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      Netanyahu says Israel will ‘stand alone’ as White House says major Rafah invasion wouldn’t help efforts to defeat Hamas – as it happened

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      Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that Israel will “stand alone” if needed in its attempt to defeat Hamas, Reuters reported.Netanyahu’s latest comments come after Biden threatened to stop providing military aid to Israel if Israel launches a major military operation in Rafah.In a statement, Netanyahu said: “If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone. If we need to, we will fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than fingernails.”Netanyahu’s recent remarks signal towards an increased tension between Israel and US as Israel continues its attacks in Gaza.
      Biden last night said the US will stop supplying specific weapons to Israel if it launches a major ground operation in Rafah in Gaza – a move commended by progressive lawmakers like Senator Bernie Sanders and democratic US house representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
      In response, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli officials said Israel will “stand alone” if needed in order to defeat Hamas – a show of blatant disregard for the US, with whom Israel has a historically ironclad relationship.
      Republican house speaker Mike Johnson expressed surprise at Biden’s threat to Israel, saying it was a “complete turn” from his previous positions. Johnson accused Biden of having a “senior moment.”
      Senior Biden administration officials like Mag Gen Patrick Rider of the Pentagon underscored the US’s opposition to Israel’s looming invasion of Rafah. State department spokesperson Matthew Miller said an invasion would not bring security to Israel and could further imperil the lives of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
      That’s it for this blog. Thank you for following along.Rider also added the US would continue to try and ensure humanitarian aid will reach Palestinians by land, sea, and air. Up until now, Israel has placed severe restrictions on humanitarian aid.Earlier this week, the head of the United Nations World Food Program said parts of Gaza have entered a “full-blown famine”.In the Pentagon’s daily press briefing, Mag Gen Patrick Rider was asked why restrictions weren’t placed on these bombs earlier in the conflict, considering the mass civilian loss they are known to inflict.In response, Rider said: “We absolutely do not want to see innocent lives lost in this tragic conflict. We’re going to continue to consult with Israel … and continue to ensure civilian safety is taken into account.”When asked if the Biden administration knew of how many civilian deaths were caused by these 2,000lb US bombs used by Israel, Rider declined to answer.The vast majority of the more than 34,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza so far have been women, children, and other civilians, according to the Gaza health ministry.Israel’s minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has made his position on Biden’s announcement to potentially suspend weapons clear:Democracy for the Arab World Now (Dawn), the organization founded by the late journalist Jamal Khashoggi, issued a statement on Biden’s suspension of massive bombs to Israel, urging the president to do more.Dawn’s advocacy director Raed Jarrar said: “Israel has time and again made clear that it will not heed the gentlest of admonishments from the Biden administration to stop its carnage in Gaza. The Biden administration should abandon wishful notions that it can positively impact Israel’s conduct and focus on ending American complicity in Israel’s war crimes and genocidal policies.”State department spokesperson Matthew Miller addresses Biden’s threats to withhold weapons from Israel in a press briefing.Miller underscores the Biden administration’s opposition to a major Rafah invasion and the belief it will weaken Israeli security, but still supports Israel’s right to defend itself against other threats. He does not clarify if withholding weapons from Israel applies to other threats.He says the amount of civilian lives lost in Gaza is “unacceptable,” but adds Israel has “achieved a great deal of its military objectives” in degrading Hamas.Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that Israel will “stand alone” if needed in its attempt to defeat Hamas, Reuters reported.Netanyahu’s latest comments come after Biden threatened to stop providing military aid to Israel if Israel launches a major military operation in Rafah.In a statement, Netanyahu said: “If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone. If we need to, we will fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than fingernails.”Netanyahu’s recent remarks signal towards an increased tension between Israel and US as Israel continues its attacks in Gaza.White House spokesperson John Kirby emphasized during his Thursday briefing that weapons are still being shipped to Israel.The clarification comes after Biden threatened to pause military aid to Israel if Israel launched a massive military assault in Rafah.Kirby said: “Weapons shipments are still going to Israel. And they’re still getting the vast, vast majority of everything that they need to defend themselves.”From Washington Post reporter John Hudson:Here is more context on the significance and nuances of Biden’s latest decision, from Politico.
      Biden’s “statement was the clearest conditioning of aid that the administration has made since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza”, [Politico’s] Jonathan Lemire and Jennifer Haberkorn write. “And it sent immediate ripples through national politics, with conservatives accusing the president of abandoning a long-held ally and some liberals hailing the pronouncement.”
      It’s hard to overemphasize what a big deal this is. For decades, American presidents from both major parties have supported Israel with few to no questions asked. But Biden and the administration have been increasingly irritated by Netanyahu for months, specifically on the threats to invade Rafah and the number of civilians Israel has killed over the last seven months.
      But there’s more nuance than appears at first blush:
      First: The Israeli military is already in Rafah. They’ve been bombing the area for weeks, but haven’t yet mounted a massive ground invasion. Which is why, as [Politico’s] Erin Banco reports, to “aid groups working in Rafah, the debate over Israel’s military operation in southern Gaza looks like only one thing: semantics.”
      Second: Though Biden made clear that while he would no longer send the IDF weapons they could use in Rafah, the U.S. will continue to send defensive weapons.
      “We’re going to continue to make sure Israel is secure in terms of Iron Dome and their ability to respond to attacks,” Biden told CNN. “But … it’s just wrong. We’re not going to – we’re not going to supply the weapons and artillery shells.”
      At the heart of it, Biden’s warning to Netanyahu is that there are other ways to go after Hamas in Rafah – and those alternatives are the only approaches the White House finds acceptable, a Biden administration official told Playbook last night.
      The White House said that a major invasion of Rafah by Israel would not advance attempts by Israel to defeat Hamas, a spokesperson said on Thursday, Reuters reported.“Smashing into Rafah, in [Biden’s] view, will not advance that objective,” spokesperson John Kirby said in a media briefing.Kirby added that conversations about Rafah between the US and Israel are still ongoing.The latest remarks from Kirby come as Biden and other US officials have repeatedly denounced a military operation in Rafah, noting that such a move would lead to a humanitarian crisis.More Democratic congressmen have supported Biden’s threat to block US weapons to Israel if Israel launches a major military assault in Rafah.US representative Seth Moulton said that he was “more skeptical” of Israel’s plans to invade Rafah after meeting with the Israeli ambassador on Wednesday and supports Biden’s decision, in a post to X.
      I’ve always said that Israel must defeat Hamas. The question is whether invading Rafah ultimately helps or hurts that cause. After meeting with the Israeli Ambassador today for an hour, I’m even more skeptical of their plan. I support President Biden’s decision.
      House speaker Mike Johnson said that he hoped Biden was having a “senior moment” after hearing about his threat to withhold US military aid to Israel.In an interview with Politico Wednesday, Johnson spoke about his reaction to Biden’s latest warning:
      My reaction, honestly, was, ‘Wow, that is a complete turn from what I have been told, even in, you know, recent hours … I mean, 24 hours ago, it was confirmed to me by top administration officials that the policy’s very different than what he stated there. So I hope that’s a senior moment.
      Johnson said that he had had “classified discussions” with “top administration officials” on Wednesday and was told there would be no delays with supplying weapons to Israel.He added that after Biden’s announcement, he approach White House officials who told him that the Biden’s threat does not impact the aid package passed by Congress.Johnson said:
      So this statement by the president tonight, I just want to – I hope, I believe he’s off-script. I don’t think that’s something that staff told him to say.
      US representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, who previously called Israel’s attacks on Gaza an “unfolding genocide”, said that “[Biden]’s historic shift to include Israel in US standards makes the world safer and our values clear.”“President Biden enforcing conditions on US military aid and holding the Israeli gov to the same bar we hold all our allies to is the responsible, secure, and just thing to do,” she added.Other progressive representatives have applauded Biden’s threat to withhold US military aid to Israel if Israel launches a major military operation in Rafah.Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley said Biden’s threat of withholding US military air is the “right and just thing … to do”, in a post to X.“The United States has a clear obligation to stop the massacre of innocent civilians,” she added.Defence minister Yoav Gallant told Israel’s “enemies and friends” on Wednesday that it would do whatever necessary to achieve its war aims in Gaza and the north, in an apparent response to US pressure to halt its operation in Rafah, reports Reuters.The comments, at a ceremony to commemorate Israel’s war dead, followed US president Joe Biden’s warning that the US would halt weapons supplies if Israel moved into Rafah, the southern Gaza city where more than a million displaced Palestinians are sheltering.“I turn to Israel’s enemies as well as to our best of friends and say – the State of Israel cannot be subdued,” he said, according to remarks released by his office. “We will stand strong, we will achieve our goals – we will hit Hamas, we will hit Hezbollah, and we will achieve security.”The comments, from one of the war cabinet ministers considered to be most sensitive to the risk of alienating the US, underlined the scale of the standoff between the Biden administration and the Israeli government, said Reuters.“We have no choice, we have no other country. We will do whatever is necessary, and I repeat – whatever is necessary, in order to defend the citizens of Israel, to remove the evil threats against us, and to stand up to those who attempt to destroy us,” he said.Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has defied mounting international pressure to agree to a ceasefire but has not so far ordered troops to enter Rafah, where Israel says four battalions of Hamas fighters are based.In the north, Israeli forces have been engaged in exchanges of fire across the Lebanon border with forces of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia ever since the start of the war in Gaza last October.Other Israeli officials have vowed to pursue Israel’s military goals in Gaza despite Biden’s threat to cut off US weapons if Israel launches a major military assault on Rafah.Israel’s far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said his government would pursue its goals in Gaza despite the US warning, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).“We will achieve complete victory in this war despite President Biden’s push back and arms embargo,” Smotrich said in a statement.“We must continue the war until Hamas is totally eliminated and our hostages are back home. This involves conquering Rafah completely and the sooner the better.”Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, also criticized Biden’s remarks, noting that Biden’s latest warning could give Israel’s adversaries “hope to succeed”.“If Israel is restricted from entering an area as important and central as Rafah where there are thousands of terrorists, hostages and leaders of Hamas, how exactly are we supposed to achieve our goals?” he said on public radio.“This is not a defensive weapon. This is about certain offensive bombs. In the end the State of Israel will have to do what it thinks needs to be done for the security of its citizens.”Progressive representative Ilhan Omar acknowledged the work of student protesters after Biden said that US bombs supplied to Israel have been used to kill civilians in Gaza.In a post to X, Omar said that “young people across the country protesting” helped move Biden’s rhetoric. Omar specifically highlighted Biden saying that “civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs”, referring to US bombs supplied to Israel.Omar said:
      This is what young people across the country were protesting for and finally the needle has moved in a significant way. I hope we see more progress, but don’t ever let people tell you that your voices are meaningless and your actions are worthless. The arc of what is possible is always within us to bend.
      Omar’s remarks are one of many reactions from progressive lawmakers at Biden’s threat to stop arm shipments to Israel if there is a major military assault in Rafah.Progressive lawmakers welcomed Joe Biden’s decision that the US will stop supplying bombs and other munitions to Israel if it launches a major military assault on the southern city of Rafah in Gaza.US representative Mark Pocan of Wisconsin celebrated the announcement in a post to X.“No offensive weapons in Rafah. Good! Thank you [Biden]! Millions of innocent Palestinians have been forced into a corner. Now it’s time for a ceasefire and to release all the hostages. It’s time to end the bloodshed once and for all.”Former Bernie Sanders adviser Matt Duss told Politico: “He’s shifting on a really important point here because the moment requires it, and I applaud that. It’s a recognition of how dire this moment is.” He added: “I understand folks who are having a tough time with the fact that this took so long, but I think it’s really important, you know, to acknowledge the steps the president is taking now.”Republicans, including the House speaker, Mike Johnson, have criticized Biden’s latest action. Johnson called the decision a “betrayal” as the question of military aid had already been voted on in Congress.Two top Israeli officials criticized US president Joe Biden on Thursday for threatening to stop certain arms supplies to Israel if it invades Rafah, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).“This is a difficult and very disappointing statement to hear from a president to whom we have been grateful since the beginning of the war,” Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, said on public radio in Israel’s first reaction to Biden’s warning.Biden’s announcement comes as the US, UN and humanitarian agencies have warned that an invasion of Rafah – where millions of Palestinian people have been displaced amid Israeli attacks – would trigger a humanitarian crisis.“I made it clear that if they go into Rafah – they haven’t gone in Rafah yet – if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities – that deal with that problem,” Biden said during an interview with CNN.“We’re not going to supply the weapons and the artillery shells used,” Biden added. More

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      ‘Madman in a circular room screaming’: ex-aide’s verdict on Trump in book

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      Donald Trump’s defense secretary called him “a madman in a circular room screaming” and stayed away from the White House, a new book quotes a senior Trump aide as saying regarding the man now facing 88 criminal charges but set to be the Republican presidential nominee for a third successive election.“Anybody with sense – somebody like Mattis or Tillerson – they immediately shunned and stayed away from Trump,” Tom Bossert, formerly homeland security adviser to Trump, tells George Stephanopoulos in the ABC News anchor’s new book, The Situation Room: The Inside Story of Presidents in Crisis.“I mean, you couldn’t get Mattis into the White House,” Bossert says. “His view was, ‘That’s a madman in a circular room screaming. And the less time I spend in there, the more time I can just go about my business.’”Stephanopoulos’s book is a survey of how presidents have used the White House Situation Room, “the epicentre of crisis management for presidents for more than six decades”. Co-written with Lisa Dickey, a prolific ghostwriter who has also worked with the first lady, Jill Biden, and the governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, the book will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy.James Mattis, a retired US Marine Corps general, was Trump’s first defense secretary. Rex Tillerson, an oil industry executive, was Trump’s first secretary of state. Both were among so-called “adults in the room” who famously sought to contain Trump.Mattis’s frustrations and ultimate opposition to Trump’s re-election are widely known. Tillerson was reported to have called Trump a “fucking moron”. Trump fired him by tweet.Bossert worked in the Trump White House for 15 months, from the inauguration in 2017 to his resignation in April 2018. He is now an analyst for ABC News. He and other former aides tell Stephanopoulos Trump avoided Situation Room briefings – which his predecessor, Barack Obama, consumed – because, in Bossert’s words, “He didn’t like the idea that he had to go into it. He wanted everybody to come to him.”Bossert also says Trump had Situation Room aides produce “books of chyron prints” – a way to boil down cable news to the messages displayed at the bottom of screens. Stephanopoulos and Hickey call this “surely one of the most prosaic tasks ever required of the highly trained intelligence officers serving in the White House”.Though Bossert’s White House tasks including advising the president on cyber security, in August 2017 it was revealed that he gave his personal email address to a British prankster pretending to be Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and chief adviser.Still, Bossert was a strong advocate of cracking down on leaks and leakers. In March 2017, he made headlines by calling people who leaked government secrets “enemies to our state”, adding: “They need to be caught, punished, and treated as such.”Throughout his presidency, Trump fumed about leaks, both of sensitive information and regarding his chaotic White House.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn summer 2020, as protesters for racial justice came close to White House grounds and Trump was reported to have been hurried to a protective bunker, Trump reportedly called those who leaked the story treasonous and said they should be executed.Trump was said to have become “obsessed” with finding leakers. But Trump has long been known to be a prolific leaker himself.Bossert tells Stephanopoulos: “I caught him doing it. I was walking out of the room, and he picks up the phone before I’m out of earshot and starts talking to a reporter about what just happened. And I turned around and pointed right at him. ‘Who in the hell are you talking to?’”Trump, the authors say, “essentially shrugged, seemingly unbothered”.“He does it, so he assumed everybody was that way,” Bossert says. “His paranoia was in part because he assumes everyone else acts like he acts.” More

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      House quashes Marjorie Taylor Greene motion to oust speaker Mike Johnson

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      The House easily quashed Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s resolution to oust the Republican speaker, Mike Johnson, on Wednesday, as members of both parties came together in a rare moment of bipartisanship to keep the chamber open for business.The vote on the motion to table Greene’s resolution was 359 to 43, as 196 Republicans and 163 Democrats supported killing the proposal.Greene took to the House floor on Wednesday evening to announce her plans, prompting boos from fellow Republicans present in the chamber. Her request triggered a countdown clock, as House rules stipulated that members had to vote on the matter within two legislative days. House Republicans chose to take up the matter immediately, as the resolution was widely expected to fail.House Democratic leaders previously indicated that they would vote to kill Greene’s resolution, and the vast majority of their caucus took the same position on Wednesday. However, 32 Democrats and 11 Republicans opposed the motion to table the resolution, and seven members voted “present”.Speaking to reporters after the vote, Johnson thanked his colleagues for helping him to hold on to a post he has held for six and a half months.“I want to say that I appreciate the show of confidence from my colleagues to defeat this misguided effort. That is certainly what it was,” Johnson said. “As I’ve said from the beginning and I’ve made clear here every day, I intend to do my job. I intend to do what I believe to be the right thing, which is what I was elected to do, and I’ll let the chips fall where they may. In my view, that is leadership.”Greene’s maneuver appeared to catch many Republicans off guard, after the hard-right congresswoman spent much of the past few days meeting with Johnson to address her concerns about his leadership. She has repeatedly criticized Johnson for passing significant bills, including a government funding proposal and a foreign aid package, by relying on Democratic support.Greene had said she would force a vote on the motion to vacate this week, but she appeared to back away from that commitment on Tuesday.“We’ll see. It’s up to Mike Johnson,” Greene told reporters when asked if she still planned to demand the vote. “Obviously, you can’t make things happen instantly, and we all are aware and understanding of that. So now the ball is in his court, and he’s supposed to be reaching out to us – hopefully soon.”Donald Trump, who has voiced support for Johnson in recent weeks, reportedly called Greene over the weekend, but she would not disclose details about the call to reporters.“I have to tell you, I love President Trump. My conversations with him are fantastic,” Greene said. “And again, I’m not going to go into details. You want to know why? I’m not insecure about that.”Even though her motion to vacate overwhelmingly failed, Greene and her allies already appear poised to turn the issue into a litmus test for fellow Republican members. Congressman Thomas Massie, a co-sponsor of Greene’s resolution, shared a picture on X of the 11 Republicans who voted against the motion to table.“It’s a new paradigm in Congress,” Massie said. “[Former Democratic speaker] Nancy Pelosi, and most [Republicans] voted to keep Uniparty Speaker Mike Johnson. These are the eleven, including myself, who voted NOT to save him.”View image in fullscreenThe Republicans who rallied around Johnson returned the fire by accusing Greene and her allies of promoting chaos in the House. The episode came less than a year after the ouster of former Republican speaker Kevin McCarthy, which brought the chamber to a standstill for weeks until Johnson’s election.Congressman Mike Lawler, who faces a tough reelection campaign in New York this November, told reporters on Wednesday: “This type of tantrum is absolutely unacceptable, and it does nothing to further the cause of the conservative movement. The only people who have stymied our ability to govern are the very people that have pulled these types of stunts throughout the course of this Congress to undermine the House Republican majority.”Congressman Sean Casten, an Illinois Democrat, offered a more concise and cutting assessment. Writing on X, he said of Greene: “She is so, so dumb. And yet she keeps talking.” More

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      Pete McCloskey, Republican who tried to unseat Richard Nixon, dies aged 96

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      Pete McCloskey, a pro-environment, anti-war California Republican who co-wrote the Endangered Species Act and co-founded Earth Day, has died. He was 96.A fourth-generation Republican “in the mold of Teddy Roosevelt”, he often said, McCloskey represented the 12th congressional district for 15 years, running for president against an incumbent Richard Nixon in 1972.He battled party leaders while serving seven terms in Congress and went on to publicly disavow the GOP in his later years.Years after leaving Washington, McCloskey made one last bid for elective office in 2006 when he challenged Richard Pombo of northern California’s 11th district in a primary race that McCloskey described as “a battle for the soul of the Republican party”.After losing to Pombo, who had spent most of his tenure in Washington attempting to undo the Endangered Species Act, he threw his support behind Democrat Jerry McNerney, the eventual winner.“It was foolish to run against him [Pombo], but we didn’t have anybody else to do it, and I could not stand what a––– they’d become,” the frank-talking former Marine colonel said of the modern GOP in a 2008 interview with the Associated Press.McCloskey cited disillusionment from influence peddling and ethics scandals under the George W Bush administration as reasons why he switched parties in 2007 at the age of 79.“A pox on them and their values,” he wrote in an open letter explaining the switch to his supporters.Born in Loma Linda, California, on 29 September 1927as Paul Norton McCloskey Jr, he graduated from South Pasadena high school, where the second baseman made the school’s baseball hall of fame, although he self-deprecatingly called himself “perhaps the worst player on the baseball team”.He earned a law degree from Stanford University and founded an environmental law firm in Palo Alto before making the move to public office. In 1967, he defeated fellow Republican Shirley Temple Black and Democrat Roy Archibald in a special election for the San Mateo county congressional seat.The left-leaning McCloskey had a thundering presence in Washington, attempting to get onto the floor of the 1972 Republican national convention during his bid to unseat then president Nixon on an anti-Vietnam War platform. He ultimately was blocked by a rule written by his friend and law school debate partner, John Ehrlichman, that said a candidate could not get to the floor with fewer than 25 delegates. McCloskey had one.Still, McCloskey loved to say he finished second.He would later visit Ehrlichman in prison, where Nixon’s former counsel served 1.5 years for conspiracy, perjury and obstruction of justice in the Watergate break-in that led to the president’s resignation.While in office, McCloskey also was known for befriending Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and criticized Israeli influence on US politics. The congressman was the first to demand Nixon’s impeachment, and the first to demand a repeal of the Gulf of Tonkin resolution that allowed the Vietnam war.But his enduring legacy is the Endangered Species Act, which protects species designated as endangered or threatened and conserves the ecosystems on which they depend. McCloskey co-wrote the legislation in 1973, after a campaign by young people empowered by Earth Day activities successfully unseated seven of 12 Congress members known as “the Dirty Dozen” for their anti-environment votes.“On that day, the world changed,” McCloskey recalled in 2008. “Suddenly, everybody was an environmentalist. My Republican colleagues started asking me for copies of old speeches I had given on water and air quality.”After 15 years in the House, he lost his run for a Senate seat to Republican Pete Wilson, who went on to be California’s governor. He moved back to rural Yolo county, relishing the life of a farmer and part-time attorney.“You know, if people call you ‘congressman’ all the time, you’ll end up thinking you’re smarter than you are,” he said.McCloskey is survived by his wife, Helen – his longtime press secretary whom he married in 1978 – and four children by his first wife: Nancy, Peter, John and Kathleen. More

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      US public school officials push back in congressional hearing on antisemitism

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      Some of America’s top school districts rebuffed charges of failing to counteract a surge of antisemitism on Wednesday in combative exchanges with a congressional committee that has been at the centre of high-profile interrogations of elite university chiefs.Having previously grilled the presidents of some of the country’s most prestigious seats of higher learning in politically charged settings, the House of Representatives’ education and workforce subcommittee switched the spotlight to the heads of three predominantly liberal school districts with sizable Jewish populations.The hearing was presented as an investigation into how the authorities were safeguarding Jewish staff and students in an atmosphere of rising bigotry against the backdrop of Israel’s war in Gaza.Calling the need for the hearing “a travesty”, Republican member Aaron Bean from Florida said 246 “very vile” antisemitic acts had been reported in the three districts – in New York City, Montgomery county in Maryland and Berkeley in California – since last October’s attack by Hamas on Israel.“Antisemitism is repugnant in all its forms but the topic of today’s hearing is pretty troubling,” he said. “It’s hard to grasp how antisemitism has become such a force in our kindergarten-through-12 [high] schools.”He cited instances of students marching through corridors chanting “kill the Jews”, a pupil caught on a security camera imitating Hitler and performing the Nazi salute, and Jewish children being told to pick up pennies.The three districts insisted in response that they did not tolerate antisemitism in their schools. They said they had taken educational and disciplinary steps to combat antisemitism following the 7 October attack, which led to an Israeli military offensive in Gaza that has triggered a wave of demonstrations on university campuses and beyond.However, the districts gave divergent answers on whether teachers had been fired for actions deemed antisemitic. Each district has received complaints over their handling of post-7 October allegations of antisemitism.David Banks, the chancellor of the New York City school system, engaged in a testy exchange with Republicans over an episode at Hillcrest high school, whose principal had been removed following a protest against a pro-Israel teacher but had been reassigned to an administrative role rather than fired.The Republican representative, Elise Stefanik – noted for her pointed questioning of three university presidents over free speech at a previous hearing last December – sparred with Banks and accused the school leaders of paying “lip service”.Banks stood his ground and appeared to challenge the committee, saying: “This convening feels like the ultimate ‘gotcha’ moment. It doesn’t sound like people trying to solve for something we actually solve for.”He added: “We cannot simply discipline our way out of this problem. The true antidote to ignorance and bias is to teach.”Banks said his district had “terminated people” over antisemitism.Karla Silvestre, president of Montgomery county public schools in Maryland – which includes schools in suburbs near Washington – said no teacher had been fired, prompting Bean to retort: “So you allow them to continue to teach hate?”Enikia Ford Morthel, superintendent of the Berkeley unified school district in California, said her authority’s adherence to state and federal privacy laws precluded her from giving details on disciplinary measures taken against staff and students.“As a result, some believe we do nothing. This is not true,” she said.“Since October 7, our district has had formal complaints alleging antisemitism arising from nine incidents without our jurisdiction. However, antisemitism is not pervasive in Berkeley unified school district.”Echoing previous hearings that featured the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Columbia, Bean asked all three district heads whether they considered the slogan “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” antisemitic.Each said yes, although Silvestre and Morthel qualified this by saying their affirmation was dependent on whether it meant the elimination of the Jewish population in Israel – an interpretation disputed by many pro-Palestinian campaigners. Bean said tersely: “It does.”Responding to the three opening statements, Bean said: “Congratulations. You all have done a remarkable job testifying. But just like some college presidents before you that sat in the very same seat, they also in many instances said the right thing. They said they were protecting students when they were really not.”The subcommittee’s ranking Democrat, Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon, accused Republicans of being selective in their stance against antisemitism, singling out the notorious white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, whose participants chanted “Jews will not replace us”. The then president Donald Trump later said the rally included some “very fine people” .She described one of those who took part, Nick Fuentes, as a “vile antisemite … who denied the scope of the Holocaust”, but noted that Trump hosted him at his Mar-a-Lago retreat in Florida in November 2022.“I will offer my colleagues on the other side of the aisle the opportunity to condemn these previous comments,” Bonamici said. “ Does anyone have the courage to stand up against this?”When committee members remained silent, she said: “Let the record show that no one spoke at this time.” More

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      Peta unveils Kristi Noem ‘ghoulish monster’ Halloween costume

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      Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor and Republican vice-presidential hopeful, is “scarier than any horror movie villain”, the animal rights pressure group Peta said as it unveiled a Halloween costume inspired by Noem’s stunning campaign-book admission that she once shot an “untrainable” 14-month-old dog called Cricket.“Anyone cruel enough to blow a rambunctious puppy’s brains out instead of attempting to train her or find her a more responsible guardian is scarier than any horror-movie villain,” said Ingrid Newkirk, president of Peta.“With Peta Kristi Noem costume, dog lovers everywhere can strike terror in their friends as the most ghoulish monster at their Halloween party.”Halloween is more than five months away but Peta said it was taking orders for the costume, which costs $79.99 and includes “a mask of Noem’s face with devil horns and a camo hat imprinted with ‘Noem: Puppy Killer’, a fake gun, and the pièce de résistance: a stuffed dog to ‘bite’ the neck of the wearer, adorned with a bandanna that reads, ‘Take a Bite out of Cruelty.’”Noem describes killing Cricket – and an unnamed goat she deemed too aggressive – in her book, No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong With Politics and How We Move America Forward.The Guardian first reported the remarkable tale of gravel-pit slaughter, thereby lighting the match on a political explosion widely held to have wrecked any chance Noem had of being named running mate to Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president.Noem has repeatedly defended her decision to kill Cricket the dog and the unnamed goat, as representative of her willingness to do unpleasant things in farm life and thus in politics.She has also rebuffed questions about what appears, later in the book, to be a threat to kill Commander, Joe Biden’s dog which was sent away from the White House after more than 20 biting incidents.This week, Politico reported that editors and advisers stopped Noem including the story in a previous book, because they insisted it would damage her image.Peta said it “urges everyone to consider whether they have the time, patience, and other resources necessary to socialise and train a dog before adding one to the family.“Humane dog training uses only positive reinforcement – never fear, intimidation, or painful methods such as shock collars, which Noem admits to having used on Cricket prior to killing her.” More

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      US says hold on weapons delivery won’t be a one-off if Israel presses ahead with Rafah city offensive – as it happened

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      US officials are making clear today that the hold put on a delivery of US-made bombs last week would not be a one-off if Israel presses ahead with an offensive on Rafah city but would be the start of a major pivot in the US-Israel relationship.Arms deliveries that have already been approved could be delayed, and shipments waiting for approval could also face obstacles.The Biden administration refuses to use the phrase “red line”, but it is making clear that the US president was serious when he told Benjamin Netanyahu in a call on 4 April that an attack on Rafah would lead to a major re-evaluation of the relationship.Although the paused shipment included huge 2000lb bombs, administration officials insist that they were not selected because of legal concerns about their use in a densely populated area (as Israel has done frequently over the course of this war) could constitute a war crime. This was a policy decision, they say, not a legal one.Here is a wrap-up of the day’s key events:
      The Republican House judiciary committee has referred Michael Cohen to the Department of Justice for prosecution. In a letter to Merrick Garland, the US attorney general, Jim Jordan and James Comer, chairs of the judiciary committee as well as the oversight and accountability committee, wrote: “Cohen’s testimony is now the basis for a politically motivated prosecution of a former president and current declared candidate for that office.”
      The US state department spokesperson, Matthew Miller, has confirmed that the US has paused a shipment of weapons to Israel and is “reviewing others”. Miller, at briefing today, cited “the way Israel has conducted its operations in the past” as well as concerns about Israel’s actions in Rafah, Channel 4 News’s Siobhan Kennedy reported.
      US officials are making clear today that the hold put on a delivery of US-made bombs last week would not be a one-off if Israel presses ahead with an offensive on Rafah, but would be the start of a major pivot in the US-Israel relationship. Arms deliveries that have already been approved could be delayed, and shipments waiting for approval could also face obstacles.
      Following the Biden administration’s decision to pause a weapons shipment to Israel over its plans for a Rafah invasion, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont said: “Given the unprecedented humanitarian disaster that Netanyahu’s war has created in Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of children face starvation, President Biden is absolutely right to halt bomb delivery to this extreme, rightwing Israeli government. But this must be a first step.”
      Georgia’s state court of appeals has granted Donald Trump’s request to consider the disqualification of Fani Willis, the district attorney who brought the 2020 election interference charges against Trump. According to a notice, the court said that it had granted the appeal request and ordered Trump’s legal team to file a notice of appeal in the next 10 days, NBC reports.
      Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell refused to comment on Donald Trump’s ongoing criminal trial surrounding his hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, McConnell said: “I’m not going to be commenting on the presidential election … I’m going to concentrate on trying to turn this job over to the next majority leader of the Senate.”
      Robert F Kennedy Jr, the third-party presidential candidate, said a health problem he experienced in 2010 “was caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died”, according to a report. In a divorce case deposition from 2012 the New York Times said it obtained, Kennedy said he experienced “memory loss and mental fogginess so severe that a friend grew concerned he might have a brain tumor”.
      That’s it as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.Vermont senator Bernie Sanders and California’s Democratic representative Ro Khanna have revealed a bill aimed at cancelling all medical debt.The Guardian’s Joan Greve reports:The bill, introduced with Oregon senator Jeff Merkley and Michigan congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, would create a federal grant program to cancel all existing patient debt and amend the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act to block creditors from collecting past medical bills.The legislation would also update billing requirements for medical providers and alter the Consumer Credit Reporting Act to prevent credit agencies from reporting information related to unpaid medical bills, alleviating the risk of such debt damaging patients’ credit histories.Sanders and Khanna described the legislation as vital for many families’ financial security, as millions of Americans struggle with the burden of medical debt. According to a 2022 investigation by NPR and KFF Health News, more than 100 million Americans, including 41% of adults, hold some kind of healthcare debt. A KFF analysis of the Census Bureau’s survey of income and program participation suggests that Americans owe at least $220bn in medical debt.Read the full story here:Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has refused to comment on Donald Trump’s ongoing criminal trial surrounding his hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels.Speaking to reporters on Wednesday in response to whether Trump’s ongoing trial would give him pause over his support for Trump as president, McConnell said:
      I’m not going to be commenting on the presidential election … I’m going to concentrate on trying to turn this job over to the next majority leader of the Senate.”
      Here are further details on the US signaling to Israel potential future pauses in arms shipments over Israel’s planned invasion of Rafah:US officials have signalled to Israel that more arms shipments could be delayed if the Israeli military pushes ahead with an offensive in Rafah, Gaza, in what would mark the start of a major pivot in relations between the two countries.Lloyd Austin, the US defence secretary, confirmed on Wednesday that the Biden administration had paused the supply of thousands of large bombs to Israel, in opposition to apparent moves by the Israelis to invade the city.“We’ve been very clear … from the very beginning that Israel shouldn’t launch a major attack into Rafah without accounting for and protecting the civilians that are in that battle space,” Austin told a Senate hearing.“And again, as we have assessed the situation, we have paused one shipment of high payload munitions,” he said, adding: “We’ve not made a final determination on how to proceed with that shipment.”Read the full story here:The Republican House judiciary committee has referred Michael Cohen to the Department of Justice for prosecution.In a letter to the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, Jim Jordan and James Comer, chairs of the judiciary committee as well as the oversight and accountability committee, wrote:
      Cohen’s testimony is now the basis for a politically motivated prosecution of a former president and current declared candidate for that office.
      In light of the reliance on the testimony from this repeated liar, we reiterate our concerns and ask what the justice department has done to hold Cohen accountable for his false statements to Congress.
      The referral comes as Cohen, once a personal lawyer and fixer for Donald Trump, is expected to testify in the former president’s hush money criminal trial in New York as the prosecutors’ star witness.The US state department spokesperson, Matthew Miller, has confirmed that the US has paused a shipment of weapons to Israel and is “reviewing others”.Miller, at briefing today, cited “the way Israel has conducted its operations in the past” as well as concerns about Israel’s actions in Rafah, Channel 4 News’ Siobhan Kennedy reported.Even though Israel has said the Rafah operation is limited in scope, “intent is one thing, results are another”, Miller told reporters, adding:
      The results have been far too many innocent civilians dying … That’s why we have such grave concerns.
      Miller also said the state department will not be delivering its report to Congress on whether Israel has violated international humanitarian law during its war in Gaza, CNN reported. He added:
      We expect to deliver it in the very near future, in the coming days.
      Former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley won more than 20% of the votes in Indiana’s Republican presidential primary on Tuesday, months after she dropped out of the race.Haley announced she was suspending her presidential campaign in March after being soundly defeated by Donald Trump on Super Tuesday, but her continued support shows persistent discontent among GOP voters with the former president. Haley has not endorsed Trump.Haley’s support was largest in Indiana’s urban and suburban counties, AP reported. She won 35% of the vote in Indianapolis’s Marion county and more than one-third of the vote in suburban Hamilton county.Robert F Kennedy Jr, the third-party presidential candidate, said a health problem he experienced in 2010 “was caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died”, according to a report.In a divorce case deposition from 2012 the New York Times said it obtained, Kennedy said he experienced “memory loss and mental fogginess so severe that a friend grew concerned he might have a brain tumour”.Neurologists who treated Kennedy’s uncle, the Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy, before his death aged 77 from brain cancer in 2009, told the younger man he had a dark spot on his brain scans, and concluded he too had a tumor. But, Kennedy reportedly said, a doctor at New York-Presbyterian hospital posited another explanation: a parasite in Kennedy’s brain. In the 2012 deposition, Kennedy reportedly said:
      I have cognitive problems, clearly. I have short-term memory loss, and I have longer-term memory loss that affects me.
      In his recent interview, the Times said, Kennedy said he had recovered from such problems. The paper also said Kennedy’s spokesperson, Stefanie Spear, responded to a question about whether the candidate’s health problems could compromise his fitness to be president by saying:
      That is a hilarious suggestion, given the competition.
      A growing number of Republican lawmakers are pushing to require a citizenship question on the questionnaire for the census, and exclude non-US citizens from the results that determine each state’s share of House seats and electoral college votes.The GOP-led House is expected to vote today on the Equal Representation Act which calls for leaving out “individuals who are not citizens of the United States.” The bill is unlikely to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate and is opposed by the White House.The proposal has set off alarms among redistricting experts, civil rights groups and Democratic lawmakers, and comes as Republicans make immigration a key campaign issue ahead of the November elections.“It’s taking it closer to reality than it has ever been,” a former census official told AP.
      This is part of a cohesive strategy in the GOP … of getting every single possible advantage when the country is so closely divided.
      The 14th amendment says the “whole number of persons in each state” should be counted during the apportionment process. Besides helping allocate congressional seats and electoral college votes, census figures guide the distribution of $2.8tn in federal money.US officials are making clear today that the hold put on a delivery of US-made bombs last week would not be a one-off if Israel presses ahead with an offensive on Rafah city but would be the start of a major pivot in the US-Israel relationship.Arms deliveries that have already been approved could be delayed, and shipments waiting for approval could also face obstacles.The Biden administration refuses to use the phrase “red line”, but it is making clear that the US president was serious when he told Benjamin Netanyahu in a call on 4 April that an attack on Rafah would lead to a major re-evaluation of the relationship.Although the paused shipment included huge 2000lb bombs, administration officials insist that they were not selected because of legal concerns about their use in a densely populated area (as Israel has done frequently over the course of this war) could constitute a war crime. This was a policy decision, they say, not a legal one. More

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      in US Politics

      Trump has yet to decide his VP pick – and it’s turning into a pageant of its own

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      Hello there, and welcome to the Guardian’s brand new US election newsletter. I hope you’re having a nice week.It’s less than six months until election day, and Donald Trump, when he’s not in court or looking at racing cars, is spending time weighing his vice-presidential pick. It’s becoming quite the spectacle.But first, some of the happenings in US politics.Here’s what you need to know …1. I don’t feel so goodDonald Trump’s trial over hush-money payments to an adult film star saw Stormy Daniels recall her sexual encounter with the president in front of a presumably nauseous Manhattan courtroom. Will this trial – and the three others he faces – torpedo Trump’s election chances? One poll this week found that it will depend on whether he is convicted. About 80% of Trump’s supporters would definitely stick with him if he becomes a felon, while 16% would “reconsider” their support. Just 4% say they would definitely ditch him.2. Biden gives antisemitism speechIn a speech on Tuesday at a Holocaust remembrance event, Joe Biden condemned what he called the “ferocious surge of antisemitism in America and around the world”, amid widespread student protests over American support for Israel’s war on Gaza. Thousands of students have been arrested around the US, during a frequently militaristic police response. Republicans have tried to use the unrest to paint Biden as weak and sow division among Democratic voters.3. TikTok hits back after US government crackdownTikTok and its parent company are suing the US government after Biden signed bipartisan legislation which could potentially ban the app from the US if it is not sold to another owner. It comes as Russian state-affiliated accounts have used TikTok to draw attention to Biden’s age and immigration policies. Critics have said ByteDance, TikTok’s China-based parent company, could also collect sensitive information about Americans. But others – including TikTok – say the US is unfairly singling out the social media platform, potentially hurting free speech and independent content makers. The debacle is fraught in an election year when many young people get news from TikTok, and Biden himself has a campaign account.Eeny, meeny, miny, moeView image in fullscreenThe election is in November, and Donald Trump has yet to decide on his vice-presidential candidate. That’s not unusual – assuming he’s not in prison by then, he’s got plenty of time – but what is kind of new is the very public auditioning for the role.Trump summoned several of the candidates to Mar-a-Lago over the weekend, where he forced them to parade around on stage, in what sounds like a version of the Miss Universe competition he used to haunt.But the contenders, who range from long-time sycophants to more recent converts, have been doing some parading of their own.Marco Rubio, the Florida senator who ran for president against Trump in 2016 (Trump dubbed him “Little Marco”, Rubio suggested Trump had a small penis, but the two have since made up) has been near-ever present on TV in recent weeks, as has Elise Stefanik, a New York congresswoman who was once seen as a sober legislator, but has since evolved into a Trump disciple.Doug Burgum – recently dubbed “less interesting than a wooden post” – and Tim Scott, who both ran against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination this year, have also been showing up on TV shows to defend Trump’s legal entanglements and threats to undermine the election.There’s also JD Vance, a big-faced beardy man who once believed Trump to be an “idiot” but has since changed his mind, and Byron Donalds, who with Scott is one of the five Black Republicans in Congress.One thing appears to be certain: it will not be Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor who has dominated headlines after admitting that she shot and killed her dog in a gravel pit.Will the identity of Trump’s running mate really make a difference?In 2016, Trump was viewed with suspicion by some evangelical voters – voters he needed to come out in droves for him to defeat Hillary Clinton. That’s why he chose Mike Pence, a devout Christian who just released a book that is literally called So Help Me God.But religious Republicans have pretty much made their peace with Trump since then – largely because the supreme court he appointed overturned the federal right to abortion.Reports indicate that what Trump is really looking for is an uber-loyal attack dog, someone who can tear into Trump’s critics on air, before coming back to the White House to quietly snuggle at his feet.It would be easy to see a vice-president as inconsequential. But since the US became a thing, nine vice-presidents have stepped into the top job: eight times because the sitting president died, and once because the president – Richard Nixon – resigned. Without wanting to be too macabre, Donald Trump is quite old, and is not known as a healthy eater. (In the name of Journalism I once lived like Trump for a week. I genuinely think it took years off my life.)Anyway: some of these people might fancy their chances of ascending to the throne.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionOn the roadView image in fullscreenA dispatch from our Washington bureau chief, David Smith:Is it a bird? Is it a plane? OK, it’s a plane, with “TRUMP” written in giant gold letters on the side. I watched the Boeing 757 dubbed “Trump Force One” fly into Freeland, Michigan, last week, accompanied by the booming soundtrack of Tom Cruise’s Top Gun.It reminded me that the Trump Show has always been about reality versus fantasy. Reality for Trump right now is hour after hour sitting in a cold, dingy New York courtroom. Fantasy is stepping out of his private jet into afternoon sunshine and the warm glow of a campaign rally where the crowd chants his name.The demographics were telling: overwhelmingly white and dominated by retirees. Every Trump supporter I interviewed is convinced that the trial in New York is a witch-hunt designed to hobble his election chances. When I asked about his dictatorial ambitions, they brushed the question aside and preferred the word “leader”.Who had the worst week?View image in fullscreenOn Monday Judge Juan Merchan, handling Trump’s hush-money payments trial, said he “will have to consider a jail sanction” if Trump doesn’t stop publicly criticizing witnesses and the jury. But if Monday was bad for Trump, Tuesday was worse.“I had my clothes and my shoes off, I believe my bra, however, was still on. We were in the missionary position …” so went the testimony of Stormy Daniels, who was allegedly paid $130,000 to remain quiet about the claimed encounter, which she says took place in 2006, a year after Trump married his wife Melania. (Trump denies having sex with Daniels.)Daniels said that Trump told her she reminded him of Ivanka Trump, his daughter, before the two became intimate. Asked by the prosecution whether the encounter with Trump was “brief”, Daniels said: “Yes.”‘It’s my favorite book’View image in fullscreenI spent no short amount of time last week reading the God Bless the USA Bible, a special version of the holy text Trump is hawking online. If you enjoy the Bible, but feel like it is missing images of American flags and bald eagles, then this is the book for you.If, however, you want a Bible without sticky pages, which hasn’t been dubbed “blasphemous”, and which doesn’t cost $60, then maybe give it a pass.Read the full story here.Elsewhere in US politicsView image in fullscreen Milwaukee is replacing its top election official, Sam Levine and Alice Herman write, which means “there will be a new head of elections in one of the most critical cities in a key battleground state”. Biden won Wisconsin by just 20,000 votes in 2020. Bernie Sanders won more than 13m votes in the 2016 presidential primary, as his brand of democratic socialism inspired young people across the country. He didn’t win, of course, but Martin Pengelly reports that Sanders plans to run for re-election to the Senate. More