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    Thursday briefing: What’s going on with Trump’s board of peace?

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    In today’s newsletter: What began as a temporary mechanism to oversee Gaza’s reconstruction is quietly mutating into a permanent system of external control, raising urgent questions about who​ will govern in PalestineGood morning. Donald Trump wants to be the supreme leader of the world.That may sound hyperbolic, but it is difficult to read the latest plans for his so-called “Board of Peace” as anything else. What was initially framed as a narrow mechanism to oversee Gaza’s reconstruction has quietly shifted into something far larger. In Trump’s most recent announcement, Gaza barely features at all.Davos | Donald Trump dropped his threat to impose tariffs on eight European countries, claiming he had agreed with Nato “the framework of a future deal” on Greenland. Danish, Greenlandic and other European officials pushed back on Trump’s claim, pointing out Nato has no authority to make such a deal.New Zealand | Emergency services in New Zealand are searching for several people, including a child, believed missing after a landslide hit a campsite during storms that have caused widespread damage across the North Island.Media | Prince Harry has accused the publisher of the Daily Mail of wanting to drive him “to drugs and drinking” by placing his life under surveillance, as he told the high court that it continued to “come after” him and his wife.Reform UK | Nigel Farage apologised for 17 breaches of the MPs’ code after failing to declare £380,000 on time, describing himself as an “oddball” who does not do computers.South Korea | Former PM Han Duck-soo has been sentenced to 23 years in prison for his role in an insurrection stemming from former president Yoon Suk Yeol’s failed martial law declaration. Continue reading… More

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      Greenlandic lawmaker says Nato has no mandate to negotiate nation’s status – as it happened

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      This blog is now closedTrump declaration of Greenland framework deal met with scepticism as doubts persistTrump news at a glance: at Davos, president rambles, backs down and touts ‘future deal’ on GreenlandHouse Republicans are starting a push on Wednesday to hold former president Bill Clinton and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton in contempt of Congress over the Jeffrey Epstein investigation, opening the prospect of the House using one of its most powerful punishments against a former president for the first time.The contempt proceedings are an initial step toward a criminal prosecution by the Department of Justice that, if successful, could send the Clintons to prison.They’re not above the law. We’ve issued subpoenas in good faith.For five months we’ve worked with them. And time’s up. Continue reading… More

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      Speak hysterically and carry a big stick: Trump’s foreign policy threats

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      In his second term, Trump’s bluster has been accompanied by an emotional and aggressive approach to foreign policyThis was originally published in This Week in Trumpland; sign up to receive it in your inbox every WednesdayTheodore Roosevelt, the 26th president, characterized his approach to international relations as “speak softly and carry a big stick”. It was an approach that won him a Nobel peace prize in 1906, for his role in ending the Russo-Japanese war.In recent days, Donald Trump’s own take on diplomacy has come into focus, one that might be characterized thusly: speak hysterically and threaten to use (and sometimes actually use) a big stick. This idiosyncratic approach to statecraft has yet to win Trump a Nobel peace prize, although that is something that the president has said – many, many times – does not bother him at all. Continue reading… More

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      We ran high-level US civil war simulations. Minnesota is exactly how they start | Claire Finkelstein

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      Developments in Minnesota closely mirror a scenario explored in a 2024 exercise conducted at the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law at the University of Pennsylvania, which I directSince January 6, roughly 2,000 ICE agents have been deployed to Minnesota under the pretext of responding to a fraud investigation. In practice, these largely untrained and undisciplined federal agents have been terrorizing Minneapolis residents through illegal and excessive uses of force – often against US citizens – prompting a federal judge to attempt to place limits on the agency’s actions. The Trump administration is encouraging the lawlessness by announcing “absolute immunity” for ICE agents. But if the secretary of homeland security, Kristi Noem, does not heed the court ruling, the consequences may be nothing short of civil war.In just the past week, ICE agents shot and killed Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, shortly after she returned from dropping her child off at school. They blinded two protesters by shooting them in the face with so-called “less deadly” weapons. They fired teargas bombs around the car of a family carrying six children, sending one child to the emergency room with breathing problems. They violently dragged a woman out of her car and on to the ground screaming. They have shot protesters in the legs. They have forcibly taken thousands of individuals to detention facilities, separating families and casting people into legal limbo – often without regard to their legal status.Claire Finkelstein is the Algernon Biddle professor of law and professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. She is also the founder and faculty director of the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law at Penn’s Annenberg Public Policy Center Continue reading… More

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      World leaders in Davos must stand up to Trump. This is their chance | Robert Reich

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      The world needs global leaders to clearly and firmly denounce the havoc Trump is wreaking on the US and international orderHundreds of global CEOs, finance titans, and more than 60 prime ministers and presidents are in Davos, Switzerland, for the annual confab of the world’s powerful and wealthy: the World Economic Forum.This year’s Davos meeting occurs at a time when Donald Trump is not just unleashing his brownshirts on Minneapolis and other American cities, but also dismantling the international order that’s largely been in place since the end of the second world war – threatening Nato, withdrawing from international organizations including the UN climate treaty, violating the UN charter by invading Venezuela and abducting Nicolás Maduro, upending established trade rules, and demanding that the US annex Greenland.Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now Continue reading… More

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      ‘You’ll find out’: Trump refuses to say how far he would go to seize Greenland

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      President also declines to offer any reassurances about his commitment to the stability of Nato allianceDonald Trump ratcheted up the uncertainty over how far he would be willing to go to acquire Greenland as he warned the Nato alliance on Tuesday that it was only as strong as the United States allowed it to be.“You’ll find out,” Trump said in a terse reply at a White House press briefing before moving to the next question. Continue reading… More

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      Rambling Trump sings his own praises as worried world watches on

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      The ‘very stable genius’ zigzagged wildly in a packed press room – Nato’s future lies in the hands of a modern Caligula“I was quite the baseball player, you wouldn’t believe,” said Donald Trump, suddenly wistful as he recalled his salad days when his mother would tell him, “Son, you could be a professional baseball player,” and he would reply, “Thanks, mom.” Carpe diem!Not for the first time on Tuesday, the US president had veered wildly off topic. The point of this story was a “big powerful building” that “loomed over the park” in Queens, New York, where he used to play little league baseball. When he asked his mother why it had bars on the windows, she told him it was a mental hospital. Continue reading… More

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      Might is right: US ‘foreign policy’ held hostage to mad king Trump’s whims

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      Increasingly unpopular at home, a president obsessed by his legacy has turned his scattergun on the world stageOne year into the second Trump administration, an actual US foreign policy remains just a nice idea. Instead, the world has been forced to adapt to the world according to Donald Trump: one increasingly shaped by his erratic shifts and unpredictable decisions, his fury at perceived slights and his growing desire to stamp his legacy in the model of an imperial leader from centuries past.Think of it as the mad king’s court, where every day is a carnival. Continue reading… More

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      How Trump has tried to undermine the powers of Congress: ‘Violation of norms’

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      In his second term, Trump has taken aim at and circumvented the legislative branch – from mass firings to tariffsFrigid January weather prompted Donald Trump’s second inauguration to be held in the rotunda of the US Capitol, an iconic room ringed by busts of former presidents that lies at the heart of Congress.Almost immediately after departing the Capitol, Trump took aim at the legislative branch, moving to siphon from lawmakers the powers to control spending, agencies and declaring war, and take them for himself, experts say. Continue reading… More