NEW YORK CITY (VINnews)-Lionel Messi was diagnosed with growth hormone deficiency as a child, but his extraordinary talent convinced FC Barcelona to sign him at a young age. Now, the Argentina captain is considered one of the greatest soccer players of all time and has broken the record for the most career goals scored in the World Cup.

When Barcelona’s then-sporting director Carles Rexach first saw the young Messi play, he immediately recognized something special.

“When I got there, I said, ‘You’ve got to sign him. That kid is different from everyone else,’” Rexach said in 2013.

Messi’s path to greatness began with that pivotal decision. Despite his medical condition, which required daily injections and raised concerns about his physical development, Messi’s skill, vision and determination set him apart.

The Argentine star has since cemented his legacy as one of football’s all-time greats, winning multiple Ballon d’Or awards, Champions League titles with Barcelona and, in 2022, leading Argentina to World Cup victory.

During the current tournament, Messi broke the record for the most career goals in World Cup history. Argentina will now face Spain in the 2026 World Cup final on Sunday.

Messi’s story continues to inspire athletes and fans worldwide, demonstrating how perseverance and talent can overcome early health challenges.

VENICE, Italy (AP) — The billionaire U.S. ambassador to Italy faced protests when he arrived in Venice on Friday aboard his luxury yacht as part of a coastal diplomacy tour marking the 250th anniversary of American independence.

Activists described hospitality mogul Tilman Fertitta’s arrival as an unwelcome display of American wealth and influence at a time when many Italians see the Trump administration as upending the post-World War II international order.

Protesters clash with police, shouting ‘Shame!”
Hundreds of protesters carrying inflatable pool toys gathered nearby to march toward the yacht that dwarfed buildings on the banks of St. Mark’s Basin.

Signs read “Make America Read Again” and “Oligarch in saor” — a reference to a Venetian specialty with sardines. There was a heavy police presence on foot, while at least three police boats circled the yacht and two lines of police in riot gear blocked access to the yacht.

Demonstrators clashed briefly with police in riot gear when they refused to stop their march toward the ambassador’s yacht just a few hundred meters (yards) away. Police pushed back with shields and inflatable toys flew through the air. The lead protesters had been walking with their arms in the air to show they were peaceful.

After the clash, protesters yelled “Shame!” at the ambassador, the mayor and the police.

Coastal diplomacy aboard a super yacht
The so-called Coastal Diplomacy 250 tour of 13 Italian coastal regions on a super yacht is intended to celebrate “our shared history, our economic partnership, and the cultural bonds that make the U.S.-Italy relationship so special,” Fertitta said in a social media post.

Many of the same groups that protested the wedding of Jeff Bezos to Lauren Sanchez in Venice last year mobilized against Fertitta’s arrival aboard the 117-meter (384-foot) luxury yacht, Boardwalk, which features two helipads, a pair of swimming pools and a fully equipped spa and gym.

On July 4, protest organizers unfurled a banner reading “Venezia non si USA,” which is a play on words combining the Italian phrase “Venice is not to be used” with the acronym USA. The banner was as long as Fertitta’s yacht to illustrate what the protesters called “the dimensions of his arrogance.”

“It’s arrogant to think he can do what he wants in a city that is ever more sold to the single culture of tourism,’’ organizer Stella Morion told The Associated Press. She said protesters are also opposed to President Donald Trump’s international politics, including U.S. strikes on Iran, which she said have prompted a spike in energy prices.

“It is the umpteenth slap in the face of a city and all of the people in Venice who struggle to reach the end of the month due to an increase in prices caused by Trump’s war,” she said.

Fertitta declined a request for an interview to discuss the tour and the planned protest.

A hospitality mogul with Italian roots
The billionaire owner of Fertitta Entertainment was sworn in as ambassador to Italy in 2025. He made his fortune in the hospitality industry, including restaurants, hotels and casinos. He also owns the NBA’s Houston Rockets. His official biography puts his net worth at $11.3 billion, while Forbes ranks him among the 100 wealthiest Americans.

Details of who Fertitta will meet while in Venice have not been released, but he is expected to attend the famed Redentore festival on Saturday, which commemorates the end of the plague in 1576 culminating with celebratory fireworks over St. Mark’s Basin.

He has already stopped over in the Sicilian port town of Cefalu, where his family’s roots trace back to 1566, and met with the governor in Palermo. Other stops have included the Calabrian port of Le Castella and sailed along the coast of Puglia and up the Adriatic coastline to Venice.

A changing U.S.-Italy relationship
Fertitta’s tenure includes navigating a cooling in the once warm relationship between Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni and Trump, who has made a series of social media attacks against her.

Meloni, who was once seen as a close Trump ally with similar views on such issues as immigration, did not attend 250th celebrations at the U.S. Embassy.

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NEW YORK (VINnews)-Foreclosure filings across the United States ballooned in the first half of the year, reaching nearly 228,000 from January through June — a 21% increase from the same period a year earlier and 28% higher than two years ago, according to data released Thursday by real estate analytics firm ATTOM.

The rise points to mounting financial pressure on homeowners, often triggered by job loss or other life events that lead to missed mortgage payments, ATTOM CEO Rob Barber said in a statement.

“Rising foreclosure rates indicate that more homeowners are in financial distress,” Barber said. ATTOM tracks foreclosures as default notices, scheduled auctions or bank repossessions.

States seeing the sharpest increases included Idaho, up 59% from the first half of 2025; Colorado, up 57%; and Georgia, up 52%.

Florida led the nation in overall foreclosure activity. In June alone, one in every 2,106 housing units in the state had a foreclosure filing.

Nationwide, foreclosures had totaled 640,864 in 2019 before dropping during the pandemic. They are now returning to pre-pandemic levels, the data shows.

“The increases also suggest that some homeowners may be facing greater financial strain than they were a year ago,” Barber added.

Short sales — in which homeowners sell properties for less than the mortgage balance to avoid foreclosure — are also climbing, according to separate data from Realtor.com, providing another indicator of homeowner challenges.

NEW YORK (VINnews) – Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, long a polarizing figure in conservative media known for amplifying divisive rhetoric, told Bloomberg News podcaster Mishal Husain that Republicans are poised to suffer significant losses in the upcoming midterms, framing it as punishment for neglecting domestic struggles in favor of overseas entanglements.

“They’re going to be punished,” Carlson said. “Younger people are legit struggling … and I don’t see any political leaders … moving their priorities from a whole suite of different foreign conflicts … and spending the time thinking about how do I elevate my people?”

The remarks, delivered in an interview that highlights Carlson’s ongoing drift from mainstream Republican priorities, underscore his pattern of sowing discord within the party he once championed. Critics have accused him of peddling isolationist views that undermine strong U.S. support for allies like Israel amid critical security challenges, while shifting blame away from domestic policy shortcomings.

Carlson’s comments come as Republicans navigate a complex political landscape, with many voters expressing concerns over economic pressures on younger generations. However, his narrative conveniently overlooks the substantial achievements of Republican-led initiatives in areas like border security, economic growth, and countering threats from adversaries — priorities that have historically resonated with broad swaths of the electorate.

Instead, the commentator appears to echo isolationist sentiments that have drawn fire for potentially weakening resolve against global threats, including those facing the Jewish state and the broader West. Analysts suggest such rhetoric risks alienating pro-Israel voters and mainstream conservatives who view robust international engagement as essential to American strength and security.

Carlson, who has faced repeated accusations of platforming fringe ideas and contributing to political polarization, has increasingly positioned himself as a critic of the GOP establishment. His prediction of a midterm “spanking” for Republicans may reflect more about his own estrangement from the party than any inevitable electoral outcome.

VINnews will continue to monitor developments in U.S. politics and their implications for the Jewish community and Israel.

TAPACHULA, México (AP) — A strong earthquake struck the southern Mexican Pacific coast on Friday, right on the border with Guatemala, and was felt from Mexico City to El Salvador. Authorities have not immediately reported any severe damage or casualties in any country.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) informed the earthquake had a magnitude of 7.3 with epicenter 48 kilometers (30 miles) southwest of Aquiles Serdan, near the coast of Chiapas and at a depth of 15 kilometers (9 miles). It was preceded by a smaller quake with epicenter a bit further out in the ocean.

In the town of Suchiate, located along the river that separates Mexico from Guatemala, coastal areas are being monitored for risk of a tsunami, according to Mayor Elmer Vázquez Gallardo.

In Tapachula, the main city on Mexico’s southern border, the tremor began mildly but gradually intensified.

“We were upstairs on the second floor when it started shaking; we thought it would pass, but then it got stronger, so we all went downstairs and evacuated in an orderly manner to the front courtyard,” Alejandra Mendoza, an administrative employee at a public hospital in the city, explained to The Associated Press.

In Guatemala City, the earthquake frightened residents because of how long it lasted. Many people poured into the streets in the middle of rush hour as the workday was beginning.

In the Mexican capital, where buildings in certain areas creaked and shook, the earthquake alert did not sound because, as the government explained, “the energy radiated by the earthquake during the first few seconds did not exceed the activation thresholds.”

By Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

“The Rebbe believed every human being could change. He never asked Jews to surrender moral clarity in the hope that someone someday might.”

Few Jewish leaders have shaped modern Judaism more profoundly than the Lubavitcher Rebbe, my Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson. His message of love, responsibility, Jewish pride, and moral courage transformed Jewish life across the globe.

2- @berelsolomon should get on knees at the Rebbe’s grave and beg forgiveness that the Rebbe embraced Hitler lovers 🤮. Hitler killed the Rebbe’s family. How dare you ? #FakeChabad – read the truth in Rabbi Shmuley’s new column – https://t.co/v6RgYXZyVB pic.twitter.com/5Yu9ENXl44

— Rabbi Shmuley (@RabbiShmuley) July 17, 2026

The Rebbe believed in the infinite value of every human being. He believed no one should ever be written off. He believed in teshuvah—the possibility that people can genuinely change. Every human being possessed an infinite spark of the divine.

But he also believed in truth.

He never confused outreach with endorsement.

He never suggested that moral clarity should be sacrificed for publicity.

That is why I have become increasingly troubled by the way one story involving Senator Jesse Helms has come to dominate discussions of Jewish outreach.

One of the more troubling recent developments has been the attempt by some commentators to resurrect the decades-old Jesse Helms controversy in order to draw false moral equivalencies with entirely different modern disputes. The Helms episode has been stripped of its historical context and repurposed as a rhetorical shield to deflect criticism of contemporary figures whose own conduct has generated intense public controversy.

Historical comparisons should illuminate, not obscure. Invoking the Helms story to dismiss legitimate concerns about present-day controversies does a disservice both to history and to honest public debate. Each case should stand or fall on its own facts. Using a decades-old political dispute as a blanket defense against criticism of current conduct is intellectually unpersuasive and risks trivializing the very issues that deserve careful moral scrutiny.

If critics believe a public figure has crossed serious ethical or moral lines, they should defend that position with evidence relating to that individual’s own actions and public statements—not by attempting to rewrite or weaponize history. Honest debate demands accuracy, context, and consistency, especially when discussing matters involving antisemitism, extremism, and the memory of the Holocaust.

Today, whenever controversy erupts over whether Jewish leaders or influencers should engage deeply controversial public figures, someone inevitably invokes Jesse Helms.

“The Rebbe met Jesse Helms.”

“The Rebbe honored Jesse Helms.”

“The Rebbe believed in influencing the future.”

Case closed.

Except history is not that simple.

Two Stories—Not One

The modern understanding of the Jesse Helms story rests largely upon Professor Alan Dershowitz’s recollections.

In a Jewish Educational Media video released in 2025, Professor Dershowitz recounts that Jesse Helms, who started with less than great affection for israel, was being honored and that the Rebbe explained one should not judge a person solely by the past but should seek to influence the future.

It is a beautiful lesson

But there’s one major problem. .

But years earlier, Professor Dershowitz appears to have described the same encounter entire differently.

According to his earlier published account, the Rebbe’s very first response was that Jesse Helms had not been honored at all but had simply been present at a Chabad event as one of countless legislators attending and was denied any special status.

Those are very different versions of the same story.

One describes an intentional honor.

The other does not.

That distinction matters enormously.

I Asked Professor Dershowitz Directly

Rather than speculate, I contacted Professor Dershowitz personally.

I wrote:

Hi Alan,

Can you please explain the discrepancy that my son Mendy found in your statements about the Rebbe “honoring” Jesse Helms. I’m writing a column on it and need an official statement please. You clearly contradict yourself.

Please watch Mendy’s video wheee he quotes you directly, both in wrottten form and transcribed from video.

At the time I finished this article, I had not received a response.

If Professor Dershowitz offers one, I would gladly publish it. Indeed, the real question is why for decades Dershowitz has sat on this letter and has not published it. Some are even asking if the letter even exists. Why won’t Dershowitz clarify such an important question and where is this famous letter?

This is not about embarrassing anyone.

It is about protecting the historical integrity of one of Judaism’s greatest leaders.

Jesse Helms Is Not Today’s Debate

Even accepting the broadest interpretation of the story, there remains another point that is often overlooked.

Jesse Helms was one of the most influential United States senators of his generation.

He served for decades in the Senate.

He became chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

He was a central figure in American politics.

Many Jews strongly disagreed with his positions on Israel.

His opposition to aspects of American aid policy toward Israel and his criticism of Israeli military decisions generated understandable concern.

But that is precisely the point.

The controversy surrounding Jesse Helms centered on public policy.

He was a mainstream elected official whose views on Israel were vigorously debated.

Using his example as a universal template for every modern controversy strips away the historical context.

Historical analogies only work when they are historically accurate.

“The Rebbe believed in changing people—not in erasing the distinction between engagement and endorsement.”

Now that’s a far cry from the catastrophic PR disaster in Israel last week with “Heil Hitler” singing Clavicular, arranged by bizarre Chabad influencer Yossi Farro and disgustingly defended by amoral influencers Lizzy Savetsky and Emily Austin, who in doing so betrayed both Israel as well as the sacred memory of the six million.

Leading antisemites like the streamer Clavicular and his best friend, the rabid antisemite Nick Fuentes, are receiving free public relations from Jews in Israel. This is not theory. It is happening in real time. Clavicular, who has sung “Heil Hitler” along to Kanye West’s track and boasts of treating women as disposable objects for five or ten seconds in a bathroom stall, was brought to Israel, fed cholent, photographed with Jewish influencers, and given a platform that rehabilitates his image. The result is a catastrophic PR victory for a man whose ideology glorifies the murder of six million Jews.

All of this rests on the Jesse Helms lie. The claim, pushed repeatedly by Dershowitz, is that the Lubavitcher Rebbe honored an antisemite and thereby turned him into a supporter of Israel. The implication is clear: if the Rebbe could honor an antisemite to influence the future, then today’s Jewish influencers can platform Clavicular, wrap him in tefillin-adjacent optics, and call it outreach. This is one of the greatest libels ever told about the Rebbe, and it is being told by Chabad’s own media apparatus.

The Jesse Helms Myth Is Garbage

Jesse Helms was not an antisemite. He was a powerful, mainstream Southern senator from North Carolina who opposed foreign aid to almost every country, including Israel. He did not believe Jews had no right to a state. He did not call Israelis Nazis or demand the destruction of the Jewish people. He was a fiscal isolationist who believed America should not bankroll other nations’ defense.

In 1982, during the Lebanon War, Helms went further and called for the United States to break diplomatic relations with Israel until the fighting stopped. These were wrong and harmful positions. But they were policy disagreements, not racial or religious hatred. Helms was never a Nick Fuentes or a Clavicular.

Helms experienced a turnaround. By the mid-1980s he became more supportive of Israel. The Dershowitz-JEM narrative credits the Rebbe with this change through a supposed letter or honor. The evidence collapses under examination.

As above, a 2014 Jewish Educational Media pamphlet, Dershowitz himself wrote that the first thing the Rebbe told him was that Jesse Helms was not honored by Chabad. He was simply there. Another Chabad source states the Rebbe said Helms had just walked in — he was not invited, let alone honored — and Chabad chose not to be rude by throwing him out. Most shocking, the JEM video is titled “How a Former Anti-Semite Became a Strong Israel Supporter.” The clear implication is that the Rebbe turned an antisemite around while he was still an antisemite by honoring him.

As stated, Dershowitz has mysteriously never produced the letter he now claims the Rebbe wrote. In the 2025 JEM video he describes a “very poignant, very powerful letter” about honoring not only the past but influencing the future. In his own earlier telling, no such honor occurred. The photographs JEM shows of Helms flanked by yeshiva students are from his well-publicized August 1985 visit to Israel — more than a year after his shift toward Israel began in early 1984. The event the Rebbe discussed with Dershowitz took place in Washington, not Israel.

The real reason for Helms’ change had nothing to do with Jewish sycophancy. In his 1984 Senate race against North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt, pro-Israel Jews and Christians sent an estimated $2–3 million to Hunt’s campaign. Hunt outraised and outspent Helms and was favored to win. That financial and political pressure — Jews fighting Helms rather than kissing his ring — forced the senator to recalculate. He moderated his Israel positions to survive politically. It was opposition, not appeasement, that moved him.

The story that the Rebbe honored an active antisemite to transform him is therefore false on multiple levels. It is a libel against the Rebbe’s legacy. And it is now being weaponized to justify platforming actual neo-Nazi-adjacent figures like Clavicular in the Jewish state.

Clavicular’s Catastrophic Visit and the “Heil Hitler / Sex-with-Women-in-the-Toilet” PR Disaster

Clavicular — a 20-year-old Kick streamer from the looksmaxxing scene — arrived in Israel this month amid controversy over his past content. He has sung along to “Heil Hitler.” He was involved in the “clubocaust” incident. He maintains close ties to Nick Fuentes, one of the most despicable antisemites in American public life. On Israeli television’s Channel 13 he was given the opportunity to apologize. He refused and attacked the presenter for even asking. This is the face of the new antisemitism: young, online, unrepentant, and now physically present in Tel Aviv with Jewish enablers.

Jewish influencers facilitated this visit. Yossi Farro, who brands himself as a Chabad figure and has built a following by chasing billionaires and celebrities to put on Tefillin on the world’s most “powerful Jews,” courted Clavicular. Farro fed him cholent, posted videos, and presented him with Jewish-themed gifts. The message sent to Clavicular’s audience and to Fuentes’ circle was unmistakable: Jews will rehabilitate you if you play along. Lizzy Savetsky, another damaged Jewish influencer, has also pledged openness to hosting figures of this stripe. The result is free PR for antisemites at Israel’s expense.

Clavicular’s own words and behavior compound the disgrace. He has bragged about using girls as sexual objects for five or ten seconds in a bathroom stall. He came to Israel, in the words of those around him, to “have sex with Jewish girls.” When confronted with the reality that he treats Jewish women as disposable, he offered no apology. Farro’s role in bringing a man with this record — and in allegedly committing on livestream to pull political levers for Clavicular to gain access to official IDF social media accounts — is indefensible.

The IDF Social Media Breach and the Demotion of Shira Braun

An IDF soldier named Shira Braun, who managed aspects of the military’s social media and TikTok presence in the Spokesperson’s Unit, appeared in Clavicular’s livestreams, abasing herself utterly. Reports indicate he made physical advances on camera and commented about taking her to a hotel room “to make love to you” they knew each other one day. She has since been removed from her position and reassigned by the IDF to kitchen duties — cooking and cleaning. This is not sufficient.

If Braun or anyone associated bragged about granting a neo-Nazi-linked streamer access to official IDF accounts, or if Farro pledged to leverage connections for such access, this is a national security matter. The IDF is a real army defending against another Holocaust. Playing with its social media channels for clout or “content” is not edgy; it is reckless endangerment of Israeli lives. Braun should face a court-martial. Israeli police must investigate Farro’s statements on the livestream. Farro should not be permitted to leave Israel until he has been questioned under oath. This is not a game. It is a stain on the Jewish state.

Chana Boteach’s Confrontation — The Moral Response My Children Delivered

My daughter Chana Boteach, an IDF veteran and Tel Aviv entrepreneur who created the Kosjwr Sex company to promote American passion and intimacy, monogamy, and faithfulness, named after the Rebbe’s saintly mother, confronted Clavicular directly in a kosher restaurant in Tel Aviv. She did what too many Jewish influencers refused to do: she spoke truth to a man glorifying Nazi ideology and degrading women.

In a video that went viral, she essentially told Clavicular, “There is no place in Israel for someone who’s both a neo-Nazi and a woman-trashing misogynist. Israel is a brave and moral country where men are raised to marry and respect women and build families; not to use girls as objects in a bathroom stall, as you bragged, you caveman degenerate. Respect this country of heroic men and strong IDF warrior women, you woman-hating chauvinist and cowardly man-child, or go back to the hole you crawled out of or wherever “Chabad” turncoat Yossi Farro dig you out of. My name is Chana and I’m named after the Rebbe’s saintly mother. Farro is a disgrace to the Rebbe and the light he brought to the world.”

Outreach Without Confusion

The Rebbe’s philosophy was both compassionate and demanding.

He believed every person possesses a Divine soul.

He believed every person is capable of moral growth.

But growth begins with truth.

Repentance begins with acknowledging wrongdoing.

The Jewish concept of teshuvah is powerful precisely because it recognizes that people can become different from who they once were.

That process is meaningful because it requires honesty.

Hope for transformation does not require pretending transformation has already occurred.

That is why I believe the Jesse Helms story has too often been simplified into a slogan rather than understood as a nuanced historical episode.

A New Era of Public Influence

The world in which the Rebbe operated is very different from today’s world of livestreams, viral videos, podcasts, and algorithm-driven celebrity.

Modern influencers possess enormous cultural reach.

Every collaboration sends a message.

Every photograph becomes symbolic.

Every appearance communicates something beyond the words spoken.

What should unite us is the understanding that outreach succeeds only when accompanied by moral clarity.

The Rebbe’s Legacy Deserves Better

The Lubavitcher Rebbe needs no mythology.

His greatness requires no embellishment.

If historical accounts differ, let us examine them honestly.

If famous anecdotes exist in multiple versions, let us ask respectful questions.

If documents remain unpublished, let us seek greater clarity.

That is not disrespect.

It is respect of the highest order.

The Rebbe taught us to think.

He taught us to ask questions.

He taught us to combine love with courage and compassion with truth.

Most of all, he taught us that Judaism never asks us to choose between kindness and conviction.

The Rebbe believed people could change.

So do I.

But he also believed that truth matters.

So do I.

The greatest tribute we can pay his memory is not to invoke his name whenever it is convenient.

It is to preserve his teachings accurately, honestly, and courageously.

That, above all, is what his legacy deserves.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, “America’s Rabbi, is the international best-selling author of 37 book, the most recent being “Comeback Nation: How Israel Annihilated Its Adversaries in a Seven-Front War of Survival.” Follow him on X and Instagram @Rabbi Shmuley.

NEW YORK (AP) — A 40-year-old New York man faces hate crime charges following a confrontation with “Today” show host Craig Melvin at NBC’s studio in Manhattan.

The man was arrested Thursday morning inside 30 Rockefeller Center in Midtown by an officer responding to reports of a disorderly individual inside the building, police said Friday.

NBC News says in a statement that an individual approached Melvin after entering an unauthorized area in a vestibule near Studio 1A. Melvin notified security, who held the man until police arrived, according to NBC.

No altercation occurred and no injuries were reported. NBC did not say how the man gained access to the area.

“We are reviewing the incident and our security protocols and remain committed to providing a safe and secure environment for everyone who works at and visits our studios,” the network said in a statement.

The man has been charged with burglary, menacing and criminal trespass as hate crimes, as well as harassment. It was not clear Friday if has appeared in court or if he has an attorney.

Police did not say what led to the hate crime enhancements on the charges. Police records show a court date has been scheduled for Wednesday.

Melvin, who is Black, discussed the incident on-air Friday morning.

“Unfortunately, an intruder made his way into an unauthorized area here at Studio 1A,” Melvin said. “Thankfully, he was apprehended quickly. He was placed under arrest. We are just very happy that everyone is safe.”

Melvin also posted about the incident on Instagram.

“Hey everyone. I’ve heard from so many of you over the last few hours,” he wrote on Thursday. “I’m doing just fine. Thanks for reaching out.”

Longtime “Today” show meteorologist Al Roker also took to social media to thank everyone reaching out to check on Melvin.

“We are both okay,” Roker posted on Instagram. “It’s moments like these that serve to pull us together. You all, like Craig, said ‘You come after one of us, you come after all of us.’”

Melvin and Roker are among a relatively small group of prominent Black journalists and anchors with regular, highly visible roles on national broadcast network news programs.

NEW YORK (AP) — Milk brand Fairlife is pausing its production in the U.S. after a ransomware cyberattack breached the company’s systems.

Coca-Cola, which owns Fairlife, announced Thursday that its dairy company had identified “unauthorized access by a third party” to a portion of its systems, including those related to production. The company disclosed that this was in connection to a ransomware event — and in response, it took some operations offline.

“Product quality and safety have not been impacted,” Atlanta-based Coca-Cola said in a statement. “However, as a result of the incident, production operations at fairlife in the United States are temporarily suspended.”

Fairlife’s Canadian operations were not affected. The full scope and impacts of the attack are otherwise still unknown, Coca-Cola added — but the beverage giant said it had informed law enforcement, and is also working with cybersecurity experts as it continues its investigation and recovery to restore operations.

A company spokesperson said there were no further updates to share as of Friday morning.

Cyberattacks are on the rise across sectors. Beyond dairy goods, other breaches have recently resulted in anything from core education services getting knocked offline to empty shelves at popular clothing or grocery stores.

Ransomware attacks — in which hackers demand a hefty payment to restore hacked systems — also account for a growing share of cyber crimes. And experts note that attackers know there’s a particular impact when going after well-known brands and products that shoppers buy or need every day.

Fairlife, based in Chicago, touts over $3 billion in annual retail sales today. The company produces a range of lactose-free products — which beyond milk, includes protein shakes.

UVALDE, Texas (AP) — Catastrophic flooding has swept across parts of Texas following days of heavy rain, submerging homes and roads, prompting hundreds of rescues and leaving emergency responders working around the clock as floodwaters continue to threaten communities.

Flood water flows through a restaurant’s parking lot on Wednesday, July 15, 2026, in Boerne, Texas. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

The Pedernales River floods near Old Kerr Highway on Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Fredericksburg, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

A property’s gate featuring cattle is partially submerged with flood waters along State Highway 27 in Comfort, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

A helicopter flies over the Guadalupe River as floods pass through the area on Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Kerrville, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

Flooding blocks off G Street along the Guadalupe River on Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Kerrville, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

Water along the Pedernales River floods the Gillespie County Safety Rest Area on Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Stonewall, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

Hugh Ghormley watches as water moves along the Pedernales River at the Blanco County Fair and Rodeo on Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Johnson City, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

An aerial view shows the Guadalupe River after a series of storms Friday, July 17, 2026, in Kerrville, Texas. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

An aerial view shows debris along the Guadalupe River after a series of storms Friday, July 17, 2026, in Kerrville, Texas. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

People gather to watch as the Perdenales River floods Ranch Road 1623 in Stonewall, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (Mikala Compton/Austin American-Statesman via AP)

Ella and Grace Sanford and their dog Benjamin ride on a Texas Game Wardens rescue boat after being evacuated from their home after flooding in Uvalde, Texas, on Thursday, July 16, 2026. (Casy Sanford via AP)

Storm debris is seen along the Guadalupe River on Friday, July 17, 2026, in Kerrville, Texas. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Crews clean up flood debris along the Guadalupe River on Friday, July 17, 2026, in Comfort, Texas. (AP Photo/Joel Angel Juarez)

The Guadalupe River floods a crossing after a series of storms on Friday, July 17, 2026, in Hunt, Texas. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

The Guadalupe River floods a crossing after a series of storms on Friday, July 17, 2026, in Hunt, Texas. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

COLOGNE, Germany (AP) — The leaders of Germany and France announced on Friday that the German military would participate in a nuclear exercise under a French initiative to deepen European nuclear cooperation.

The move by both countries to deepen nuclear cooperation underscores growing European defense self-reliance amid concerns about the future of U.S. security commitments to the continent.

“We will have German conventional forces participate in a nuclear exercise conducted by the French armed forces before the end of this year,” Chancellor Friedrich Merz announced after talks with French President Emmanuel Macron at Norvenich air base near Cologne in western Germany.

He said that the cooperation with France “complements” the NATO nuclear sharing agreement, to which Germany remains committed. U.S. nuclear bombs are stationed in Germany as part of NATO’s nuclear deterrent, and German fighter jets have been certified to potentially carry the weapons in case of an emergency.

Previous German leaders have refused offers of nuclear cooperation with France, Merz said, but “the world we live in today requires new answers.”

Germany’s participation in the nuclear exercise will be with conventional means for now, Merz said.

“We are proceeding step by step, it may be that this will result in a new doctrine, but it is far too early to say that today,” he said.

Advanced deterrence is very important for European collective security, Macron said, “because it creates strategic doubt among our adversaries.”

The French president said that Germany would have a “vanguard role” in deterrence efforts and that “diluting the presence of the nuclear deterrent” is what confuses enemies.

Macron said that cooperation would translate into “explaining some aspects of how we operate, sharing certain closely held practices, offering joint exercises, developing joint initiatives and partnerships, and fostering greater … trust among our teams, experts and military personnel.”

Macron didn’t give details about operational measures.

“Complete and absolute transparency is not necessarily the most effective strategy when dealing with adversaries on European soil,” he said.

Enhanced nuclear deterrence won’t involve financing from Germany, Macron said.

On Thursday, French Rafale and German Eurofighter jets participated in a joint in-flight refueling exercise, a symbolic kickoff to the cooperation. The Rafale jets are designed to deliver nuclear weapons.

In early March, Macron announced that his country would increase its nuclear arsenal, and he invited European partners to strengthen cooperation on nuclear deterrence. France’s initiative came amid doubts across Europe about U.S. reliability when it comes to the continent’s defense.

France has been the only nuclear power in the 27-nation European Union since Brexit.

Several countries announced their interest in the French initiative, including the United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden, Denmark and Norway.

The participation of Germany, which is implementing a major rearmament plan to build Europe’s strongest conventional military by 2039, boosts the program.

The German and French leaders also sought to reinvigorate bilateral ties after a planned $100 billion joint fighter jet program collapsed in June. The project had aimed to replace Rafales and Eurofighters used by Germany and Spain by 2040.

The two leaders are eager to lock in advances over the coming months, as Macron approaches the end of his presidency, and uncertainty grows over whether his successor will share his commitment to deeper European cooperation.

(AP) – Heat that hit Europe exceptionally early and hard this year appears to have led to a spike in deaths, with well over 10,000 more people dying at the height of the heat wave than would normally have been expected, according to figures that are still emerging across the continent.

Measures of what researchers call “excess mortality” — the difference between the normally expected number of deaths and the actual number — spiked in late June, when parts of Europe experienced record temperatures. Experts caution that it takes a while for a full picture to emerge, and that many heat-related deaths will never formally be recorded as such. For example, a heart attack, which can be triggered by extreme heat exposure, especially in people who are older or have underlying health issues, may be listed on a death certificate simply as a heart attack.

It’s an alarming start to the summer. Several heat waves have killed thousands of people in the past few years in Europe. Still, 2003 stands as the deadliest year in Europe for heat, with about 70,000 deaths. The frequency and intensity of heat waves are supercharged by climate change, which comes from the burning of fuels like coal, oil and gas.

An exceptionally deadly week in early summer 2026
The EuroMOMO mortality monitoring hub, which receives data from two dozen countries, gave an estimate of 14,260 for excess mortality from all causes in the week ending June 28, more than 12,000 of those deaths being among people age 65 and older. That’s out of a total 84,583 deaths that week. Figures in the preceding and following weeks were far lower.

Lasse Vestergaard of Denmark’s Statens Serum Institut, which coordinates EuroMOMO, said that “we attribute this to the heat wave affecting quite a lot of countries in Europe, and we do that because there is no other obvious explanation that could explain such a high excess mortality happening at the moment.”

Such a high excess in a single week is “highly unusual,” he added. EuroMOMO doesn’t give absolute numbers for individual countries, but found the highest rates of excess in France, Belgium and Germany.

Nations that bore the brunt of the heat have issued their own estimates — which don’t always follow the same methodology or timelines. Here is a snapshot of heat-related deaths being reported by various countries.

Germany
Germany’s disease control center, the Robert Koch Institute, directly attributed 6,830 deaths to heat this year through early July, 6,470 of them among people 65 and older. Temperatures in Germany late last month hit their highest levels since records began, peaking with a measurement of 41.7 degrees Celsius (107.06 Fahrenheit) on June 28, according to the German Weather Service.

United Kingdom
Britain’s Met Office, the national weather agency, said that 2,700 people are believed to have died from heat-related causes during heat waves in England and Wales in May and June. Of those deaths, it says that about 550 occurred in late May and about 2,200 in late June. This year brought national heat records for May of 35.1 Celsius (95.18 Fahrenheit) and for June of more than 37 Celsius (98.6 Fahrenheit).

France
France’s public health authority said there were at least 2,000 more deaths in the week of June 22-28 than the previous week, when temperatures were already climbing. France recorded its hottest-ever days on June 24 and 25, when the Meteo France weather service said the national thermal indicator — an average of daily temperatures measured at 30 weather stations — hit 30 Celsius (86 Fahrenheit). More than 40% of France saw peak temperatures of above 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit).

Spain
An estimated 937 deaths in Spain in June were attributed to excess heat, according to the Carlos III Health Institute, an official Spanish monitoring agency. Last month was Spain’s second-hottest June on record, with temperatures 3.2 Celsius (5.8 Fahrenheit) above the monthly normal average, according to the AEMET weather agency. A five-day heat wave saw temperatures regularly surpass 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), AEMET said.

Belgium
There were 1,747 deaths above what would usually be expected during the heat wave that ran from June 18 to July 1, according to Sciensano, Belgium’s public health institute. It said that “a certain excess mortality is expected during heat waves, as during waves of cold weather and flu epidemics. Nevertheless, the heatwave of June 2026 is distinguished by its exceptional breadth.”

At the peak of the heat wave, there was a measurement of 35.5 Celsius (95.9 Fahrenheit) on June 26, the IRM weather institute said.

Netherlands
An initial estimate of excess death figures from the June heat wave found that the Netherlands had 480 more deaths than expected, according to the public health service. Increased mortality was particularly notable in eastern and southern areas, where the temperatures were the highest.

The country saw its highest temperature ever for June, with the Dutch weather service registering 36.8 degrees Celsius (98.24 Fahrenheit). That’s more than a degree Celsius (1.8F) higher than the previous record, set in 1947.

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — An elementary school bus returning from an educational trip to a scenic waterfall in Uganda veered off the road and overturned, killing at least 20 children and one adult and leaving at least nine children in critical condition, police and a government official said Friday.

The bus crashed Thursday night in the Kapchorwa District in eastern Uganda on the way back from the region’s Sipi Falls, the Uganda Police Force said in a statement posted on X.

Survivors, including three adults and several children, were taken to several hospitals, according to police. More than 28 children were being treated in hospitals, nine of them in critical condition, Ugandan Minister of Local Government Balaam Barugahara Ateenyi said on X.

The adult among the 21 people who died appeared to be the founder and head of the school, Barugahara said.

Video from the Uganda Red Cross showed bodies of victims in and around the wreckage as people arrived to help following the nighttime crash. Some of the survivors were transported to a hospital in a pick-up truck, according to the video provided to The Associated Press.

Education Minister John Muyingo said the government had suspended all school trips and tours across the country of around 45 million people in response to the tragedy.

The bus belonged to the King David Junior School, an elementary school in the capital, Kampala, police said. The village where police said the crash occurred is near the Uganda-Kenya border, some 300 kilometers (some 190 miles) from Kampala.

The driver reportedly lost control of the bus, which veered off the road, struck a rock and overturned, according to the police statement, which added that the information was preliminary and the cause of the crash was under investigation.

A police photo showed the bus lying on its side with the entire roof ripped off and the seats exposed, including some that were mangled. Luggage and clothing lay strewn on the road.

Road accidents are common in the East African nation and often are blamed on poorly maintained vehicles, speeding and poor road conditions, which are problems across Africa. At least 14 people died when a bus collided with a truck in a remote area of northern Uganda earlier this month.

Africa has the worst road safety record in the world, with more than 300,000 annual road deaths and around 26 deaths per 100,000 people. In Europe, which has far more road traffic, there are around 20,000 deaths yearly and nine deaths per 100,000 people, according to the World Health Organization and the United Nations.

WASHINGTON (VINnews) — U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley on Thursday read into the Senate Judiciary Committee record a blanche_letter_of_support_-_rabbi_jacob_teitelbaum from Rabbi Jacob Teitelbaum, the Siget Rav of Brooklyn and son of Satmar Grand Rabbi Rabbi Zalman Teitelbaum, endorsing Todd Blanche’s nomination to serve as U.S. attorney general.

Grassley, the committee’s chairman, read portions of the letter during Blanche’s confirmation proceedings.

Teitelbaum, who is widely known for his volunteer work assisting members of the Jewish community who become entangled in serious legal matters, wrote that he had known Blanche for many years through those efforts, including advocacy on behalf of Jewish inmates. In his letter, Teitelbaum said people from all walks of life turn to him for spiritual guidance and practical assistance, from helping them confront remorse and repentance to connecting them with experienced legal counsel.

He wrote that his work brought him into contact with Blanche during the attorney’s years in private practice, allowing him to observe both his legal abilities and personal character firsthand.

In the letter, Teitelbaum described Blanche as “an exceptionally gifted lawyer” whose integrity, humility and compassion set him apart. He said Blanche frequently represented clients facing financial hardship on a pro bono or reduced-fee basis and never allowed a person’s financial circumstances to affect the quality of his representation.

Quoting the biblical verse, “Justice, justice shall you pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:20), Teitelbaum said Blanche is committed to a criminal justice system that is both fair and humane.

Teitelbaum urged the Senate Judiciary Committee to approve Blanche’s nomination and called on the full Senate to confirm him as the nation’s next attorney general.

LONDON (AP) — Andy Burnham was officially declared leader of Britain’s governing Labour Party on Friday, promising to bring hope to the British people and purpose to the floundering government as he cleared his final hurdle to take office as prime minister next week.

The former mayor of Greater Manchester was the only contender in the center-left party’s leadership contest to replace departing Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who was forced out by a Labour rebellion. Friday’s announcement was a foregone conclusion after Burnham secured nominations from 379 of the 403 Labour lawmakers in the House of Commons.

“We’re going to give them hope back,” Burnham told an audience of lawmakers, party activists and trade union leaders in his first speech as leader. “This is a proud moment you have given me and my family today, and an emotional one, but it is one for which I am ready.”

“I have a plan,” he added, in a bid to reassure a party that has seen its popularity nosedive since winning a landslide election victory two years ago.

Burnham has been prime minister-in-waiting for weeks, since winning a special election for a seat in Parliament a month ago, but he has revealed little detail about his policy priorities. He will arrive in Number 10 Downing Street largely unknown to voters outside Manchester.

He sketched out some priorities in Friday’s speech, promising to deliver “hope in every heart” and “good growth in every post code,” in part by transferring power from central government in London to local leaders in cities and regions.

“We will take power back from Westminster and Whitehall and give it to the place you live,” he told the audience. “More power over life’s essentials so you can make them work better.”

Starmer announced last month that he would resign after two years in office marred by missteps and judgment errors that eroded his standing with his party and the public.

Labour regularly trails behind anti-immigration party Reform UK in opinion polls, and the governing party had catastrophic results in local elections in May, triggering pressure on Starmer to step down that he couldn’t resist.

Burnham brings a more relaxed style of leadership than the rather stern Starmer, and is regarded as one of the Labour Party’s best communicators. But he faces many of the same problems as his predecessor, including a sluggish economy, a cost-of-living squeeze fueled by wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and overstretched public services.

And his promises of a new, less divisive politics are not too different to what Starmer pledged when he took office in 2024.

“I will work to build a new politics. The country is crying out for it,” Burnham said. “How can politicians point fingers when living standards are falling and politics as a whole isn’t working for them? It infuriates them and makes them switch off.”

He said he would have the “courage to fix the big things that politics has neglected,” such as tackling the patchy access to social care for those who need it because of age, illness or disability. It’s a pressing issue in a country with an aging population, and one that has foxed previous Labour and Conservative governments.

He highlighted plans to focus on economic renewal, more public control of key sectors and creating new modern industrial jobs, arguing that Britain took “a series of wrong turns in the 1980s” when “political power was centralized and economic power privatized.”

That’s the decade when Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher oversaw policies of privatization, deindustrialization and political centralization that transformed the U.K. economy.

“Slowly, at times imperceptibly, over four decades, political and economic power drained away out of our communities in every region and nation of the U.K.,” Burnham said, calling Britain’s change of prime ministers — for the sixth time in a decade — “the most significant change moment in our politics for 40 years.”

Starmer will remain prime minister until Monday, when he formally tenders his resignation to King Charles III. The king will then ask Burnham to form a government.

Britain’s parliamentary democracy allows governing parties to change leaders, and thus prime ministers, without the need for a general election. The next national election doesn’t have to be held until 2029.

New prime ministers have come with increasing frequency in recent years. Burnham will be the U.K.’s seventh leader since 2016.

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — A Danish police officer and two other people were shot Friday, including the suspected perpetrator, authorities said.

The shooting occurred in Nørresundby, in the North Jutland region in northern Denmark. The injuries were serious, Søren Pejtersen, a spokesperson for the North Jutland police, said in a statement posted to Facebook.

Police received a report of a fire in an industrial area of Nørresundby at 1:39 p.m. (1139 GMT) and rushed to the scene, Danish broadcaster DR reported.

The officers were met with gunshots, the statement said, and they returned fire. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the police officer was shot by the suspect or injured in friendly fire. It also wasn’t immediately clear who the third injured person was, or who shot them.

Police said that the shooting was over by 3 p.m. (1300 GMT), but the investigation would continue, DR reported.

A column of black smoke was visible in photos and video from the scene. Further details weren’t immediately available.

(AP) – Smoke from wildfires — which are burning more of the Northern Hemisphere as Earth warms — attacks nearly every system in the human body, killing tens of thousands of people a year, numerous medical studies show.

It attacks the body immediately, spiking asthma cases with increased ambulance runs within hours, swamps emergency rooms in a day or so with people suffering from heart attacks and other cardiovascular and lung issues, as well as mental health issues, doctors and scientists told The Associated Press.

Smoke also harms pregnant women, increasing the risk of premature births and low-weight babies who could have breathing problems the rest of their lives, doctors and studies say. And then there are long-term risks connecting prolonged smoke and other air pollution exposure to some cancers and dementia.

After huge global fires in 2018 and 2019, the medical and science communities started looking at the health effects from the smoke with “more and more studies coming out finding that there’s all types of impacts that may not have been so obvious before,” said Dr. Mary Johnson, a Harvard School of Public Health environmental health scientist.

Smoke causes inflammation by triggering the body’s immune system to go into overtime to fight the irritant. Scientists have found it can harm the brain, the skin and men’s sperm, with almost no system of the body spared, Johnson said. People over 60 become more prone to stroke in wildfire smoke, she said.

“Wildfire smoke is the toxic product of combustion of whatever burned,” which could include houses and cars, said Dr. Courtney Howard, an emergency room physician, chair of the Global Climate and Health Alliance and president-elect of the Canadian Medical Association.

“So really it’s a big giant toxic soup of particles and gases.”

Scientists have counted at least 1,000 toxins in wildfire smoke, according to Colorado State University environmental toxicologist Luke Montrose.

“If I gave you a list, you would recognize some of these as being very bad, oftentimes associated with the burning of diesel fuel or cigarette smoke, things like formaldehyde or volatile organic compounds,” Montrose said. “So just the smoke itself can be bad.”

Rising global temperatures from climate change means more fires
So far this year, more than 5,740 square miles (more than 14,860 square kilometers) of the United States has burned from wildfires, which is 31% more than the average of the previous 10 years on this date, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. The amount of U.S. land burned each year in the 2020s — averaged out over a decade — is now more than twice what it was 30 years ago.

Europe saw a record high amount of land burned in 2025, Canada has had several record or near-record fire years in the 2020s and the Arctic recently has had unprecedented levels of burning.

“Wildfires are becoming more frequent and intense because of climate change, and when a fire happens, you have smoke,” said Colleen Reid, a University of Colorado geographic health professor.

Most of the biggest particles in wildfire smoke fall close to where a blaze is burning, while the smallest particles — the ones that scientists say do the most damage — travel the farthest. In a typical wildfire, the nasty particles that harm human health are about the size of one micron, Reid said.

Inside the body, particles attack
First those particles have to get by your body’s protection, mainly nose hairs and mucus, then they get into your lungs and from there the bloodstream.

Montrose said the particles can be coated in lots of chemicals and have large surface areas. That triggers the body’s defense system to “send signals to other cells that say, ‘We have a problem. We need to mount an immune response to this.’ And that’s where you get your acute effect or your effect within minutes, hours or even that day.” It’s mostly happening in the hearts and lungs, he said.

And many people die.

On average 24,100 people died each year in the Lower 48 states between 2006 and 2020 due to long-term exposure to tiny particles from wildfire smoke, according to a study this year in the journal Science Advances. A Stanford study projects that U.S. wildfire smoke deaths will increase with climate change and by midcentury hit an annual cost of $244 billion in terms of the economic value the government puts on each life.

On a global scale, wildfire smoke particles cause 677,745 deaths annually, with almost 39% of them children under age 5, according to a 2021 study that combined observations, studies on how the body responds to the particles and computer models to calculate the toll.

The biggest nonlethal effects have to do with the way people breathe, especially those with asthma.

“We did a study here in 2014 after we had about two-and-a-half months of smoke off and on, because we’re in the subarctic so we’re warming at triple the global rate, so in a way we’re kind of canaries in the coal mine of the health impacts of climate change,” Howard said on a clear day from Yellowknife, Canada. “We found a full doubling of emergency department visits for asthma and about 50% increase in pneumonia.”

“Even in individuals that don’t have asthma, the air can be so irritating that you could have difficulty with your respiratory system regardless,” Johnson said, “whether it’s coughing, whether it’s chest tightness, whether it’s sore throat, headache.”

There are ways to minimize the risks
Studies have linked smoke to people having more trouble with decision making and other cognitive issues. People come to the emergency room depressed, Howard said. That’s why it’s important to find a place with clean air — including designated shelters or libraries — to get a break from the smoke and possibly exercise, she said.

Experts suggest people wear high-quality masks when outdoors, even though they don’t provide perfect protection. Inside, check windows and doors for seals, invest in a good ventilation system and check air filters, they say.

“Staying away from the smoke is No. 1 if you can,” Johnson said.

KHAN YOUNIS (VINnews)-A Hamas company commander who served as a key figure in holding Israeli hostages and acted as the right-hand man to senior terror group leaders was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, the IDF and Shin Bet announced Friday.

Anas Mahmoud Ahmad Hamdan, a company commander in Hamas’s Khan Younis Brigade, was eliminated in a precise strike in the southern Gaza city, according to the military and security services.

The IDF and Shin Bet identified Hamdan as a central figure in the terror group’s hostage operations in Gaza, including during the ongoing war and the process of returning hostages to Israel. He was also responsible for Hamas propaganda efforts within the Khan Younis Brigade.

During the war, Hamdan held hostages and was tasked with documenting them during release ceremonies, the IDF said. Prior to the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas massacre, he was responsible for holding Israeli civilian Avera Mengistu hostage.

Hamdan additionally served for years — including throughout the current conflict — as the right-hand man to senior Hamas military wing leaders Muhammad Deif and Rafa’a Salameh.

The military said Hamdan was targeted due to his recent involvement in training terrorists and efforts to advance attacks against Israeli troops and civilians.

“The terrorist posed a threat to our forces operating in the Gaza Strip and was eliminated in precise aerial strikes,” the IDF stated.

BEIJING (AP) — China on Friday said it has never interfered in U.S. elections and has no interest in doing so, urging Washington to stop making what it described as “groundless accusations” after President Donald Trump accused Beijing of meddling in the 2020 election.

In an address to the nation Thursday, Trump again raised doubts about the U.S. elections results in 2020 and accused China of interfering in them.

“The relevant allegations by the U.S. are entirely fabricated and aimed at vilifying China,” said China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian. “We have no interest in interfering in US elections and have never done so.”

In a daily briefing in Beijing, Lin called on the U.S. to stop making groundless accusations against China.

Asked whether this might affect the expected visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to the U.S. in September, the spokesperson replied: “As I just said, we urge the U.S. to stop making an issue of China in its elections and do something conducive to China-U.S. relations.”

Trump visited Beijing in mid-May and met with Xi, and both governments said they would adopt a new framework to manage the bilateral relations. Trump invited Xi to visit the United States in September and Beijing confirmed Xi has accepted the invitation.

NEW YORK (VINnews)-The Democratic National Committee is deploying organizers, volunteers and staff to FIFA World Cup fan zones, sports bars and watch parties across the country this weekend in a bid to register thousands of new voters ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

The drive coincides with Sunday’s World Cup final between Spain and Argentina at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, with kickoff set for 3 p.m. ET. Democrats hope the excitement surrounding the match will help them reach potential voters, particularly younger ones and those in the Hispanic community.

DNC Chair Ken Martin outlined the plan in a statement.

“From outside FIFA Fan Zones and at World Cup watch parties to bars, restaurants and parks, we’ll spend the weekend registering thousands of new Democrats and having conversations about how we win races up and down the ballot,” Martin said.

The party aims to register about 3,000 new voters and is active in two dozen states, including battlegrounds such as Arizona and Pennsylvania. In Arizona, efforts will focus on Phoenix, Chandler, Tempe, Tucson and Yuma.

The initiative is part of the DNC’s “When We Count” program, which prioritizes registering young voters. About one-third of the program’s fellows are native Spanish speakers. The party is also conducting a four-part national training series for more than 1,500 people on voter registration techniques.

Lee Igel, a professor of global sport management at New York University, told Politico that large sporting events create unique opportunities for outreach.

“The power in sport is that people gather. It creates a sense of belonging,” Igel said. “If you want to get 3,000 people registered to vote at a watch party for a sports mega-event, you’d be hard-pressed not to get closer to 30,000 people.”

Igel noted that politicians, including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, have successfully leveraged sports to boost their campaigns.

“Sport is fun and games, but the attention it attracts in communities — from eyeballs to people in person — is enormous,” he said.

The effort comes as Democrats seek to build momentum heading into the 2026 midterms.

LONDON (VINnews) — British police on Friday charged a 39-year-old man from Liverpool with assisting Iran’s intelligence service, the latest case highlighting Tehran’s alleged efforts to conduct hostile activities in the United Kingdom through proxies.

Vahid Aberi was charged under the UK’s National Security Act, authorities said. He was arrested and taken to a police station in central England, with searches conducted at addresses in Birmingham and Liverpool.

UK security officials have repeatedly warned that Iran seeks to leverage criminal networks and proxies for espionage and other threats. The charging comes days after Britain banned support for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) under new powers aimed at countering state-sponsored activity.

Since the outbreak of the US-Iran war, Britain has seen a surge in antisemitic incidents linked to Iranian influence, according to officials.

Police emphasized that the investigation into Aberi has not identified any immediate threat to any specific community or individual. However, authorities noted an uptick in such cases.

“We have seen a significant and sustained increase in the tempo of our work in national security investigations in recent years,” Helen Flanagan, head of counter terrorism policing in London, said in a statement.

New York (VINNEWS/Rabbi Yair Hoffman)  Smoke from roughly eight hundred Canadian wildfires settled over New York this week and turned a number most people ignore for eleven months of the year into the most important figure of the day: the Air Quality Index. What few realize is that the number does not mean the same thing in every country. A traveler who checks the air in Brooklyn on Monday, Toronto on Tuesday, and Yerushalayim on Wednesday is reading three different scales built on three different philosophies. One of them runs backwards.

This Week in New York

On Wednesday, July 15, city Emergency Management and the Health Department issued an advisory as a plume from fires in western Ontario arrived in the middle of a heat wave. By 2:30 that afternoon the AQI hit 155, squarely Unhealthy. Governor Hochul extended an advisory statewide.

Thursday was the worst of it. The index stood at 162 in the morning, climbed past 201 into Very Unhealthy territory, and Mayor Mamdani stressed at a morning news conference that at those levels the effects reach everyone, not only asthmatics and the elderly. New York got off lightly compared to the Midwest. Chicago closed its beaches and pools. Milwaukee registered 460, and Bradford Beach on Lake Michigan held about fifteen people on a July day that would normally draw thousands. Toledo reached 775. Michigan’s Western Upper Peninsula hit 785.

Today, Friday, brings partial relief as a northerly flow pushes the smoke west, though Western New York remains under an advisory and most of New Jersey stays under an alert. Rain is expected around midday Saturday, and federal officials say it should bring major improvement — falling droplets collect particles and carry them to the ground. Forecasters expect Moderate air by early Sunday afternoon.

What the Index Actually Measures

Air pollution is invisible and the body is a poor detector of it. Monitoring stations measure ozone, fine particles known as PM2.5, coarser PM10, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide. During a wildfire, PM2.5 is what matters: particles roughly thirty times smaller than the width of a human hair, small enough to slip past the body’s filters, reach deep into the lungs, and enter the bloodstream.

Each country runs those same measurements through its own formula. That formula is where the philosophies part ways.

The American Ladder: Higher Is Worse

The EPA scale runs from 0 to 500 in six color-coded bands.

AQI

Category

Meaning

0–50

Good

Little or no risk.

51–100

Moderate

Acceptable; unusually sensitive people may be affected.

101–150

Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups

Sensitive groups may feel effects.

151–200

Unhealthy

Everyone may begin to feel effects.

201–300

Very Unhealthy

Health alert; more serious effects.

301+

Hazardous

Emergency conditions for the entire population.

The number 100 is not arbitrary. It marks the National Ambient Air Quality Standard, the legal limit set to protect public health. Below the line is compliance; above it is a problem.

The method calculates a sub-index for each pollutant and reports only the worst one. If ozone scores 60 and PM2.5 scores 180, the AQI is 180. The system deliberately refuses to average away the danger. The scale is also not linear: 300 does not mean twice the pollution or twice the harm of 150, because the breakpoints stretch and compress according to what the health research shows at each concentration.

When the Scale Runs Out of Room

The EPA’s published breakpoints stop at 500. Thursday’s readings did not. Toledo’s 775 and the Upper Peninsula’s 785 are not typographical errors, but they are not quite what the scale was designed to express either. Numbers beyond 500 come from extending the formula past its published range.

The AQI was built to answer a regulatory question — whether the air complies with the Clean Air Act — and 100 marks that line. A wildfire does not care about the Clean Air Act. When smoke drives concentrations to levels the drafters never contemplated, the index keeps counting, but the categories stop distinguishing. Milwaukee at 460 and the Upper Peninsula at 785 are both simply Hazardous. The scale has no vocabulary left.

The Canadian Question: Combined Risk

Canada, the source of this week’s smoke, took a different road. Its provinces once used indices built around what industry could realistically achieve rather than what lungs could tolerate. That approach was judged inadequate, and the replacement — the Air Quality Health Index — was designed from the ground up as a health tool rather than a compliance tool.

AQHI

Health Risk

General Population Advice

1–3

Low

Ideal for outdoor activities.

4–6

Moderate

No need to change activities unless symptoms appear.

7–10

High

Consider reducing strenuous outdoor activity if symptoms appear.

Above 10

Very High

Reduce or reschedule strenuous outdoor activity.

The difference is philosophical. The American index asks which single pollutant is worst right now. The Canadian index asks what the combined health risk is from breathing this particular mixture, on the theory that pollutants do not attack the body one at a time and neither should the warning system. It splits its advice into separate columns for at-risk people and everyone else, and it suggests changes that reduce a person’s own contribution to the problem rather than only defensive measures.

The elegance has a cost. A scale of 1 to 10 offers less resolution than one of 0 to 500. The difference between an American 155 and an American 195 is meaningful, and a Canadian 7 blurs it.

The Israeli Scale: Zero Is the Boundary

Israel’s Ministry of Environmental Protection produced something genuinely unusual, and anyone who assumes it works like the American version will read it exactly wrong. It tracks seven pollutants, including total nitrogen oxides — a measure few other countries report, reflecting dense highway traffic in a narrow coastal strip. The calculation begins conventionally, computing a sub-index for each pollutant and taking the highest.

Then comes the twist. The Ministry subtracts that result from 100. The result is a diverging scale running from a high of 100 down through zero and into negative territory, as far as −400. Higher is better and lower is worse — the precise opposite of the American arrangement.

Israeli AQI

Category

Meaning

51 to 100

Good

Clean air; ordinary activity is fine.

0 to 50

Medium

Noticeable pollution; sensitive people should pay attention.

−1 to −200

Low

Poor air quality; caution warranted.

−201 to −400

Very Low

Severely polluted air.

Zero is not the bottom of the scale; it is the boundary. Crossing from positive to negative is psychologically vivid in a way that climbing from 99 to 101 is not. A negative number reads instinctively as a deficit, something owed, something wrong. The design turns arithmetic into intuition. The breakpoints are also stricter than the American ones for fine particles: Israel treats a 24-hour PM2.5 average of 18.6 micrograms per cubic meter as the point where air leaves the top band, while the current EPA table still counts a comparable concentration as Moderate.

Three Systems, One Agreement

System

Strength and Weakness

United States

Most granular and legally anchored to enforceable standards. But it reports only the worst pollutant, understating the burden of breathing several at once, and its categories lose all resolution above 300.

Canada

Most medically sophisticated, built around combined risk and honest that lungs do not encounter pollutants in isolation. Coarse at the top of the scale.

Israel

Broadest coverage and the most psychologically clever design. But it is unfamiliar: a visitor who sees 45 in Tel Aviv and thinks of the American 45 will conclude the air is excellent when it sits in the Medium band.

One principle unites all three. Every system singles out the same people for protection: children, the elderly, pregnant women, and those with respiratory or cardiovascular conditions.

What to Do With the Number

Anyone can feel the effects — coughing and wheezing, headache, stinging eyes, scratchy throat, chest pain, rapid heartbeat, fatigue. Those outdoors this week described it in strikingly consistent terms: a metallic taste, an acrid campfire smell, a burning in the eyes within moments of stepping outside. 

\When the index is elevated, reduce or eliminate outdoor exertion, keep windows closed, and run an air purifier or air conditioner. Sensitive groups should move activities indoors entirely. Shortness of breath, coughing, dizziness, or unusual fatigue are signals rather than annoyances.

Cardiologists added a warning this week: wildfire smoke is a heart problem as much as a breathing problem, because those fine particles reach the bloodstream and stress the cardiovascular system. The CDC notes that people with diabetes and heart disease face elevated safety risk alongside asthmatics, children, and pregnant women.

And speaking of safety, the AQI is actually anumber that tells a person whether the air outside will harm him engages at least six distinct Torah obligations — and the sixth is the one that makes ignoring the forecast, rather than merely being harmed by it, a matter of halacha.

First, there is the Mitzvah of “veNishmartem me’od b’nafshosaichem” (Dvarim 4:9) — the Mitzvah of protecting our health and well-being. Fine particles that reach the bloodstream and stress the heart fall squarely within it.

Second, few have heard of the second Mitzvah. The verse later on (Dvarim 4:15), “Rak hishamer lecha,” is understood by most Poskim to comprise an actual second Mitzvah (See Rav Chaim Kanievsky zt”l, Shaar HaTeshuvos #25) — to take special care. Special care is precisely what a published index makes possible: the danger is invisible, but it has been measured and posted.

Third, there is the Mitzvah of “V’Chai Bahem — And you shall live by them” (VaYikra 18:5).

Fourth, the verse in Parshas Ki Saytzai (Dvarim 22:2) discusses Hashavas Aveidah with the words “vahashaivoso lo — and you shall return it to him.” The Gemara in Sanhedrin (73a) includes within these words the obligation of returning “his own life to him as well.” This is the source for the Mitzvah of saving a life, and appears to be the general Mitzvah the Shulchan Aruch refers to in Orach Chaim 325.

Fifth, “Lo Saamod Al Dam Rayacha” — a negative Mitzvah of not standing idly by your brother’s blood (Shulchan Aruch CM 426:1 and the Rambam). This extends to one’s own household: an elderly parent, a child with asthma, a neighbor who does not know the mask distribution sites exist.

Sixth, there is the Mitzvah of “Lo Suchal l’hisalaym” — a negative commandment associated with the positive Mitzvah of Hashavas Aveidah, from the verse in Dvarim (22:3), “You cannot shut your eyes to it.” The Netziv (HeEmek She’eilah) refers to this Mitzvah as well.

That sixth Mitzvah deserves a further word. The others are engaged once a person knows the air is dangerous. “Lo Suchal l’hisalaym” addresses the prior step — the decision not to look. When a state agency publishes a number every hour, free of charge, on any phone, the claim that one did not know becomes difficult to sustain. The forecast is available. Shutting one’s eyes to it may perhaps be subsumed in the aveirah that this pasuk describes.

The author can be reached at [email protected]

WASHINGTON D.C (VINnews) — President Donald Trump on Thursday alleged that officials within the FBI and other intelligence agencies operated a “shadow government” to suppress information about Chinese meddling in U.S. elections and withhold critical intelligence from his presidential daily briefings.

In remarks highlighting previously unreported allegations, Trump claimed an FBI official admitted to running what she described as a “shadow government” aimed at preventing intelligence about China’s election interference from reaching him and the public.

“Document[s] show that during this period, dozens of significant CIA and NSA reports about China’s election targeting were kept out of the presidential briefing,” Trump said, according to the provided details. “These were briefings I would get almost every day. Everything was kept out.”

He further cited an email among intelligence analysts in which they allegedly admitted to having “deliberately massaged the presidential daily briefing to withhold information regarding Chinese activities related to the election.”

The accusations come amid ongoing reviews and declassifications by the Trump administration into 2020 election-related intelligence, with reports of Chinese efforts to access voter data and influence operations.

Trump’s statements align with his long-standing concerns about foreign interference and what he has described as efforts by elements within the government — often referred to as the “Deep State” — to undermine his administration. Critics have pushed back on such claims, noting prior intelligence assessments that found China did not deploy interference efforts to alter the 2020 election outcome.

The president made the remarks as part of broader discussions on election integrity, including in a primetime address focused on related issues.

VINnews could not immediately obtain independent verification of the specific “shadow government” quote or the exact documents referenced. White House officials have pointed to declassified materials and ongoing probes led by figures like FBI Director Kash Patel into past intelligence handling.

This latest disclosure fits into a pattern of allegations that senior intelligence officials under previous administrations sought to downplay or conceal China-related threats during the 2020 cycle, including access to voter registration databases in multiple states.

Trump has vowed continued efforts to address what he views as politicization within the intelligence community. Further details from any formal releases or investigations are expected in the coming weeks.

WASHINGTON D.C (VINnews) — President Donald J. Trump is scheduled to deliver a formal Address to the Nation from the White House East Room on Thursday, July 16, at 9 p.m. EDT, the White House announced earlier this week.

The speech comes amid ongoing discussions about election integrity, recent foreign policy developments including U.S. actions related to Iran, and the state of the American economy as the nation continues to mark its 250th anniversary year. White House officials have indicated the president will touch on voting and elections, as well as other national priorities.

Trump has frequently highlighted what he describes as a “golden age” for America, pointing to strengthened national security, economic gains, and military achievements in recent months. The address is expected to build on themes from his recent remarks during America 250 celebrations, including patriotism, resilience, and warnings about ideological threats.

Networks’ coverage plans varied ahead of the speech, with Fox News planning live broadcast while some major networks opted not to air it fully on their primary channels, instead offering streaming or later analysis.

The president’s appearance follows a busy schedule this week, including meetings with lawmakers and international leaders. Jewish communal leaders and pro-Israel advocates have closely followed Trump administration policies on Iran, antisemitism, and U.S.-Israel relations, areas expected to feature in broader national security discussions.

AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) — The Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who shot a Colombian man in Maine this week is an Army veteran who has struggled with serious mental health issues since early childhood and never should have been given a badge and gun to patrol American streets, several of his close relatives told The Associated Press.

David Brouillette has a history of terrifying and violent behavior, according to those relatives. They accuse him of attacking women in his life over the years, and one shared a voicemail with the AP from last winter in which he told her that he thought someone should slit her throat.

Brouillette’s troubling past further challenges how thoroughly the Department of Homeland Security has vetted recruits as it went on a hiring spree to help carry out President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents since Trump launched the crackdown after retaking office, including 25-year-old Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national who was shot and killed by Brouillette on Monday while in his car near his home in the coastal Maine city of Biddeford.

DHS, which hasn’t released the name of the officer who killed Durán Guerrero, has said the “vehicle attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon.”

Brouillette didn’t respond to text messages or an email seeking comment. Three relatives who said they spoke to him since the shooting, including an ex-wife and daughter, said he told them he acted in self-defense.

When reached for comment about Brouillette’s record and his role in Monday’s shooting, ICE spokesperson Lauren Bis said in a statement that, “We will never confirm or deny attempts to dox our law enforcement officers,” and that “The ICE officer in question has nearly a decade of federal law enforcement experience with required training including use of force training.”

The White House referred all questions about the shooting and Brouillette to ICE.

A new career in ICE
Brouillette, 37, told his ex-wife Ashley Brouillette late last year that he had been hired by ICE. She said that because of his long history of psychiatric issues, she thought he was having a mental health episode and she didn’t believe him. She didn’t realize he’d been telling the truth until this week, when videos began circulating online of the moments surrounding the shooting.

Ashley Brouillette told the AP that she spoke to her ex-husband in a Facebook audio call, and he acknowledged that he had killed Durán Guerrero. Their 18-year-old daughter, Madison Brouillette, also told the AP that her father called her Wednesday and said that he shot and killed Durán Guerrero.

David and Ashley Brouillette were high school sweethearts who got married in 2007. She said she divorced him in 2009 because he had become physically violent with her, which began after she got pregnant with their daughter.

According to Ashley Brouillette, he once threw boiling water at her while she was holding their child — an incident her mother Avis Collins also recounted.

The abuse continued after she left him, she said.

David Brouillette doesn’t appear to have a criminal record in Maine, as a check with the Maine Department of Public Safety returned no records for him.

But hundreds of family court records obtained from the Augusta District Court clerk’s office detail years of allegations of physical and verbal abuse raised by his second ex-wife on behalf of herself and his daughters.

The ex-wife — whom the AP is not identifying because she fears retaliation — alleged that he had stalked and harassed her and physically and verbally abused his daughter, according to multiple requests for temporary protection orders. Brouillette tackled his teenage daughter and smashed spaghetti in her hair, and during another outburst, he dragged his daughter around the house as she cried, she said.

“Dave needs counseling or something for his PTSD & depression,” she wrote in an application for a temporary protective order on behalf of his teenage daughter which a judge granted in 2021.

In court filings, David Brouillette said that his second ex-wife had slandered him.

His oldest daughter, Madison Brouillette, said she also witnessed her dad’s volatility.

“I watched my dad struggle a lot with a lot of things,” she told the AP. She said she came home from school once and he told her he had been sitting on a tree stump with a gun to his head.

“If you don’t really, truly take care of yourself, there’s no way you can protect other people. And with my dad, he never wanted to get help,” she said.

An immediate relative of David Brouillette who spoke on the condition that their name not be used said he was diagnosed with severe bipolar disorder and attention deficit disorder as a child — a diagnosis that Ashley Brouillette confirmed. The immediate relative described him as “extremely mentally ill” and said he attempted suicide twice at age 12 and was hospitalized multiple times.

The relative said they’ve been estranged for years, after they broke off contact because they feared he would harm them. He did not respond to their outreach this week, the relative added.

A military career and law enforcement aspirations
Growing up in Gardiner, a city of about 6,000 people roughly 60 miles (97 kilometers) northeast of Biddeford, where Monday’s shooting occurred, David Brouillette was enchanted by law enforcement and the military, his relatives said.

High school yearbook photos show he was a member of the school’s Naval Junior ROTC, and he wrote that he planned to go to college and become a police officer.

Brouillette was initially rejected by military recruiters because of his mental health diagnoses, but recruiters encouraged him to go off his medications for a year and reapply, which he did, his immediate relative said.

He was eventually able to enlist.

According to U.S. military records, Brouillette enlisted as a chemical equipment repairer in the Maine Army National Guard but then changed jobs to be a medical logistics specialist. He was in the Guard from November 2007 until January 2010, according to records provided by the Pentagon.

A 2009 article in the Kennebec Journal listed Brouillette as a private in the Maine Army National Guard’s 152nd Maintenance Company in Augusta.

In January 2010 he joined the regular Army as a human intelligence collector. Brouillette deployed to Afghanistan from May 2012 to February 2013 and eventually left the Army as a sergeant in December 2015.

His immediate relative believes Brouillette’s time abroad worsened his emotional struggles: “Afghanistan destroyed him — trained him to be a killing monster, a machine. They took someone who was extremely mentally ill and turned him into a killing machine.”

Life after the Army
In March 2025, Brouillette passed an exam to become a real estate sales agent. His license was active until December. In a Facebook post, Realty of Maine announced Brouillette would be working in the firm’s Bangor office.

“David lives in Maine after retiring from the United States Army,” said the post, which has since been deleted. Brouillette is no longer listed as an agent on the firm’s website. Messages seeking comment were left for Realty of Maine.

In March, the Maine agency that handles child support matters filed a lien against him, public records show. The filing suggests that Brouillette may have been in line for a permanent impairment or disability settlement.

In late 2025, around the time he joined ICE, his ex-wife Ashley said he left a three-minute voicemail mocking her for taking out a restraining order against him. According to the message she shared with AP, he repeatedly called her “disgusting” and suggested that she and the other women and girls in her “bloodline” should die.

“And all of you should have your f——–g throats cut,” the voicemail said. “Yeah, you should. Am I threatening that I’m gonna do that? Nope. Nope. But do I think that you should have your f——-g throats cuts? Or should have had them cut? Yep.”

She said she cut off contact with him until Wednesday, when his picture began circulating online.

She reached out to his current wife on Facebook and they spoke on the phone for several minutes. Her ex-husband spoke with her, according to cellphone screenshots of the phone exchange she shared with the AP. He acknowledged he had fatally shot Durán Guerrero.

“He was asking if I could tell them that he was a good person and not to talk about the abuse and stuff that I had endured well with him and he said that the most important thing is his character right now,” she said.

She said he told her he is now hiding in protective custody.

“I asked him why he did it,” she said. “He said it was a justified shooting. The guy was trying to run him over with a car.”

His daughter also said he told her it was justified.

“I don’t think he sees himself as a killer,” Madison Brouillette said.

“I think he thinks that he genuinely did the right thing,” she added. “All he said was that he did what he had to do. He said that he had to protect himself.”

NEW YORK (AP) — President Donald Trump’s media company is planning to charge for special high-speed access to Truth Social posts, including possibly his own affecting national security and financial markets.

The move announced Thursday would allow Wall Street trading firms and other institutions to get news from Truth Social contributors in milliseconds so they could profit off subsequent moves in stocks, bonds and interest rates. Called Truth PSI, it would mimic paid access at other platforms with one key difference: The most popular Truth Social poster is the president himself and, as the biggest shareholder of the public traded parent company, would directly benefit.

“He’s selling expedited, privileged access to information about what he is doing as president,” said Kathleen Clark of Washington University School of Law and an expert in government conflicts of interest rules. “It’s yet more brazen corruption, an improper exploitation of government power to enrich himself.”

The Trump family company declined to comment. Truth Social’s public parent, Trump Media & Technology, did not immediately respond to emailed questions, including whether the president’s posts will be excluded from the offering.

A press release suggested Trump would indeed be part of the offering, stating it would allow traders to see “the highest-ranking Truth Social accounts” ahead of others. The president has 12.9 million followers on the platform.

The release did not say how much customers would be charged.

In the past few months, Trump has announced decisions and musings on his platform including posts about the Iran war, tariffs and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdown in U.S. cities. The Iran posts in particular are impactful because investors are worried that higher oil prices will continue to stoke inflation and possibly force the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates.

The announcement comes as stock in Trump Media & Technology has plunged 70% since the president took office last year.

Trump Media said that it hopes start the service next month and that it has already signed up customers.

WASHINGTON D.C President Trump’s former Defense Secretary Mark Esper warned that U.S. airstrikes alone cannot achieve victory against Iran or alter Tehran’s strategic objectives, urging instead a strategy focused on economic pressure.

In comments highlighting the limitations of the ongoing bombing campaign, Esper outlined two stark options for confronting the Islamic Republic: “One option is full military onslaught. The other is you strangle them economically.”

Esper set two clear benchmarks for success: ensuring the Strait of Hormuz remains fully open to international shipping and securing a nuclear agreement with Iran that is stronger than the 2015 deal negotiated under President Barack Obama.

His remarks come amid heightened tensions in the Middle East, with Israeli and U.S. strikes targeting Iranian nuclear and military sites. Esper expressed broader concerns about the toll on American military preparedness.

“What are we doing to our readiness and stockpiles? Because my big concern globally is China,” he said.

The conflict has also roiled global energy markets. U.S. crude inventories have fallen to their lowest levels since 1984, while Brent crude oil prices hovered around $85 per barrel Thursday. Analysts warn that prices could surge past $100 if the situation drags on, potentially fueling inflation and straining economies worldwide.

The former Pentagon chief’s assessment raises questions about whether the current Iran strategy is depleting U.S. resources and undermining Washington’s ability to respond to potential future crises, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region.

Esper’s comments reflect ongoing debates within foreign policy circles about balancing immediate threats from Iran’s nuclear program and proxy network — which pose direct dangers to Israel and regional stability — with long-term strategic competition from China.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — A ghost gun company has been ordered to pay more than $100 million in the death of a Kentucky teenager who had purchased the company’s pistol-building kit online.

The verdict — believed to be the largest-ever against a gun dealer — was awarded by a jury Wednesday following a trial focused on whether the vendor, Husky Armory LLC, skirted federal regulations barring the sale of the gun-assembly kits to those under 21.

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EDITOR’S NOTE — This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org. Helplines outside the U.S. can be found at www.iasp.info/suicidalthoughts.

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In a wrongful-death lawsuit, the family of Henry Willis said he was just 18 when he purchased the Glock G19 pistol “build kit” from Husky Armory’s website in 2023. He assembled the handgun in his garage — telling his father it was a transistor radio — and used it to end his life six days later.

Everytown Law, which represented the family, said the $104.2 million payout was the largest ever reached against a gun seller, surpassing the $73 million settlement awarded to the families of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting by the rifle-maker Remington.

It comes a little over a year after the Supreme Court upheld regulations enacted by the Biden administration that mandated serial numbers on the homemade weapons and required buyers to complete background checks and age verification.

Attorneys for Willis said Husky Armory had flouted each of those requirements.

Their website advertised the product as having “everything you need to build your own Glock style pistol from the comfort of your home,” noting the weapon could be assembled by “nearly anyone with a brain,” according to the lawsuit.

Inquiries to Husky Armory LLC and its owner, Cody Yurk, were not immediately returned. The company, which is based in Omaha, Nebraska, was not present for the trial, according to the family and their attorneys.

At a news conference Thursday, Willis’ mother, Laura Herp, described her son as a “kind, gentle child” who had struggled with mental health issues in the months leading up to his death.

“A child in crisis should never be able to access a deadly weapon,” Herp said. “Companies like Husky Armory thrive off selling to folks who shouldn’t have access to firearms, and they didn’t care who Henry was. They didn’t even bother showing up to the trial.”

A state court in Louisville had previously issued a default judgment against the vendor for failing to respond to the lawsuit. Following a two-day trial this week, a jury awarded $4.2 million in economic damages and $100 million in punitive damages to the family.

“This historic verdict sends a powerful message to ghost-gun sellers who set up businesses to profit by circumventing critical safeguards like background checks and age verification,” said Dana Mulhauser, an attorney for Everytown Law. “Henry should be home with his family today, and Laura deserved more time and opportunity to help her son heal.”

WASHINGTON (VINnews) — The Food and Drug Administration has approved a first-of-its-kind pill that can drastically reduce cholesterol in a way that’s previously only been available with expensive, injectable drugs.

The drug from Merck was OK’d on Thursday for patients with artery-clogging cholesterol that persists even after taking statins, the standard medications for cutting heart attack risk. Merck will market its pill under the brand name Lipfendra.

It’s the first noninjectable medication that works by blocking a liver protein called PCSK9. That protein limits the body’s ability to clear cholesterol from the blood, and biotech injectables targeting it have been available from Amgen and other drugmakers for more than a decade. But patient access has been stymied for years by high prices, insurance restrictions and limited prescribing by doctors.

Statins block some of the liver’s production of cholesterol and are the cornerstone of treatment. But even at the highest doses, many people need additional help lowering their LDL, or bad, cholesterol enough to meet medical guidelines.

Merck, which has headquarters in Rahway, New Jersey, won approval based on two studies in high-risk patients who added the company’s pill to their standard treatment, including statins. In one study of 3,000 patients, those taking Lipfendra saw their levels of LDL cholesterol drop more than 55% after six months. In a second study, patients averaged a reduction of 59% compared with patients who received a dummy pill.

That benefit dropped only slightly over a year, and side effects — including dizziness and diarrhea — were similar between those taking the pill or a placebo, researchers found. One caveat: The pill must be taken on an empty stomach.

The FDA reviewed the drug under its program that promises ultra-fast reviews for promising medications that serve the public interest. The pathway was created by then-FDA chief Dr. Marty Makary, who resigned from the agency in May after months of pressure from drugmakers, patients and other outside groups.

Heart disease is the nation’s leading cause of death, and high LDL cholesterol, which causes plaque to build up in arteries, is a top risk factor for heart attacks and strokes. While an LDL level of 100 is considered fine for healthy people, doctors recommend lowering it to at least 70 once people develop high cholesterol or heart disease — and even lower for those at very high risk.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Israel has taken a step toward testing the use of crocodiles as part of security measures outside prisons housing convicted security inmates, after the country’s environmental protection minister approved a legal change allowing the reptiles to be kept by authorized security agencies.

Idit Silman signed a declaration classifying crocodiles as a “domesticated wild animal,” clearing a legal obstacle that previously prevented the reptiles from being kept outside licensed zoos.

The move follows a proposal by Itamar Ben-Gvir to establish a pilot program using crocodile-filled moats around prisons holding Palestinian security prisoners, including members of Hamas’ Nukhba force.

According to Israeli officials, the Israel Prison Service has studied the proposal, including visits to zoos and reviews of security measures, and concluded that such a system could reduce security costs while serving as a deterrent to escape attempts.

Until now, Israeli law classified the Nile crocodile as a protected wild animal, limiting its possession to licensed zoos. The new designation permits authorized security agencies to keep crocodiles for the purposes of the planned pilot program while requiring appropriate safety, environmental and animal welfare standards.

Officials have not announced when or where the pilot program would begin.

Business Leaders and Media Executives Ask the Same Question: “How Has Nobody Thought of This Before?”

LAKEWOOD, N.J. — In an age of information overload, where readers are forced to navigate countless websites, newsletters, television networks, social media feeds, podcasts, and publications just to stay informed, the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce is expanding its mission of business education and empowerment with JBizNews, a business news platform built around a simple idea: put all the business news people need in one place and explain it in language they can understand.

The concept may sound obvious, but the response has been anything but ordinary.

As JBizNews has expanded, executives from mainstream media organizations, business leaders, entrepreneurs, investors, and professionals have repeatedly shared the same reaction: “This is brilliant. It’s so badly needed. How has nobody thought of this before?”

Their observation points to a growing problem in today’s information economy.

Every day, readers jump between financial publications, television networks, websites, newsletters, social media platforms, government releases, industry journals, and trade publications trying to piece together a complete picture of what is happening in business and the economy. The result is often hours spent consuming information without gaining a clear understanding of what matters most.

JBizNews was created to solve that problem.

Published by the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce, the platform curates and delivers the most important developments across business, markets, finance, real estate, healthcare, technology, public policy, energy, entrepreneurship, and the broader economy in one centralized destination.

For years, the Chamber has focused on helping businesses succeed through education, advocacy, networking, and access to opportunities. JBizNews extends that mission into the information space by helping readers stay informed without becoming overwhelmed.

“Business owners don’t have unlimited time,” said Duvi Honig, Founder and CEO of the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce. “They’re running companies, managing employees, serving customers, raising families, and trying to understand an economy that seems to move faster every day. We created JBizNews to help people find the information they need, understand what it means, and move forward with confidence.”

The publication’s mission is built around three principles:

• Save readers time
• Help people understand the economy
• Deliver relevant business intelligence in one place

Rather than assuming readers have a background in finance or economics, JBizNews focuses on translating complex developments into clear, straightforward reporting that can be understood by business owners, professionals, investors, and everyday consumers alike.

The platform also reflects the Chamber’s commitment to providing professional, respectful, family-friendly, and kosher-appropriate content that can be comfortably shared across workplaces, homes, schools, and communities.

Although launched by the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce, JBizNews quickly attracted readers far beyond the Jewish community. Today, its audience includes readers from diverse industries, backgrounds, and regions who share a common need: understanding how economic and business developments affect their lives and livelihoods.

As economic headlines increasingly influence everything from hiring decisions and investment strategies to household budgets and retirement planning, the ability to quickly understand what matters has become a competitive advantage.

JBizNews was built on a simple belief: people should not need to spend hours searching dozens of sources to understand the business world around them.

To give readers one place to get their everyday business news, understand the economy, and stay informed without spending hours navigating countless websites and media sources.

Visit: www.JBizNews.com

About JBizNews

JBizNews is a business news publication of the Orthodox Jewish Chamber of Commerce dedicated to helping readers understand business, markets, finance, healthcare, technology, real estate, public policy, and economic trends through clear, relevant, and easy-to-understand reporting. Its mission is to educate, inform, and empower businesses and communities through knowledge.

(AP) – The remains of several geese were found on the wreckage of a sightseeing helicopter that crashed into the Hudson River last year in New York City and killed 6 people, investigators said Thursday.

The National Transportation Safety Board reports released Thursday describe evidence and witness reports suggesting the helicopter struck several birds before it plummeted into the river on April 10, 2025.

The Federal Aviation Administration has said that helicopters are especially vulnerable to bird strikes because they fly at low altitudes. Helicopter bird strikes are unusual, but they can be devastating.

The victims of last year’s accident included a Siemens business executive from Spain, his family and the pilot. Passengers Agustin Escobar, 49; his wife, Mercè Camprubí Montal, 39; and their three children, Victor, 4; Mercedes, 8; and Agustin, 10, all died. The pilot was Seankese Johnson, 36, a U.S. Navy veteran who received his commercial pilot’s license in 2023. The crash renewed safety concerns about the popular sightseeing flights and prompted New Jersey’s governor to ask for additional restrictions on nonessential helicopter flights.

(AP) – Speeding in your car to work, to pick up your children from school, or go from one errand to the next not only wastes money in gas and sends harmful emissions into the air, it barely saves you time, new research says.

It is something to think about as gas prices stay elevated throughout the summer months and add pain to day-to-day driving and seasonal road tripping.

Instead, abiding by posted speed limits can save U.S. drivers millions of dollars at the gas pump and eliminate millions of gallons of fuel each day, according to a study published Thursday in the Nature journal Communications Sustainability. That is fuel that, when burned, emits planet-warming gases into the atmosphere. To top it all off, changing driving habits wouldn’t even add a full minute to a driver’s commute.

University of Minnesota researchers analyzed 120 million vehicle trips across the United States from four Wednesdays in 2021 using driving data on national road networks, speed limits and U.S. Geological Survey elevation data. The analysis included roads with speed limits of 45 mph (72 kph) and higher.

More than 43% of the studied trips included at least one instance of speeding, and drivers spent nearly 12% of their driving time going faster than the speed limit.

They found that if drivers of light-duty, conventional internal combustion engine vehicles actually drove at posted speed limits, it could save an average of $22 million, based on fuel costs at the time, 6.7 million gallons of fuel and 57,000 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide every day. The researchers said that is comparable to taking about 5.5 million passenger vehicles off the road.

And while drivers say that speeding saves them precious time, researchers found that is not really the case. With an average daily driving distance of 28.6 miles (46.03 kilometers), driving at or below the posted limit corresponds only to about 54 seconds longer per day.

“If your goal is to shave one minute off your time, then you’ve got to drive fast. If your objective is to get to your destination safely and to save fuel, then you might drive slower than the speed limit,” said William Northrop, mechanical engineering professor at the University of Minnesota and study co-author.

The research considered battery-electric vehicle efficiency only in California given the level of EV adoption in the U.S. at that time. Based on the California modeling, “We find that driving slower is beneficial for EVs as well,” he said.

Interestingly, the study found differences among states. Nevada saw elevated speeding prevalence as well as high speed excess. There was high speeding prevalence in Florida, Georgia and North Carolina, though those states did not necessarily exhibit high speed excess. Montana, Wyoming, Idaho and South Dakota showed both low speeding prevalence and speed excess.

The cost of faster driving today
Driving faster increases a vehicle’s energy use and the emissions from its engine, as well as reduces efficiency. Vehicle engines have become increasingly more efficient over the past several decades even as vehicles have gotten bigger and more powerful. But speed limits have also climbed since the Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act was implemented, which mandated 55 mph national speed limits amid the 1970s energy crisis.

Accounting for the average cost of gas today and more vehicle miles traveled, that increases to roughly $26 million and 7.2 million gallons of fuel that Americans collectively could save each day this year just by not putting the pedal to the metal.

One limitation of the research is that slower driving could impact traffic patterns, which could play a role in efficiency.

However, it is especially timely as U.S. drivers remain price-sensitive to volatile gas prices as the war in Iran has sent the cost for a gallon of fuel above $4 this year. Experts have said there are a number of ways to improve one’s gas mileage, including something as simple as slowing down. Less fuel needing to be purchased because of better efficiency could influence oil market demand, which in turn could impact pricing.

Rob Middleton, associate research scientist of mechanical engineering at the University of Michigan who was not involved in the research, said the study was well-done. But he also noted that the fuel saved from driving more slowly still only represents a fraction of daily gasoline consumption in the U.S., which is about 375 million gallons daily.

“It’s a big number, but it’s a small fraction,” Middleton said. “This is a ‘freebie’ in that it doesn’t really cost anyone anything to do.”

“The market penetration of selling EVs is still small, so we still need fuel, we still need ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles, we’re still going to have them for a very long time,” he added. “Things that we can do to either make the new ones better or to improve our fuel supply, we need to do.”

The controversy surrounding New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s immigrant enclave map continues to draw criticism after it initially omitted Little Italy while recognizing dozens of other ethnic neighborhoods across the city, like Little Palestine, Egypt and Yemen.  The map also failed to identify many of New York’s historic Jewish and Irish communities, prompting accusations that some of the city’s oldest immigrant populations were being erased from its official cultural landscape.

In an interview with Rabbi Daniel Schonbuch, host of The Viktor Frankl Podcast, Andre DiMino, President of the Italian American One Voice Coalition, called the omission “a total disgrace,” arguing that it ignored the Italian, Jewish, Irish, and other long-established communities that played a central role in building New York City. While the city later announced that Little Italy would be restored following public backlash, DiMino said the controversy reflects a broader effort to diminish the historical contributions of these communities.

The discussion also explored the history of discrimination against Italian Americans, including the 1891 lynching of eleven Italians in New Orleans—the largest mass lynching in American history—as well as decades of employment discrimination and enduring stereotypes. DiMino said these chapters of American history deserve greater public recognition, particularly as debates over identity and historical memory continue.

The interview also highlighted the longstanding friendship between New York’s Jewish and Italian communities, whose members lived and worked alongside one another for generations. Both DiMino and Rabbi Schonbuch expressed concern that identity politics increasingly divides communities instead of bringing them together and emphasized the importance of preserving the history of all of New York’s historic ethnic and religious communities.

“If you’re going to be mayor for all the people,” DiMino said, “you cannot ignore the people who built this city.”

Follow Rabbi Daniel Schonbuch at www.rabbiforamerica.com

WASHINGTON (VINnews) – Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent disclosed publicly for the first time Thursday that he was the target of an alleged assassination plot just hours after being sworn into office.

Speaking at a State Department ministerial on political terrorism, Bessent said he was the subject of an alleged assassination attempt “two hours after being sworn into my job,” adding that the case demonstrates that politically motivated violence remains a real threat.

Scott Bessent: “I'm going to remind the media that I was the subject of an assassination attempt February 2024by an adult left-wing activist two hours after being sworn into my job

“So any of you who want to report that this is a fiction and does not exist, be there for the… pic.twitter.com/MOZHfirMkG

— MCBN (@MCBNNEWSS) July 16, 2026

Federal prosecutors have charged Ryan Michael English, 24, of Massachusetts, in connection with the alleged plot. According to the Justice Department, English traveled to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 27, 2025, carrying a folding knife and two improvised Molotov cocktails with the intention of killing a Cabinet nominee whose Senate confirmation vote was scheduled that day.

English later pleaded guilty to federal charges, including unlawful receipt, possession and transfer of a firearm and carrying a dangerous weapon or incendiary device on U.S. Capitol grounds. He is scheduled to be sentenced in August.

Bessent made the remarks while defending the Trump administration’s efforts to combat politically motivated violence and expand investigations into financial networks that officials say support violent extremist groups.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Israel’s ministerial committee overseeing the Shin Bet approved lifetime security protection for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife, Sara Netanyahu, according to Israeli media reports Thursday.

The decision, reportedly based on a recommendation from Shin Bet Director David Zini, provides the couple with permanent security regardless of whether Netanyahu remains in office.

The committee also approved extending security for the Netanyahus’ children, including a personal vehicle and driver, for an additional five years.

According to Channel 12, the move followed pressure from Netanyahu’s associates and went against the position of security professionals, who reportedly argued that protection should continue to be based on ongoing threat assessments.

The Israeli government has not publicly detailed the reasoning behind the decision.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Officials under President Donald Trump want to make it easier for men to get a prescription for testosterone, the latest shift in a decades-long debate over the benefits and risks of replacing the hormone that affects sex drive, mood and other health factors.

The move, backed by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other top officials, aligns with the advice of many online influencers and podcasters, including men’s health gurus who tout the hormone as a way to boost muscle and energy. On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the military would begin screening for low testosterone and offering the hormone as a way to help troops operate at their “absolute best.”

The notion of testosterone as an all-purpose elixir for strength and vitality is not supported by the science. But medical experts say a decade of new research has bolstered the case for testosterone’s benefits for sexual health while allaying concerns about its impact on the heart.

“Many providers have been trained for years that these were real issues, and they were scared to get a testosterone reading from a patient or offer them testosterone therapy,” said Dr. Justin Dubin, a urologist at Baptist Health Miami Cancer Institute.

Last year, the Food and Drug Administration removed a bold safety warning about possible heart risks with testosterone pills, gels, injections and patches, based on recent data that showed no increase in those problems.

Last month, the agency proposed rewriting prescribing instructions to clear the way for using testosterone against age-related symptoms, such as low libido and erectile dysfunction. Currently the label emphasizes that the hormone is only approved for abnormally low testosterone levels caused by serious medical conditions or injury.

But experts who prescribe the drug say those patients are a small segment of people seeking help.

“The majority of people we see in our office are regular men complaining of these common symptoms because they’re dramatically affecting their quality of life,” said Dr. Helen Bernie, a urologist and director of sexual health at Indiana University.

Testosterone use has evolved over decades
Testosterone was first approved in the 1950s to treat hypogonadism, a condition defined by low testosterone levels caused by medical problems affecting the testes or other organs.

Testosterone declines naturally with age and can effect sexual function, mood, bone density and other measures. The question of how to diagnose and treat men with those issues has long been debated by researchers.

“These symptoms overlap with symptoms of human aging in men, so there’s a high risk of misdiagnosis and that’s led to the controversy” said Dr. Shalender Bhasin, of Harvard Medical School, who has co-authored several recent testosterone studies and guidelines.

Bhasin says increased willingness to prescribe testosterone reflects growing acceptance of the seriousness of men’s sexual health problems, beginning with the introduction of Viagra for erectile dysfunction in the 1990s.

Bhasin helped write the Endocrine Society’s current guidelines for testosterone, which recommend discussing testosterone with men who have documented symptoms and two blood test results confirming low hormone levels. One recent study by Michigan researchers found that just 12% of men getting a prescription met that criteria.

Prescriptions previously soared, despite little evidence
The potential for overprescribing testosterone is real and helped lead to current restrictions.

In the early 2010s, drugmakers spent millions on TV ads for gels, patches and other products promising relief from “low T,” including a laundry list of symptoms like fatigue, muscle loss, brain fog and weight gain.

By 2013, the drugs were generating more than $2 billion in sales annually, despite lacking FDA approval for most of the issues described. Doctors remain free to prescribe drugs off-label, or for unapproved uses, and many men today continue taking testosterone because they believe it improves energy, mood and appearance.

In 2015, the FDA hit drugmakers with a double whammy: They had to clarify that their drugs weren’t approved for routine problems and also add a boxed warning about possible heart risks.

FDA scrutiny led to new research
The FDA now says updated data warrants relaxing the restrictions.

An FDA-mandated study published in 2023 followed 5,000 men with a history of heart disease, with half receiving daily testosterone gel and the other half getting a sham drug. After two years there was no difference in heart attack, stroke and related problems between the two groups.

A series of studies by the National Institutes of Health also clarified the benefits of the hormone. Results from nearly 800 older men showed testosterone therapy improved erectile dysfunction, libido and other sexual measures and had a small effect on mood. There was little or no improvement in other measures like fatigue, memory or overall well-being.

The recent testosterone studies are the largest ever conducted, but Bhasin — who helped lead both efforts — says more research is needed on longer-term effects.

“I think FDA’s label changes are very welcome and they are bringing us a big step forward,” said Bhasin, who also co-authored the Endocrine Society’s guidelines. “But I think there’s a lot more to be done to better define the safety and efficacy.”

In recent comments submitted to the FDA, the Endocrine Society recommended studies of 15 to 20 years to assess conditions that evolve slowly, including prostate cancer, which remains a concern when prescribing testosterone.

Some men should not get testosterone
Experts agree that men who are hoping to have children in the near future shouldn’t take the hormone. Getting testosterone from a pill or gel shuts off the body’s natural process for making the hormone.

“It can stop the signal from your brain to your testicles to make testosterone, and so you stop making sperm,” Dubin said. “That can compromise fertility.”

Most guidelines also recommend careful consideration for men who have had prostate cancer or are at risk of the disease, given lingering questions about whether hormone therapy hastens tumor growth. But guidelines may soon change.

The FDA has proposed new language that would only suggest that men whose prostate cancer has spread to other parts of the body should avoid testosterone.

Be wary of online promotions
Dietary supplements promoted online to boost testosterone should be avoided because they aren’t FDA approved and probably don’t work.

FDA-approved testosterone drugs come in a variety of forms. Gels and pills generally need to be used daily. Injections, patches and implantable pellets can last for weeks or several months.

Many of these medications are available through telehealth services, though accessing them that way can have risks.

A 2022 paper by Dubin found that only 1 in 7 online prescribing companies asked basic screening questions, including whether men planned to have children. And most of the companies did not have a testing threshold for whether patients actually had low testosterone.

MIAMI (AP) — The Trump administration is reviving a rule that could deny green cards to immigrants who use public benefits that could include food stamps, Medicaid, housing vouchers and others.

The policy, known as “public charge,” appeared on Thursday in the Federal Register and will be formally published on July 20.

The policy was first implemented in February 2020 as one of President Donald Trump’s moves to limit legal immigration during his first administration, but it was reversed after Democratic President Joe Biden came to power.

Under the policy, applicants for green cards have to show they wouldn’t be burdens to the country or “public charges.”

Its return comes when the Republican administration is implementing a hardline policy to curb both illegal and legal immigration, and when the cost of healthcare and food is rising.

The federal government “is reaffirming the requirement of self-reliance, protecting public resources and ending policies that encouraged dependency on the backs of hard-working American taxpayers,” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said in a post published on its X account.

“Under President Trump, USCIS is restoring the basic principle that immigrants must be able to support themselves,” the post said. The agency said the rule will take effect Sept. 18.

While the administration’s crackdown on immigration has an increased focus on deportations and immigration enforcement in cities across the country and at borders and entry points, it has also taken actions that target legal immigrants and mixed status families.

Federal law already requires those seeking permanent residency or legal status to demonstrate that they will not become a public charge. The Trump administration’s rule, however, includes a broader range of programs that could disqualify them.

The Trump administration first promoted the rule in 2018 as a way to ensure that only those who were self-sufficient came to the U.S. Immigrant rights advocates criticized it, saying it amounted to a “wealth test.” Public health experts said it would lead to worse health outcomes.

Nongovernmental organizations said the policy generated confusion and fear and caused many immigrants and their U.S.-born relatives to decide not to apply for benefits and services to which they were entitled.

GENOA, Italy (AP) — An Italian court on Thursday convicted the former CEO of Italy’s main highway operator and 31 others in the 2018 Genoa highway bridge collapse that sent vehicles plunging and killed 43 people, a disaster that exposed serious lapses in the maintenance of Italian infrastructure.

Dozens of family members of the victims packed the courtroom as Chief Judge Paolo Lepri read the verdicts against 57 defendants, including former executives and officials. Many relatives broke down in tears as the sentences were read.

The former chief executive of highway operator Autostrade per l’Italia, Giovanni Castellucci, was sentenced to 12 years in prison, the highest in the case after four years of trial and four hours of deliberations.

Castellucci’s lawyers said they would appeal, noting in a statement that as CEO, their client had relied on Italy’s leading engineers, and that a construction defect had not been detected by experts for over half a century.

“The suffering caused by the Genoa tragedy is immense and deserves respect. But the gravity of the event requires justice to remain based on individual responsibility, not the search for a scapegoat,” they said in a statement.

Also convicted were Autostrade’s former head of maintenance, Michele Donferri Mitelli, who was sentenced to 11 years in prison. The former CEO of the SPEA engineering company, Antonino Galatà, received five years and six months.

Defendants faced charges including negligence resulting in the collapse and manslaughter stemming from failures to maintain the bridge, which was part of a main route linking northern Italy with the French Riviera.

In all, 32 people were convicted and handed sentences ranging from 1 year and 11 months to 12 years. Others were either found not guilty, or lesser charges had expired under the statute of limitations.

“I think it is important that responsibility extends beyond those at the top. Autostrade, SPEA and the Transport Ministry all had roles to play. I hope the state’s responsibility also emerges clearly,” Egle Possetti, who heads a committee to preserve the memory of the bridge victims, told reporters outside the courthouse.

“I lost my sister, her two children, my brother-in-law and even their little dog. That’s where my determination comes from — to make sure they receive justice and that their deaths were not in vain,” she said.

Warning signs of defect were ignored
Shortly before noon on Aug. 14, 2018, a 200-meter (650-foot) section of Genoa’s Morandi highway bridge gave way during a rainstorm, sending dozens of vehicles plunging to the ground.

Images of the collapsed bridge were seen around the world and shocked Italians on one of Italy’s busiest travel days, as millions headed out for the traditional Aug. 15 Ferragosto holiday that marks the peak summer vacation season.

Prosecutors argued that years of maintenance neglect led to the collapse, and demanded combined sentences totaling nearly 400 years for all of the defendants. The defendants denied wrongdoing and say the fault was caused by a construction defect.

Considered an engineering marvel when it opened in 1967, the Morandi featured three A-shaped concrete pylons and concrete-encased stay cables.

Caruso, who represents the family members of three victims, said that the trial showed that warning signs about defects in the pylon that collapsed had existed for decades. He cited maintenance on the other two starting in 1993 that was never extended to the third.

“From 1993 onward, the problem was known. We had three identical pylons. Two had already shown the same defect, and no one seriously asked whether the third one had it as well,” Caruso said.

Autostrade had reached a deal to avoid trial
The current Autostrade chief executive, Arrigo Giana, issued a public apology Thursday in an open letter published in major Italian dailies.

“The actions and decisions of some people left indelible scars,’’ said Giana, who joined Autostrade as CEO last year. “Offering today the apology that was not made then is, for us, a moral imperative that goes beyond establishing legal responsibility and the course of justice toward the truth.”

Autostrade and its subsidiary reached a deal on corporate liability earlier in the proceedings, paying roughly 30 million euros ($34 million) in financial penalties. The agreement spared the companies from a trial as corporate defendants and potentially much harsher sanctions, including exclusion from public contracts.

The settlements were reached after the companies adopted new compliance procedures aimed at preventing similar accidents, and after victims were compensated.

A new bridge designed by Genoa-born Italian architect Renzo Piano opened in 2020, spanning a memorial to the victims of the Morandi Bridge collapse.

(AP) – President Donald Trump’s longtime teleprompter operator is in settlement discussions with federal regulators over allegations that he used advance knowledge of the president’s prepared speeches to profit from prediction market wagers, according to ABC News.

Citing people familiar with the matter, ABC reported that Gabriel Perez, a White House technical assistant who has operated Trump’s teleprompter since the 2016 presidential campaign, allegedly earned more than $100,000 by placing bets on the contents of more than a dozen presidential speeches through the prediction market Kalshi.

The report said the Commodity Futures Trading Commission began investigating after Kalshi flagged suspicious trading activity involving its “Mentions” market, which allows users to wager on whether certain words or topics will appear in public speeches. According to ABC, Kalshi voluntarily referred the trades to federal regulators and has been cooperating with the investigation.

ABC reported that investigators believe Perez placed wagers on several high-profile speeches, including the president’s State of the Union address, remarks at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and other public appearances over a three-month period. Investigators also examined instances in which bets were allegedly adjusted during speeches when Trump departed from prepared remarks, the report said.

White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told ABC that the administration expects all staff members to follow its ethics rules and said Perez is cooperating with the CFTC investigation. A CFTC spokesperson declined to comment, according to the report.

ABC reported that federal prosecutors in Manhattan were informed of the matter but declined to pursue criminal charges. Instead, regulators are discussing a potential civil settlement that could require Perez to forfeit any profits and refrain from similar trading in the future.

Kalshi prohibits users from placing wagers based on confidential information obtained through their employment. The company recently strengthened its compliance policies by requiring users to disclose their employer and has said it is expanding safeguards against insider trading.

Perez remains employed as one of Trump’s teleprompter operators while the matter is being resolved, according to ABC.

NEW YORK — Ordained minister and Heritage Foundation Visiting Fellow Luke Moon, who returned to the conservative think tank to combat antisemitism from both the political right and left, said in a recent interview with Podcaster Alan Skorski that former Fox News host Tucker Carlson ignored his advice and “doubled down on his antisemitism.”

Moon, who has spent the last decade raising awareness about the persecution of Christians in the Middle East and encouraging Christian support for Israel and the Jewish people, made the remarks during an interview with Alan Skorski.

Moon described multiple conversations with Carlson following last year’s controversy, in which Heritage President Kevin Roberts initially declined to distance the organization from Carlson after his interview with Holocaust denier and self-described “groyper” Nick Fuentes. Carlson had sought Moon’s guidance on how to shed the “antisemitism” label.

“After advising Carlson on the necessary steps needed to redeem himself, Tucker doubled down on his antisemitism,” Moon said.

Moon returned to Heritage as a visiting fellow specifically to address rising antisemitism across the ideological spectrum. His work highlights the growing Marxist-Islamist alliance and its implications for Jews, Christians and Western values.

During the interview, Moon addressed the rhetoric of Democratic Socialists of America activists and candidates, including those running for office in Wisconsin. A frequent refrain among them, he noted, is: “None of us are free until Palestine is free.”

“Why is it important for the DSA activists and candidates to declare this idea?” Moon asked. “It is because the liberation of Palestine means the end of Israel. And Israel is a stand-in for God. To destroy Israel is to destroy God which would bring about liberation from God’s commands and expectations.”

Moon described Israel as “the living testimony that the God of the Bible makes promises and keeps them.” The reconstituted Jewish state in its ancient homeland after 2,000 years of exile, he said, is “a provocation to every worldview that denies a sovereign God who acts in history.”

He drew a parallel to 19th-century figures, noting that Karl Marx once identified British revivalist preacher Charles Spurgeon — who was leading thousands of working-class people to faith — as the person he hated most in Britain, because Spurgeon was drawing away potential followers from Marxist ideology.

Similarly, Moon said, Islamists demand total submission to Allah and view the G-d revealed through Israel and the Church as a rival truth claim that must be suppressed. When Islamists gain power, churches and synagogues are often destroyed or converted into museums or government-controlled sites.

Citing the drastic decline of Christian communities in the Middle East, Moon pointed to Iraq, where the Christian population has plummeted from more than 450,000 in 2014 — when he began his advocacy — to fewer than 185,000 today. By contrast, he noted, there are more Christians living in Israel than in Iraq.

Moon’s comments come amid ongoing concerns about antisemitism on both ends of the political spectrum and the complex alliances forming between far-left activists and Islamist groups.

WASHINGTON D.C (VINnews)- Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday described radical leftism as a “distinctive and unique evil” driven by hatred of civilization itself, framing it as a resentful campaign by the weak and inadequate to destroy the achievements of the strong and accomplished.

In pointed remarks that cast communism and related ideologies as fundamentally destructive rather than idealistic, Rubio portrayed left-wing extremism as a recurring force that cloaks resentment in the language of equality and justice.

“This is a revolt of the worst against the best; of the weak and the cowardly against the strong and the good,” Rubio said. “It is perpetrated by those who cannot build, cannot create, cannot achieve great things — and take their revenge upon the world for their own inadequacy by seeking to destroy those who can.”

Rubio argued that while radical leftism adopts varying slogans over time — anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, communist, anarchist or Marxist — its core character remains unchanged: “a poisonous resentment cloaked in the language of equality, justice, liberation.”

He rejected the common critique that communism is a good idea that fails in practice, asserting instead that the ideology itself envisions a diminished world.

“The world it envisions for all of us is small, flat and gray — leveled of all exception, drained of all that is good and noble in the human soul,” Rubio said. “It is a world without courage, creativity, or ambition; without heroes or glory or great causes to strive towards. Without miracles. Without myths. Without men who rise above the rest to do incredible and extraordinary things. Without God.”

According to Rubio, the towering achievements of civilization represent an unbearable humiliation to its critics, prompting them to lash out through violence and destruction.

“They attack pipelines, railroads, laboratories, power grids: the physical, embodied symbols of power, invention and achievement,” he said.

Rubio’s remarks come amid ongoing debates over political extremism, ideological conflicts and their impact on global stability. The secretary positioned the ideology as inherently opposed to beauty, achievement and the human spirit’s higher aspirations.

NEW YORK (AP) — Heavy, pungent smoke from Canadian wildfires darkened skies in the U.S. on Thursday, from the Great Lakes to parts of the East Coast, reducing visibility for commuters and prompting warnings about air quality that made outdoor activities dangerous.

Detroit’s air quality was among the worst in the world for major cities, as a lingering high pressure system trapped smoke from dozens of fires in Canada and northern Minnesota and winds from the northwest blew it into Michigan, said Steven Freitag, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Pontiac, Michigan.

“Sure enough, it arrived in force here and it’s really pretty extreme levels,” said Freitag, who noted that visibility in some areas was reduced to a half mile.

Some other cities across the Great Lakes states also registered air quality ranging from unhealthy to hazardous. Fine particles in smoke are especially dangerous for children and people with health conditions such as asthma and heart disease.

In the New York City area, a thick, gloomy haze tinged the morning sky in orange-and-yellow, reducing visibility so dramatically that it partly obscured Manhattan’s prominent skyline.

City officials opened cooling centers as health officials urged New Yorkers to limit strenuous and prolonged outdoor activities and to stick to air-conditioned spaces as much as possible.

State officials distributed tens of thousands of face masks designed to filter out 95% of tiny airborne particles, including dust and smog, at the city’s Penn Station and Grand Central transit hubs and other major locations.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani said public schools, parks and other city agencies were adjusting programming, moving activities indoors, rescheduling events and adjusting operations as air quality was expected to worsen as the day progressed.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation issued a statewide air quality health advisory.

The agency said there was a potential for temporary spikes of “very unhealthy” air quality from Buffalo in the state’s western corner to Rochester by Lake Ontario, Syracuse in the central region, down to the greater New York City area.

LONDON (AP) — The British government said Thursday it will keep the country’s spies on a tighter rein after a report found MI5 misled courts about its ties to a neo-Nazi informer accused of attacking his partner.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said she is taking “urgent action” to strengthen oversight of the U.K.’s domestic security service after a tribunal found MI5 repeatedly gave “a false account” of what had happened.

Earlier this year MI5 apologized and paid compensation to settle a legal claim brought by a woman over her treatment by an allegedly abusive ex-partner. He was an MI5 informant, identified in court as Agent X.

MI5 maintained in sworn testimony that it had neither confirmed nor denied that Agent X was an informant. But in fact an MI5 officer had disclosed the information during a conversation with a BBC journalist who was investigating Agent X.

The Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which investigates allegations against Britain’s intelligence services, said MI5 had misled three courts because a false narrative was “allowed to take hold and persist.” It said “systemic failures” meant chances to correct the error were missed,

“The findings of this report are stark. It details serious failings by individual MI5 officers, resulting in false evidence being provided to the courts, and criticism of MI5 as an organization,” Mahmood said.

“MI5 plays a critical role in keeping our country safe and we owe a debt of thanks to its staff. They have made significant progress over the last year in learning from these failures, but there is more to do to ensure the highest standards of integrity and accountability are upheld.”

MI5 Director-General Ken McCallum said the agency “recognizes without hesitation the seriousness of our failings” and was working “to ensure we never find ourselves in this position again.”

In a separate case last year, a report found that MI5 protected a top spy planted within the Irish Republican Army when they knew he was wanted by police for murder, and continued to suppress the truth about the agent decades after Northern Ireland ’s bloody conflict.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is proposing to improve security around the White House by putting up a fence around nearby Lafayette Park to help limit public access when law enforcement authorities determine doing so is necessary.

The proposal is scheduled for consideration on Thursday by the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, according to a meeting agenda and the plans posted on the agency’s website. The agency has oversight over the design of construction on federal land in Washington.

The commissioners are also set to take another look at the design for an underground facility to screen the thousands of tourists and others who visit or work at the White House. All seven commissioners were appointed by the Republican president.

The proposals are being considered at a time when security for the president has become a top concern. President Donald Trump has been the target of multiple assassination attempts, including two during the 2024 campaign and a third this past April as he attended a dinner in Washington with White House journalists.

Those concerns were heightened the following month after U.S. Secret Service officers fatally shot a man who opened fire near a White House security checkpoint.

The administration says the projects will be an improvement over temporary structures that have long been used to aid perimeter security, like barriers fashioned out of bicycle racks, and for screening the many guests who access the White House and its grounds.

A look at both projects:

Lafayette Park last had a permanent fence in the late 1800s
Trump was accompanied by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum on a recent tour of the park to see updates being made at his direction. The president has worked with the Interior Department and one of its agencies, the National Park Service, to restart dormant park fountains.

“We’re really doing a job at Lafayette Park, which is really the entrance to the White House, and that’s going to be completed very shortly and it’ll be incredible,” Trump said in June.

The administration’s 79-page proposal for the 8-acre (3-hectare) park calls for fencing it all the way around with gates at the north and south entrances to control public access. Options call for either including or excluding four monuments located at each of the park’s four corners.

The proposal, which is backed by the Secret Service and the Executive Office of the President, in coordination with the Interior Department and National Park Service, notes that leaving out the monuments would expose them to vandalism.

The report says the goal of the plan is to “enhance long-term safety,” preserve the Lafayette Park’s identity as a significant National Park Service landscape and “maintain public access to this nationally symbolic space.” Throngs flock to the park to protest or celebrate major events.

Lafayette Park has not had a permanent fence around it since the 19th century. The Secret Service anticipates the fence would start going up sometime next year.

The administration wants similar fencing along Pennsylvania Avenue on the north side of the White House complex, from the Treasury Department building at 15th Street to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building at 17th Street. The report said that will be treated as a separate proposal and submitted to the commission at a later date.

White House visitor screening facility could replace currently used tents
The commission is set to review a revised design for the facility, which would be built beneath Sherman Park, federal land southeast of the White House, to support screening for public tour participants, guests attending large events, White House staff and contractors.

The original design called for locating the facility’s entrance at the southern end of the park, but meetings and consultations led to a revised proposal that shifted the entrance to the western edge of the park to avoid conflicts with infrastructure and minimize the impact on the surrounding views, according to the report submitted for the commission’s review on Thursday.

The administration said the permanent facility will eliminate the need for a series of temporary screening tents currently used for events, improve security on the White House complex and enhance the experience for visitors.

The Secret Service, Interior Department, National Park Service and Executive Office of the President want to start construction in August on the 33,000-square-foot (3,066-square-meter) underground facility. They have set a July 2028 date for it to be operating.

White House visitors would face an initial ID check before they enter the facility through a pavilion located above ground, then head down to a lower level and a second checkpoint. After they are cleared, visitors will ride escalators that will take them up to the White House grounds.

SYDNEY (AP) — More than 500 people are feared dead after reports that two boats carrying members of Myanmar’s persecuted Rohingya minority have capsized in the Bay of Bengal, officials said Thursday.

According to preliminary information, the two boats left Myanmar’s western state of Rakhine in late June carrying mostly Rohingya passengers, including some who had traveled from refugee camps across the border in Bangladesh, according to a statement from the International Organization for Migration and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

More than 500 people are feared to have been aboard two boats that reportedly capsized off the coast of Myanmar.

Most were Rohingya passengers risking dangerous sea journeys in search of safety. We and IOM are deeply concerned by these reports and call for stronger efforts to… pic.twitter.com/FIvT4T4AfR

— UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency (@Refugees) July 16, 2026

One boat, believed to have been carrying around 250 people, lost contact shortly after departure. A second boat, reportedly carrying 280 people, is believed to have sunk off Myanmar’s Ayeyarwady coast on July 8.

″While the incidents and casualty figures have yet to be officially confirmed, UNHCR and IOM are gravely concerned by the potentially devastating loss of life,” the agencies said.

Acting police Brig. Gen. Soe Lin Aung, the spokesperson for Myanmar’s Ministry of Home Affairs, declined to comment. Spokespeople for Myanmar’s president and the Ayeyarwady region’s government did not respond to requests for comment.

The Rohingya, who have in recent years fled both Myanmar and Bangladesh’s squalid refugee camps by the thousands, typically avoid such boat journeys at this time of year, when monsoons are frequent and conditions at sea are particularly dangerous. The UNHCR and IOM noted this in their statement, saying that recent torrential rain and flooding across the region would have made such journeys especially risky.

Around 1.2 million stateless, predominantly Muslim Rohingya remain trapped in overcrowded refugee camps in Bangladesh after fleeing waves of violence by Myanmar’s security forces.

The United Nations has warned that more than five hundred people are feared dead after two boats carrying Rohingya refugees reportedly capsized off the coast of Myanmar.#Asiaone #asiaonenews #Myanmar #Shipwreck #UnitedNations #HumanitarianCrisis pic.twitter.com/bq8SJLBAuC

— ASIA ONE NEWS (@AsiaOne_News) July 16, 2026

The refugees have no way to safely return to Myanmar, where the military that killed thousands of Rohingya in 2017 during what the United States declared a genocide remains in charge of their homeland. The Rohingya still living in Myanmar face severe restrictions and many are confined to internment camps.

Steep cuts to foreign aid by the U.S. and other countries have led to ration cuts in Bangladesh’s refugee camps, while the ruling military and an ethnic armed organization in Rakhine have fought for control of the region.

The unrest has led to an increasing number of Rohingya attempting to make the dangerous ocean crossing to Malaysia on rickety boats. Thousands have died in the process, including babies, children and pregnant women. Local maritime authorities have frequently abandoned the Rohingya at sea, often ignoring reports of boats in distress.

The IOM and UNHCR said on Thursday that the latest potential tragedy at sea underscores the continued lack of sustainable solutions for the Rohingya, and urged the international community to support those trapped in Bangladesh’s camps.

“Stronger regional and international efforts are needed to prevent further loss of life along one of the world’s deadliest maritime routes, including through enhanced search and rescue efforts, access to asylum and protection, and actions against smuggling and trafficking networks,” the agencies said.

More than 6,500 Rohingya fled and nearly 900 were reported dead or missing in 2025, the deadliest year for Rohingya who tried to leave by boat. The figure represents the highest mortality rate of any major route for refugee and migrant sea journeys in the world, the UNHCR said.

HONG KONG (AP) — Major Taiwan computer chipmaker TSMC said Thursday it plans to spend another $100 billion on expanding its manufacturing capacity in the United States.

The latest commitment appears to bring the company’s total pledges for investment in U.S. chipmaking to $265 billion. It also raised its annual revenue forecast after booking record high profits thanks to runaway demand from the boom in artificial intelligence.

The world’s largest contract chip manufacturing and one of the world’s most valuable companies, TSMC is seen as a barometer for the global chip industry and for AI at a time when worries about a potential AI bubble have been buffeting financial markets.

As AI-related demand continues to jump and needs for computing power from data centers surge, TSMC has been expanding chip fabrication plants in the U.S., Japan and Taiwan. It said it is increasing its annual capital expenditure budget for this year to $60 billion-$64 billion, up from an earlier estimate of $52 billion-$56 billion.

TSMC, or Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., is a key supplier to Nvidia and Apple. It had previously already committed $165 billion in the U.S. for building plants in Arizona, with six fabrication facilities planned.

The extra $100 billion in investments are to “support the strong multiyear demand from our leading U.S. customers,” C.C. Wei, chairman and CEO of TSMC, said during the company’s quarterly earnings conference Thursday. An additional four fabrication plants in Arizona will likely be built with the new investments, TSMC said. They will focus on making some of the most advanced chips that are 2-nanometer and below.

“We believe this investment will help to further foster the development of the U.S. semiconductor ecosystem, strengthen the supply chain and support an increasing number of high-tech, high-paying jobs in the United States,” he said.

Earlier this year, U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration and Taiwan reached an agreement that cut U.S. tariffs on Taiwanese goods, as Taiwan promised around $250 billion of new investments in the United States’ tech sector, including in semiconductors. That included spending by TSMC.

AI-related demand globally continues to be “extremely robust,” Wei said, as the “AI megatrend continues to drive the need for more and more computation.”

“I believe from this day on, all the way to probably 2029, 2030, the demand is very strong,” he said.

TSMC on Thursday reported a record 706.6 billion new Taiwan dollars ($22 billion) in net profit for the April-June quarter, up 77% from a year earlier and better than what analysts had expected. Revenue was up 36% year-on-year during the quarter, to 1.27 trillion new Taiwan dollars ($39 billion).

Wei said TSMC now expects its annual 2026 revenue growth to be slightly above 40% year-on-year, up from its previous forecast of over 30%.

TSMC’s ramped up investment plans are “essential to support (its) long-term growth” and to keep up with demand, said William Li, a senior analyst in semiconductors at Counterpoint Research.

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syrian authorities thwarted an attempted weapons smuggling on its border with Iraq, reportedly heading to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon, state media said Thursday.

The truck that was seized was carrying advanced weapons and rockets, Syria’s state-run SANA news agency quoted an unnamed Interior Ministry official sa saying. A preliminary investigation concluded that its intended destination was Hezbollah in Lebanon, which since early March has been at war with Israel, the official said.

The new leadership in Syria, which toppled former President Bashar Assad in 2024, has cracked down on smuggling of weapons and illicit drugs along its borders, especially with Iraq and Lebanon, that for decades have served as strategic routes for supplying Hezbollah and other groups backed by Iran.

Iraq’s Joint Operations command said that it formed a committee to investigate the smuggling and will coordinate with its counterparts in Damascus. It did not offer other details.

U.S. President Donald Trump has insisted Syria take military action against Hezbollah, as Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa has been trying to prevent his country from being sucked into a wider regional conflict.

Hezbollah did not comment on the allegations.

Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi earlier this week traveled to Washington to meet with Trump, who has been pushing Baghdad to disarm Tehran-backed militias.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Three suspects have been arrested in connection with the killing of a distinguished American marine biologist at his home in the central Philippines, police said Thursday.

Three men broke into the house of Kent Carpenter, 73, in the coastal town of Sibulan in Negros Oriental province during a suspected robbery on Sunday. One of them is alleged to have shot the scientist in the head with a handgun as he sat on a sofa, police officials said. Another suspect forced Carpenter’s Filipino companion into a room and raped her.

The suspects took a laptop, an unspecified amount of cash and a backpack before fleeing, national police spokesperson Col. Allen Rae Co said. The third man is being hunted, Co told a news conference, adding that investigators were trying to determine why the suspects shot Carpenter.

A fourth suspect, who acted as a lookout outside the property, was arrested after surrendering to police and allegedly provided crucial details of the crime.

One of those arrested had previously been hired by Carpenter to do some carpentry work in his house, Co said, adding that the arrested suspects include the alleged gunman.

“All indicators as of now point to the fact that the attack was not connected to (the American’s) work,” Co told reporters. “It was really a planned robbery. So, we are still verifying why they killed the American marine biologist.”

Several U.S. and Philippine environment and biodiversity centers and universities have expressed shock over Carpenter’s violent death.

Carpenter had testified for the Philippine government when it took China to international arbitration over longstanding disputes in the South China Sea. His testimony as a biodiversity expert centered on the environmental impact of China’s island-building and fishing activities in the disputed waters, according to former Philippine officials who had knowledge of his contribution.

The arbitration panel in The Hague invalidated China’s expansive claims and pointed out the environmental damage caused by China’s construction of islands in the disputed waters in a July 2016 decision. China, however, questioned the panel’s jurisdiction, refused to participate in the arbitration and rejected its ruling as a sham.

Carpenter had been a longtime lecturer and researcher at the Silliman University in Negros Oriental. He had also been a biological sciences professor at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, since 1996.

His research — which focused on the Philippines and the Coral Triangle between the Indian and Pacific oceans — shaped conservation efforts around the world, officials of the American university said. They said he was on an extended research assignment in the Philippines and planned to retire in September.

“He dedicated his career to expanding our understanding of the world’s bodies of water and protecting some of its most vulnerable ecosystems,” Old Dominion President Brian Hemphill said in a statement.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) – An Israeli judicial oversight official has upheld a complaint against Chief Rabbi David Yosef over public remarks criticizing the country’s judiciary during a dispute surrounding a High Court hearing that took place on Shabbat.

In a decision released Thursday, retired Judge Asher Kula, who serves as commissioner for complaints against judges, concluded that the chief rabbi’s comments fell outside the scope of his official responsibilities and therefore were not entitled to the special protections generally afforded to statements made in the course of performing his duties.

Kula said the remarks directed at Israel’s High Court of Justice crossed the line from legitimate public criticism into rhetoric that could undermine public confidence in the judicial system. He wrote that senior public officials, particularly those serving in judicial or quasi-judicial roles, are expected to maintain a level of restraint in their public statements.

The complaint stemmed from comments Yosef made during a public controversy over the High Court’s decision to convene a hearing on Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath. The issue sparked criticism from some religious leaders and lawmakers, who argued that holding judicial proceedings on the holy day showed insufficient respect for religious observance. Others defended the court’s authority to schedule hearings when circumstances require.

While upholding the complaint, Kula did not impose disciplinary measures or other sanctions against the chief rabbi.

In the same decision, however, the commissioner rejected a separate complaint concerning Yosef’s criticism of a High Court ruling requiring the Chief Rabbinate to permit women to take examinations for rabbinical certification. Kula determined that matter falls within the chief rabbi’s official responsibilities and that his comments on the issue did not warrant intervention.

The ruling marks the latest chapter in longstanding tensions between Israel’s judiciary and some religious and conservative leaders, who have accused the courts of overstepping their authority in matters involving religion and state. Supporters of the judiciary argue that the courts play an essential role in safeguarding the rule of law and protecting individual rights.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — The Knesset on Thursday approved in its second and third readings a bill sponsored by MK Limor Son Har-Melech, chairwoman of the Knesset Lobby for Charedi and Religious Women from the Otzma Yehudit party, allowing institutions of higher education to offer gender-separate academic programs for advanced degrees.

The law reverses the situation created by a High Court of Justice ruling that prevented universities from operating separate programs at the graduate level, returning the decision to the legislature and the academic institutions themselves. Under the new law, each institution will be able, at its own discretion and according to demand, to open separate study tracks for men and women, thereby expanding access to higher education for those who wish to combine academic studies with their religious beliefs and lifestyle.

Until now, this policy created a significant barrier for thousands of men and women seeking advanced academic degrees without compromising their way of life. In many professions, a master’s degree is a prerequisite for eligibility in civil service tenders, advancement within the public sector, management positions, and higher earning potential.

In practice, the inability to study in a framework consistent with their religious convictions prevented many people from pursuing senior positions, government appointments, and professional advancement. Supporters of the law say it removes this obstacle and enables individuals to advance based on their abilities while remaining faithful to their values.

MK Limor Son Har-Melech welcomed the legislation, saying: “Today, the Knesset declared clearly that genuine freedom of choice also includes the right to study in separate academic programs. For years, a single worldview was imposed on the public, preventing thousands of men and women from advancing academically without giving up their way of life.

“The harm extended far beyond education itself. When an advanced degree is a prerequisite for professional advancement, senior positions, and eligibility for government tenders, the result was the exclusion of an entire sector from positions of influence, leadership, and employment. A society that believes in equal opportunity cannot force people to choose between their careers and their faith.

“The law we passed today forces nothing on anyone. It expands freedom, promotes diversity, and respects the human mosaic of Israeli society. Anyone who truly believes in pluralism must also respect choices that differ from their own worldview.

“This is a victory for freedom of choice, justice, and for a public that for years was excluded from academia and professional opportunities in the name of a progressive ideology. In a Jewish and democratic state, there must be room for every citizen, including those who wish to pursue higher education while remaining true to their faith and values. I am proud to have led this important reform, which will enable thousands of students to fulfill their academic ambitions, advance in the workforce, and open doors that have long been closed to them.”

She also thanked National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, Education Minister Yoav Kisch, MK Yosef Taieb, Education Committee Chairman MK Zvi Sukkot, Coalition Chairman Ofir Katz, her staff, and others who helped advance the legislation.

Dr. Malkali Bloy Chanukah, director of the lobby, called the vote “a historic day and the correction of a long-standing injustice for thousands of Haredi and religious women.”

“The new law removes the barrier that prevented talented women from pursuing advanced degrees, opening the way to positions of influence and senior leadership. The notion that a woman had to choose between her professional aspirations and her commitment to Torah values was paternalistic. Today we restored genuine freedom of choice.”

Anat Gopstein, another director of the lobby, added:”The law’s approval is a victory for freedom of choice and for the dignity of women who seek to study while remaining faithful to their traditions and way of life. For years, alien worldviews prevented religious and charedi women from advancing academically simply because they wished to preserve their values. The lobby will continue working to ensure that every woman can reach the highest professional levels with pride in her identity.”

BNEI BRAK, Israel (VINnews) — Police escorted Israeli Tax Authority inspectors from a neighborhood in the central city of Bnei Brak on Thursday after a crowd surrounded their vehicle and damaged it during a violent protest.

According to Israeli media reports, the unrest began in the Kiryat Viznitz neighborhood after tax inspectors arrived to conduct inspections in the area. As students left nearby educational institutions, hundreds of people gathered around the inspectors.

Witnesses said some members of the crowd threw eggs at the inspectors’ vehicle, smashed its windows and caused other damage.

Police responded to the scene and safely escorted the inspectors from the neighborhood. No injuries were immediately reported.

The incident followed a similar confrontation in the same neighborhood last week, when tax inspectors also encountered a crowd after arriving for inspections. Police were called to that scene as well, and the inspectors left before completing their work as tensions escalated.

Israeli authorities did not immediately comment on whether any arrests were made or what prompted the inspections.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Amid the growing incitement in the Israeli media against Torah students, a disturbing assault was reported in Ramat Gan on Wednesday. A Haredi yeshiva student from Bnei Brak was allegedly attacked while anti-charedi threats were shouted at him. According to Radio Kol Barama, despite a complaint being filed with the police, the suspect has not yet been arrested.

The victim, identified as Rabbi David, described the incident in an interview with the radio station:

“He jumped off his bicycle, struck me in the stomach and on the arm with a glass beer bottle, and tried to break it so he could stab me. He shouted in the street: ‘Haredim, go back to Bnei Brak. Don’t set foot here. In another five minutes I’ll come back and kill you.’ We’ve reached a point where a Jew is afraid to walk in Ramat Gan because of the way he is dressed.”

The victim added: “The incident happened just five meters from a crowded bus stop in Ramat Gan. Everyone saw and heard what was happening. Not one of the dozens of people there intervened, said a word, or even took out a phone to record the attacker assaulting me. They simply stood by and watched.”

On the same day, a shocking example of charedi incitement against soldiers was published on social media, demonstrating the acute polarization of the charedi community due to the anti-charedi sentiment in Israel and the current attempts at forced conscription. A charedi yeshiva student lambasted a Chashmonaim soldier, telling him: ‘The Torah doesn’t protect you. You will die in Gaza, you’ll be burnt in Gaza, they’ll make a schnitzel out of you.”

מזעזע: חרדי אמר לחייל חרדי מחשמונאים מוקדם יותר היום. ״עליך התורה לא שומרת, אתה תישרף בעזה, יהיה ממך שניצל חייל״
קרדיט: הפרגוד pic.twitter.com/gXvmvu1Gci

— יעקב הרשקוביץ | Yaakov hershkowitz (@yaakov_hershko) July 14, 2026

ALBANY, N.Y. (VINnews) — New York Gov. Kathy Hochul warned that smoke from Canadian wildfires is expected to continue blanketing the state Thursday, with air quality forecast to deteriorate to very unhealthy levels across much of New York as officials urged residents to limit outdoor activity.

Smoke from the Canadian wildfires will continue to blanket New York today.

Air quality is expected to worsen, with very unhealthy conditions affecting much of the state.

Stay informed by monitoring the real-time Air Quality Index at https://t.co/64PRgQecP8.

Stay indoors if you… pic.twitter.com/6Qx1jkrt3V

— Governor Kathy Hochul (@GovKathyHochul) July 16, 2026

State officials said an Air Quality Health Advisory remains in effect statewide as smoke from hundreds of active wildfires in Canada combines with high temperatures to create hazardous conditions. Air quality is expected to range from unhealthy for sensitive groups to unhealthy and, in some locations, very unhealthy, depending on the concentration of fine particulate matter.

Hochul urged New Yorkers to stay indoors whenever possible, keep windows closed, use air conditioning or air filtration if available, drink plenty of water and check on older adults, children and people with heart or lung disease, who are especially vulnerable to wildfire smoke.

Residents who must spend time outdoors were advised to wear a properly fitted N95 respirator, which can help reduce exposure to fine particulate pollution. Officials also recommended avoiding strenuous outdoor exercise until air quality improves.

More than 100,000 N95-style masks have been made available statewide, with free masks being distributed at major transit hubs and other locations in New York City by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the New York National Guard, according to the governor’s office.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and Department of Health are continuing to monitor conditions and may update advisories as smoke levels change. Officials encouraged residents to check real-time air quality forecasts through AirNow.gov before spending extended time outdoors.

Smoke from more than 100 out-of-control wildfires in Ontario has spread across much of the Northeast, reducing visibility and prompting air quality alerts in several states. The smoke has also affected major cities including Toronto, Boston and New York City.

TEHRAN (VINnews)  Iran on Thursday labeled the Strait of Hormuz an inviolable “red line,” warning that any U.S. strikes on its infrastructure — including power plants and bridges targeted by President Donald J. Trump — would prompt retaliatory attacks on critical targets across the Gulf region.

The declaration follows four straight days of U.S. strikes on Iranian military sites and the reimposition of a naval blockade on Iranian ports. Washington has said its actions aim to restore freedom of navigation through the vital waterway after repeated Iranian attacks on commercial shipping.

Iranian officials insisted that their control of the strait does not rely on coastal bases or islands, claiming Tehran can maintain dominance from positions deeper within its territory. They reiterated demands that the U.S. comply with a previously signed memorandum of understanding and accept Iranian regulations on vessel transits before the strait can reopen.

The escalating rhetoric comes as the regional conflict broadens rapidly. Iran has launched missile and drone attacks against U.S. forces and partners in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain. Analysts have warned that Tehran could further pressure global trade by directing its Houthi allies in Yemen to expand operations into the Bab al-Mandeb Strait.

The Strait of Hormuz, a narrow chokepoint between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, handles about one-fifth of global oil shipments. Disruptions there have historically sent energy prices soaring and heightened tensions throughout the Middle East.

NEW YORK (VINnews) — U.S. Senator John Fetterman has expressed deep concern over what he sees as growing radicalization within the Democratic Party and an increasingly anti-Israel trend among its members.

“I’m still a Democrat, but if our party ever officially becomes anti-Israel, that will be the time to leave it. I can’t be part of a place that lacks moral clarity,” Fetterman said.

He added: “I’m very concerned about what’s happening within the party. It’s moving further and further away from Israel and could ultimately turn its back on it.”

To illustrate his concerns, Fetterman pointed to a recently defeated legislative proposal that sought to eliminate U.S. security assistance to Israel.

In an unusual twist, the measure was introduced by a Republican lawmaker, but none of his fellow Republicans supported it, while more than 100 Democrats voted in favor.

“We’re seeing the kinds of people who have been winning our primaries lately,” Fetterman said. “They’re becoming increasingly anti-Israel and hostile toward those who hold pro-Israel views.”

In his opinion, “some people are riding a wave of anti-Israel sentiment to gain voters’ support and are exploiting the situation inappropriately.”

Fetterman has long been regarded as one of Israel’s strongest supporters in the U.S. Senate. Immediately after Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack, he displayed photographs of all the hostages held by Hamas outside his Senate office and kept them there until every hostage had returned home.

When pro-Palestinian demonstrators gathered outside his office accusing Israel of committing genocide, Fetterman responded by pointing to the Israeli flag flying from the roof of the building.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — The IDF is racing to finish eliminating Hezbollah terror infrastructure in 52 southern Lebanese villages in the coming weeks before the US presses Israel for a wider withdrawal, IDF sources told the Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.

During a visit by Israeli military reporters to Bint Jbail, multiple kilometers into southern Lebanon, and where the IDF vanquished one of Hezbollah’s main centers of gravity in the area, IDF officials how they defeated the group and the current state of affairs.

On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he wanted Israel to withdraw from both Lebanon and Syria. Yet in order to withdraw, Israel must first find an able partner to occupy areas where it withdraws from and also be able to supervise the partner’s activities in curbing terrorist elements from approaching Israel’s borders. In order to achieve this, the IDF is building a series of permanent outposts in Southern Lebanon, despite the US demands for a unilateral withdrawal. These outposts will enable it to monitor the entire region of Southern Lebanon and identify security risks in the region.

For the last couple of weeks, Israel, the US, and Lebanon have been negotiating over the regions where the pilot program of Israel undertaking small partial withdrawals, in which it hands over a specific area to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), will take place.

Originally, two areas under discussion were Tibnin and Ali Taher Ridge, but there could be an evolution in the areas, including the addition of a third area, IDF sources said.

On July 5, the Post spoke with the Givati Brigade’s Weapons Commander Lt.-Col. “I,” who described watching the LAF move into certain areas where the Givati Brigade was leaving.

According to “I”, higher-level IDF and US officials handled the transition and handover of territory coordination, with “I” and his forces observing the Lebanese army from a safe distance for a period of minutes. Curiously, this handover of land occurred some weeks before the IDF had said that officially transferring territory in some key spots in southern Lebanon over to the Lebanese army would occur.

IDF sources emphasized that it is critical to Israel that the transfer process ensures the LAF meets certain benchmarks before additional transfers proceed.

The IDF has said that after the previous withdrawal in November 2024, after a few months of trying more seriously to evict Hezbollah from southern Lebanon, the weaker Lebanese army eventually mostly gave up, part of why Hezbollah started to recover and felt strong enough to attack Israel again in 2026.

The partial withdrawals and land transfers are being coordinated by US Marine Corps Lt.-Gen. Joseph R. Clearfield, who was the main coordinator with Israel and Lebanon on such issues from fall 2024 until the recent war, with support from around 30 other American military officials.

IDF sources said that Clearfield properly understands the weaknesses that the Lebanese army has, though they cannot vouch for whether American political officials will hold up the land transfers if necessary from an Israeli security perspective, which may clash with their timeline for wrapping up Lebanon as an issue.

An official for CENTCOM’s Marine Corps Command (MARCENT), relating to CENTCOM’s Military Coordination Group for Lebanon, declined over the weekend to provide more specific updates about how the transfer of territory was going so far. However, the Post reported that Clearfield met with IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir on July 1 and secretly visited Lebanon on July 2.

While IDF sources are concerned that the Lebanese army will again fail at clearing Hezbollah from areas it takes over, as it failed in 2024-2025, they have some additional hope of success given that this time the Lebanese government has held several public meetings with Israel and is publicly backing disarming Hezbollah.

NEW YORK (VINnews)  — The war with Iran has reportedly exposed tensions between U.S. President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, amid the president’s frustration with the pace of the campaign and Hegseth’s push for a more aggressive approach toward Tehran. The claims were reported on Wednesday by CBS News in an article examining U.S. military options regarding Cuba, which it said are currently limited because of America’s focus on the war with Iran.

Last month, it was reported that Trump was considering dismissing several senior administration officials who had opposed an agreement with Iran, including Hegseth. According to that report, although Trump has publicly praised Hegseth on multiple occasions, he has privately expressed frustration with the pace of the military campaign. Sources said the president believes the administration missed an opportunity to prevent a prolonged war earlier this year when it rejected an Iranian proposal involving concessions on its nuclear program.

Two U.S. officials told CBS that Hegseth advocated for a more aggressive military strategy toward Iran despite reservations voiced by Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. According to the officials, Trump’s dissatisfaction grew as the conflict dragged on and became more complicated than expected after the war broke out in February. Throughout the campaign, they said, Trump became increasingly impatient with both Hegseth and Caine whenever they presented him with the limitations of U.S. military capabilities.

One source also said Pentagon officials had expressed frustration with Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), accusing him of promising more than the U.S. military was capable of delivering against Iran.

The White House denied any rift. In a statement, it said President Trump is “especially proud” of the leadership shown by Hegseth and Cooper. White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said the two had successfully led Operation Epic Rage, which she claimed “completely destroyed Iran’s ballistic missiles, production facilities, navy, air defense systems, and more.” She added that the recent U.S. strikes demonstrate that “the United States can strike anywhere, at any time, and Iran can do nothing about it.”

Acting Pentagon spokesman Joel Valdez declined to comment on what he described as “hypothetical military operations” and said the Defense Department would also not comment on Hegseth’s private conversations with President Trump.

New York (VINNEWS OP-ED) A billboard went up this week in Enghelab Square in central Tehran. It shows a “dead” President Trump lying in an open black coffin, eyes shut, hair mussed, hands folded across a red tie. Splashed across it in white graffiti, in Persian and in English, are the words: “We Will Kill Trump.”

Fat chance.

Consider what this billboard actually is. It is not a threat. It is a eulogy — for the regime that painted it.

Regimes that are winning do not advertise assassination fantasies on street corners. They advertise victories. The Islamic Republic once filled that same square with images of its own reach: proxies in Lebanon, in Yemen, in Iraq, in Gaza. The message then was look what we control.

That message is now gone, because those assets are gone. They are morally, ethically, spiritually, physically, positively, absolutely, undeniably and reliably gone.  Hezbollah’s command structure was gutted. The Syrian land bridge — decades in the building, the artery through which Tehran armed its northern front — collapsed with Assad. The Iranian air defense network was demonstrated to be decorative. Nuclear facilities buried under mountains turned out not to be buried deep enough.

Ayatollah Khamenei himself is dead, killed on February 28 when the war began. A regime that cannot protect its own supreme leader inside his own capital is not in a position to reach across an ocean and touch the President of the United States. It is in a position to paint pictures.

That is precisely what it is doing. The billboard is a substitute for capability, not an expression of it. When the arsenal is intact, you use the arsenal. When it is rubble, you buy paint.

The deeper problem for the mullahs is not military. It is that they have lost their own people.

Iranian citizens have spent nearly five decades subsidizing an empire they never asked for. Billions flowed to Hezbollah, to Hamas, to the Houthis, to Shiite militias in Iraq — while the rial collapsed, while blackouts became routine, while water ran short, while inflation devoured savings, while a generation of educated young Iranians looked for exits.

They noticed. The 2009 Green Movement, the 2017 economic protests, the 2019 fuel riots, the 2022 uprising after Mahsa Amini’s death — each wave broader than the last, each met with more killing, each proving that the regime’s only remaining argument is force.

A government that must shoot its own daughters for uncovering their hair has already lost the argument. It is simply waiting for the sentence..

The regime is not threatening Trump because it can kill him. It is threatening Trump because its own street needs to be told that someone, somewhere, will be punished for Khamenei’s death — and the regime has no one else to offer. It cannot produce a retaliation. So it produces a poster.

This is the arithmetic of every dying autocracy. The gap between what it promises its people and what it can deliver widens until the promises become absurd. Then the people stop believing. Then it ends.

Ceaușescu spent his last morning giving a speech to a crowd he assumed was his. The crowd began to boo. Within a week he was dead. The mullahs are somewhere in that speech right now, and the booing has started.

If Tehran wants an honest billboard, this is the true image that belongs in Enghelab Square.

New York (VINNEWS/Rav Yair Hoffman) Tonight, the second of Av, marks the yahrtzeit of Rav Aharon Yosef Bakst zt”l Hy”d — the Shavler Rav, one of the crown jewels of the Mussar movement, a talmid of the Alter of Kelm, Rav Simcha Zissel Ziv, and of the Alter of Slabodka. He learned in Volozhin under the Netziv, in Slabodka, and in the Talmud Torah of Kelm — the Beis HaMussar itself.  Notwithstanding all of this, he is not so well–known even in Torah circles.  This is an attempt to correct that.

This author’s family comes from Suvalk, and Rav Bakst served as this author’s great-grandfather’s Rav. He served as Rav in Beisagola, Semiatych, Tsaritsyn (later Stalingrad, today Volgograd), Shadova, Poltava, Suvalk, Lomza, and finally Shavel, whose last Rav he would be. In every single place, he founded a yeshiva. He was among the founders of Agudas Yisroel and its Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah. On the sixteenth of Tammuz 5701 — July 1941 — as the Nazis overran Shavel, he was arrested and later murdered together with his son-in-law and other leading Jews of the kehillah.

That is the biography. What follows is the man.

The Rosh Yeshiva Who Wouldn’t Be

He was known then as Reb Artchik, an elite talmid of Slabodka. The Alter of Slabodka approached him and asked him to serve as Rosh Yeshiva. Understand what that meant: Slabodka was the most important yeshiva in Europe. To be its Rosh Yeshiva was the single most coveted position in the entire yeshiva world.

He asked for a few days. He needed to check something.

He returned and declined. The Alter pressed him for weeks. Nothing. Finally the Alter invoked a gezeiras rav and compelled him to speak.

As a bachur, he explained, he had been engaged to a daughter of Rav Shraga Feivel Frank — a talmid chochom and an enormously wealthy businessman who supported lomdei Torah. Rav Shraga Feivel died at forty-three, leaving a widow and four daughters. His will stipulated that every daughter marry a talmid chochom of true stature who would become a Rosh Yeshiva, and that his estate would sustain them. His widow, Golda, took the charge with absolute seriousness and investigated every proposal exhaustively. In the end all four sons-in-law became Roshei Yeshiva.

But the eldest was first engaged to him.

During the engagement, his future mother-in-law and kallah asked whether he’d like to see the family business. He was an excited chosson. Of course! They walked him through the factory, and as they went he asked questions — how do you do this, why that way, where do you ship.

The next day the mother summoned him. “We are breaking the shidduch.” He was stunned; this was the shidduch he had always wanted. She continued: “My husband and I want only sons-in-law who will be Roshei Yeshiva and Gedolei Yisroel. The way you asked those questions yesterday made me understand that you are more interested in business than in learning Torah — and that you do not have within you the capacity to become a Rosh Yeshiva.”

Now the two things he had gone to check.

First: whether the widow was still alive. Because if she were, his appointment would cause her pain — she would have to live knowing she had rejected the man who became a great Rosh Yeshiva. “I checked. She is still alive. Therefore I am not willing to cause her pain, and I will not take the position.”

Second: whether his former kallah had married someone who became a Rosh Yeshiva. A week later he returned with the answer. Her husband was Rav Moshe Mordechai Epstein — an illui in kollel, who had never become a Rosh Yeshiva.

And then Reb Artchik made his request of the Alter.

Give him the position. Give it to Rav Moshe Mordechai Epstein — so that the widow should have joy in her decision.

And so it was. Rav Moshe Mordechai Epstein became Rosh Yeshiva of Slabodka, and later of Chevron in Eretz Yisroel.

The woman had initially judged him unfit to be a Rosh Yeshiva. The chance to prove her wrong before all of Klal Yisroel arrived unbidden. He gave it away — to the man she had chosen instead of him. And then he engineered her vindication.

When the story reached the Chofetz Chaim, he said he wished to meet Reb Artchik. When they met, the Chofetz Chaim rose in his honor and kissed him.

Rav Bakst’s son records that his emunah was not an abstraction. It was tangible, and it was on his face.

In the First World War, hundreds of thousands of Lithuanian and Polish Jews were driven into the Russian interior and scattered, facing material and spiritual ruin. Refugees fled wherever they could. He traveled to Poltava specifically to be there for the refugees and for Yiddishkeit, and refused to leave for Rosh Hashanah. On the second day, distinguished members of the kehillah came to consult him on how to rebuild communal life. The conversation ran long, the afternoon burned away — and they missed Mincha b’tzibbur, davening individually instead.

When he finished, he opened his mouth and said: “Master of the World, I have never in my life davened a Mincha alone on the second day of Rosh Hashanah… I ask forgiveness for what I did against Your will, but in life and health it happened…”

His son writes: “I saw this with my eyes and heard it with my ears, and the image is engraved in my heart forever. He spoke to Hakadosh Baruch Hu as if He were literally standing next to him — and in what manner it was said, I cannot forget.”

Elsewhere his son puts it plainly: emunah with him was not a perception but something concrete and living. When the Rav stood before Hashem, he was seen as one standing before Him.

Ten Hours Over a Lung

Rav Bakst’s son recalls an erev Pesach — six in the evening on erev Yom Tov — when a shochet and butcher came with a she’eilah on a lung.

He began examining. He ordered warm water brought. He worked roughly an hour and a quarter. Then he sent the shochet home. He kept thinking. He went to his sefarim and worked until midnight. The butcher came — no answer yet. Go home, come back at six. He lay down for about half an hour, got up at half past four, and was already standing at the door of the house; the family heard his voice. At five he was in his room. At a quarter past five he came out to the butcher and said: Kosher.

Ten hours to render a psak without fear.

His dread was structural, not neurotic. If he permitted what was forbidden, he had caused a Jew to stumble and had sinned against Heaven. If he forbade what was permitted, he had caused a Jew financial loss. When he ruled kosher that Pesach morning, he understood immediately what the man had endured — and pressed money into his hands so he could buy other meat and cover the expenses of Yom Tov.  He kept a Gemara’s warning at the center of his self-understanding — pesilna lach l’dina, I am disqualified from judging you — precisely because a dayan is never fully free of the pull of self.

“If I Don’t Honor the Torah, Who Will?”

A rav from a nearby town arrived one morning to consult him. He immediately invited him to breakfast, then sat and learned with him until noon.

For two hours afterward he received people who came with cases. Lomza was a large city and many disputes reached him. When the visiting rav was present, the Rav seated him at his side and repeatedly asked his opinion — handing him the honor in front of the litigants.

When it came time for the visiting rav to leave, he ordered his son to escort him to the train station. That evening he came back into the house and asked his daughter, checking: Did you honor the rav properly? If I don’t honor the Torah, who will?

Never Wounding Another Person

He was extraordinarily careful never to cause damage to another person — a middah he attributed directly to Kelm. He would say: if the world had no paupers, they would have invented them in Kelm — because how is it possible that a man walks into his friend’s house in unclean boots and dirties his floor?

The proof is documented. In Poltava, in the days of terror, the city’s Jews were being hunted, their homes torn apart in searches for anything of value. In his possession was a large sum — several hundred rubles in gold — belonging to the yeshiva. He was afraid it would be found in his house. So he deposited it with Reb Zalman Ossovsky, a rav and Rosh Yeshiva in Slabodka who was living in real poverty, on the theory that no one would think to search there.

One day Reb Zalman appeared, distraught. The money had been stolen from his home.

The Rav’s response: “Reb Zalman, over money there’s no need to be upset and pained.” He thanked Hashem for the chesed of having prevented the loss from occurring in his own house — and from that day forward never mentioned the loss again. Not once. Not in a single word.

Fleeing Honor

He never conducted himself with authority, and dealt with every person the same way — great and small alike. He hid his deeds and fled from honor and publicity.

When he participated in Ravnic conferences and proposals arose that he thought right, he would arrange for others to propose them, so that his name would not be attached. When he spoke at gatherings, he made a point of speaking last, so that no one would have to argue about giving him precedence.

He explained the root of the desire for honor this way. A man who lives in a society that regards greatness in Torah as worthy of enormous esteem will value that greatness — but he knows he does not possess it. That knowledge causes him suffering. So he strains to present himself as great in Torah, using Torah as a vehicle for his own deficiency.

The love of honor, he taught, is entirely negative. There is a kernel of genuine aspiration buried in it — a real spiritual aspiration — but it takes negative form, and it feeds on imagined honor, trading away a real portion in the World to Come for a counterfeit portion in this one.

And then the line that describes himself: A man who possesses true greatness does not chase after imagined greatness.

The Chofetz Chaim Puts On Shabbos Clothing

He visited the Chofetz Chaim regularly and consulted him on the affairs of his community.

The winter of 5691. A letter reached him from Baranovich: the Chofetz Chaim asked him to come. He came. When he arrived, Rav Mendel Zaks zt”l went in to the Chofetz Chaim and told him that Rav Bakst was on his way in.

The Chofetz Chaim put on Shabbos clothing to receive him.

Another time, both were invited to an atzeres in Vilna on taharas hamishpacha. The hall filled past capacity and hundreds were pushed outside, waiting to see them come out — especially the Chofetz Chaim.

At the end, they were supposed to exit together, as expected. Rav Bakst — afraid that he might absorb honor by walking out beside the Chofetz Chaim — slipped out a side door.

The Chofetz Chaim noticed. He sent his son-in-law to bring him back into the hall. And when he returned, the Chofetz Chaim said to him: My honor wants that only I be seen because of the honor. Please receive from me my forgiveness.

Once the Chofetz Chaim visited him and arrived while he was sitting with his talmidim delivering a drasha. The Chofetz Chaim rose to greet him, went out to receive him, seated him at his side, and asked him to say a devar Torah. Reb Aharon answered that he had come to listen, not to be heard. The Chofetz Chaim continued, and at the conclusion would not stop until Reb Aharon said something.

Reb Aharon, having no choice, began — and said nothing of his own. He returned to the words of the Chofetz Chaim, adding explanation and expansion, in a clearer and more accessible form.

The Man With the Broom

Rav Bakst was known for chesed and for a face turned pleasantly toward every human being. His home was always open to guests and to the needy.

One night in Shadova, two new talmidim were accepted to the yeshiva and lodged in one of the rooms. Late that night, after Reb Aharon put his own children to bed, he went into the new room with a broom and stood there sweeping — worried that the boys might wake in the night, need to leave the room, and not find their way in an unfamiliar house.

So he stood there in the dark and swept the floor, so that their feet would find no obstacle.

Another Shabbos evening: on his way to shul he passed through the market between the fish stalls. He found two women standing outside with unsold merchandise, panicking as Shabbos came in. He helped them carry their goods inside.

What Mussar Is For

His son records his father’s understanding of the whole enterprise.

Mussar is not merely guidance toward emunah and yiras shomayim. It is the means to understand the foundations of life itself and how a person is meant to live. It illuminates the life of the human being. It is a demanding, absolute unity between knowledge and the details of living — between knowing and doing. There is an issur to separate the two.

He taught that mussar instructs a person in how to understand the words of Chazal — how to draw out what is hidden in them, without importing his own intentions. He would say: if one always explains the words of Chazal through cleverness and pilpul, he shows great skill — but that is not the intent of Chazal in what they said. The words of Chazal must be unfolded in the way of pashtus, of plainness, and in that plainness one finds the depth that is in them.

All of this, his son writes, he received from his rebbi, Rav Simcha Zissel of Kelm.

Self-Criticism

He held that the essence of mussar is not the dropping of mussar ideas but their execution in action. He was critical of those who innovate deep chiddushim in mussar thought, in chesed and middos, and are not a drasha in the world but only a drasha for its own sake. He would say: it is a condition for one who gives mussar that he be one who repairs his own middos.

He would say: a man who does not run each night to his bed to reckon over his deeds during the day will not be a yerei shomayim. And principally there is need to search in his middos, since the sin in them causes all his deeds.

He always saw himself as a talmid, and would often visit Rav Simcha Zissel. He would say: at the time when he felt himself not good, he would come for a few days to the Beis HaTalmud in Kelm.

They characterized his path with words published in the name of Rav Yisroel Yaffe zt”l: A man must always demand the truth — that he see also his spiritual form, so that he can look at himself and distinguish clean from stained. See this in its purity and brilliance, as all of them were. Mar’os hatzovos — these were always the mirror of the people of Israel. These were the people on whose level each one saw the example and the highest model of the life of a man, who merits by the will of the Creator, and looks in them and recognizes his own ugliness and his own flaws.

“As Far As East Is From West”

Once he sat at a gathering and said:

Dovid HaMelech says, “As far as east is from west, so far has He removed our sins from us.” Oy vey! What are we doing? What are we doing?! We are drowning in sins so deep — and here we speak of distance from sin…

The Ten Harugei Malchus

One of his talmidim recorded hearing him speak on the Asarah Harugei Malchus, the Ten Martyrs.

My sons and talmidim, he said, you want to know and to understand my ways? I too, like you, want to reach the depth of these matters. But it is impossible to comprehend the thing until we reach great levels. Who among us is great? And Rav Akiva, who all his life longed to fulfill the great mitzvah of giving over the soul on the sanctification of His Name — the mitzvah of “b’chol levavcha u’v’chol nafshecha” — and now that it has come to his hand, he does not fulfill it? Only at the hour that he sanctifies himself in holiness and purity does his soul depart as one.

The talmid who recorded it added: In that hour we saw our Rebbi — his face shone with rays of light like Moshe Rabbeinu, and we saw that our Rebbi too longed with all his might to reach that level of kiddush Hashem, and that he was ready and prepared to sanctify with all his heart the Name of Heaven, as Rav Akiva did in his time.

The End

On June 22, 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union. On the 26th the Germans entered Shavel, and the killing of Jews began immediately. Within days the Rav’s house was surrounded and he was seized, along with his son-in-law, the city’s dayan, and several distinguished baalei batim of the kehillah. All were taken to the municipal prison and eventually murdered. 

The Lesson

The Alter of Kelm taught that greatness is not what a man achieves but what a man is when no one is watching and nothing is at stake except another person’s heart.

Reb Artchik had one chance to answer the woman who had judged him unworthy. He had the perfect answer in his hand — the most prestigious position in the Torah world, offered to him by the Alter of Slabodka himself. He gave it away to the man she had chosen instead of him.

He stood in a dark room in Shadova with a broom so that two boys he had never met would not stumble on their way to the bathroom. He gave away a fortune in gold and never mentioned it again when it was lost. He slipped out a side door in Vilna so that no one would see him standing next to the Chofetz Chaim. He arranged for other men to propose his own ideas.

And in a prison yard in Shavel, still refusing to be broken, he reached the level he had once described to his talmidim: to sanctify, with all his heart, the Name of Heaven — as Rabi Akiva did in his time.

Yehi zichro baruch. Hashem yinkom damo.

What follows are 35 of his teachings culled from the Sefer Lev Aharon:

On Knowledge

“Wisdom is not owned. It is on loan, renewed each moment, and the loan can be called.”

The blessing of Chonein HaDa’as is built differently from every other blessing in Shemoneh Esrei. The others open with a request — heal us, bless us. This one opens with a declaration: You grant knowledge to man. Only afterward does it ask. Rav Bakst reads the structure itself as the teaching. Had da’as been given once and deeded over, the blessing would need no statement of fact — you don’t remind a man of a gift he already holds. The statement comes first because the giving is happening now, and now, and now. The request that follows — grant us from You knowledge — is not a request for a new gift. It is a plea not to interrupt the one already flowing.

“Every fool was once clever. Only the flow stopped.”

This is the practical edge of the above, and it is meant to be unsettling. We have all watched an intelligent person do something so stupid that the room goes silent. The usual explanations — he was tired, he was emotional, he had a blind spot — all assume the intellect was present and merely malfunctioning. Rav Bakst says something harder: for that moment, the intellect was not there. The supply was cut. And since you are the same kind of creature he is, the same interruption is available to you, and you will not feel it happening. This is why the maxim is not an insult directed at fools. It is a warning directed at the clever.

His example is Russia allying with France against Germany before the First World War. Russia was agricultural land that, properly developed, could have fed Europe. Germany was industry and technology. Common sense demanded they complete one another and together dominate the world. They did the reverse. Rav Bakst is not offering a theory of European diplomacy. He is saying that when statesmen of an entire continent walk into catastrophe against all straight thinking, the ordinary explanations are too small.

“The size of the lamp tells you the size of the darkness.”

His father’s parable. Light a tunnel beneath a city with five hundred candles and nothing changes; ten thousand and perhaps you see something. But if the tunnel runs beneath all of Poland, ten thousand candles accomplish nothing at all. Now read the verse backward. Hashem needed to illuminate the human body, and the only thing sufficient was the candle of Hashem is the soul of man — a portion of God from above. Nothing smaller would do. So: what must be inside a man, that this is what it takes to light it?

The maxim is a method, not just an observation. You cannot look directly at your own darkness — that is what darkness means. But you can look at what was required to address it, and reason back. This is also why the maxim is oddly consoling. The lamp was in fact provided.

On Human Action

“The fish in the net loses nothing by struggling. The fish on the hook tears itself deeper. Know which one you are.”

Chazal ask what the “evil net” of Koheles is and answer: the fishhook. Rav Bakst wants to know why that is the sharper image. A fish in a net either escapes or doesn’t; the thrashing costs it nothing. A fish on a hook is in a different category — every motion toward freedom drives the barb further in and rips its own flesh. It is not merely failing to escape. It is the instrument of its own worsening.

Then he applies it without softening: a man falls ill and calls a doctor, the doctor errs, and the man dies of the treatment. The one who sought rescue procured the harm. The maxim’s closing instruction — know which one you are — is deliberately impossible to follow, and that is the point. You cannot know. That is the condition. Which is why the section that contains it is titled the torment of uncertainty, and why the way out, when it comes, will not be better calculation.

“Pharaoh raised the redeemer of Israel in his own house. Cleverness is not the same as foresight.”

Pharaoh’s whole program was to prevent a deliverer. And his household is precisely what produced one — because a Moshe raised in slavery would have been one more groaning slave whose words carried no weight. Only a man raised in the palace could speak with authority to Israel and be heard. Pharaoh didn’t merely fail to stop the redemption; he supplied the one ingredient it could not have done without. Through his own cleverness.

“The man who sold everything to buy one jewel handed it to Yosef himself.”

The gentile was told his property would end up with Yosef Mokir Shabbos. He liquidated everything, converted it to a single jewel, set the jewel in a hat, and wore it on his head — because what is safer than what never leaves you? The wind took the hat, a fish took the jewel, the fish was sold erev Shabbos, and Yosef bought it. Note what actually delivered the jewel: the concentration. Spread across property, it could never have fit inside a fish. His precaution created the mechanism.

Together with Shlomo sending his servants to Luz — the exact place the Angel of Death was waiting — and Hordos rising precisely because Yochanan pressed the Edomites, these are not four stories. They are one structure, shown four times so it cannot be dismissed as coincidence.

“Only what comes from Hashem is absolute good. Everything else is good for something and bad for something else.”

The Torah opens with bais because bais begins baruch, blessed, while alef begins arur, cursed. The Even Ezra objects: plenty of good things start with alef and evil things with bais. The Ohr Yisrael’s answer reframes what the Midrash was ever claiming. Sunlight is good — and bad for a diseased eye. Hard labor refines the soul — and ruins the man hoping to sleep. Every worldly good has a hidden clause. But the blessing of Hashem — it enriches, and He adds no pain with it: no clause, nothing subtracted. Bloodletting looks like a curse and is a cure — so even “arur,” properly understood, is the one true opposite of an absolute.

So the Torah does not begin with the letter of things that turn out well. It begins with the letter of the only good with no other side.

And this is the answer to the fishhook. Since every human calculation is conditional, and you cannot see the condition, the search for a reliably good action is over before it starts. Shlomo: one who listens to Me shall dwell securely, and be tranquil from the fear of evil. Not because obedience guarantees pleasant outcomes — but because it is the one input that is not conditional on a future you cannot see.

On the Intellect

“A donkey cannot be wrong the way a man can be wrong.”

The Midrash says Hashem stopped the mouth of the animal out of mercy for human honor — had it spoken, men could not have worked with it or served with it. Rav Bakst refuses to let that pass as charming. He calls it a terrible thing to see. Read it plainly: the reason animals are mute is that we could not survive the comparison.

A donkey has a fixed measure of understanding and no ability to exceed it. Having no capacity for surplus, it has no room for crookedness. It is not wise. It is simply never bent.

“The higher the mind can soar, the further it has to fall.”

Here is the mechanism, and it is not a warning against pride so much as a description of architecture. Man’s advantage over every creature is that his comprehension can embrace a whole world. That same faculty — not a different one, not a corrupted version of it, the very same one — is what permits crookedness. Height and distortion come from one source. This is why he says a man can end up lower than the lowest animal: the donkey cannot descend that far because it could never have climbed that high. There is no such thing as a mind that can soar safely. The capacity is the exposure.

“A man will deny what his own eyes saw, and call it reasoning.”

Egypt watched the forces of nature turned against it — one wave of a hand and hundreds of thousands destroyed, none escaping — and still argued before their king that a mortal can be withstood. Haman looked at the Judge of all nature, who does not tire and does not weary, and said: their God is old. Rav Bakst asks whether there is madness greater than this, and answers that it is not madness at all. It is the standard equipment. There is something loose in the human intellect that permits a man to deny what he actually sensed — and it does not feel like denial from the inside. It feels like thinking.

“Bilaam set out to destroy a nation with his mouth and threatened his donkey with a sword he did not have.”

The single sentence that proves the whole section. Bilaam’s claimed power was that his word alone could annihilate a people. Facing his own donkey, he said: if only there were a sword in my hand, for now I would have killed you. He forgot what he was, in the middle of being it. Had the donkey answered him, Chazal say, he could not have stood against it — and the reason is now clear. It was never a contest of wisdom. It was straightness against crookedness, and crookedness loses.

He then turns this on his own generation without flinching: democracy, anarchy, revolution — dreams with no grip on reality, and yet how many wise men were swept into the current, tripped by what a schoolchild would have stepped over. And Menashe’s line to Rav Ashi from beyond the grave — had you lived in my generation, you would have grabbed my hem and run after idolatry — closes the escape route. You do not get to think you would have been the exception.

Amalek belongs here. Who happened upon you — he cooled you off. That is the whole attack. Not defeat; temperature. Israel had just seen the sea split, and Amalek’s contribution was to demonstrate that it could be argued with. Hence: even after the greatest miracles, there is still room for misleading. Only one trained in a healthy intellect rises above it — Hashem is my banner. And so the two rememberings: erase him physically, because he attacked the weak stragglers; do not forget spiritually, because he proved that seeing is not the same as being convinced.

On the Path

“There is no standing still. There is only up and down, and the ground beneath you is not ground.”

The path of life leads upward for the wise one, in order to turn away from the grave below (Mishlei 15:24). Rav Bakst reads the second clause as the explanation of the first, not an added benefit. Why must one always climb? Because the alternative to climbing is not remaining. Man alone was formed of two opposites — dust from the ground, and a breath of life blown into him — and therefore, uniquely among creations, he has no native altitude to rest at. Angels stand in the heavens. Everything on earth stays where it is. Man is the only composite, and a composite cannot idle.

“Turn away from Torah and you have not stopped in the middle. There is no middle.”

Guard yourselves lest your heart be seduced, and you turn away and serve other gods and bow to them. Read the verse’s grammar: it does not say you turn away, and then later, having drifted, you might serve. It puts them in one breath. Rav Bakst: if you only turn away — one can no longer say he is standing in the middle, neither in Torah nor in idolatry. From one extreme to the other. The verse even goes further than serving — it says bow, full prostration, hands and feet spread. That is the distance the Torah says is covered by “turn away.”

“One deviation is never one deviation.”

Kayin spoke with Hashem directly. Then he spared his own property and brought an offering from inferior flax seed. Hevel brought the choicest of his flock and their fat, having toiled with his soul, and Hashem turned to him — as was fitting. Kayin had held back, and He did not turn — as was fitting. And from that one withholding: Kayin became very angry and his face fell, jealousy, hatred, and the blood of his brother and of every descendant that brother would have had. One sin drags another. He went up on the path of life, and he rolled.

“Guard against a hair’s breadth. Every small good is worth more than fine gold.”

The symmetry is the consolation, and Rav Bakst places it deliberately. If a deviation of one point is enough to put a man in the category of and you turn away — then the same physics runs the other direction. Every inclination toward the good, every small deed of improvement: it is impossible to know the happiness and the treasure a man acquires through it. Every positive point has a value that cannot be measured against fine gold. The system that makes small failures enormous is the same system that makes small victories incalculable.

Rav Shimon bar Yochai in the prison understood this exactly. His threat to Rav Akiva — teach me, or I will tell my father Yochai and he will hand you over to the government — cannot be read at its surface. Rav Bakst reads it as the argument: I am in danger to my soul right now if you do not teach me, and if you refuse, who knows to what depths I will descend — to the point that I will end up handing you over to the government, and over Torah itself. He was not threatening. He was forecasting. That is how well Chazal knew the yetzer, and how well they knew the antidote.

On Selfhood

“Adam was not condemned for eating. He was condemned for listening.”

Read the verse: because you listened to the voice of your wife. Hashem does not name the eating. He names the listening. Rav Bakst asks the question that makes the whole passage move — why did Adam’s teshuvah not help? Had it helped, the punishments would have lifted. The answer is that he was never charged with the sin. He was charged with having no self to sin from.

“Being dragged is worse than sinning, because a sin has an owner who can repent.”

This is the engine. Teshuvah requires a someone — a party who chose, who can return, who can be spoken with. A man who was carried has not made a decision that can be revisited. Rav Bakst’s phrase is chilling in its precision: there is no witness to selfhood, and there is no one to speak with. Not that repentance was denied. That there was no address to send it from.

“A king who listens to the people is not sitting on a throne.”

Shaul: because I listened to the voice of the people. Same verb, same verdict. If the voice of the people is what moves him, he has no selfhood of his own, and a man with no selfhood is not fit to sit on the throne of the kingdom — not as a punishment, but as a description. A throne requires an occupant.

On Truth

“The Amoraim became a lesser generation the moment they judged themselves honestly against the one before.”

Rav Bakst notices something in the calendar that should be impossible. Historical eras succeed one another — each begins when the last has closed. But the era of the Amoraim began while the era of the Tannaim was still running. They overlapped. So what actually divides them? Not chronology; the chronology is shared.

The answer: the division was made by the Amoraim themselves. Considering the Tannaim, they concluded — honestly, against their own interest — that these men were greater, and that they belonged to a different era. The line in history exists because a generation drew it against itself.

Rav is the illustration. He lived in the Mishnaic period. The Gemara itself sometimes rules that Rav is a Tanna and disputes — the title was available to him, and it may be that he assisted in the writing of the Mishnah. And yet, weighing himself against Rav Yehudah HaNasi, he arrived at: I cannot compare myself. The recognition of truth did not permit it. This is why he troubled himself over a terse Mishnah rather than dismissing it — having seen with what precision, what holiness, what weighing of every word Rebbi wrote, he could not believe that Rebbi would leave something sealed without cause. His mind was not settled until he found this Tanna is a Yerushalmi, and he teaches in a concise tongue. Rav Bakst’s phrase: Rav was forced against his will to find it. That is what a point of truth in the heart does to a man.

“A man who cannot see his fellow’s greatness has not yet found the point of truth in himself.”

The diagnosis, delivered without cushioning: this is missing today. Even the great ones of Torah do not see the truth in this form. A man of Torah does not recognize the greatness of his fellow. And the cure is not humility drills — it is that the trait of absolute truth demands toil and diligence, examining every matter against one’s own point of truth. Then the gates of understanding others open. The order is not accidental. You cannot see your fellow accurately until you can see yourself accurately, because it is the same faculty doing both.

On Middos

“An unpolished mirror reflects nothing, however bright the light before it.”

The Chovos HaLevavos’ parable in Sha’ar Cheshbon HaNefesh: you stand in a place, a form is set opposite you, and the only way to see it is by a mirror — which you must first polish. Rav Bakst draws out the intention: wisdom is not reflected in a bad heart. The middos destroy and cloud it; the surface lacks the polish required. Straighten and polish the middos and the soul is made in clarity, and spiritual matters are portrayed in it.

Notice what the parable rules out. The light is not the variable. The form opposite you is fully present, fully illuminated. Nothing is wrong on that side. The only variable is the surface.

“Wisdom without corrected middos ends in materialism. It cannot end anywhere else.”

Rav Bakst does not treat materialism as a philosophical error to be refuted. He treats it as an outcome that was scheduled. The philosophers of our own time skip the correction of middos entirely and imagine that their methods take root on their merits. But corruption of middos is natural, rooted in every heart, and undone only by tremendous exertion. One who does not toil at it — his heart is bad, his wisdom is a shaking reed, and everything remains merely bodily. And then: this is in essence unavoidable, and it was impossible for it to be otherwise from the outset. Without prior correction of middos, the end of wisdom is to recognize only the physical and to stand far from the spiritual. Such is the nature of things. The mirror was never polished. Of course it showed only matter.

“The philosopher who mapped the stars could not rest until he told someone. The Gra let his wisdom die with him.”

The philosophers themselves say it approvingly: a man who charts the orbits of the stars will not rest until he tells his fellow what he discovered. Rav Bakst sets beside it the Gra and the Gri”s, who reached and acquired wisdom — and with their deaths their wisdom died too, without revealing any desire at all to transmit it. The same intellectual attainment; opposite relationship to being seen. The philosophers had studied middos. They had not been purified of them, so the wisdom arrived still carrying the man’s need to be known.

“Fear of punishment is the polishing of the candle. The flame comes after.”

Which raises the obvious objection, and Rav Bakst raises it himself: if middos precede wisdom, how does a man improve his middos before he has any wisdom to do it with? The answer is fear of punishment. Every bad trait is a severe transgression; the fear of it accustoms a man to correction, and this is available before wisdom. This is what Chazal had and the philosophers lacked — and it is the entire difference. Chazal labored at middos by means of that fear and were entirely purified, so their wisdom was absolute, pure and refined. The philosophers also rose in middos, but their cleanliness came only by way of carefulness, and carefulness without fear does not reach the bottom.

Sinai is the proof text. You draw near and hear, for we are afraid lest this great fire consume us — an open, tangible, unembarrassed fear of punishment. And Hashem’s verdict: they have done well all that they have spoken. The Midrash’s fragrance like the fragrance of candles is the same picture — the candle must be trimmed and improved before the pure oil is poured in. The improving is not the light. It is the precondition of light.

And past it lies the fragrance of the ketores — where a man rises to the level at which his soul itself is conducted in the service, and serves not from fear but in the pleasure of the soul. Three levels of faith: simple faith; faith with love; and the level of the Chovos HaLevavos — even if You burn me in fire, You will do nothing to me other than that I will add love to You. The Gra ate less than his needs and slept very little and was wondrously robust: evidence that the spiritual is not an inference but something that can be sensed.

On Sensitivity

“Adam ate only fruit, which falls on its own. Every descent enlarged what he was able to destroy without flinching.”

Rav Bakst reads the history of permitted food as a record of decline. In Gan Eden, Adam ate fruit — and fruit, when it ripens, falls by itself; even plucked, the tree is neither damaged nor harmed. This was not a dietary rule. It was a fitting: he was not able to bear destruction. His soul was pure and holy, and nothing in him could tolerate harm.

After the sin, he was told he could eat the grass of the field — which must be severed from its body to sustain him. After the Flood, when man had descended further, meat was permitted: sustenance bound up with taking a life. Man had fallen far enough to find his food in killing. Only one line held — ever min hachai, flesh cut from a living animal, which remained unbearable.

Nothing was ever granted as an improvement. Each permission is a measurement of what he could now stomach.

“The pampered son ate week-old chamin the day he lost his mind.”

The wealthy man’s only son was raised in such fastidiousness that only an egg laid that day would reach his mouth, and fresh butter had to be produced daily for his sake. At bar mitzvah he went out of his mind — and wandered the streets, entering houses begging food, eating Shabbos chamin on the fourth day after Shabbos, and it did not harm him at all.

Read what changed. Not the food. When his mind was whole and his sensitivity fine, hard food damaged him. When the mind broke, the sensitivity blunted, and the moldy food passed through him without effect. He had not become stronger. He had stopped registering. So too a man: before the sin, fine sensitivity, and therefore food with no destruction in it; after the sin, the sensitivity taken, and no special food required. Sin dulls the heart and blunts the senses.

“An execution once in seventy years was to shake the nation. We have seen millions. Our heart is a stone.”

And all Israel will hear and fear. Rav Bakst does the arithmetic that the verse invites and no one performs. This was written about an event so rare that a Sanhedrin executing one man in seventy years was called a destructive Sanhedrin. One man. Once in a lifetime, or less. And the Torah expected it to shake the life-foundation of an entire nation.

Then he sets his own days beside it: not one, not a thousand, not ten thousand, but multiplied tens of thousands of brothers and sisters. How much should this have shaken us out of the calm of our daily routine? What should the they will hear and fear have produced?

And where are our sensitivities? Our heart has turned into a stone and does not sense and does not feel, to the point that we must force ourselves to be shaken. To where have we arrived. May Hashem have mercy.

And the previous two maxims have already explained why — which is what makes this unbearable rather than merely sad. Sin dulls the heart. The failure to feel is not a separate misfortune that befell us. It is the reading on the instrument.

On the Yetzer

“The yetzer never asks for the sin. It asks for the discount.”

Chazal’s account of how the bnei Yisroel were enticed (Sanhedrin 106a): an old woman stationed outside, a young girl within, linen garments for sale. Israel eating and drinking and rejoicing, out for a stroll in the marketplace. Don’t you want to buy linen garments? The old woman quotes the market price; the girl quotes less. Twice, three times. Then: here you are like a son of the house — sit and choose for yourself. A jug of wine resting nearby. Would you care for a cup? He drank, and the fire burned in him.

Rav Bakst walks the ladder rung by rung and finds no rung with a prohibition on it. Eating, drinking, strolling — permitted. Buying linen — permitted. Buying it slightly under market — still no sin. Every single step is clean. This is not an oversight in the story. It is the story. The yetzer opens with nothing it could be refused for.

“It has no power over what is clear. Only over what is cloudy.”

Sin crouches at the opening — the yetzer waits at the openings of the heart, and it enters where it sees signs of weakness, of doubts, of lack of clarity. Rav Bakst states the limit explicitly: in the world, it has no permission and no power to entice a man about something clear and absolute. Only about something cast in doubt.

This is enormously important and easily missed. The yetzer is not omnipotent. It is specialized. It cannot come at you through a wall; it comes through a gap. Which means the defense is not strength. It is clarity.

“‘You are like a son of the house’ — that is the whole seduction. Everything after it is bookkeeping.”

The sentence that does the work is not the offer of wine. It is the moment he is made to feel at home — sitting, choosing for himself, treated as family. The drawing near is complete right there. What follows is not persuasion; it is collection. Rav Bakst: once he sits with them, he is no longer capable of standing against the yetzer or arguing with it — what is this, that you entice me to transgressions as severe as these? He is no longer his own master, but in the domain of the yetzer.

“They fell into the gravest sins of the Torah because a Ravnic decree had not yet been made. A fence would have let them say: up to here.”

Chazal drop one clause into the story: at that time, the wine of gentiles had not yet been forbidden. Rav Bakst refuses to let it be background. It is the hinge — and it produces an inversion that ought to be impossible. These Jews transgressed Torah prohibitions of the gravest order. Had they been bound by a mere Ravnic decree, they would not have. How can a man violate d’oraisa and be stopped by d’rabbanan?

Because by the time he reached the Torah prohibition, he was no longer capable of refusing anything. The Ravnic fence would have caught him earlier — while he could still speak. And what he would have said is: up to here. From here onward we cannot. We are not drinking from your wine; it is forbidden, and there is in it a danger to souls. A partition of iron. Had it stood there, they could not have walked a step further; they would have stopped exactly at the boundary.

The fence is not a lesser prohibition. It is placed where a man still has a mouth.

“It is never satisfied with the breach it has. That is what a breach is for.”

The yetzer is not satisfied with the small breach it achieves — even the lightest thing it can grasp — because from there it can continue and advance. One transgression drags another. Rav Bakst names its actual objective plainly: the greatest victory over a man is that it is given a point of grip — to take control over him, over his thought and his deeds. The sin was never the goal. The grip was.

“Its entire strength is the blurring of the intellect. Recognize it clearly and it has nothing.”

And here, after all of that, the turn. A man might reasonably say: the yetzer has the powers of an angel, it renews itself against me every day, were it not that Hashem helps him a man could not withstand it — what is my strength against such a force?

Chazal’s answer, as Rav Bakst reads it: the entire strength of the yetzer is the blurring of the intellect and the confusing of concepts. That is the whole arsenal. It draws a man with false openings of some kind, only in order to breach a fence — and then exploits the smallest breach to cast its authority over him. But it manufactures nothing. It only exploits fog.

So the practical advice: understand its cunning tactics, acquire a full and clear recognition of everything, and give it no point of grip — concede not even the easiest thing. Hence a fence for a fence and a safeguard for a safeguard, so that a man is far from every hint of drawing near; so he will not feel himself like a son of the house among such pleasures, not knowing where they lead; so he will not hurry to leap upon light pleasures that seem to hold no prohibition at all — for they serve as a bridge toward explicit ones. Examine every point of pleasure: permitted or forbidden — and even if permitted, perhaps there is a hidden intention in it.

And then, remarkably: through this clear recognition there is no fear at all of the yetzer, and in this Hashem helps a man, and it is guaranteed to him that he will overcome it. Fortunate is the one who understands this.

On Life

“Place the goose against the current. Swimming upstream is the only proof it is alive.”

The halacha in Yoreh De’ah 57: a goose that fell from a roof is a doubtful tereifah — possibly its limbs are crushed, possibly it is whole. How to resolve it? Set it against the current. Swim upstream and it is sound. Get carried, and its health remains in doubt.

Rav Bakst takes it whole into avodas Hashem. Note the elegance of the test. Downstream motion proves nothing, because the water supplies it. A dead goose goes downstream. Only motion against the water can be attributed to the goose. The current does not injure it — the current tests it, by removing every explanation for its movement except itself.

“Everyone is carried by the current. Only the one who feels it is alive.”

In the absence of a life of Torah and true mussar, everyone is swept with the general current — chasing profit and pleasure, surplus and physical desires. And Rav Bakst’s charge is not that this is wicked. It is that not one of them has a personal life of his own, or even a true taste of life. He swims with the current of materialism and has no grasp at all of the essence of life. The tragedy is not that they are going the wrong way. It is that they are not going at all — they are being moved, and cannot tell the difference. Which is exactly the sin of Adam, arriving one last time: being dragged, with no self to be dragged from.

And you who cleave to Hashem your God are all alive today. Man was not created except to take pleasure in Hashem and to enjoy the radiance of His Presence. Torah and mussar are the path that gives a man the gift more precious than all — the taste of true life, by means of cleaving. And only those who learn the path of the service of Hashem in all their ways are the ones called alive.

The author can be reached at [email protected]

WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President JD Vance says the Trump administration “absolutely” mishandled the communications surrounding the Jeffrey Epstein files.

During a lengthy podcast interview with Joe Rogan released Wednesday, Vance pointed largely to former Attorney General Pam Bondi, who infamously stated that an alleged “client list” of Epstein’s was “sitting on my desk right now.” Epstein was a convicted sex offender who was known for his wide web of connections to the world’s elite.

In addition to those comments, the Justice Department under Bondi had also offered conservative commentators and influencers binders that were called “The Epstein files: Phase 1″ and “Declassified.”

“I know Pam. I like Pam. I don’t think there was anything malicious going on,” Vance told Rogan. “I think Pam was trying to respond to the political moment. I think she overstated what we had and what we didn’t have.”

As a result, Vance said, Bondi was “roasted” publicly for it and led people to “mistrust” the administration’s transparency efforts on the Epstein files.

“We absolutely screwed up the comms of the Epstein files. Like, we just did,” Vance said. “But do I think the reason we screwed up the comms is because we were trying to hide something? No.”

The controversy over the Epstein files dogged the administration for much of last year, with lawmakers eventually passing a measure that compelled the release of a massive trove of documents in the government’s possession related to its investigations of the disgraced financier. The Justice Department began releasing the documents in late December, which included photos, call logs, grand jury testimony and interview transcripts.

NEW YORK (VINnews) — Chabad-Lubavitch has launched a new billboard campaign across New York City promoting Jewish pride and identity, saying it aims to respond to rising antisemitism with messages of confidence, joy and Jewish continuity.

The campaign, titled “Born to Be a Yid,” features billboards showing joyful scenes of Jewish life, including children wearing yarmulkas and tzitzit playing together and a bride and groom celebrating beneath a chuppah. One billboard overlooks the Third Avenue Bridge and the FDR Drive, while another is displayed near Staten Island Borough Hall and the St. George Ferry Terminal. A digital billboard is also scheduled to appear in Times Square.

Each billboard directs viewers to Chabad.org/JewishAndProud, where visitors can learn more about Judaism and Jewish identity.

Rabbi Motti Seligson of the Chabad-Lubavitch Media Center, who directed the campaign, said the goal is to emphasize Jewish pride rather than fear.

“The public knows all too well about the challenges we face,” Seligson said. “We wanted to go in a different direction, one that is confidence-inducing and joyful.”

The campaign comes as Jewish organizations have reported increased incidents of antisemitism in New York City and across the United States following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza. Many communal responses have focused on security measures, public advocacy and combating antisemitism directly.

“We’re speaking privately to fellow Jews, and we’re happy for others to listen in,” Seligson said. “When they do, they see Jews who are proud of themselves. That earns respect.”

The current campaign’s creative direction was led by copywriter Avi Webb and designer Chana Snyder. Organizers said the principal donor funding approximately $200,000 worth of billboard advertising asked to remain anonymous, while businessman Yossi Popack and Chabad of the United Arab Emirates also helped develop the project.

Seligson said organizers have already reserved billboard locations in Florida and are seeking partners to expand the campaign to additional cities across the United States.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The New York Times on Wednesday filed a motion to quash subpoenas that the Justice Department served on journalists who reported on security concerns involving the new, Qatari-gifted Air Force One, teeing up a significant court fight pitting press freedom against the the government’s ability to force reporters to identify sources.

“As we set out in our motion, these subpoenas are brought in bad faith to punish The Times for its coverage. They violate the constitutional rights of The Times and its journalists. We are going to court to defend our journalists’ rights to report freely on the administration and to provide the public with stories that matter,” David McCraw, the newspaper’s senior vice president and deputy general counsel, said in a statement.

The filing was made under seal in the Southern District of New York, where the journalists were summoned in subpoenas delivered last Friday to testify before a federal grand jury. The Times had said it expected five journalists to be subpoenaed; three were ultimately served.

The subpoenas, delivered to reporters at their homes, marked a dramatic escalation of the Trump administration’s crackdown on media leaks that free press advocates swiftly condemned as a government effort to intimidate news organizations. It followed an FBI search earlier this year of a Washington Post reporter’s home and the seizure of her electronic devices.

The subpoenas centered on reporting the newspaper had done on security concerns involving the new Air Force One.

The new jet in question, a present from Qatar that Trump’s administration spent $400 million to retrofit and upgrade, recently entered service. But the Republican president used an older model Air Force One jet to leave a NATO summit in Turkey last week.

The Times, citing anonymous sources, reported that the switch had come at the urging of the Secret Service and that the newer plane lacked some of the advanced security features of the older aircraft, including antimissile capabilities. On social media, Trump denied security concerns.

The Justice Department has justified the subpoenas by saying that “to be clear, reporters are not the targets, those leaking classified information are.”

“We value and appreciate the important role that the press plays in this country,” the department said after the Times reported it had received the subpoenas. “But DOJ also plays an important role to make sure that the people entrusted with our nation’s secrets do what they’re supposed to do with that information, which means not sharing classified information.”

Asked about the issue at his Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said: “The Department of Justice requires that I authorize it, which I did. And those reporters — we’re not targeting reporters. They’re material witnesses.”

When Sen. Peter Welch, a Vermont Democrat, pointed out to Blanche that the department wants to ask the journalists who their sources were, Blanche replied, “No, the question we want to ask them is who provided them with classified national security information, which everybody in this body should want to protect.”

The Justice Department over the years has developed, and revised, internal policies governing how it will respond to news media leaks.

Though the department across presidential administrations has periodically seized the phone records of individual journalists in hopes of identifying sources for national security stories, it is extremely rare for the government to attempt to compel a reporter to reveal their sources before a grand jury.

In April 2025, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi rescinded a policy from President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration that protected journalists from having their phone records secretly seized during leak investigations — a practice long decried by news organizations and press freedom groups. The moves again gave prosecutors the authority to use subpoenas, court orders and search warrants to hunt for government officials who make “unauthorized disclosures” to journalists.

A memo Bondi issued said members of the press are “presumptively entitled to advance notice of such investigative activities,” and subpoenas are to be “narrowly drawn.” Warrants must also include “protocols designed to limit the scope of intrusion into potentially protected materials or newsgathering activities,” the memo stated.

In January, FBI agents searched the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson, who has been covering Trump’s transformation of the federal government, as part of a leak investigation into a Pentagon contractor accused of taking home classified information.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iranian attacks targeted Bahrain and Kuwait early Thursday as the U.S. launched more airstrikes on Iran.

There was no immediate word on damage or casualties from the strikes.

The Iranian strikes come as the U.S. has reimposed a blockade on Iran and stepped up its airstrikes on the Islamic Republic over the Strait of Hormuz.

(AP) – Thousands of visitors were told to evacuate a remote Minnesota wilderness area accessible only by boat as wildfires send dangerously heavy smoke over the U.S. Midwest and Northeast this week.

More than 100 wildfires are burning in Canada, where a train crew in northern Ontario filmed themselves surrounded by flames before being safely evacuated. Winds are carrying the smoke southeast.

Warnings about unhealthy air conditions Wednesday extended from Minnesota through Toronto and into New York. Unusually hot summer temperatures were expected, too.

The best advice is to stay indoors to avoid both the smoke and the extreme heat, said Tyler Hasenstein, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Chanhassen, Minnesota.

“Those two things coinciding with each other is not good from a health perspective,” he said.

Rangers try to get thousands of campers out of remote Minnesota wilderness
In far northeastern Minnesota, rangers were trying to warn people that the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness was closed Tuesday because about 17 fires caused by lightning more than a week ago were spreading through the vast wilderness accessible primarily by canoe.

Rangers estimated anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 people were inside the 1.1-million-acre (445,000-hectare) wilderness, which is almost the size of Delaware, Superior National Forest spokesperson Joy VanDrie said.

“It’s an arduous job,” VanDrie said of rangers and campers having to canoe for hours or even carry their boats over land to evacuate.

No injuries or deaths have been reported. Rangers were going through every lake and waterway and officials estimated they had about 90% of the people out Wednesday.

Campers rescued this week said skies quickly darkened from smoke and they could feel the heat as they paddled or were taken by boat to safety.

Jan Bailey was camping with her husband, daughter, son-in-law, two grandchildren and three dogs when they noticed wispy smoke on the horizon. Two hours later, they could see a raging firestorm. A paddleboarder with a satellite phone fled to their campsite and they called forestry rangers who sent a boat to rescue them and others.

“We had fire on both sides of us at that time,” Bailey told Minnesota Public Radio. “So we’re just weaving between the lakes. It’s a little smoky. Campsites are going up.”

Even authorities in Canada pitched in. They rescued two groups of youth campers Wednesday who had crossed the border. One group was stuck on an isolated sandbar, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said.

VanDrie didn’t know when the area might reopen. Minnesota officials said some fires in the Boundary Waters will be allowed to burn indefinitely but will be monitored to ensure they don’t threaten people or property.

Severe drought and heat have led to a busy wildfire season
Dan Westervelt, associate professor at Columbia University’s Climate School, said severe drought conditions combined with heat in Canada and the U.S. have created “a perfect storm for really dry conditions to provide a lot of fuel for these wildfires to burn.” Research shows warming temperatures from burning coal, oil and gas are making fires more frequent and intense.

High levels of fine particulate matter in the air from wildfire smoke may be unhealthy for sensitive groups, such as children and people with heart or lung conditions. The particulates can cause shortness of breath, coughing, dizziness or fatigue and aggravate heart and lung diseases and other chronic health issues.

Experts suggest wearing a N95 mask if you have to be outside and keeping your indoor air cleaner by closing windows and running an air purifier or air conditioner.

It’s been a particularly busy and deadly fire season in the U.S. About four dozen large fires are currently burning across 15 states, from Minnesota and North Carolina to Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Oregon and California, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.

Prolonged drought and record low snowpack levels combined to make conditions ripe for rapid fire growth.

Smoke spreads as officials warn wildfires could burn for months
In Minnesota, officials warned large fires could burn for months. In Minneapolis, the high Wednesday was expected to be 96 degrees F (36 C) and temperatures above 90 F (32 C) were expected the rest of the week.

“It could well be we’re having significant fires throughout the summer until we have snow. Snow would be a good thing,” said Patty Thielen, director of the state Department of Natural Resources.

The smoke was so thick that the sky turned orange like Mars in northern Minnesota, said Matt Taraldsen, supervisory meteorologist with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.

Part of the danger of the heat and smoke there is that only about half the buildings have air conditioning, Taraldsen said. Residents usually would open windows to keep cool “but when there’s dense smoke, you can’t do that,” he said.

Taraldsen’s mother said she woke up in her Duluth, Minnesota, home Wednesday morning and everything smelled like a campfire. When she opened her door, her eyes watered and she had to use her inhaler to ease her asthma.

Typically, Theresa Taraldsen said, she can see the St. Louis River from her yard but it was all a white wall of smoke Wednesday.

“You literally couldn’t see nothing,” she said.

Officials in Michigan and Wisconsin warned residents about air quality issues that could last for days. People in New York reported smelling smoke Wednesday afternoon and the problems extended even to Maine, where residents were reporting a yellowish and brownish color in the sky.

The most intense smoke could spread as far south as Washington, D.C., by midday Thursday.

(AP) – The presence of carbon monoxide was confirmed in a parked vehicle in Toledo, Ohio, where five people were found unresponsive and three of them died Wednesday in what an official described as an accident.

The Ford Explorer had pulled over with a flat tire into a parking lot, and the victims were discovered shortly after 11 a.m., Toledo Fire Chief Allison Armstrong said.

City of Toledo spokesperson Rachel Hart said the victims included a grandmother and her grandchildren. She said the woman’s son who had been called to help found the bodies.

Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz said foul play was not suspected. He said three of the victims died while two children were hospitalized in critical condition. Their names, ages and hometowns weren’t immediately released.

“Today, a family experienced a tragedy that no family should ever have to endure,” the mayor said on Facebook.

Investigators later started the vehicle with the doors closed and a meter inside. In a telephone interview, Armstrong said, “we had a high spike of carbon monoxide inside the passenger compartment on that vehicle.”

She said the vehicle was towed by police.

“They’re going to have to do some further investigation to see if they can identify how does that happen,” she said. “I think that’s an important piece of this that people want to know, and they should know for everybody’s safety.”

Armstrong recalled a “very similar” incident several years ago involving carbon monoxide that seeped into holes in the floorboards of a vehicle.

Ford Explorers were part of a previous six-year investigation by the federal government into exhaust odors in passenger cabins.

In 2023, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says it reviewed more than 6,500 consumer complaints, tested SUVs in the field and called in automotive, medical, environmental health and occupational safety experts before determining that the SUVs didn’t have high levels of carbon monoxide and didn’t need to be recalled.

The probe covered nearly 1.5 million Explorers from the 2011 to 2017 model years.

Armstrong said it wasn’t immediately known what year the SUV involved in Wednesday’s incident was made.

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City’s official World Cup guide lists no less than 100 free places to take in soccer’s biggest tournament on big screens. One place that isn’t listed? The city’s notorious Rikers Island jail complex, better known for its overcrowding and violence than for hosting social events.

More than 100 inmates were rewarded with a special viewing of the World Cup semifinal match Wednesday between England and Argentina because of their model behavior behind bars.

The inmates, dressed in tan uniforms, took seats at tables facing a large projection screen set up in a gymnasium. The jail has hosted about 90 such watch parties since the tournament kicked off last month, with about 4,500 of the roughly 6,600 inmates incarcerated on the 400-acre island participating, correction officials said.

“Programs like this equal safety in our jail,” said Stanley Richards, the city’s correction commissioner and a former Rikers inmate. “What we say to them is that your humanity is seen, heard and valued.”

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks with inmates on Rikers Island as they watch the World Cup semifinal soccer match between England and Argentina on Wednesday, July 15, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

The scene Wednesday was in sharp contrast to complaints about Rikers Island that have been so bad in recent years that a federal judge appointed an outside manager to help improve the facility.

On Tuesday, that federal overseer, former Vermont Department of Corrections head Nicholas Deml, submitted a plan for reforms that underscored the continued dysfunction at the facility, which opened in 1935.

The report described one instance when inspectors arrived at a housing unit to find it filled with smoke from fires set by prisoners, blaring alarms and people pounding on their cell doors. In another incident, prisoners streamed through an unsecured door and brawled after a guard abandoned his post.

“Violence remains pervasive, basic correctional practices remain unreliable, and unconstitutional conditions persist,” the report said.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who has vowed to honor a 2019 city law mandating the closure of Rikers, paid a short visit to Wednesday’s watch party.

With his white shirt sleeves rolled up, the Democrat took a seat at a table and immediately started chatting about the tournament.

One of the inmates said he expected Argentina to prevail over England and go on to face Spain, which had defeated France the day earlier.

“You never know,” said Mamdani, a professed Morocco fan.

At another table, an inmate told the mayor he was going home later in the day. “That’s amazing,” Mamdani said, patting his back.

Rikers Island inmate Victor Caldas, an Argentina fan, reacts during the World Cup semifinal soccer match between England and Argentina, at the jail complex in New York, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

The jailhouse crowd erupted in a mix of groans and cheers as England struck first with a goal early in the second half.

Ralph Veal was among the minority of England fans who raised his arms in celebration as Argentina supporters grimaced and looked away dejectedly. The 53-year-old Mount Vernon resident, who has been incarcerated since November, said he’s rooting for England because it’s his 20-year-old son’s favorite team.

“I’m sitting at the table with Argentina fans, but it’s all right,” Veal said shortly before the England goal. “The energy is real positive in here.”

Victor Caldas was among the legion of Argentina fans who jumped out of their seats hugging and clapping and banging the tables as the team took a decisive 2-1 lead in stoppage time, and then went on to win a spot against Spain in the final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on Sunday.

The 39-year-old, who has been incarcerated for four months, has been rooting for Argentina since his home country of Ecuador was knocked out of the tournament.

Caldas said he appreciated being able to watch the game uninterrupted among fellow soccer fans and not having to compete with other inmates for use of the television in his housing unit.

Thomas McCoy was among those simply relishing a rare treat: a catered meal. The buffet spread included salad greens, salmon, penne alla vodka and chicken parmesan, along with Snapple drinks.

“It’s not a sports club, we can’t get our drinks on and stuff like that. That’s OK though,” said the 52-year-old Brooklyn resident. “I’ve been locked up 21 months, so it’s been a long time since I had real food like that. It was a wonderful experience.”

AUSTIN (VINnews) – In a stunning display of tension between the Trump administration and the Jewish state, Vice President JD Vance lashed out at Israeli influencers and government officials on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, dismissing concerns over his Iran policy and telling critics to “go to !#%*.”

Vance, appearing on the hit podcast hosted by Joe Rogan, voiced irritation with Israeli voices accusing him of taking cues from Tucker Carlson or Qatar amid opposition to the administration’s controversial Iran peace plan. The vice president framed the pushback as interference, declaring: “Go to hell. I’m gonna do what I have to do for the American people. I represent Americans first.”

The remarks highlight growing strains in the vital U.S.-Israel alliance as the Trump administration advances a memorandum of understanding with Iran that many in Israel and the Jewish community fear will embolden the Islamic Republic and its terror proxies, including Hezbollah and Hamas, at Israel’s expense.

Israeli officials, including far-right ministers who have long warned against appeasing Iran, have raised alarms that the deal fails to adequately address existential threats to the Jewish state. Vance has previously rebuked such critics, questioning their alternatives and suggesting Israel cannot “kill its way out” of security challenges — comments that have drawn concern from pro-Israel advocates who view them as dismissive of Israel’s hard-won lessons from decades of facing Iranian aggression.

While Vance has reiterated that President Trump remains Israel’s key supporter, his latest podcast outburst highlights an “America First” posture that risks sidelining the security needs of America’s closest Middle East ally. Many in the Jewish community worry the approach could weaken deterrence against Iran, whose leaders have repeatedly called for Israel’s destruction.

The episode, reportedly recorded in Austin on Tuesday, July 14, 2026, comes as Israel continues to grapple with threats on multiple fronts. Pro-Israel voices argue that robust U.S. backing, including substantial military aid funded by American taxpayers, has been essential to Israel’s survival, and that unilateral American deals with Iran could undermine years of joint efforts to prevent a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic.

WASHINGTON D.C (VINnews)-In a troubling sign of the Democratic Party’s eroding commitment to America’s strongest ally in the Middle East, more than half of House Democrats who cast votes Wednesday supported an amendment aimed at stripping $3.3 billion in vital U.S. military aid to Israel.

The amendment, sponsored by Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky. — a vocal critic of Israel whose isolationist stance has drawn sharp rebuke from pro-Israel advocates — ultimately failed 314-104, only thanks to steadfast Republican opposition. Yet 103 of the 211 Democrats who participated backed the measure, marking a sharp escalation from just two years ago when merely 37 Democrats endorsed a similar effort.

House Minority Whip Katherine Clark and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined the push, openly defying Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who represents a heavily Jewish district in Brooklyn and has historically positioned himself as a supporter of the Jewish state. Jeffries struggled to unify his caucus and acknowledged a potential “change in direction” within the party.

This vote highlights a disturbing transformation in the Democratic Party, once a bulwark of bipartisan support for Israel’s security against existential threats from Hamas, Hezbollah and Iranian-backed terrorists. What was once a fringe position held by a small cadre of lawmakers has now entered the party’s mainstream, fueled by a wave of primaries that ousted pro-Israel incumbents in favor of anti-Israel socialists. Some of these challengers have praised Hamas terrorists or suggested the 9/11 attacks were “inevitable.”

Massie’s Role in the Assault on Israel Aid

Massie, long an outlier even within Republican ranks for his opposition to robust U.S.-Israel cooperation, has repeatedly advanced measures to undermine military assistance to the Jewish state. His latest amendment targeted core foreign military financing under a longstanding U.S.-Israel memorandum of understanding, drawing criticism for its overbroad language that could harm essential security cooperation. Pro-Israel groups celebrated Massie’s own primary defeat earlier this year, viewing it as a rejection of his anti-Israel isolationism.

The amendment’s failure highlights Republican resolve in standing with Israel, even as Democrats fracture. Overwhelming GOP support preserved the aid package critical for Israel’s defense against genocidal threats.

This shift coincides with plummeting favorability toward Israel among Democratic voters and elected officials, emboldened by radical voices who prioritize political activism over America’s strategic interests and the survival of the world’s only Jewish state.

VINnews will continue to monitor these developments as they pose risks not only to Israel but to the broader fight against terrorism and for democratic values in the region. Strong, unwavering U.S. support for Israel remains essential.

AUSTIN (VINnews) – JD Vance described a visit to Los Angeles as reminiscent of conditions in a “third world nation” such as Haiti, citing stark contrasts between wealth and squalor while faulting Democratic leaders Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass for failing to address the city’s visible homelessness crisis.

Vance recounted the experience during a recent appearance, drawing a parallel to the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

“I realized when I was there, you know what this reminds me of? This reminds me of going to the US Embassy in Port-au-Prince Haiti, like super security, the crazy wealth and privilege and status on the inside and squalor and misery on the outside!” Vance said.

He noted being given convoluted directions near Skid Row that appeared designed to steer clear of the area, particularly at night.

“I’m like, why do I have to follow these directions? Why don’t I just put it in Google Maps?!” Vance recalled.

The directions, he said, were intended to avoid Skid Row. Following Google Maps instead led him through the area en route to an event.

“And so you get to this party, you drive through Skid Row if you follow Google Maps’ directions, you get there and it’s like this beautiful facility with like fancy food and fancy wine and then there are armed guards outside of it and these gigantic walls!” Vance added.

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NEW YORK (AP) — United Airlines is trying to attract flyers with another luxurious perk: an empty middle seat.

The Chicago-based carrier announced plans this week to roll out a new row of its “Economy Plus” seats with no neighbor in the middle spot — and instead use the space for a shared table (and more elbow room) between the aisle and window travelers.

The offering is only set to be available in one row on United’s new Airbus A321XLR aircraft, with pricing and sales expected to be disclosed later this year. But United suggested it could expand the no-middle-seat option to other planes down the road.

The move arrives amid a broader push from airlines advertising more and more special tiers and separate add-ons to their flights — particularly when it comes to courting passengers who are willing to pay more for comfort.

United is following the footsteps of a handful of European airlines, including Lufthansa and Finnair, already offering empty middle seats to business class passengers. And other carriers have also allowed travelers for years to pay extra or buy additional tickets to keep seats near them empty.

United said Tuesday that it expects to be “the only U.S. airline” to have these kind of rows. The middle seat has long been bemoaned by travelers — both those in the aisle and window seats that have to share an armrest or more with whoever is occupying the middle seat, and for those passengers stuck wedged in a middle seat between two others.

The latest no-middle-seat option also arrives just months after the airline announced the “United Relax Rows,” which, starting early next year, will allow passengers in economy class to turn a row of three seats on some wider Boeing planes into a couch they can sleep or lounge on after takeoff.

“We’re investing nose-to-tail across our fleet,” Andrew Nocella, United’s executive vice president and chief commercial officer, said in a statement Tuesday. She said both of these new offerings give customers more “choice and value in every cabin.”

Across carriers, passengers on the same flight can still have strikingly different travel experiences. And while there’s demand for roomier seats and other perks, some budget-conscious travelers may feel a widening gap between the back and front of the plane — or frustration over new fees for services that were once free and added tiers to juggle when comparing fares.

A handful of big-name airlines, like Delta, have embraced strategies to provide “the best” — not the cheapest — offerings. Meanwhile, United executives have pushed back on the idea that the industry has become solely focused on chasing big spenders, maintaining that premium investments are part of a broader strategy to improve every traveler’s experience.

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JERUSALEM (VINnews)-The Israel Defense Forces on Tuesday eliminated two senior Hamas Nukhba Force commanders in a precise aerial strike in the northern Gaza Strip, the military said.

The strike targeted Ali Shamlakh, deputy commander of a Hamas Nukhba company, and Nasser Louh, head of a Nukhba cell in Hamas’ Sabra Battalion. Both terrorists posed an immediate threat to IDF troops operating in the area, according to the IDF.

As part of his role, Shamlakh worked to advance terror attacks by training operatives planning assaults against Israeli civilians and IDF forces in the region, the military said.

The IDF described the operation as a targeted strike carried out under the Southern Command. Troops remain deployed in the area in accordance with the ceasefire agreement and will continue to act against any immediate threats.

The Nukhba Force is Hamas’ elite commando unit, known for its role in the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre in southern Israel.

This latest action comes amid ongoing IDF efforts to degrade Hamas’ military capabilities and prevent terror attacks during the fragile ceasefire period.

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Amazon said Wednesday that the technology company will launch its new satellite internet service Amazon Leo in South Africa in 2027, seemingly pushing ahead of Elon Musk’s rival Starlink to win business in Africa’s most advanced economy.

Amazon, which was founded by Jeff Bezos, said that it would partner with South African internet provider Herotel to launch a new service in the country of 62 million people. Amazon said that it was its first satellite internet agreement on the African continent.

No financial details were initially disclosed.

Amazon’s announcement follows Musk’s bitter criticism of the government in his country of birth. The world’s richest man has said that South African regulations have prevented him from launching Starlink there because he’s white, and has accused the government of racism.

He was referring to South Africa’s affirmative action policies, which require foreign companies operating in the communications sector to give a minority share of their local entities to Black or other non-white owners in order to acquire a license.

The regulations are meant to provide opportunities that were denied non-white people under the country’s previous apartheid system of white minority rule.

The South African government has backed the Amazon deal, with Communications Minister Solly Malatsi joining Amazon and Herotel representatives to announce the agreement.

Amazon launched its first low orbit internet satellites last year and says it has more than 390 currently operational.

Starlink’s first operational satellites were launched in 2019 and it now has more than 10,000 in orbit. Starlink’s satellite internet has launched in around two dozen other African countries, but Musk has refused to follow South Africa’s affirmative action regulations.

Amazon said Wednesday that the South African deal was the start of its effort to roll out across Africa, where it would also partner with Vanu Inc., a Lexington, Massachusetts-based company specializing in mobile internet in developing countries.

There’s a large potential market for satellite internet in Africa, a continent of more than 1.5 billion people where many live in rural and other areas without fixed internet connections.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s pick to head the nation’s intelligence agencies struggled to win Democratic support in a contentious confirmation hearing Wednesday where he clashed repeatedly with them over the 2020 election.

Democrats asked Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and a former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, over and over again whether former President Joe Biden won the election and defeated Trump. Echoing many of Trump’s nominees, Clayton said many times that the election was “certified” for Biden, declining to say outright that the Democrat won.

“I’m not going to get into this with you,” Clayton told Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff, the last of several Democrats on the committee to grill Clayton on the 2020 election. Clayton appeared frustrated and flustered as Ossoff repeated the question several times. “I’ve answered it,” he said.

Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, who had praised Clayton’s nomination when Trump picked him for the role last month, expressed exasperation with him at the end of the hearing. Democrats say they are concerned that Trump will try to direct intelligence agencies to influence U.S. elections as the president has repeated his false claims that the 2020 contest was stolen.

“I’ve known Mr. Clayton for some time, I worked with him closely when he was at the SEC,” said Warner, the top Democrat on the intelligence panel. “But I am bitterly disappointed.”

While Clayton has broad support among Republicans, the acrimony with Democrats could be a blow to GOP leaders who had hoped to gain their consent for a quick vote to replace temporary intelligence director Bill Pulte, a former housing official with no known intelligence experience and who used his previous administration perch to target perceived adversaries of the president.

Senators in both parties have criticized Pulte, and Republicans had hoped to confirm Clayton immediately after he was nominated in June so Pulte did not take over when Gabbard left office. But Trump delayed Clayton’s nomination, allowing Pulte to take the job temporarily.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said the committee will vote on Clayton’s nomination next week.

Clayton emphasizes national security experience
Clayton did not mention Pulte in the hearing. But he emphasized his own government and national security experience, attempting to assuage senators in both parties.

“I saw firsthand how a strong national security apparatus depends on decisive judgment, discipline, integrity, and effective communication and cooperation across different branches of the government,” Clayton said in his opening statement. “If confirmed as Director of National Intelligence, I will commit to upholding these principles every day.”

Cotton expressed frustration last month when the hearing was delayed. He said in his opening statement Wednesday that Clayton has a reputation for operating with “morality, decency and integrity” in his previous positions and that he hopes his nomination will win bipartisan support.

Democrats press Clayton on Gabbard’s election activities
Democrats also pressed Clayton on former National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard’s visit to a Georgia election office earlier this year during an FBI search related to the 2020 election. Trump administration officials have given varying explanations for Gabbard’s involvement in the search, which appeared to be outside of her intelligence role.

Clayton declined to say whether Gabbard’s visit was appropriate or how he would handle the same situation. At one point he said he wasn’t aware of Gabbard’s visit before this week, then later appeared to backtrack, saying “it wasn’t something on my mind” before he started to prepare for the hearing.

Warner said it “strains credibility” that Clayton wasn’t aware of Gabbard’s election activities.

Democrats also asked Clayton about Trump’s announcement that he will deliver a primetime address on Thursday with a focus on elections, after the president suggested he could revisit long-debunked conspiracy theories about his 2020 defeat. Clayton said he had has no involvement with that speech.

As US attorney in Manhattan, Clayton oversees vast portfolio
Clayton is currently the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, one of the most prestigious of the Justice Department’s prosecution offices. His cases have ranged from terrorism and espionage cases to security fraud and public corruption.

Democrats pressed Clayton on subpoenas of four New York Times journalists after they reported on security concerns involving the new, Qatari-gifted Air Force One. The Committee to Protect Journalists has called the subpoenas “an extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations and have a chilling effect on the work of journalists across the country.”

Clayton said he was not able to discuss the details of the subpoenas and declined to elaborate on whether he spoke to the White House before they were issued. He said he is “confident in procedures we have in place to protect freedom of press.”

Under Clayton, the office also facilitated the unsealing of thousands of pages of court records from the prosecutions of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell — documents that were made public as part of the Justice Department’s release of records related to the late sex offender and his longtime confidant.

Clayton has also overseen the prosecution of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Maduro’s wife, Cilia Flores, on drug trafficking charges.

Confirmation vote could unlock renewal of surveillance authority
Clayton’s confirmation could potentially clear the way for bipartisan legislation to renew Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, which stalled last month when Democrats had said they would not provide the necessary votes to pass the bill unless Pulte’s temporary appointment was withdrawn.

The law, which aims to prevent terrorist attacks by monitoring the communications of targeted foreigners located outside the United States, expired in June.

Even if Democrats relent, it is unclear if Trump would sign the bill. He said in his June social media post delaying Clayton’s nomination that he would not sign the FISA renewal without his legislation to require proof of citizenship for all voters. The voting bill does not have enough support to pass the Senate.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) – Colombia will open an embassy in Jerusalem and restore full diplomatic relations with Israel following the election of President-elect Abelardo De La Espriella, officials announced.

The move reverses the policies of outgoing President Gustavo Petro, who severed ties with Israel in 2024 amid the Gaza conflict, expelled Israeli diplomats and imposed trade restrictions while backing legal actions against the Jewish state.

De La Espriella, a pro-Israel leader, said opening the embassy in Jerusalem will be among his first acts in office. He pledged to formally recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, strengthen security cooperation — particularly against narcoterrorism — and rebuild bilateral ties.

The decision aligns Colombia with a growing list of nations that have relocated or plan to move their embassies to Jerusalem, reflecting closer alignment with both Israel and the United States.

Petro’s government had taken an increasingly adversarial stance toward Israel during the ongoing war with Hamas and other Iranian-backed terror groups. The rupture followed years of relatively warm relations between Bogotá and Jerusalem.

De La Espriella’s victory and policy shift mark a significant turnaround in Colombian foreign policy. Details on the exact timeline for reopening the embassy and resuming full diplomatic operations were not immediately released.

(AP) – White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and FBI Director Kash Patel personally oversaw an aggressive leak investigation after disclosures about security concerns involving a Qatari-gifted aircraft intended for use as Air Force One, according to CNN.

The report said some administration officials were asked to surrender their cellphones at the White House as investigators sought to identify the source of leaks concerning the aircraft’s security capabilities. Investigators also sought information from officials who traveled with President Donald Trump or were involved in the trip.

According to CNN, Patel delayed a planned trip to Chicago and spent about seven hours working alongside Wiles from the West Wing as they directed the investigation.

The leak probe became public after the Justice Department subpoenaed four New York Times journalists who reported on the aircraft’s security shortcomings. The newspaper has said it will challenge the subpoenas in court, while press freedom advocates criticized the move as a threat to First Amendment protections.

The investigation followed reports that Trump altered travel plans during a NATO trip after officials concluded the retrofitted Qatari Boeing 747 did not yet provide the same level of security as the existing Air Force One aircraft. Trump has denied security concerns prompted the change.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Mint has begun producing a new $1 coin bearing President Donald Trump’s face to help celebrate America’s 250th birthday, the Treasury Department said Wednesday.

The final design for the commemorative coin, being released in the fall, was approved earlier this year by the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, whose members were appointed by Trump. But the finished product unveiled Wednesday differs from that version in a few aspects, including that it is not made of gold but rather has a gold finish.

The coin is intended “to honor the enduring legacy of liberty and a lasting symbol of patriotism,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a post on X. “Featuring President Trump, it celebrates the strength of American values, and the promise of a nation dedicated to preserving freedom for all.”

Trump, a Republican, has a penchant for putting his name and likeness in the historical record, following his renaming of the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Kennedy Center performing arts venue and a new class of battleships, among other tributes. The move to put his face on the gold coin has drawn criticism in particular because federal law prohibits the depiction of a living president on U.S. currency, though the treasury secretary has the authority to authorize the minting and issuance of coins in some circumstances.

The front of the coin features an image of Trump in a suit and tie and with a stern look on his face. Lettering on the top half of the coin’s arc spells “LIBERTY,” with the dates 1776-2026 on the bottom half of the arc. The words “IN GOD WE TRUST” are in the middle.

The reverse side depicts the traditional image of the bald eagle in the Great Seal of the U.S., with “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA” on the top half of the coin and the Latin phrase “E PLURIBUS UNUM,” meaning “Out of many, one,” on the shield emblazoned on the bird’s breast.

Among the other differences from the design approved earlier this year is that Trump doesn’t have his fists resting on top of what is supposed to be a desk as he leans forward. The Treasury Department did not specify Wednesday why the final product diverged from the originally approved design.

The Treasury Department announced in March that it would be putting Trump’s signature on all new U.S. paper currency.

Traditionally, U.S. paper currency carries the signatures of the treasury secretary and the treasurer, not the president.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Billionaire Warren Buffett said Wednesday that his decision to cut the Gates Foundation out of his charitable giving is more about believing his three kids are ready to handle giving away his entire fortune than it is about Bill Gates ‘ ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Buffett told CNBC that Gates’ association with Epstein was “distasteful,” but the 95-year-old investor suggested that Gates’ actions weren’t much different from mistakes he himself had made over the years in hiring the wrong person or in choosing friends.

“No one bats a thousand in the business of choosing people,” Buffett said on CNBC.

Buffett read up on Gates’ ties to Epstein
Buffett said he “read a great deal since Jan. 1 in terms of what happened with Bill and Epstein. And I have read his remarks to Congress given under oath, and I read the cross-examination.” He noted that Gates eventually ended his relationship with Epstein.

Buffett said Gates wasn’t surprised by the decision Buffett announced Tuesday to eventually donate all the rest of his $140 billion of Berkshire Hathaway stock to foundations associated with his family and his three children, Howard, Susie and Peter. Gates flew to Omaha a few weeks ago and spent several hours talking with Buffett. The two hadn’t spoken much since before additional details about Gates and Epstein started to come out when the federal government began releasing files from the Epstein investigation.

Gates has said that he only met with Epstein because he thought it might help him raise money for charitable causes, and he didn’t know about Epstein’s ongoing crimes.

Epstein, who was accused of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls, was found dead at the Manhattan federal lockup in August 2019. His death was later ruled a suicide by New York City’s medical examiner.

Buffett said in 2024 that he planned to cut off donations to the Gates Foundation after he died and let his three children decide how to distribute the rest of his fortune.

In other news from the CNBC interview, Buffett revealed that he recently broke his leg and underwent surgery for it, but he said he is recovering well.

Drastically increasing donations to give away his fortune by 2034
The Gates Foundation didn’t immediately respond after Buffett’s interview on Wednesday, but a day earlier the foundation thanked Buffett for donating more than $47 billion since 2006. The Gates Foundation plans to close in 2045 after distributing the rest of Gates’ fortune.

Buffett said he wants his own money to be distributed even quicker than he has previously indicated: by the end of 2034. To do that, he will have to drastically increase the amount he donates every year, to more than $17 billion annually.

Right now he is giving roughly $6 billion to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation and the foundations his children run: the Sherwood Foundation, the Howard G. Buffett Foundation and the Novo Foundation. The majority of that is going to the foundation named in honor of his late wife, which may quickly become one of the world’s largest such organizations. Buffett also traditionally gives additional gifts to his family foundations around Thanksgiving each year.

He has said that after his death, a new foundation will be created to distribute the rest of his shares and that his children will have to agree unanimously on where to donate them. He wants his children to be able to make those decisions before they die and his oldest daughter will be nearly 81 in eight years.

Buffett’s donations may affect his successor’s support
The accelerated pace of Buffett’s plan to give away his fortune over the next eight years rather than doing it over the 10 years following his death will mean that his successor at Berkshire Hathaway, Greg Abel, won’t be able to count on the support of Buffett’s family as the company’s biggest shareholder for as long as he thought.

Nevertheless, Buffett said he believes it’s clear that Abel is the right man to lead the conglomerate he built, and “that becomes more evident by the day.”

However, Buffett did note that Berkshire’s big investment in Google’s parent company, which has grown in value considerably over the past year, is one he initiated and not an investment Abel picked, though Abel did agree on it. Just last month, Berkshire agreed to invest another $10 billion in Alphabet after previously tripling its stake in the company.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A blood test may predict if apparently healthy older adults are likely to develop Alzheimer’s symptoms in the next five or 10 years, researchers reported Wednesday.

That information could be reassuring or terrifying, but for now it’s a potential tool to speed drug development by helping to identify and enroll high-risk people into studies of possible Alzheimer’s treatments or preventive strategies.

Already large clinical trials are testing if certain drugs could prevent or at least delay the disease — and if any of those pan out, doctors will need an easy way to tell who should try them.

The scientists behind the new study stress that it’s too soon for healthy people to seek out the so-called p-tau217 test, which is currently used to help diagnose whether people experiencing cognitive problems have Alzheimer’s or another disorder.

“Wait and get tested when you can potentially do something about it,” stressed Dr. Reisa Sperling of the Mass General Brigham Neuroscience Institute, the study’s senior author. “At this point it wouldn’t change what I would tell someone to do. I’d still tell them to eat well, sleep well, exercise a lot and stay engaged.”

The new findings showed that symptom-free older adults who harbored very high levels of p-tau217 had a 38% risk of developing cognitive impairment over five years. That risk grew to 78% by 10 years.

The research was published in JAMA and presented at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in London.

It’s not clear exactly what causes Alzheimer’s, but its telltale markers are brain-clogging amyloid plaques and neuron-killing tau tangles. The p-tau217 test measures a form of tau that correlates with how much plaque buildup someone has and gives a hint about tangles, Sperling said.

The Mass General Brigham team analyzed data from 2,684 older adults who were healthy when they’d joined some long-running Alzheimer’s studies, receiving the p-tau217 blood test at enrollment and yearly cognitive checkups. Between the earliest enrollment in 2004 and last year, about 478 had developed cognitive impairment.

Study participants with very low p-tau217 levels likewise had a low risk of developing cognitive impairment over the five- to 10-year period.

There’s a conundrum in predicting Alzheimer’s: Lots of people harbor high levels of amyloid plaques yet never get dementia. A leading theory is that at some point amyloid buildup triggers an abnormal type of tau to form tangles, leading to symptoms.

Sperling said the blood test data offers some new clues. While different intermediate levels of p-tau217 signaled progressive risk, only the very highest level seemed to correlate with other evidence about that tipping point.

“This is a gradual process where amyloid and tau build up in the brain and this blood-based biomarker is telling you how far you are in that process,” she said.

Scientists not involved in the study praised it but also offered some reasons to be cautious. One is that only a small fraction of study participants had been tracked for a full decade, so there’s less confidence in the 10-year risk estimate than the five-year risk estimate.

Also, the predictions could be clouded by other factors — older people may be at risk of dying from something else, or have heart-related problems that can cause vascular dementia rather than Alzheimer’s, noted Drs. Suzanne Schindler of Washington University in St. Louis and David Wolk of the University of Pennsylvania in a commentary published in JAMA.

The blood tests “are not yet precise enough to guide individualized prognosis,” wrote Schindler, who also studies p-tau217’s prognostic potential, and Wolk. Still, they said the new work has “provided a crucial piece of the puzzle.”

Already “we have people coming saying, ‘I want this blood test. I have a family history of Alzheimer’s disease,’” said Jessica Langbaum of the Banner Alzheimer’s Institute in Phoenix, something she strongly discourages — for now.

“These findings are quite strong,” Langbaum added, and a predictive blood test would be “really important” — but only if ongoing studies eventually find a drug that could help people before symptoms begin.

JERUSALEM (VINnews)-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will travel to the United States on Sunday for meetings with President Trump and to attend memorial services for the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, a longtime champion of Israel who died suddenly at age 71.

Netanyahu is scheduled to meet Trump on Monday to discuss bilateral defense and diplomatic issues amid ongoing regional developments, according to officials. On Tuesday, he will participate in services honoring Graham, the veteran Republican senator from South Carolina.

Graham, who passed away Saturday from an aortic dissection, was widely regarded as one of Israel’s strongest allies in Congress. Netanyahu has described him as “one of Israel’s greatest friends,” citing his decades of advocacy for robust U.S.-Israel relations and firm opposition to Iran.

The full itinerary remains subject to final confirmation.

Graham’s death has drawn tributes from across the political spectrum, with many highlighting his steadfast support for Israel through key legislation and diplomatic efforts over his long Senate career. Netanyahu’s participation in the memorial underscores the deep personal and strategic bonds between the Israeli leader and the late senator.

The visit comes as the Trump administration continues to shape U.S. policy toward the Middle East.

(AP) – A group of 26 Meta employees has sued the company, claiming it used artificial intelligence systems to select people for layoffs, disproportionately targeting those on medical, parental or family leave.

They are among the 8,000 employees, or about 10% of its workforce, Meta said it would lay off in May. The lawsuit filed late Monday in federal court in Oakland, California, claims the company used internal AI systems, keystroke and activity-monitoring data, AI token-usage dashboards and algorithmically assisted performance rankings, among other methods, to determine who would be laid off.

Many of these scores and ratings “by design, cannot be accumulated by an employee who is on protected medical or family leave, or whose output is reduced by a disability,” the lawsuit says. Meta, according to the lawsuit, did not account for protected leave when taking employees’ scores into account and “did not pause the system for the individualized, leave- and accommodation-neutral review that the law requires.”

As a result, people on protected medical or family leave were disproportionately selected for layoffs, the lawsuit says. Each of the 26 anonymous employees in the lawsuit took protected leave and requested or received a reasonable accommodation for disability. Though they have been notified of their layoffs, all 26 remain employed by Meta, with separations set to begin July 22.

Many workers were on parental leave
Many of the employees in the lawsuit took pregnancy or parental leave, during which time they wouldn’t have worked and thus had their measured output reduced. Others took medical leave — one disclosed a “serious health condition and disability” that was approved by Meta’s own provider. But according to the lawsuit, he was “discouraged and deterred from taking that leave by a manager” who warned that doing so would result in his selection for the anticipated layoffs. Meta offered no accommodation for his disability, the lawsuit says.

Meta said in a statement that the claims “lack merit and are not based on facts. Workforce management and organizational decisions were and are made by people, not AI.”

About half the plaintiffs had taken leave for caregiving or pregnancy-related reasons. Eight are women who had taken maternity or pregnancy-related leave, four are men who had taken parental leave and one is a woman who had taken leave to care for a family member and later bereavement leave.

The lawsuit says the layoffs violated several state and federal laws, including the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act and the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.

Lawsuit cites ‘disparate impact’
The complaint also references “disparate impact liability,” a longstanding civil rights concept that President Donald Trump’s administration moved to abandon. Disparate impact, codified in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, holds that facially neutral policies or practices can be discriminatory if they disproportionately burden a protected class of workers and aren’t necessary for the job.

The Trump administration has ordered federal agencies to deprioritize disparate impact liability enforcement, arguing that its use undermines “meritocracy” and encourages the assumption that any racial or gender imbalance in a workforce is the result of discrimination. The order has led the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to drop discrimination cases on behalf of some workers.

However, the lawsuit against Meta underscores that companies remain vulnerable to disparate impact litigation in the age of AI despite the Trump administration’s efforts to stamp out its enforcement. Workers are still free to pursue such lawsuits on their own if the EEOC rejects their complaints, and several state laws specifically prohibit disparate impact discrimination.

In the case against Meta, lawyers for the plaintiffs argued that the company’s “algorithmically assisted selection process, by systematically recording such absences as reduced performance, falls more heavily on women than on men.” That’s because women disproportionately take pregnancy and caregiving leave, according to the lawyers. The lawsuit cites Title VII’s prohibition on employment practices that have a disparate impact, as well as a landmark 1971 Supreme Court ruling that recognized the doctrine.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers said in a statement that the lawsuit asks for one thing — preserving the status quo to keep the workers employed pending arbitration. That’s because “once these separations are final, the harms are irreversible: employer-subsidized health coverage lost during pregnancy, postpartum recovery, and active medical treatment; time-bound leave rights extinguished; unvested equity forfeited; and immigration consequences triggered.”

BEIRUT (AP) — After two days of U.S.-mediated talks in Rome, Lebanon and Israel took steps toward implementing “pilot zones” in southern Lebanon where Israeli forces would withdraw and turn over control to the Lebanese army, the U.S. State Department said Wednesday.

The State Department said in a statement that the talks were “productive” and the parties “agreed on the structure and guidelines for the pilot zone process, to be finalized and implemented in the coming days.”

There was no immediate statement from Lebanon or Israel on the outcome of the negotiations.

Lebanon and Israel announced a “framework agreement” on June 26 laying out a plan for Israeli forces to withdraw from the large swathes of southern Lebanon they are occupying, in exchange for disarmament of the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group.

The deal was supposed to begin with two “pilot zones” where the Israeli military is to turn over control to the Lebanese army, which would clear the areas of any Hezbollah presence.

However, implementation on the ground had stalled ahead of this week’s talks in Rome.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, who is slated to visit Washington on July 21, said in a statement ahead of the Rome talks that instructions had been given to the Lebanese delegation “to demand the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from the two pilot zones before any further discussions.”

Wednesday’s statement did not specify where the pilot zones would be, but Lebanese and Israeli officials previously said they would include the towns of Froun, Ghandouriyeh and Zawtar.

The designated zones generated some controversy in Lebanon, because Israeli troops were not present in most of the selected area to begin with, raising questions about how a withdrawal could take place. The Lebanese army had pushed for pilot zones that were larger and included more area occupied by Israeli forces.

The latest Israel-Hezbollah war began when Hezbollah fired missiles across the border on March 2, two days after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran.

Hezbollah and Iran had sought to link the end of the war in Lebanon to the outcome of broader U.S.-Iran talks. The Lebanese government, trying to minimize Iran’s influence, aimed to keep the two tracks separate and negotiate a ceasefire directly with Israel.

The June 26 Lebanon-Israel deal also envisions steps toward an eventual peace agreement between the two countries — which technically remain in a state of war nearly 80 years after Israel’s establishment.

The State Department said that following implementation of the pilot zones, “We will move to expanded technical talks … with the aim of reaching a comprehensive agreement between Israel and Lebanon.”

Hezbollah has been vehemently opposed to the direct Lebanon-Israel talks and has said it will not abide by the agreement and has no plans to disarm. Israeli officials, meanwhile, have said publicly that they plan an extended occupation of southern Lebanon.

New York (VINNEWS/Rabbi Yair Hoffman) There is a bill in Congress called the Sunshine Protection Act. If it passes, the whole country would stay on daylight saving time all year long. The clocks would never change again.

In the summer, nothing would feel different. Summer would be exactly the way it is now.

Winter would be a different story. Winter sunsets would come an hour later, and that is exactly what the supporters of the bill want. But there is a second half to that trade. If the sun sets an hour later, it also rises an hour later. In most of the country, the sun would not come up until well after 8:00 AM. In some places it would be closer to 9:00 AM. That late sunrise is where all the objections come from.

The Orthodox Position: Two Arguments, One Cause

Rabbi A. D. Motzen is the national director of government affairs for Agudath Israel of America. He was recently quoted saying that the Orthodox Jewish objection has two parts. The first is safety — children walking to school and standing at bus stops in the dark. The second is religious practice. Both problems come from the same single fact: the late winter sunrise.

The safety worry is not new. It is the same worry that turned the public against permanent daylight saving time back in the 1970s. Parents of every background still raise it today.

The religious problem is more specific. Jewish law sets the earliest times that morning prayers may be said. Most of those times depend on sunrise. In general, services cannot start much before the sun comes up. So the rule is simple: the later the sun rises, the later services must start.

Now add up the pieces. Morning prayers take time. The commute to work takes time. If services cannot begin until after 8:00 AM, getting to work on time becomes very hard, and for many people impossible. The other outcome is just as bad. Shuls in the affected cities would have trouble finding ten men for a daily minyan at all.

This is not a new position. Agudath Israel, the Orthodox Union and the Rabbinical Council of America all raised these same concerns in 2022, right after the Senate passed the Sunshine Protection Act. Motzen recently told Jewish Insider that the plan this year is the same one: explain the problem to members of Congress who simply do not know how Orthodox practice works. He said lawmakers have listened.

Agudath Israel is not pushing for permanent standard time either. Motzen is not asking Congress to pick his side. He is asking Congress to do its homework. If the clocks are going to be locked, he says, then policymakers should look carefully at what daylight saving time would do, compare it to what permanent standard time would do, and compare both to leaving things alone. What the observant Jewish community does not want is dark winter mornings created on purpose by a law.

The Orthodox objection rests on two time markers in Jewish law. Neither one is a custom. Neither one is a preference. Both are tied to where the sun actually is in the sky. That is the key point, and it is worth saying plainly: changing the clock does not move the sun.

Netz hachama means sunrise. It is the moment the top edge of the sun first appears over the eastern horizon. In Jewish law it is the anchor of the morning. It is the ideal moment to begin Shemoneh Esrei, the central prayer of Shacharis. A minyan that is timed so Shemoneh Esrei starts exactly at sunrise is called a vasikin minyan. The name comes from the Gemara in Berachos (9b), which praises the vasikin — the especially careful and pious Jews of earlier generations — for davening this way. Netz matters for other things too. It opens the window for mitzvos that belong to the daytime, and it closes the window for mitzvos that belong to the night.

Misheyakir means “from when he can recognize.” It is the earliest moment a person may put on tallis and tefillin. In a real bind, it is also the earliest one may daven Shacharis. The Mishnah (Berachos 9b) does not define it with a clock. It defines it with an eye test: there is enough light when a person can recognize someone he knows slightly from about four amos away, or tell the blue techeiles thread of his tzitzis apart from the white ones. Misheyakir comes after alos hashachar, the very first light of dawn, and before netz. In practice it works out to somewhere between 35 and 60 minutes before sunrise. The exact number depends on which custom a community follows and on how far north the city is.

So the morning runs in this order. First alos hashachar, the first light. Then misheyakir, when there is enough light to recognize a face, and tallis and tefillin become permitted. Then netz hachama, sunrise, the ideal moment for Shemoneh Esrei.

Now put a law on top of that order. If a statute pushes sunrise to 8:20 AM, misheyakir slides to about 7:45 and netz lands at 8:20. A man cannot put on tefillin before 7:45 and still catch a 7:30 train. The clock is something people invented. Netz and misheyakir are not.

The December Numbers

The effects land first on New York. About a million and a half Jews live here, the largest Jewish population anywhere outside Israel.

New York. In late December under permanent daylight saving time, the sun would rise around 8:20 AM and set around 5:33 PM. With netz at 8:20, misheyakir would fall near 7:45. A vasikin minyan would be starting Shemoneh Esrei after most of Manhattan was already at work. Candle lighting would move from about 4:11 PM to about 5:11 PM. The rough stretch would run from the middle of November to the end of January.

The cities below show something important. New York is not the worst case, and it is not where this bill came from.

Denver. Denver sits at 105°W, near the western edge of the Mountain time zone. That alone puts its clock about forty minutes behind the real position of the sun, before anyone touches daylight saving time. In late December the sun would come up around 8:20 AM — almost exactly the same as New York, but for a completely different reason. Farther west it gets worse, in Grand Junction and the towns near the Utah border. Sunset would be around 5:38 PM. A child at a 7:40 AM bus stop would be standing there in full darkness.

Miami and the Florida peninsula. Florida is where this bill started, and Florida is the exception. It sits far enough south that the seasons do not swing as hard. December sunrise would be around 8:07 AM and sunset around 6:35 PM. For the frum communities in Miami Beach, Boca Raton and Hollywood, this is the mildest version of the problem anywhere in the country.

California. Los Angeles would see sunrise around 7:59 AM and sunset around 5:48 PM. That is about twenty minutes earlier than New York, which means the Pico-Robertson and Valley kehillos would feel this less than the Five Towns would. San Francisco would see sunrise around 8:25 AM. Redding and Eureka would be closer to 8:35. The California legislature approved a ballot measure in 2018 that authorized the switch. Eight years have gone by and nothing has come of it.

The Bus Stop Question

The safety concern is not a guess. The country already ran this experiment, more than fifty years ago, in 1974.

Congress passed permanent daylight saving time that January, during the Arab oil embargo. About 79 percent of the public supported it. Within a few weeks, Florida reported eight schoolchildren killed in early-morning traffic.

Whether the law actually caused those deaths was argued about then and is still argued about now. A later review by the National Bureau of Standards found the statistics were weaker than the newspaper coverage had made them sound. But the political damage was immediate. Papers ran photographs of first-graders waiting at the curb under streetlights. The governor of Florida called for repeal. By October, public support had fallen to about 42 percent, and Congress repealed the law. The experiment lasted less than ten months.

Today’s research points in both directions at once. Dark mornings move the danger to the morning commute. Bright evenings reduce the danger during the evening commute — and the evening commute has always been the deadlier one, because there are more cars on the road, drivers are tired, and alcohol is more of a factor. Researchers at Rutgers and at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety have argued that year-round daylight saving time would actually lower the total number of pedestrian deaths for exactly that reason.

But a total is only an average, and an average hides who pays. The danger does not disappear. It moves. It moves west, from the eastern edge of each time zone to the western edge. And it moves down in age, from adults driving home to children walking. Children in Denver, Redding and Indianapolis would carry the cost. Adults in Miami would collect the benefit.

The Halachic Consequences

For the Orthodox community, a sunrise at 8:20 AM is not an annoyance. It is a head-on collision with the workday.

Netz at 8:20 puts misheyakir near 7:45 and vasikin Shemoneh Esrei at 8:20. A man who has to be at a desk in Manhattan by 9:00 could not daven vasikin. He could not even put on tefillin at misheyakir and still make a 7:30 train.

That leaves him two choices, and neither is good. He can daven alone on the train. Or he can rely on the lenient opinions for alos hashachar, which the poskim allow when there is no other option but do not want anyone using as a regular practice. For roughly ten weeks every year, a large part of the community would be forced into the b’dieved — the fallback — by an act of Congress.

There is a way out, though, and the yeshivos are the ones who can build it.

The obvious move is to daven earlier. That move makes everything worse. A yeshiva davening at 7:15 AM under permanent daylight saving time in December would be davening before alos hashachar according to most opinions. The prayers would be too early to count.

The answer runs the other way: daven later, and put learning first.

Here is what that looks like. The building opens at 7:15 AM for a halacha seder — forty-five minutes on Mishnah Berurah, on hilchos tefillah, on the practical halachos that most bochurim pick up in pieces and almost never see taught in order. Shacharis follows at 8:15 or 8:20, right at netz, with tefillin at the proper zman and in daylight. First seder starts at 9:15.

That schedule is not just damage control. Look at what it produces:

• Davening at netz, which most mosdos want and few actually manage
• A daily halacha seder that many yeshivos have wanted for years and could never fit into the schedule
• Bochurim who arrive at davening awake, instead of rolling out of bed into it
• Elementary school students leaving the house in daylight, because school starts at 9:00

That last one deserves attention. It solves the bus-stop problem inside the community without waiting for Congress to do anything. A school that starts at 9:00 AM has no children standing at a bus stop at 7:30. Whatever happens to the national clock, a community still controls its own schedule.

The Erev Shabbos Ledger

Now the other side of the ledger, and it is the strongest argument the bill has.

Late-December candle lighting in New York would move from about 4:11 PM to about 5:11 PM. That extra hour would mostly end the mid-winter scramble of leaving the office at 2:45. Chanukah licht at 5:30 instead of 4:30 would mean fathers are home to light them. For working families this is not a small thing. It is fifty-two Fridays a year entered b’menucha, calmly, instead of under pressure.

So here is the full accounting. Fifty-two Erev Shabbosim gained. Roughly fifty winter mornings lost. The difference is that the mornings can be recovered by changing schedules. The Fridays cannot be recovered any other way.

The Legislative History

The Sunshine Protection Act passed the Senate on March 15, 2022, by unanimous consent. That procedure requires no debate, no roll call and no senator going on record. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida made the request. Nobody objected. The whole thing was over in under a minute.

Several senators later admitted they had not realized the vote was happening. Senator Tom Carper said he would have objected if he had known. A bill that would rearrange the daily schedule of 330 million people passed the Senate without a single word of discussion.

Then it went to the House and stopped cold. Representative Frank Pallone chaired the Energy and Commerce subcommittee that handles it, and he refused to move it forward. His reason was not that he liked the current system. His reason was that a hearing had convinced him Congress had not actually decided which direction it wanted to go. That objection has held in every Congress since. To be clear about the order of events, since coverage often gets it backwards: the bill passed the Senate, not the House. It has been reintroduced in the 118th and 119th Congresses and has not moved.

Right now the language is riding inside the Motor Vehicle Modernization Act of 2026. The House has not taken it up. Under the Sunshine Protection Act, any state that does not exempt itself before the law takes effect would be locked onto the time it currently observes between March and November. Hawaii and most of Arizona would likely stay exempt, since they already keep standard time all year.

Who Wants This

Supporters. Retail is out in front. The National Association of Convenience Stores has pushed to extend daylight saving time for decades, and its logic is simple. A driver heading home in daylight stops and buys something. A driver heading home in the dark just goes home. The golf industry has put a number on its interest: hundreds of millions of dollars for every extra month of evening light. The candy industry spent years pushing to extend daylight saving time past Halloween so trick-or-treating would happen in daylight and kids would collect more. That is not a rumor — it is a documented part of the legislative history of the 2005 Energy Policy Act, which extended daylight saving time by four weeks at industry request.

Opponents. The sleep medicine field, which wants permanent standard time and considers permanent daylight saving time the worst of the three choices. Farmers, quietly — they work by the sun no matter what the clock says, but rural districts worry about long, dark bus routes. The airlines, which do not want their international schedules scrambled. And parents, who have no lobby and have never needed one. The 1974 reversal was not organized by anybody. It took nine months.

The Half-Hour Proposal

There is another bill floating around this year. It would make “half-daylight saving time” permanent. Instead of moving sunrise and sunset a full hour later in the winter, the Daylight Act of 2026 would move the clocks forward by thirty minutes and then leave them alone forever.

Agudath Israel does not support that one either. Motzen’s objection is practical rather than religious: it would make time zones even more confusing than they already are.

The Impasse

Congress has exactly three choices. Keep switching twice a year. Lock the clocks on daylight saving time. Or lock them on standard time.

Here is the trap. Most people agree the switching should stop. But the group that wants it to stop cannot agree on where to stop. Business wants daylight saving time. The medical world wants standard time. Neither side can put together a majority. So the switching continues by default — and switching is the one outcome that nobody is actually asking for.

The structure of the law makes it worse. Under the Uniform Time Act, a state is allowed to opt out of daylight saving time on its own, which is what Arizona and Hawaii did. But a state may not adopt daylight saving time permanently without Congress approving it first. Nineteen states have already passed laws making daylight saving time permanent, all of them waiting on Congress. That is a lot of pressure with nowhere to go, which explains both why this issue keeps coming back and why it never gets settled.

The West Coast is another wall. California, Oregon and Washington have each looked at permanent daylight saving time and each said no. The reason is the arithmetic. A December sunrise in Seattle under daylight saving time would land near 9:00 AM. No Washington State delegation is going to vote to send children to school in that. And without the West Coast, supporters cannot reach the sixty votes they need in the Senate.

Prospects. The most likely thing to break the deadlock is an energy crisis. That is what produced the 1974 law, and it is the only force that has ever pushed past the objections. A presidential push is also possible. The issue does not split along party lines at all, which in this Congress makes it either uniquely easy to pass or completely orphaned. The third possibility is a compromise nobody has bothered to write: permanent daylight saving time paired with a federal requirement that school start times move to match. That single amendment would erase the bus-stop objection, split the sleep researchers, and still hand retail the evenings it wants. It has been sitting there for four years without a sponsor.

Assessment

The bill is sold on June and paid for in December. The cost does not fall evenly. It falls on children at the western edge of each time zone, and on people whose obligations are set by the sun instead of by the clock.

The Orthodox community is in that second group by definition. That is exactly why Agudath Israel is asking for careful thought rather than for a particular answer. Weigh the options honestly, and do not create dark winter mornings by accident.

The yeshivos, for their part, are left with something better than a complaint. They are left with a plan. Halacha seder at 7:15, Shacharis at netz, first seder at 9:15 — a schedule better than what most mosdos run right now, arrived at for a reason that has nothing to do with davening. Any institution that prepares for it will end up davening vasikin as a matter of routine.

And if the bill never passes — which fifty-two years of legislative history suggests is the more likely outcome — the halacha seder is still worth having.

NEW YORK (AP) — A lead U.S. negotiator for the release of hundreds of people captured by Hamas during the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks in Israel will have a book out this fall.

The Penguin Random House imprint Crown has scheduled Brett McGurk’s “Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7 Hostages” for Oct. 6, nearly three years to the day after the deadly Hamas siege that left more than 1,000 people dead and more than 200 taken captive.

McGurk, 53, is a longtime Middle East adviser and diplomat who had already served under three presidents when he was appointed by President Joe Biden in 2023 to oversee hostage talks between Israel and Hamas. According to Crown, McGurk will describe his frantic efforts to balance the competing and seemingly intractable demands of the two sides, traveling worldwide in pursuit of an agreement.

“On October 7, Hamas unleashed a devastating war and the largest hostage crisis in modern history,” McGurk said in a statement released Wednesday by Crown. “I wrote ‘Brink’ to bring readers inside the rooms as events unfolded in real time — from the Situation Room with hundreds of missiles in the air, to compounds across the Middle East where diplomacy teetered between breakthrough and collapse.”

According to Crown, McGurk will also disclose details of a near-deal before Oct. 7 that would have normalized relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia and will remember his unlikely alliance with President Donald Trump appointee Steve Witkoff as they handled talks during the transition time between the administrations of Biden, a Democrat, and Trump, a Republican. The remaining surviving hostages were freed in October 2025.

“’Brink’ details the bipartisan front they forged when it mattered most, ultimately securing a deal that would save lives,” the publisher’s announcement reads in part.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two human rights groups say Trump administration sanctions imposed on the International Criminal Court over its investigations of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza have illegally impeded their ability to advocate for Palestinians.

The organizations say in a lawsuit filed Wednesday that they have been forced to censor their own advocacy work to avoid scrutiny from the White House, which in an executive order last year not only targeted the Hague-based criminal court but prohibited providing or receiving services to or from entities that have been sanctioned.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Manhattan against top administration officials by DAWN and Taxpayers Alliance Against Genocide, seeks a court order that would strike down the restrictions on their advocacy and their ability to interact with Palestinian human rights groups and other sanctioned parties.

“The Trump administration is using the blunt instrument of economic sanctions not only to punish human rights defenders but to police the political expressions of millions of Americans,” said Omar Shakir, the executive director of DAWN, a U.S.-based group advocating for democracy and human rights in the Arab world that was founded by Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was killed in 2018.

“The government is violating the constitutional rights of American citizens in order to shield officials of a foreign government who have committed a genocide,” he said in a statement.

The White House did not immediately return an email seeking comment on the lawsuit.

The Hague-based ICC has been investigating allegations of war crimes in Gaza during the war that began after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. A panel of judges issued arrest warrants in 2024 for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant. Netanyahu has called the warrants “absurd.”

The U.S. and Israel are not among the court’s members, and neither nation recognizes its authority.

In response to the arrest warrants, President Donald Trump, a Republican, issued an executive order last year that accused the ICC of engaging in “illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel” and warned of “tangible and significant consequences” on those responsible for the ICC’s “transgressions.”

The U.S. over the last year has slapped sanctions on Palestinian human rights groups, a series of ICC judges and staffers — including the court’s former chief prosecutor — and Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza. Her family sued in February, saying the penalties violated the First Amendment.

Already, the lawsuit says, DAWN has halted work on submissions to the ICC about Israel’s conduct during the war, stopped exchanging evidence and legal analysis with sanctioned non-government organizations and abstained from collaborating with them on advocacy campaigns. It has also been forced to “discontinue its professional engagements with Albanese.”

“The chilling effect on Plaintiffs has been profound,” the lawsuit states. “They now face prison terms and ruinous fines if, in their interactions with the designated parties, they provide or receive anything that Defendants could plausibly characterize as a ‘service’— an extraordinarily capacious term that potentially reaches any act that confers a benefit on its recipient. Fearing liability, Plaintiffs — and countless others like them —have turned to self-censorship.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is among the defendants in the lawsuit, denounced the court as recently as this week, pledging in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece that Trump’s administration would “dismantle the ICC — brick by brick, if necessary.” He warned that the court’s “overreach,” if left unchecked, could subject Border Patrol agents, federal prosecutors and U.S. Marines to the tribunal’s jurisdiction.

“The ICC’s interfering with American military and law enforcement operations isn’t only a grave overreach of its purported authorities. It would mean the death of the U.S. as a sovereign and independent nation,” Rubio wrote. “Our decision and our people would be at the mercy of the ICC and its collaborators in the ‘international community.’ To accept the ICC is to surrender control of our national destiny.”

The State Department said the campaign against the court could include additional sanctions or visa revocations and travel bans for ICC employees as well as “increased scrutiny” of nations that don’t reject ICC authority.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says Immigration and Customs Enforcement should continue traffic stops after recent fatal shootings, seeming to contradict a new policy to halt them.

Trump wrote early Wednesday on his social media site ICE is “doing a GREAT job, one that has to be done.”

The Republican president says to remove criminals he says were let into the country under the previous Democratic administration “we must be strong, tough and smart and we CANNOT give up one of ICE’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!” Trump says, “Once we do, we are playing right into the criminal’s hands.”

The policy change came after an ICE officer shot and killed a Colombian driver Monday in Maine and a week after one shot and killed a motorist in Houston, renewing criticism of the agency’s enforcement tactics that were widely condemned last winter after the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minnesota.

In Florida on Tuesday, a third man in roughly a week died during an encounter with immigration officers. This time, a 28-year-old man was killed after he was hit by a tractor trailer while running from immigration and other federal officers, authorities said.

It’s a narrative that has been repeated again and again since the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown began, with federal officers confronting drivers then saying they opened fire when their vehicles became a danger. That’s despite decades of warnings from policing experts that shooting into moving cars presents a danger of its own and should almost always be avoided.

At least 10 people have been killed during immigration operations since the start of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. At least four of those deaths involved people in vehicles, including one last week in Houston, a trend so troubling U.S. Sen. Susan Collins said Tuesday she urged DHS secretary Markwayne Mullin “to cease all non-urgent vehicle stops.”

John Sandweg, who was acting director at ICE, which is part of DHS, during the Obama administration, estimated recently that there have been roughly 18 traffic-stop shootings during the Trump immigration crackdown.

NEW YORK (VINnews) — The funeral procession of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was accompanied by calls for revenge and demands to assassinate the President of the United States. On Wednesday, a massive billboard was placed in Revolution Square in Tehran, showing Donald Trump lying in a coffin, alongside text in Persian and English stating: “We will kill Trump.”

Threats against Trump are clearly visible on billboards throughout Iran, as an integral part of the messaging campaign promoted by the ayatollah regime. In fact, this giant poster is only one more element in that campaign.

Last week, the American newspaper The Wall Street Journal reported that Israel had recently provided the United States with intelligence indicating that Iran was considering an assassination attempt against Trump. According to the report, the intelligence suggested that Iran has wanted to target Trump since he ordered the killing of Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani at the end of his first term in office in 2020.

A day after the Wall Street Journal report, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee confirmed that “Israeli intelligence warned the White House about a specific assassination plot against Trump.”

However, the newspaper also reported that American officials “fear that Israel shared only partial intelligence regarding the threat, partly in an effort to push the United States back into a full-scale war with Iran.” According to those officials, the president’s decision to return to the United States from the NATO summit in Turkey aboard the presidential aircraft Air Force One was made after Israel shared intelligence about the possible assassination plot.

Concerns were heightened further following a report by The New York Times claiming that the new Air Force One aircraft that Trump received as a gift from Qatar lacks sufficient defensive systems.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir stated on Wednesday that the terrorist cell uncovered in the Bedouin town of Segev Shalom had planned to assassinate him over his policy of demolishing illegal structures in the Negev.

According to Ben Gvir, the suspicion that the cell planned an attack against him proves that the enforcement and governance policies he is advancing are successfully targeting groups that, for years, had become accustomed to weak enforcement.

Four residents of Segev Shalom and the Bedouin communities in the Negev were arrested in May and June in a joint investigation conducted by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and the Southern District Police’s Central Unit. An indictment was filed against them last Friday.

The i24NEWS channel published footage of the suspects’ arrests, along with transcripts from the interrogation of the main suspect accused of planning the attack. During questioning, the suspect was asked what he intended to do and responded that he planned to stab a large number of people at the Beersheba Central Bus Station, saying: “There are many soldiers there.” The suspect also said that shooting at the Segev Shalom police station was part of the plan.

The main suspect also told investigators that he wanted to establish a terrorist framework that would eventually reach the size of a battalion: “I also wanted to establish a battalion that, in the event of an invasion, would operate against the Jews if something happened in our area.”

When asked about the purpose of the planned battalion, the suspect replied: “A response to the police for demolishing homes.” His answer referred to National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s enforcement policy regarding illegal construction in the Bedouin communities of the Negev.

The investigation also revealed that members of the cell traveled to Turkey to receive training in preparation for carrying out the attack. Searches of their phones uncovered pictures of Ben Gvir and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Security officials suspect that the cell may also have planned to assassinate them.

Ben Gvir responded today to the arrest of the cell: “The fact that a terrorist cell planned to murder me because of the policy of demolishing illegal structures in the Negev is the best proof that we are harming those who for years became accustomed to a lack of enforcement and lawlessness.

“We are leading a clear policy of governance and law enforcement, and in the past year alone we have demolished approximately 5,700 illegal structures in the Negev. This policy will continue and will even intensify. This is not the first time there have been attempts to harm me. Eight times already attempts have been made to assassinate me, once because of the policy I led in prisons against terrorists, once because I promoted the death penalty for terrorists, and once because of my uncompromising struggle to restore governance in the Negev.

“Anyone who thinks that threats, terrorism, or assassination attempts will cause me to stop is living in la-la land. They will continue to threaten, and I will continue to act for governance, law enforcement, and the security of Israel’s citizens.”