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    Wednesday briefing: Is Zelenskyy playing political poker – or Russian roulette?

    Good morning.Talks. Istanbul. Thursday. In the geopolitical equivalent of a playground challenge, the latest move in the back-and-forth brinkmanship between Russia and Ukraine has seen President Zelenskyy call Putin’s bluff.The Russian president crushed moves by Ukraine and its European allies to force a ceasefire by instead demanding peace talk negotiations in Istanbul tomorrow. In response, Zelenskyy challenged him to travel to Istanbul to meet him face to face.Putin has yet to respond, but these latest manoeuvres by both Ukraine and Russia – who seem very far away from being able to negotiate a mutually agreeable peace deal – share one thing: a desire to get Donald Trump on their team at the negotiating table.With Trump signalling that he could take a break from browsing private jet interiors in Saudi Arabia to join the party in Istanbul, we are either gearing up for an extraordinary photo opportunity or a complete damp squib if neither Trump nor Putin shows and the deadlock continues.For today’s newsletter I talked to our central and eastern Europe correspondent, Shaun Walker, about the latest round of power games, and whether there really is any prospect for peace in Ukraine.Five big stories

    US politics | Donald Trump says he will lift sanctions on Syria and meet with the country’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, during his tour of the gulf states. Sharaa’s pitch to woo the US offered access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus.

    UK news | Peter Sullivan, who has spent 38 years in jail, has had his murder conviction quashed in what is thought to be the longest-running miscarriage of justice in British history. Sullivan was wrongly convicted in 1987 for the frenzied murder of a florist and part-time pub worker, Diane Sindall, 21, in Merseyside.

    Conservatives | An MP has been charged with sexual assault over alleged incidents at London’s Groucho Club in 2023, the Crown Prosecution Service has said. Patrick Spencer, the MP for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich, was charged with two counts of sexual assault against two separate women, said the CPS.

    Assisted dying | At least five MPs have decided to vote against the UK assisted dying bill, the Guardian understands. It comes as the Scottish parliament votes to consider a bill to allow assisted dying for terminally ill people for the first time.

    UK news | A man has been arrested in connection with a series of suspected arson attacks on property linked to Keir Starmer, Scotland Yard has said. The 21-year-old was arrested in the early hours on suspicion of arson with intent to endanger life and remained in custody, the Metropolitan police said.
    In depth: ‘Putin doesn’t want to be in a room with Zelenskyy. This is what Ukraine is banking on’View image in fullscreenThe past few days have seen intricate displays of diplomatic cat-and-mouse as Ukraine and Russia try to gain the upper hand while facing increasing pressure to end the war in Ukraine.There is much at stake. Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians have lost their lives. Last night the air raid sirens were still wailing across Kyiv as hopes of an imminent ceasefire were once again crushed.What moves towards a peace deal have happened in the past few days?Last weekend, things seemed to be going well for Ukraine. Zelenskyy’s one-to-one meeting with Trump at the Vatican had helped repair the rupture caused by the extraordinary press conference in the White House, and momentum appeared to be with him.After recent attempts to get Russia to agree – and actually stick to – a ceasefire had failed, last weekend saw frustrated European leaders travel to Kyiv with an ultimatum for Putin: agree to a ceasefire or face new, tough sanctions.Yet Putin had other ideas. Undermining Zelenskyy’s insistence that a full ceasefire should begin ahead of any peace negotiations, Putin went on Russian TV to propose direct talks between Russia and Ukraine and named the time and place: Istanbul, on Thursday 15 May.Trump weighed in. Posting in his usual capital letters on his Truth Social platform, the president said that Ukraine should agree to Putin’s demand for a meeting immediately. “I’m starting to doubt that Ukraine will make a deal with Putin,” he wrote. “HAVE THE MEETING NOW!!!”Zelenskyy took Putin’s challenge and raised the stakes. He said he would travel to Istanbul personally and challenged Putin to do the same, saying that the two leaders should meet face-to-face for the first time since 2019.Since then, Putin has gone quiet. With the Kremlin refusing to comment, Ukraine has been ramping up the pressure. Yesterday, Shaun attended a bullish press briefing and then a sit-down interview with Zelenskyy. “His message is Ukraine is not the one to blame,” says Shaun. “He is saying to Trump that we are doing everything you ask. We’re not the problem here.” What are the peace talks in Istanbul?At the moment there is no detail on what will and won’t be discussed on Thursday, or even who will be the ones doing the negotiating.Shaun says that while Putin’s holding position is to give the impression that he wants to negotiate, Russian demands at the talks on Thursday – regardless of whether Putin shows or not – are likely to be pretty much the same as the demands they were making at the beginning of the conflict, which include Ukraine dropping its aspirations to join Nato, give up territories taken by Russia and scale back its military.On the other side, Ukraine wants to be a sovereign nation and an independent, democratic country with links – and ideally Nato membership – to the West. They will find it politically difficult to cede territory to their enemy.“My reading is that it is very clear that Putin’s only goal for Ukraine is for it not to be a threat – in the way he perceives it – to Russian interests, and become this beacon of ‘anti-Russianness’ that will cause him problems,’” Shaun says. “At the talks, the Russian delegation will most likely continue pushing for terms that will still be fully unacceptable to Ukraine.”How likely is it that Putin will show?Shaun says that he’d be very surprised if Putin makes a personal appearance in Turkey on Thursday. “Putin doesn’t like being pressured into things. He doesn’t want to be in a room with Zelenskyy. This is what Ukraine is banking on,” he says. “I’d give it about a 5% chance that somehow Putin and Trump talk to each other this week and both go. I think the most likely scenario is that we’ll have Zelenskyy in Istanbul on Thursday recording a video saying, ‘Look, I’m here but nobody else turned up.’”At the moment Zelenskyy is travelling to Ankara, the Turkish capital, to meet with its president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and will go to Istanbul if Putin shows. It’s unclear if he will be bringing a delegation with him who could start talks with the Russian team in the absence of Putin.In some ways, Zelenskyy calling for a personal summit with Trump is potentially a high-stakes move, because if Putin does show up then Ukraine could face pressure to show they are willing to concede to some of Russia’s demands. Yet Shaun thinks a Putin no-show at this point is almost certain.How much is this all about Trump?Shaun says that the only thing uniting both Russia and Ukraine at the moment is their desire to get Trump onside.“Ever since that disastrous White House meeting, Zelenskyy has been trying very hard – and with some success – to get Trump back on Ukraine’s team,” says Shaun.Trump knows he wields huge power and influence on the global stage and hasn’t been afraid to use it. Since he took office, he has become increasingly frustrated with the Ukraine war and wants to show that he can do what he promised the US voters would be easy – to end the war and use whatever aggressive boardroom tactics he has at his disposal to force the two sides to bend to his will.He is currently in Saudi Arabia for a lavish four-day trip where he hopes to enrich both the US and his own family with a raft of multi-billion dollar deals (and fly home in his new Qatar-gifted luxury jet). Trump will want to build on this momentum and return home triumphant, able to say that he is dictating the terms of global politics.The danger for Ukraine, says Shaun, is that even though the Biden administration moved much slower than the Ukrainians would have liked, America has been Ukraine’s most significant ally, providing weapons, intelligence sharing and other support.“Now with Trump they know he doesn’t like it when things get difficult so their fear will be that he’ll just give up and say, ‘Sorry, this is your mess to fix,’ and walk away like he’s promised to do so many times,” says Shaun.Shaun says that for Russia, Trump bailing on the war would be a good outcome. “If the negotiations fail and Trump walks then Ukraine could risk losing US support, which would be catastrophic for them.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIf the talks fail, what next?Shaun says that in the event that nothing is agreed in Turkey, the big question will be whether the Europeans can get Trump on board and once again ratchet the pressure up on Moscow for a ceasefire. European leaders have indicated they will press ahead with further sanctions if talks this week fail to achieve real progress.The issue, as ever, is Trump’s unpredictability. “We know from experience that there could be a new command or request from the Americans at any time and everything could change again,” he says.In such a high-stakes game of political poker, it’s impossible to place a safe bet on what will happen next. Until then, the sirens will continue and the war will grind on.What else we’ve been readingView image in fullscreen

    In a gripping interview, Hannah al-Othman meets Nicola Packer, who was acquitted of using abortion pills to illegally end a pregnancy last week after a near five-year ordeal. “Abortion is healthcare. It should not be treated as anything other than that,” she says. Charlie Lindlar, acting deputy editor, newsletters

    With Reform UK on the rise and young men increasingly forming a core part of their voting bloc, Damien Gayle goes in search of answers as to why so many are increasingly turning to the right in this fascinating and sometimes chilling film. Annie

    Even as a Eurovision agnostic, Angelica Frey’s rundown of the 10 best songs at this year’s contest is a hoot. Estonian rap-dance, thinly veiled double entendres and … space dogs? There’s something for everyone. Charlie

    In this interview by Steve Rose for the Guardian’s long-running How we survive series, painter Patrick Dougher talks about how art saved him from the wreckage of generational addiction and gifted him a second chance at life. Annie

    In case you missed it: the online news site HuffPost turned 20 this month, and this oral history of the site, told through the bizarre and poignant splash headlines that became its trademark, is a joy. (It’s good to see many alumni have, like me, kept the pyjamas gifted to us by founder Arianna Huffington each Christmas.) Charlie
    SportView image in fullscreenFootball | Goodison Park has been saved from demolition and will become the country’s first major stadium dedicated solely to a women’s team next season, the Guardian can reveal. Hailed as a gamechanging move for women’s football, Everton Women will kick off their first season at Goodison in September.Cycling | Sir Bradley Wiggins has revealed he became addicted to cocaine after his retirement from cycling and is “lucky to be here”. The 2012 Tour de France winner and five-time Olympic champion said his children wanted to put him in rehab amid fears the issue could prove fatal.Football | Manchester United intend to retain Ruben Amorim as head coach next season even if they lose the Europa League final against Tottenham. The club feels the Portuguese deserves this summer transfer window to improve the squad.The front pagesView image in fullscreenThe Guardian’s headline is “Zelenskyy: Putin is the obstacle to a peace deal”, as the Ukrainian leader pledges to travel to Turkey for talks. The Telegraph claims “Hostile state linked to Starmer firebombs”. The i reports “New migrant rules boost UK hopes of softer Brexit deal”. The FT says “Beijing fears over UK-US trade accord cloud London’s bid to revive China ties”.The Mail leads on the quashing of Peter Sullivan’s conviction with “28 years in jail for a murder he didn’t commit”. The Mirror follows the same story with “Cleared after 38 years”. Finally the Times reports “Weight-loss drugs hailed as key to a longer life”.Today in FocusView image in fullscreenTrump’s ex-Russia adviser on the prospect of WW3Defence expert Fiona Hill on why the world becomes more dangerous when international systems break down.Cartoon of the day | Rebecca HendinView image in fullscreenThe UpsideA bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all badView image in fullscreenJennifer Hobson describes finding an adult grey seal named Pinkafo, close to death with a flying ring toy caught round her neck, as a moment that “broke my heart”. But it was a moment that changed her life too.Seven years on, Hobson is a leading seal welfare campaigner and author whose work has been recognised by the prime minister and led to retailers changing their product line to remove the potentially lethal rings. On 26 May, she will lead a national campaign to raise further awareness of their dangers. “Everyone can learn how to protect seals by swapping flying rings for seal-safe solid flying discs this summer,” she says.And as for Pinkafo? Thanks to Hobson’s intervention, she survived – and is believed to have later given birth.Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every SundayBored at work?And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.

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    Trump news at a glance: president gives Syria ‘chance at greatness’ with promise of sanctions relief

    Donald Trump has announced plans to lift sanctions on Syria after holding talks with Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, describing it as an effort to “give them a chance at greatness”.The announcement came as the White House also confirmed that Trump would meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. It would be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva.Sharaa’s pitch to Trump for sanctions relief included access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus, according to sources who spoke to Reuters.“I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness. It’s their time to shine,” Trump said at an investment forum on Tuesday in Riyadh. “We’re taking them all off. Good luck Syria, show us something very special.”Here are the key Trump administration stories of today:Trump announces $142bn US-Saudi arms deal and Syrian sanctions reliefThe United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a $142bn arms deal touted by the White House as the “largest defence sales agreement in history”. Trump announced sanctions relief on Syria alongside the Saudi arms deal, in the first stop of his four-day diplomatic tour to the Gulf states aimed at securing big deals and spotlighting the benefits of Trump’s transactional foreign policy.Read the full storyTop Democrat to obstruct DoJ picks over Trump jet giftThe Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, announced on Tuesday he would obstruct all Trump administration justice department nominations until the White House provided answers about plans to accept a luxury aircraft from Qatar for presidential use.The move has ignited controversy over the constitutional and security implications of accepting a foreign government’s offer to provide what would become the new Air Force One. Schumer called the proposed arrangement “not just naked corruption”, likening it to something so corrupt “that even [Russian president Vladimir] Putin would give a double take”.Read the full storyUS tech firms secure AI deals as Trump tours Gulf statesA swath of US technology firms announced deals in the Middle East as Trump trumpeted $600bn in commitments from Saudi Arabia to American artificial intelligence companies during a tour of Gulf states.Among the biggest deals was a set signed by Nvidia. The company will sell hundreds of thousands of AI chips in Saudi Arabia, with a first tranche of 18,000 of its newest “Blackwell” chips going to Humain, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign-wealth-fund-owned AI startup, Reuters reported. Cisco on Tuesday said it had signed a deal with G42, the AI firm based in the United Arab Emirates, to help the company develop that country’s AI sector.Read the full storyFederal grand jury indicts Wisconsin judge over alleged obstructionA federal grand jury has indicted a Wisconsin judge who was arrested by the FBI last month on allegations that she helped an undocumented immigrant avoid federal authorities.Hannah Dugan, a county circuit court judge in Milwaukee, was charged on Tuesday with concealing a person from arrest and obstruction of proceedings.Read the full storyTrump must realise Putin is an obstacle to peace, Zelenskyy saysVolodymyr Zelenskyy has said he hopes the current period of frantic diplomacy and high-stakes gambits between Russia and Ukraine will end with Trump understanding that Vladimir Putin is the real obstacle to a peace deal.“Trump needs to believe that Putin actually lies. And we should do our part. Sensibly approach this issue, to show that it’s not us that is slowing down the process,” said Zelenskyy, speaking to a small group of journalists, including the Guardian, in his office at the presidential administration in Kyiv.Read the full storyRFK Jr and his grandchildren swam in DC creek contaminated by sewageThe US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, has revealed that he went swimming with his children in a Washington DC creek that authorities have said is toxic due to contamination by an upstream, aging sewer system.The “Make America healthy again” crusader attracted attention for the Mother’s Day dip in Dumbarton Oaks Park with his grandchildren Bobcat and Cassius, which he posted about on X. He was also accompanied by relatives Amaryllis, Bobby, Kick and Jackson.Read the full storyHarvard hit with $450m more in cuts Eight federal agencies will terminate a further $450m in grants to Harvard University, the Trump administration announced on Tuesday, escalating its antagonization of the elite institution over what officials frame as inadequate responses to antisemitism on campus. The latest cuts follow a $2.2bn freeze, bringing total federal penalties against Harvard to $2.65bn.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

    The pace of inflation slowed in April, the month that Donald Trump announced his sweeping “liberation day” tariffs on the US’s largest trading partners. The annual inflation rate was 2.3% in April, down from an annual rate of 2.4% March, according to a new inflation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

    Stars of Trump’s Make America great again movement are speaking out in unambiguous terms against the plan for him to be donated a jet described as a “palace in the sky” and convert it into Air Force One
    Catching up? Here’s what happened on 12 May 2025. More

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    Federal grand jury indicts Wisconsin judge over alleged Ice obstruction

    A federal grand jury has indicted a Wisconsin judge who was arrested by the FBI last month on allegations that she helped an undocumented immigrant avoid federal authorities.Hannah Dugan, a county circuit court judge in Milwaukee, was charged on Tuesday with concealing a person from arrest and obstruction of proceedings, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.Dugan was apprehended in the courthouse where she works in April, sparking public protests and rebukes from lawmakers. Her arrest has escalated a clash between Donald Trump’s administration and local authorities over the Republicans’ sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats have accused the Trump administration of trying to make a national example of Dugan to chill judicial opposition to the crackdown.“Let’s be clear. Trump’s arrest of Judge Dugan in Milwaukee has nothing to do with immigration,” said US senator Bernie Sanders at the time. “It has everything to do with [Trump] moving this country towards authoritarianism.”Prosecutors charged Dugan in April with concealing an individual to prevent arrest and obstruction. In the federal criminal justice system, prosecutors can initiate charges against a defendant directly by filing a complaint or present evidence to a grand jury and let that body decide whether to issue charges.A grand jury still reviews charges brought by complaint to determine whether enough probable cause exists to continue the case as a check on prosecutors’ power. If the grand jury determines there’s probable cause, it issues a written statement of the charges known as an indictment. That’s what happened in Dugan’s case.Dugan faces up to six years in prison if she’s convicted on both counts. Her team of defense attorneys responded to the indictment with a one-sentence statement saying that she maintains her innocence and looks forward to being vindicated in court.Prosecutors say Dugan escorted Eduardo Flores-Ruiz and his lawyer out of her courtroom through a back jury door on 18 April after learning that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents were in the courthouse seeking his arrest.According to court documents, Flores-Ruiz illegally re-entered the US after being deported in 2013. Online state court records show he was charged with three counts of misdemeanor domestic abuse in Milwaukee county in March. He was in Dugan’s courtroom the morning of 18 April for a hearing.Court documents suggest Dugan was alerted to the agents’ presence by her clerk, who was informed by an attorney that the agents appeared to be in the hallway. An affidavit says Dugan was visibly angry over the agents’ arrival and called the situation “absurd” before leaving the bench and retreating to her chambers. She and another judge later approached members of the arrest team in the courthouse with what witnesses described as a “confrontational, angry demeanor”.After a back-and-forth with the agents over the warrant for Flores-Ruiz, Dugan demanded they speak with the chief judge and led them away from the courtroom, according to the affidavit.She then returned to the courtroom and was heard saying words to the effect of “wait, come with me” and ushered Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out through a back jury door typically used only by deputies, jurors, court staff and in-custody defendants, according to the affidavit. Flores-Ruiz was free on a signature bond in the abuse case at the time, according to online state court records.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionFederal agents ultimately captured him outside the courthouse after a foot chase.The state supreme court suspended Dugan from the bench in late April, saying the move was necessary to preserve public confidence in the judiciary. A reserve judge is filling in for her.Dugan’s case is similar to one brought during the first Trump administration against a Massachusetts judge, who was accused of helping a man sneak out of a courthouse back door to evade a waiting immigration enforcement agent. That case was eventually dismissed.She was scheduled to enter a plea on Thursday.The Associated Press contributed reporting More

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    US and Saudi Arabia sign $142bn arms deal as Trump to meet Syrian leader

    The United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a $142bn arms deal touted by the White House as the “largest defence sales agreement in history” in the first stop of Donald Trump’s four-day diplomatic tour to the Gulf states aimed at securing big deals and spotlighting the benefits of Trump’s transactional foreign policy.During the trip, the White House also confirmed that Trump would meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. The informal meeting will be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva.Speaking at an investment forum on Tuesday, Trump said that he planned to lift sanctions on Syria after holding talks with Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness,” Trump said.Sharaa’s pitch to woo the US president offered access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus in exchange for the lifting of US sanctions on Syria.Though the details of the sanctions relief were still unclear, Sharaa’s team in Damascus was celebrating. “This is amazing, it worked,” said Radwan Ziadeh, a Syrian writer and activist who is close to the Syrian president. He shared a picture of an initial mockup of Trump Tower Damascus. “This is how you win his heart and mind,” he said, noting that Sharaa would probably show Trump the design during their meeting in Riyadh on Wednesday.The visit was heavily focused on business interests and securing quick wins – often with characteristic Trumpian embellishment – for the administration. Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed pledged to invest $600bn in the United States during a lunch with Trump, including $20bn in artificial intelligence data centres, purchases of gas turbines and other energy equipment worth $14.2bn, nearly $5bn in Boeing 737-8 jets, and other deals.But details of the specific commitments remained vague, the numbers put out by the White House did not total $600bn, and some of the programs began under Joe Biden’s administration.The White House called the arms deal the “largest defence sales agreement in history” and said that it included plans for more than a dozen US defense companies to sell weapons, equipment and services in the areas of air force advancement and space capabilities, air and missile defense, as well as border and maritime security.The US president was feted with a royal guard as he arrived in Riyadh on Tuesday. Royal Saudi Air Force F-15s escorted Trump’s Air Force One jet as it arrived in Riyadh and Trump sat with Salman in an ornate hall at the Royal Court at Al Yamamah Palace with members of the US and Saudi and business elite. Among them were Elon Musk, prominent figures in AI such as Sam Altman, as well the chief executives of IBM, BlackRock, Citigroup, Palantir and Nvidia, among others.When Salman pledged that Saudi Arabia would invest $600bn in the US economy, Trump smiled and joked that it should be $1tn.The trip is part of a reordering of Middle Eastern politics dominated by Trump’s “America first” platform of prioritising domestic US economic and security interests over foreign alliances and international law. Critics have said that the dealmaking empowers Trump and a coterie of businessmen around the president, and the US president’s family has business interests in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, giving this administration an unprecedented conflict of interest.The most glaring example of the new commoditisation of American foreign policy under Trump has been the proposed gift from the ruling family of Qatar of a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet that the White House said could be converted into a presidential plane and then be given to Trump’s presidential library after he leaves office.The gift has provoked anger from congressional Democrats, one of whom described it as an “aerial palace” and said it would constitute “the most valuable gift ever conferred on a president by a foreign government”.Trump has defended the offer, saying in a post it would “replace the 40 year old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction” and called Democrats asking for an ethics investigation “World Class Losers!!!”The meeting between Trump and Salman was characterised by smiles and friendly backslapping, a sharp contrast to past summits when the Saudi leader was mired in controversy over the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.While his administration touted big deals, Trump also admitted that his geopolitical goals of Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic recognition of Israel would take time due in large part to the Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gaza.“It will be a special day in the Middle East, with the whole world watching, when Saudi Arabia joins us” in the Abraham accords, the Trump administration’s framework for Arab states to recognise Israel, he said. “And I really think it’s going to be something special – but you’ll do it in your own time.”Trump is also due to visit the United Arab Emirates on Thursday before continuing on to Qatar this week.His negotiations in the region have been characterised by big-ticket investment deals, and those appeared to play a role in his reversal of US policy on Syria as well.Sharaa, who is keen to normalise relations with the US, has reportedly offered Trump a number of sweeteners including the Trump tower in Damascus, a demilitarised zone by the Golan Heights that would strengthen Israel’s claim to the territory it has occupied since 1967, diplomatic recognition of Israel, and a profit-sharing deal on resources similar to the Ukraine minerals deal.The idea to offer Trump a piece of real estate with his name on it in the heart of Damascus was thought up by a US Republican senator, who passed on the idea to Sharaa’s team.“Sanctions in Syria are very complicated, but with Trump, he can [get] most of them lifted. It is a great opportunity,” Ziadeh said.The trip is also extraordinary for Trump’s decision not to visit Israel, the US’s closest ally in the region, due to the war in Gaza and Trump’s fraught relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu. Hamas released the last remaining American hostage, Edan Alexander, on the eve of Trump’s visit to the Middle East, in an effort to push Trump to pressure Netanyahu to end the war.Netanyahu doubled down on the war on Tuesday in a show of defiance, saying that any ceasefire would only be “temporary”.“In the coming days, we will enter with full force to complete the operation to defeat Hamas,” he said. “Our forces are there now.”“There will be no situation where we stop the war,” he added. More

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    Chuck Schumer says he’ll obstruct Trump’s justice department picks over Qatar jet gift

    The Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, announced on Tuesday he would obstruct all Trump administration justice department nominations until the White House provides answers about plans to accept a luxury aircraft from Qatar for presidential use.The New York senator declared the hold amid growing controversy over the constitutional and security implications of accepting a foreign government’s offer to provide what would become the new Air Force One.“In light of the deeply troubling news of a possible Qatari-funded Air Force One, and the reports that the attorney general personally signed off on this clearly unethical deal, I am announcing a hold on all DOJ political nominees, until we get more answers,” Schumer said in a Senate floor speech.Schumer called the proposed arrangement “not just naked corruption”, likening it to something so corrupt “that even [Russian president Vladimir] Putin would give a double take”.Though the procedural maneuver cannot completely block nominees, it forces Senate Republicans to use valuable floor time to overcome Democratic opposition through individual confirmation votes.Schumer said he has several demands that must be met before he lifts the blockade, including having the attorney general, Pam Bondi, testify before Congress to explain how accepting such a gift would comply with the US constitution’s emoluments clause, which prohibits presidents from receiving gifts from foreign states without congressional approval.“President Trump has told the American people this is ‘a free jet’. Does that mean the Qataris are delivering a ready-on-day-one plane with all the security measures already built in? If so, who installed those security measures, and how do we know they were properly installed?” Schumer asked.The blocking tactic has also been deployed by Hawaii senator Brian Schatz, who said in February he’d also place a blanket hold on Trump’s nominees to the state department until its attempt to shut USAID was reversed. Under the Biden administration, the Alabama senator Tommy Tuberville held a 10-month hold on military promotions based off the Pentagon’s abortion policy.But the opposition on accepting the plane extends beyond party lines, notably from some pro-Israel Republicans long angered by Qatar’s diplomatic role on Israel’s years-long military campaign in Gaza, and its close communication with Hamas.The Texas senator Ted Cruz, typically aligned with Trump, said on CNBC that the aircraft arrangement “poses significant espionage and surveillance problems”. The West Virginia senator Shelley Moore Capito, part of the Republican leadership, said: “I’d be checking for bugs is what I’d be checking for.”Former US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, who ran against then campaigned for Trump, said the idea of taking gifts from other countries “is never a good practice”.“It threatens intelligence and national security. Especially when that nation supports a terrorist organization,” she wrote on X. “Regardless of how beautiful the plane may be, it opens a door and implies the President and US can be bought.”Even the Senate majority leader, John Thune, acknowledged “there are lots of issues associated with that offer, which I think need to be further talked about”, while Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican senator, suggested: “It would be better if Air Force One were a big, beautiful jet made in the United States of America.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionA spokesperson for the White House accused Democratic leadership of “prioritizing politics over critical DOJ appointments” and “obstructing President Trump’s ‘Make America safe again’ agenda”.Trump previously defended accepting the aircraft before departing for a trip to the Middle East, calling it “a very nice gesture” and suggesting the plane would eventually be housed in his presidential library after its service life.“Now I could be a stupid person and say: ‘Oh no, we don’t want a free plane,’” Trump told reporters at the White House. “I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer.”The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, indicated on Monday that legal details were “still being worked out”, but insisted that “any donation to this government is always done in full compliance with the law”.There are three nominations to the justice department awaiting confirmation, the New York Times reports, with dozens more likely to come down the pipeline. More

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    RFK Jr and his grandchildren swam in DC creek contaminated by sewage

    The US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, has revealed that he went swimming with his children in a Washington DC creek that authorities have said is toxic due to contamination by an upstream, ageing sewer system.The “Make America healthy again” crusader attracted attention for the Mother’s Day dip in Dumbarton Oaks Park with his grandchildren Bobcat and Cassius, which he posted about on X. He was also accompanied by relatives Amaryllis, Bobby, Kick and Jackson.Rock Creek, which runs through the federal park, is described as unsafe for swimming or wading because it acts as a runoff for excess sewage and storm water during rain storms.Studies of streams in the nation’s capital have revealed “chronic elevated levels of Escherichia coli (E coli) contamination that exceeded DC’s surface water quality standards”, according to one published in 2021.The District of Columbia banned swimming in all waterways in 1971, citing “extraordinarily high levels of pollutants from human and animal waste containing bacteria such as salmonella and hepatitis, and viruses”.Separately, the National Park Service has said: “Rock Creek has high levels of bacteria and other infectious pathogens that make swimming, wading, and other contact with the water a hazard to human (and pet) health. All District waterways are subject to a swim ban – this means wading, too!”Part of the issue is that the District’s combined sewer system was developed before 1900, and – like New York City sewage and rain systems – is designed to combine to ease runoff, bypassing water treatment plants.In Washington, according to Open Data DC: “Release of this excess flow is necessary to prevent flooding in homes, basements, businesses, and streets. [Combined sewer overflows] are discharged to the Anacostia River, Rock Creek, Potomac River or tributary waters at CSO outfalls during most moderate rain events.”Kennedy, an avid outdoorsman, had not responded to a request for comment as of publication time, and has not posted on social media about it.In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Kennedy described himself as a “renegade”. Joined by other appointees to the federal health agency – including the TV doctor Mehmet Oz, Marty Makary and Jay Bhattacharya – he said: “The entire leadership of this agency are renegades who are, you know, who are juggernauts against convention and who are trying to look for truth, no matter what the cost.”On Sunday, Kennedy joined Donald Trump to unveil a new administration plan to lower high US prescription drug prices. He thanked the US president for standing “up to the oligarchs” and took aim at Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, who has made drug pricing a signature issue of his political platform.“It’s one of these promises that politicians make to their constituents knowing that they’ll never have to do it,” the former 2024 Democratic turned independent presidential candidate said.Sanders later scoffed at the administration’s plan, saying it “will be thrown out by the courts”.Kennedy is known for taking risks of a biological kind. He admitted to transporting a roadkill bear cub to New York’s Central Park, and his daughter Kick described a childhood adventure when her father transported a rotting whale head on top of their car from Nantucket to their Westchester home.Had Kennedy’s foray into the polluted creek produced ill effects, the probable treatment for E coli poisoning would not necessarily have benefited much from the administration’s drug cost reduction plan. Common antibiotics used to treat E coli infections are typically priced $10 to $30 for a course of treatment. More

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    Trump 2.0 takes quid pro quo fears to new heights with $400m flying grift

    Fox & Friends, the show beamed into millions of rightwing Americans’ homes every morning, is not generally considered to be the place where Donald Trump faces the tough questions. The “& Friends” in the show’s title gives that away.But on Monday morning, the show’s co-host Brian Kilmeade put the billion-dollar question to the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt. News had just broken that Trump had decided to accept a gift of a $400m luxury jumbo jet from the government of Qatar, a petro-state which the president once denounced as a “funder of terrorism”.“Do you worry that, if they give us something like this, they want something in return?” Kilmeade asked.Leavitt swatted the question away, saying that the Qataris knew that Trump “only works with the interests of the American public in mind”. Despite her protestations, the heart of the matter is now out there for all to contemplate: what about the quid pro quo?The avoidance of quid pro quo – of favours granted in return for something, or to put it colloquially, you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours – has been a bedrock of American governance, especially in foreign policy, for decades. It even informed Trump’s first presidency when the Trump Organization, his family business, forewent all foreign deals for the duration.Now he’s back in the Oval Office, all such guardrails separating personal from public gain appear to have been discarded. Since Trump’s second presidential victory in November, the Trump Organization, under the management of his third child Eric, has seen an explosion of activity in the Gulf region.Plans have proliferated for Trump towers and golf resorts in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It would take a bold commentator to suggest that the president’s visit beginning on Tuesday to those same fabulously rich oil nations is purely coincidental.Of all the transactions in the pipeline, the most brazen is the proposed gift of a $400m “palace in the sky” from the Qatari government. It is hard to imagine a clearer violation of the emoluments clause of the constitution which bars federal officials, including the president, from accepting high-value gifts without congressional approval.The Republican senator from Kentucky Rand Paul summed it up. “It’s not like a ride on the plane,” he said. “We are talking about the entire $400m plane.”Trump’s approach in his second term towards such inconveniences as ethical codes and the rule of law has been to dismiss from the leadership of key federal agencies seasoned public servants committed to the US constitution and replace them with loyalists committed to his Make America great again (Maga) mantra. From Trump’s perspective, that may look like an easy fix. But for anyone concerned about quid pro quo it has merely compounded the problem.According to ABC News, Pam Bondi, Trump’s US attorney general and the country’s top law enforcement officer, carried out a legal analysis of the Qatar plane gift that concluded it would be “legally permissible”. That’s all very well. But what about the fact that in the run-up to the 2022 soccer World Cup, Bondi worked as a lobbyist for the Qatari government, receiving from it a handsome $115,000 every month?Quid pro quo over the gift of the Boeing 747-8 jetliner from that same Qatari government is further complicated by the intricate nexus of business deals that Eric Trump is creating at lightning speed through the Gulf region. The first foreign deal secured by the Trump Organization since Trump’s return to the Oval Office in January is in Qatar.The deal is for the construction of a luxury resort and 18-hole golf course outside the Qatari capital, Doha. It will be known as the Trump International Golf Club & Villas.The scheme will be developed by a Qatari company, Qatari Diar, which happens to be owned by the Qatari government. The real estate business was set up by Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and has a government minister chairing its board.That would appear to be a breach of Trump’s second-term promise – already so much weaker than the ethical pledges he made in Trump presidency 1.0 – that the family business would pursue no deals involving foreign governments. The Trump Organization insists the partnership was arranged with a Saudi firm, Dar Global, and not the Qatari company. But that only raises a further issue: Dar Global has close ties with the Saudi royal family.Were that not enough, there’s also the crypto factor. Trump’s venture into the crypto currency business is another whole can of worms, with so many ethical conundrums attached to it that it would keep a conflict of interest investigator busy for years.Suffice to say that the Trump family is betting big on cryptocurrency at the same time that the president is using his executive powers to boost the fledging digital payment system as well as remove regulatory restraints standing in its way.Where are the Trump family’s biggest crypto deals located? In the Gulf states.A fund run by the royal family of UAE recently invested $2bn in a crypto exchange. The fund channeled the money through a new cryptocurrency known as stablecoin that tracks the US dollar.The stablecoin was issued by a cryptocurrency company, World Liberty Financial. It is owned by the Trump family.The front page of World Liberty Financial’s website invites visitors to “meet our team, the passionate minds shaping the future of finance”. Under a beaming photograph of the 47th president are the words: “Donald J Trump, chief crypto advocate”. More

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    Trump’s border intimidation is coming for US citizens too – ask streamer Hasan Piker | Owen Jones

    Where are all the free speech warriors on the right now? Hasan Piker, a popular streamer with 4.5 million followers across YouTube and Twitch, who has been hailed by mainstream publications such as the New Yorker and New York Times as the left’s answer to the deluge of rightwing internet influencers, says he was detained and questioned for hours by border control agents as he re-entered the US (Piker is a US citizen). It is an instructive moment. Countries that behave like this towards political commentators and dissenting voices who are their own citizens are either nakedly authoritarian, or well on the way.Piker was reportedly interrogated at length not just about Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah, but his views on Donald Trump. The 33-year-old pundit – an unapologetic champion of the Palestinian cause – stuck to a message of opposing “endless bloodshed” and siding with civilians. That the biggest progressive streamer in the US was subjected to this experience is emblematic of a phenomenon that requires an accurate and insistent description: it is the biggest assault on free speech in the west since the height of McCarthyism seven decades ago.When foreign-born citizens – including green card holders – began to be detained by US authorities over their opposition to Israel’s genocide, it should have been clear that this was just phase one: US citizens would be next. Sure, Piker wasn’t arrested, but the authorities are pushing the boundaries bit by bit. The numbers of foreign visitors entering the US are falling as it is, undoubtedly driven by fears of a punitive border regime. But Piker’s detention sends a message to Americans with dissenting opinions – not least opponents of Israel’s genocide. The threat of being stopped at the border and subjected to lengthy interrogation simply because of what you think is straightforward political intimidation. It won’t stop there.That the vice-president, JD Vance, railed against Europe for a supposed war on free speech underlines what a sham this favoured narrative of the right always was. Weeks later, his boss announced that universities allowing “illegal” protests would be starved of federal cash – with Columbia University losing $400m despite having clamped down on pro-Palestinian protests – and dissenting students would be variously expelled, arrested, imprisoned or deported. Alas, it was under the Biden administration that the McCarthyite blacklisting-style campaign began, with defenders of Palestinian rights being variously deplatformed, fired and threatened.Indeed, Vance could have noted how European countries such as Germany have assaulted free speech by silencing pro-Palestinian activists: from imposing crippling restrictions on protests and violently assaulting demonstrators to shutting down conferences, sacking people who speak out and now seeking to deport activists, too. Alas, it’s not really free speech that Vance is interested in, but rather advancing far-right politics.If we’re going to discuss who is being stopped at the border, let’s discuss the astonishing 23,380 US citizens who serve in the IDF, according to figures quoted in the Washington Post a year ago. Many of them are undoubtedly committing unspeakable war crimes in Israel’s genocidal onslaught. Yet they are being waved through the border. And that really sums it up. If like Piker, you speak out against genocide, you are liable to be treated as a criminal as you enter your own country. If you’re a US citizen serving in a foreign army committing heinous atrocities, you’re more likely to be treated as a hero. The world is turned on its head.

    Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

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