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      Prosecutors Investigating Whether Ukrainians Meddled in 2020 Election

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      The Brooklyn federal inquiry has examined whether former and current Ukrainian officials tried to interfere in the election, including funneling misleading information through Rudolph W. Giuliani.Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn have been investigating whether several Ukrainian officials helped orchestrate a wide-ranging plan to meddle in the 2020 presidential campaign, including using Rudolph W. Giuliani to spread their misleading claims about President Biden and tilt the election in Donald J. Trump’s favor, according to people with knowledge of the matter. More

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      Beneath Joe Biden’s Folksy Demeanor, a Short Fuse and an Obsession With Details

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      As Mr. Biden settles into the office he has chased for more than three decades, aides say he demands hours of debate from scores of policy experts.WASHINGTON — The commander in chief was taking his time, as usual.It was late March, and President Biden was under increasing pressure to penalize President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia for election interference and the biggest cyberattack ever on American government and industry. “I have to do it relatively soon,” he said to Jake Sullivan, his national security adviser. More

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      Blinken Jousts With China and Russia in United Nations Meeting

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      President Biden’s top diplomat said the United States would uphold international rules and “push back forcefully” against those who don’t, a sharp contrast to the Trump years.Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, meeting with counterparts from both China and Russia on Friday, said that the United States would “push back forcefully” against breakers of international rules, even as he acknowledged his own country’s violations under the Trump administration.Mr. Blinken’s counterparts, Foreign Ministers Wang Yi of China and Sergey V. Lavrov of Russia, took their own diplomatic swipes at the United States, accusing it of hypocrisy and of defining international rules in terms designed to assert Western dominance in the world.The exchanges came at a United Nations Security Council meeting, convened by China and held virtually via videoconference link, on the theme of multilateral cooperation against the pandemic, global warming and other common threats.It was in some ways a rematch between Mr. Blinken and Mr. Wang, who was part of a top Chinese delegation that brusquely lectured the United States at a meeting in Alaska two months ago. That unscripted confrontation was regarded heroically in China, where the government has stoked rising anti-Americanism and nationalism.Although the terms and tone used in the Friday meeting were more diplomatic, the differences were stark in the world views espoused by Mr. Blinken and his counterparts. Those differences suggested that the gridlock among the big powers of the Security Council would not ease anytime soon.The session was held the same week that Mr. Blinken, meeting with the foreign ministers of the Group of 7 nations in Britain, emphasized what he described as the importance of “defending democratic values and open societies” — a signal of the Biden administration’s intent to challenge China and Russia on human rights, disinformation and other issues that had been de-emphasized or ignored by the administration of President Donald J. Trump.In another clear signal from the Biden administration, Mr. Blinken also visited Ukraine, where he pledged support for its fight against a Russian-backed insurgency that has claimed 13,000 lives since 2014.Mr. Blinken asserted in his Security Council remarks that the United Nations remained a critical force for good in the world, responsible since its founding at the end of World War II for the most peaceful and prosperous era in modern history, but was now under severe threat.“Nationalism is resurgent, repression is rising, rivalries among countries are deepening — and attacks against the rules-based order are intensifying,” Mr. Blinken said. “Some question whether multilateral cooperation is still possible. The United States believes it is not only possible, but imperative.”Mr. Blinken said the United States would work with any country on the global threats presented by the coronavirus and climate change, “including those with whom we have serious differences.”At the same time, he said, in a clear warning to China and Russia, that the United State would “push back forcefully when we see countries undermine the international order, pretend that the rules we’ve all agreed to don’t exist, or simply violate them at will.”He did not lay out any new positions but clearly sought to emphasize that the Biden administration was committed to reversing the foreign-policy legacy of President Donald J. Trump, who frequently disparaged the United Nations and led the United States down what critics called a destructive, unilateral path.“I know that some of our actions in recent years have undermined the rules-based order and led others to question whether we are still committed to it,” Mr. Blinken said. “Rather than take our word for it, we ask the world to judge our commitment by our actions.”He enumerated how the Biden administration had rejoined the Paris Climate accord, halted Mr. Trump’s withdrawal from the World Health Organization and was seeking to rejoin the U.N. Human Rights Council.“We’re also taking steps, with great humility, to address the inequities and injustices in our own democracy,” he said. “We do so openly and transparently, for people around the world to see. Even when it’s ugly. Even when it’s painful.”Mr. Wang, whose country holds the rotating Security Council presidency for May, sought to depict China as a responsible global citizen that adhered to international law. Without mentioning the United States by name, he chided countries that he said had defined international rules as a “patent or privilege of the few.”He also declared that “no country should expect other countries to lose,” reflecting a Chinese accusation that the United States is seeking to suppress China’s ascendance — an accusation that Mr. Blinken and others have denied.Mr. Lavrov was more direct in his criticisms of the United States and its allies, describing Mr. Blinken’s references to a “rules-based order” as a guise for Western efforts to repress other countries.He was especially critical of the economic sanctions that the United States and European Union have imposed on Russia and others they disagree with, which Mr. Lavrov said were designed to “take opponents out of the game.” More

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      John Brennan: Joe Biden Should Watch “The Present”

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      On a recent evening I watched “The Present,” a short film by Farah Nablusi, a Palestinian filmmaker, which was nominated for an Academy Award for live-action short film (the winner in the category was “Two Distant Strangers). Ms. Nablusi’s 25-minute film is a powerful, heartbreaking account of the travails of Yusuf, a Palestinian man, and Yasmine, his young daughter, as they traverse an Israeli military checkpoint in the West Bank twice in a single day.“The Present” establishes its context quickly, opening with images of Palestinian men making their way through a narrow passageway at one of the numerous checkpoints that dot the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Palestinians going to work, visiting family or shopping on the opposite side of a security barrier have to bear this humiliating procedure every day.Yusuf sets out with Yasmine to buy an anniversary gift for his wife. He is held in a chain-link holding pen. The ostensible reason is that the Israeli guards want to search him and his possessions more thoroughly. Yasmine sits nearby, watching and waiting in silence.The scene brought back memories of my first visit to the West Bank in 1975, when I crossed the Jordan River and arrived at an Israeli security post. As a student at the American University in Cairo, I was excited about visiting Jerusalem and spending Christmas Eve in Bethlehem. I joined a relatively short line, which moved at a steady and efficient pace.A few feet away, I could see men, women and children in a much longer line fully enclosed by steel mesh fencing labeled “Palestinians and Arabs.” I saw several subjected to discourtesy and aggressive searches by Israeli soldiers.While I was distressed by what I saw, I knew that Israel had legitimate security concerns in the aftermath of the 1967 and 1973 wars, worries that had been heightened by attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets by Palestinian terrorist organizations.Half a century has passed, and the political and security landscape of the Middle East has profoundly changed.Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. The Abraham Accords, brokered by the United States last year, have paved the way for four more Arab states — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco — to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. Hopefully, more Arab leaders will follow suit as there is no reason and little geostrategic sense in continuing to deny the reality and permanence of the state of Israel. (Unfortunately, the accords did nothing for the Palestinians except to obtain a suspension of Israeli plans to illegally annex the West Bank.)There also has been significant progress in reducing violence carried out by Palestinians inside and outside the occupied territories. The exception is Hamas, which continues to launch rocket attacks into Israel from the Gaza Strip.In the West Bank, Palestinian security and intelligence services have worked closely with their Israeli, Arab and Western counterparts to disrupt extremist networks and prevent attacks. These Palestinian agencies have demonstrated an impressive degree of professionalism over the past two decades.Despite sharply reduced tensions between Israel and the Arab world, the Palestinian people themselves have seen no appreciable progress in their quest to live in their own sovereign state. Political fissures and the ineffective political leadership of the Palestinian Authority have contributed to stymying ambitions for Palestinian nationhood.But that could change. Legislative elections in May and presidential elections in July in the West Bank and Gaza offer Palestinians an opportunity to elect representatives capable of conducting a more effectual political dialogue within the Palestinian homeland and beyond. Palestinian candidates who do not bear the sclerotic reputations of political incumbents, if elected, would help soften the deep-rooted cynicism that many Israeli officials display toward Palestinian negotiators.The major hurdle will be to reverse the trend of diminished interest that the Israeli government has shown in pursuing a two-state solution. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has spearheaded relentless expansion of settlements in the West Bank. That expansion has brought along more concrete walls, security barriers and control points, further reducing the spaces where Palestinians can live, graze their flocks, tend their olive groves and vegetable gardens without being challenged by their occupiers.Unfortunately, during the Trump years, the United States ignored Palestinian interests and aspirations. Mr. Trump moved the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, rejecting the position of all previous U.S. administrations that it would endanger final status negotiations on that contested city. He senselessly severed funding to the Palestinian Authority and ended our contributions to the United Nations for Palestinian refugee assistance.In a welcome change, the Biden administration has authorized the release of $235 million for humanitarian, economic and development programs supporting Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and elsewhere in the region.The concluding scene of “The Present” shows Yusuf, tired and hobbled with back pain, increasingly angry and on the verge of violence as he attempts to return home with the anniversary gift. His chilling, emotional outburst made me think of the frustration felt by every Palestinian who has to live with the stifling security measures and political oppression attendant to Israel’s military occupation.It was his little daughter, Yasmine, though, who gave me most pause and concern. She watched her father’s patience, dignity and humanity steadily erode.I can only imagine the imprint such experiences have on the young girls and boys who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They grow up traumatized by injustice, discrimination and violence. They live with the feeling that their existence is controlled by people who don’t care about their welfare, their safety or their future.The Biden administration is dealing with a dizzying array of domestic and international problems but the Palestinian quest for statehood deserves the early engagement of his national security team. The United States needs to tell Israeli leaders to cease provocative settlement construction and the sort of oppressive security practices depicted in “The Present.”A clear signal from President Biden that he expects and is ready to facilitate serious Israeli-Palestinian discussions on a two-state solution would be of great political significance.John Brennan is a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      ‘A Tremendous Complication’: G.O.P. Dances Around Trump’s Lingering Presence

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      A gathering of Republican leaders and top donors in Florida this weekend is less a reset of priorities and more a reminder of the tensions that Donald J. Trump instills in his party.The first spring donor retreat after a defeat for a political party is typically a moment of reflection and renewal as officials chart a new direction forward.But with former President Donald J. Trump determined to keep his grip on the Republican Party and the party’s base as adhered to him as ever, the coming together of the Republican National Committee’s top donors in South Florida this weekend is less a moment of reset and more a reminder of the continuing tensions and schisms roiling the G.O.P.The same former president who last month sent the R.N.C. a cease-and-desist letter demanding they stop using his likeness to raise money will on Saturday evening serve as the party’s fund-raising headliner.“A tremendous complication” was how Fred Zeidman, a veteran Republican fund-raiser in Texas, described Mr. Trump’s lingering presence on the political scene.The delicate dance between Mr. Trump and the party — after losing the House, the Senate and the White House on his watch — will manifest in some actual shuttle bus diplomacy on Saturday, as the party’s top donors attend a series of receptions and panels at the Four Seasons Resort before traveling to Mar-a-Lago, the former president’s private club, to hear Mr. Trump speak.Mr. Trump’s insistence on leading the party “affects every member,” Mr. Zeidman said, as lawmakers and would-be elected officials jockey for a Trump endorsement that is as powerful in a Republican primary as it can be problematic in a general election.“He’s already proven that he wants to have a major say or keep control of the party, and he’s already shown every sign that he’s going to primary everybody that has not been supportive of him,” Mr. Zeidman said. “He complicates everything so much.”Among other things, Mr. Trump is considering running again in 2024. Though few of his allies believe he will follow through, his presence could have a chilling effect on other potential candidates.“The party is still very much revolving around” Mr. Trump, said Andrea Catsimatidis, chairwoman of the Manhattan Republican Party and a donor who will be at the retreat. “He was the one who very much revived the party when we weren’t winning.”Also inescapable is the fact that Mr. Trump has quickly built a political war chest that rivals that of the R.N.C. An adviser to Mr. Trump said he currently had about $85 million on hand, compared with nearly $84 million for the R.N.C.“Send your donation to Save America PAC,” Mr. Trump urged supporters last month, not to “RINOS,” the derisive acronym for “Republicans in Name Only.” Mr. Trump has appeared as passionate about punishing Republicans who crossed him, especially those who supported his second impeachment, as he has about taking back the House and Senate in 2022.For party officials, the goal is keeping the energy that has propelled Mr. Trump to success inside the Republican tent while not entirely allowing the former president to dominate it. Ronna McDaniel, the R.N.C. chairwoman whom Mr. Trump supported for a second term, has vowed to remain neutral in a potential 2024 primary should Mr. Trump run again.“It is a difficult balancing act,” said Bill Palatucci, a Republican National Committeeman from New Jersey who has been critical of Mr. Trump.“The president certainly has devoted followers,” Mr. Palatucci said, “but he also more than offended a lot of people with his conduct since the November election, which culminated in his helping to incite the riot on Jan. 6.”Organizers moved the final Saturday evening events to Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property, meaning the party will again be paying the former president’s private club to use its space.Saul Martinez for The New York TimesSeveral Republicans who are considered likely to run for president in 2024 — including Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota — were scheduled to speak to the R.N.C.’s donors at the Four Seasons. Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state and C.I.A. director who served under Mr. Trump, had been scheduled to speak on Friday but did not attend the gathering.Notably absent are two leading Republican figures who also skipped the last big Republican gathering, the Conservative Political Action Conference, that Mr. Trump attended: former Vice President Mike Pence, who is starting his own political advocacy group, and Nikki Haley, the former United Nations ambassador.Some donors are hoping to quickly move past Mr. Trump, but they are also focused on the current Oval Office occupant.“It is very important the Republican Party puts Donald Trump as far into the past as possible,” said William Oberndorf, an investor in California who has given millions to G.O.P. candidates but fiercely opposes the former president.“However, if Joe Biden does not ensure that major pieces of legislation have bipartisan support, it is he who will bear more responsibility than any group of Republican donors ever could for resurrecting Mr. Trump’s political future and fortunes,” he added.Among donors, the jockeying for favor and financing extends beyond Mr. Trump and the R.N.C.On Thursday and Friday, a separate but overlapping gathering for Republican contributors was held at Mr. Trump’s private club: an “investors meeting” of the Conservative Partnership Institute (C.P.I.), a nonprofit organization. Mark Meadows, who served as Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, is now a senior adviser for the group, and Caroline Wren, who used to fund-raise for the former president, is raising money for it.Donors are being pitched on a dizzying array of Trump-adjacent projects, including Mr. Pence’s group and new entities being started by Ben Carson, Mr. Trump’s former housing secretary; Stephen Miller, his former White House adviser; and Russell Vought, the former director of the Office of Management and Budget.Corey Lewandowski, Mr. Trump’s first campaign manager in 2016, is said to be involved with efforts to start a Trump-aligned super PAC, as well.Mr. Trump, who continues to talk privately about a future campaign of his own in 2024, spoke to donors for the Meadows-linked group for more than an hour on Thursday, also at his private club.“All Republican roads lead to Mar-a-Lago,” said Jason Miller, an adviser to Mr. Trump. “Trump is still the straw that stirs the news cycle. His influence will be central to every speech and story line this week.”Those who have trekked there to meet Mr. Trump in recent months include Sarah Huckabee Sanders, his former press secretary and a candidate for governor of Arkansas; Senator Rick Scott of Florida, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee; and Representative Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California and the House minority leader.The R.N.C. had initially planned for its entire retreat to be held nearby in Palm Beach, but organizers moved the final Saturday evening events to Mr. Trump’s resort, meaning the party will again be paying the former president’s private club to use its space.During Mr. Trump’s White House tenure, his political campaign, the R.N.C. and his allies spent millions of dollars at Trump businesses, including his hotel in Washington near the White House and a resort property in Miami, where yet another pro-Trump group also held a conference this week.Party officials maintained that donors and a number of party activists were happier being at Trump-branded properties than they were anywhere else.Still, the Trump branding of official Republican events had alienated what was once the Republican establishment.“This is all about the Trump circle of grift,” said former Representative Barbara Comstock of Virginia, who is close to another high-profile Republican — and a frequent target of Mr. Trump’s — who was also notably absent: Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming.Ms. Comstock said that the Republicans keeping their distance were wise to “build their own coalitions” and “not get sucked into Trumpism, which has a limited and short-term appeal with demographics dying in this country.”Henry Barbour, an influential R.N.C. member from Mississippi, said that the party was still in a transitional phase since Mr. Trump’s loss.“When you lose the White House, you kind of figure it’s going to take a little bit of healing, and I think probably first quarter has hopefully got us moving on a better path,” Mr. Barbour said. Mr. Trump, he said, is a “big force in the party, but the party is bigger than any one candidate including Donald Trump.”With Mr. Trump’s priorities differing from those of other party leaders, the tension remains palpable. On Friday, the super PAC for Senate Republicans, which is aligned with Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, announced its backing of Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, who infuriated Mr. Trump by voting to impeach him. (Some Trump 2020 advisers are working for Ms. Murkowski’s Republican challenger, Kelly Tshibaka.)Last month, Mr. McConnell privately boasted of the super PAC’s fund-raising in a meeting with Senate Republicans, bragging that it had raised more than Mr. Trump’s super PAC had in 2020. He even distributed a card to hammer home the point: “In three cycles: nearly $1 billion,” the card said. Below that were Mr. Trump’s super PAC statistics: “Trump: $148+ million,” referring to the group America First.But the Republican small donor base remains very much enamored with Mr. Trump.“He’ll still be the most significant figure in the party in November 2022,” predicted Al Cardenas, a former chairman of the Florida Republican Party and former chairman of the American Conservative Union. “Everybody has a shelf life and Donald Trump has lost a bit of his shelf life.”“It could be two years,” Mr. Cardenas added. “It could be 10.” More

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      What’s Missing in Israel’s Election? Biden.

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      But that may not be a good sign after all.On March 23, Israel will go to the polls for its fourth national election in two years. The worst part is that this depressing Election Day may just be a prelude to yet another: Opinion polling suggests that Israel’s political blocs will struggle to elect and form a stable parliamentary majority. Our politics, it seems, are stuck on a repetitive doom loop.At least one thing is different: This time, the American president is a nonentity.Consider two election cycles of the last decade. In 2015, just days before Israelis voted, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Washington and spoke before Congress about the threat of Iran. Mr. Netanyahu made his fierce opposition to President Barack Obama and his Iran deal central to his campaign. Four years later, when Israel entered its current long cycle of repeated elections, Mr. Netanyahu posted his image alongside that of President Donald Trump on a high-rise overlooking Tel Aviv’s main highway. This time his goal was making America a central feature of his campaign, by highlighting his closeness to the president. In both cases, the political messaging was spot-on.Mr. Netanyahu was hardly the first Israeli politician to make America’s president an electoral issue. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was helped by President George W. Bush. Prime Minister Ehud Barak was elected with the backing of President Bill Clinton’s administration.Why are American presidents so central to elections in a country so far away from Washington? First, because Israelis see the United States as a cornerstone of their country’s security. And while Israelis’ confidence in the alliance has somewhat eroded in recent years, the ability of their leaders to understand, debate and confront the leaders in Washington is still important. Second, what happens in Israel also matters to America; Israeli politics are also part of Washington’s strategy for the Middle East.But in the lead-up to this month’s election, there has been neither an embrace of President Biden nor a repudiation of him. And that’s not for a lack of opportunity. Nearly four weeks passed between Mr. Biden’s inauguration and his first call to Israel’s prime minister. That was viewed by many as a snub. But when Mr. Netanyahu was asked this month why Mr. Biden was so late to call him, the prime minister didn’t try to convince the voters that in fact, Mr. Biden was his best friend; nor did he try to claim that Mr. Biden was a great foe who threatened Israel’s security. He dismissed the question with a few generalities and moved on.Mr. Netanyahu’s main rivals, Yair Lapid, Naftali Bannett and Gideon Saar, have also been hesitant to seize on the issue, or on early signs of disagreement between Washington and Israel over Iran as proof that the prime minister is not fit to keep Israel secure.There’s a simple explanation, and a more complicated one, for this unusual absence. First, the simple: Israelis do not yet know whether Mr. Biden will prove to be a friend, like his predecessor, or a thorn in their side, like the president he previously served under. Mr. Netanyahu cannot yet oppose him because so far he has done nothing objectionable, and alienating the White House for no good reason is beyond the pale even for a cynic like Mr. Netanyahu. The opposite is also true: Mr. Biden has not yet proved himself to be Israel’s friend as president, and so the prime minister’s rivals must be careful not to portray themselves as his admirers.The more complicated explanation concerns America’s interest in the Middle East and the country’s relative irrelevance to much that is happening in the region. The United States was unsuccessful in its halfhearted quest to contain Iranian expansion; it was missing in action in the Syrian civil war; it bet on wrong horses during the so-called Arab Spring; it has alienated the Saudis, let Russia take over Libya and did nothing of value to resolve the Palestinian issue. The list goes on.In fact, the only true achievement of the United States in the region in recent years is the Abraham Accords, the normalization agreement between Israel and the Gulf Arab countries, which was orchestrated by the Trump administration. But this significant move was achieved not as a triumph of the traditional American policy but because American diplomacy was on leave — temporarily occupied by the revolutionary troops of the Trump administration.If America’s leaders are just tired of being involved in Israel’s never-ending political process, I can’t fully blame them. We Israelis are all tired of it, too. We would all wish for a little break. And yet, an Israeli election with no America as a background noise is disturbingly strange. Is this another proof that America is less interested in the country that much depends on its support? Are we being demoted?In more than one way, the policy of the Biden administration seems to be moving along a trajectory that assumes a less central role for Middle East affairs in America’s foreign policy. So it’s quite possible that Israel’s needs are becoming less urgent and that who leads Israel matters less in the eyes of the United States. In such case, the proper election question for Israelis is no longer “Which leader could better deal with America?” but “Which leader can better manage without America?”Shmuel Rosner (@rosnersdomain) is the editor of the Israeli data-journalism site TheMadad.com, a senior fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute and a contributing opinion writer.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More