only as a prominent Orthodox synagogue, but also as a meeting place where world leaders, diplomats, ambassadors, and religious figures from across the globe regularly visited and addressed the kehillah.

In recent years, the synagogue also found itself at the center of anti-Israel and antisemitic demonstrations. While protesters targeted several New York City shuls, incidents outside Park East Synagogue ultimately prompted the city to adopt buffer-zone protections outside houses of worship.

“A Match Made in Heaven”

Rav Ben Tzion Krasnianski and his wife, Chanie, arrived on the Upper East Side in the summer of 1991 with the brachah of the Lubavitcher Rebbe and with a mission they say has guided every aspect of their work ever since: ensuring that no Jew is ever left behind.

What began as a single Chabad House has, over the course of 35 years, grown into an extensive network of approximately ten branches serving virtually every segment of the Upper East Side Jewish community.

The Chabad Israel Center serves Israeli expatriates, while Chabad Young Professionals has become a home for thousands of young Jewish professionals building their lives in New York. Friendship Circle supports children and adults with special needs along with the volunteers who assist them. Chabad at Hunter College strengthens Jewish life on campus, while Chabad Care provides spiritual support and comfort to Jewish patients throughout the area’s hospitals.

The organization also operates extensive programming for senior citizens, Chabad Young Families, and a thriving Hebrew School for children. At the same time, the Upper East Side Kollel and Adult Education Center has become a major address for serious Torah learning among adults from every level of observance.

Under the new partnership, nearly all of these educational and communal programs—including Chabad Young Professionals, Friendship Circle, Chabad Young Families, and the Upper East Side Kollel and Adult Education Center—will now be based inside Park East Synagogue’s landmark building.

Chabad’s Jacques and Hanna Schwalbe mikvah, widely regarded as one of the country’s finest, together with its flourishing preschool, will continue operating from the Schneerson Center.

“As things were needed, we responded,” Rav Krasnianski said. He explained that the organization’s growth has always been driven by a desire to serve “every aspect of the community by caring, embracing, and ultimately, engaging” Jews wherever a need exists.

Rav Krasnianski said that same philosophy makes the new partnership “a match made in heaven.” He noted that the relationship between the two institutions stretches back many years.

“Park East approached us to see if we could collaborate and work together so we could accomplish much more than we could accomplish individually,” Rav Krasnianski said, explaining that the strengths of the two institutions naturally complement one another.

“At this critical juncture in Jewish New York history, this collaborative effort sends a powerful message that Jewish New York is here to stay,” Rav Krasnianski said. “We will not rest until all 70,000 Jews on the Upper East Side hold their heads up high and actively express their Jewish pride on a daily basis, one mitzvah at a time.”

{Matzav.com}

President Donald Trump warned Friday that Congress risks regulating the American artificial-intelligence industry “out of business,” placing himself directly into an intensifying fight over how Washington should police increasingly powerful AI models without slowing U.S. companies competing with China. 

Trump’s comments come as lawmakers consider proposals that would impose federal requirements on frontier AI developers, including independent security evaluations of the most advanced models. The debate has become more urgent after recent testing showed AI agents capable of escaping controlled environments and compromising outside computer systems. 

The business question is no longer whether Washington will regulate AI. It is how much regulation companies will face before putting their most powerful models into the market.

That distinction matters because building frontier AI already requires billions of dollars for chips, data centers, electricity and engineering talent. Mandatory testing, licensing or compliance requirements could add another layer of cost and potentially lengthen the time between developing a model and releasing it commercially.

Large companies such as OpenAI, Google, Anthropic and Meta may be able to absorb those costs. Smaller AI developers may have a much harder time doing so, potentially strengthening the largest companies even when regulation is intended to restrain them.

The opposite risk is becoming harder for lawmakers to ignore.

Recent incidents involving advanced AI agents have raised concerns that models could eventually discover software vulnerabilities, execute cyberattacks or take actions beyond what their developers intended. The administration has already established a voluntary system under which leading AI developers can provide advanced models to the federal government for cybersecurity testing before public release. 

Trump has generally favored a lighter federal approach and has also pushed back against separate state AI regimes. His administration argues that requiring companies to navigate dozens of different state rulebooks could slow innovation and weaken America’s position against foreign competitors. 

Congress has not fully accepted that argument. A previous attempt to broadly restrict states from regulating AI faced overwhelming Senate opposition, leaving Washington caught between industry demands for one national standard and lawmakers who want states to retain authority to protect their residents. 

For businesses, the eventual answer will affect far more than Silicon Valley.

Banks, healthcare companies, manufacturers, retailers and small businesses are beginning to integrate AI into everyday operations. Rules governing which models can be released, how they must be tested and who is responsible when they malfunction could ultimately affect the price and availability of the AI tools those businesses use.

Washington is therefore beginning to decide the economic rules for the next phase of AI — how much risk companies can take in the name of innovation, and how much compliance they must accept in the name of safety.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

© JBizNews.com⁠ All Rights Reserved. Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

Sen. Ted Cruz is urging the Trump administration to abandon diplomatic efforts with Iran and instead intensify military and economic pressure, including providing weapons to anti-government demonstrators in an effort to bring about the collapse of the Islamic regime.

“I think our objective should be regime collapse,” Cruz said Friday on CBS News national security analyst Aaron MacLean’s “School of War” podcast.

The Texas Republican argued that the United States should continue targeting Iranian military assets, maintain strict economic sanctions, and preserve the blockade on Iranian ports aimed at limiting Tehran’s oil exports. Cruz noted that he first advocated arming Iranian protesters earlier this year.

“What I believe we should do, what I have urged President [Donald] Trump repeatedly, what I’ve urged Israel to do repeatedly, is arm the protesters, give them the guns, to let them overthrow their own government so that it’s not American boots on the ground, it’s Iranians fighting for their own country,” he said.

The current conflict began on February 28, when the United States and Israel launched military strikes against Iran. Since then, the confrontation has alternated between combat operations and diplomatic efforts, while instability in the Strait of Hormuz has disrupted one of the world’s most critical shipping lanes, through which roughly one-fifth of global oil supplies normally pass.

In June, the two sides reached a memorandum of understanding intended to halt hostilities, reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and pave the way for renewed nuclear negotiations. That agreement unraveled in July after fighting resumed and disagreements emerged over control of the strategic waterway.

Cruz sharply criticized the failed accord, calling it a “disaster” and a “terrible deal.” He argued that easing sanctions and creating a proposed $300 billion reconstruction fund would only strengthen the Iranian regime.

“You’ll forgive me if I’m not terribly eager to give them $300 billion to facilitate their carrying out their stated intent of murdering us,” Cruz said. “Giving them $300 billion is an exceptionally bad idea. It was a bad idea two months ago, it’s a bad idea today and it would be a bad idea two months from now. So I hope we don’t go down that road.”

The Trump administration has maintained that the proposed reconstruction funding would come voluntarily from Gulf nations and private investors rather than from the U.S. government.

Meanwhile, Iran and Oman are reportedly working on a temporary maritime arrangement that would allow vessels to enter the Persian Gulf through an Iranian-controlled route and depart through an Omani-controlled corridor without paying transit fees. Officials believe the proposal could serve as a stepping stone toward broader negotiations.

Although President Trump has recently moved away from earlier statements favoring regime change in Tehran, Cruz said he is unconcerned about which opposition group might ultimately replace the current leadership.

“I don’t have a dog whether it’s the son of the Shah, whether it is the [Mojahedin-e-Khalq opposition group], whether it is someone local, as long as they are not an Islamist who hates America and is actively trying to kill Americans,” Cruz said.

Cruz’s position underscores ongoing divisions within the Republican Party over U.S. policy toward Iran. While Vice President JD Vance has supported continued negotiations, other Republicans have argued against making concessions to Tehran.

Addressing those competing views, Cruz rejected both interventionism and isolationism.

“I disagree with both the interventionist and the isolationists. I think the interventionists are too quick to send the Marines. That’s their solution for everything,” he said. “But I am most definitely not an isolationist. It is a dangerous world, and it is our military’s job to prevent enemies of America from killing Americans.”

Just hours after his release from military prison, bochur Shmuel Shmelka Pinter, grandson of the Ziditchov Rebbe, paid a visit together with his grandfather and father to the Sanzer Rebbe at his residence in Caesarea. During the lengthy conversation, the Rebbe reflected on earlier generations of tzaddikim who endured imprisonment, spoke sharply about those who incite hatred against bnei Torah, shared encounters with secular Jews who seek blessings, and expressed unwavering confidence that Torah will ultimately prevail.

Shmelka Pinter had completed a 20-day prison sentence imposed after refusing military service while continuing his Torah studies. Upon his release last week, he was warmly welcomed by the kehillos that support those who dedicate themselves to full-time learning.

Soon after leaving prison, he traveled with his grandfather, the Ziditchov Rebbe, and his father, Rav Chaim Pinter, to visit the Sanzer Rebbe in Caesarea. What follows is a rewritten transcript of their conversation.

The Sanzer Rebbe began by recalling that his father had once told him about an earlier episode involving Rav Aharon of Kreiz-Sanz, who was imprisoned. When people urged the Divrei Chaim to pray specifically that his son be released, the Divrei Chaim responded by pointing to earlier giants of Jewish history—including Yosef HaTzaddik, the Maharam of Rothenburg, and the Rebbe of Ruzhin—who had also endured imprisonment. When others argued that the incarceration created a chilul Hashem, the Divrei Chaim replied that the true chilul Hashem is forgetting Hashem even for a single moment.

The Ziditchov Rebbe added that the Me’or Einayim of Chernobyl had likewise spent time in prison, as had other great tzaddikim throughout Jewish history.

The Sanzer Rebbe noted that his predecessor was never impressed simply because his son had been imprisoned. He accepted the ordeal with dignity, understanding that imprisonment itself was not a measure of greatness, even though his son remained incarcerated for a significant period.

Rav Chaim Pinter remarked that his family descends from the holy Rav of Kreiz through his son-in-law, Rav Moshe of Berdichev.

The Sanzer Rebbe then said that while Shmelka had still been behind bars he had intentionally refrained from sharing a particular story, explaining that not every episode from the lives of the tzaddikim should be imitated. Now that the young man had been released safely, however, he felt comfortable recounting it.

The Ziditchov Rebbe observed that Rav of Kreiz had originally been imprisoned after placing a ban on someone who refused to comply with a beis din ruling. He wondered aloud whether today’s rabbinic leaders should likewise convene a beis din to place those who persecute Torah and its learners under cherem. He added that the Sanzer Klausenburger Rebbe, the Shefa Chaim, had many years earlier wanted to organize a major gathering addressing similar concerns.

The Sanzer Rebbe replied that the Shefa Chaim had possessed remarkable foresight. He explained that the Rebbe’s vision had been to assemble Orthodox Jewish attorneys who could coordinate legal efforts on behalf of Yahadus HaChareidis throughout Eretz Yisroel. Whether such an initiative would succeed today, however, was another question. In his view, many of those in positions of authority now act with arrogance, answerable to no one, and simply do whatever they choose without accountability.

Turning to Israeli society more broadly, the Sanzer Rebbe emphasized that the overwhelming majority of Jews in Eretz Yisroel possess faith in Hashem and maintain a deep respect for Torah and Yiddishkeit. He argued that most do not harbor hatred toward those who learn Torah. Rather, he said, a relatively small group of agitators in the media creates the false impression that it speaks for the majority. As evidence, he described how, whenever he visits areas such as Netanya or Caesarea where many residents are secular, people frequently approach him asking for brachos, demonstrating that genuine faith remains alive within them.

The Rebbe noted that Caesarea is generally considered a politically left-leaning city. Yet when he goes for a walk and a woman approaches from the opposite direction, she will often cross to the other side of the street on her own initiative without being asked. On numerous occasions, secular parents have even sent their children to request a blessing. He also recalled that one Friday night a car stopped beside him, and the elderly Jewish driver spoke to him in Yiddish, asking whether he needed any assistance because he assumed the Rebbe had become lost. Another neighbor once told him that although he knew the Rebbe would not eat in his home, he would gladly provide water or anything else that might ever be needed. “That,” the Rebbe said, “is the true face of most Jews living in Eretz Yisroel.”

The Ziditchov Rebbe responded with a similar story involving the Lev Simcha of Gur. While walking outside the religious neighborhood in Haifa on Shabbos, a secular Jew approached the Rebbe, assuming he had lost his way, and warmly offered to drive him anywhere he wished to go.

The Sanzer Rebbe continued by saying that the war has created tremendous confusion among many people. Those who do not appreciate the holiness of Torah often find it impossible to understand the position of the bnei Torah. At the same time, however, the war has awakened a profound strengthening of faith among countless Jews, many of whom now seek blessings and prayers. He recalled that during the large gathering outside the military prison, officials responsible for coordinating the event privately admitted to him that they were personally pained by the entire situation and were only carrying out orders because they had no alternative.

The Ziditchov Rebbe remarked that the Shefa Chaim had long ago described the leading instigators against Torah as belonging to the Erev Rav. He speculated that perhaps they were souls of earlier heretics who had returned to this world in order to rectify their past, but instead had only deepened the damage. He lamented that the campaign of incitement against the chareidi community had crossed every conceivable boundary.

The Sanzer Rebbe responded that while many secular Jews unfortunately transgress the Torah, it is not for us to judge them, since most are tinokos shenishbu who were never taught the difference between what is permitted and what is forbidden. Even when they speak harshly against Torah Jews, he said, it is often because they believe doing so will make their own lives easier. Nevertheless, he recalled that his father had taught that when someone demonstrates an unusually intense hatred for religion and actively wages war against those who observe Torah and mitzvos, it is possible that such a person traces his spiritual roots to the Erev Rav.

The Ziditchov Rebbe then shared a personal experience. While walking through Tel Aviv, a passerby suddenly began shouting at him. Curious, he asked what the man wanted. The fellow replied that all he wanted was for the Rebbe to “go back to Poland.” The Ziditchov Rebbe remarked that perhaps his appearance had reminded the man of something from Poland.

The Sanzer Rebbe responded with a story from his own youth. He recalled that while walking down the street, someone chased after him carrying a stick and struck him. Looking back, he said he was actually grateful that he had at least merited to be beaten simply because he was a Jew.

The Ziditchov Rebbe commented that even so, the hatred in those years did not resemble the atmosphere that exists today.

The Sanzer Rebbe agreed, observing that today’s public incitement and brazenness have reached levels that simply did not exist in earlier decades.

The Ziditchov Rebbe mentioned the role played by newspaper editors in fueling much of that hostility.

The Sanzer Rebbe replied that the Divrei Chaim, commenting on Parshas Vayakhel, writes that the leaders of the nation in the era before Moshiach would come from the Erev Rav.

The Ziditchov Rebbe recalled a teaching the Sanzer Rebbe had cited during the recent rally from the Shefa Chaim on the Gemara’s description of a generation in which “the youth will behave arrogantly toward the elders.” He then related a well-known story involving the Chasam Sofer. Whenever the Chasam Sofer traveled to Yergen near Pressburg, he would rent lodging. On one occasion, a local Jew insisted on hosting him free of charge. After Shabbos, however, the Chasam Sofer overheard the same man describing the rabbi of Pressburg as a sinner.

The Sanzer Rebbe explained what had happened. The unlearned innkeeper had watched the Chasam Sofer eat the Shabbos daytime meal without reciting Kiddush as he believed it should be said. Since the man mistakenly thought the daytime Kiddush required the full nighttime text rather than only Borei Pri Hagafen, he concluded that the Chasam Sofer was violating Shabbos.

The Ziditchov Rebbe continued that the Chasam Sofer later said the incident actually brought him comfort. For many years he had feared that a time might come when corrupt leaders would mislead the Jewish people so completely that authentic Torah observance would disappear. But after witnessing the innkeeper’s reaction, he realized he had been mistaken. Hashem gave the Torah to a strong-willed nation. Even though the Chasam Sofer was the universally respected rabbi of a major community, the simple Jew refused to abandon the traditions handed down from his parents merely because a prominent rabbi appeared to act differently. That demonstrated, the Chasam Sofer concluded, that faithful Jews would ultimately remain loyal to the Torah they had received from previous generations and would not allow misguided leaders to draw them away from it.

The Sanzer Rebbe said that Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai had already declared that Torah would never, chas v’shalom, be forgotten from Klal Yisroel. He added that his father would often say that Torah would never “go bankrupt.” Despite all the hardships facing the Torah world, he expressed complete confidence that the Torah would ultimately prevail. The greatest focus of our prayers, he said, should be for Jews whose lives are not centered around Torah study, that they should not, chas v’shalom, be swept away by the influences surrounding them.

The Ziditchov Rebbe responded that Klal Yisroel is in need of tremendous yeshuos. He then recalled a saying from the Shefa Chaim about how sincere efforts made below bring about corresponding assistance from Heaven.

He reminisced about attending the emotional hesped the Shefa Chaim delivered for the Tchebiner Rov. Although the Klausenburger Rebbe had not been in Yerushalayim for several years, thousands packed the hall to hear him. The Rebbe began by analyzing the Talmudic concept of “trei u’trei” before transitioning into a tear-filled eulogy.

The Sanzer Rebbe responded that he had not been present at that gathering, noting that it had taken place in the year 5726.

As the visit drew to a close, the Sanzer Rebbe turned to Shmuel Shmelka Pinter and offered him heartfelt words of encouragement and blessing.

Quoting the posuk, the Rebbe blessed him that the words “Samcheinu Kimos Inisanu” should be fulfilled in his life—that the joy awaiting him should far outweigh the suffering he had endured. He told the young bochur that he had merited to become a shaliach for the sanctification of Hashem’s Name and that Heaven had chosen him to carry that mission on behalf of Klal Yisroel.

Rav Chaim Pinter then asked the Rebbe whether his son should recite Birchas HaGomel following his release from prison.

The Sanzer Rebbe replied that he could certainly recite HaGomel, but without Shem U’Malchus.

Shmuel Shmelka Pinter then shared that while he was incarcerated, the prisoners heard the gathering organized by Sanzer Chassidim outside the prison walls. He said hearing the event provided tremendous encouragement and gave him great strength during his imprisonment.

The Sanzer Rebbe concluded by offering a final blessing, expressing the hope that they would all meet again only on joyous occasions.

{Matzav.com}

The U.S. economy lost jobs in July, and Wall Street bought stocks on the news. The reason is simpler than it sounds: the Federal Reserve has spent this year debating whether to raise interest rates to finish off inflation, and a shrinking payroll count makes raising them into a slowing economy very hard to justify. Cheaper money for longer is worth more to share prices than a strong jobs number, so buyers moved in — and they moved hardest into the expensive technology names that get hurt most when rates go up.

The S&P 500 finished Friday’s session at a record 7,757.64, up 0.62%. The Nasdaq Composite led the major averages with a 1.3% gain to 26,690.62. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 151.83 points, or 0.28%, to close at 54,036.93. The small-cap Russell 2000 rose 1.1% to 3,034.49, and the CBOE Volatility Index eased to 14.90.

The Jobs Number Behind the Rally

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday morning that nonfarm payrolls fell by 23,000 in July. Economists surveyed by Reuters had forecast a gain of about 80,000. Government payrolls dropped 53,000, driven by local government education, while private employers added just 30,000.

The unemployment rate ticked down to 4.1% from 4.2%, but not because more people found work — the labor force shrank by 264,000, and the participation rate slipped to 61.4%, the lowest in more than five years. Revisions did the heavier damage: May and June were marked down by a combined 103,000 jobs, leaving the recent hiring trend materially weaker than markets believed a day earlier. Average hourly earnings rose 3.2% over the year, the slowest wage pace since 2021.

Rates, the Dollar and the Fed Path

The Fed held its benchmark rate in the 3.50%-3.75% range last week on a 9-3 vote, with three members preferring a quarter-point increase. Traders had been pricing a September hike as the likely next move. After Friday’s report, odds of that increase fell to 42% from 58%, according to the CME FedWatch tool.

Treasury yields dropped across the curve, with the 10-year retreating from about 4.68% and the two-year from roughly 4.25% ahead of the release. The dollar index fell about 0.3% to near 99.60, and the euro touched a seven-week high around $1.1567.

For the week, the S&P 500 gained 3.6% and the Nasdaq 5.2%, its strongest showing since May. The Dow added close to 3%. Chip stocks powered the move, with the iShares Semiconductor ETF ending the week more than 7% higher. It was the second straight winning week for all three major averages.

Market Movers

SpaceX (SPCX) jumped about 14% to roughly $131, its best day since listing. Argus Research analyst Steven Silver upgraded the shares to Buy from Hold with a $160 target, citing strong operating performance and a faster-than-expected payback on the company’s artificial intelligence buildout. The move also reflected relief that Thursday’s expiration of 911.5 million insider shares — which more than doubled the public float — produced no wave of selling. The stock remains roughly 50% below its June record of $225.64.

Palantir (PLTR) climbed 9.6% to $170.85, capping a week that included a 29% surge Tuesday on second-quarter revenue of $1.94 billion, up 93% from a year earlier.

Cloudflare (NET) rose about 8% after posting revenue of $696.1 million, up 36%, and raising full-year guidance to $2.86 billion to $2.87 billion.

Coherent (COHR) gained 13% Friday and 43.5% over five sessions on peer results and a JPMorgan target increase.

Rocket Lab (RKLB) added 8% and Intuitive Machines 9% as space names rallied alongside SpaceX.

On the losing side, DaVita (DVA) fell 17% on the week after reaffirming rather than lifting its outlook, and Honeywell Aerospace (HONA) cut full-year organic sales growth guidance to 4%-5% from 7%-9% in its first report as a standalone company.

Commodities

September West Texas Intermediate crude settled at $77.08 a barrel, down 0.27% on the day and 3.44% for the week. Prices climbed more than 1% intraday on renewed tension around the Strait of Hormuz before fading into the close, with a deal to reopen the waterway still under discussion in the sixth month of the U.S.-Iran conflict.

Gold was the week’s standout, rising 2.4% Friday to $4,347.70 an ounce, a seven-week high, for a weekly advance of about 7.5% — its best week in seven months. Silver also gained. Bitcoin traded near $64,963, up 0.89%.

What’s Next

The July consumer price index lands Wednesday, Aug. 12. Economists expect headline inflation to ease to 3.4% from 3.5% and core to slow to 2.5% from 2.6%. A soft print would further drain the case for a September hike; a hot one puts it back on the table, and the assets that led this week — gold, small caps and long-duration technology — have the most to give back. Earnings from Super Micro Computer on Tuesday and Applied Materials on Thursday round out the week.

JBizNews Desk | Wall Street

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What appeared to be a devastating shoulder injury from a water park accident ultimately saved a man’s life after doctors discovered what they initially believed was a malignant tumor. The remarkable firsthand account, shared by Rabbi Moshe Weisbecker, has drawn widespread attention throughout the Olam HaTorah as a striking example of hashgachah pratis and the power of the brachos and tefillos of Gedolei Yisroel.

The extraordinary story was shared on the “Siach Yitzchok” hotline, which features Torah teachings and firsthand accounts involving Chaver Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah Rav Yitzchok Zilberstein. Rabbi Weisbecker personally recounted the events in the hotline’s “Bedidi Hava Uvda” segment.

Rabbi Weisbecker, a son-in-law of Rav Ben Zion Goldberg-Yedler, is a respected avreich in Kollel Beis Dovid in Holon and the author of the sefer Lemaan Yaarichun on the halachos of honoring one’s parents.

Opening his account, Rabbi Weisbecker said that he felt compelled to share a deeply personal experience that demonstrated how every event in life is orchestrated by Hashem, even when everything appears to be falling apart. He said the story also illustrated the extraordinary power of the blessings and prayers of the Gedolei Hador.

Several weeks ago, while accompanying his Talmud Torah class on an annual trip to a water park, Rabbi Weisbecker was supervising students from the top of one of the park’s tallest water slides. Another member of the staff encouraged him to take a turn on the slide. Though initially reluctant, he confirmed the safety instructions with the operator, sat on a double inflatable tube to feel more secure, and began his descent.

Within moments, the tube became stuck near the beginning of the slide. He shouted repeatedly that he was trapped, but the sound of the rushing water drowned out his cries. Two fellow rabbeim waiting behind him heard him and warned the slide operator, but according to Rabbi Weisbecker, the operator insisted everything was fine and instructed them to continue.

Seconds later, another double tube carrying two staff members crashed into him with tremendous force. The collision flipped his tube and hurled him violently into the sides of the slide. Dazed and in excruciating pain, he managed to pull himself from the water before an emergency responder from United Hatzalah who was part of the group administered oxygen. He was then rushed by ambulance to Poriya Medical Center.

Doctors initially suspected internal injuries and ordered a CT scan, which revealed that he had fractured his collarbone. But while reviewing the scans, physicians noticed something far more alarming—what appeared to be a suspicious mass in his abdomen.

After consulting several specialists, doctors informed him that they believed he had a tumor in his intestine. Although they could not determine whether it was benign or malignant, they recommended immediate surgery to remove part of the intestine along with the growth. If the tumor proved to be cancerous, they explained, he would likely require additional treatment afterward.

The diagnosis plunged Rabbi Weisbecker and his family into an agonizing month filled with fear, uncertainty, sleepless nights, and constant anxiety as they awaited the operation.

Before proceeding with surgery, family members sought the guidance of Rav Yitzchok Zilberstein, asking whether the operation should be performed on the eve of Tisha B’Av. Rav Zilberstein responded unequivocally that the surgery should go ahead, even on that day.

When the day of the operation arrived, Rabbi Weisbecker later learned that Rav Zilberstein had gathered the avreichim in his kollel in Holon to recite Tehillim with tears and offer heartfelt prayers for his complete recovery while the surgery was taking place.

Doctors had prepared for a lengthy operation to remove both the suspected tumor and part of the intestine. Instead, after only 74 minutes, the surgeon emerged from the operating room smiling and delivered astonishing news: there was no tumor.

The medical team discovered that the suspicious mass was actually a surgical sponge measuring approximately five centimeters that had accidentally been left inside Rabbi Weisbecker’s abdomen during an unrelated operation nine years earlier. Over the years, his body had formed a protective layer of tissue around the sponge, preventing serious complications. Only recently had an abscess formed around it, causing the scans to resemble a malignant tumor. When surgeons removed the sponge, they could still see the operating-room identification markings printed on it.

Doctors told Rabbi Weisbecker that the water park accident had likely saved his life. Had he not suffered the fall and broken collarbone, they never would have performed the CT scan that uncovered the hidden problem. Within days or weeks, they explained, the infection could have spread throughout his body, creating a life-threatening medical emergency before anyone knew it existed.

Looking back on the ordeal, Rabbi Weisbecker said the painful injury and frightening accident turned out to be the very events that saved his life. He expressed profound gratitude to Hashem for every step of the experience and credited the precise guidance, heartfelt prayers, and blessings of Rav Yitzchok Zilberstein with helping him emerge from the ordeal completely healthy.

{Matzav.com}

A multistate salmonella outbreak tied to fresh jalapeño peppers has sickened 345 people across 27 states, sending 36 people to hospitals and forcing restaurants and distributors to pull affected produce from their supply chains.

Federal health officials have linked the outbreak to jalapeños grown in Sinaloa, Mexico, and distributed in the United States by Coast Citrus Distributors. Illnesses have been reported from June 19 through July 20. No deaths have been reported.

The peppers were supplied to restaurants, including locations operated by Chipotle Mexican Grill and QDOBA, rather than being shipped directly to grocery stores. Both chains stopped using the implicated peppers after investigators traced illnesses back through the food-distribution system.

For restaurants, the damage from a food-safety outbreak can extend well beyond the cost of throwing away one ingredient.

A restaurant typically buys produce through distributors that aggregate food from multiple farms and growers. That makes fresh ingredients inexpensive and widely available, but it can also make tracing contamination complicated. Investigators must work backward from sick customers to restaurants, distributors, packing facilities and eventually the farm where the produce originated.

That process can take weeks.

Chipotle has particular reason to move aggressively. The company spent years rebuilding consumer trust following earlier foodborne-illness outbreaks, and its shares have come under pressure as investors evaluate whether the latest incident could affect customer traffic.

The financial risk is not limited to one restaurant chain. Produce distributors can face recalls and destroyed inventory, growers can lose access to customers, and restaurants that never served contaminated food can still suffer if consumers begin avoiding an entire category of cuisine or ingredient.

That is already becoming a broader concern for the restaurant industry. The salmonella investigation comes as the U.S. is simultaneously dealing with a large cyclosporiasis outbreak linked to other produce, increasing consumer attention to fresh-food safety.

Salmonella commonly causes diarrhea, fever and stomach cramps and can become more serious for young children, older adults and people with weakened immune systems.

For businesses, however, the immediate lesson is supply-chain visibility.

When one pepper can move from a Mexican farm through a distributor and into restaurants across dozens of states, food safety increasingly becomes a logistics and traceability issue as much as a kitchen issue.

Federal and state investigators are continuing to track the affected distribution network and identify whether additional businesses received implicated jalapeños.

JBizNews Desk | Atlanta

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President Donald Trump sharply condemned a federal appeals court Friday for blocking construction of his planned White House ballroom and security complex, arguing that the ruling endangers national security and pledging to take the case immediately to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a Truth Social post, Trump blasted the decision, writing, “The Military and Secret Service are viewing this horrendous, politically motivated, and unlawful ruling as a National Security threat to our Nation in that the entire Complex is being built for the protection of our Country and, additionally, all future Presidents.”

He also criticized the makeup of the appellate panel, stating that “two Obama and Biden Appellate Court Judges just voted against the desperately needed Military Center, required for the National Security of Washington, D.C., and our Country, itself.”

Earlier Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled 2-1 that the administration may not continue constructing the ballroom without congressional approval. The court delayed enforcement of its ruling for 14 days, allowing the administration time to seek review from the Supreme Court.

Trump confirmed that his administration intends to move forward with an appeal, saying, “The decision has been stayed, and does not take effect for a period of time. We will be immediately appealing to the United States Supreme Court.”

The president argued that the project extends well beyond the construction of a ceremonial ballroom, describing it as a comprehensive security initiative designed to strengthen protections for the White House, its occupants, and future presidents.

According to Trump, the broader complex includes “Bomb Shelters, State of the Art Hospital and Medical Facilities, Protective Partitioning, Top Secret Military Facilities, Structures and Equipment, Protective Missile Resistant Steel, Columns, Roofs, and Beams, Drone Proof Ceilings and Roofs, Military Grade Venting, and Bullet, Ballistic, and Blast Proof Glass.”

Emphasizing the integrated nature of the project, Trump added, “It is all tied together as one big, expensive, and very complex unit, which is vital for National Security and Military Operations of the United States of America!”

The appellate majority concluded that the president lacks the authority to proceed with the construction project without first obtaining congressional authorization.

At the same time, the judges stressed that their ruling did not address whether the ballroom itself is good public policy and did not foreclose the possibility that the project could ultimately move forward through the proper legal process.

Judge Neomi Rao dissented, arguing that the National Trust for Historic Preservation lacked legal standing to challenge the project and that the government’s national security interests favored allowing construction to continue.

Trump highlighted Judge Rao’s dissent, pointing to her conclusion that the lower court had engaged in “judicial overreach.”

In the portion quoted by Trump, Rao wrote, “This was a blatant abuse of discretion. To begin with, the district court had no jurisdiction because the Trust has no standing to stop construction at the White House.”

She further argued that the lower court had improperly prioritized aesthetics over security, writing, “The district court elevated the aesthetic displeasure of a single passerby over the government’s security interests in the ballroom and the security risks of leaving an open construction site at the President’s home and office.”

Trump echoed that argument, asserting that the appellate court was “totally wrong on the vital subject of STANDING, of which the plaintiff has none.”

He warned that the ruling “severely jeopardizes the lives and welfare of the people who work, and will be working, at the White House – including all future Presidents of the United States, and their families, as well as the lives of all those visiting, such as Heads of State and other Dignitaries, and all Americans who wish to visit the historic, beautiful Executive Mansion.”

The president also stressed that the project is being financed entirely through private donations rather than taxpayer funds. He said much of the construction has already been completed or fabricated, with significant portions of the materials already delivered or currently arriving at the site.

Trump wrote, “The Circuit Court also refused to acknowledge that the desperately needed, and totally secure Ballroom, which is being built ahead of schedule and under budget, is a Gift from President Trump and Great Patriots of the United States of America.”

He continued, “The entire Complex, Military and all, is largely built, fabricated, and paid for. Much is already on site, or being delivered. Why didn’t they bring this case long prior to construction starting? There will be no expense to the American Taxpayer.”

Trump closed by urging the Supreme Court to overturn the appellate ruling in full, declaring, “This unjust decision must be overturned by the Supreme Court in its entirety.”

{Matzav.com}

A student visiting the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial in Austria sparked outrage after he was seen wearing a shirt featuring a Palestinian flag, the slogan “Free Palestine,” and an image identified as terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, prompting a heated confrontation with a Jewish visitor and police intervention.

The incident took place during a visit to the former Nazi concentration camp, where the student was photographed wearing the controversial shirt. The image on the garment was identified as Dalal Mughrabi, the terrorist who led the 1978 Coastal Road massacre, also known as the “Bus of Blood” attack, in which 38 Israelis—including 13 children—were murdered.

A Jewish woman identified as Jordana noticed the shirt and began recording the encounter before confronting the student and his teachers.

During the exchange, Jordana rebuked the group, saying, “You come to a concentration camp and call the war a genocide? A real genocide happened here. You learned nothing. Shame on you!”

Several students and teachers responded by claiming that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza.

Jordana forcefully rejected the comparison, arguing that equating Israel’s war against Hamas with the Holocaust dishonors the memory of the more than 100,000 victims who perished at the Mauthausen concentration camp.

Following the confrontation, staff members at the memorial site called police to respond to the scene.

{Matzav.com}

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has carefully cultivated an image of calm confidence and optimism on social media, but more than a dozen political insiders say the mayor behaves very differently behind closed doors, describing him as highly sensitive to criticism and quick to confront public detractors, The New York Post reports.

According to interviews with elected officials, political consultants, and Democratic operatives conducted by The New York Post, Mamdani frequently contacts critics who challenge him publicly, holds grudges against political opponents, and often responds to messages only when negative publicity has become a concern.

“I see more and more he cannot handle criticism, but mainly from elected officials who he thinks he can push around,” one political consultant said.

“The mayor personally reaches out when electeds criticizes him publicly. If they speak, then he cares. He cares because he doesn’t want bad press. It shows a sensitivity.”

Many of those interviewed requested anonymity, saying they feared damaging working relationships with a mayor they continue to deal with on government and political matters.

One recent flashpoint reportedly followed calls by Jewish community leaders urging Mamdani to “stop fanning the flames of hatred” against Israel after an alleged antisemitic stabbing on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Sources told The New York Post that Mamdani personally contacted at least one elected official who attended the news conference, objecting to the criticism and expressing frustration that the appeal was linked to a video he released days earlier in which he called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “war criminal.”

That two-minute video, in which Mamdani addressed viewers while seated before American and New York City flags, reportedly amassed approximately 100 million views across multiple social media platforms.

Political observers widely credit Mamdani’s mastery of TikTok and Instagram with fueling his rapid ascent from a relatively little-known state legislator in 2025 to mayor of America’s largest city. He now reportedly has 3.5 million followers on TikTok and 11.9 million on Instagram, where he built his campaign around polished videos emphasizing affordability and cost-of-living issues, including his widely viewed “halalflation” posts highlighting rising food prices.

After taking office in January, Mamdani continued investing heavily in public messaging, allocating $53 million to establish an Office of Mass Engagement, significantly expanding City Hall’s communications operation. Critics have argued the office functions primarily as a taxpayer-funded public relations apparatus.

His administration has continued releasing professionally produced videos, including one filmed outside billionaire hedge fund manager Ken Griffin’s $200 million condominium promoting the Democratic Socialists of America’s “tax the rich” platform, as well as a 13-minute documentary spotlighting tenants organizing against what they described as an unresponsive landlord.

Several insiders said Mamdani’s sensitivity to criticism stems in part from the pressure of becoming the first Democratic Socialists of America mayor of New York City.

“He’s the first DSA (mayor) so they have to show he can manage the city, and any time someone puts a dent in that it hurts their cause,” a government insider said.

Another Democratic operative described Mamdani as demanding with staff members, saying he frequently conducts late-night strategy meetings at Gracie Mansion with fellow DSA leaders.

Sources also claimed the mayor closely monitors media coverage and social media commentary, even attempting to prevent potentially unfavorable stories before they gain traction. They pointed to a July dispute after Queens Borough President Donovan Richards criticized the DSA as “white supremacy” in a post on X. According to multiple sources, a Mamdani staff member contacted Richards’ office seeking removal of the post, but Richards declined, and the disagreement later became the subject of media coverage.

“He’s so thin-skinned and reads everything,” one City Council member said.

“His security blanket is his phone and the dopamine from how many likes he gets on a post,” a Democratic operative scoffed. “Seems to keep him going.”

According to sources, City Councilwoman Virginia Maloney also drew the mayor’s attention after responding to one of his budget claims on X with the sarcastic remark, “I know math is hard.” Insiders said Mamdani personally contacted her following the exchange.

“That Virginia Maloney tweet really got under their skin,” a source said amid the spat.

Several officials also said the mayor reached out directly after lawmakers criticized his proposal to raise property taxes by nearly 10%.

The mayor reportedly became particularly frustrated last week after he was not invited to deliver a eulogy at the funeral of Army Sgt. Angel Sarah Rampersad in Queens. One Democratic insider described Mamdani’s reaction as restrained but visibly cold, contrasting sharply with the cheerful demeanor he typically projects in public appearances, including interactions with political opponents and appearances where he has faced public boos.

Multiple sources said they have learned that negative news coverage or critical social media posts are often the quickest way to receive a response from either Mamdani or his senior staff.

“They only respond when it’s a crisis for them and reaches crisis levels in the press, but before that they don’t return calls, texts or emails,” a Democratic operative said.

“He has been known to hold grudges against whoever challenges him or his positions for even some of the smallest of slights, and those people get sent to the back of the line unless he needs something.”

Not all of the assessments were negative. Several insiders credited the 34-year-old mayor with approaching negotiations thoughtfully and being willing to acknowledge areas where he lacks expertise.

“He asks lots of questions. Seeks to understand the issues he’s lacking familiarity with,” one union source said.

“He does more listening than talking. That’s uncommon in the political realm.”

Responding to the allegations, senior mayoral spokeswoman Dora Pekec said, “The mayor’s focus has and always will be how best to deliver for New Yorkers and he sees our city and state elected officials as valuable partners in building a safer and more affordable city.”

Former Eric Adams spokesman Fabien Levy argued that the administration spends too much energy monitoring social media criticism instead of governing.

“Mamdani should focus on the job, rather than a ‘first-term council member tweeting’ about him,” Levy said.

“This administration is more on Twitter, Instagram or TikTok than probably any other politician in the county, but to steal an Eric Adams-ism: it’s not what’s in the tweets, it’s what’s in the streets.”

{Matzav.com}

A drone carrying professional-grade explosives and a working detonator was found on the grounds of one of Europe’s most important air freight airports late Tuesday night, and German federal prosecutors have now taken over the case as a suspected attack on the country’s logistics infrastructure.

The Federal Prosecutor’s Office said Thursday there was sufficient factual evidence to conclude that an explosion had been intended at Leipzig/Halle Airport on the evening of August 4, and that professional explosives and a detonator had been attached to the drone for that purpose. Federal prosecutors took the investigation over from local prosecutors in Dresden, calling it a serious attack on Germany’s transportation and logistics infrastructure and a threat to the country’s external and internal security.

The choice of target is what gives the incident its commercial weight. Leipzig/Halle is a major cargo and military airport in the eastern German state of Saxony and serves as the main base for NATO’s Strategic Airlift International Solution, delivering equipment to reinforce the alliance’s eastern flank using a small fleet of Ukrainian-built Antonov cargo planes. The airport has served as the European base for Ukraine’s Antonov jets since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, and is also used by NATO for transport needs and by the German military. Freight moving through that airfield is not incidental traffic — it is a significant share of how goods and defense materiel reach central and eastern Europe.

What happened on the ground reads almost as improvisation. Police in Leipzig first reported the sighting of an unidentified object late Tuesday night. It turned out to be a drone armed with explosives, discovered in a secure cargo area near the southern runway. The Federal Police’s improvised explosive device unit examined it and removed the detonator. A senior German lawmaker, Detlef Seif, told reporters Friday that a bus driver working at the airport kicked the low-flying, explosive-laden drone out of the air, after which it crashed nearby. The newspaper Bild, citing unnamed investigators, reported that a technical fault kept the device from detonating.

There was a second incident the same night. Another object, which prosecutors suspect was a second drone, struck a cargo jet near the airport while the aircraft was executing a go-around because of the security situation. The plane landed at Hanover with minor damage. That cargo aircraft belonged to DHL.

Operations were interrupted but not for long. Both runways closed and several flights, including one passenger aircraft, were diverted after the object was spotted shortly before midnight Tuesday. An anti-explosives robot was sent to inspect the object near the south runway. The southern runway reopened Wednesday evening at 6:46 p.m. local time, and an airport spokesperson said flight operations have run without restriction since.

German officials are treating this as a category shift rather than another entry in a familiar pattern. Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, who cut short his vacation to travel to the airport, told reporters that a drone carrying explosives represents a new quality of danger. Drone sightings and drone threats in a hybrid context are already known, he said, but an explosive-armed drone at an airport is a new threat scenario. Saxony’s Interior Minister Armin Schuster described it to broadcaster ZDF as a suspected attack scenario, noting it was the first of its kind. A counterterrorism investigation is underway, and NATO said it is aware of the incident and that German authorities are continuing to investigate.

For the freight and insurance industries, the practical question is what this does to risk assumptions around cargo airports. European operators have spent the past two years dealing with drone incursions that closed runways and delayed flights. Those were disruption events, priced accordingly. A device built to detonate inside a secured cargo area is a different exposure entirely, and one that existing perimeter security at commercial airfields was not designed around. Detection systems capable of spotting a small low-flying drone, and the authority to bring one down over an active airfield, are neither cheap nor widely deployed.

No suspects have been publicly identified. The investigation now sits with Germany’s top prosecutors, which is itself a signal of how the case is being classified.

JBizNews Desk | Berlin

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An alleged Hamas Nukhba terrorist who authorities say participated in the October 7 massacre was arrested in southern Gaza after being found behind the wheel of a humanitarian aid truck headed toward the Kerem Shalom Crossing, according to Israeli reports.

Channel 12 News reported that the suspect was detained in the Rafah area and later handed over to Israeli security forces for extensive interrogation.

According to Israeli security officials, the cargo aboard the truck was intended for Gaza’s private commercial sector. The shipment had first been received by a private merchant inside Gaza before the suspect picked it up for transport.

The arrest took place before the truck reached the Kerem Shalom Crossing. During the course of the investigation, authorities identified the driver as an individual who had allegedly taken part in the October 7 Hamas attack, leading to his immediate arrest and transfer for further questioning.

Last month, COGAT released figures showing that roughly 1.78 million tons of food entered the Gaza Strip between October 2025 and June 7, 2026. According to the report, that amount was nearly three times the monthly humanitarian requirement established by the World Food Program. COGAT said humanitarian shipments alone exceeded the WFP’s higher benchmark, with commercial imports adding even more food to the local supply.

The report also stated that food prices across Gaza dropped by approximately 72 percent between September 2025 and May 2026, attributing the decline to the combined impact of expanded humanitarian aid and increased commercial deliveries.

COGAT further asserted that Hamas remains the primary obstacle to the effective distribution of humanitarian assistance and to broader efforts to stabilize Gaza. The agency reiterated that Israel remains committed to facilitating aid deliveries in coordination with the United States, the United Nations, and other international partners.

In January, the IDF warned that Hamas was significantly rebuilding its capabilities through the large number of aid trucks entering Gaza each day, as well as through smuggling conducted along additional routes into the territory.

Military officials said dual-use items—including cigarettes, tobacco, electrical equipment, mobile phones, and agricultural materials with potential military applications—have entered Gaza not only aboard humanitarian aid convoys, but also through border crossings and other routes, sometimes under the cover of Israeli security operations and civilian contractors working near the border.

At the time, senior IDF officials recommended that Israel’s political leadership limit the Rafah Crossing to the movement of people only and prohibit the transfer of commercial goods from Egypt into Gaza, reversing the policy that had been in place before the October 7 attack.

The IDF also noted that, prior to the outbreak of the war, Hamas’s military buildup relied heavily on goods entering through the Rafah Crossing. Despite repeated warnings from defense officials that the flow of cargo was strengthening the terrorist organization, thousands of trucks continued crossing into Gaza each year until the war began.

{Matzav.com}

A prominent Shi’ite Muslim cleric in Michigan celebrated the death of Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham and asked worshippers to pray for President Donald Trump’s death, before later urging Muslims to elect Abdul El-Sayed, who this week won the Democratic nomination for Michigan’s US Senate seat.

Mohammad Baqer Qazwini made the remarks during a July 17 Friday sermon at the Islamic Institute of America in Dearborn Heights, according to footage published Friday by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). MEMRI identified the original source as the Islamic Institute of America’s YouTube channel. The remarks in the clip were delivered in English.

Qazwini told worshippers he had awakened to “very good news” following Graham’s death and said Allah had taken the senator’s soul to hell.

He blamed Graham for what he called the “genocide in Gaza” and for the deaths of civilians in Lebanon, and described the senator’s death as “a slap” from Allah that Graham had not anticipated.

Qazwini then turned to Trump.

He asked worshippers to raise their hands and pray that Allah would also take “the friend of Lindsey Graham,” referring to the president, according to the footage. Qazwini said Allah could bring about sudden miracles and ended the passage by calling for victory for Islam and Muslims.

Imam said Muslims had responsibility to elect El-Sayed

Graham, 71, died on July 11 from an aortic dissection caused by cardiovascular disease. The South Carolina Republican had become one of Israel’s strongest supporters in Congress and a close Trump ally, advocating military assistance for Israel and a hard line against Iran.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called Graham one of Israel’s greatest friends after his death and said the senator understood that “the security of Israel and America are inseparable.” President Isaac Herzog, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, Defense Minister Israel Katz and other Israeli officials also paid tribute to him.

The political significance of Qazwini’s remarks increased two weeks later, when he publicly backed El-Sayed ahead of Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary.

In his July 31 sermon, Mohammad Baqer Qazwini said Muslim men and women had a responsibility to elect El-Sayed because he was Muslim and would support issues important to Muslims in the United States, according to MEMRI’s account of the sermon.

Four days later, Michigan voters went to the polls.

El-Sayed, a 41-year-old physician and former Detroit health director, narrowly defeated Rep. Haley Stevens and secured the Democratic nomination. He will face Republican former congressman Mike Rogers in November in a race that could help determine control of the Senate. El-Sayed would become the first Muslim elected to the US Senate if he wins.

Mohammad Baqer Qazwini is based at the Islamic Institute of America and studied for 10 years at the Shi’ite seminary in Qom, Iran, according to his biography at Al-Hujjah Islamic Seminary. He also holds a sociology degree from the University of Michigan.

His endorsement came alongside a broader effort by leaders at the Islamic Institute to mobilize support for El-Sayed.

Hassan Qazwini, who founded the Islamic Institute of America in 2015, repeatedly urged worshippers to back El-Sayed during sermons in the final days of the primary, according to footage reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon.

During a July 24 sermon, Hassan Qazwini described voting for El-Sayed as a “moral responsibility” and a “religious duty,” while accusing the pro-Israel lobby of attempting to influence Michigan voters.

In a July 31 sermon, he told worshippers that their votes represented a powerful tool and urged them to “deal the Zionist a bigger blow” by voting against Stevens, whom he portrayed as serving Israeli interests. The Islamic Institute and El-Sayed’s campaign did not respond to the Free Beacon’s requests for comment for its August 3 report.

The two clerics’ support for El-Sayed followed the candidate’s own appearance at the Islamic Institute weeks earlier.

El-Sayed appeared at Islamic Institute opening

El-Sayed attended the June 6 dedication of the Islamic Institute’s new campus in Dearborn Heights, joining Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, Dearborn Heights Mayor Mo Baydoun and other political and religious figures.

Local Arab-American media reported that El-Sayed spoke about the responsibility of mosques to feed the hungry, assist vulnerable people, promote justice and strengthen their communities.

The Washington Free Beacon reported that El-Sayed called attending the opening an “honor and a privilege,” praised the new mosque and congratulated Hassan Qazwini. El-Sayed also used his remarks to criticize US support for Israel and accuse Israel of committing genocide with American taxpayer support.

The new Islamic Institute complex, built on seven acres in Dearborn Heights, cost approximately $16 million and includes a mosque accommodating more than 1,100 worshippers, educational facilities, youth programs and community spaces.

The Free Beacon has previously documented a series of inflammatory remarks by Hassan Qazwini, including statements concerning Israel, Iran and Hezbollah. Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign publicly denounced what it called Qazwini’s “antisemitic conspiracy theories” and “toxic” rhetoric after the imam appeared at a Sanders campaign event.

There is no indication in the material published by MEMRI that El-Sayed participated in, knew about or endorsed Mohammad Baqer Qazwini’s July 17 comments about Graham and Trump.

The Jerusalem Post also did not locate a public response from El-Sayed specifically addressing those newly published remarks as of Friday afternoon.

El-Sayed rejects accusations of antisemitism

El-Sayed has repeatedly rejected accusations that his criticism of Israel reflects hostility toward Jews.

After winning the primary, he directly appealed to Jewish voters, calling them his “sisters and brothers” and pledging to protect their safety. His campaign has centered its Israel policy on opposition to unconditional US military assistance, a position he has said should also apply to countries including Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

Earlier this year, after Jewish Insider reported that a campaign donor had posted antisemitic material online, El-Sayed’s campaign refunded the donation and said he “condemns any and all antisemitic or racist comments made, no matter who or where they come from.”

He also condemned a March attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, saying Jewish Americans had the right to worship safely and declaring that there was “no room for antisemitism in America.”

His handling of that attack nevertheless drew criticism from Michigan Jewish leaders after El-Sayed later discussed the attacker’s family losses in Lebanon and said that “hurt people hurt people.”

Temple Israel Rabbi Jen Lader called that framing “offensive” and argued that an attack on a Michigan synagogue could not be explained through Israeli actions overseas. El-Sayed subsequently told JTA that nothing justified the attack and said he would always defend the rights of his “Jewish sisters and brothers.”

Michigan Democratic state Rep. Noah Arbit, whose district includes West Bloomfield and who grew up attending Temple Israel, was even more critical at the time, accusing El-Sayed of having “done more than most to stoke & inflame hatred against Jews.”

Those comments preceded the newly released Qazwini footage.

Trump, Republicans target El-Sayed

El-Sayed’s views on Israel have already emerged as a major line of Republican attack following his primary victory.

Trump wrote on social media Wednesday that El-Sayed was a “Communist loser who hates Jews and Israel” and described his nomination as good news for Republicans. El-Sayed does not identify as a communist and has rejected allegations of antisemitism.

Rogers, his Republican opponent, said the November contest presented voters with a choice between “common sense or complete insanity,” while Republican campaign organizations have described El-Sayed as one of the most radical Senate nominees in the country.

The Democratic primary had already become one of the country’s most expensive and closely watched battles over Israel policy. Stevens benefited from tens of millions of dollars in outside spending from a pro-Israel super PAC, while El-Sayed repeatedly used that spending to cast himself as a grassroots candidate challenging powerful political interests.

El-Sayed’s victory has now moved that argument into a general election in a state Trump carried in 2024 and that Democrats likely need to hold if they hope to regain control of the Senate.

This post was originally published on here.

(AP) – Police released video Friday of a mass shooting that killed three people at an Idaho In-N-Out Burger, and heaped praise on a bystander who engaged the gunman on a trail, slowing him down and possibly preventing more deaths as authorities were catching up.

The video revealed more details of a chaotic scene in Twin Falls last weekend. The gunman walked up to the drive-thru window four times and opened fire, killing an In-N-Out employee, police said.

A total of 10 people were shot — inside the restaurant, directly outside, on an adjacent busy road and at a nearby visitors center lot, Twin Falls Police Chief Matthew Hicks said.

Hicks said at a news conference that investigators still don’t have a motive for the shooting. The gunman, Chad Williams, 24, killed himself.

“What happened here was violent, frightening and deeply traumatic,” Hicks said.

It should have been a “normal Saturday afternoon,” he said. “Employees showing up for work. Visitors coming to see our beautiful city. Instead they were confronted with chaos, fear and now loss.”

A man who encountered the gunman is a ‘hero’
As the shooting unfolded, employees from nearby stores fled to a walking trail. When the gunman headed to the trail, he came across two people, including one with his hands in the air talking to him, according to the video.

He distracted the gunman from possibly pursuing others on the trail. Williams subsequently killed himself as police closed in. His body was found near a canyon.

“To that young man, you are a hero,” Hicks said. “Your courage, your composure, your selflessness in that moment likely gave others the time they needed to escape harm. This community is grateful for you, and we will never forget what you did that day.”

Hicks also praised the work of an off-duty state trooper and a former police officer, A.J. James, who was wounded while confronting Williams.

An off-duty officer helps the wounded
James ran toward the sound of gunfire from the drive-thru window and was shot and wounded, while the off-duty officer inside the In-N-Out exchanged gunfire with Williams through the window and directed workers out of the building, Hicks said.

He acted “heroically and unbelievably” to try to slow down the shooter, the police chief said, declining to release the off-duty officer’s name.

Braxton Steube said he was the person who encountered Williams on the trail after fleeing a Dick’s Sporting Good store.

“I said, ‘I have a family.’ I said, ‘You don’t have to do this. I’ll tell you whatever you want. I’ll do anything,’” Steube told KMVT-TV. “He started to like tear up a bit, it seemed. And he said to me, ‘Just get away from me, man.’”

Steube said the gunman shot at him and missed.

The Twin Falls In-N-Out, 130 miles (210 kilometers) southeast of Boise, the state capital, had opened in July as part of the chain’s expansion into Idaho.

Police identified those killed as Ashley Garibay, 23, of Stockton, California; Dale Schultz, 66, of Salt Lake City; and Christopher Claunch, 59, of Hagerman, Idaho.

Williams had briefly attended the College of Southern Idaho and previously lived in Arizona.

Alphabet, the parent company of Google, is planning to raise between $20 billion and $25 billion through a major U.S. bond offering as it pours billions into artificial intelligence and computing infrastructure, Reuters reported.

The offering is expected to include several tranches of debt with different maturities and comes as Alphabet dramatically increases spending on the data centers, chips and computing capacity required to develop and operate increasingly powerful AI systems.

Alphabet is competing in an increasingly expensive technology arms race as major companies invest enormous sums to secure the infrastructure needed for the next generation of artificial intelligence products.

Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle are also ramping up spending on data centers and advanced chips as companies race to expand AI capacity and integrate the technology across their products.

For Google, those investments are expected to support increasingly sophisticated AI features across search, digital assistants, image and video tools and other services.

The scale of the spending has also raised questions among investors about how quickly the enormous investments in AI infrastructure will generate sufficient returns.

Alphabet, however, continues to bet that artificial intelligence will become a central component of virtually every major technology service in the coming years, making the infrastructure buildout critical to maintaining Google’s position in the industry.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

No tankers have loaded at Kharg Island, Iran’s main export terminal, for at least a week, recent shipping and satellite data show, suggesting that the renewed US naval blockade has brought Tehran’s crude oil sales to a halt, the Financial Times reported on Friday. 

The US reimposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports in mid-July after an interim agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz collapsed. 

Operations at Kharg Island, vital to Iran’s oil industry, halted on July 31, according to Kpler and Energy Aspects, two intelligence providers for global energy, commodity, and shipping. 

Satellite images revealed that all three berths on the island had been “empty for an extended period of time,” maritime intelligence company Windward said. 

On Tuesday, only 16 vessels were anchored in the waiting area around Kharg, added Windward, the lowest number since the beginning of last month.

About nine out of every 10 barrels of crude oil exported by Iran are loaded on the small coral island in the northern Gulf because much of the country’s coastline is too shallow to allow large tankers to dock. “The blockade is effective, in the sense that there isn’t much tanker traffic going in or out,” said Richard Bronze, head of geopolitics at Energy Aspects.

However, Bronze said the loss of export revenue was not expected to put immediate pressure on Tehran to compromise in negotiations with the United States. “It’s pretty clear that the Iranians feel they have the upper hand when it comes to Hormuz, and they are willing to absorb a great deal of economic pain to exploit their advantage,” he said.

According to the FT, Iran continued loading tankers at Kharg throughout the six months of its war with the United States and Israel, making the current standstill one of the longest since the war began.

United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), a Washington-based lobbying group that tracks Iranian oil shipments, said that since July 12, it had not identified a single tanker loaded with Iranian crude oil that had managed to leave the Gulf.

For now, Iran continues to receive revenue from cargoes that left the Gulf during the ceasefire and are only now reaching customers in Asia. According to UANI, 26 Iranian-flagged tankers have arrived in waters near Malaysia, where Iranian oil is commonly transferred between vessels before being delivered to refineries in China.

Tehran could benefit from rising oil prices, Bronze says

Bronze said Tehran could even benefit from rising oil prices before those barrels are eventually sold. In the coming weeks, however, that source of revenue is also expected to come to a halt. 

“The sand is running out of the hourglass in terms of how long this will continue generating revenue,” he said.

The blockade is also preventing Iran from replenishing its supply of empty tankers available for loading on the island. Vessels that have already unloaded their cargoes in Asia have not returned to Iranian waters. According to UANI, several are waiting off the coast of Sri Lanka, while others have been seen near Oman and Pakistan.

The price of Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, stood at just under $82 a barrel in London on Friday, as traders continued to await an agreement that would allow shipping through the Strait of Hormuz to resume.

Senior Iranian Foreign Ministry officials said this week that they had reached an agreement with Oman on the geographic coordinates of a new shipping route through the strait, but there have been no signs of progress since Wednesday. On that day, the sides said a joint statement was in the “final stages.”

Tehran possibly reducing oil production

The halt in operations at Kharg has not yet led to a significant filling of the island’s oil storage tanks, Energy Aspects noted. This could indicate that Tehran has already begun reducing oil production at its fields to avoid reaching a point where it has no storage space left.

Although the talks between Iran and Oman are being conducted bilaterally, a person briefed on the situation said that if an agreement acceptable to the parties is reached, the United States will lift the blockade and reinstate the oil sanctions waiver, allowing buyers to freely purchase Iranian crude oil, the FT said.

This post was originally published on here.

Israel’s Consul General in New York, Ofir Akunis, has ordered the Israeli Consulate to end all subscriptions to The New York Times, accusing the newspaper of repeatedly publishing false accusations against Israel and fueling incitement against the Jewish state.

Akunis announced Friday that every New York Times subscription used by staff at the Israeli Consulate in New York would be canceled immediately.

He said the decision was prompted by what he described as “a series of false blood libels and ongoing incitement against the Jewish state” appearing in the newspaper’s coverage.

Explaining the move, Akunis declared, “I have ordered the cancellation of subscriptions to the New York Times, a newspaper that consistently incites against the Jewish state.”

Pointing to a recent article published by the newspaper, Akunis criticized its reliance on unnamed sources, arguing that the report lacked credibility.

“Another blood libel from ‘anonymous sources’ in the New York Times against the State of Israel,” he said.

He further charged that the newspaper had previously relied on Hamas-linked sources, adding, “Let me remind you who their ‘sources’ were for the previous blood libel – Hamas terrorists!”

European stocks closed at another record Friday, extending their strongest run in months as corporate earnings came in better than investors expected and a weak U.S. jobs report reduced fears of another near-term Federal Reserve rate increase. 

The pan-European STOXX 600 rose 0.6% to a record 660.25, finishing the week about 2% higher and marking its fourth consecutive weekly gain. Technology stocks led Friday’s advance with a 1.9% rise, while healthcare gained 1.2%. 

The rally is being supported by something more durable than sentiment.

European companies are now expected to deliver their fastest quarterly profit growth since 2022, giving investors a fundamental reason to keep buying even after indexes reached record levels.

Second-quarter earnings for STOXX 600 companies are now projected to rise 22.4% from a year earlier. Energy companies account for much of that increase, but profits excluding energy are still expected to grow 11.5%, showing that the improvement has spread into other parts of the economy. 

Basic-materials companies — including miners, steelmakers and chemical producers — are expected to post profit growth of nearly 58%. Revenue across the index is projected to rise 12.6%, the strongest pace in four years. 

That distinction matters.

A stock market can rise temporarily because investors expect lower interest rates or because money is moving out of another region. A rally supported by improving sales and profits is harder to dismiss because companies themselves are producing more cash to justify higher valuations.

Friday’s market also benefited from developments in the United States. The weaker U.S. employment report sharply reduced expectations that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates in September. Lower expected U.S. rates can make European equities relatively more attractive while also reducing pressure on global borrowing costs. 

Individual earnings continued to drive large moves.

Kingspan surged nearly 18% after the building-materials company raised its profit forecast on booming demand from AI data centers. Danish biotech company Genmab climbed 6.5%, while Novo Nordisk gained 3.9%. 

The strength is notable because European stocks have spent years trading at substantial discounts to U.S. equities, partly because investors expected slower profit growth and weaker technology exposure.

That gap has not disappeared. But improving earnings across energy, healthcare, industrials and materials are giving global investors more reasons to reconsider how much of their portfolios belong in Europe.

The risk is that record prices leave less room for disappointment. Companies that miss earnings expectations are increasingly being punished, meaning the market will need continued profit growth to sustain the rally.

For now, Europe’s record market is increasingly being supported by the companies underneath it — not simply by investors hoping prices will keep rising.

JBizNews Desk | London

© JBizNews.com⁠ All Rights Reserved. Reproduction or distribution without written permission is prohibited.

Washington moved twice on Friday against the plumbing Iran uses to move money without touching a bank — first the crypto exchanges, then the network of Dubai and Hong Kong front companies that convert the regime’s oil revenue into usable currency.

The method is simpler than it sounds. Iranian money leaves the country as digital tokens or as invoices written on a shell company’s letterhead. Either way, no Iranian name appears on the transaction, and no American bank sees it coming. Treasury’s answer is to name the middlemen so that everyone else’s compliance software will catch them.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control designated two digital asset exchanges along with the operator of a multi-country network of front companies handling illicit cryptocurrency activity and sanctions evasion. Treasury said Iranian actors used unlicensed or lightly regulated platforms to move large volumes of digital assets, running the proceeds through corporate networks and a large online gambling operation that hid where the money came from before it reached the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and regime insiders.

At the center is Siavash Kayvanpour, born in Iran, holding additional citizenship from Dominica and Afghanistan and living in the United Arab Emirates, who runs the Shelbit Exchange through a Republic of Georgia company. Guard Corps wallets sent more than $1 million in digital assets to Shelbit addresses, more than $2 million moved from Shelbit back to Guard Corps addresses, and addresses controlled by Kayvanpour sent over $2 million to Nobitex, the Iranian exchange Washington blacklisted in June. His companies designated alongside him span the Emirates and Poland, including a Dubai firm trading commercially as Shelbit Exchange that stayed open after Emirati regulators took enforcement action against it in January 2025 and again in July 2026.

The gambling angle is the detail that will travel. Shelbit serviced a large Persian-language gambling network run by two Iranian influencers living abroad, and tens of millions of dollars of that network’s digital assets were laundered through the exchange — while the operators, convicted of illegal gambling in Iran in 2023, kept access to Iranian online payment systems the central bank tightly controls.

The second exchange named, Aban Tether, was designated for operating in Iran’s financial sector after processing millions of dollars in transactions with the previously blacklisted Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin and Ramzinex. OFAC built the case with IRS Criminal Investigation, and the State Department is offering up to $15 million for information that disrupts Guard Corps financing. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the department would pursue these networks “whether in dollars, rials, or crypto.”

The companion action went after the older machinery. OFAC targeted networks across several countries that let Iran’s rahbar banking system move hundreds of millions of dollars, marking its eighth action this year against the shadow banking apparatus. Two Dubai exchange houses anchor it: Titan Exchange, which held tens of millions on behalf of Iran’s Shahr Bank as of early 2026, and Alps International, which enabled hundreds of millions of dollars of transactions in multiple currencies this year. The mechanics were spelled out plainly — invoices generated on a chosen shell company’s letterhead, then payments run through that shell’s bank accounts. Shell firms in Hong Kong and Singapore were designated for carrying the transfers, and a Shahr Bank employee was named for coordinating currency conversions with Russia’s sanctioned VTB Bank. Bessent said the system “is buckling under Economic Fury.”

For American and foreign firms, the consequence sits in the fine print. Foreign financial institutions that knowingly handle significant transactions for anyone designated Friday risk secondary sanctions, and OFAC can bar or restrict their correspondent accounts in the United States. Any bank, payment processor or exchange with Gulf or Hong Kong trade exposure needs its screening lists updated today, because OFAC enforces on a strict liability basis — intent is not a defense.

The timing is the story’s second half. Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office that a Strait of Hormuz agreement had not been reached, describing it as “sort of open right now” while saying he is personally involved and it could come soon. Bessent has said a 30-to-60-day ceasefire could land within a day or two. Friday’s designations say something different about sequencing: pressure is still being added, not unwound, and nothing lifts until OFAC formally delists or licenses it.

JBizNews Desk | Washington

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A frightening household accident in Yerushalayim ended safely on Friday after firefighters carefully freed a child’s hand that had become trapped inside the metal beater of a kitchen mixer during a painstaking rescue operation.

Emergency crews from the HaUma District Fire Station were dispatched to a home in Yerushalayim after receiving reports that a child’s hand had become stuck inside a metal mixer attachment.

The call came through the Fire and Rescue Service’s 102 emergency dispatch center. When firefighters arrived, they found the child’s hand tightly wedged within the rigid metal wires of the mixer beater, making it impossible to remove without specialized equipment.

Rescuers kept the child calm as they carried out the intricate operation. Using precision rescue tools, including a miniature Dremel cutting device, firefighters carefully snipped through the metal wires one at a time until the child’s hand was released safely and without injury.

Incident commander Reshef Gordon Asulin praised the crews for their careful work, saying, “This was a delicate and complex rescue that required exceptional precision and great care to avoid injuring the child’s hand during the cutting process. The firefighters worked professionally, calmly, and with great caution, using specialized equipment while reassuring the child throughout the operation. Thanks to their efforts, the child was rescued safely.”

{Matzav.com}

In a bipartisan show of support, the Senate on Friday overwhelmingly approved legislation imposing tougher sanctions on Russia and Iran, advancing one of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s signature legislative efforts just weeks after his death.

The Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 passed by an 86-11 vote.

The measure targets Russia’s oil and natural gas exports, which have helped finance Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, while also extending sanctions on Iran’s energy and weapons industries that were set to expire at the end of this year.

Graham, who died last month, was the driving force behind the legislation and had argued that it could increase pressure on Moscow and help bring the conflict in Ukraine to a close.

The bill gained overwhelming bipartisan backing last week when it cleared a key procedural vote just hours after Graham’s funeral at Washington National Cathedral.

Under the legislation, the Trump administration would have the authority to impose tariffs of up to 100% on the five countries importing the largest volumes of Russian crude oil or natural gas. It also renews existing sanctions on Iran that otherwise would lapse after this year.

“This bill says to Vladimir Putin, ‘Your days of war are numbered,’” bill co-sponsor Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said last week. “’You are on the losing side. Better to come to the table now than sacrifice more lives, waste more money, crater your economy, destroy your standing in the world.’

“America stands with Ukraine.”

Before the Senate voted, Graham’s sister, Sen. Darline Graham Nordone (R-SC), urged lawmakers to unite behind the legislation, calling for “a show of strength” that would preserve America’s role “as a beacon of hope to the free world.”

“Each member of this body must also make a choice,” she added, “whether we have the courage to stand up to evil, or continue on with the status quo.”

Following the vote, Darline Graham was invited to announce the final vote tally from the Senate floor.

Although the bill was introduced last year and attracted broad support from senators, it remained on hold as President Trump pursued diplomatic efforts to bring an end to Russia’s four-year war against Ukraine.

One day before his death on July 11, Graham revealed that he had reached an agreement with the White House to move the legislation forward.

At the time, Graham expressed confidence that the measure would ultimately pass, pledging it would “become law” and saying he had “never been more optimistic” that the war in Ukraine could soon come to an end.

The legislation now heads to the House of Representatives, which is scheduled to reconvene from its summer recess on August 31.

{Matzav.com}